Taking a break / random 311 post

I thought I'd take a little break from the baseball research with an impromptu post of random things. 

It's 3/11! What's your favorite 311 song? I think mine is either "Beautiful Disaster" or "Don't Stay Home". Their cover of The Cure's "Love song" is pretty good, too. A lot of my high school friends listened to 311 but I didn't get into them until much later.

Have you seen any good movies lately? I was finally able to get out to the local video store (aka the library) earlier this month. Couldn't find any new releases that were interesting so we rented Long Shot (which I had wanted to see for a while) and Why Him? 
 
Long Shot was really funny. I enjoyed that one a lot. Why Him? was good, too. The actress who plays James Franco's girlfriend looked familiar to me - sort of like Isla Fisher, or Emma Roberts. My wife was the one who searched Google/IMDB for Zoey Deutch because she's usually good at recognizing people in movies/TV shows.. and the reason she looked familiar is because she's Lea Thompson's daughter. 

Zoey starred in the film adaptation of Before I Fall, which I have sitting on my bookshelf. I'm not certain I've read it, but if I have it was at least four or five years ago when I was immersing myself in Young Adult fiction. 
 

Sometimes I feel like I've outgrown all the books, movies, and TV shows I used to enjoy. Then again..my manager (who is a dozen years older than I am) was talking to one of the guys about Arrow. They're both big fans and I've never seen it. They were talking about the ending, and the characters they liked..and she said she likes Mia because "Mia is a badass."

Mia is played by Katherine McNamara. That sweet little thing is a badass now? Where does the time go?

 

Speaking of lovely ladies who can sing.. you may have noticed the picture on my right sidebar changed. I went down a bit of a wormhole earlier this week because a Carole King song came on at work.. and my mind immediately went to Melissa Benoist.

Goddamn that woman is talented. Y'know, Glee never interested me at all but I might have to give it a chance some time. I've seen Pitch Perfect at least twice. It's pretty much the same thing, right?

It's the weirdest thing. I rarely - almost never - have any interest in female singers. Some of them might be nice to look at but their music doesn't appeal to me. Except Lynn Gunn of Pvris. She frickin rocks:

That said, nearly every actress and entertainer I've liked over the past few years can also sing. I think I made a playlist of them all in a  post some years back, so I won't repeat myself here. I know Kristen Bell was on that list...

One other thing we watched recently was the fourth season of Veronica Mars. I might have to share my thoughts on that in a separate post - not that anyone cares, lol.

Do you have a favorite singer or actress at the moment? Any Veronica Mars fans reading this? Let me know if I should bother with a recap post in April :)



Switching back to sports.. I completed my 102nd trade on TCDB earlier this week, which was supposed to be a one-for-one with user terrbear5951. I offered up my extra Ryan Zimmerman manupatch for a Satchel Paige MLB Debut coin. When Teresa checked her collection she realized that the Paige was no longer there and asked me to pick a replacement. I didn't mind at all since she had a lot of things I needed. I made a list and asked her to send whatever was fair. This is what I received:

All the Boston guys were on my list. The Ultra Jordan was too, but I wasn't expecting a graded copy. No idea why she sent the 1994-95 Ultra cards, I'd asked for 1993-94 Ultra singles. But that's okay. I think this was a fair return - though I'm not sure what to do with the MJ now.

I don't want to get into a whole big discussion over the Coronavirus, but it would be a shame if Joe Thornton played his last home game in an empty arena. I'm not sure how much he has left in the tank but I'd really like to see him come back next year and take one last run at a Stanley Cup - with anyone but Pittsburgh. Or Carolina. Or the Rangers. Or Winnipeg. Or St Louis. Or...damn there's a lot of NHL teams I don't like.



Anyway, that's all the random thoughts I have for now. Its' been fun to free-write a little bit. The All-Time Teams series will resume this weekend. I'm working hard to complete it before the season starts in 15 days. Also, at the conclusion of the series - and a "Free Stuff Friday" exclusive for those of you who have commented on the series. (There will be cards to claim from all sports, not just baseball.)



Thanks for reading this randomness!




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A few of my Favorite Things

This is a long but lightly-worded post to see who's blogging this time of year. Feel free to use this topic on your own blog, or leave a long comment with your favorite things...

First of all, I apologize if the title of this post reminds anyone of that godawful Arianna Grande song. My boss has Pandora on all day and that track comes up way too often. I dislike pop music in general, but there are only a few songs I truly cannot stand - and that's one of them. 

What pop songs do I like? Well, that's the theme of this post: my favorite baseball card design, popular* song, and movie from each decade.  Here we go...

*not necessarily "pop" songs

The 1950's

favorite baseball card set: You already know it's 1956 Topps; my favorite Bowman designs are 1953(color) and 1955.

favorite movie: I can count on one hand the number of 1950's movies I've seen. But I do love me some sci-fi.

favorite song: I dunno.."Rock Around The Clock"? My musical tastes don't go that far back.

The 1960's

favorite baseball card set: 1968 Topps will always be special to me, but two non-flagship sets I really like are 1964 Topps Giants and 1961 Golden Press.

favorite movie: I'm gonna go with Fail-Safe here. Cold War hysteria at its finest.

favorite song: It's tempting to pick "Light My Fire"(the only Doors song I like) or something by the Beatles, but "A Whiter Shade of Pale" really moves me, man.

The 1970's
 

favorite baseball card set: 1975 Topps. Nothing else comes close, though I am warming up to '72 and '74.

favorite movie: So many classics..I have to watch The Godfather trilogy again, it's been too long. Until then, my favorites are Rollerball and Soylent Green. 

favorite song: It would probably be something by Kraftwerk or Joy Division, but since I'm sticking with popular songs I'll go with "Baba O'Riley" (aka Teenage Wasteland)

The 1980's 

favorite baseball card set: My birth year set is bland, and Topps didn't do a whole lot better during the decade. If I had to choose I'd go with 1983 Donruss, 1984 or 1987 Fleer, and 1989 Upper Deck, in no particular order.

 

favorite movie: Probably Back To The Future - which was one of the first movies I ever saw (the first non-animated movie I remember was Flight of The Navigator)

 

favorite song: There's so much good '80s music out there, you really can't go wrong. But this song will always remind me of my childhood - spending summer days with Mom watching MTV while she cleaned million-dollar homes.

 

 

 This video has over 900 million views. I think it qualifies as "popular"

The 1990's  

favorite baseball card set: So many choices! I love 1991 Topps, 1993 Leaf (and the underrated 1994 Leaf), 1992 and 1993 Fleer Ultra, and so on. I'll go into more detail in my next post, but here's a preview:

 

favorite movie: Pulp Fiction. The first time I saw the trailer it annoyed me; I couldn't tell what the movie was about. But the more it ran, the more interested I was until I finally saw the damn thing and...wow. 

 

favorite song: I'm trying not to pick something that was featured on the Alternative Rock countdown contest I mentioned in December...which leaves songs like "Enter Sandman", "Don't Speak", and U2's "One" (Metallica's "One" is also amazing - but it came out in 1988) 

 

 

The 2000's   

 

favorite baseball card set: I've blogged about my love of Topps Pristine before, and nearly all of my interest in the brand was because of the 2002 set.

 

favorite movie: It might be Idiocracy, I'm Not Sure. ;) 

favorite song: "Hey Ya" and "Take Me Out" are catchy as hell, and I love Coldplay's "Fix You", but any list of great tracks from the 2000s must (repeat: must) include "Seven Nation Army" 

I will never forgive Bill Simmons and his cronies for omitting this. You're a sports writer, ffs.

The 2010's    

favorite baseball card set: Stadium Club sets are a popular pick, but I prefer the design elements (and price point) of 2015 Topps.

 

 

favorite movie: I've never been into the comic book/MCU scene, so there's only a handful of films I've been excited about this decade. The first Hunger Games movie is my favorite.

 

 

favorite song: The overabundance of auto-tuned and recycled sludge that kids (and my 50 year-old boss) listen to is disturbing. Thank God for Fall Out Boy.

 

 

What are some of your favorite things?

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