January 2014 - Matt Ralston's Blog

Why Uber is Uber Lame 1

Jan

27

2014

Like many other gullible dullards, up until recently I had praised the app-based car service Uber as being a convenient alternative to taking a taxi cab – as most Los Angeles taxi cab companies seem to issue potential employees a questionnaire that seeks out who is most openly aggressive towards Americans and throw out the ...

Thinking about Capitalism in the Liquor Aisle at Ralph’s

Jan

23

2014

Capitalism. The word inspires feelings of jealousy, power, and the desire to look it up on Wikipedia. People on Medicare sing its praises while decrying Socialism. I’m not an expert on the subject, but I’m pretty sure that without Capitalism we wouldn’t have High Definition televisions. Let’s just say, however, that Capitalism never existed, but we ...

Kelly Thomas Can No Longer Go Apartment Hunting Since he is Dead 3

Jan

17

2014

Kelly Thomas is the name of the man who was beaten to death, or forcibly asphyxiated, depending on how you look at it, by Fullerton Police in 2011. Can you find anything odd about the following description of the events, which I pulled from an Associated Press article?: Two California police officers who were videotaped ...

The Least Surprising Murder Ever 2

Jan

15

2014

The following is a factual account of the murder of Chad Oulson, a former U.S. Navy Petty Officer, by a former Naval cadet and Tampa Police Captain, and most recently Head of Security at Bush Gardens, guy named Curtis Reeves. As the shooting victim struggled to breathe, an off-duty County Deputy who happened to be ...

Conclusive Proof that Dennis Rodman is a Walking Contradition

Jan

10

2014

A lot has been made of Dennis Rodman’s Basketball Diplomacy campaign, sponsored by Kim Jong-un, the water headed, flipper-handed genetic hot tub who inherited North Korea from his father. Rodman has called Kim his ‘best friend’ and has participated in nauseating sycophantic behavior towards the dictator while in No Ko, including bowing to him and serenading him ...

Sports Television Etiquette Part I

Jan

8

2014

A friend of mine recently wrote me, via postal mail, with this complaint: Dear Matt, I was really pissed off yesterday, because I really wanted to watch the National Championship Game, and when I arrived home, my friend was watching a movie on the big screen. I asked him if he wanted to watch the ...

How Creepy is the Warner Bros. Marketing Department?

Jan

7

2014

In my previous post I wrote about the television promotions for Grudge Match – a cultural abortion featuring – according to the poster for the film – the severed heads of Sylvester Stalone and Robert DeNiro scotch-taped onto some young men’s bodies. When I first saw the promos – which prominently feature people’s tweets as endorsements for ...

Why I am Holding a Grudge against Grudge Match 10

Jan

5

2014

Grudge Match is a movie starring Robert DeNiro and Sylvester Stalone in which they both play old boxers. They both play old boxers because they both played young boxers in iconic films earlier in their careers. Now they get to make a movie where they make joking references to the boxing movies they made decades ago ...