OH MY GOD

This video showed up on reddit today and it made me lose my shit in a fit of laughter. Since writing on a regular basis doesn't seem to be our thing, I always wondered what it would be like if the four of us did a regular podcast together. We'd probably end up doing something completely stupid like this guy.

I'm sure we could cover compelling topics like the strength of Thor's hammer and how it compares to Ryu's Hadouken. Perhaps we would discuss which fictional characters we would want to marry and that would lead to Adonis explaining how a marriage to an animated character would work.

The end result would be completely useless, a little douchey but probably met with uproarious laughter from listeners and decades of shame from our parents. Pretty much sums up this blog.

The Hunger Games

[EDIT: Changed from animated .gif to poster to reduce page loading time]



BWWWAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHMMMMMMMMM (oh wait)

'Moneyball' Trailer

I remember when Bring It On came out and it was followed in a few years by Drumline and critics said it was like Bring it On for band geeks.

From the looks of the first trailer, The Social Network scribe, Aaron Sorkin, and a few others wrote a screenplay that feels like The Social Network for baseball geeks.

Based on the best-selling book, Moneyball tells the story of Oakland A's manager Billy Beane and how he made a championship contending team for pennies on the dollar using advanced statistics, called 'sabremetrics' in baseball nerd jargon. By ignoring scouting techniques used for over a century, Moneyball and its sabermetric strategies caused a rift in the baseball community between old-school traditionalists and new-school math whizzes.

There are some fair criticisms to be made about Beane's strategies and how much of them actually worked and how much of his success was just luck. What can't be argued against, though, is how sabermetrics have permeated baseball culture, not only through the fantasy baseball game that nerds like Adonis and I play, but in the statistical analysis that takes place in every major league front office.

There was a great article posted last week about "Moneyball 2.0" on Grantland. The writer, Bill Barnwell, detailed how sabermetrics and Billy Beane's notion of "Moneyball" have evolved over the years and how teams have been able to maximize wins against each dollar spent. Worth a read if only because last year's overachieving San Diego Padres are used in nearly every example he uses.

As far as the movie goes, after toiling in development hell for some time, it looks like it has a lot of potential. Nazer and I were huge fans of The Social Network, and I'll watch anything that Aaron Sorkin attaches his name to (The American President is one of the greatest romantic comedies of all time).

There's a fat guy played by Jonah Hill who wows powerful people with his smarts? Lightning fast "walk and talk" dialogue along with nerdy baseball-isms? I'm not sure I can find anything to dislike there.

Our "Comeback" is starting to look more and more like...

I'll chalk it up to everyone being busy...

Ray and friend-of-blog, Oli Bata, are coming up with fresh tracks every Monday as the hip-hop collective, Elevated Masses. Socially conscious lyrics without being pretentious and jazz samples with breezy melodies - music for the people...by the people two guys in a garage.

You can still find Adonis posting on the internets at http://adoniscomplex.tumblr.com/ where he's been featured on Tumblr's sports subpage. After that happened, he refused to acknowledge that he ever wrote here so go ahead and bookmark that address and delete this one.

Nazer hasn't yet joined us hipsters on the Tumblr, but if you haven't already, check out the music page at his website, http://www.nazerlagrimasjr.com/main/music.html. I never knew he added more tracks. Hell, I've been friends with him my whole life and I never even knew he played an instrument.

As for me, I've been doing absolutely nothing. Stay in school, folks...stay as long as you can.

In-N-Out Grand Opening Brings Woman To Tears

This is the kind of local news gold that I'd be posting on my own tumblr if I had one. Former Californian (hell, a Fontanian?) Danielle DeInnocentes sheds tears while stuffing her face at an In-N-Out Grand Opening in Frisco, Texas. We're all ridiculously passionate about food, but this shit is on another level. A quote from DeInnocentes reads as follows:

"I kept saying all night, pinch me, it doesn't feel real. It felt real in there."

FUUUUUHHHHHHHHHHHHH I swear I was about to start crying myself after she said that. She even saved the wrapper! Sigh...I wonder if I'll ever love something that much.

Probably not. But In-N-Out does sound pretty good after all that. In the words of hardcore fatty Gspook, who waited hours in line to be the first customer, "The burger gods have blessed us with an In-N-Out in Texas..."

Amen buddy, amen.

(Story via dallasnews.com)

Why stop at your phone and computer when you can have Google in your kitchen

Google had their annual I/O conference today, where they announced more details on their plan for global domination and introduced new digital soldiers to wage war with their mortal enemy, Apple.

For me, a project to integrate Android into household appliances piqued my interest the most. I did research into how technology like this could help homes be more green in college and with Android's share of the market and how far along existing technology for this use already is, the idea seems like it could only be a few years from being affordable and effective.

Energy in the household could be managed efficiently by allowing home owners to manage temperature in their home remotely, appliances could be turned off when not in use, and garage doors would never be left open while no one was home.

While these green benefits sound great, all I could think about was remotely controlling my oven and the possibility of heating up pizza rolls without ever having to leave my computer chair.

From:

To:

All from my cell phone! The future is near and it will be fat.

Android eating Earth photo via: Gizmodo

Tina Fey got whore'd up for a Jersey Shore spoof

And you won't find any complaints here. God I hope I can look this good when I'm 40 and pregnant. I meant, not that I'm a woman or that I want to be pregnant...you know, whatever the guy equivalent of this would be.

Head on over to Warming Glow for the whole sketch from Late Night with Jimmy Fallon.

THOR

Needs more rainbow bridges.

"Across the rainbow bridge of Asgard
Where the booming heavens roar
You'll behold the breathless wonder
The God of Thunder,
Mighty Thor!"

Apparently, the Coolest Kids in the Room Are Not Extinct

But these guys are.


I had this post all ready to go until recent news forced me to make a modification to the image.

The ABC show, Dinosaurs, premiered 20 years ago last month. And while I was too young to understand any of the jokes, it was also so long ago that I wouldn't be able to tell you if the show was actually funny. Either way, Dinosaurs was a staple in the weekly TGIF lineup that my family would watch together and sitting all of us down together to watch television for the night was the only way to prevent my brother and me from accidentally killing each other during our nightly wrestling matches (worth a whole post on its own).

Anyways, after it was replaced by Step by Step or Boy Meets World or some other white sitcom that I probably watched, it had a series finale on another network that I never watched. And considering how young I was when I watched the show, I'm glad I never saw it because it is fucking grim.

We all know dinosaurs became extinct eventually and the geniuses behind the show decided to end the show with that. The show spares us from an effects-laden disaster sequence and instead gives us this:

a morose monologue from a remorseful father about the end of the world to his family which includes three young children.

Enjoy!



[Warming Glow]

Happy Star Wars Day...

...though not an actual holiday by any means. It's not the anniversary of Star Wars, or any important date in the mythology, May 4th is crowned as Star Wars day by many simply because of the damn day of the year. May the 4th Be With You. Man I hate that shit.

Anyways, there was a ton of Star Wars Blu-ray ("Star Wars will never come out on Blu-ray...") info released today, which helps to justify the ridiculousness of that phrase just a bit. Reports from theHDRoom say that each disc will include audio commentary from an all star cast, including sound designer Ben Burtt, which is good for me because I'm obsessed, but there's a lot of other neat stuff as well, including some fan service documentaries covering the madness that is Star Wars.

May the 4th be with you...I cringe just typing it. And even worse, Revenge of the 5th, oh my gahhhhhhhh.

Things I Miss From College - Dunkin Donuts Iced Coffee

I really miss Dunkin Donuts large caramel mocha iced coffee. Weighing in at 350 calories and 12 grams of fat (if the Nutrition Facts on the Dunkin website are accurate) it's not going to make anyones healthy dietary options list, but this beast of a beverage was a staple in my college years in Boston. It was the perfect compliment to any situation, at any time of the day. Good for the morning caffeine boost, with hangover or without, the "I only have 10 minutes between classes and need something to keep me sane" situation that we all know and love, the "fuck I need to stay awake because I've pushed back my paper till after it was actually due" problem that frequently plagued many a college student, and so much more.

I haven't found anything like it in San Diego. I've tried the local favorites, but really, nothing compares, at all. It's not like I crave or necessarily need a replacement either, but every now and then I most certainly get the itch for a large Dunkin Iced Coffee, and maybe a Boston kreme or chocolate glazed donut on the side (or a pumpkin cake donut if its in season). I guess the memory and this ridiculously exaggerated photo will have to do for now.

The Long Haul

Re: Regarding Our Decision Not To Blog Here Anymore

When analyzing the fall of any community, I personally find that one of the most important steps in a post-apocalyptic scenario is to figure out what exactly went wrong. So before diving headfirst into a "bloggers renaissance," I graciously took the time out of my busy, busy day (watching every episode of Archer and beating Portal 2 multiple times is no easy task) to figure out why we started this monstrosity in the first place and pinpoint the kinks in our otherwise flawless system.

It started as a pretty admirable task. Four young minds, deep into their college careers, coming together to share their individual perspectives on the fairly diverse worlds that surrounded them. Ray breaking down the finest of literary works, myself exploring a musical universe previously unheard by ears of suburban San Diego natives, Lance grinding his teeth on every byte the Informatics department at UCI could throw at him, but also many other bites, and Adonis with stick in hand beating opponent after opponent in a battle of Gods known more commonly as Super Smash Brothers. No one could predict what would come from this, but I think at the very least we were all optimistic.

An excerpt from Adonis' first coolkids post in December of 2007 reads "So far I like what I see, but really, a collaboration of the great minds of Lance, Ray, Nazer, and Adonis is simply UNSTOPPABLE." With words like that, we were ready to take on the world!

And so from there we went forward. Maybe it was the presidential election, or the writers strike, or maybe it was simply a love for the craft, but whatever it was, month after month we filled the minds of readers everywhere with original pieces of work on the topics that we cared most about. When searching through the Cool Kids archives, it was discovered that the tags we used most frequently were television (32) followed by Video Games (27), and then fatass (22). Following shortly afterward were lazy post (16), nerd boner (15), Barack Obama (14), and then the Chargers (13).

Some may call it garbage, but for a lot of people many of these posts could be crowned as real works of art. We even had a "Best of the Cool Kids" compilation, featuring our very best and most beloved posts.

But we quickly took a turn for the worse...

Our once glorious website that flourished with exciting and fresh content was now a desolate wasteland. Posts came weeks, even months apart at times, and our content struggled all the same. Quick posts about absolutely nothing flooded our internet roads, surveys were displayed as features, and old fans everywhere were screaming, yearning even for new content. It got so bad that Ray even wrote a post about our lack of posts! In the shadows people heard whispers of a revival, but nothing came out of that, until just recently when Ray found it in himself to make an attempt to "get the band back together."

So here I am, a sunny day in late April, dusting off the keyboard and flexing my blogger muscles in hopes that we truly will come together and rise to our previous state of greatness. I do have to wonder though, is this newly found fire something that could keep us going strong, or is this simply just a taste of the past from the burps of those heavy Easter meals we had? Only time will tell, but I have to ask you this, my cool kids brethren, are we ready to saddle up and go the long haul, or are we just tumbling, and tumbling, and tumbling along. Let me know if I should start packing my stuff.

Best,
- Nazer

Post Date TBD

My hands are full, but soon.


I promise.

Let's stay together...

RE: Regarding Our Decision To Not Blog Here Anymore

Dear Cool Kids and Cool Kids family (i.e. Not so small talk), 

I'm writing this letter in hopes that this will get to you guys, someway, somehow. This is really hard for me right now, so I'll try and be brief. But I admit; I spent the past few hours outside, staring up at the night sky, with only the the stars to keep my company... Just now, I've been pacing back in forth in front of my computer, glaring at the screen, hoping this page would fill up with words by itself. But I'm here now, so I must finish what I started...

Ray, Nazer, Lance -- I know I had left you guys. Even worse, I left without saying goodbye. It was like a breakup without closure, or having some fun and not calling the next day, with no regard for your feelings at all. Yes, it was wrong of me; but I was young, stupid, immature, without any sense of what I was leaving behind.

But I had too... I had to get out of our relationship. I felt trapped. For too long, I felt like I bullshitted as a Cool Kid. We goofed off, made fun ourselves and joyfully hurt the ones we love. But I had to explore on my own, had to see the world, had to discover what was beyond the Coolest Kids in the Room, and grow up as a person, and also try and write more "seriously." Then the years went by, and I had moved on; a Cool Kid enjoying himself in self-imposed exile.

But really... it was all a facade. The supposed, newfound happiness was forced. There'd be nights where I'd toss and turn in bed, feeling miserable; alone, empty. I'd turn on my computer and load up coolkidsroom, going through the archives and looking back on old posts, constantly checking behind my back as if I was trying not to get caught. It was like re-reading old texts, or going through old pictures; reminiscing until the point where I had to close my laptop shut because the tears in my eyes would get too unbearable.

I miss it. The sarcasm, the randomness of topics, the clowning on homies, the bad ms paint pics, the bukkake, even the more relevant issues we wrote about; I miss it all. I miss what we all shared together, and I want it back. Just remember all the good times we've had. We can be great together, again. I just hope you can forgive me...

But I'll say, this indefinite hiatus of mine, is no more. This blog, The Coolest Kids in the Room, is where I'm meant to be. Like Ray said, "Being in a polyamorous blogging relationship with all of you was like something I've never felt before." I feel the same way. I want to be together again. I believe in second chances, but I'd like to believe as if we never broke up at all. We can work this out. Let's stay together.

We've all come so far:

"If you love something, set it free; if it comes back it's yours, if it doesn't, it never was..."

Please come back...

- Adonis

Regarding Our Decision To Not Blog Here Anymore

Regarding Our Decision To Not Blog Here Anymore
inspired by "Regarding Our Decision Never To See Me Again" by Ellie Kemper

Whats up guys, It's me Ray. I know we said this wouldn't last forever, but I've really put some thought into it for the past few minutes, and I have to say I think I've changed my mind. Its like when you sit down for a really long time and get up too fast and you end up feeling all dizzy and what not. Whats that called? A head rush? Yea I think that's what happened. It was a head rush. I just wasn't thinking straight I promise.

Its kind of hard you know, to put all that I'm feeling into words. I really felt like we had something the four of us. Being in a polyamorous blogging relationship with all of you was like something I've never felt before. And after you guys stopped posting, (Adonis n Lance) I really felt like something was missing in my life. It was hard just doing it with Nazer, I think me and him just couldn't have as much fun with just us two. We just needed our other halves........

Lance, who else was going to arise the same kind of feeling out of me as you. I know the rest of you haven't felt both uncomfortable and well informed at the same time, since Lance decided to leave the group. I think we all need a special bit of Lance's love juice in the mix...what did you used to call it. Oh yea thats right, a post-bukkake. Your a saint Lance. A beautiful heavenly saint. If you come back I swear you can post-bukkake all over this blog. I swear it.

Nazer, you held on longer then most and I think it really is that time again to get back on that horse and ride it. Gallop, gallop and post about things I know nothing about because being confused makes me feel like less of a person. And your great at that. Who else is going to educate me on shows (Pushing daisies, battlestar galactica) that I would probably only watch if they popped up on netflix during my free one month trial? No one that's who, no one. And that's a strong probably mister, a really really strong one. Almost even a maybe, a loving maybe.

And Adonis, Oh Adonis. I always appreciated your way of.....And then that time you....Oh and lets not forget that one thing, you know the thing that you did that one time. Great. I've really missed how you always have a way of...yuh your just great bro. Honest.

I really think were one of those groups where we first meet and there isn't really this huge lasting impression at first, but for some reason we all reconnect. Realizing that all the other blogs we've had were meaningless and this was the one true blog and we have, like, this really great story to tell people when they ask how we got together. You know the type, the ones where our kids ask us how we met, and I'll say, "You tell em Lance." and Lance will be like "No no, Nazer tells the story the best." and then Nazer would say, "OK, OK....." And when we go through all our old photos our son will be like who's Adonis daddy is this him?



Time will have slowed down at this very moment. As memories ring out in each of our minds. Lance will recall a simpler time when Adonis passed out in Mel and Kristine's bathtub fully clothed, and Tuan and I turned the water on. Nazer, will remember how great the cool kids used to be as a single tear runs down his cheek. I'll stop turn my head towards our son. With a slight grin on my face. I'll take a deep breath, the kind of breath our fathers take when they HAVE to do something, not something they necessarilly want to do, but they must. And I'll pause for a second. Look straight into his eyes and simultaneously slap the shit out of him while screaming "YOU DON'T SAY THAT NAME IN MY HOUSE!"

So what do you say boys. Give US another chance. I promise I'll be better this time. We had a few bumps in the road, but ain't no speed bump gonna slow us down. Head rushes are great an all, but when we put our minds together were not just cool kids, were the coolest kids in the room.



-Just RA

P.S. Adonis you haven't posted since march 2009, that's over two years JACKASS. But then again that post had the best comment run of all time. So kudos

Another show to watch on Thursdays

By now, you guys are probably aware that we watch a lot of TV on Thursday nights.  With no new episodes tonight of 30 Rock, Parks and Rec, or any of our other favorites (if you like Perfect Couples, then you deserve to be stabbed in the eye), then there’s really no reason why you shouldn’t be watching Archer tonight.

The animated show revolves around a spy agency and focuses on their star field agents, Sterling Archer and Lana Kane, and their interactions with the agency’s office drones. It’s like a sexy, vulgar cartoon remix of The Office and Chuck.

While there’s plenty of sex jokes and cheap visual gags, the show has a surprising amount of depth to its humor as well.  I’m talking about literary and historic pop culture references that’ll make you run to Wikipedia just because a joke went over your head.  And nothing delights us hipsters more than jokes that go over people’s heads.

The show’s cast is damn good also. H. Jon Benjamin, my favorite voice actor of all time, stars as the lead.  His work as Coach McGuirk in the underrated Home Movies was full of YouTube highlights and he also plays the lead in Fox’s Bob’s Burgers, another excellent animated comedy. Jessica Walters and Judy Greer of Arrested Development fame and Chris Parnell, formerly of Saturday Night Live, also star.

You owe it to yourself to check it out tonight, if only for the hot cartoon characters who might give you a semi hard-on.  Because we’re the experts in cartoon ladies who might give you a boner.

Archer is on at 10pm on FX, Thursdays.

Over Analyzing With Just Ra Vol 1. Romantic Dramas/Comedies

I know I posted this in my blog, but maybe it will inspire others to write something *ahem* *ahem*

Ever notice how in Romantic comedies and Dramas almost always the male lead is placed in a position of control or power. If not love and intimacy can only be achieved through a male perspective. Which is ironic as most of these movies are marketed towards women. This may be completely off or nothing new to some people, but their are plenty of examples to what I'm trying to say here.

For instance,

Knotting Hill

"After all... I'm just a girl, standing in front of a boy, asking him to love her."

Despite all of the fame that Julia Roberts' character has she is in one scene completely vulnerable to the "Average joe" that is Hugh Grants character. And he still is able to reject her only to realize later that he wants to be with her and makes one of those dramatic speeches in front of a crowd to win her over. In real life if someone like me even had a chance with a famous person and then rejected her, if we came back later with our mind changed she would more then likely act like she had no idea who you were and say, "uh no thanks, stalker."

Love and Othe Drugs

"I've never known anyone who actually believed that I was enough until I met you. And then you made me believe it too."

While Anne Hathaway controls the relationship for about 2/3's of the film. Jake "dreamy" Gyllenhaal in a way is left with the choice of being in a committed relationship who is almost literally deteriorating as years will go by. Despite her acknowledgment of her disease and essentially letting him go so he could live his own life, his decision is final and once again the equation is only solved by his choice in pursuing their relationship. Cue cliche chase scene and long drawn out explanation for why they are meant to be. And scene

10 Things I hate about you

"I hate it when you lie. I hate it when you make me laugh, even worse when you make me cry. I hate it when you're not around, and the fact that you didn't call. But mostly I hate the way I don't hate you. Not even close, not even a little bit, not even at all."

Not exactly one of ledger's most memorable films, unless you were a tween/teen in the late 90s, but none the less still caters to a similar formula. Despite the relatively interesting scene where Heath Ledger sings in the stands for Julia Stiles, the fact remains the same. His character is literally being paid to date her and this to many females I would assume would be a red flag to douchery. But of course with charming good looks and the ol "yea i was getting paid, but I ended up really liking you" formula the collective she will always forgive her man, even if she completely loathed him for 50 percent of the movie.

Twilight

Edward Cullen:" I don't have the strength to stay away from you anymore.
Isabella Swan: Then don't."

He literally stalked her, abandoned her, his brother tried to attack her and has an innate yearning to kill her. But she loves him regardless so its cool. Truly a relationship to strive for people. Its eternal, so its romantic though. Um....sure.

When I was first sitting on the toilet over analyzing these types of films my immediate counter film was,

500 Days of Summer

"I hate her crooked teeth. I hate her 1960s haircut. I hate her knobby knees. I hate her cockroach-shaped splotch on her neck. I hate the way she smacks her lips before she talks. I hate the way she sounds when she laughs."

This one really got to me, as I would think it would with any person male or female that's had their heart broken. Zoey's character is strong minded and hardly naive in comparison to Joseph Gordan Levitt's character. Joseph's character is premised in the film as someone who believes in love at first sight and knows he'll find the ONE. Unfortunately Zoey's character believes otherwise. Until that is the end. She may not give in to Joseph's boyish charm, but falls into the institution of marriage and ultimately agrees that true love does exist. "you just know" kind of shit. Despite her strength in being a free woman she ultimately has to come to the realization (within the films context) that love does exist, I better get married like RIGHT NOW!

Before you jump down my throat about the fact "their just movies", or "your reading way to into it Ray", lemme just say, uh no Im not. Films should inspire us to think critically, especially for those of us who have been blessed with opportunities in higher education. I recognize the entertainment value of movies and while I can enjoy senseless movies like anybody else, doesn't necessarily mean I should make my brain go numb and not think critically. Critical thought and discussion strives me as an individual and I need the stimulation. Fact is we shouldn't fall for these tricks and be influenced in our relationships by sappy romantic comedies. Something I figured I'd get off my chest.

-Just Ra