2014 POP CULTURE FANTASY DRAFT

  At this time of year grown men, and more and more women to be sure, start acting out a strange fantasy.  Does it involve Jennifer Lawrence and a one time chance encounter fueled by too much wine and unbridled lust? Where she has just gotten a little tipsy after a long day of filming and meets you at the bar and asks you to buy her a drink but then she buys the drinks because she is crazy rich and then the two of you, oh, um, sorry.  Got a little side tracked there. No, guys aren't dreaming of starring with Ms. Lawrence in "Hunger Games 5: Hungry Like the Wolf." Their fantasy is to be like Dallas Cowboys owner Jerry Jones, minus the crazy Joker smile and pulled back face (maybe).  It's time for the NFL season to start and millions of people across the country are embroiled in fantasy football leagues.  If you don't know about fantasy football, you basically pretend to be a GM and create your own team then go head to head with other "teams" in your league in a battle of statistics. The nerd factor is fantasy football's seldom discussed embarrassing uncle.  So you draft players to your team based on past performance as well as what you think they will do in this upcoming season.  The more statistics, or points, that player racks up, the better your chances of "winning" your "games."

  What if we did a Pop Culture Fantasy Draft? No, your list shouldn't consist of Kate Beckinsale, Brad Pitt, or Sofia Vergara, it's not that kind of fantasy list.  What if we did a draft based on who could score you the most fantasy Pop Culture points?  Past performance would have to be considered and what the "player" can do in the future would have to be a factor. You may not particularly like the person you draft (I drafted Tom Brady in a fantasy league a couple of years ago, selling my soul to the devil in a move based on pure fantasy greed. And guess what? He blew out his knee in game 1 and missed the entire season. Thanks a lot dick!), but you have to recognize their talent and potential to get you points.

  So here I go!  I'll be drafting in the classic fantasy football order of QB, 2 wide receivers, a defense, and finally a kicker, because you HAVE to pick a kicker (BOOOO!)  I feel my team will be UNSTOPPABLE!!

QUARTERBACK:  TAYLOR SWIFT

Since 2006, Swift has sold over 26 millions CDs in an industry that doesn't sell CDs anymore.  She has sold over 75 million digital downloads which is definitely the currency of today's youth.  Has a Taylor Swift CD ever come out and tanked?  Nope.  Does she sell out arenas that used to be the "boys only" stomping grounds for major rock acts? Yes.  She's music's MVP right now and really has dominated the scene for years in an industry that relegates you to "has been" status before you can say "One Direction."  She's dependable and smart enough to mature her music as her audience matures.  She started with Teardrops on Her Guitar and is now admonishing haters to go ahead and hate hate hate as she shakes you off.  Dare I say it, she's the Tom Brady of music, with no knee blow outs on the horizon.

WIDE RECEIVER #1: CHRIS PRATT

 In fantasy leagues, WRs are the speed merchants, getting you quick points as they rise to superstardom from relative obscurity.  While Parks and Rec fans have been on to him for years, Chris Pratt literally became a Galaxy dominating star this year.  He kicked it off with The Lego Movie and endeared himself to kids and grown ups alike in one of the best "kids" movies of the past decade. Then he merely followed that up by starring in Guardians of the Galaxy, the highest grossing (and to me best) movie of 2014.  His comedic riff on the Han Solo type was charming as hell. Women seem to love him and guys would like to go have a beer with him. He's got Jurassic World coming up, the final season of Parks and Rec, and I still love him for whispering "Osama" in Zero Dark Thirty.

WIDE RECEIVER #2: ARIANA GRANDE

  If you have a tween or teen daughter, then Ariana Grande is in your life whether you want her there or not. One day I thought a cat was being strangled in our kids TV room, which is weird since we don't have cats. When I ran to investigate, turns out my daughter was watching "Sam and Kat," some horrible Nickelodeon show that starred Ms. Grande and her bizarre voice. I couldn't tell if her voice was a put on or if she was a human AutoTune.  Regardless, that wailing cat is now all over my radio. Her hit "Problem" was probably the Song of the Summer. She's got another hit song with "Break Free" and seems to be on an unstoppable rise to the top. Until she gets there, I still think her name sounds more like a Starbucks drink. (and her voice that of a strangled cat)

DEFENSE: MODERN FAMILY

  You want your fantasy defense to be consistently strong, stable, and able to come up with a big score every once in a while.  Modern Family has been all those things since debuting in 2009.  Is it laugh out loud funny every week? Not always. But you can count on it not being bad, and that's tough to do these days.  Every Fall networks launch new sitcoms that crash and burn before the snow flies. Modern Family has shown staying power. Every 3rd or 4th episode is great, and sometimes touching, and we can sit down as a family to watch it.  Team Modern Family MVP awards go to Ty Burrell as Phil Dunphy (my favorite TV dad of all time) and the cast of kids. It's hard to cast kids that aren't annoying "cute" or "clever." Modern Family's kids are sarcastic, devious, and sometimes just outright mean, you know, like real kids.

KICKER: BILLY EICHNER  "BILLY ON THE STREET"

  Kickers are oddballs, full of weird routines and superstitions.  They are barely football players and at times barely look like athletes. But they are important and can win you games. They score points consistently and every once in a while hit a 60 yarder.  Which brings me to Billy Eichner and "Billy on the Street." If you haven't seen this show, you should. It's easy to find on YouTube or Funny or Die and it basically involves him running around the streets of New York doing "man on the street" interviews with regular people. That's been done before, right? Never quite like Billy does it. His manic interview style and madcap disdain for the people who can't answer his questions is hilarious. He genuinely seems offended when people don't know that Kim Kardashian's booty in insured for 5 million dollars.  What he is really doing is skewering our country's seemingly unending and dumb fascination with celebrities.  Ironic since I am including him in my Pop Culture Fantasy Draft.

  So my team will take on all challengers! Swift is calling the plays, Pratt and Grande are streaking up the field, Phil Dunphy is stumbling over a fumble, and Billy on the Street is yelling at you about it all.

I like our chances. Who you got?

  

Top 40 @ 40

I'm FORTY today.  
  I'm of a certain age to remember Casey Kasem countin' down the hits on Sunday mornings, starting at 40 until we reached the top. Now poor Casey sits somewhere, no one really knows for sure, dead as a doornail and really the subject of his own eternal Long Distance Dedication. (seriously, the man's been dead for months now and only his nutso wife knows where the body is. Google it, or don't) As I hit 40 today I started thinking about making a list of the 40 most influential pieces of pop culture in my 4 decades. I'm sure I missed some things, please point them out. If you have some of your own, I'd love to hear them.  There's no particular ranking, but my very favorite things are near the top.
1) LOST-easliy my favorite show, really ruined TV for me ever since
2) The Dark Knight Returns-graphic novel by Frank Miller
3) The iPhone and portable music
4) Star Wars-the original 3, which I still call 1 through 3, and you will never convince me the other 3 are worth a tin shit
5) Pearl Jam-they came around at just the right time for me, fan forever
6)Stephen King- Favorites: The Stand, IT, 11/22/63, Bag of Bones
7) The Howard Stern Show- roll your eyes if you will, but the man is funny and much smarter than farts and boobs
8) Guns n Roses-my wife just cringed
9)The Dark Knight trilogy of movies- as superhero movies get more and more cartoonish, this trilogy took it very seriously and I love that
10) Harry Potter books- all of them but they really began to amaze from The Goblet of Fire on 
11) September 11th-forgive me, it's not really pop culture but it was the most important news story of my life so far and it unbelievably happened on live TV. I still watch replays of the coverage every year, I still get angry and sad every year.
12)Hoosiers- greatest sports movie ever! If you don't think so, you're shucking corn. "I love you guys."
13) Jimmy Buffet- the music and the mentality
14) March Madness
15)The Shawshank Redemption-maybe my favorite movie ending
16) A Christmas Story-run a single movie 24 hours straight on Christmas day? I'm in, as long as it's this one. Ralphie's dad is my guru
17) A Walk in the Woods by Bill Bryson
18)The Beatles-seems like a no-brainer, their catalog of hit songs is insane
19)Scent of a Woman-first Al Pacino movie on the list, not the last
20) the Kindle
21)Steven Spielberg-favorites: Close Encounters, ET, Jaws
22)Muse
23) Live concerts from age 16-25  Favorites: Pearl Jam, Lyle Lovett, NIN, Smashing Pumpkins
24) Harry Potter movies, from Goblet of Fire to the end
25) Monday Night Football
26) The Watchmen graphic novel by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons
27) The Shield- great gritty show from beginning to end. The best series finale I've ever seen
28) Trainspotting
29)Lyle Lovett-my wife and I danced to a Lyle song at our wedding
30)OK Computer by Radiohead-one great disc, but maybe the death of rock n roll
31)Heat-second Al Pacino movie on the list, not the last
32)Drive-Ryan Gosling in maybe the "coolest" movie I've ever seen
33)Rammerjammeryellowhammer by Warren St John- I read this book about the tailgate culture in the SEC EVERY Fall to get me in the mood for football season. It is so great, you can smell the beer and barbecue.
34) Disasters on TV- the space shuttle disasters, Indonesian tsunami, 9-11
35) U2
36) Babel- Mumford and Sons
37)Dr Steve Brule and Fire Marshall Bill on YouTube- laughs, guaranteed 
38) Glengarry Glen Ross-ok, THAT's the last Pacino movie on the list
39)Twitter
40) Spongebob Squarepants- bow down to one of the VERY few kids shows that is ok for adults too

Any Port in the Storm

    There's a scene in Good Will Hunting, a better movie than you might remember, where Will (Matt Damon) spots a painting on his therapist's wall. He immediately starts to critique the painting, basically tearing it apart as a piece of crap. The scene eventually ends with the therapist grabbing Will by the neck after he disrespects his wife.  That therapist is of course played by Robin Williams, who won his only Oscar for the portrayal. As everyone well knows, he died this week by his own hand after what apparently was a lifelong battle with addiction and depression.  So I think about that painting on the wall, a man in a rowboat on stormy seas seemingly hellbent on swallowing him, and how he still rows for shore. This week Robin Williams stopped rowing.

  Williams was known and celebrated for his manic energy, his seemingly stream of consciousness comedy that would erupt when the cameras came on, volcanic in its volume.  He would flit from character to character, voice to voice, and topic to topic with what seemed like ease, but if it was so easy why couldn't anyone before or since do what he did? (not quite used to the past tense yet) What we are finding out now is that those masks were to hide the darkness inside. It appears Robin Williams was comfortable at being everyone else in the world except Robin Williams.  

  If you didn't know much about depression before this week, Williams' death this week has been a flicker of light in a dark corner.  Imagine a Oscar winning actor, with a string of film and TV hits (and misses, let's be honest) as long as anyone that has ever been in the business.  He was beloved by millions. Yet this week he decided the pain inside him was too much, the waves were swallowing him up.  The millions of voices telling him what a talent he was couldn't drown out the voice inside that must have been telling him all hope was lost.  That's what depression is, a pain that will not go away, no matter what.

  I know depression has darkened my path from time to time, I'm not ashamed to admit, especially after this week. I've never felt that drowning sensation though.  Depression has touched my family in a big way. I have seen what being in its grips can do, the dragging down, the struggle to get back up, and the dragging down again. I had desires at times to yell "shake it off, pick yourself up!"  That's the ignorance I had that only time and understanding could burn off.  It's not that simple, it's maybe the most complicated of burdens.  

  If you yourself are depressed, find a person to reach out to. If you know someone who is depressed, or "down," or "sad," or whatever the term may be, be that hand that they can reach out to. Pull them up from the waves if you can. An actor, comedian, and humanitarian left us this week.  The attention his death has gotten is partly based on his amazing body of work, and partly due to the manner of his passing.  If he died of a heart attack, I doubt the coverage would be as blanketing. He died of depression. It's that serious. Get help if you need it and give help if you can.  Rest in Peace Robin Williams, thanks for the laughs and thanks for the tears.

You Must Listen Closely

ARE YOU LISTENING?

  I made a promise to my mom.  She's gone now, her life taken too soon by that damn thief Cancer.  She knew it was coming, in the end.  She fought the good fight, the tough fight, the fight against a thief that would not be denied, not this time around.  She talked a lot to me, to my brother and sisters, about what she hoped we would do with our lives. Really she only wanted us to be happy. That's all she ever really wanted. Those conversations live in my heart now and they rise to the surface from time to time.  Like a swimmer surfacing from a long dive, those conversations come up for air and remind me of the good times. They remind me that I made my mom a few promises before she left us and this Earth.

  I promised my mom I would write.  It's always hard to tell when a parent is complimenting you, whether they are doing that because they are your parent and by default your biggest fan, or because they are genuinely impressed by something you did. Mom always liked my writing and encouraged me to keep doing and find a way to share it.  I did that on occasion, writing for a local paper and the school paper while in high school. I started down the path to a journalism degree in college (Ball State--go Cardinals!) but one night class (and a few too many parties) and that train derailed.  

  So, here I am. I'll be 40(how ancient that number used to sound to me) in a few days. The temples have gone gray, the knees pop a little more than they used to, and I've lived a little life now.  I have the most wonderful wife, my joy and inspiration, and 3 kids who are whip smart and make me laugh every day. (never had gray hair before them, now that I think about it) Now it's time to keep that promise to Mom.  

  What you'll find on this screen if you grace me with your presence at this blog is a little bit of everything.  My head gets filled with thoughts and at times I need to dump them out. I love all things pop culture, movies, music, and TV chief among them. I'm a dad (a word I just noticed sounds a little deflated) and a husband and if you think those two roles aren't loaded with material then you have never witnessed a kid run through your room at 3 AM yelling "I think I'm going to throw up!!" Write what you know is what they told me at the one Wednesday night journalism class I made it to (success-thank you very much!). I plan to do just that.

  So come along, I'd love to hear your thoughts too!  This will be MUMBLES BY ZACH, a spot for a chronic mumbler to finally be heard.  Thanks Mom!