ByronCrawford.com

Draft the tards

I remember reading, like, at the end of last year maybe, that G-dubs was going to bring back the draft in June of '05. It seemed plausible enough at the time just because they were running out of suckers to sign up and having to resort to such methods lowering their standards to include high school dropouts and people with health problems and forcing people who already did their time to serve second and third tours of duty. Keep in mind, I have no problem with this sort of backdoor draft, as I mentioned here a long time ago, but eventually there's going to come a time when even it won't be enough to fill the military's need for fresh cannon fodder, as the "situation" in Iraq continues with seemingly no end in sight and new situations develop in seemingly every other shithole of a country in the region.

If they do bring back the draft, I'm not going one way or the other, whether I have to fake some kind of medical condition or hit the road to Canada or whatever. But I wonder why, as long as they're lowering the standards so much anyway, they don't just start drafting retarded people to go over there. I mean, they send their recruiters down to inner city high schools where a lot of the kids can't read anyway; drafting retards would really only be like, a half-step down the intellectual ladder. While you could argue that we've lost some talented people (and for nothing, I might add) in the past 3 years, or however long it's been since the war began, I don't think you could argue in this case at all that we'd be losing anything by sending the short bus crowd over there. In fact, just think of the money we'd save having to house and maintain these people over the course of a lifetime.

So really, the only problem that's standing in the way of solving the military's recruitment problems, at least for quite some time, are the kind of people who don't think it's fair to send tards off to fight in a war. On the contrary, I don't think it's fair to send lucid, able-bodied men and women who've got children to support (lest the rest of us have to pick up the tab) over there to risk life and limb when we've got a whole class of basically expendable citizens that does nothing other than sit around and leach off and/or prey on (of course the homeless would be included in this program) the rest of society.

Just to speed up the process, I've created an online petition which I intend to present to President George W. Bush either in person or via email, depending on whether or not I have the means. I would encourage you all to read it and, if you agree with what it says (and I don't see why you wouldn't), sign it. Let's not waste any more valuable lives as long as we don't have to.

Big Pun's wife, the beeyotch

Did everybody see this story about how Big Pun's wife is auctioning off one of his ridonkulous-looking Terror Squad medallions on Ebay so that, I guess, her and her 3 kids don't have to move back to wherever the rest of the Puerto Ricans live? How unfortunate. I would feel sorry for her and maybe send her $5 in the mail, just because Pun was one of the greatest MCs to ever touch a mic, nhjic, but all I ever hear about her doing is badmouthing the dude now that he's dead, releasing magazine articles and DVDs about how he used beat the living shit out of her.

First of all, it's hard for me to feel sorry for a woman that gets her ass whipped any more than, I don't know, 100 times in a row? Anytime a broad gets knocked around so hard that she can no longer see straight and she still doesn't leave, you know she's just in it for the money. Also, we have to look at the reason why she was getting beat in the first place. Now, I'm not offering any kind of excuse for that sort of behavior, but, at the same time, it's very seldom that somebody just gets beaten for no reason at all. For all we know, it could've been her bad behavior that was driving him to gradually eat himself to death.

If only he could've somehow killed her.

Andy Milonakis age rumor

Actually, this isn't even so much of a rumor as it is a matter of fact, but it's certainly not as well known as it should be thanks to those tall Israelis over at MTV always trying to hide information from a brother. Next thing you know, we'll be finding out that he commited some sort of date rape that they attempted to cover up by sending him on an out of nowhere trip to Cancun, which I'm sure is just like sending a kiddie rapist to Thailand or some shit.

But anyway, I was watching this crap the other day, and while I did notice that some of the "humor" seemed, not smart per se but smart for a 12-year-old boy, or however old he's supposed to appear to be, it never really occurred to me to suspect that he might actually be an adult just pretending to be a 12-year-old boy. Sure enough, it turns out he's one of these guys who's got some sort of growth disorder that makes him look like a little kid despite the fact that he's actually a 27-year-old man.

I noticed that in the press leading up to this Sunday's premier of his awful new program, he skillfully avoids (having no doubt been trained by his owners at MTV) mentioning how old he is other than to say, in the USA Today for example, that he's somewhere between the ages of 10 and 30, but I found an older article, from back when he was first beginning to gain notoriety for his "The Superbowl Is Gay" video, that goes into a lot more detail as far as this kid's actual story is concerned.

ALSO: I've mentioned this before, but this really is the greatest and best piece of Journalism in the history of the form. I'll be upset if both individuals involved don't receive the Pulitzer. [via Foz's House of the Awesome]

The Real World: Austin - Episode 2: Episode Summary

You'll recall that last week Danny tried to get in a fight with some random ass kids out in the street and ended up getting jacked in the face pretty good. Serves him right, as far as I'm concerned. But now he's all walking around talking about pressing charges and taking the video tape to the police "so that none of the other roommates have to go through this," or some silly bullshit.

Melinda, meanwhile is just looking for a reason to fuck some guy despite the fact that her boyfriend, Jason, gave her a promise ring before she left Wisconsin, or wherever it was. Hopefully, he'll beat the crap out of her as soon as she gets back. When the gang decides to go out for yet another night of drunken foolishness, she decides to stay home with Danny, who's waiting for the swelling to go down before he can have his eye operated on. So they sleep in the bed together and it looks like Danny might have hit it.

So the next morning, a cab arrives to take them to their job already. Didn't they used to wait 2 weeks before they gave them jobs, or did they have to do some tricky editing again to cover up another date rape? So they arrive at this barn and Wes is worried that they might get a job cleaning up shit, but it turns out that they're going to be making a documentary about the South By Southwest Unimportant Music Festival with the famous indie film industry sycophant, John Pierson, which is only kind of like cleaning up shit.

The rest of the episode concerns Melinda trying to figure out how she can weasel her way out of her relationship with her boyfriend back home, because she's already been fucking Danny, but of course she tries to turn it into some kind of woman's empowerment bullshit because she didn't like the way he talked to her on the phone or some shit? So we're supposed to be impressed with the way she "stood up for herself." They aren't broken up for 15 minutes before she's in the bed doing the nasty with Danny. It'll be interesting to see what ends up happening when she realizes Danny doesn't want anything to do with her skanky ass other than sex. She seems like the clingy type.

This post is part of:

The Real World Austin Episode Guide

Eve sex tape surfaces on the Internets

Now, you guys know I don't normally do this, just because, in theory, there could be children reading this, and since children have a constitutional right to use the Internets, it's important that we don't publish anything here that might damage their fragile egg shell minds. Also, this video is fucking disgusting. Obviously, it was shot long before she could afford any kind of "personal" grooming.

Honestly, I don't even recommend that anybody look at this thing, but I see a lot of people have been searching for it and I'm upset that before I left to get my Miller High Life, like 2 hours ago, I ranked 7th for the term Eve Sex Tape and now I'm not even on the front page. What the fuck kind of bullshit is that?

So here you go, bitches:
http://www.eve-sex-tape.com

Spin's top 10 albums 1985-2005

Another week, another one of these teh ghey ass albums lists. In this case, it's Spin magazine's top 10 albums from 1985-2005. Obviously, it's got some issues with teh ghey ass rock shit that's really not that good cluttering up the top 10 and it wasn't until I had typed it all up that I realized that there weren't any albums from 2000 (or 1997, even) onward, but I guess this was part of a larger list of the top 100 albums from that era and it just wouldn't be correct to put anything recent so high on the list.

1. Radiohead - OK Computer - So yeah, this is a pretty good album. I hadn't heard it in quite some time when we rocked out to it on the way to Fitz's pre-marriage incident, and I was pleasantly reminded of how fucking good it was. But where's Kid A? How come this is a list of the top 10 albums from 1985-2005 and I don't see shit from 2000 on?

2. Public Enemy - It Takes a Nation of Millions to Hold Us Back - It seems like the trend lately (like in Entertainment Weekly and MTV's lists) has been to give Paid in Full the edge over this, but I notice that shit's nowhere to be found on this list, at least not in the top 10. I should make a separate post just debating those two albums.

3. Nirvana - Nevermind - Ah, the great Nevermind dropping all the way down to number 3. I guess because having two rock albums ahead of Nation of Millions just wouldn't look right. If anything, I would've dropped OK Computer down to number 3 or lower and had either this or PE at number one.

4. Pavement - Slanted and Enchanted - You know this one had to be on there since they had it as being the second greatest album of the 90s, behind only Nevermind, six years ago and obviously, to look at the current indie rock scene, it's only grown in influence since then. As much as I like it though, doesn't Slanted and Enchanted seem a bit slight compared to the top 3?

5. The Smiths - The Queen Is Dead - What the fuck is this teh ghey ass shit doing at number 5? Think about it: If this was really the fifth best album of the last 20 years, I don't even know if I'd be as much of a fan of music. Obviously such high placement has to do with this current resurgence in popularity of old corny ass alternative groups from the 80s.

6. Pixies - Surfer Rosa -  Case in point: If the Pixies weren't all reunited and touring , I doubt they'd be nearly as high as they are. Not that this album isn't good, but right now it's just trendy to like, which is teh ghey. Isn't Dinosaur Jr. back on the state fairs circuit? It would've been cool to see You're Living All over Me crack the top 10.

7. De La Soul - 3 Feet High and Rising - This is a pretty good album. Obviously, I could think of a few hip-hop albums from the last 20 years that I'd prefer to it, but I'm not mad at it being on here.

8. Prince - Sign 'O' the Times - When I first saw this list, my first reaction was "Dude, where's Purple Rain?" but then I realized that they were only counting from 1985-2005. I actually like Sign 'O' the Times better anyway, so I guess this was a pretty good choice.

9. PJ Harvey - Rid of Me - Funny, I seem to recall that 6 years or so ago, To Bring You My Love was the PJ Harvey album that you were supposed to pretend that you liked. Also, weren't Live Through This by Hole and Post by Bjork, which I both like better, a lot more critically acclaimed at the time? Still, there's something kind of satisfying in a mean way that you'd have to go back to at least 1995 to find an album by a woman that would only look kind of out of place on a greatest albums of all time list.

10. NWA - Straight Outta Compton - Weak. I mean, I suppose it was influential and all, but it's really not that good of an album. About half of it's the Best Shit Ever, but there's a few songs on there that are rather teh ghey. The rest of it is just meh.

So yeah, obviously a lot of preference was given to groups that are still out there touring and making albums. For example, had Radiohead broken in up in like 1998 and if they weren't currently the consensus Best Band in the World, would they really be at number one, ahead of Nevermind and Nation of Millions? Similarly, if Morrissey and the fat Pixies weren't currently out on the indie rock nostalgia circuit, of course they wouldn't be on the list.

Ying Yang Twins - United State of Atlanta: Album Review

Ying Yang Twins, (U.S.A.) United State of Atlanta (TVT, 2005)
If you've read any of my other album reviews, you're probably already aware that I don't listen to that much Southern rap. It's not that I have anything against it other than the fact that very little of it is worth listening to, it's just that I'm a very uncultured person. As soon as I get done with this review, I'm gonna throw on my copy of New Miserable Experience, and you know what? I'm gonna fucking enjoy it. As usual.

Kanye goes off on Bol

I was going to create a much more elaborate post having to do with this, but I'm tired now and I've still got some shit to do. Anyhoo, your boy Big Bank Kanye, pictured above with two of his typical fans, went on this radio show in England the other day (the Tim Westwood program) and went off on yours truly - I mean, like really went ape shit, at one point shouting, "Die motherfucker, die!" and all kinds of crazy shit. You can tell he's talking about me, even though he doesn't mention any names, just because he makes reference to specific posts on Ye Olde BC and also the fact that I once attempted to have him banned from the Grammys.

HEAR FOR YOURSELF: "Freestyle" | Interview

Version 3.0

I think I mentioned yesterday that I was busy working on something and I'm sure you all assumed I was just wanking my crank, but I was actually hard at work on this gully new redesign. Just looking at it, having finished it maybe 15 minutes ago, it doesn't seem all that different from the old one, considering all the gotdamn time I put into it. There's still a few things I'd like to tweak here and there, but it will probably be a while before I get around to them, just because I'm tired of dealing with it. If I should ever decide that this thing needs yet another redesign (which is possible but not likely), I'll probably just have somebody else do it.

Obviously the main reason for the redesign, other than to make the site a bit nicer to look at and to fix a few things that have been broken for quite some time, was to clear up some space to run more advertising. Since TypePad's own advertising turned out to be rather teh ghey, I just got rid of it altogether and created some space on the page for a few different kinds of advertisements. I don't have any deals with advertisers set up right now - the ones that are there are just placeholders and, you'll notice, don't work - but, if things work out the way I'm planning, I should have some real ads up and running by the end of next week. If not, I figure I'll get some sooner or later, but at least now I'm one step closer to getting that paper.

So I guess feel free to commence with your bitching about how the site doesn't look any better and how you don't like the advertising and what have you in the comments section. Also, if you find anything that's broken or doesn't look right, feel free to post that here, as well. My bad about not warning everybody that I was getting rid of the old design so that you might have taken a picture of it or some shit, for posterity. I actually just decided to do it on a whim after seeing the Daily Kos' fucked up new design. Not to sound conceited or anything, but my shit's way better.

Terry McMillan's DL brother

Presented without comment, other than to say no homo, because I'm busy right now.

Epilogue for 'Stella' author: a messy divorce

In a tale rich in lost love, closeted secrets and acrimonious divorce, it turns out that famed local writer Terry McMillan -- whose celebrated romance and subsequent marriage to a man 23 years her junior became the subject of her fictionized best-seller "How Stella Got Her Groove Back" -- actually got her groove back with a man who now says he's gay.

The story is spilling out in made-for-Hollywood detail in Contra Costa County Superior Court, where McMillan has filed for divorce from her Jamaican- born husband of six years, Jonathan Plummer.

McMillan, 53, said in court documents that the marriage was based on a "fraud'' because Plummer lied about his sexual orientation -- and married her only to gain U.S. citizenship.

"It was devastating to discover that a relationship I had publicized to the world as life-affirming and built on mutual love was actually based on deceit,'' she wrote in her declaration. "I was humiliated."

Plummer, 30, countered in court papers of his own that McMillan has turned on him with a "homophobic'' vengeance and is trying to force his return to an uncertain future in Jamaica. He wants to void the couple's prenuptial agreement that would keep from him most of the millions she's earned as a writer.

He also claims he was denied his full share of royalties, as spelled out in the prenup, from "How Stella Got Her Groove Back," the fictionalized account of a single mother's torrid relationship with a Jamaican young enough to be her son that very much parallels the lives of McMillan and Plummer.

..........................

"I was a 20-year-old kid when I met her and had no idea that she was anybody other than an attractive, older woman,'' he said in court papers.

For her part, McMillan, who was then 42, said she worried when she first met Plummer that he was interested only in her money. "But Jonathan was very charming and made me believe that he was crazy about me,'' she told the court.

The two eventually married in Maui on Sept. 8, 1998 -- but not before Plummer signed a prenup that waived his rights to everything should they ever part, including "temporary and permanent spousal support and attorney's fees, '' according to court papers filed by McMillan.

The couple settled in McMillan's $4 million Danville home and, at least according to Plummer, enjoyed a happy life -- until the last few years when the marriage started coming undone.

"He became less attentive, less charming, more distracted and absent from the home,'' McMillan wrote in her declaration.

Plummer said he was spending long hours with a dog-grooming business in Danville that McMillan had set up for him a couple of years ago in apparent anticipation of a split.

...................................

In court records, however, McMillan says Plummer confessed to being gay only after she confronted him about all his hours of phone calls to a male friend living in Jamaica. She also says she later learned that Plummer was participating in online gay chat sites.

In any event, judging from the court filings, the disclosure quickly turned ugly. McMillan obtained a restraining order to keep Plummer from their house, and she claimed she recently discovered that Plummer had embezzled at least $200,000 from her bank accounts before and during their marriage. (He admits in court papers "a gross error of judgment" in taking $62,000 without her knowledge, but said that he was financially dependent on her during the marriage and that he intends to pay it back.)

Plummer obtained his own restraining order against the author, alleging that McMillan constantly harassed him for coming out of the closet, and at one point walked into his dog-grooming business and tossed a ceramic object across the room.

................................

"She is an extremely angry woman who is homophobic and is lashing out at me because I have learned I am gay,'' Plummer declared in a court filing last month.

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On June 17, a Superior Court judge handed Plummer a minor victory -- ordering McMillan to pay him $2,000 a month in spousal support, plus $25,000 in attorney's fees -- until a full trial on the validity of the prenuptial agreement and the annulment request is heard in October.

via THE NEWS BLOG and Old Matt