ApeDonkey Power Rankings - 1/17/11

 Today was Martin Luther King day and with schools being closed I had the kids at home all day. It is damn near impossible to write more than three consecutive words with a 6 & 1 year old crawling up you butt all day. Take that as an excuse and an apology if this week's power rankings aren't up snuff. Then again it's a free blog, so you can go screw yourself if you don't like what you read today.

Top 5



1. Ricky Gervais - I didn't watch the Golden Globes last night because unless it's produced by the Bang Bros. I have no interest is watching a bunch of "stars" jerk each other off. However, I did spend about half an hour watching clips of Ricky Gervais killing it. Anytime someone works in a Tom Cruise/John Travolta gay joke on national television they get the top spot in the ApeDonkey power rankings. Based solely on the Youtube clips I saw, Gervais was great. It was like watching a roast in which the roatee didn't know they were going to be roasted. I guess more than a few of the "stars" were offended and Ricky Gervais has been banned from future Golden Globes. Good. Yours is by far the dumbest of all the award shows. You don't deserve a great host like Gervais. I'd like to think people wouldn't waste their time with it anymore but I think we all know that would be giving people too much credit for being smart.

2. My Netflix account - Just out of curiosity I decided to see how much I'm paying per movie for my Netflix account. I know I'm an extreme case and regardless of what I found there was no chance I was canceling my subscription. I'm far too lazy to go to a brick & mortar movie store and the Red Box kiosks just don't have enough selection. What I found though was a little surprising and extremely pleasing. I figured $22/mo or $264/yr is what I'm paying for my Netflix account. Between traditional discs and streaming, I watched 262 movies. Yeah, I know that's not normal. That comes out to $1.01/movie. You can't beat that. Especially when a movie ticket is somewhere around $10 these days and that's if you're willing to slum it and not watch the 3D version.

3. The United League of Dip Shits - I don't know if you all felt it but there was a very noticeable tremor in the force this weekend. Three of the least likeable, even dispicable quarterbacks in the NFL led their respective teams to the conference championship game. You know who I'm talking about The Rapist, Baby Bama Bangs and The Dirty Sanchez. BBB, the owner of the worst body language in the NFL was somehow able to lead the Bears over those vaunted 7-9 Seahawks. In fairness, BBB was pretty damn good on the day but still, it was the Seahawks. The Dirty Sanchez was just better than bad. This is his calling card. TDS is always just better than bad for 3 quarters, only to turn it around and play well in the 4th. This game was decided by the Jets defense though. They pounded Brady all day and completely took the Pats receivers out of the game. It's never a bad thing when the Brady/Belichick evil consortium goes down. Now we come to The Rapist. He likes to do three things 1) drink 2) force unsuspecting girls to have sex with him in bar restrooms 3) knock the Ravens out of the playoffs. Well kudos to you Big Ben you've accomplished all three this year. Here's to rooting for the only QB left in the playoffs that doesn't make you want to strangle someone. Go Pack.

4. Early 90's Rock - Maybe I'm just being nostalgic or maybe it's soon to be 20th anniversaries of Nirvana's Nevermind and Pearl Jam's Ten but I've been reemersing myself in the music of the early 90's. This was a time when people of my own age finally had a say it what was being played on the radio and bands we loved or could relate to were finally breaking through. Pearl Jam, Nirvana, Alice in Chains and Soundgarden all exploded on to the radio and washed away the hair bands like Poison who had dominated for the previous half decade. Established bands like REM were finally finding a main stream audience and those of us who had followed them for years were saying "I told you so." I've been playing this music constantly for a week now, trying to ingrain the sound in my kids' heads. There's a Drive-by Truckers song that paints a pretty good picture of what was going on at that time and whenever I hear it I always want to pop in Alice in Chain's Dirt and embrace my inner junkie.

Find more artists like Drive-By Truckers at Myspace Music

5. The Rainard School Broadway Musical Review - And what is so great about this? Well let me tell you. The passing of TRSBMR means the infinite loop of Supercalifragilistiecspialidocious and So Long Farewell will finally end. I have been tortured by these songs for months now. Whether is was my kid singing those same verses for three solid hours on the way to San Antonio or her wanting to listen to the CD the music teacher gave her, I could escape the music. Julie Andrews went from being a weird fetish subject to my oppressor over the course of a few weeks. Even as I write this my kid is belting out "There's No Business Like Show Business." So instead of my nightmare coming to an end, it's likely to be only the beginning.


Bottom 5

1. Joe Flacco - Gob Bluthe had a bad day on Saturday. James Harrison & Co. were coming at him from all angles and you could literally see his testicles retracting up into his person. The Steelers beat the crap out of him and he didn't respond. It's becoming clear that Flacco just isn't a clutch player in mold of Brady, Manning or Rothlisberger. He looks closer to Schaub than those upper tier guys to me. A guy you can win with but unless the circumstances are stacked in his favor he's probably not going to take you all the way to a championship.

2. Guys in Ed Hardy - Tom Brady was sacked 5 times on Sunday and hit many more times than that. The unfortunate side effect of this for the douche bags of the world is that every time Brady takes a shot, guys in Ed Hardy clothes can also feel the hit. Maybe you have one of those friends. He wears ridiculously printed shirts. His jeans look like his mom got jiggy on the pockets with her new bedazzler. His hats all have a really flat brim and may even be turned to the side or backwards for increased douchebaggery. Just take solace in the fact that every time you saw Brady take one to the ribs, those fine threads he's so proud of were causing him wince in pain.

3. Adam Sandler & James Cameron -When is the last time you really wanted to see an Adam Sandler or James Cameron movie. Yeah, I can't remember either. Wait that's not true. It was Punch Drunk Love and Terminator 2. This weekend everywhere I turned all I saw were ads for Just Go With It and Sanctum. I have to give Sandler and Aniston for that matter credit, there is nothing about a terrible movie that scares either one of them. Combined they have amassed mountains of blockbuster refuse specifically designed to bilk their hardworking fans out of their money simply by putting their names on a poster. Shamful. The best thing I can say about Just Go With It is at least it's not Little Fockers. James Cameron is an entirely different beast all together. He at least strives to make good movies. He just can't seem to accept the notion that a good story is better than a good visual. Titantic and Avatar while both visually superb were terrible naratives. Now comes Sanctum a story about a group of people jumping down a big hole. I'm sure it'll have some cool underwater shots and plenty of action but ultimately I'm not going to see Sanctum for the same reason I never read Super Fudge. It just sounds nasty.

4. Disgusting food - We didn't feel like cooking Saturday night so we took the kids out to Willie's Ice House. Though the food isn't particularly good, Willie's works well because 1) it's loud 2) the have a sand box for Audrey to play in 3) making a mess is OK. I usually get the fried catfish because you kind of have to try to screw up fried catfish and my daughter likes it so we can split one order. When she told me she didn't want the catfish, I was left with a delima. Order the tried and true or step out on a limb. It was cold and dreary out and I wanted something hot so I decided on the special. It was either gumbo or tortilla soup and 4 fried shrimp. I went for the tortilla soup over gumbo because, well I don't eat ditch water. Bad choice. The tortilla soup was barely more than luke warm when it arrived at the table and as I started spooning through it the chicken in the bowl was either the neck, gizzard or butthole. After a few bites I couldn't take it anymore so I just moved on to the shrimp. The shrimp was cold too but the first 2 at least tasted OK. Then came the third shrimp, which tasted like it had been put on the plate straight from a diaper genie. I'm sure we'll go back at some point but rest assured I won't be straying far from what I know.

5. Sunday Night Television - I shared my thoughts on the Sunday night lineup this morning but there was a huge issue I didn't address. There was entirely too little Amanda Seyfried, Emmy Rossum, Gennifer Goodwin, Carla Gugino and Addison Timlin for my taste. A Sunday night should not pass in which these five ladies don't take up 50% of the available screen time. Instead of arguing my point further, I'll just leave you with this exhibits A through E.