Archive: December, 2006
Lose yourself in the links, forage among the favorites, comandeer the conversation. I'm off duty.
Happy holidays to you and all the blinqers.
Happy Holidays! Enjoy!
Enrico Campitelli Jr. has bought only one sports jersey in his adult years. It's red, white and blue, with Philly on the front and Allen Iverson's No. 3 on the back. He never wears it outside; it hangs in his closet. But he writes that he's a better Philadelphian for having it there:
I never thought trading Allen Iverson would make me feel so emotional. When I think about my love for Philadelphia sports, there are two guys that immediately come to the front of my mind: Allen Iverson and Donovan McNabb. Sure I have memories of my dad taking me to watch Sir Charles and The Doctor, but it was Allen Iverson whose entire career as a Sixer I followed from start to finish.
I was 15 in 1996 as I watched Pat Croce go nuts at the NBA Draft Lottery show when the Sixers found out they'd get the rights to draft the scrappy guard out of Georgetown. The Sixers drafted Allen Iverson with the first pick, and my hope in a championship coming to Philly was fueled by the lightning quick skills of the barely six footer. Basketball was my first love back then, and The Answer was wearing a Philadelphia uniform. A.I. gave me hope.
Maybe you saw this brief over the weekend:
A man who escaped police custody Saturday night was soon at Einstein Hospital in critical condition after being hit by a car. The accident happened around 7 p.m. at Broad and Champlost streets in PhiladelphiaÂ’s Fern Rock section. Police said the 20-year-old man jumped from a second-story window at the 35th police district. Then, he ran into the street and a car hit him.
The back-story is right out of "Hill Street Blues."
Sylvester Stallone wasn't the underdog he was made out to be?
Hollywood Today contends that the whole unknown-who-convinces-a-studio-to-let-him-star-in-his-own-screenplay story was just that - a story, cooked up by spinners and served by Stallone, himself.
Accounts of the day had Stallone walking into United Artists with his hand-written script and not giving up until they agreed to let him play Rocky. Studio heads told that tale. Stallone, himself, told it while doing press for the 1976 Oscar winner.
Huge.
"Now that was an absolutely enjoyable football game to watch," writes Enrico at the AOL Fan House.
After five lead changes and one tie, the Eagles punched 14 unanswered points onto the scoreboard to beat the N. Y. Giants at the Meadowlands, grabbing both revenge and command of the Wild Card race.
Damien Rice leaned into the mic and mumbled, "This one is about messing it up even more than the previous," and he was into another delicate song about a broken love. Bed hair and all, he arrived on stage at the World Cafe Live a good half hour late - transportation troubles, they announced. He said he was a little disoriented - just awakened at 12:30 p.m. - his bus having traveled all night from his last gig, in New York City. You wonder what route they took.
It didn't matter. The eight songs he picked out to play for the full lunchtime house were spell-binding, whether it was Rice on the Rhodes electric piano, or gently picking his guitar, backed by a cellist, percussionist, bassist and Lisa Hannigan on vocals. This was really lovely stuff, even if he stuck to the "low songs," as he called them. He said he wasn't sure he could hit any of the high notes, given the indelicate hour. When he had to, though, he soared.
"A skinny, young, Gentile, Leonard Cohen," my English-prof pal observed, adding Irish and dreamy.
Ahmet Ertegun, visionary co-founder of Atlantic Records, died yesterday. He was 83. He'd been in a coma since falling backstage at the Beacon Theater in October, when the Rolling Stones were playing Bill Clinton's 60th birthday party.
Son of a Turkish diplomat, Ertegun helped shaped the careers of Ray Charles, Otis Redding, John Coltrane, Led Zeppelin. He added Young to Crosby Stills & Nash. He took a gospel singer and turned her into the Queen of Soul.
From the L.A. Times obit:
As good for you as transfat, second-hand smoke and watching Sixers games, it's Blinq's first annual, when-does-vacation-start, end-of-year, list of lists!
- Aquarium Drunkard
- Arts and Letters Daily
- ArtsJournal Blog Central
- Augasm
- Blogcritics.org
- Fluxblog
- Gawker
- I Am Fuel, You Are Friends
- Largehearted Boy
- Metafilter
- Motel de Moka
- NPR Music
- Romenesko
- Said the Gramophone
- Some Velvet Blog
- Stereogum
- The Awl
- THE TOFU HUT
- WFMU's Beware of the Blog
- When you Awake
- Der Spiegel Online
- Economist.com
- Global Voices Online
- Guardian Unlimited Newsblog
- signandsight
- Boing Boing: A Directory of Wonderful Things
- Dynamist Blog
- Gizmodo
- Slashdot News for nerds, stuff that matters
- A List Of Things Thrown Five Minutes Ago
- A Smoke-Filled Room
- Above Average Jane
- Afro-Netizen™
- artblog
- Attytood
- Balls, Sticks and Stuff
- Beerleaguer
- Blankbaby
- blonde sagacity
- Books, Inq.
- Changing Skyline
- Citizen Mom
- How Appealing
- Mere Cat
- Philadelphia Weather
- Philebrity
- philly
- Philly Burbs Blogs
- Philly Future
- slacktivist
- Suburban Guerrilla
- Swing and A Miss
- The BM Rant
- The Clog
- The Daily Jive
- The Phanatic
- The Smedley Log
- The700Level.com
- TheIlladelph
- This Urban Life
- Tom Gralish's Photo Blog
- Young Philly Politics
- CJR
- editorsweblog.org
- Online Journalism Review
- Poynter Online - Romenesko
- PressThink
- Reflections of a Newsosaur
- Second Draft by Tim Porter
- BuzzMachine... by Jeff Jarvis
- DeepBlog
- Joho the Blog
- Technorati
- The Daily Beast
- 538
- Booman Tribune
- Brad DeLong
- Daily Kos
- Digby
- Eschaton
- Informed Comment
- Instapundit
- Little Green Footballs
- My DD
- Pajamas Media
- pandagon
- Power Line
- The Daily Howler
- The Huffington Post
