Monday, February 18, 2008

The Last Straw For Pittsburgh: I think I’m going to send the city the bill for my tire.

I hate to follow up such a fun topic like the rebirth of the art of the dunk in the NBA with a rant on pittsburgh, but alas I have no choice after tonight.

I’ve made it really clear that I’ve been less than thrilled with living in pittsburgh for the last 3 years or so, well tonight my frustration with this place hit an all time high and surprisingly it has nothing to do with anything at the law school.

Many of you have probably filed your taxes already, I haven’t yet, but will soon. I didn’t make much money in 2006, so last year when I filed I wasn’t charged any federal taxes, neither was I charged state taxes, but somehow the city of pittsburgh thought that it was such a privilege to live here that I should pay them $143.

I have no problem paying taxes, I love my county and think it deserves my financial support. Also, the state of PA has some nice areas that I wouldn’t mind financially supporting via taxes. But the idea that pittsburgh deserves money from me is crazy. If I could see one single area where they are investing this money to make my live here better then I would be perfectly fine with it, but as it stands the infrastructure of this place is falling apart despite the fact they will tax any activity you may want to do here. I’ve lived in much bigger cities which took care of their roads and other governmental responsibilities really well without any state or local taxes. So, this conundrum is what leads me to tell you my story from tonight.

Tonight I went out to watch wrestling at a local restaurant. As I drove there I swerved to avoid a traffic cone tuned over in the street. I was able to avoid the traffic cone, but still hit what I assume it was put there to help me avoid, a massive pot hole. I wasn’t driving all that fast, certainly less than 35 miles an hour, but as I continued to drive I could tell that my tire had been cut by the impact. Interestingly, just Friday I had heard on the morning news of another area where a pot hole had caused 8 flat tires in an hour. Obviously I wasn’t happy about the situation, but I was able to find an emergency pull off before I wound up riding on my rim. I changed the tire and wondered why the city hadn’t spent any of my $143 from last year filling any of their pot holes.

So, I make it to my destination on my spare and enjoy the show. As I head home I feel another bump, this time going less than 25 miles an hour, and surprise, surprise, I suddenly feel that I’m driving on a flat tire again. This time there wasn’t even a cone, even though I was on the same street. That’s right, pittsburgh’s roads are so bad that I got a flat tire from different pot holes on both my way to and from my destination.

It’s not like these pot holes are a rarity, the roads here feel like you’re driving on a gigantic asphalt piece of Swiss cheese. Also, there are quite a few man hole cover like things that aren’t level with the road. Get this, they constructed these things, made them not level with the road, and on top of that put them directly on the part of the road where your tire runs, not in the center of the road like anyone with a brain would have done. These things aren't bad enought to pop a tire, but are bad enough to really annoy you while you drive.

So, as a result of this insanity I have officially eliminated any possibility of staying in pittsburgh when my lease run out. Whatever small chance there was of me staying is now gone. I know some will say “but what if you get a great high paying job offer out of the blue that’s in pittsburgh?” To them I say this; get a stop watch and time me making world record speed as I run from this place no matter what.

Sunday, February 17, 2008

The Dunk Contest Is Back!

Back in the day the NBA Dunk Contest used to be like an oficial holiday for me and every other basketball fan. Then, somehow it got boring. So boring that the NBA actaully ditched it for a few years before bringing it back. Even since it returned it's never really been the same though, the prevailing theory is that essentially everything that could be done had been done. I watched last year only to see my man, Dwight Howard of the Magic, get robbed by the judges. This year I was so jaded that I spent the evening playing board games with some friends instead, but after hearing about what went down I realized I had to find some video online. Here are the highlights from NBA.com that show this generation of dunkers has brought creativity back. More importantly, below is the video of this years champion Dwight Howard finding a way to work my favorite team and favorite superhero into one dunk

Friday, February 15, 2008

Cool Story on Rambo 4

I went out and watched Rambo 4 back when it was released on January 25th. It was ultra violent, but it used that violence to hit on an important message regarding the civil war in Myanmar, formerly Burma. In interviews Stallone said that he wanted to shed some light on the the attocities in that region. This is a pretty neat video on the movie from CNN, apparently it's been banned by the government in Myanmar, but it's being passed around by those against military rule.

Sunday, February 03, 2008

Something tells me this book won't be hitting the shelves on February 11th

Hey guys, be sure to pre-order your copy of 19-0: The Historic Championship Season of New England's Unbeatable Patriots.
This just in, um, it's not coming out. I was wrong on my prediction earlier, but I don't care. Congratulations to the New York Giants and even more importantly to the 1972 Dolphins, still
THE ONLY UNDEFEATED TEAM IN NFL HISTORY

Super Bowl Thoughts

I figure I should give a few thoughts on the Super Bowl, so here they are;

- The Giants can win this game and it may well be close. The Pats have shown in a few games that even though they're undefeated they can be vulnerable. With all that said, the Pats will win. I'm not rooting for them, but they're a machine, a machine that just wins football games.

- I don't know if I'll enjoy the game, but I know I will enjoy Tom Petty at halftime.

- I'm watching Puppy Bowl IV right now and I've got to tell you, I would love it if Animal Planet changed their programming to the Puppy Bowl 24/7/365. I could watch it all day, it's like getting all the benefits of owning a cute precocious puppy without any of the actual work. If only they wouldn't show such depressing animal adoption commercials during the commercial breaks everything would be perfect.