It's the WNBA Finals!

The WNBA Finals are happening right now.  If you knew that raise your hand.  Keep your hand in the air if you knew the two teams playing are Minnesota and Atlanta.  And that they are called the "Lynx" and the "Dream."  And if you can name one player.  If you're reading this and your hand is still in the air, I think you're lying.  Unless you're my sister who works for ESPNW, but even then I'm not so sure.  I did a little research just now and found out that Maya Moore from Uconn plays for Minnesota.  That's at least a name many people have heard of.  Also according to the box score on espn.com there were 15,124 people in attendance at game 2 on Wednesday night. And the photo to the right does seem to back that up.  So there definitely are fans that exist, I guess I just don't happen to know any of them.

In an episode of the office last season, Dwight Schrute said this: "What's the argument here?  NBA, WNBA.  One is a sport, one is a joke.  I love sports, I love jokes.  Room for all."  Now I'm not saying that I necessarily agree with that quote, but I do think it's telling that NBC was willing to write it into one of their most popular prime time shows.

Depending on reactions to this, I may or may not write a blog in the very near future about why I think I could play in the WNBA.

When did they start making pink grapefruit tic tacs?

When I was a little kid my grandmother always had tic tacs (I'm not capitalizing the t's in "tic tacs" because they don't do it on the box, and since I don't like capital letters anyway I figured this was a good opportunity not to).  Because of that I thought they were the greatest thing ever, and she would buy them for me whenever my family visited.  I remember when the orange ones first came out, and thinking to myself "Orange mint?  That sounds gross."  But as it turned out they were actually pretty good.  It's probably been at least 20 years since I last had a box of tics tacs, so I may be way late on this one, but when did the pink grapefruit flavor come out?  I just saw a commercial for them a week ago, and that was the first I'd heard.

I think I'm going to love these things.  On holidays when my whole family gets together, my mom makes two fruit salads.  One with grapefruit for me, and one without it for my sisters, because they think it makes the whole thing taste like grapefruit.  I want everything to taste like grapefruit.  Pretty much anything you put grapefruit in I love.  I think it may be my favorite flavor of any kind.  That's a weird thing to say.  I never thought of it before.  Do people have "favorite flavors?"  I know you do for things like ice cream or jelly beans, but for all things combined?

I'd heard that people actually did this, but I guess I never really believed it

I've read about it, and I've seen clips on youtube.  So I know that it's real, but I guess part of me never actually believed it till I saw it with my own eyes.  Last weekend I was walking by Boston Common, and I saw people playing Quidditch.  And I'm not talking about a few kids messing around.  There were teams in uniforms.  Referees with whistles.  Even fans sitting in the bleachers and cheering.  I can't really fathom how this is possible.

On the off that chance somebody doesn't know, Quidditch is a FICTICIOUS game made up for the Harry Potter books, in which wizards fly around in the sky on brooms.  The problem is that in real life, people can't fly.  So the kids who play Quidditch just run around on the ground instead.  This makes sense to me, except for the fact that they do it while pretending to sit on flying brooms.  I can't imagine how annoyed, uncomfortable, and stupid I would feel trying to run, throw, and catch, while also holding a stick between my legs.  Whatever is going on the heads of the people who enjoy doing this is something I obviously can't comprehend.

Am I looking at it from the wrong perspective?  Maybe it's just theater, and not a competitive sport.  And yeah, I know the picture sucks, but I was kinda scared to get too close.

The creepy Snickers Halloween commercial is back

This ad ran all the time last Halloween, and now it's back this year.  I don't really understand why, but something about the combination of the mask and weird voice is scary.  Like legitimately disturbing.  Does Snickers know this?  Are they doing it on purpose?  Everything about it looks like it's meant to be funny, but it's not.  It's freaky as hell.

Also, I'm not sure exactly why I'm writing about TV commercials so much.  I get the feeling people like it though.  Too bad there's not a job like "TV commercial critic," cause I could kill at that. 

Is this the best it's ever been in Wisconsin?

The Packers blew out the Broncos in Green Bay yesterday, 49-23.  The defending Superbowl champs are now 4-0, and tied with the Detroit Lions (yes, the Detroit Lions) as the only unbeaten teams left in the NFL.  On Saturday in Madison, the University of Wisconsin football team crushed formerly #8 Nebraska 48-17, and improved to 5-0.  Yesterday the Badgers moved up to #4 in the country in the AP poll.  And with the Brewers 9-4 win over the Diamondbacks last night in Milwaukee (and a 4-1 win on Saturday), they now lead the NLDS series 2-0.  It's the farthest the Beermakers have been in the playoffs in 28 years.  If you look on the map, Green Bay, Madison, and Milwaukee are all in the state of Wisconsin.  That's a lot of good stuff to happen in one state in one weekend.  Congrats Wisconsinites.

And for the record, before the comments start rolling in, obviously I knew the geography without looking at the map.  I just thought it was funnier this way.

Dwayne Wade is Delusional

I've been meaning to write about an interview I saw with Dwayne Wade on 1st and 10 last week, but the end of the baseball season took priority.  Anyway, his answers to their questions made me really appreciate how cocky and out of touch with reality some professional athletes can be.  Jay Crawford asked Wade if he regretted celebrating in front of the Dallas bench after hitting a 3 in game two of the Finals (at the time it gave Miami a 15 point lead, but it also seemed to inspire Dallas to come from behind and win both the game and the series).  Wade said "no," claiming that his actions had nothing to do with Dallas' play, and that Miami losing was just a breakdown on their part.  Crawford later asked him if he regretted the pre-season celebration/party the Heat had when they signed Lebron and Chris Bosh.  Again Wade said "no," because "Miami is a very poor community" and that was an uplifting celebration for them.

I just don't get it Dwayne.  What's wrong with admitting that maybe you did something wrong?  It makes you look more human, and less like an egotistical jackass.  Finally, Skip Bayless asked Wade whether or not he thought Lebron choked in the Finals.  Admittedly a tough question to answer (and I love that Bayless always asks questions like that, most reporters are usually afraid too), but all Wade could muster up was "he didn't have the finals that he wanted to have."  You think?  Kind of an understatement for the worst performance ever by a star player in the Finals.

Here is a clip of the full interview, it's kinda long and the first few minutes are just Wade trying to sell a product he endorses (obviously the reason he agreed to do the interview), start watching around the 3:30 mark.

This Heineken commercial is like the "Teen Wolf Too" to the original

The same plot and gimmicks used all over again, a weaker cast, not as good music; just a poor attempt overall to recreate something great (watch the original awesome ad).  But really, you can't expect to make that kind of magic happen again.