Hey, sports fans. No doubt you've noticed that some people like some sports more than other sports. Since all sports are not created equal, I have decided to publish the first ever official grading of sports, so that everyone knows once and for all what the best sports are. Behold, the ReSPORT Card!

Baseball: Once America's pastime, the sport of baseball has suffered from strikes and scandals over the years. It is sad that we lived in the steroid era and had to put up with the McGwires and Bondses. But now it seems like the numbers are deflating and we're actually watching athletes play a sport again. People who don't understand the sport criticize it for being too slow, but with each pitch having its own strategy, and each pitch having the potential to be important, baseball is an exciting game. Added bonus: they play almost every day, so you always have something you can throw on if there's nothing else happening. It's also really fun to play, since most people have the ability to throw and catch a ball. I think.
Watch: A-
Play: A

Football: At this point, it seems like football is the favorite sport in America. To the point where it's annoying. They play once a week for a few months, but we have to sit through analysis and predictions and speculation for about 11 months out of the year. And the draft, how fucking boring is the draft? And the fans! Nothing else gets drunk fat men to attend games shirtless in freezing weather, or groups of people to act like every Sunday is Halloween. It's all a little much. That said, I like to watch football. While it's true that there's really not much action during the game, every play has the potential to be exciting, and games are often evenly matched enough that there aren't TOO many blowouts. And it is fun to sit around with some friends and watch, because it's got the right mix of action and sit-around-talking-time. It CAN be fun to play, if you have the right mix of people, but it can also be really frustrating if you're, say, 5'7".
Watch: A-
Play: C+

Basketball: There are people who really like basketball. I'll say this about basketball: It has more actual action than football. I'll also say this about basketball: It's super boring. I'm just not impressed by giant freaks of nature stuffing a ball into a hoop. Can I do it? Not easily. But then, I'm not seven feet tall. Watching these men with monstrous 12 foot wingspans stuff a ball in a 10 foot tall hoop just isn't entertaining. Add to that the hundreds of time outs and stoppages of play, especially at the end of the game, and you have something that's just not fun to watch. The WNBA is even worse. Playing it is another matter, as you and your buddies are probably normal sized human beings, and even your little buddy who isn't athletic can probably manage to get the ball through the hoop every so often. Just don't play shirts and skins. Nobody wants to see your moobs flopping all over the place.
Watch: C-
Play: B

Hockey: Before the most recent strike, hockey was my favorite sport to watch on TV. I loved the hits, the amazing goals, the amazing saves, the fights. The sport seemed to move quickly back and forth. It's like soccer done right - full contact, small scale, and fast moving. For some reason, since the strike, I haven't been able to watch hockey. Maybe it's because my teams (Avs and Thrashers) aren't consistently good enough to pay attention to. I still like to watch it, but just not at the same level. That said, they play about every other day, and if there's nothing else on, hockey is still a solid bet for a fun evening. I can't ice skate, so I can't say that I know how fun it is to play. It looks like a blast, but it gets docked points for being more specialized than the other sports on the list.
Watch: B+
Play: C

Soccer: Normally I wouldn't include soccer on a list like this, but since we just got wrapped up in "World Cup Fever" I thought I'd mention again how much I dislike this sport. The pros: It's never on TV, and the World Cup only happens every four years. The cons: It's super boring to watch guys kick a ball back and forth across a court that seems to be the size of Rhode Island. Nothing ever happens. 1-0 is an exciting game. Every so often you have to listen to someone talk to you about why soccer is the greatest sport in the world. Look, all the fancy footwork in the world can't save the sport from the fact that 98% of the awesome tricks don't result in goals. The "amazing" footwork that kept the other team from stealing the ball will just result in an intercepted pass in a few seconds. The header or bicycle kick will sail 30 feet over, to the left, or to the right of the net the vast majority of the time. Just like the vast majority of non-fancy kicks. I'm not saying I can do what these guys do - but my shitty footwork can result in 0-0 ties just the same. Playing it is more fun than watching it, especially since all you really need to be able to play it are the will and ability to run run run run and run some more.
Watch: F
Play: C+

I'd like someone to do a scientific poll to see if people who smoke cigarettes while driving are worse drivers than the rest of us. To me, it seems like people who smoke cigarettes in general are, for the most part, inconsiderate assholes anyway. I just notice that a large percentage of the time I'm behind some jackass driving 10 under the speed limit, swerving, and being a moron, after a couple minutes he or she will flick a cigarette out the window. Not to say that those are the only bad drivers on the road (please see: women in large SUV's talking on cell phones), but seriously. I'd like to know what percentage of smokers get in accidents versus non-smokers.

Now let's get down to business, shall we? Brass tacks, as they say for some reason. Show me the cheese, as I will from now on say. The time is now to commence with the subject of the day, and the subject of the day is decreed to be these new scanners at the airport. Maybe you've seen them.

That's pretty cool, right? A 3d image of a person being scanned that can catch all types of weapons, not just metal ones. It's like a metal detector, but way more thorough. Sorry, terrorists, your wooden knives and plastic bombs will no longer be able to terrorize us in the skies. The only objections to this technology should be that it takes a little longer than the metal detector. You do have to empty your pockets completely and stand in an awesome chamber for a minute in different positions in order to get all the images made. I saw one of these in Atlanta and wanted to go through it, but accidentally got in the wrong line. Luckily, they're coming to Denver, soon!

BUT WAIT! Here come the crazies! They're coming in to protest these magic machines of the future. What's their problem, you ask? That these machines show outlines of naked bodies! Hide the women and children, and head for the hills, because we all know what these new scanners are all about. Free porn for the TSA! Now that you know how raunchy and, well, just plain sexy those pictures are, go back and take a look at them again. And just try to keep your hands out of your pants. Those terrifying glowing aliens with outlines of penises and boobies really turn me... on?

Look, if someone at some point says mandatory strip searches for everyone before they get on a plane, I'll have an issue. And no, I don't necessarily want everyone in the world looking at my junk and fat rolls. But when faced with a choice of having someone see an outline of my body, or being killed in an airplane, I'll take the exhibitionist route. I'm sure that perverts know there are actual naked people available at millions of places online for free, and I don't expect an influx of sex freaks into the TSA. And even if there is, so what? The people who check these images sit in a different room, so they can't glance back and forth between your scary alien body and your real body to try to fill in the blanks. They will see hundreds of these images per hour. They're not going to save and print the hottest images for "review" later. And if they do, you won't know about it, so who the hell cares?

Seriously, people. Priorities. If you are so upset about someone seeing an outline of you naked that you're willing to risk your life and hundreds of others, maybe you should hit the gym.

In other news, Levi Johnson is making a reality show about running for mayor of Wasilla, AK. The only reality show I want to watch about anyone related to the Palin family is one where they get dropped off in the African savanna and get eaten by lions.

Well, shit. It's August -- wait, it's August? How'd that happen? There were at least two occasions in July when I was all set to post a blog update, but it just never happened. And so, for all intents and purposes for this blog, I did not exist during the month of July. I'm okay with that. Here's what I would've mentioned, had I not been such a slacker:

1. Infinite Jest. Still going strong, though I've slowed down my pace due to other things going on (see point number 2). The goal is to finish the book by August 14th, which is when I'm leaving to go to the Outer Banks. 12 days. About 300 pages. Should be easy enough, hopefully. Still an awesome, awesome book.

2. My off-off-Broadway acting debut. Huh? Yes. Got wrangled into performing in this really really really really really bad one act play. It was fun, but not for reasons that rehearsing should be fun -- instead, it came down to just making fun of how horrible the script was. But yeah, it had a one week run, five performances. Right in the heart of the theater district downtown in Manhattan. Crazy. I'm a superstar now, I should have you know. Part of the reason I was distracted during the end of July was because I was out partying with the likes of Brad Pitt, Angelina Jolie, and Paulie Shore. Good times!

3. Futurama. I'm glad it's back. It had a phenomenal return episode, then got a little bumpy as it found its feet again, but has steadily improved since episode 2. Last week's episode featured time travel, which is pretty much the way to win me over. (In anything. Entertainment, sci-fi, love.) Here's to hoping they've gotten whatever kinks out they needed to get out, and now they've hit their stride and will continue to go strong. Either way, I'm glad it's back. I do enjoy those characters very much.

4. American Idiot (the Broadway musical). My sister came up here to spend a few days palling around with me in the city before seeing my play and promptly leaving in the very early A.M. the following day. During that time, we got cheap tickets to see the new Broadway-ed version of American Idiot. Consensus? So-so. The good: solid soundtrack that doesn't suffer from too much Broadway-ization. A few songs are Broadway-ed up, but, for the most part, it's pretty good. I never really listened to the album, but it definitely make me want to go back and dig out the old CD. The bad: there's basically no book. It's like they assumed that the songs themselves were strong enough to carry three (!) storylines. The songs are good, but they're not THAT good. Also, don't even get me started on the main dude's talking voice.

5. Inception. I've seen it twice now -- once with friends, the other with my sister. I like it. Quite a bit, even. But I don't love it. It's a great excuse to set up four or five super awesome sequences, but the rest of it seems kind of uneven. Also, can we all agree that Ellen Page's character is hella annoying? And it's totally not her fault -- the script makes her an auxiliary to the story instead of a character. Still, totally worth seeing on the big screen for those cool shots alone. But it's already at the #3 slot on IMDB's top 250, and I don't agree with that. It deserves to be on the list -- somewhere in the top 100, even, for sure -- but #3? (And Toy Story 3 is still up there, at #10. Another movie that's good, but not THAT good. [I just did that "THAT" thing at the end of the last paragraph. Sorry.])

6. Concerts. Haven't been to any since the Josh Ritter one way back when, I don't think. But I picked up tickets to see the Avett Brothers at Radio City. Seems like an odd venue for them, but I'm excited. Show's not until October, though.

Okay, I guess that's about it. If I think of anything else, I'll intend to update this blog, but then put it off for a month.