Cru Jones Society

The annual CJS rendezvous was one society member shy as Hart had obligations that prohibited him from making the usually splendid trip. And while Dagger, Lady E, and Senor Limon were living it up without a care in the world, Hart was stuck in his craptacular routine. We decided to use today to share memories from the trip. Hart has supplied us with a comparison about his weekend to allow us to fully appreciate a good vacation. Continue Reading »

Part of the annual CJS Rendezvous is taking in a couple of meaningless baseball games in the beautiful March Arizona weather. Since we’re hooked up in Tucson, we’ve always been just a short hop away from Hi Corbett, and an across town jaunt to Tucson Electric Park. There’s nothing like pre-empting the end of the winter dregs with the refreshing tonic of warm weather, and the greatest game on the planet. You feel like you’re cheating nature. And you’re not alone. Per capita, spring training baseball draws more alarmingly old people than your average city council re-zoning meeting or Saturday morning trip to the bank.

And thanks to the incompetence of the City of Tucson, CJS has spent its last year enjoying Rockies pre-season baseball in our very own backyard. Here are some thoughts to send it off properly. Continue Reading »

The month of March usually means the annual CJS rendezvous in Tucson, unfortunately one of us couldn’t make it this year. But it did get us thinking about the places we visit every year without fail. And that got us wondering where some of your annual trips take you. So we asked: Where is one place you visit every year without fail? We received some great responses that take us all across the country. So grab your bags and let’s go! Continue Reading »

We don’t know about you, but this has felt like a long week. But now it has finally come to an end. We’re just a few short hours from beer thirty and we plan on killing the time with some time wasting links. We invite you to do the same. And why wouldn’t you? After all this week we have frogurt, the best dead guy ever, and of course more Oscar talk. So duck the boss, kick back, and read on. Continue Reading »

Since we’ve spent so much time this week discussing the best of the best, why not spend some time celebrating the worst of the worst? This Saturday, the day before the Oscars, your favorite celebration of achievement in shitty filmmaking presents its 30^th Anniversary spectacular. This year’s nominees for Worst Picture of 2009 include: All About Steve, GI Joe: The Rise of Cobra, Land of the Lost, Old Dogs, and Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen.

I’m sure not all of these movies are terrible, but I can say with certainty that I had no desire to see any of them except for GI Joe, and that’s mostly because Lady E wanted to see it. She wasn’t allowed to play with GI Joes as a kid, and therefore has always enjoyed the forbidden fruit.

Whichever film enters this *ahem* prestigious pantheon of suckitude, let’s take a look back at some of my favorite past winners. Not all of these movies are terrible, it’s just that… who am I kidding? These movies are pretty much terrible, but hold a special place in my heart. Let’s find out why… Continue Reading »

By this point we are all aware that I am essentially a child in a man’s body. Not so much because I act immature, though I do have my moments, but this young age of mine revolves more around my enjoyment of toys, cereal, and cartoons. Today I would like to focus on that last one. Continue Reading »

When the Oscars air on Sunday, most of the hubbub will surround the various fashion faux pas committed by celebrities urged to wear the nightmarish fantasies of batshit insane designers that foist bizarre, and insanely uncomfortable-looking twisted reams of gaudy fabric upon hapless celebrities hoping to be on the cutting edge of haute couture. For celebrity bloggers (a small notch below incurable lepers on the social scale), this is their Super Bowl and they’ll have a field day with haranguing these unforgivable trespasses against humanity. The world will weep for this incredible waste of time and energy.

Allegedly they also give out awards at this event, but we all know none of that matters (CJS’s week of coverage notwithstanding), considering after we skewer the event’s fashion choices, we’ve got a host to discombobulate as well. And this year we’ve got the unusual pairing of Steve Martin and Alec Baldwin. Continue Reading »

We’ll continue our Academy Awards week with a look at some of our favorite Oscar winning performances. Keep in mind my couple of years of high school drama in no way make me an authority on acting, but I know what I like. And this is in no way a list of the best actors to ever win an Oscar. That list would be filled with Daniel Day Lewis, Marlon Brando, and George C. Scott. No, these are just the performances that keep me coming back to these movies and want to check out other works from these thespians (sadly not as dirty as it sounds).

I can’t promise you I won’t give away any spoilers, but I will do my best not to. So consider this a warning. But with our pop culture, um, culture you probably know how these movies end whether you’ve seen them or not. But I digress, on with the show.

Now in no particular order, the winners are… Continue Reading »

We say a fond farewell to the Olympics here at the Cru Jones Society for two reasons: 1) For two weeks every other year, the country comes together and watches the same thing allowing for collective conversation unparalleled in the dry desert of fractured experience that happens in the interim; and 2) Generating daily content that everyone can relate to for two weeks is ridiculously easy. We’ll miss that.

Thankfully, right on the heels of these enormously entertaining Olympics is the cultural juggernaut known as the Oscars. Vacuous, petty, borderline evil people will debate about which celebrities looked worst on the red carpet while the film industry gives itself a big fat self blowjob on national television for all the great work it’s done this year (All About Steve notwithstanding).  So, to kick your anticipation into high gear, we asked you to look back at Academy Award history and share with us: What is your favorite Best Picture recipient of all-time? We got outstanding turnout in this week’s Confessional, so let’s not delay any further. Here are your picks for the best of the best. Continue Reading »

“Well, we’re doin’ mighty fine, I do suppose,
In our streak of lightnin’ cars and fancy clothes,
But just so we’re reminded of the ones who are held back,
Up front there ought ‘a be a Man In Black.”

Johnny Cash would have been 78 today and so this Friday post is dedicated to him, those he has inspired, and all those he was wearing black for. Johnny, thanks for all the great music

To honor Mr. Cash I just wanted to have a black screen up for the day. But I was told that was a stupid idea and was banned from talking for the rest of the meeting. Instead it was decided we would follow our usual Friday format and let you waste your morning, or afternoon, or whenever with a cavalcade of links. Some funny, some interesting, and some just wacky (also probably one about baseball, it’s been known to happen) whatever the case we hope you find one or two you enjoy. Continue Reading »

It wouldn’t be the Olympics on NBC without a giant cock slap of promotion across your face every damn night, now would it? Two years ago I wrote about the poor sap that has to schedule this rotating carousel of vomitous promotional excess with the following passage:

“People who work at television stations are generally insane as it is, they’re moreso during events with live coverage and repetitive commercials. This is especially true when a network is forcing a couple of  semi-wretched looking shows down everyone’s throat and has to air the promos for them to fill in during extra commercial breaks on top of the already excessive scheduled airings.”

Glad to see nothing has changed at NBC in the last two years. But what of the shows they’re force feeding us this year? Let’s take a look… Continue Reading »

On Monday night, the CJS tweeted the following: “Curling, man. Why can’t I look away? Every freaking day I’m watching this ridiculous shit.” That was me.

Despite Erin Burnett and Mario Bartiromo’s ridiculous hotness on their Today Show updates that I inexplicably watch each morning, I have no reason to even acknowledge CNBC’s presence as a network. Jim Cramer is a hollering fool, market wrap-ups have as much utility as your local fortune teller’s latest palm reading, and the stock ticker at the bottom is like an even less interesting version of the college basketball scores that endlessly populate ESPN’s bottom line during February.

Yet, for the last two weeks CNBC has been the network I’ve kept on most. Why? One reason: Grown men and women chasing after 40 lb. stones with brooms for sport.

I don’t know what it is about curling. It’s not terribly exciting. There’s no threat of violence. The sport has been called “chess on ice” which doesn’t normally lend itself to compelling television. And, depending on which nation is represented (and which gender), you’re rolling the dice with either hot chicks or frumpy-looking housewives pushing circular stones at a target several dozen yards away. In short, this seems like a sport that should immediately following the Professional Bowling Tour on ESPN2 each Sunday.

Yet, I can’t get enough of it. Continue Reading »

The Olympics are truly an amazing event. For two weeks they become the central focus for most people. The water cooler talks revolve around Shaun White’s big air, USA wining a sweet hockey game, or the fall of some ice skating couple. Never wanting to be left out, I too become consumed by the Olympics and my thoughts are overwhelmed in the spirit. But sometimes those thoughts don’t generate much and we wind up with some random musings, Olympic edition. Continue Reading »

The past few days of the Olympics have left me disinterested. I’m not sure if it’s because I blew my load on the U.S.A. versus Canada hockey game or if it has been the airing of events like ice dancing and ski jumping. Either way the past couple of days have bored me and I started thinking about some other events I would like to see in the Winter Olympics. I doubt these would make it, but it would be fun. Continue Reading »

We mentioned when we started our Olympic coverage that if you had something interesting about the Olympic you would to share to drop us a line. We are now happy to present to you an article from one of our readers who took us up on our offer. Please enjoy our special guest columnist, CJS regular Corriander.

Tight pants?  There are no tight pants in snowboarding!

Uniform styles have always been a hot topic in all sports and the Olympics are no exception.  There was a ton of attention directed at Michael Phelps’ new Speedo at the Beijing games.  Now we have our own controversies for the Vancouver games and some of them are just ridiculous.  Think that they have something to do with new technology (like the Speedo) or with competitive advantage?  If so, you are wrong. Continue Reading »

We remain balls deep in Olympics coverage here at CJS, and the time has rolled around again for your involvement. Last week we asked you about your favorite Olympic events, so this week we changed it up and asked: What Olympic event always seems like a good idea, but ends up disappointing you?

Think of this question as the once every four years cousin to making microwave popcorn, watching “The Soup,” or checking out Japanese porn – y’know, just to change it up for once – you think you’re going to have a great time, but just walk away unhappy, dissatisfied, and/or disgusted. Our answers are below, yours below that, and the slackasses who join us in the comments section all the way at the bottom.

So let’s make like we’re all virgins again and get disappointed. Only this time, we won’t have any sticky mess to clean up and we’ll be surrounded by awkward European people. What are we waiting for? Continue Reading »

It’s clear we have spent our evenings watching extended coverage of the Olympics. Unfortunately it’s not like four years ago when we were able to spend the days watching even more coverage, but we grew up and had to get real jobs. Though we wasted the week perusing the internet looking for Olympic coverage and in the process we found some other links about Quentin Tarantino, Roger Ebert, and some of our favorite non-Winter Olympic sports. Now position yourself on the starting block and go for the gold. Continue Reading »

Shaun White is the greatest living athlete of our generation.

After watching him obliterate the competition last night in Vancouver, the argument is closed. No one is doing the things Shaun White is doing on the halfpipe, and few are even anywhere close. And while it’s fun to marvel at Shaun White’s technical ability and limitless ability to push the boundaries of the sport he now reigns supreme over, that’s not even the best part of watching him. So, what is the best part?

In a word: Joy. Continue Reading »

If you need one reason why the Winter Olympics are superior to the Summer Games, you need only remind yourself of that miserable, angry hedgehog who calls the diving competition. I still have no idea what her name is, and frankly I don’t care because that would likely only angry up my blood even further. You know who I’m talking about. She’s the one that no matter how perfect a dive looks, she’ll find something miniscule to needle about it and project much lower scores than the diver will actually receive.

So when I make the following comparison, please don’t take it as a knock against the generally pleasant ski jumping announcer. He’s basically fine. But watching ski jumping is exactly the same as watching diving in the summer. Continue Reading »

Poor Lindsey. She had to put up with hackneyed criticism of her misguided hot-dogging for four years only to fall short once again at the Winter Games.

By now you’ve all heard this story at length and probably watched Jenna Bush (of all people) inexplicably try to interview Lindsey after she clipped that gate yesterday. We know how she feels, which is not to say we’re elite level athletes (although I did go to the gym last night where some bitch on the treadmill in front of me switched from Olympics coverage to local Fox news), rather, she’s behaving in a way very near and dear to our hearts.

Lindsey Jacobellis is acting out as many scenes from RAD as she can. We’ll explain. Continue Reading »