9/11 Conspiracy Theorists Are Insane

Today is as close to a national day of mourning that we have in this country. It's been 11 years since the attacks on 9/11 but it's still somewhat fresh in the minds of many Americans, particularly those of us who lived in or near New York at the time. Of course, with time the impact of these attacks begins to lessen, and America's other national past time takes over: Wack a doo conspiracy theories. To be fair, a lot of these nutjobs were throwing around conspiracies since the day it all went down. Things have only gotten crazier though, especially since the kookie messages previously only transmitted to the true believers through decoded messages in their X-Box headsets, have now become if not widely accepted, at least tolerated by a small portion of society. I'd say the majority of rappers probably believe that 9/11 was an inside job ("Why did Bush knock down the towers") as do about 80% of CUNY professors. These people even have a name: Truthers! See, they're the yang to the "birther" movement's yin because as we all know, radical zealots on both sides need cute names to make themselves feel like they matter to anyone besides their world of warcraft team members or PCP dealers. And like any group of fringe lunatics they have a Bible of sorts, in the Truthers' case it's the low budget film Loose Change, a delightful romp that details how the US government didn't just mishandle the knowledge of the terrorist attacks in 2001, or even allow them to happen. No, that would be almost believable in a paranoid, delusional sort of way. These films go into great detail to prove that the U.S. government, spearheaded by those evil geniuses George W. Bush and Dick Cheney, blew the damn buildings up themselves. That whole plane flying into the building thing you might've seen? Hollywood level flim flam effects, all orchestrated by the US government so they could start a war in the name of oil. A little far fetched? Don't tell a truther that, or feel the wrath of their highly advanced brains, able to recite bullshit they read off a Wordpress site like it's actually not laughably stupid. If you do encounter one of these deep thinkers, wish them well and back off. There's that old saying about not arguing with a fool because from a distance you can't tell who is who, and that definitely applies here. Also, they're liable to stab you in the face with a screwdriver. Never forget that these people are idiots who you are much, much better than.

Who's Your Daddy? Best New York Sports Chants of All Time

Last Friday night, the Knicks blew out another miserable team at home, absolutely dominating a truly awful Wizards team. There was some controversy over whether or not the Wiz could beat Kentucky a couple weeks ago. After witnessing this game, I'm not sure they could beat Brooklyn College. Their girl's basketball team. One positive that came out of the extensive garbage time, however, was a new chant from the Garden crowd. This time it was "FORTY-SEVEN!" coming down from the cheap seats, a reference that at first escaped me (and apparently Steve Novak) to the score the Wiz were stuck on for close to an entire quarter of basketball. New york crowds often receive praise for being the most intelligent fans in sports (as well as some of the loudest) but we sometimes forget their mastery of the art of the group chant. We all know the basic chants: De-fense, charge, aaaashole. Those are all classics in their own right but from time to time we hear some truly inspired chants. It's easy to mess them up like that character on Conan O' Brien's show used to, but here are a few of my favorites.

"YOU"RE NOT JE-SUS"



That "LET"S GO YAN-KEES" rythym is so versatile any four syllables can be inserted in it's place and it sounds pretty good (besides We Want Tacos which is just bush league). Before Johnny Damon was a Yankees World Series hero, he was just another idiot on the eventual champion Red Sox with some decidedly un-Yankee like hair. Besides the great line "Looks like Jesus, throws like Mary" the Yankee Stadium bleachers also came up with "you're not Jesus" to try to get in his head. It mostly didn't work but was a great chant.

"UG-LY SIS-TER"


New York has known it's fair share of sports villains throughout the years but perhaps no one this side of John Rocker has inspired as much hatred amongst tri- state area fans of Reggie Miller. Just the sight of that monkey face on TNT still makes my blood boil. One silver lining to seeing Cheryl's more feminine brother every spring was a couple great chants. Of course there was "REGGIE SUCKS", "CHEEEERRRYYYYYLLLL" and the best of all "UGLY SISTER". Because nothing hurts a man worse than hearing 20,000 people simultaneously insulting your sister. And as you can tell by that horrifying photo, they weren't lying. This same chant was later used by Mavericks fans (amongst other Laker haters) when Khloe Kardashian's husband Lamar Odom was still an actual basketball player.

"WHO'S YOUR DADDY?"



Pedro Martinez was yet another Red Sox thorn in the Yankees' side for years. From the Don Zimmer fight to his many dominating performances against them to Grady Little fatefully leaving him on the mound an inning too long, Pedro and his Jeri Curl were smack in the middle of so much Yankee history. After a regular season loss to the Bombers, however, Pedro made the mistake of calling the Yankees his "daddy" and the rest was chant history that would last all the way until his reincarnation as a washed up pitcher with the Phillies in the 09 Series.

"POTVIN SUCKS"



We don't get into much hockey talk at PTU (and when I do I just make stuff up) but it's undeniable that hockey crowds know a good chant. One that's spanned decades is the ever present "Potvin Sucks" that is sometimes used to replace "Let's go Rangers" that refers to a guy who played for the Islanders 30 years ago. Like a good crosstown rivalry, a good chant never dies.

"WIIIIFE BEEEEATER"



Jason Kidd is one of the more respected veteran players now in the NBA but there was a time that he had some dirt on him. While his image is now pretty squeaky clean this wasn't always the case. During the early 2000s things were much different. The Nets were actually an exciting, fun team to watch that did nothing but win after replacing Stephon Marbury with Kidd at the point, and for a few years there dominated the Knicks (on the court if not in the papers). Present for most of the fun was Kidd's hot wife and weird looking child, sitting courtside until revelations about their domestic abuse were revealed, including Joumana throwing a cookie at Jason and Jason hitting her with a purse (or the other way around). Either way, they broke up and the Garden crowd was provided with a chant that was questionable in taste but truly insulting to Kidd. The way all great chants should be.

"FIRE ISIAH"



Simple yet gets the point across.

Women of Brooklyn, Don't Hide Your Butts

There's been a rash of disturbing sexual assaults in Brooklyn over the past few months involving tiny Mexican men jumping out at young women and groping them. It began in Bay Ridge and Sunset Park earlier this summer and continued throughout the southern end of Brooklyn in Park Slope. Most of these attacks have fit the same pattern: a short, Latino man with dark hair in his 30s (and is it any wonder that the search up until this morning has mostly turned up nothing? That description fits every Mexican in New York city) follows a girl in her 20s or 30s (or late teens) from a train station and either grabs their ass or breasts or engages in some other type of pervishness. From what I understand, this guy (or guys) is not out to actually rape any of these girls but gets off on the sick, cheap thrill of grabbing and running. If not, then they are really, really bad at rape. They don't get past first base before the victim hits them over the head with her purse and they scurry off into the night to plot their next attack or their early morning shift making salads at Pax. In no way am I trying to belittle these poor girls who have been attacked though. These assholes are the lowest form of scumbag, well, maybe not the lowest but they're pretty skeevey. Some controversy has arisen over how women should combat these attacks though. Recent urgings by the authorities of women to cover their butts have been met (understandably) with resistance and scorn by women's groups and most people I've talked to. The ol' "she was asking for it" defense doesn't fly today, and it's true that women shouldn't have to worry about their mini skirt from Forever 21 setting off sick impulses in South American men they pass on the R train. I don't agree with the slut walks, which seem to think that it's a woman's right to literally dress like a prostitute and basically act like a whore (that's pronounced who-uh) and seem to mostly be made up of chubby girls in their underwear, but I do think that telling a girl she shouldn't dress in a certain way because it will attract gropers is wrong. If girls have to stop wearing skirts because a handful of dirtbags can't keep their paws to themselves then the terrorists have won. Or at least the Mexicans have.

PTU Douchiest Neighborhoods in Brooklyn Power Rankings

L magazine, that pocket sized authority on all things hip and pretentious, recently ran their feature on the Brooklyn Neighborhood power rankings. I quickly glanced at it, so I'm not sure what their ranking system was. As opposed to New York magazine (which is also hip and pretentious but at least journalistically thorough) who had a complicated metric system to break down the order of their neighborhood rankings, L seems to just have ranked these in descending order from "where most of their art school classmates are moving" to "where most of their art school classmates are moving out of" to finally "where no one they would be caught dead speaking to would step foot in" aka Brownsville. Taking our inspiration from them, PTU proudly presents the Douchiest Neighborhoods in Brooklyn Power Rankings.

5. Park Slope

Park Slope held down the distinction as the first BK neighborhood to really make it for many years. By make it, I mean make it insufferable for normal Brooklynites to walk through without feeling like they've been transported to a land of yuppie couples, faux bohemian types (fauxhemian?) and of course, strollers. It's kind of a cliche now to make fun of Park Slope's stroller infestation (it's been parodied on at least 2 HBO comedies) but it doesn't make it any less true and annoying for us single bozos who hate children.

4. Bay Ridge

Sorry, Bay Ridge. We here at PTU have kind of a love hate relationship with you (M@d $cientist, you may want to skip ahead). You're still the most affordable safe neighborhood in Brooklyn, and you still provide so many memories for all of us. But you also are home to at least 3 active terror cells and some of the most douchiest fuck sticks this side of the Jersey Shore. Which is worse: the degenerate Arabs who wish they were Puerto Rican and while away their years on this Earth by hanging out in front of car services and McDonalds, hoping to one day grow up to be the next home-grown Jihadist just like their dirtbag parents or the spray tanned asshole with the Pauly D haircut and the Ed Hardy wardrobe that works out 9 times a week to stand around in Salty Dog and score blowjobs from Guidette nursing students? It's a toss-up for sure.

3. Bushwick

Bushwick was always regarded as one of those neighborhoods that you didn't want to wander through at any time, both for the local gang bangers or the Hasidic population. But over the past few years, those reviled hipsters have invaded East Williamsburg, bringing with them higher rents that their disappointed fathers will pay and the kind of "cool" buzz that gives unemployed organic smoothie makers a hard on in their skinny jeans. Bushwick Bill must be so ashamed.

2. Vinegar Hill

I'm not sure where this is, but it's called Vinegar Hill.

1. Williamsburg

That's right, the reigning champion of douchery, the Muhammad Ali of entitled hipsters, and the biggest reason that Brooklyn style is now considered to be something that looks like this: Williamsburg (or the even douchier nickname Billy Burg). With apologies to Hater J, who lived there pre-hippie takeover, Williamsburg has a couple things going for it; decent bars and restaurants, proximity to Manhattan. But it all pales in comparison to the extreme douche baggery that is on display every day in W'burg. Porkpie hat wearing pussies debating the works of Proust over PBR's and Hasidic Jews double parking make for one of the more annoying experiences you can have in New York. There once was a time that Brooklyn wasn't known for layabout artists and other similar morons, but now you can't separate the two. Brooklyn is hipster douches and there's nothing you can do about it besides write snarky, hate filled blog posts. 2 Broke Girls looks really annoying, too.

Honorable mention:
DUMBO (douchey acronym), Carrol Gardens (sorry Bottle, but kinda douchey), Sunset Park (perp douches), Brooklyn Heights (rich douches).

Manhattan Mini Storage Ads Reviewed

If you've had the privilege of taking the subway in New York city over the past 8 or 9 years then you're probably familiar with a particular storage company even though you've never stored a damn thing in one of their units. Manhattan Mini Storage has cornered the market on sometimes funny, often political, always everywhere subway ads. Even if you don't know exactly what they're selling, those familiar ads have burrowed their way into your subconscious. The BIG BLOCK LETTERS and an abstract picture of something related to whatever the theme of the ad is, and that now familiar logo alongside the 29$, free move. What truly sets MMS apart from other local ads on the trains and through out the city is the willingness to push their political agenda whenever they can. I'm pretty liberal (I guess) and I find most of these kind of annoying. While most companies try to stay as bipartisan as possible in order to not alienate any potential customers, MMS knows they can get away with it in liberal Manhattan, while at the same time portraying a hip, edgy quality. Let's take a look at a handful of the more memorable ads to grace the N train and piss off your conservative friends and family.


Probably the most striking of the MMS ads, this particular one wasn't confined to the iron horse, but was actually a giant billboard overlooking the West Side of Manhattan. Again, these guys really don't give a fuck about normal marketing strategies. Advertising 101 would tell you: "Illegal abortion involving coat hangers is not an image that will help sell your product" (unless you were selling illegal abortions I guess). It is a clever visual joke (the coat hanger works doubly for the closet space reference and the abortion thing) but on the annoyingly liberal meter this one still scores extremely high.

5 rusty coat hangers out of 5



Some of these seem like relics from an ancient civilization where government bashing was the norm for snarky hip types. This particular ad was pretty lame. For one thing, the opposite of narrow isn't liberal, and they're mixing metaphors like a motherfucker here.The I heart Halliburton button is also annoying. If you didn't understand who Cheney meant, then you probably won't get the allusion to that. One of the worst ads in the collection, as he was one of the worst Vice Presidents of all time (see what I did there?)

2 out of 5 Water Boarders




Another tenuous analogy involving the Bush administration and how shitty your closet space is. Not very creative, but as annoying to a conservative New Yorker as Rachel Maddow. The manila folder with "war secrets" is a nice douchey touch.

1 Michael Moore baseball cap out of 5



This one's very recent and topical. You may have heard that the gay types had wanted to get hitched but some fuddy duddies in Washington wanted to rain on their gay parades. This ad is kinda straightforward but not as controversial as some of the others. It conveys the message that I think most people agree with these days: Why is it anyone's business if someone wants to marry a dude? Gay marriage doesn't affect you. These are the new school MMS ads that shun the message related image in the background for plain block yellow letters over a blue background, so no two guys on a wedding cake or anything to really hammer home the point.

4 out of 5 Lady Gaga t-shirts



Another new school entry, this one's gotta hurt for any long suffering fan of New York's most shitted on team. Imagine the rage that something like this must inspire in the beleaguered Mets fan on his way home on the 7 train from another ugly loss against the Marlins or some other minor league team. The last thing you need is to be mocked by the subway advertisements that usually provide you with such joy and comfort. At least Dr Zizmore never makes fun of your crappy fashion sense.

3 out of 5 Ike Davis Bobblehead dolls.




And finally, maybe the least political of any of Manhattan Mini Storage's ad lineup, but the one that basically sums up their attitude. Nothing says obnoxious liberal hipster like a kickball trophy, except a joke about the kickball trophy falling on your baby. I'm no stranger to cruel humor, so the baby thing doesn't really bother me (yeah, I laugh at dead babies), but the kickball trophy really turns my stomach.

5 out of 5 vegan barbecue restaurants

RIP RXP: They Don't Wanna Rock

New York radio station 101.9 (RXP) announced this week that they will be changing formats beginning next week, switching from it's current format of "alternative" rock music to 24 hours of news aimed at 40 year old women (?). With that, there are (once again) no modern rock stations in New York, the biggest market in the country. What are we left with?

• Z-100 and KTU- the dominant radio stations in New York, that basically play whatever 14 year old girls listen to.
• Hot 97 and Power 105- that mostly plays southern rap that talks about cocaine.
• Q104- that plays the same Pink Floyd and Creedence Clearwater songs on a loop for the past 40 years.
• Lite FM-the soundtrack at any dentist's office.
• Mega and La Calle- Spanish stations that are usually played in bodegas.
• QXR- The classical music station that is played at certain Asian tailors and dry cleaners.
• Conservative talk radio- the majority of AM stations are further to the right than Joseph McCarthy.
• ESPN and WFAN- Sports radio that your dad listens to in the car.
• Kiss FM- Station that older black folk listen to who don't like cocaine (at least don't like people rapping about selling it).

What's missing from that vast, sad musical landscape? Rock n roll, of course (or at least modern rock, unless your idea of "modern" is whenever Slippery When Wet was released). Since Howard Stern decided he didn't want to have his naughty words bleeped out, thereby taking down KROCK with him, there's been a rocking void in our city. KROCK wasn't all that great but at least you could turn it on at some point and maybe hear a Nirvana song or the occasional Tool song that you don't mind that much, but RXP was more like a cool ipod. It's without a doubt the only station around here that played Arcade Fire and Pixies records on a regular basis, as well as being a legitimate station for underground and unsigned bands to get some shine. They recently played my cousin's very good up and coming band (shameless plug) Last Stand for Lucy's singles, and I'm pretty sure that won't happen on Elvis Durant's show any time soon. Besides the more hip stuff that you could find on one of those college radio indie shows, though, RXP also wasn't afraid to have unhip bands on their playlists. I attended a Weezer show in December sponsored by the station and hosted by bald music geek Matt Pinfield, and that's the type of band that you won't see at Jingle Ball but are also past their hipness expiration date for those other cool stations. On any given hour, you could hear Pearl Jam followed by The Cars, and then some Gogol Bordello right after that. I guess anyone could get that on Pandora or through their I pod jack, but there's something about turning on a radio in your car or at home that's unlike just listening to your own self-tailored digital playlist. Unfortunately, the kids don't want to rock anymore, so New York is robbed of rock radio yet again. Turn up that Michael Savage.

RIP RXP

Top 5 Local New York Commercials

In conjunction with their new series about kooky local commercials, the IFC channel is running a local commercial contest celebrating the best and cheesiest in local cable commercials that we all simultaneously love and hate. You know the type of ad that runs incessantly during any Knicks or Mets game or the kind of commercial that you're forced to watch ad nauseum if you want to see what the girls on Beer Money are wearing that day. Usually filmed on a budget of what appears to be the price of a bagel (without cream cheese), and a cast seemingly made up of family members and office receptionists, these commercials work themselves into your brain with their cheesy charm, until you would probably hug Dr Zizmore if you saw him on the street. These are my 5 favorite commercials that can only be seen in the tri-state area or if you have NBA League Pass:

5) The Grand Prospect Hall

So this place isn't really a bad place for a wedding reception (I've been there) but the seriously wooden "We will make your dreams come true" makes this a classic cheesy Brooklyn commercial. A nominee in the IFC contest, as well.

4) Dial 7 Car and Limo

Oh, how this commercial has haunted my dreams on many a cold winter Brooklyn night. Maybe I'll be in the other room grabbing a beer or sandwich while Mike D'Antoni calls another rally killing timeout, and then I hear it: "Taxi, taxi, TAXIIIIIIII!". Despite the fact that no one in any city anywhere has ever hailed a taxi by repeatedly yelling "TAXI" like a lunatic, this commercial somehow made it past Dial 7 car and Limo's usually strict advertising standards. The zoom into the guy's mouth is pretty horrifying too.

3) Keith Hernandez for Coin Galleries of Oyster Bay

On any given day, the mustachioed first base man can be seen on Mets broadcasts, TBS MLB broadcasts and the Seinfeld reruns that run on about 15 other cable channels, but if you can't get enough Keith, he's also prominently featured in these shoe string budget Long Island jewelry ads. I figure he either owed a favor to someone, is a coin enthusiast or doesn't know how to turn any television offers down. It's probably a combination of all three of those.

2)Gary's Gutters

Not much to say about this one except I think Gary is trying to be funny here (at least I hope he is). There's a lot of stuff going on here that even the whitest, least hip hop savvy person can have a laugh at, like the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air font or the goofy chain that he's wearing that one of the youtube commenters rightly points out looks like copper paper clips. It sounds like a bootleg version of Rapper's Delight but Gary obviously can't afford to pay the Sugarhill Gang for the actual song so instead it was probably a beat redone by a 13 year old in Kansas with frooty loops. R-0-0-F...Moving on...

1)Hillside Honda
The epic saga of the Hillside Honda couple has captured the hearts and minds of New York cable subscribers for the past few years, or at least has had thousands of dudes googling Hillside Honda girl. Somewhat of a cult figure in New York and at PTU, what I can imagine began as a one time commercial featuring the cheapest actors Honda money can buy has turned into a full on romance serial. To break it down: First, the guido guy meets super hot girl and then instead of asking for her phone number he just wants to log on to Hillside Honda.com (loser), the coy approach must have worked because in subsequent commercials, they're shacked up, laying on a bear skin rug or something and the most recent edition finds the two back in that Honda chatting it up like an old married couple. The Before Sunrise of cheesy local commercials, and the introduction of America's sweetheart, the Hillside Honda girl. Hondas are still shitty cars, though.

Have any other favorite lame-o commercials that you have seen or are in? Let it be known.

Taxi Cab Confusions

There's been some controversy in our home town of New York lately involving the yellow cab drivers and the livery cab drivers (or as people in Brooklyn refer to them, Car Services, or if you're driving behind one of them simply "asshole"). While illegal, it's a long standing practice of car service drivers in the outer boroughs to stop and pick up customers on the street just like their more formal yellow brothers do, which of course infuriates the hacks to no end. What's really got them pissed is a proposed bill that would legalize these street pickups. They feel this eats into their business, that is the business of picking up every 5th person who hails a cab as long as they live within 2 miles of where they pick you up and aren't black or hispanic. This is what I don't understand about the Yellow Taxi driver's beef: you're more likely to see a unicorn than a yellow cab picking people up in an outer borough. What do they care what the liveries do in some foreign land that they would never pass through? If you open a pizzeria that only delivers to Flushing, why would you get mad when Papa John's opens in Harlem? The livery cabs are satisfying a need that yellow cabs have neglected since Andy Kaufman worked in the garage.

Attempting to hail a cab to Brooklyn on most evenings in Manhattan is like trying to hitchhike naked holding a shotgun. There must be hundreds of off duty taxi cabs on any given night and they all travel in the same area (usually wherever I happen to be coming from that night). Ask most drivers to take you to Brooklyn and you would think you invited them to a sleepover at the Marlboro Projects. They peel off like Indian Dukes of Hazards. And this is if you're white. As I alluded to earlier, most car service drivers are a pain in the ass to drive behind, and they definitely employ their fair share of sketchy characters, but I'm on their side all the way here. Not only are they more efficient and cheaper than the yellow cabs, but they also have a tendency of DYING ON DUTY. Livery cab driver is only slight less dangerous than Alaskan crab fisherman and New York Mets infielder. They don't have the bulletproof glass to protect them either. NYS Taxi Federation president Fernando Mateo invoked the danger aspect in his impassioned speech yesterday, and it's pretty sad that he's right when he says every year they bury a great number of drivers. This isn't police or firefighters we're talking about here, it's a car service driver. But, if they want to risk their lives by picking up any old schmo off the streets, I say more power to 'em. If the yellow cab drivers feel like they'll be left out in the cold if the bill becomes a law, maybe then they'll know how the rest of us feel.

The New York City Subway: Still Grimy

Ah, New York City. The Big Apple, home to everyone from everywhere who's trying to chase their dream. It's a well known fact, bemoaned by us native NYers to the point of exhaustion to anyone who does or doesn't want to listen, that our home town ain't what it used to be. Johnny and Jilly Hipsterpants have taken over the outer boroughs to the point that the person whining about gentrification is starting to sound like those gay marriage opponents: It's a fact of life that you just have to accept at some point, even if you find it personally offensive. The invasion began a long, long time ago when most of us were still in jean shorts and Catapults. By now, a whole generation has grown up knowing Brooklyn (and other parts of the city) as artist and yuppie havens. As I've mentioned before, this has it's pros and cons (safety vs character basically) but for all those lovers of all things old and crappy, New York still has one remnant of the dangerous old days:

The NEW YORK CITY SUBWAY

Sure, it's not as dangerous as the 70s or 80s when you were as likely to get knifed in the gut as you are unlikely to get a seat on the 6 train during rush hour today, but every day for us commuting straphangers is another race against the clock to escape death or at the very least, a homeless person shitting themselves. Even if Times Square now looks like something Michael Eisner would hallucinate after a Salvia binge, the subway station is still a hot, muggy, grimy cesspool of diseased homeless people and pissed off commuters just like it's always been. And by muggy I mean there are a lot of people down there who want to mug you. There might be less graffiti down there, and there aren't as many marauding gangs looking for thrill kills or initiation beat downs, but everyone who's lived here for at least a year or two has a story about a close encounter with a naked crack fiend or screaming lunatic racist (who is probably also naked). Every girl that I know has numerous stories of homeless dudes (or even pervs who have homes) jerking off in front of them. If that is not an incentive to stay in Wisconsin and enjoy the lower cost of living, I don't know what is. And then there's the rats. This video may or may not be staged, but it combines the two key elements of subway travel in New York: sleeping homeless people and giant brown rats. That might as well be the MTA's slogan.

All this might make it sound like I hate the New York city subway system (and I do) but one aspect of the subways that's kind of cool is it might be the last real example of the New York City "melting pot". While most neighborhoods in and around the city are either homogeneously ethnic or are that common mix of new school out of town hip folks and original residents who are either left behind or refuse to go anywhere, the average subway station crams hundreds of different people together like sardines spanning every race, tax bracket, shape, size and color. A Benetton ad of people who hate their lives and each other, avoiding eye contact and trying to read Junot Diaz or Sistah Souljah (depending on their race) with a 300 pound Guatemalan's elbow lodged in their stomach and praying to Allah or Christ that there aren't "station delays" and that the guy in the bike shorts in his bare feet during a snow storm is just harmless crazy and not "stab you in the brain" crazy . Sinatra couldn't have said it better.

RIP Bill Gallo

He may have appeared to be 150 years old and his sensibilities were maybe even older than that, but I can't remember a day growing up that I didn't see one of his cartoons in the morning paper or a Sunday without his article about talking boxing or Yankees in some barber shop that probably existed in the 50's. The cartoons were not actually funny and they usually stated the obvious, but they still had an old fashioned charm to them, and were kind of comforting in a mostly cynical sports world. While smart alecks like us here at PTU spend most of our days thinking of new ways to hate on the athletes we watch, or rant about the things that piss us off, Gallo would just draw another harmless cartoon like this:



That's not particularly funny or insightful. It just says that LeBron will probably be hiding next time he returns to Cleveland because the fans will be mad at him. That's it. But that's the era that Gallo was from; not a post-modern, extra sarcastic internet journalist who would probably place LeBron in a larger context, or purposely exaggerate the evilness of a young athlete (even if he did unintentionally make Bron look like Bin Laden) who left for another basketball team, just tellin' it like it is: LeBron left the Cavs, and now the fans in Cleveland will be mad at him. He also had a bunch of old timey characters who spoke like they were straight out of Our Gang: Basement Bertha, General Von Steingrabber (which Steinbrenner supposedly hated and then grew to love), lil Yuchie and maybe his favorite, two kids talking sports on a stoop or in a candy store. He also had a lot of out dated ideas in his cartoons like the fed up housewife in the apron who's husband is glued to the tv watching sports or even the idea that two kids would sit on a stoop or in a candy store and talk about anything as opposed to being on facebook or twitter or texting each other. He probably never heard of Twitter and that's cool. Unlike gas-bags like Lupica who force their sappy nostalgia for the good old days, this really was what Gallo was about. An old-school New York sports guy who wasn't anything like most of us, but that's exactly why he'll be missed.

RIP Bill Gallo.

The Battle For Uptown Supremacy

For a city long considered the "mecca" of basketball, New York hasn't had a tremendous number of home-grown stars in recent years. While you can find a hoop every couple of city blocks, the southern states have taken over as, by and large, the main source of talent. There's a lot of theories as to the lack of New Yorkers who make it at the highest levels of hoops, be it the all flash/no fundamental games that some seem to label NY players with, or the fact that players from other areas shoot better (our rims have no nets), but whatever the reasoning, our city has been severely underrepresented in both the pro and college ranks for a while now. I'm sure this bothers absolutely no one outside of New York, since they all think we're self-absorbed douche bags to begin with.

Well, for one night at least, the country will be watching three of the Big Apple's own douche bags: Harlem's Lamont "Momo" Jones and Bronx bred Kevin Parrom for Arizona vs. (PTU favorite) Uconn's Kemba Walker of the Soundview projects in the BX, in the elite 8 tonight.

Harlem and the Bronx, besides being geographically close, have some other similarities. While Harlem may be a little flashier (c'mon, Momo Jones just sounds like the name of a 1970's pimp) residents of the two uptown areas tend to pride themselves in their swagger (people from outside of the tri-state, and even some within might call it cocky). And you can see that quality in all three of these guys. Maybe this cocky attitude is part of the reason you don't see as many NY players make it as it can border on uncoachable arrogance, but for our purposes we'll think of it as swagger.

Team mates when they played together at traditional NY basketball powerhouse Rice High School, BFF's Jones and Walker should know each other's games pretty well, but don't expect to see the two best buddies guard each other much (Jeremy Lamb or Shabazz Napier will be on Momo. Shabazz vs. Momo might be the ultimate first name matchup). You might, however, see one-time St. Raymond's star Parrom take a crack at slowing down Kemba. Perhaps that wording isn't how he should be instructed to guard Kemba though, since he has been known to punch people in the face.

Whoever wins tonight, it will be nice to see some New York born ballers get a little shine for once. Hopefully, these three have careers that are more Artest and Odom than Omar Cook and Felipe Lopez. Oh yeah, and some other guy who's not from New York plays for Arizona too but who cares about him?

PTU Old Man Rant: What is Wrong With These People

I was reading the NYTimes today when I came across something interesting in the real estate section. It had a link to a blog called "Urbanbaby.Com", a place where cool hipster parents can get together to talk about their new strollers and how to buy their kids into the best pre-K class. The article referred to the post you can find here.

"I want to say thank you to all of you. I posted a few weeks ago about my guilt around having my family subsidize my life by giving me enough money to buy a new larger apartment in Manhattan. I always wondered what friends or colleagues secretly thought but by hearing from anon strangers who had no need to "be nice" I realized that people don't think less of me (I do work and we pay our monthly bills) and I should shut up and enjoy it. It has been genuinely more liberating for me than years of therapy, so THANK YOU UBERS!!!!"


Are you serious that you need this level of acceptance and confirmation of your lifestyle? Is it not enough that mommy and daddy support your 40 year old ass and your family so you can have a big apartment to show off to you friends? Now you need your fellow yupsters to validate your lifestyle?

Listen, I know a lot of people who may have had some help from their parents, but they just appreciate this and enjoy life. Only an insecure loser would take money from mommy and daddy and then beg for validation on a yuppie website.

Stop embarrassing yourself and grow a set of balls like previous generations of Americans.

New Taco Tuesday Record

Congratulations to M@d Scientist, who last night set a new PTU record for tacos eaten during Taco Tuesday at Hop Devil Grill on St. Mark's. In a performance that would make Kobayashi cower in fear, M@d dominated churiso, beef and chicken crunchy and soft tacos like a true champ, downing an astonishing 45 in a half hour*.

This greasy, dead sea scroll looking thing is the damage done last night. It's kind of like looking at the box score from Wilt's 100 point game, only 100 times more dominant. M@d arrived late and had a limited amount of time, so it would be like Wilt entering the game in the 4th quarter and still hitting the century mark. I can only imagine what the toilet bowl at the slob den must look like this morning.



Salute to the M@d Scientist, PTU taco champ!

*a slight exaggeration