What is Erykah Badu saying in her new music video for her single, “Window Seat“? (Click image to view.)

She’s protesting free speech with her naked booty?

She seems to have a lot to say. And it’s a shaky truth.

One should not “Group Think” this one too much, but it seems evident that Ms. Badu wants us to think about JFK and the reality of social delusion. And her booty.

Thank you, Ms. Badu, for your courage. Now, explain that public booty-shaking session for us, please.

                          

The abysmal Pittsburgh Pirates of Major League Baseball are at it again. With a record of 46-66, they are 20 games below .500.

That’s just 2009, so far. The Pirates are the worst franchise in all of professional sports, with even a close-second Los Angeles Clippers having had winning seasons in 2005-2006.

After the 1992 season, manager Jim Leyland was hoping to rebuild the team with younger, more hungry players. In a flummox to Pirates fans, their team has been unable to come up with a winning season since, accumulating a 16-year losing streak.

This current losing season streak has tied the Philadelphia Phillies, who had losing seasons from 1933–48, the longest in any of the country’s four major professional sports leagues.

Bring back Willie Stargell, Dave Parker, Kent Tekulve, Phil Garner, Bill Madlock, and Omar Moreno. And Three Rivers Stadium.

Thirty Years since the “We Are Fam-i-ly” cheers, and the funny box hats.

Miss some Big Willie. And Three Rivers, of course.

                          

John Hughes
(February 18, 1950 – August 6, 2009)

John Hughes created some of the most endearing films of the 80s and 90s, including National Lampoon’s Vacation, Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, Weird Science, The Breakfast Club, Some Kind of Wonderful, Sixteen Candles, Pretty in Pink, Planes, Trains and Automobiles, Uncle Buck, and Home Alone.

Many, many, many lines of dialogue emerged from this man and his creative mind. Just a few here:

Breakfast Club (1985)
Andrew: We’re all pretty bizarre. Some of us are just better at hiding it, that’s all.

Pretty in Pink (1986)
Blane: You couldn’t buy her, though, that’s what’s killing you, isn’t it? Stef? That’s it, Stef. She thinks you’re shit. And deep down, you know she’s right.

Ferris Bueller’s Day Off (1986)
Ferris: Hey, Cameron. You realize if we played by the rules right now we’d be in gym?

Sixteen Candles (1984)
Jake: Happy birthday, Samantha. Make a wish.
Samantha: Well, it already came true.

Thank you, John Hughes. An auteur of alternative imagination, and a kind soul.

                          

The dude abides. Lance Armstrong is an exceptionally gifted athlete with an extraordinarily profound path in life.

As the world’s premier cyclist in 1996, he was diagnosed with testicular cancer that spread to his lungs and brain. Advanced chemotherapy treatments stabilized the malignant cancer, and he’s been in remission since this time of recovery and rehab.

Lance’s LIVESTRONG Foundation has become an incredible institution in the battle against cancer, with the ubiquitous yellow bands now commonplace in work and school environments.

His “Ride for the Roses” event in Austin, Texas has created a place for his local riders to support and take part in his foundation’s ongoing efforts against cancer.

At 37 years of age, a cancer-stricken Lance Armstrong finished third at the 2009 Tour de France.

This is an otherworldly accomplishment with a perfectly healthy body, much less a 37-year old bag of bones.

Lance Armstrong is a great example of what it means to LIVESTRONG. For this, Lance Armstrong is my hero.

                          

Hurley U.S. Open of Surfing is happening this week at the always entertaining Huntington Beach Pier in Huntington Beach, Ca.

Surfline forecasts are calling for a nice southerly swell of 4-6 feet to start Friday and continue through Sunday, apparently the latter end of a southern Pacific storm from last weekend.

The U.S. Open of Surfing has made its home in Huntington Beach, Ca. since the early 60s, beginning with the south pier competition in the 50′s. According to the Hurley website:

“Fifty years at the Pier began in 1959, when the West Coast Surfing Championships (WCSC) became the biggest surfing event in the country – if not the world. HB local Jack Haley won the first event while the legendary Linda Benson took women’s. This was the beginning of a long tradition of competitive drama along the 300-yard stretch known as the ‘South Side.’“

Good buds and tasty waves in the warm July, Southern California sun. Check out 18-year old, lady surfer Coco Ho as she rides her way into the weekend heats.

                          

The recently released Soul Power documentary captures the state-sponsored 1974 concert in Zaire that set the stage for Muhammad Ali and George Foreman‘s legendary “Rumble in the Jungle.”

What a spectacle of soul-infused musical bravado. In the midst of Vietnam, Nixon, Civil Rights, and a miserable economy, Don King and James Brown pulled off the impossible, just like Ali, in the middle of war-torn Zaire. That’s some Soul Power.

Soul Power is produced and directed by Jeff Levy-Hinte, president of Antidote Films, who was also the producer-director of the Oscar-winning documentary When We Were Kings (1996). Most of the Soul Power footage was uprooted after the production of When We Were Kings. All this gloriously funky footage has been waiting nearly 35 years to see the light.

Soul Power keeps your head bobbing by showcasing these historic performances from funk, soul, and R&B legends like B.B. King, Bill Withers, and the kinetic madman and self-professed Sex-Machine, James Brown, whose early-70s single of the same name lends the film its title.

Using notable cinematographers, Albert Maysles and Paul Goldsmith, to lend the documentary a gritty but stunning style verité, the footage captures the Don King-promoted Rumble in the Jungle’s political and personal spirits in all their vivid intensity.

Can you say, “Gonna have a funky good time…”?

                          

Heroic displays of courage are commonplace in professional boxing. Arturo “Thunder” Gatti boxed in some of the most dramatically contested matches of all time, his fights nominated for the Ring Magazine “Fight of the Year” an astonishing six times — and won four times.

The most famous of all these fights is the Mickey Ward vs. Arturo Gatti war on May 18th, 2002.

To start the ninth round of this eventual Ring Magazine 2002 “Fight of the Year,” Mickey Ward hits Arturo Gatti with a left hook that breaks Gatti’s ribs. Ouch! But Gatti gets up, and just when Mickey thinks he has Gatti beat…

View the YouTube video of the 9th Round of Mickey Ward vs. Arturo Gatti – I.

The LA Times is reporting that Arturo Gatti was found dead in his hotel room yesterday, July 11, 2009, the victim of apparent homicide. Evidence at this time points toward his Brazilian wife, who he was seeking separation from.

Arturo Gatti was a man who knew no fear, who challenged himself constantly to be the best boxer and the best person he could be. He was human, full with flaws and imperfections.

A typical Arturo Gatti quote:

“I was feeling healthy, but you never know what’s going on inside your body. I just didn’t know what was going on. I was feeling good, but sometimes, because I have a big heart, my attitude is I always feel good. I don’t want to go to the hospital for nothing.”

But the “heart” of Arturo Gatti is something a boxer can never learn. Arturo “Thunder” Gatti will always be known — like Diego “Chico” Corrales — for having the courage and determination of a champion.

No man could break world-champion Arturo “Thunder” Gatti‘s heart, but a woman did.

In the words of Charles Bukowski, “Many a good man have been put under the bridge by a woman.”