Weekly Update.

(WARNING: No naked chicks below)

– Da Mystery of Chessboxin’: Come see Mark Lee’s friend Jaron Carter fight in his first (and last??) amateur bout at BB King’s on Thursday, April 8th.  It’s for the Corporate Challenge Boxing charity event.

• Roy Jones Jr, the reason I love boxing, got beat by Bernard Hopkins on Saturday night.  It’s a sad day for Blake as he watches his idol continue his downfall (kidding, I didn’t watch it).  He should have retired 5 years ago, but he just couldn’t.  Roy was great when he had his speed, it made up for his lack of technical skill.  Once that speed was gone, the great one fell.
• David Haye made John “Punch Once, Cling, Repeat” Ruiz’s corner throw in the towel in the 9th round.  B-Hop called out Haye, but Haye wants either one of the Klitschkos.  B-Hop needs to shut up considering his last fight (see above) drew less than 7,000 spectators.
• On April 10th, my third favorite current fighter, Andre Berto, faces Carlos Quintana.  Roughly four or five years ago (yes, Blake is going to brag), my brother told me he got to meet and work with Jim Lampley.  I told him that the next time he meets Lampley, ask him what he thinks about Andre Berto.  My brother called me a couple of days later to tell me that Lampley said “you must really know your boxing,” to which my brother had to sheepishly admit it was me and not him.  Anyway, I’ve been a fan of Berto’s since I saw his first fight on the Jermain Taylor/William Joppy undercard in 2004.  I remember talking to Money that night and both of us gushing about “this Haitian” Berto.  He’ll have a tough fight against Quintana, who’s sneaky good, but should win on cards.  Hopefully one of Berto’s patent-pending uppercuts lands to floor Carlos.
• Also on April 10th, 24/7 Mayweather/Mosley starts up.  Grab the wifey and watch this documentary series.  If Mayweather’s “charm” doesn’t rope you in, Liev Schreiber’s voice will.

– War of the masses, the outcome disastrous: Take a moment to read this description of a fire fight in Mosul, Iraq by Michael Yon. Although it’s from 2005, it showed up in Yon’s Reader feed last week. (Huge blunder on my end for not posting previously, even bigger blunder on your end for not being on Reader. We even? Probably not. Why I always gotta go out my way?) The story features gun shots, guys hit by bullets, a “ground fight”, a biting of a wristwatch, and a good yell for grenades. Oh, and you will feel an adrenaline rush.  Wooten, my Dad, and a co-worker all talked about how wrapped up they got in it.  If you like the article, you can donate money to Mr. Yon so he can keep telling these stories. And taking these pictures: (Michael Yon Online)

– Black Misses America, you’re name is Erykah: Badu walks around Dallas and starts stripping. Eventually she gets naked then a “bullet” snipes her in the dome piece a la JFK. Her blood spells “groupthink” in blue because it’s a message. And you were totally paying attention to the message and not staring at Badu’s big ass. Song’s called “Window Seat”. (okayplayer) (The link in here is from original post, but that video was removed due to copyright. Try this link)

– Shotgun slammin’ in your chestpiece, blaow: You know the problem with a taser? It can’t go the 35 to 65 feet distance in which suspects can throw lethal objects at cops. This forces cops to draw guns. Solution? Shotgun taser. (PopSci)

– Cash rules, fuck the bacon: Somehow bacon become a phenomenon last year and is still riding it’s wave of fame. So here’s a roundup of random bacon goods: Toothpicks, beer, cups, popcorn, marmalade, lamps, envelopes, more popcorn, lollipops, turtles, chocolates, donuts, and art:

It’s a bacon sunrise!

– Protect Ya Neck: On Mythbusters we found out you can plausibly protect yourself by diving underwater during an explosion; you can’t bullet proof your car with phone books.

– Blend wine, who wanna win mine: Like wine, opium ages and gets better over time.  “You can walk around with opium for 10 to 15 years and, perhaps, like the wine it gets better with the time,” says Jean-Luc Lemahieu.  Also, Afghanistan is now the world’s top cannabis source.  (Wooten)

– You can’t catch my style with bugs: Heidi (and so glad I don’t have to say “Mike’s Heidi” anymore, those that know – know) decided to creep me out by sending along some zoomed in insect pics with dew on them:  (Heidi)

– Black Jesus: Here’s a New York Mag article showing Obama feigning interest at mundane factory/warehouse stuff:  (Wooten)

– While she do it in the sack, jazz music in the back: The long awaited new David Simon project Tréme airs on HBO April 11th.  Let’s not miss this one.  The show stars The Bunk and Lestor Freamon along with John Goodman and Jamal Wallace.

– The Marks Wu-Tang Financial Update:

• MDH – Harter entered in the year at $2.04 and ended the first quarter at $2.47, that’s a 21% gain.  He got as high as $2.82 on January 15th, but rode a wave of booze down to his low of $1.81 on February 26th.  Unlike his Rangers, he found a way out of the slump in time to finish best among the Marks.  Harter’s always a risky move, though as we’ve seen this year he’s been the Mark to bet on.
• MFL – Mark Lee finished second this quarter by starting at $13 and ending at $13.50.  Mark Lee’s worse day was February 22nd when he closed at $12.75, and if I recall that was at the height of the “Mark Lee might move to C-Town” hysteria.  From there he got that dirt off his shoulder to end up 3.77%.  We’ll see if slow and steady wins the race.
• MAB – I’m betting Bunk’s put two and two together to figure out he hasn’t diversified his bonds, nigga, and finished last this quarter.  The question is, does he know how bad?  -6.18% bad.  Considering the S&P 500 is up around 3.6% and the other two Marks are outperforming, it’s not looking so good for the Bunkman.  From a $15.20 start to a $14.26 end, he’s still the most expensive Mark, but doesn’t look like he can hold onto that title for long.

– What you missed: Wu-Massacre. If you haven’t caught it in this post, you aren’t a rap fan. The bolded items up to this point are Wu-Tang Clan lyrics or songs (yes, even Black Jesus). “Why, Blake?” you ask. Well, I respond, because Meth, Rae, and Ghost dropped an album called “Wu-Massacre” this week. Of the Wu-Tang Clan, it wouldn’t be hard to argue that Raekwon dropped the best album, everyone loved Method Man in the late 90s, and Ghostface has been the most consistent. So why haven’t you bought this CD? Harter, come on. I mean, Bunk and Mark don’t really need to. I’d expect Mark to buy a new Slick Rick CD, for instance, and I think Bunk would buy a new Juvenile CD if I told him to. (Bunk did promise us he’d “Back That Azz Up” down the aisle whenever he got married.) But you, Harter, gotta buy the Wu-Tang album. Just seems right. “Wu-Tang, yo sewwwwwww, represent!”

– What I missed: Manifesto. And why try to test, the Rebel I-N-S? Inspectah Deck also dropped an album this week. This led to a discussion at work that Inspectah Deck usually had the best verses on the Wu’s albums. At first I disagreed, then I started getting swayed, and then when I started looking through lyrics to write this post I gotta disagree. I don’t think there was any “best” when it comes to the Wu-Tang Clan albums. I think Rae, GZA, and Inspectah Deck are up there with lyrics, but Ghost, Meth, and ODB are the verses everyone was saying. The only people I’d argue this point with are Bram and McCarthy, anyway. Bram moved to Japan because of the Wu-Tang Clan. Mac would make ceramic “W” ashtrays in high school. The more I thought about it, the more I realized Wu-Tang started both of my friendships with these two. Bram: as I waiting in the back of a car to go to intramurals in college, we talked about Wu and The Roots, but we talked about rap only because I had heard he was a huge Wu fan. With Mac: we were on the football field in practice and I remember I said “Oh my lawd, another corn chopped by the Wu-Tang sword” in my Meth impersonation after someone in the distance said “oh my lord!” Mac turned with a cocked head and a smile and that was that, kid’s laughed at my stupid shit ever since.