Depeche, it's time for dinner.

My apologies for the significant delay in getting something new up this week. Who I'm apologizing to, I'm not so sure because I doubt anybody regularly reads this drivel that I post but it makes me feel better about writing this if I delude myself into thinking that there's an audience out there. With that said, I am going to try my best to post something, anything each and every day from here on out, even if its just a link or two. You'll have to forgive me if I miss a day or two during the month of March...why? Well, Spring Training takes place during March which means that the last half of February and the entire month of March are nothing more than a succession of 11 hours days over and over and over as my work week extends to a full seven days during this time. In case you were wondering, I have a Master's degree and the major league staff constantly shoot me looks like a just threw up on their shoes during this stretch of spring...sounds fun don't it?

As I was driving back into work from an appointment earlier today, I was listening to Depeche Mode...yes, I listen to Depeche Mode and NO, I'm not ashamed to admit that publicly...anyway, I was listening to the Violator CD when I started wondering how many poor kids out there have been named Depeche by their idiotic parents. I'm absolutely positive that their are numerous kids out there with this name, though I base this opinion on nothing whatsoever other than my complete and total lack of faith in the entire American population.

Shortly after this, I went through the Burger King drive-thru to get a small order of fries and was served (with a complimentary side of sass) by a young woman who apparently, according to her name tag, goes by the name of Sugar...I rest my case.

I don't have alot more other than some much delayed thoughts on the NBA All-Star Game:

I was quite surprised that Quentin Richardson won the three point contest since he's more of a streak shooter than a pure shooter like Kyle Korver (my pick) but you certainly can't complain about the dramatic fashion in which he won...one thing I can, and will complain about is having to see his fiancee Brandy on my television repeatedly throughout the evening. She makes me uneasy...I think its the fact that her eyes are on either side of her face like some sort of half woman-half fish. Its unnatural. Speaking of Brandy, her career has never really been the same since she did that song with Monica where they appeared side-by-side in the video. Before that, everybody seemed to think that Brandy was this beautiful songstress (not this guy), that is until people saw her standing next to Monica, who really IS beautiful. Then suddenly, the general public was forced to reevaluate their whole stance on Brandy and the next thing you know, she was faking marriages and starring in shitty sitcoms on the WB.

The Dunk contest was quite exciting since Josh Smith possessed not only the ability but also the neccessary showmanship for such an event. I won't go into great detail since most people saw, at least, the highlights of the contest but I will address one thing that really bothered me: J.R. Smith got jobbed on his first dunk attempt. If you didn't see it, Smith came out on his first dunk attempt and executed a dunk that I had never seen prior. Basically, Smith jumped with the ball in his left hand and then brought the ball behind his back and into his right hand which he then used to dunk the ball. This is a very hard dunk to execute. If you don't believe me then go out and try to complete this move and finish the subesequent layup...I tried and couldn't even finish the move itself, much less the layup. Well, for being original and completing a dunk with such a high degree of difficulty, J.R. received a 45, that's right a 45. I've seen guys get a 45 for doing a reverse off the bounce in the dunk contest...the lesson of course is: never, ever go first in the dunk contest.

Now to the actual game:

-Vince Carter's dunk was awesome as I can't remember seeing VC jump that high in about four or five years. Right after he completed the dunk, I saw Yao Ming nudge Tracy Mcgrady on the bench and then lean over and say something. Who knows what exactly Yao said, but really I hope that Yao insulted Carter for being derivative and unoriginal or maybe for being the biggest mama's boy in the NBA.

- Did you notice Allen Iverson breathing like he just ran a marathon during his halftime interview with the Predator, err, Cheryl Miller? Iverson said that his teammates were probably surprised to see him so winded but that "it was, what it was"...or in other words, "I have been drinking and smoking until the wee hours of the morning for the past three days...what else do you think we do during All-Star weekends? Other than gangbang groupies, of course."

-During the 2nd quarter, Steve Kerr was talking about the last time that Denver hosted an All-Star game and while he talked, TNT went into a highlight package from the 1984 All-Star game. Kerr went on to discuss the results of the game and reveal that Isiah Thomas was named the MVP. This reminded me that the 1984 All-Star game was also the sight of the famous "freeze-out" of Michael Jordan that was led by Isiah himself. Pretty amazing that not one single reporter played this angle up in the past week. It would've been a pretty interesting story to look back upon when you consider that this one event led to the bitter Bulls-Pistons rivalry as well as to Isiah being left off of the original Dream Team. Of course, I can understand why there wasn't time for this type of fluff reporting when the guys at the Denver Post were working on big stories like the one about Marcus Camby's toilet overflowing during his party on Friday night.

-Amare Stoudemire's dunk off the Kobe Bryant alley-oop...Holy Shit!! Shawn Kemp must want to cry everytime that he sees Stoudemire dunk. If not Kemp, then certainly Gary Payton.