Malcolm Gladwell on sports franchises

Very good article by Malcolm Gladwell on the NBA lockout, the Boston Red Sox's racist past and sports franchise owners who say they lose money.

Read it here at Grantland.com.

Sofia quote of the day

This afternoon, while sitting on the throne: "Daddy, I think we need to take a break from the tacos."

Netflix Challenge: The Final Breakdown

It's all over. Che is done and I even knocked off a few re-adds and automatically added films -- Agatha Christie's Evil Under the Sun, the awful Goya's Ghosts and the totally awesome Oceans for good measure. I highly recommend Oceans.

I started the Netflix Instant Queue Elimination Challenge back on Aug. 10, 2010, as a way to clean out all the films I was hoarding on the queue, but not actually watching. I vowed to not add any new titles until the backlog was cleared.

Exactly one year and four days later, on Aug. 14, 2010, I was done.

A lot has happened since then, including one very nasty price increase, and I'm glad it's finally all over. Here's a little breakdown of the experience

Total Films: 54

Average Watch Rate: One movie every 6.8 days

First Film: Wonderful World with Matthew Broderick

Last Film: Che was the official end, but Goya's Ghosts was the last to be watched after it somehow sneaked back onto the queue.

Best Film I Hadn't Seen Before: Based on my Netflix ratings, I guess it's got to be Mary and Max, since it was the only one to get the hard-to-come-by 5-star "Loved It" rating. I don't just hand those out, unlike my wife who gives five stars to entire seasons of Roseanne.

Worst Film: I'll Believe You. This was horrible. The only Netflix Challenge film I couldn't finish, despite it featuring Chris Elliott.

Surprise Film: All of the Ramin Bahrani's U.S. immigrant story movies: Goodbye Solo, Chop Shop and Man Push Cart. I had never heard of this guy before, but I'll be sure not to miss any of his movies in the future. No wonder Ebert called him "Director of the decade."

Late breaking Netflix Challenge news

Che is off the queue. The Netflix Challenge is history!

More analysis to come...

OK, this is bullshit

After a long, fun summer away from here, it's time to finish off the Netflix Challenge tonight. No more bullshitting around. You're going down, Che, you two part, 4.5 hour biopic.

In the meantime, I wish I had HBO so I could watch this:

Ep. 75: Clip - Larry on… Pig Parking

It's scary, but I become more like Larry every day.