Happy Memorial Day

Remember those who gave their lives in service to this country, that you have the freedom to live the life you choose.

Rule 5 Monday -- brought to you by the letter A

This week's Rule 5 posting a random collection of lovely young ladies whose first names begin with the letter "A"

I'm sort of an old school kind of guy. I do my html coding free hand rather than use templates and I tend to sort things, particularly images of people by their last name alphabetically. But it gets tiresome always renaming files and most people online sort images by first name. So my image collection is oddly sorted.

So, enjoy this bunch of cuties no matter how I've arranged them. Because hotness cannot be catagorized anyway, am I right?

*click on the thumbnails for full-sized images*

Rule 5 Sunday suggested by this.

Hat tips:
Jake Finnegan
The Daley Gator
The Classic Liberal
Say Anything Blog
Proof Positive
Reaganite Republican

Sox one game below .500 now

Boston took 2 of three from the Phillies this weekend as the Sox won 5-1 Sunday.

Josh Beckett looked good on the mound for a second straight outing as he allowed only one run over 7 2/3 innings.  Still not pounding fastballs, Beckett's relying a lot on finesse and location to get guys out which has me wondering about his health.  But he fielded his position like I cannot remember seeing before catching an infield pop up and turning a nifty 1-4-3 double play at one point.

Though I didn't care for the heat he took over "GolfGate" perhaps it woke him up a bit and reminded him he's still an employee of the team and the fans, and needs to play like he owes them something each week.

The guys brought the thunder to series with Philly with Aviles hitting back-to-back lead off homers and Salty crushing a couple of huge blasts as well.  The Sox have won 8 of their last 10 to move to within a game of .500 and if they can maintain a pace similar to this for a while will climb out of the cellar and move back into contention in the highly competitive AL East.

Nice  :-)

Here's something I don't see enough of . . .

Underrated cutie Anna Faris in a bikini:

I've always thought Anna was adorable to start with, and within the last year or two she purchased an upgrade package for her bosum.  We don't usually see much of her body in the movies she does, but as is evident in these bikini pics . . . she's pretty bangin'!

Hopefully she'll want to show off her new figure more this summer.  No complaints from this fan :-)

Late night hotness . . .

Why yes, actually . . . I am ready for some football . . .

Boston splits series with Rays

The Red Sox won tonite 5-3, to split the quicky series with the Rays.

Felix Doubront gave up 2 runs, only one of them earned in 5 2/3 innings to get the win.  Last year's Ray's phenom Matt Moore gave up two solo homers -- one to Cody Ross and one to light hitting Marlon Byrd to get the loss and see his record fall to 1-5.

The win salves the wounds of last night's 2-1 loss where both Rays runs came on fluky bad plays -- a stumble balk by Clay Buccholz and another awkward easy fly ball lost in the lights by Cody Ross.

The series should have been a sweep for the guys, but I'll take the split against the division leading Rays for the moment.  It's off to some interleague play now as the 8 game road trip rumbles on.

And Happy Birthday Megan Fox

Normally I eschew postings about Megan Fox because I find her pretentiousness off-putting. But hey, its her 26th birthday, so happy wishes to the birthday girl!

I believe the pics below are from Terry Richardson's Esquire shoot a few years back:

Happy Birthday Josh Beckett

Josh Beckett celebrated his 32nd birthday yesterday with seven shutout innings against the Mariners en route to a 5-0 win for the Red Sox.

After getting shelled in his last outing against the Indians, where he didn't last through 2 innings, Beckett appeared more dialed in yesterday racking up 9 strikeouts.  David Ortiz went yard again to continue his impressive year and the bullpen once again looked solid as Rich Hill and Alfredo Aceves kept Seattle off the scoreboard to seal the win.

Granted this was only the Mariners we're talking about here, but only last week, the cellar dwelling Royals slapped the Sox around pretty good, so a win's a win, and these are games the guys have to take to climb out of the AL East cellar.

They're in town now for a series against the division leading Rays.  Buccholz is on the mound tonight against Hellickson.  The Sox are riding a five game win streak, so this will be a good test to see if they are finally settling down and playing the kind of ball this club is capable of.

Well, the MIB3 premiere looks interesting

First off . . . who knew they were even making a Men in Black 3?! 

Anyway, Micaela Schaefer showed up on the red carpet basically naked with something I suppose you could call a dress made out of . . . what, a ripped up garbage bag?  Not sure what that was, but if this gal is in the movie, guys won't have to be lamenting any non-nude scenes cause we can pretty much see everything Micaela's got right here.

Hmmm, perhaps she's filling in for Lara Flynn Boyle who, last time I saw a picture of her, seemed to be melting into a puddle of botoxed fillers.  Then again, maybe she just likes showing up to premieres in attention grabbing outfits.  Nah . . . that's just crazy talk, what am I thinking?

I also noticed Josh Brolin is in the flick (going by the movie poster background in some of the shots).  I guess he's filling in for Tommy Lee Jones who's getting a little long in the tooth for these action flicks.

Adding a smidge of glamour to the red carpet was the lovely Nicole Scherzinger, who always seems to be bringing the glam to these things.  Girl knows how dress, that's for sure:

Yes, Game of Thrones is still vexing me

First off, let me say I'm still loving HBO's Game of Thrones.  It's well produced and executed with fabulous casting and great performances.  But . . .

I'm just not getting the wild divergence from the second book this season.  In A Clash of Kings, Daenerys spends her time in Qarth trying to secure ships to sail back to Westeros.  Xaro Xhoan Daxos spends his time trying to woo Dany to wed him.  He and Pyat Pree do not slaughter the council of 13 and declare Daxos king!  Why bother with that sort of embellishment?  And as I mentioned in a previous post on this, Dany's dragons are not stolen, in fact she take the black one - Drogon with her to the House of the Undying and it is the dragon that saves her in there.  There's enough drama in the original story to translate to television so I'm just not getting it.

Plus the story of Jon Snow beyond the wall.  In the book, he spares Ygritte's life and lets her escape and in turn she helps spare his when he has to confront the wildlings led by Rattleshirt.  But now we've got Ygritte leading Jon into an ambush where he'll be forced to join them or die (I suppose). Then commanded to kill Qhorin Halfhand at their command rather than the book's version where Halfhand tells Jon to do what he must to infiltrate the wildlings and allows Jon to slay him.  The book's version allows Jon more honor and despair.  Why demean his character the way it appears they are going?

I'm not so put off by Arya's interaction with Tywin Lannister.  It humanizes Tywin a bit and the back and forth between them is enjoyable.  This perhaps is a better deviation from the source material and Arya's time in Harrenhall was generally grim and downbeat.

Only two episodes left apparently, so I'll be interested to see how they finish off the season.  There's so much left in the book that hasn't been covered I'm curious how they'll get it all in in just two hours.

Still come highly recommended by me for viewing.  And I plan to get through the fourth book on my vacation later this year.  I wonder if HBO will follow the books to the end (currently at five novels) or just curtail it after another season or two?

Hmmm . . .

Lester gives the Sox bullpen the night off

Red Sox pitcher Jon Lester threw a complete game last night in Boston's 6-1 win over the Mariners.

The Boston ace has struggled with crappy run support in his starts this year, but the guys finally got the sticks out for him with recently recalled Daniel Nava and catcher Kelly Shoppach hitting home runs to allow Lester the breathing room to throw pitches confidently.

The Sox are now on a four game win streak with three straight from division leading Cleveland and last night's win against Seattle.  One more game against the M's tonight with embattled Josh Beckett on the mound.  Beckett got shelled his last outing and made things worse by tweaking the fans with his response to the poor pr move of golfing on what was supposed to be a rehab day for an injury.

After a rocky start, is the bullpen finding its groove?  Hard to say as Bobby V has had to mix and match like a mad scientist to find guys who can put up solid innings.  As of the last three weeks though, the bullpen has the best era in the league -- 1.47 over 73 2/3 innings.  And for the moment, the closing team of Andrew Miller, Vincente Padilla, and Alfredo Aceves seem to be getting it done.

The guys are still in the cellar with a ways to go to get out.  A two game series against the Rays starts Wednesday then I think interleague play begins, so who knows if they can make up any ground in the tough AL East.  There's a reason the baseball season is 162 games long -- plenty of time to get it right and work through anything.

Here's hoping . . .

Game of Thrones WTF?

While you may have come here after "googling" the post title, this particular post is about season two. Try this link to see my thoughts about the episode that aired June 2, 2013.
You may also like this posting where I give my thoughts on the entire Song of Fire and Ice series of books and HBO's adaptation of them.

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So, I'll admit that I missed the bit about Renly being gay in the books.  Guess I just sort of glossed over that because it didn't really mean much to me.  And I'll grudgingly admit that perhaps Stannis is having sex with Melisandre, even though it isn't overtly mentioned in the books I've read so far.  But . . .

Last night's episode had a whole lot of stuff I am pretty freekin' positive did not occur goin' on!

Don't recall reading anything about Dany's khalasar being slaughtered and her dragons stolen from her!  In my recollection [Spoiler Alert] she and her followers grow full and comfy in the city of Quarth and she accepts an invitation to visit the House of the Undying Ones to learn about her future and such.  The entire set up in the book is completely understandable, so why bother with the contrived business about stealing the dragons?  Seems like pointless dramatic license to me.

Then there's this bit about Arya using the mysterious Jaqen H'ghar to kill some random guard who saw her reading a missive she had stolen.  Where the eff was that in the book?!  As I recall, the second guy Arya has killed is some bully who slaps her around and threatens her.  I guess that's a minor plot change considering how they're compressing stuff for the series, but it's a bit more palatable to me than the faux dragon kidnapping I mentioned earlier.

Hmpff

And here's another bit on the casting so far:

Also liking the casting of Natalia Tena as Osha the wildling who ends up befriending Bran Stark.  And this Tom Wlaschiha who is portraying Jaqen H'ghar.  I loved Jaqen's character in the book, with the third person speech and all and this guy is doing a wonderful job making him seem real.

And like most casual folks, I had first seen Natalia as Nymphadora in the Harry Potter movies and thought she was kind of cool looking -- offbeat and such.  She's got a much bigger part in this ongoing series and frankly, after last night's nude scene, she's got a pretty bangin' body too.  I felt a bit like Theon there thinking how much I had wondered just what she actually looked like.

And I had meant to mention this in an earlier post, but I wonder if the actors involved in this series are enjoying not having to tamp down their accents on camera?  I've seen Liam Cunningham in a number of things, but have never heard his Irish accent like I have in Game of Thrones.  And all these other actors/actresses . . . it has got to be nice to just let your voice be itself with all the varied nuances of the British accents that exist and not be trying to sound like a non-descript American.

Still enjoying the series as a whole and if you haven't seen it yet, I recommend it highly.  Just remember, it is not for the faint of heart in terms of sex and violence.