Top 5 Commercials

Today I'd like to introduce a new feature I'm going to have here at the Neighborhood. A top five list. I like making lists. People like reading lists. This seems like a match made in heaven. Plus, I'm working hard on an incredibly difficult programming assignment and I'm reaching an impasse, so finding a way to kill some time is a great idea.

The first top five I'd like to share is my favorite commercials of all time. I'm going to count down in reverse order, so that I build suspense up to my number one. Enjoy!


5. "This is Sportscenter" - Steve Irwin vs. the Florida Gator

The "This is Sportscenter" marketing campaign from ESPN has been a hit for probably more than ten years. While Sportscenter is turning to shit, the commercial levels have not dropped off. It was tough to pick a favorite (the Y2K test was a close 2nd, but I didn't want a Y2K overload in this list). Most of them are hysterical. Check it out.



4. "Man Fights Bear" - John West Salmon

I have to admit, I've never seen this commercial on TV, except for maybe on a show that chronicles the best commercials of all time. I watched this commercial for the first time probably somewhere near my first few years of college, right when I first got personal DSL+ strength internet, and found viral videos. Any commercial that features a bear with boxing moves gets my vote.



3. "Y2K Jogger" - Nike

I alluded to the fact this list would have more Y2K in it in my "This is Sportscenter" description. This commercial for Nike was directed by Spike Jonze, and if my memory serves me correctly, aired before the turn of the millennium. The commercial shows what amounts to be almost a worst-case scenario of the Y2K crash, while a jogger keeps his cool and goes about his daily routine. Although I am not a jogger, nor do I pretend to be, I love this commercial.



2. "Drumming Gorilla" - Cadbury's

If you want a commercial with a zany idea, featuring a song that takes me back to 1988, and a gorilla, then this is your commercial. I don't really know how to describe this commercial, other than to say it's almost the perfect commercial.



1. "Glenn" - Starbucks

A running theme in my favorite commercials is picking a cheesy song from the 1980s and parodying it. The fact that Survivor, the band who wrote "Eye of the Tiger" agreed to do this commercial just raises the awesome factor twentyfold. Hey, if you can't laugh at yourself...



Honorable Mention, favorite commercial of this year: "Beer Closet" - Heineken

Beer commercials usually deliver the laughs. I've always enjoyed Heineken's commercials. The Holiday 5-pack is a good one. This one takes a tried-and-true method, projecting female characteristics or actions on males. An instant classic.



Hope you enjoyed my inaugural top five list. Have a great day!

Best. Lab Meeting. EVER.

Every Tuesday at 3:30 our lab group meets to discuss how our research is coming along. It's usually an extremely boring meeting that drifts from tangent to tangent, leaving me ready to decapitate myself and feed my severed head to the nearest dog. Or drink heavily. Whichever is easier. However, today we did something different. Everyone in the lab brought a six pack of beer or other beverage, and several people brought snacks and desserts. We relaxed out on the CCRC patio, where the weather was perfect; upper 70s, and we were in the shade. A light breeze kept things from overheating. In order to keep cold, we stored our beer and assorted soft drinks in the cold room until the meeting, which, while hilarious, was also dangerous, in that any other researchers using the cold room could have easily come in and taken the liquid booty. And knowing most of the rest of the CCRC personnel, it would have taken maybe ten minutes.

Needless to say, while our range of topics in typical lab meetings are usually xylan structures in certain land plants, glycosyl transferase activity and genes, today we discussed cheap wine tasting, Mad Dog 20/20 (incidentally, I always thought Mad Dog was a malt liquor; I guess you learn something every day), the pros and cons of Jack Nicholson and Heath Ledger in their respective Joker roles, and encounters with the cops my P.I. had under the influence of whatever he was under the influence of when he was in undergrad.

Like the title said, this was the best lab meeting ever.

When Professors Attack!

Something interesting happened in Athens this weekend; it was something that actually made national news. Professor George Zinkhan, "an endowed marketing professor at [UGA's] Terry College of Business," murdered his wife and two other people involved in a local community theatre. Of course, this is a very tragic incident for the town I've called home for almost a year and half, and I hope and pray that justice is served to Zinkhan, and my heart goes out to the families of the victims. However, this whole story seems a little weird. First, is the story I heard from my friend's brother's friend's cousin's dog's cousin's owner's brother-in-law's hamster about how he came into class on Friday, told the class there was a change in plans and there would no longer be a final, asked all of them to submit their final papers early, and told them their final grades would be given later that day. Weird. **UPDATE: This rumor actually seems to have some legs. Link** Second, look at this guy:

Anybody with that facial hair style (not just the goatee, but the goatee with wings, as far as I can tell) should raise all kinds of red flags as someone just a little off his rocker. Finally, before the website blocked his profile, his Rate My Professors page was hysterical. An example of one of the ratings I read yesterday, if I can remember it at all (in other words, not an exact quote):

"Dr. Zinkhan is a pretty good teacher. His tests aren't too bad, and he's generally helpful outside of class. One time, he murdered three people. Other than that, I would recommend this class to all of my friends."

Comedic gold. Even still, you can see that some of the pre-yesterday ratings include quotes such as "he demonstrated himself to be cold hearted and just plain nasty when I needed help. Stay away from this man," "creep," and "he is a little quirky." Now, I've been called "creep" more times than I can remember, and a little quirkiness could do us all good, but to me this just sounds like a recipe for disaster.

One time when I visited the site yesterday, there were probably thirty ratings that had been added that day. I imagine that before the website blocked his page, they were trying to remove new ratings as fast as possible in order to maintain any sort of professionalism on the site, and new ratings were pouring in by the bucketload. They've probably never had to do anything like this to their site before, which is why it took so long.

Needless to say, this is something that is quite out of the ordinary in a quaint college town like Athens. The aftereffects are still being felt all over town. The university will operate under a normal schedule this week, even though Zinkhan hasn't been caught yet. Hopefully, this whole thing will be over soon, Zinkhan will be thrown in prison for the rest of his life, and things will return to normal. That's the best we can hope for.

Welcome!

If you've happened upon my blog, then welcome! I decided to start one up on somewhat of a whim; been thinking about it for awhile, figured I might as well go for it. I'm not planning on updating daily or even on any periodic schedule, but hopefully I'll be able to get around to it enough to make it interesting. A couple of things about me and what I hope this blog does:

• I'm 24 years old (25 in May) and a graduate student at the University of Georgia getting my master's in bioinformatics
• I got my bachelor's degree at Auburn University, and thus, I am very passionate about Auburn athletics (particularly football); I'm also very passionate about the St. Louis Cardinals and somewhat passionate (I guess fairweather) about the Oakland Raiders
  
• I figured out that my life is so exciting, people wouldn't be able to resist reading my random ramblings and musings about the world!
  
• Usually, I'll opine about different topics: sports, music/entertainment, science, news, and occasionally politics

Hopefully, you'll enjoy this enough to keep coming back. Although I am using this as a way to express my outlook on life and the world, I hope that I get people to stop in and read. Plus, I'm always looking for a new blog or website to waste my time on, so if you've got one of those for me, I'll be happy to take a gander at it myself. Well, I guess that does it for now, happy blogging!

P.S. If you're wondering about the title of this blog, it's pretty simple and didn't take long for me to think of. When I was at Auburn, most of my fraternity brothers got in the habit of calling me J-Dizzle (I guess ebonics for J.D.). One time, my parents were coming into town for a little while, and we were all going to have a big dinner one night. Afterwards, one of my fraternity brothers told me he had to resist the urge to call my parents "Mr. and Mrs. Dizzle." I guess he would think of Mr. Dizzle as my dad, but I figured since dad would actually be Mr. Rizzle, I could take Mr. Dizzle for myself.