Sports break- time for other news

I've been so immersed in baseball chatter for 2 straight days that I almost forget today is a national holiday- Larry Legend's 50th birthday! Great picture on the front of ESPN.com to commemorate this historic event:

It seems like just few years ago that Bird only looked 50 as he ran up and down the Garden court, porn moustache and manperm flailing in the breeze that was coming from all the cracks and broken doors in the place, hitting long threes and whipping passes down low to Chief and McHale.

Now the Legend actually is a quarter century old, and still going strong. He is a front office exec with his home state Pacers and will probably take over as team president when Donnie Walsh retires.

I know I speak for all fans of the Green that we hope & pray he will forget about his "hick from French Lick" roots and take over our beloved but beleaguered C's. Alas this looks like a pipe dream, but Celtics fans have a hard time letting our icons go. Especially to another team.

So know I know what I am going to watch tonight, no matter what: my copy of Larry Bird: A Basketball Legend" DVD. Can't go wrong with taking a stroll down memory lane, when basketball players played for the love of the game and could get away with wearing nut huggers. Ah, good times, good times...

I'm going to watch that disc tonight because I'm ticked off with the 2nd week of NBC's new Must See TV Thursday Block; the anchor of the lineup, my beloved The Office, is not on. WTF? Instead we get a 1-hour My Name is Earl, as Earl & Randy travel to Mexico to get Catalina back into the country. This will be the second two-parter this season including the premiere, and not only is this one in 2 parts, it spans a total of 1 hour & 1/2. The show is testing the patience of its loyal viewers, but I'll tune in anyway just to see guest star John Leguizamo, and whether or not Catalina wears her stripper outfit again.

As I said The Office is on pre-holiday hiatus so earl will lead into Scrubs at 9:00 and 30 Rock at 9:30. I'm still test driving Scrubs so I'll check that out, an I love 30 Rock and its new time slot, so that's a go as well.


-In other entertainment news there has been a follow-up report on the Lane Garrison DUI crash that killed a teenage boy. Turns out that Garrison, who played Tweener on Prison Break, didn't have the proverbial "just one drink" at the party he went to with three teens. In fact he brought a bottle of the Goose, downed a number of shots and held the bottle out to the rest of the party goers (presumably all teenagers) for them to share in his fun. Later, after the booze was all consumed, Garrison and the three kids, 17-year-old Vahagn Setien and two 15-year-old girls, went out in the 26-year-old actor's Land Rover to...buy more Goose! This contradicts earlier reports that he was headed to his apartment to meet his girlfriend and the teens were just tagging along when the accident occurred. On the way to reload Garrison lost control of the SUV and it jumped a median and struck a pole, killing Setien.

This story is disturbing on so many fronts. First he met the kids at a gas station (not a supermarket as earlier reported), they invited him to a party, and the well-known semi-celeb actually went. As I mentioned in my earlier post it's like the episode of Entourage from last season when Vince & the boys met some kids on the street shortly after Aquaman came out. They "oooh'd & aaah'd" then asked Vince to their party; he accepted and soon the "biggest movie start on the planet" was chugging brews with a house full of underage fans. Except in the show Vince ended up giving the nerds his Maserati, not laying them out on in chalk lines on the street. I guess Garrison didn't see that part of the show.
Then the fact that he would act that way (shitfaced) in front of the kids, offering them shots and volunteer to drive out to get more liquor in that condition really sets a nice example, doesn't it? This was the definition of an accident waiting to happen, and unfortunately it did.

Now it looks like Lane's life may be imitating art again. If he was indeed blitzed at the time of the crash (and that looks like a definite) I'm no lawyer but I would think a charge of DUI manslaughter would be forthcoming, which could land the man in prison. Ironic, yes, but more sad than anything. He will have to live with a lifetime of pain knowing how one foolish mistake led to a young man's death and changed so many people's lives forever. From the looks of this picture posted on TMZ today of Garrison exiting a church this afternoon, that reality is starting to hit him.

-Fugitive Snipes snatched in Orlando
Wesley Snipes, star of such films as the Blade Trilogy, White Men Can't Jump, and numerous crappy "B" direct to video flicks , was arrested at the Orlando International Airport on charges of tax evasion & fraud. The 44-year-old actor has been charged with not paying taxes on his income from 1999 until this year, and filing fraudulent claims in 1996 & '97. All told Nino Brown owes a cool $12 mil to the real Cash Money Brothers, the IRS. Snipes had been shooting his latest DTV piece of crap in Namibia and refused to rush home to face the charges, which he of course denies. But as soon as the schlock shoot wrapped and he returned to the states he was nailed and jailed. Looks like Nino will have to do a ton of those cheesy "B's to pay off this nut or he's going to be spending some personal time with Richard Hatch.

-One other piece of "celebrity" news caught my eye today. Aspiring wrestler and all-around knuckle-headed offspring of Hulk Hogan, 16-year old son Nick, decided he thought it would be cool to peel out in his new Viper outside of Hollywood eatery The Ivy on Wednesday afternoon. Mom Linda, a.k.a. The Battle ax, hops into their red Suburban she had when I worked for her back in 1999 and in the meantime Nick guns the high-powered sports car into the street, nearly tagging the car in front of him. Nick , it wasn't all that long ago that you totalled The Hulkster's Lambo in Miami- I don't think you want to add a Viper to your mangled collection too, do you? Give this kid an Aspire already, Terry.

And last but not least, my talented future brother-in-law Paul Starke, producer of the Glenn Beck Show, seen nightly on CNN Headline News, has helped create a special called "Puppet Planet: Christmas in New York", which airs Sunday night at 8:00 on the Travel Channel. He describes the "offbeat" holiday special as "extremely bizarre, and not in a good way." But if I know Paul's humor, which is much like mine & my sister's, I'm sure it will be hilarious. He informs that the one-hour special features Bulgarian circus performers, two light sabre duels, a Turkish bathhouse scene and special guest appearances by Adam Batman West & Catherine Daisy Duke Bach, as well as a cameo from Paul himself as a proprietor of a Brooklyn halfway house.

Please tune in to this unique special Sunday night. Who knows, my sister may end up getting married to a Hollywood player, which would allow me to reap the benefits of being the brother of the wife of a Hollywood player. I smell a possible HBO show: Entourage II: The Italian Jew Crew.