THE RATASS GAZETTE

ARIZONA STATE'S NEW FOOTBALL HELMETS ARE AWESOME - I happened to catch Arizona State's 43-22 butt-kicking of USC last night, and I was blown away by their new helmets and uniforms.  These new red (maroon? wine?) duds might be the best in the land.  Do you agree?  Take a look! For the record, I actually liked their old helmets (with the cartoon Sun Devil and pitchfork), but the new ones are amazing.  These new Nike productions instantly vault ASU into the conversation whenever the best college football helmets are discussed.  Great move by ASU!

"If it ain't broke, you can probably still fix it. That's my motto."   Oh, how I love these old Tim Allen stand-up routines!  He's a man, he loves tools, he loves engines, he grunts, he burps, he soups up his lawnmower and he's proud of it, dammit!  Here's a look back at some truly funny stuff from his early stand-up days.  All of this material was truly original at the time.  I used to think of him as "the hardware comedian" because his bits were all about duct tape and ladders.  Home Improvement was one of the biggest sitcoms of the 90's and almost all of the material for that series originated in his early stand-up.  A lot of comedians have bits about how men are different than women, but Tim Allen made a career off it!  Here is the "Rewires America" special in it's entirety (from YouTube, broken into 3 parts) and I've noted a few of my favorite lines and bits along the way.  Enjoy!    Here is Part 1 of "Tim

Green Day - Horseshoes and Handgrenades.   This is my favorite cut off 21st Century Breakdown .  If you haven't heard anything off their most recent album, I encourage you to give it a listen, it's fantastic.  This is a foot-stomping rocker!   First is a clip of Billie Joe, Mike, and Tre giving some background on the track.  Good stuff.     Here is the song with lyrics. Enjoy! GREEN DAY NEWS - Green Day recently did a gig in California where they played about 15 new songs they'd been working on.  Wish I would have been there, I'm sure it was awesome!  Be sure sure to check out their official site, Green Day.com , as well as excellent fan sites like Green Day Authority and Green Day.net to keep up on tours, magazine features, TV appearances, and tons of other great stuff related to Green Day.  They're the best rock band on the planet right now.

He's old, he's jaded, he's a baseball scout.  He thinks today's players aren't shit compared to Home Run Baker and Three-Finger Brown.  He spews out so many old baseball names you're not sure if they're real or made up.  He mentions obscure nicknames as if they're common knowledge.  And more often than not, he'll start spinning a yarn about some guy he (supposedly) once saw rather than answer your original question.   So who better to ask about Washington Nationals pitching phenom, Stephen Strasburg? < " I don't think he's in the same class as [presumably retired pitcher] Ezekiel Pratt.  The Amish Horse. " On Strasburg's Arm... " Decent arm.  I'd probably even go as far as to call it a good arm.  But I don't think he's in the same class as [presumably retired pitcher] Ezekiel Pratt.  The Amish Horse.  Big Zeke .  Pratt once raised a barn one morning, then went out and pitched both games of a d

Sometimes you can tell a book is bad just by reading a paragraph or two.  Sometimes you'll stick out 100 dull pages in the hopes that the book will get interesting about halfway through, but the book never gets good (yep, I'm looking right at you, Robert Ludlum's The Sigma Protocol ).  So I'm here to save everyone a lot of valuable time.  In this space I'll give you an excerpt of a book that sucks, give reasons why it sucks, and try to convince you not to waste your time.  This is an excerpt from a short story I wrote a while ago, called The Juiced Mug .  As you can tell by just this little bit, the story is pure garbage. ------------------------------------------------- From The Juiced Mug , by Nate Spade... "They think they can take away Munch Munch?"  Charlie shouted as he clenched the revolver in his sweaty hands.  "Them fuckers can go to HELL!"  Wind blew sand across the desert floor and Charlie shielded his face with his sun burn