Author: Steve Murray

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Not News of the Week

If it’s not worth talking about, then it must be the Not News of the Week.

Our first weird story of the week might not even be true. The Sun newspaper in Britain reported that a British teenager sent an insulting email to US President Barack Obama and was told by police that he was barred from ever entering the country. The teen claimed that he was drunk at the time he wrote the email and called Obama a “p***k.” (I’m not entirely sure what the apparent insult was.) Local police went to the man’s residence to pass along a message from the FBI that he’s no longer welcome in the USA. However, the blog Gizmodo says that Homeland Security doesn’t tell people that they’ve barred entry from the country. They just make notes on the person’s file and they’re turned away at customs. So what’s the weirder part of the story: That the kid was banned from the USA or that it looks like a newspaper ran a fake story? Continue reading →

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Sunday Link-Off: Tech Wars

The new TV season kicks off tomorrow. To celebrate, here’s Chuck (and Mass Effect 2) star Yvonne Strahovski.

Let’s kick off the links with this great, in-depth Q&A with Los Angeles Dodgers play-by-play man and the voice of baseball Vin Scully. (Big League Stew)

A lot has been made over the Reggie Bush scandal and there are very few voices of reason. Fortunately, Sir Charles Barkley is here to set the record straight: Everybody gets paid. (Out of Bounds)

Have you seen the new Twitter yet? I opined about it in this week’s Humanoids column but here’s a more in-depth look at how it works. (Lifehacker)

After the jump, a look at the new F1 video game, scads of tech links, and Ken Block’s Gymkhana. Continue reading →

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OUA Morning Warmup: Week 4

Welcome to a new feature on the blog. We’re trying something this week called the (obviously) OUA Morning Warmup. This will get you ready for the week’s OUA action by recapping the schedule, game storylines and big stories of the week that was. It’s part preview and part linkdump but 100% OUA football. (At least, that was the plan at the start. It deviates a bit near the end.) This week, we have two big games to look forward to. One has likely playoff implications while the other has definite implications at the top of the OUA standings. Continue reading →

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The Humanoids: Instant Insanity

We live in a world where when something happens, everybody knows about it almost instantly. The age of the internet, we’ve become a society that is constantly connected with every other place on earth and we demand information as it happens. And this is driving me insane. You just can’t get away from the barrage of news and reviews from around the world. The problem is, though, that the thought of turning TweetDeck off scares me because I might miss something that happens as the story develops. This internal contradiction of not caring about knowing but still needing to know is driving me insane. And today’s Humanoids column is all about those things that drive people insane. Continue reading →

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Mick Foley: A Modern Day Evel Knievel?

A thought occurred to me the other day: Throughout his wrestling career, Mick Foley has been better known for his wild stunts than his technical wrestling skills. His reputation and influence among the fans has been built on spilling blood on six continents and breaking multiple bones. His popularity has come largely on the strength of the high impact smashes and crashes than your standard wrestling matches. There is one legend that has built a reputation in the same way as Foley but wasn’t a professional wrestler. That man was Evel Knievel. Continue reading →

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Wednesday Link-Off: Intense

Making her Lowdown Blog debut, here’s Maria Menounos who was the highlight of the MTV VMAs.

I mentioned last week that EA Sports’ NHL 11 came out last week. The only problem is that it might be a bit too intense for hockey fans to handle. (Kotaku)

My favourite link of the day: It’s an in-depth profile of The Daily Show’s Jon Stewart. (New York Magazine)

Everybody has done the Heisman pose at some point in their lives. Well, Heisman front-runner Michigan’s Denard Robinson gave it to Notre Dame in the middle of a play. (Sports By Brooks)

After the jump, some football links, everybody hates LeBron, and Mike Leach makes a better coach than broadcaster. Continue reading →

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Lowdown BlogCast: September 14, 2010

It’s back to September and another year of school. Unlike the last three years, we aren’t considering September the start of the new season of The Lowdown BlogCast. (We might call the Christmas special the start of the new season just for fun.) That doesn’t mean that we’re taking our collective foot off the throttle. On this episode, Jackie previews all the new shows starting up for the new TV season. The CW is trying to get the jump on everyone with early season premiere but is there much left worth watching on there. The discussion gets particularly interesting when discussing Shit My Dad Says and controversial when Steve opines as to why Undercovers is likely to fail. The boys also talk about a couple of returning shows for good measure. And they also reveal some surprising people who are paid less than Jersey Shore’s The Situation. We also have the usual music features of Jackie’s Single of the Week, It Came From YouTube and the Worst of Music. Sports begins with a look at Ben Roethlisberger’s suspension and Ilya Kovalchuk’s new contract and ends with a new sports game called Report Cards. In all, it’s 95 minutes of vintage Lowdown fun and hilarity.

Click here to download The Lowdown BlogCast.
Click here to download the podcast quality version.

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Not News of the Week

It’s time for the weirdest and wackiest stories from around the world. It’s the Not News of the Week.

A while back, we had a story about a New Zealand lawn bowling star who whipped his little lawn bowling pin to tell his teammates that they were playing like dicks and was banned for 10 years. Well, he appealed his suspension and it was overturned. The Bowls New Zealand judicial committee cited the fact that the event was in the locker room and the player was drunk as mitigating factors to his actions. So while drinking is getting North American sports stars into all sorts of trouble, you can get off easy in New Zealand by claiming that you’re smashed. Continue reading →

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Back To School At UWO For 2010-11

Four months of summer break have wrapped up and now the denizens of the University of Western Ontario are back to classes today. Actually, unless you go to Ivey, classes are back underway right now for those poor souls who have Monday morning 8:30 classes. To ease the pain of having to sit through today’s dreadful early lecture, here are some hot women dressed in the school girl outifts and other school related outfits (such as cheerleaders and librarians). Continue reading →

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F1 Italian GP: Forza Ferrari

In Italy, there is no team other than Ferrari. Sure, football (or soccer as it’s known in my half of the world) is the national sport but the national team is Scuderia Ferrari. The Tifosi were out in full force at Monza for the Italian Grand Prix. And they went home happy as Fernando Alonso scored the pole and the win in his first Italian Grand Prix for Ferrari as the Scuderia put both drivers on the podium. Alonso’s win combined with poor outings for the championship leaders also gave us a much more interesting championship picture heading into the final stretch of the season. Continue reading →