DonkeyCigars

I've done Toastmasters twice; once in my youth to get better at presentation and speaking skills as a way to grow/qualify into bigger professional roles and then again recently via the multinational global org I work for who has a Toastmasters chapter. Takeaways: Toastmasters is a lot of work and effort if you do it right. The primary driver is enhancing a skill and a craft so, like your music skills, you'll find you will spend a lot of hours into the work and practice and such. The social/community/getting to know one another is like a secondary or tertiary benefit, at best. If you aren't sufficiently and intrinsically motivated to become a great public speaker (do you dream of giving a NorthCarolinaxTED talk?) then you are probably better served doing something else because I doubt you'd stick with it. The time commitment to benefit just wouldn't make quantifiable sense.

Saw this over the weekend, and wanted to tie off with you-- as you rightly stated I was, and still contend, that a response had to be made. I stand with you in disappointment and shame and disbelief that we continue to suck at doing the basic things right. It's like the U.S. Military is Texas football in that way.

FIFY

The rock bottom for me was in the 80's, that one year that Anthony Michael Hall and Randy Quaid and Robert Downey Jr. had the worst sketches and didn't seem to care. Joan Cusack and Damon Wayons were also on that season for their one and only year. Just googled it, 85-86 (season 11). Name a worse season, you can't.

I ended up buying one today for $799. Is that too much? Dumb? Fair?

What did you end up doing? I'm trying to get out in front of this issue for Christmas too. I ended up buying one today for $799. Is that too much? Dumb? Fair?

The Mad TV zinger. The last line. Did you miss that? That's hilarious and kinda ballsy in a burning bridge kind of way.

Funniest thing that has happened to SNL in the last few years was when a funny guy got the gig, subsequently got cancelled because he said some questionable things in the past, and then dropped this zinger of an apology. He should have gotten re-hired for this response alone:

Yea, skipping a 7 yarder to your TE or whatever that was, made me laugh at least.

I'm not saying Goff is better than Stafford, but for all Goff's faults, his obvious strength was the opposite of a noodle arm. That dude has a big arm.

It helped that only 5 seconds was spent showing the blow out soccer match.

For sure.

He sure can't, with fans like you.

That's a weird way to describe Elon Musk or Bernie Sanders, but I'll allow it.

I almost went full brick horn and turned the episode off at the stupid haircut scene. Everything up to that point had me thinking the good times were gone. But boy did it rebound very quickly afterwards and turned into a pretty good episode-- maybe my 2nd or 3rd favorite of the season. Enjoyed seeing the doc get knocked down a peg, both by her mentor and a Peugeot, and seeing her drawing closer to Ted who himself took a step up a peg emotionally; I think they meet on the same plane in the next episode or so which will be good viewing. Also, I'm not a huge Roy Kent fanboy like most, though I like him well enough, I thought his response to Jamie was moving and another feather in the cap of a character who is written to be basically the soccer playing, real life (debatable still, I guess) Shrek. A grunting, brooding loner ogre with a heart of gold and good instincts for other people, kids, and probably animals. Like shadow said, and I'm actually kind of surprised at this, but the Rebecca and Sam stuff was very anticlimactic. After all the build up and tension it just kinda meted itself out in a nice, boring way. Cool, I guess. Maybe the big twist is when people find out and they have to deal with the fall out. Or since it's European and English soccer, maybe the story line becomes tackling anti-miscegenation and other racist behaviors (aren't the europeans famous for throwing bananas at soccer players and harassing the young black guys who missed a PK recently that kinda looked like Sam IRL?). I think that would be an interesting direction but probably too edgy for this show.

Dragonheart (1996)

Just watched the first four of these and I agree, the Dr. Strange one has been the best. These aren't that great.

Even if you are correct, which I don't think you are, 10-7 wins the NFC East by at least a full game.

Every accusation is a confession.

A loss is a loss. This was a god awful loss. +3 in turnovers. Moved the ball all night. Stalled drives. No pressure at all on Brady. Missed kicks. Dumb penalties. Typical Dallas loss. Oh no! Dallas lost to one of the best teams in the league despite having a chance to win in the last minute! They are going to be horrible and lose all the games against even the middle-of-the-road and bad teams too!

Yea but I have full confidence that we will win the crappy division, so a couple of good losses-- this wasn't a bad loss-- won't make too big a difference.

Dak played lights out even if you don't consider the context of him coming back. Made it close and almost won a game almost nobody gave them a chance to win. Mahomes couldn't beat this exact same team either.

Yea I was delayed.

No Time outs is huge here