The Pat Barringer Show

Detroit Lions? Now they're awesome!?

2009-04-25T17:14:00.004-05:00

It must be tough to be a Lions fan. Once again they are trying to make a fresh start this year and make us all forget how awful they have been recently. They will accomplish that by fooling all of us with a new logo. However, it looks a little familiar... Not to mention, the new lion's hair makes him look a lot like the main character of the above-mentioned cartoon. What was wrong with the '90s uniforms that Barry Sanders wore? Epic fail Lions.

Randy Orton's Lawyer... Looks Familiar?

2009-04-01T20:05:00.003-05:00

Not much to say here. I was just watching Monday Night Raw and thought one of Randy Orton's "lawyers" looked familiar. What do you think?

I'm sure that it Orton does not pay as well as Mr. Burns and Kent Brockman. What are the odds that guy is an actual attorney anyway? I mean the real one, not the cartoon. I know the blue-haired lawyer is legit.

Uncle Larry Can't Spell

2009-02-08T00:16:00.000-06:00

Rancov

(ranq-kov)

Bitter resentment or ill will / hatred or spite

To break apart; To Seperate or divide

If you listen to KFGO, then you are probably familiar with their morning offering, "Tom and Larry in the Morning." I wake up to this every day because it is the same 12-15 minutes of content looped over and over for three hours. It's hard to miss anything that way.

Lately there has been some kind of change where Larry does these prerecorded bits (judging from the way Tom has no interaction with him while he does these) consisting of did-you-know or odd news stories. It's made to sound like he's there with him, but I'm not fooled.

Anyway, one of Larry's daily bits is the "word of the day." He'll tell you the word all morning starting about 6 AM (and sometimes spell it for you if you're lucky) but you don't get to find out the definition until about 7:50. What a tease!

A couple weeks ago the word of the day was "rancor." I heard it on the air that morning, and later that evening I decided, out of curiosity, to check out their website that they are so proud of for some reason. Under the Tom and Larry page, you can see the breakdown of the word of the day.

The text I posted above is taken directly - copied and pasted with no modifications - from that part of the website. It is truly mind-boggling. "RANCOV"? That's not even a word! Not only that, but the phonetic breakdown shows a "Q" in the first syllable! And there's another typo in the definition! I'm so pissed that I can only express myself with exclamation points!

When you are doing a bit that is supposedly educating people, the least you could do is copy and paste the definition from a website. This has been apparantly typed from memory by someone who is so ignorant and inconsiderate that they don't even have the common courtesy to give us a literary reacharound (as in a spell check.) Good God Larry! I sure hope you aren't the one posting this nonsense, or I might fear your brain is crusted over with lemonade residue and clogged with beef stick gristle.

The Lost Films of Paulie Walnuts

2008-12-13T16:27:00.004-06:00

You know how people like to watch what they call "B Movies" and laugh about how awful, yet entertaining they are? You might call the movies I enjoy from the 70s "D" or "F" movies. Most of them are borderline unwatchable. It sort of a sick self-punishment that I enjoy. In the future I plan to detail some of these types of movies in this blog.

It's not all bad though. Sometimes I get to discover things that the internet didn't already know. Sometimes I find guest stars that you might recognize today, but at the time they were nobodies.

The other night I was watching an obscure 1979 movie "Smokey and the Hotwire Gang." I'm not sure if it's even available through normal retail channels. The plot is forgettable (literally - I don't even remember what it's about.) It has something to do with a "hot" woman named Smokey and her gang of... thugs? Then they do... stuff. Like I told you, I can't remember, it was that bad. IMDB gave it a rating of 2.8 out of 10.

The point of all this is, I saw an actor that you and I know well, but this movie was not listed in his IMDB credits. A scoop for me! Here are some screen caps, do you know him?

Of course you do - it's none other than Sopranos star Tony Sirico looking very thin and weasely. In the first pic, he's just chilling out in a diner overhearing some juicy gossip. The second pic is him telling Smokey how it's gonna be. In the last one, Smokey (pictured at right) is apparently trying to find out just how high the waistline of those dungarees goes. Like I said, I can't even remember what it's about and I watched the whole thing.

In summary, I can say with 100% certainty, and having no research of any kind, that this is the first and only place on the internet to have this story. Hopefully, as news of this discovery spreads like wildfire across the internet, the Pat Barringer show will be given full credit. Thanks for tuning in!

The Sirius/XM Merger: It's "Hair" to Stay!

2008-11-20T19:51:00.008-06:00

Wait! Don't click "Back" just yet. I admit that the title is extremely lame, but I couldn't think of a good one so I went with a newspaper style title. I would like to register my opinion on the recent merger of the above-named satellite radio companies.

I loved XM for the most part. At around $13 a month, there was not a whole lot to complain about. When the merger was announced, I'm sure most of the subscribers would have thought it was a good thing - to combine two mediocre companies and use the best of both of them to make one great service. Well, that's not at all what happened.

First off, non-subscribers might not know that it was a merger in the way that Saddam Hussein tried to "merge" with Kuwait in about 1991. Very, very few of the XM music channels survived the cut while they phased out duplicate channels. Most of what they took from XM was the great Opie and Anthony show, and all the sports channels.

Among those gutted channels was one of my favorites called "The Boneyard." This channel featured hard-rocking, arena bands from the 80s such as Judas Priest, Whitesnake, Aldo Nova, Helloween, etc. During the merger, some corporate suit who probably has never even heard of Y&T decided that the Sirius equivalent "Hair Nation" was the one to keep.

Right from the start I am pissed because of the name. The label "hair band" is thrown around way too loosely to describe bands from that era. It is generally a derogatory term meant to downplay their music. I don't subscribe to the idea that there are guilty pleasures in music. Either you enjoy the music and it makes you happy or you don't. What else could there be?

The main component of this channel's new found awfulness is that, unlike The Boneyard, the Hair Nation has DJs... ALL DAY LONG! They break in about every three songs with valuable quips about what's going on in their lives or awful jokes that would make local FM DJs cringe.

If they had DJs that maybe told you a little trivia about the bands, or stuff you didn't know about the genre you're listening to, fine. But that's not the case here. They tell you what song and artist you heard, which is utterly useless on XM since your receiver tells you that exact info at all times. They also find it necessary to tell you what's on other channels, or what they will be watching on TV tonight. And if you're lucky, you can strap on your laughing-hat and hear jokes to the effect of "Bruce Dickinson puts the 'dick' in 'Dickinson.'" Oh, I hope you didn't swerve into the median because of intense laughter! Not even Fargo's own Scotch & DUI would find that funny (and yes, I use the traditional spelling of that jerkoff's name.)

The point is, if Sirius insists on putting hacky DJs on every music channel, what makes if different than FM and thus, why pay for it? The best part of the music channels used to be that you would hear uninterrupted music that you don't normally hear a lot of on the regular airwaves. With this Hair Nation nonsense the playlist is much less deep (I heard 3 Guns N Roses songs within a 1 1/2 hour stretch, no exaggeration) and the vibe is ruined by the inane babble of its talentless DJs.

To give you an idea of how well run this company is, check out their channel description taken from the online player. This new company really has a handle on things!

I love "Alrenative Hits!" If this trend continues against the channels I've been willing to pay for, I will be "Siriusly" considering buying a Slacker mobile player (Ooh! an easy, corny pun on the way out.)

Your an Idiot!

2008-11-05T20:28:00.006-06:00

So I was filling up my truck the other day at one of the local Cenex stations, when I noticed this message posted on the pump. Not a big deal to most people, I'm sure, but I am a bit of a stickler for grammar and spelling, although I don't claim to be an expert. This is clearly wrong though. We can all agree on that I hope.

I dismissed it as a common error, and went on my way. Then, filling up at another Cenex, I saw the exact same sign pasted on the pump! This means that some fool printed up a bunch of these and delivered them to the local Cenex stations - presumably a manager. So, someone who has risen to a level where they dictate policy to multiple stations can't tell the difference between "your" and "you're"?

"You're" is the correct usage by the way, as in "you are" on camera. That sentence doesn't have a subject or a verb, unless you count the implied "you", which I won't. In summary, if you are in a position to make such visible decisions, at least spell check. And if you are the person responsible for this, you are a dummy.

Teen Sex Causes Accident At New Restaraunt

2008-10-01T23:28:00.000-05:00

Oh, hello. I didn't hear you come in. I'm Pat Barringer, host of the Pat Barringer Show. I was just reading my local newspaper, The Fargo Forum from their website, in-forum.com.

One of the features of the online edition is a box that shows the most read stories in a given hour. I have noticed a pattern in the types of stories that make the top of the list. Here are - in order of most to least read - the most popular subjects that Fargo and Moorhead readers can't get enough of.

1. Someone dies in a car wreck. This trumps everything. Could it be someone YOU know? Better find out...
2. Pornography/Prostitution. Photos of the accused are a must. And child pornography? So much the better. These stories probably serve as a "what not to do" for every pervert reading the online Forum.
3. Teen Anything. It doesn't matter what the story is about. Use "teen" in the title or as an adjective for anything to guarantee it will be read.
4. Restaraunt Opening/Closing. There's not much to do in Fargo other than eat and drink, so a new place for area fatsos (this writer included) to spend money is always welcome.

So, check it out for yourself. My bit is to scan the headlines every morning and then try to guess which story will be the most read. Use this list to get you started. Enjoy the sexiness!