So the ninth season of Scrubs premiered tonight and I will admit I am skeptical of the validity of TPTB decision to keep this show going.  After years of it being shuffled around the NBC schedule like that gift you got from your mom and only bring it out when she comes to visit the gang from Sacred Heart (well some of them anyways) finally seem to have found a home that accepts them.  For now.  I wonder if ABC will be so Scrubs happy if the show doesn’t perform well.  Will they stand by it for a 10th season or will they watch it wither away and die a needless death?  Now don’t get me wrong I quite enjoyed Scrubs 2.0.  It was nice dipping back into the insanity pool with our gang of misfits.  But it just seemed too little too late.  It was as though you could feel their time had come and gone.  What mad it even sadder is that what should have been the finale was so fitting for one of mine and many other’s favorite comedies. 

Scrubs 2.0 brings us to Winston University which if we believe Dr. Cox is one of the more pathetic schools and all the doctors that come out of there are all murders.  That’s definitly something all young minds want to hear right before they begin learning how to save lives.  Apparently 2.0 Dr. Cox is an even bigger jerk now.  Not once during the whole hour did you get the impression that deep down he was a good guy.  Instead they made him into a person that med students brake their necks trying to hide from him.  The one thing I loved about Scrubs back from the very beginning is that they never made Dr. Cox out to be mean for the sake of being mean.  Sure his ways of teaching could be considered callous but it was only because he knew that there was a fine line between tough love and a pat on the back.  I get that they are trying to make it seem as though JD is now the teacher, but frankly seeing Dr. Cox as a one dimentional character was simply disheartning.

But Guy Love is flourshing and is stronger than ever.  Thankfully they didn’t try to retouch that golden treasure.  The chemistry between Zach and Donald is as good as ever.   You can really tell that these two are best friends on or off the show.  Albiet I can not stand it when JD schreeches “Eagle.”  It grates my ears, but oh well it is a small price to pay for a little bromance.  Is it weird that there was absolutely no mention of Carla?  I know she isn’t on the show any more but they could atleast have mentioned her and hell even Jordan in passing.  But nope, notta word was whispered.  But we did learn that poor Enid had passed and Dr. Kelso was doing his best to move on with his life.  Hell 2 days to get over a loved one seems like enough to me too.  How great was it to see Neil Flynn as the Janitor one more time?  Even though he has his own new show, The Middle, he still came back to do a cameo to say goodbye in such a fitting way.  It seemed a perfect ending for their Wile Coyote vs. Road Runner relationship.

So we know how I feel about the professional Scrubbers, but the new ones?  Truthfully I am not sure.  After 2 episodes the only thing nice I can say about Lucy, oh who am I kidding she irritates the hell out of me.  Do we really need another voice over?  Was it pertinent to the tone of the show?  It was fine when JD was doing it, but a new person?  Um no.  I know they should just see if ZB would tape the voice over like Kristen Bell does on Gossip Girl.  Wait nevermind it would probably just make me miss JD more.   Hopefully in the coming episodes Lucy won’t grate me so much, but honestly I doubt it.  I wonder if I am the only who who thinks she looks alot like Leighton Meester.  Hey cool that was not only my second Gossip Girl reference, but even better it was my second Veronica Mars reference.  I am thinking about starting a 6 degrees of VM game. 

Slightly better, but not much, would be Cole Aaronson played by Dave Franco.  Oh yeah you know the last name.  And I did notice one thing about Mr. DF and that is he squints just like his not quite as famous brother (I kid, I kid).  Now fortunately for DF it isn’t him who makes me cringe.  It isn’t even his character, a young Todd in the making or possibly Bob Kelso considering his family money.  Nope what made me cringe was that horrible dialogue.  Do people really talk like that?  No really I want to know.  Luckily for DF he managed to pull off that crap, but I wonder how long he can keep it up.

My two favorites of the night were Drew Suffin, played by Michael Mosley, and Denise Mahoney (Images of Police Academy are playing on the TV set in my mind right now) played by Eliza Coupe.  I will say this to TPTB and that is good choice keeping Eliza on.  So far they seem the most three dimensional.  And I mean out of all of them.  In all fairness I don’t think I could ever get too much of The Todd though.  I have a feeling that these two are ging to be the go to people of the show now.  I realize that Lucy is supposed to be the heart of the show now but MM & EC stole the show out from under the rest of them. 

Ok guys for all ya who dont know scrubs is (in my oppion) one of the best TV series of all time (next to the simpsons). So with their last seasons ending people were questing if they would come back (look at the bottom of this post for the video). But by the power of ABC they came back with the new season. This one is set after hospital has been demolished and turned into a med school and the main charicters are the new med students. The neariator is now voiced by Lucy (Kerry Bishe) who replace the old nariator John ‘J.D.’ Dorian (Zach Braff) but who now a teacher at the med school this show is chock loaded with new and old charaters and what makes scrubs one the best shows ever! Watch the videos below to see the last epp. of last season and the TWO new epp. of the new season.

Scrubs season 8 My Finale, Part 1

Scrubs season 8 My Finale, Part 2 (best part at the end)

Scrubs season 9 Our First Day of School

Scrubs season 9 Our Drunk Friend

“Our First Day of School”/”Our Drunk Friend”

December 1st, 2009

“Everything’s new, except for the title.”

When Scrubs returned for an eighth season on ABC last year, I was a naysayer.

In my eyes, the show had worn out its welcome with a number of problematic seasons that became problematically silly in a way that ruined the heart that made the show so compelling in earlier seasons. I got to the point where I felt the show did not even deserve the chance for closure: no matter what I once felt for these characters, I had no desire to see them continue on thier problematic path.

And then season eight happened, and my point of view changed. The show literally went back to basics, rewinding back into the earlier seasons and starting to tell stories about our beloved characters maturing and a new crop of interns learning the ropes and in need of mentors. The show was breaking no new ground, relying on the same combination of cutaway humour/blind sentimentalism that defined seasons one and two, but it grounded the show to a sense of identity that reminded me what I missed during the dark years. So when it had its beautifully executed finale, season eight proved itself to be the perfect endnote on these characters’ journey.

And then ABC renewed the show. And all over again, it felt like everything was wrong: this was a show that had a chance to leave on a high note after most of us had written it off, and now it’s risking everything to return. And so we had another summer/fall of Bill Lawrence assuring us that the show would be different, this time a distinct enough entity from the Scrubs we knew (he wanted to call it Scrubs Med) to justify returning even after J.D.’s emotional departure.

Watching the ninth season premiere, I’ve realized that the problem is less that this is inherently bad (in fact, it’s quite good) and more that this is absolutely exactly what happened last season. The show presents a new set of med students looking for mentors, and keeps the older doctors around to serve as those mentors, resulting in a show that isn’t actually that different from what they did a year ago.

Which makes it solidly engaging, if not nearly the sort of reboot that it might have been a year ago.

The one thing about this new version of Scrubs is that it is substantially more future proof: if, for some reason, the show emerges as a comic hit this season, there is actually a show here that could logically continue. The same couldn’t be said last season, which felt more substantially like an ending. However, the seasons basically follow the same principle in the early going, as many of the big changes (like Zach Braff’s inevitable departure) have been delayed in order to help viewers transition into the new structure. However, none of them are actually given storylines: outside of the bromance between Turk and J.D., and Dr. Cox’s relationship with J.D., the show is treating its long-term characters as tools to help shape the journeys of its new characters.

This is inherently smart, but it actually sort of handicaps the season early on because the new characters aren’t well-developed enough to really carry these types of storylines. Lucy is officially the new J.D. in terms of the alternate narrative perspective (sharing with J.D., hence the “Our” in the title), but she is simultaneously too similar (with the same kind of elaborate dream sequences) and too different (in terms of having no history for us to really relate to). Last season, while they had new interns like Denise, they largely used them as teaching tools for the older doctors, so the show hasn’t yet gotten used to having other characters become the new J.D., Turk, Elliot, etc. The result is that Lucy speaks and acts like J.D. in a way that works with the rhythm of the show but does very little to establish her own sense of identity.

If you go back to the show’s pilot (which is actually where I’m headed after I finish this review), it’s true that J.D. wasn’t yet a fully formed character, so to expect the same here is perhaps unfair. However, the problem is that the show has in some ways fully formed a character for her in that she is the new J.D. And while those traits developed organically in Braff’s performance (before overpowering it entirely), they’ve been transplanted onto Lucy in a way that Kerry Bishé can’t really give any nuance while having to share screentime with the returning characters and their quirks. The show runs her through the paces, teaching her a lesson about addicts and the futility of trying to fix their problems (a lesson that nearly every character in the show’s history has learned at some point), and it isn’t unentertaining so much as it is less effective than it was in the past.

The other character to get some substantial development here is the one younger holdover from last season, as Eliza Coupe is back as the acerbic Denise. The show is smart in how it folds her into the series, pairing her off with the age-appropriate med school dropout Drew and turning her into the unattainable superior for the cocky and entitled Cole. And whereas Lucy hooking up with Cole feels pointless and rushed, never connecting with any sense of character, Denise is the perfect foil to these new characters in that we more carefully understand her point of view, and because she is in a unique position as an intermediary between Cox/J.D.

Now, I do think that they moved a bit too quickly in terms of humanizing the character, as Denise from last season was mean and emotionless to the point where her sudden shift to the sentimental here (as she realizes after a single conversation with J.D. and Turk that she doesn’t, in fact, want to be alone forever on her island with her turtles). However, I think that it was the one shift that felt like it wasn’t inherently reductive of previous seasons. Drew’s med school burnout story (and his position as Dr. Cox’s #1) is similarly unique, and while his relationship with Denise is very simple it feels like something that could grow and develop in a different way than the relationships which came before it (Elliot/J.D., Turk/Carla, etc.). While Denise’s character has been softened, I don’t think it’s a problematic softening in the long run.

And as for Dave Franco’s Cole, I think it’s an example of my appreciation for the performer outweighing the limited capacity of the character. In context, he’s barely more developed than the hot Australian doctor (who is little else than that, really), playing a delightfully douchey and entitled student, which is not actually in itself that unique. After all, early in the series, the show did a similar storyline with a trustee’s son tormenting Elliot when he’s assigned to her care. What makes it work for me, though, is that Franco has most often been playing either stoners or geeks who talk like stoners (most recently on The CW’s Privileged), and it’s kind of great to see him play someone with a more brash personality. While Lucy is the new J.D., and Drew has his own quirks (like this use of “whore” in stressful situations), Cole is the character who feels the most like a caricature (shortens words, has a wingmom) but yet Franco’s performance helped elevate to something that grew on me as the episodes went on.

And yet, in the two episodes, I’m not sure the show really did enough with any of this to convince me that it’s all going to work out if I wasn’t a returning viewer who understood the show’s patterns. It’s a weird position to be in, as for me the show is problematically familiar and for new viewers the show is likely problematically unfamiliar in terms of the leaps and shortcuts it makes to try to replace an outgoing cast with an incoming one. When the show went back to basics last year, it was repetitive in a way that felt like the show coming full circle: now, the show is trying to use the same tricks to start something entirely new, and in the process leaning on old material (and old characters, like the superfluous Dr. Kelso) in a way that is actually slowing down any sort of progress.

Neither of the two episodes were bad, and in fact I’d say that “Our First Day of School” probably did as good a job as it possibly could trying to explain away the show’s new premise (old hospital torn down, new hospital built on university campus, Elliot is seven months pregnant, etc.) and introduce these new characters. “Our Drunk Friend” had less of a narratological burden which meant that its problems were somewhat more apparent, but overall the episodes tread closely to Scrubs’ ongoing tradition and represented nothing close to a departure for Bill Lawrence and company.

As such, my true verdict on the new Scrubs waits until the departures actually happen, and when most of the returning characters outside of Turk and Dr. Cox leave and allow the show to get on with its new existence. The transition period exists for a number of reasons, many of them relating to promotion (Braff’s cache is way down, but still exists), but at this point it’s keeping the show from defining itself as anything but the exact same show with the exact same storylines but with new characters who are forced to fight over screen time with characters we love but who no longer have any sort of narrative arc. And while that’s charming, and on occasion very funny, it’s not a sustainable television model and, perhaps more problematically, it’s the same thing the show did last year just with different characters at the forefront. If this was Season 8, I’d view it as a fresh new start: as Season 9, it’s a weird transition phase that could go in any number of directions.

Cultural Observations

• I think the one lingering question for me is what happened to Carla: Judy Reyes is one of the missing actors who didn’t get another job (Neil Flynn, the Janitor, is of course on ABC’s The Middle), and yet she hasn’t been confirmed to be stopping by that often. This is largely because the show doesn’t seem to have any major storyline plans for Turk and Dr. Cox (Christa Miller is over on her husband’s other show, after all), but it’s interesting we didn’t get a mention of it.
• While the ratings aren’t of huge importance for the show, as in many ways it was brought onto the schedule in order to kill time between Dancing with the Stars seasons, I really hope the show maintains some momentum so that it can help launch Better Off Ted: that’s a show that deserves a few more seasons, and if a zombified Scrubs can make that happen I’ll be most pleased.
• While J.D.’s antics were tiresome throughout the two episodes (and remain the show’s lowpoint), I thought Dr. Cox worked well in a largely supporting role and as a teacher: we know from experience that he’s a great teacher when he wants to be, and it’s great to have John C. McGinley remain on my television.

A performance as miserable as the Manchester weather but did it have to be this way? It seems that as soon as we see the kit of a top 4 team our knees start knocking and we beat ourselves before the referee blows the opening whistle. We had a decent chance tonight, opened the better only to find ourselves behind against the run of play.

We pick ourselves up and try again only to give up possession too easily and allow another great effort from Gibson to hit our net. 2-0 down and really game over unless we can get ourselves going and we failed to do so melting away as the second half wore on.

Both sides played people who often sit on the bench. Jenas should fancy to do as well as Gibson or better. He has loads more experience yet Gibson shows him how to deliver when a chance to show the Manager arrives. Bentley gets a rare start and on his favoured wing yet doesn’t really get going and cannot beat the first man from any dead ball situation. Hutton has loads of good runs but cannot cross the ball with any accuracy.

Why is that? How can these guys not know what to do to get the job done.

Ok, I accept Vidic played well but did we do our best to put him under pressure. Jenas has a great engine I’m told but all I see is him ambling between boxes without the ball and getting rid when it comes to him. What does he offer apart from defeat when he is in the starting line up? The only answer is a lack of desire and motivation.

What else do these guys have to do apart from practice? And there lies the problem. It seems that some have trouble fitting in training and matches into their busy lives. What with all the drinking, car crashes and hotel room fun who would want to practice corners or moving towards the opposition goal when putting your foot on it and going backwards appears acceptable.

Yes we had good possession but did we create enough? Harry’s tactic of putting Lennon against Gary Neville was a cunning one but we failed to get him the ball in positions where he could exploit it. When Tommy came on we did try and exploit the space better as nearly every distance pass had been under hit in the first half.

We also have to believe there will be a man in the box. JD was playing so he’d be borderline offside every time but we did not believe enough to try and make the cross. Bale had several good opportunities and then checked himself. If the cross was gone for and good it’s up to others to get the head/body/foot on it so why don’t we believe a man will be there?

Tonight we can console ourselves that Top 4 is more important than Carling Cup and we are right. But we shouldn’t overlook that this was another poor performance when it mattered and a couple of thousand Spurs fans travelled 300 miles to see it.

We also have to make the top 4 and on this showing we won’t get any points against the top 4 teams because we’re too busy showing them too much respect rather than getting stuck in. That means it is questionable. Harry’s face summed it up in the last 5 minutes. It said “we’ll be in the top 3 for agent payments again next season if we really want to compete”. We certainly need to do better on Saturday.

Finally I noticed Berba’s new hair cut. Is it so that Sir Alex does not recognise him and he maybe gets picked more often?

Age: 28

Hair: Red

Height 5′4

Method: Wearing Her Down

Advancement:  The Sitcom Shoot down

Me and D have one of the weirdest friends/non-relationships/love/hate kind of things. It all boils down to the simple fact that we could/will never remotely get our shit together. Either I have a girlfriend, she has a girlfriend, I’m not looking for a relationship, she’s a basket case, or we spend all our time on the phone together, it’s a revolving relationship. It’s been this way for years, and I get a little sick of it every few months. It also works out that our schedules never mesh, so we go through these fits without actually having to see each other.  Last night, in a fit of drunken spontaneity, she randomly calls and asks me if she can come over, just to get a bottle of wine. Luckily, I don’t live in a place where such a feat is impossible at 10pm at night.

So she comes over, and I haven’t seen her in well over a year, and it was just weird. It was awkward as hell, so she immediately asks to crack open the wine. We also decide that we are gonna watch some Scrubs, because she likes to joke that we are like JD/Elliot in the on/off again kind of stuff. So we are sitting there on the couch with a pretty decent mutual buzz going on, she’s cuddled against my chest, and I just decide to go for it. I turn, kiss her, and immediately she pulls away. And this freaks me the fuck out, because I’d never seem to misread a situation more. She tells me that we should wait, but I become paranoid, that I did something wrong, and I don’t think she likes me at all and seeing me in person has completely complicated the situation.

But she then proceeds to keep cuddling with me, holding my hand, putting her head in my chest, until she falls asleep. Eventually I wake her up, because I know she had to get home, and I walk her to her car. It’s that slow kind of walk where we are just chatting and being flirty, and out of nowhere she goes, “I swear to God if you try and kiss me, I’ll kick your ass”. And this screamed of the kind of time where a girl would say the exact opposite of what she means, but it rattled me enough to not bother going for it, even still wanting to.

Listened to some best of today, I gotta say that I hate re-runs.  But with Howard, they are okay.  I cant ever watch a movie 2 times.  No matter how good it is, or how funny it is.. Howard is different though, and I guess if I really think about it, Its good to listen to because…well, you know.. I dont know what it is.

Its just good entertainment.  The Rosie Interview, Dustin Hoffman, JD canceling the Car show, ect.  Its not all strippers and sibian rides, its not all lesbians and finding out what is in Sals pouch.  Us fans know that.  Although that stuff is super entertaining and funny.  Some of the great interviews howard gets are just enough funny and enough seriousness to get through.  Nobody cares about hearing about characters on movies, we want to know what these celebs do when they are not on camera.

Howard knows how to do it.. that is why he is the best and that is why these re-runs are not so bad to get through.  I dont know if i could listen to re-runs for ever though, there is nothing like hearing a live show on a monday morning.  When and if Howard goes, its really gonna suck.

JD reveals that he has spent over $10,000 on web cam girls. His favorite web cam girl is Kissyfur from keen.com and his screen name is DaBa, short for Da BadAss. Hilarious stuff here. Order Sirius-XM and get the Howard Stern Show! Listen from Part 1 thru 5. Part 3 slows down a bit due to a Ralph Cirella phone call.

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Part 5

We’ve already seen Robbie Keane score 4 goals this season against Burnley so to expect to see someone score more in a game would have been more than a little bit greedy. But we got it and what’s more all in the space of 45 minutes for he wasn’t breaking the offside trap in the first.

Firstly the team. I called for width and balance and got it. Keane was rested and I bet he enjoyed his drive home tonight – Not! Lennon on the other hand will be enjoying his having returned to the side and putting in a devastating shift which provided goals for firstly Crouch, then Defoe before helping himself to one and Kranjcar put in a superb performance carrying on from where he left off against Sunderland. His vicious shot which became the ninth goal was really deserved to round off his best performance in a Spurs shirt.

And really in the second half they were all outstanding passing it around at will and taking the game by the scruff of its neck and forcing home the advantage. Had we played like that throughout, instead of allowing Wigan back into the game in the latter stages of the first half we would have broken the Premier League highest score record. Granted we did not keep a clean sheet and as it was a hand ball goal a West Ham friend of mine has already texted suggesting the game should be replayed but a momentary lapse could not detract from the sort of performance all football fans dream of.

In my preview I did suggest that if we got the show on the road we could score more than my 2-0. I said to G before the start this could be good today having seen the team sheet and so it proved. After a quick start which saw long balls floated in for Lennon to attack and deliver deadly crosses which produced an early goal for Crouch and a second near miss.

Then there was a quick corner which saw a ball laid across the face of goal for Tommy to hit a powerful shot which was unstoppable and just wide. Palacios took a ball and carried it before hitting another powerful drive that Kirkland acrobatically saved at his top corner.

At the other end Wigan were also attacking and Gomes was made to take crosses and make saves one from a long throw out of his own that was picked off and driven low to his left corner.

At half time we questioned why we had let go of our early grip and could we pick up our play once more to get the second goal. G felt a rocket from Harry would put it right and as usual he was on the button! After the second goal the game burst into life with a flurry of Defoe goals running onto through balls and finishing in style. And that was history of the second half. From the Paxton Road you thought on occasions he had gone too wide only for him to rifle it into the far corner.

Lennon left the proceedings to much deserved applause and Bentley came on scoring an excellent goal from 25 yards from a free kick which we understand is credited to Kirkland as it came back onto his back from the crossbar.

Can it get any better? Probably not. You don’t want to criticise on such a day but we did give the ball away too easily in the first half which might have been punished by a stronger opponent but you can only beat what has been put in front of you and those sloppy passes were made in an effort to provide the type of entertainment that Harry knows Spurs fans expect to see. I’ve seen 10 in a game before at White Hart Lane but that was 6-4 against Reading. I didn’t see the 9 against Bristol Rovers when we were in Division 2 as it was then so this is the pinnacle in scoring on my many visits. I loved it and congratulate the team for delivering a result far beyond any of our expectations at the kick off.

So what now for Robbie; how doe he get back into the side? And Jenas and what about Modric who we understand is nearing fitness? Performance is the answer, they may have to wait but they will know that none of those who performed so well today can be dropped without good reason for the next game. This team looked miles better than the starting line up for Sunderland and got the result in confident fashion. That’s what this game is about. Come on You Spurs!

Just saw this in todays sun. This works out at £20 a litre which is as cheap as it ever gets. If anyone knows any cheaper please let us know cos i’ll be stocking up here otherwise. Offer ends 22nd nov, max 3 bottles per customer

To ASDA it is then!!!

  I feel as though I have neglected this blog lately.  We had a dark moon on Monday and I didn’t even mention it.  The problem was, we also set up and opened the holiday kiosk all freaking day.  Way busy, so the lunar report was left out.  Spending far too much time at the mall right now but it’s only temporary.  Seasonal jobs are like that.

The big news of the day though (other than J.D. being The Solstice Saviour) was that Hanny met Al Gore!  They shared cheese!  First Gloria, now Al.  This radio gig is definitely the place to see and meet important folks.

Jermaine Dupri has seen his name in the news lately for positive reasons. Most recently JD’s been in the headlines for his work alongside his Ocean’s 7 family member Nelly for Atlanta flood victims and for adding diversity to his portfolio by working with rock band Weezer.

Now however JD’s name has been added to a growing list of celebrities going through tax woes.

The state of Georgia filed a tax lien against him Tuesday for $135, 749. That’s just the beginning of his troubles however considering that the IRS filed a $3,095,004 lien against him in September.

According to his attorney James Kane, JD’s currently working on getting the liens removed and told the Detroit News his client successfully made payments on the money past due.

“I can assist you in telling you that all of the taxes have been paid and my law firm has been, and is, in the process of getting the liens removed in normal course. As to any other information, you can certainly understand under the attorney-client privilege that I am not able make any further comment.”

Riiiiiight.

Just recently JD and his incarcerated So So Def sister, Da Brat were sued by a woman who Brat assaulted at his Studio 72 club. No word on the amount asked for in that law suit.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. PAY YO BILLS PEOPLE!

Nelly, JD, Trey Songz and Big Kountry King were spotted at Magic City last Monday night making it rain for Nelly’s Celebrity Birthday Bash. I heard Nelly threw out tens of thousands that night. As you can see from the flicks, there are just about as many women that attend Magic City Strip club as there are men. I’m told that’s where all the straight men in Atlanta hang out…

….And Floyd Mayweather made it rain in Vegas along with JD, Ray J and Diddy recently. Floyd will be broke before his next fight at the rate he’s going. smh..

I got into Cooley. I think everyone gets into Cooley. I’m not totally sure but I think you literally get in if you just take the LSAT exam. So, yeah. The one cool thing is I received a scholarship for half of my tuition. That’s pretty significant. I’ve honestly treated Cooley Law as the back up school, as well I should be. That’s just the way it goes. I’ve been told by many that you get a great JD education there and I’m inclined to believe them. But if I can get into a school that’s more exclusive, I can only benefit from that. I won’t be hearing from Wayne State or Michigan State until late December/early January and that sucks. I want to know right now. But at the very least I know I have a good deal waiting for me if all else fails.

Actually, I have a little bit more to think about now than I thought I would. A 50-percent scholarship knocks the tuition down to about $10-11,000 per term. Assuming I get some help from financial aid, I could walk out of Cooley after three years and only be about $30,000 in debt. That’s significant as I may not even get into the other two schools, let alone receive scholarship or grant money. For both I’m look at least $60-70,000 in debt. Sure, I’ll make it back a lot easier but that’s a daunting number to say the least.

So, yeah, getting into Cooley really doesn’t mean much but it still made me happy to receive the letter. Law School has seemed a bit artificial for a while and that letter finally made it real. This IS going to happen and, NO, I won’t have to paint houses for the rest of my life.

JD’s hiatus on the music scene looks like it won’t be over anytime soon. While he’s been dabbling in projects with his Ocean’s 7 super group, he has yet to produce his own solo material. In keeping with that trend JD is producing for someone else once again and focusing his talents to a popular rock band. The rock band Weezer tapped JD for help on their Raditude album.

JD contributed his penmanship to two tracks for the group and told Billboard he was drawn to the group after hearing their lead vocalist on the song, “Buddy Holly.”

“”When I heard River’s saying, ‘What’s with the homies dissin’ my girl/Why do they got to front,’ I became a big fan. He was talking my type of language in a rock record, and it always stayed with me. They talk like I do, but to a different crowd — we’re basically speaking the same words.”

He also told Billboard that So So Def was now independent and he was prepping new projects.

“So So Def is independent now. The brand is worldwide, and for the things I want to do and the places I want to take my artists, I don’t have to have major-label backing anymore. Right now I want to help introduce my first female artist in a long time: Dondria…I’m putting her first single out, titled “You’re the One.”

Dondria’s first single will be released November 23.

Here is the full leaked version of Mariah Carey’s new track “100 Percent”, the theme song for the new movie “Precious”. The track was produced by Jermaine Dupri & B. Cox.

Mariah Carey – 100%

Yes, I know this review is long over-due, but before reading Ted Dekker’s “Green” I went book OCD and had to read “Black”, “Red”, and “White”. Yes, I know, craziness.
Anyway I need to start off by saying that I really am a fan of Dekker’s. He’s never written anything that I found myself not enjoying (Although “Thunder of Heaven” came close). The same truth held for “Green” which more than held my attention although I feel quite confused after the ending. Having read most of the other books tied to this one I thought “Wow, I’ll finally get all the answers!” and I did get quite a few. (Just a hint for “Showdown” readers, you’ll love how Billy connects in this new book.) Still I feel like there’s still more to the Circle series. The reader is left either lunging for “Black” if they haven’t read it yet or thoroughly confused. I’m not a fan of spoilers so the only thing I’ll say is that the Circle is on of two things. The futile life of Thomas Hunter, for if the story is left as it is in “Green” then there is no hope, only a cruel joke that feel’s very unlike Elyon or the beginning of an intriguing spiral which I’m eager to dive deep into. The novel definitely had Dekker’s trademark of thrills, deep themes, and jolting truth which made it worth reading regardless of the confusion at the end.
-JD