"If you wanted to disappear, Ardmore, Oklahoma, would be a fine place to do it"

From an article about once-promising NFL player Justin Blackmon:

The town envelops you slowly, pulling you in from the highway on your way north from Dallas or south from Oklahoma City. Cut through the layer of strip malls and Applebee’s; head past the Walmart Supercenter that draws shoppers from nearby towns Lone Grove and Wilson; and as you head past Main Street toward downtown you can watch the world transform. Here the brick is faded, the signs all slightly askew. Businesses have straightforward names. There’s Ashley’s (books), Marquis (furniture), and Antiques (antiques). Above, a water tower and a feed mill reach toward a sky that is vast, occupying air that is hot and dry. Below, locals say, a web of tunnels snakes through the earth, underground passages that once connected bootleggers to brothels and gave criminals refuge whenever their enemies passed through town.

Quorra Disney Infinity figure is $8.89

At Amazon.

"[Southern California] Court clerk at center of massive bribery scheme forged records for drunk drivers and others"

LAT:

For some of the drunk drivers, speeders and red-light runners of Orange County, the most powerful person to know wasn’t a judge, a prosecutor or a defense attorney. It was a low-level paper pusher who rarely saw the inside of a courtroom, authorities say.

In 2010, word began spreading quietly through the seamier corners of the O.C’s vibrant car enthusiast scene that there was someone working inside the county courts who, for a price, could make a criminal charge or ticket disappear.

Mall design: "you never, ever, ever make a straight hallway longer than 600 feet, or a curved hallway much over 1000 feet"

R:

A few examples that I can remember off the top of my head: you never, ever, ever make a straight hallway longer than 600 feet, or a curved hallway much over 1000 feet. If the average American can see that it's more than 600 feet from where they're at to the store they want to go to, they'll leave and go back to their car, intending to drive around to a closer entrance. But, studies showed, once in their car, half of them decide to just simply go home. You can trick them into walking 1000 feet if it's a visually busy place -- sculpture, gardens, fountains -- and even then, only if they can't see that it's more than 600 feet, so the corridor has to turn at least once. Any farther than that and they won't go; it's too far to walk. They also won't go up or down more than one escalator flight.

That's why almost every mall in America has a center entrance on the middle floor of a three story mall, with two or three wings of 1000' length, each wing curved at least once in the middle.

Picked up from my wishlist: The Etched City

$1.99 right now--I picked it up based on a recommendation.

ESPN says John Elway is a man amongst men...when dealing with a waffle maker

Two passages from a new profile:

He was less than three weeks into his new job running the Broncos. He wore a leather jacket. Desk clerks stared. Scouts stared. It was like Springsteen had showed up for open mic night. Elway approached the waffle maker, poured the batter and clamped the irons. The red light didn't come on. He flipped it over. Nothing. He fiddled with it. Still nothing. Then he got that look he gets when he's imposing his will. Brow furrowed, tongue hugging his upper lip. The look from when he threw the bullet that capped The Drive, the look from when he launched himself into three Packers near the goal line in Super Bowl XXXII.

...

More than the excitement of winning, Elway is hooked on the "excitement of not knowing" what's possible, what he's capable of. He was never immune to pressure the way Montana was. When he jogged onto the field late in the fourth quarter of Super Bowl XXXII, with the game tied 24-24 and just over three minutes left, he didn't look for John Candy in the stands. He looked inside. He thought what every viewer thought: This is his whole career right here.

His intensity isn't for everybody. It wasn't for John Fox

"A U.S. Marine Tried To Warn A Comrade, Now He Faces A Discharge"

NPR:

Four years ago, Jason Brezler sent an urgent message to a fellow Marine in Afghanistan, warning him about a threat. The warning wasn't heeded, and two weeks later, three U.S. troops were dead.

...

In particular, the local police chief, Sarwar Jan, turned into a problem.

"Sarwar Jan, he was a threat to not only the Afghans but our own Marines," Brezler says.

The chief was maybe linked to the Taliban. He was also alleged to be a pedophile who preyed on local boys — something alarmingly common among Afghan warlords.

Recently there's been a debate about whether U.S. forces should tolerate Afghan allies who keep kids at their barracks. Back in 2010, there was no policy. Brezler couldn't fire Sarwar Jan, but he could kick him off the base.

"We put Sarwar Jan on the next helicopter. And, once he left, we could have probably had a parade the next day through the bazaar. The Afghans were absolutely elated," he says.

Brezler went home. In the summer of 2012 he was still in the Marine Reserves, and working as a Brooklyn firefighter. On the side he was getting a master's degree.

"I'm sitting at a conference table in Oklahoma, taking I believe a public budgeting class, and I received an email, and the title was 'SARWAR JAN IS BACK,' all caps, exclamation point, exclamation point," he says.

It was a forwarded request for information from a Marine in Helmand. Sarwar Jan was living on a U.S. base again. He'd brought a small group of underage Afghan boys to serve him there.

"My reaction was largely a visceral one. I was like, 'Are you freaking kidding me?' " he says.

Brezler searched his laptop — it was the same one he'd had with him in Helmand — and found the dossier on Sarwar Jan. He attached it, hitting "reply all" and then "send." That set off a chain of consequences, including one Brezler never intended, according to his lawyer, Mike Bowe.

"As soon as he sends it, the Marine on the other side says, 'This is marked classified,' " Bowe says. "So, at the first break during class, [Brezler] calls on his cellphone to his [commanding officer] and he says, 'Look, this is what just happened,' " says Bowe, "so he self-reports right away like he's supposed to do."

"The NFL Has an Age Problem And you’re seeing the effects on the field. The players are younger than ever, the football is worse than ever"

An article at The Ringer about NFL teams filling their rosters with young, cheap (bad) players:

On March 18, 23-year-old Ravens cornerback Tray Walker died from injuries suffered in a motorbike accident in Miami one day prior. Eight days later, at the funeral in a Baptist church in south Florida, [Ravens coach John] Harbaugh approached the head of the NFL Players Association, DeMaurice Smith. “I said the rules have to be adjusted for first-, second-, third-year guys,” Harbaugh said, referring to rules that limit offseason contact between players and coaches. “The rules are built for guys who have families and need time off.”

Smith said the interaction was brief. “One, we were at a funeral,” he said. “Two, we don’t negotiate with coaches. If he has any issues he has an owner right upstairs. The owner reports to the management committee and they approach us about changes.”

Terminator 2: T-1000 (Motorcycle Cop) Ultimate Action Figure by NECA available for preorder

At the BBTS.

Pinyike: Robotic Nude Body

PPG.

"The 40 Best Wonder Woman Twirls"

Link.

"Why is Aikman mad" at Skip Bayless?

TR:

If there’s one fact repeatedly cited in critiques of Bayless . . . it’s this: 20 years ago, Bayless may or may not have claimed in a book that Aikman was gay. I hesitate to wade into the minefield. But it’s worth revisiting what Bayless actually wrote in 1996, because it’s a little more complicated than the way it’s being portrayed.

...

But the “Switzer camp” kept telling Bayless the rumor did matter. From Page 188:

Maybe I imagined this, but I began to feel subtle pressure from the Switzer camp to “tell the truth” about what a “fraud” Troy is. In December, Switzer supporters would wonder if “the truth” about Troy had made him a “very troubled young man” and helped cause his slump. My response: “What exactly am I supposed to tell the truth about?” I had no proof of “the truth.”