Month: December 2022

The Kansas State Wildcats are trying to get a measure of revenge on TCU and ruin their perfect season on Saturday afternoon. The Wildcats and the undefeated Horned Frogs are squaring off in the Big 12 championship game, which doubles as a rematch of a game that TCU won in Fort Worth earlier this year.

If the Wildcats are able to go on to win the game, the fine folks in Manhattan are going to discuss this touchdown run by standout running back Deuce Vaughn for years to come. While facing a second-and-5 from right near midfield, Kansas State called on their standout running back to make a big play. Vaughn managed to hit a gigantic hole that let him pick up the first down, and then did a whole heck of a lot more, which included embarrassing a TCU defender with one of the nastiest jukes that you will see this season.

Sticking your foot in the ground to hit a hole like this is impressive enough, but doing this in the open field to sit an opposing player down on your way to the end zone is just spectacular. The 44-yard touchdown put the Wildcats up, 28-17, and was the first time that Vaughn picked up six on the afternoon.

Remember when calling your parents, a tow truck or a friend when you were out and about meant digging in your pocket for a quarter to make a pay phone call? Well, a Philadelphia-based collective, PhilTel, is jumping into the past with a modern twist, by installing free-to-use pay phones throughout the city.

Of course, the pay phones that many of us grew up were removed from public places years ago. There no longer seemed to be a need for them when most people had a phone in their pocket or in their hand. But it’s easy to forget that not everyone has or wants that luxury. For some people, staying that connected all the time can be too much and for others, it’s simply financially impossible to own a cell phone.

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Cell phones are expensive, and when you add the cost of a phone plan or paying for minutes, they quickly become out of reach for many people on fixed incomes or those experiencing homelessness. PhilTel’s aim is to help close this gap by making phones accessible to all. There’s only one catch: You have to leave the quarters at home!

That’s right, the phones will be free to use and that includes making nationwide calls. For the people of Philadelphia, that means a lot less asking strangers to use their phone if your battery dies or you accidentally lock your phone in your car. According to opensource.com, Mike Dank, the co-founder of PhilTel, said, “Philadelphia in particular has a lot of payphone use, even as payphone companies have been steadily removing phones from service year after year.”

Dank continued, “Residents who rely on these phones are being increasingly marginalized and if this trend continues, many will be left without a communication platform they need to carry out their lives.”

This isn’t the first time pay phones were added to a city in the age of cellphones. PhilTel was inspired by a company called Futel in Portland, Oregon, that has a similar program.

The phones are not new, they’re actually refurbished pay phones and will use a Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) service to connect callers. If you’re in Philly, you’ll be able to use one of these free pay phones as soon as December 17, when the first one gets installed at Iffy Books.

While this is a wonderful solution for those that need access to pay phones for day-to-day life, one has to wonder if the name will get updated. I mean, they’re not really pay phones anymore. They’re free phones or just public phones. I don’t know about you but this little detail is going to live in my head rent-free for a while.

A couple years ago, Sarah Michelle Gellar revealed that she crossed a parenting milestone: She let her kids watch Buffy the Vampire Slayer. It went well! Not only did they not mind watching their mother as a young woman fighting supernatural creatures; they actually got “so into it.” If it worked out so well for Gellar, could the same happen to other actor parents when they showed their older work to them? For John Krasinski, it was more of a mixed bag.

During a recent appearance on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, the erstwhile Jim Halpert said that his two young daughters “literally just started watching” the American version of The Office, the show that made him a star. They had expressed curiosity in the beloved program, and at the request of their mother, Emily Blunt, he put on the pilot. It went…well, interestingly.

“They were watching the first episode, and my oldest, it turns out she’s a screen talker-atter,” Krasinki explained. “She’s talking to the screen. So when Steve [Carell] fired Jenna [Fischer], she goes, ‘What are you doing? What are you doing?’ And then she goes,’”You’re a horrible person!’ And I said, ‘You should meet Steve Carell.’”

His younger daughter then had something to say about how he looks on the show, which debuted 18 years ago. “And then my six-year-old kept asking, ‘Is that you?’ And I said, ‘Yeah, it is,’” he recalled. “She said, ‘You look very different.’ And I was like, ‘Okay, I’ll try to not take that as a hurtful thing. But sure.’ And she goes, ‘You look very different.’ And I said, ‘No, that’s me. I’m just playing a character.’ And she went, ‘[Scoffs] That’s not you.’ And watched two more episodes being like, ‘That’s not you. Guy looks a lot like you, though.’”

The Office wrapped nearly a decade ago, but its cast continues to be involved with it some fashion. There’s a podcast, and the alum are constantly being asked about it. Krasinski himself last year revealed that there was only one time he refused to do a scene, namely on where Jim was supposed to make out with someone who wasn’t Pam while she was out on maternity leave.

You can watch Krasinski’s Late Show appearance in the video below.

The second season of The White Lotus hasn’t been as over-the-top as the first. But it is arguably hornier. And it can still swing big. The fifth episode concluded with a, well, very interesting choice. Even its first episode featured quite a large surprise: A gigantic prosthetic dong worn by Theo James’ cocky financier Cameron. The size of James’ fake Malcolm Gladwell turned a lot of heads. It even shocked James, partly because he had requested that his faux-dong be of average girth.

James stopped by The Tonight Show on Friday, where the subject of Cameron’s package — which he casually reveals mere feet away from Aubrey Plaza’s Harper, the wife of his college pal Ethan (Will Sharpe) — inevitably came up. In his conversations with makeup designer Rebecca Hickey, James wanted something more modest.

“I said, ‘Honestly, I just want it not to be distracting,’” James told host Jimmy Fallon. “‘He needs to be Regular Joe, ’cause the scene’s… you know, it’s not about the pee-pee — it’s about power play and sex. It’s about whether he did it deliberately or whether it was an accident and what that means and all that kind of stuff.’ And she says, ‘I got you. I got you. Regular Joe.’”

Alas, Regular Joe was not what James got. “We get to set and she’s got, like, a hammer or something,” James explained. “I mean, it’s bigger than that. It’s like she stole it off a donkey in the field. The thing is ginormous. And me and the director, Mike White, are sitting there going, ‘That’s… average, is it?’” He added, “It was nine inches flat and about four inches wide. We were like, ‘What the hell is that?’”

Back in November, James told Entertainment Weekly that the scene was initially as excessive as the size of the willy. “The original derivation of it, it’s kind of full-frontal, if you know what I mean. We shot that and it felt too much, too aggressive,” he told them. “What we came to is a bit more opaque, and that’s exactly what Mike does so well. You’re never sure a hundred percent of the characters’ intentions.”

You can watch James talk about his prop ween below. The White Lotus airs new episodes on HBO and HBO Max on Sunday nights at 9pm.

(Via EW)

The Utah Utes threw a major wrench in USC’s plan to make it to the College Football Playoff on Friday night. The Trojans needed a win in the Pac-12 championship game in order to secure a chance to play for a national title, but the Utes physically dominated them en route to a 47-24 drubbing that will send them to the Rose Bowl.

USC’s struggles in the game largely seemed to revolve around the fact that star quarterback Caleb Williams suffered an injury early in the game. Williams, the Heisman Trophy favorite, hurt his hamstring and stayed in the game, even though he was very obviously physically compromised.

It’s a tough way for Williams’ season to potentially end, but it is a little extra satisfying for the Utes. Coming into the game, Williams got “F*CK UTAH” painted on his nails. It’s not a new thing for him, but it was something that his opponents rallied around and, eventually, used as fuel to troll him.

The Utes’ quarterback, Cameron Rising, got asked about Williams’ nails after the game, and while he said that Williams could “do whatever you want,” it’s evident that it didn’t sit especially well with him.

There is no word on what Williams’ availability will be for the Trojans’ bowl game.

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Jacobi started on the traditional photography path in 2011, focusing mostly on human portraits.

When he noticed that his kitty content generated a lot more buzz online (no surprise to cat people), Jacobi started developing a niche, and now has made a career out of it. He not only does commissioned shoots for individuals, but is often called on for commercial work in magazines and pet food ads. In other words: cats on cats on cats. All day, every day.

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This was certainly an unexpected life path, since Jacob admits to not even liking cats as a kid—a lot of that due to a temporary childhood allergy. It wasn’t until he met his adopted cat Fritz, aka the “love of his life,” that he started to have a change of heart.

Here’s Fritz in full Halloween glory.

@furryfritz Count Fritzula wishing you a spooky Halloween 🎃🧛‍♂️👻 #furryfritz #catographer #cat #halloween #halloweencat ♬ Solitude – Felsmann + Tiley Reinterpretation – M83 & Felsmann + Tiley

Despite having worked with so many cats, Jacobi says that every photoshoot is unique, and that’s what keeps things exciting. The key, he tells Upworthy, is being flexible and patient. “You can’t force a cat to pose in front of the camera. If it feels uncomfortable, you will notice it in the photos and it won’t look good.”

See on Instagram

See on Instagram

See on Instagram

See on Instagram

He also stresses the importance of tending to the needs of each individual cat. Some respond to play more, kittens especially. Others are a bit more treat oriented. Occasionally he’ll even pull out the “kitty drugs” like valerian, catnip or silvervine if a feline client is particularly high strung.

Actually, there is one thing that remains the same. Every photoshoot begins with a thorough sniffing of Jacobi’s equipment.

In case you’re still on the fence about whether or not this guy has the best job in the world, one of the biggest perks is meeting kittens on the regular. It’s one of the things he finds the most rewarding, along with collaborating with shelters. For two years in a row, he’s participated in a charity photoshoot for his local animal shelter, and he has offered free photoshoots in exchange for shelter donations. You could say he’s using his talent to be a top-notch catvocate.

See on Instagram

And of course, when not sharing images of his fabulous meowdels, Jacobi offers us vital info on his TikTok, like how to make kitty Christmas cookies:

@furryfritz Cat cookies for xmas 🍪😻 #furryfritz #catographer #cats #xmascat #christmascookies #catcookies ♬ Jingle Bell Rock – Bobby Helms

Or you can stick to following his work on Instagram. It’s never without amazing cat inspo.

On Friday, chaos agent Elon Musk did something chaotic, again: He gave journalist Matt Taibbi some supposedly damning intel about how Twitter handled the 2020 election. It wasn’t that damning. Over an epic tweet thread, Taibbi argued that it showed the social media service deleting tweets about a since exonerated New York Post story about the Hunter Biden laptop story, at the behest of the Biden campaign, including one by former actor and current far right stooge James Woods. But as Mediaite pointed out, most of those tweets involved pornographic photos of Hunter Biden. (It also revealed Twitter deleted some tweets at the request of the Trump administration.) Many on the right were left disappointed. Others tried to claim this rendered the 2020 election compromised. One of them was, of course, the biggest loser of the 2020 election, Donald John Trump.

The former president took to his rinky dink Twitter clone to make a mountain out of the molehill that was Taibbi’s report. Where many on the right saw as an anticlimactic nothingburger, Trump saw a “revelation of MASSIVE & WIDESPREAD FRAUD & DECEPTION.” He then proposed doing one of two things, asking, “do you throw the Presidential Election Results of 2020 OUT and declare the RIGHTFUL WINNER, or do you have a NEW ELECTION?”

Trump was of course referring to himself as the “RIGHTFUL WINNER,” as he’s spent the last two years-plus crying voter fraud without supplying anything approaching proof. He’d probably prefer simply being reinstated in his old gig, as the “red wave” that failed to materialize during the midterms last month strongly suggest most voters want nothing to do with him or his bozo MAGA candidates, who either underperformed or flamed out. But at least this gives him something else to distract people from some of his recent dinner guests.

The United States men’s national team is out of the 2022 World Cup. After making it out of Group B and earning a knockout stage matchup with the Netherlands, the USMNT’s efforts to go on a run got caught up in an Oranje wave, and by the time the dust was settled, the Dutch picked up a 3-1 win over the red, white, and blue.

The Americans started the game with a golden opportunity. Tyler Adams played a speculative ball into the box that just happened to land at the feet of a totally unmarked Christian Pulisic. Unfortunately for Pulisic, the ball landed on his weaker left foot, and the Netherlands’ goalkeeper, Andries Noppert, was able to get the save with his left leg.

The USMNT continued to apply pressure to the Dutch, but Pulisic’s chance getting parried away came back to haunt them minutes later. The team put on a clinic in counterattacking football, which ended with Denzel Dumfries playing a ball into the penalty spot that Memphis Depay tucked away with ease.

Tried as they might, the United States were unable to break down a Dutch side that was happy to let them possess the ball. Their organization, mixed with the USMNT’s timidness when they were in and around the box, meant that team struggled mightily to create a good chance.

In fact, the best opportunity the team had in the first half aside from Pulisic came by way of Timothy Weah, who leathered a ball from outside of the box and made Noppert make a save.

And then, disaster struck. With mere seconds to go before halftime, the Dutch got a throw in that the United States was unable to deal with. Dumfries once again played a ball to the penalty spot, and this time, Daley Blind made the U.S. pay with the final kick of the ball before the two teams went into the locker room.

An opportunity came up for the Americans early in the second half off of a corner kick, with Pulisic playing a ball into a dangerous area. Tim Ream was just able to get his foot to the ball, but it was not enough.

With 20 or so minute to go, the Netherlands had a golden opportunity to put the Americans away, until Matt Turner made the double save of his life.

And much like the first half, a golden opportunity that got denied on one end turned into a goal on the other. One of the United States’ substitutes, Haji Wright, redeemed himself after an ugly miss that got sent out for a corner by a Dutch defender. Amid the chaos after that ensuing corner, Pulisic played in a ball that got to Wright’s feet. He just barely got enough onto it, and the USMNT had its first goal of the game.

With the wind finally at their sails, the Americans pushed and pushed with an eye on a second. But unfortunately for them, the dagger came by way of Dumfries. This time, he was on the receiving end of a cross from Blind, and while Antonee Robinson tucked too far inside to mark Cody Gakpo, Dumfries was totally free to put a ball past Turner.

Ultimately, the hill became too much for the Americans to climb. Their time in Qatar is over, while the Dutch will sit and wait to see if their quarterfinal game will be against Argentina or Australia.

Disney has always championed their back catalogue of classics, but for the last few decades, they’ve done their best to keep quiet about one of them. That film is 1946’s Song of the South, a “problematic” text, to put it lightly, concerning a plantation of happy former slaves in the Reconstruction Era. It’s never been released on home video (at least in America), and it’s certainly not on Disney+. Thing is, the company can’t completely deep-six it. After all, it features one of their most enduring songs, “Zip-a-Dee-Doo-Dah,” and it’s the inspiration for one of their most beloved theme park rides: Splash Mountain. But if they can’t remove the latter from their parks, they can, finally, dramatically rework it.

As per USA Today, Splash Mountain — a thrilling log flume ride that produced plenty of famous pictures of screaming riders — will shutter on January 23, after years of planning. But it won’t be going away entirely. In 2024, it will reopen as Tiana’s Bayou Adventure, inspired by a very different Disney film, 2009’s The Princess and the Frog. That’s right: A ride based on a film widely criticized as racist will rebrand for the studio’s first animated film with a Black Disney princess.

How different will the ride be remains to be seen. Maybe all they have to do is remove references to Uncle Remus, the Tar Baby, et al. Otherwise, it’s a good ride! It’s not the first time Disney has altered one of their iconic theme park rides; they did the same with Jungle Cruise, which you might be surprised used to feature some racism, too.

Splash Mountain first opened at Disneyland in 1989, three years after the last time Disney reissued Song of the South in theaters. It made its Disney World debut three years later, where it’s attracted untold riders who probably have no idea about its dodgy origins.

(Via USA Today)

Over the last week-and-change, the world has unfortunately learned a lot about a certain fringe figure in the GOP. His name is Nick Fuentes. He’s a Holocaust denier. He’s a white nationalist. He’s a self-described incel who thinks “dating women is gay.” And on Thanksgiving, he had dinner with former president Donald Trump and fellow anti-Semite Kanye West. He wasn’t a well-known presence before the meet-up, but now he’s famous enough that he can get into food fights in top shelf fast food joints.

On Friday night, Fuentes received a rude Los Angeles welcome when he dared step foot in an In-N-Out Burger. Video emerged chucking a cup of Sprite at someone. Another West associate, the racist YouTuber “Sneako,” later confirmed that Fuentes meant to hurl it at a heckler. Instead, he only wound up dousing some people right in front of him. Fuentes himself acknowledged the incident on Telegram, claiming, “Nobody was hurt.” Real “sir, this is an In-N-Out” energy to this whole affair.

Before the now-infamous dinner — which newly back-on-the-scene Kanye campaign staffer Milo Yiannopoulos later claimed was a set-up meant to humiliate the ex-president — Kanye had already come out as an anti-Semite. Since then he has doubled, tripled, quadrupled down, even gushing to bankrupted conspiracy theorist Alex Jones about his love of Adolf Hitler. Anyway, fun times we live in.

(Via The Daily Beast)