Wednesday PM Quick Hits

This time I can say that real life has rudely intruded, since my internet, after having been intermittent at best since the middle of last week, finally went out completely tonight. A technician will arrive sometime between 8 and 10am tomorrow to find the cause of my signal loss, meaning I'll get to watch the Beverly Hillbillies in the morning, but also that I'm now at the office taking care of all that stuff I had put off until first thing tomorrow morning. And also blogging, because even if I am the only one here, the thrill of goofing off on the internet when there's work to be done is still the same as it will be tomorrow afternoon.

Alabama Gameday has an interesting post on what to take away from Saban's appearance at SEC Media Days.

Memphis Tider points us to a good read on Antoine Caldwell, Simeon Castille, and John Parker Wilson, and their leadership role on the team:

Tide Druid links to some amusing videos of Coach Saban on the Fox 6 Morning Show, including Saban's attempt to teach Paul Finebaum how to cover a receiver.

Nico and I hung out last Friday and we got to talking about Outside the Sidelines, and I'm pretty sure my exact words were "That guy is so good it makes me want to give up blogging. Everything we do seems stupid next to that." I know Nico already linked to it, but if you missed it and haven't been reading him, GO DO IT NOW.

I think it's pretty obvious that Nico and I share three passions: Football, Music, and Movies. It's been a rough week for two of those. I'm sure all of you know about the passing of Bill Walsh, the father of the West Coast Offense and a man who had a such an impressive impact on the game of football and how it's played that the trickle down effect of his coaching and philosophies is part of the sport for teams and coaching staffs whether they run his offensive schemes or not. Niners Nation and SMQ both have eloquent eulogies for Coach Walsh, EDSBS trumpets his influence on another sport we all love, video game football, and Stiles Points rounds up the media reaction.

The other great losses this week are filmmakers Ingmar Bergman and Michelengelo Antonioni, two giants of European cinema that profoundly changed the way I looked at and appreciated film. I'm not trying to get film snobby on y'all, especially considering I list Billy Madison as one of my all time favorite movies, but after seeing the Seventh Seal for the first time I truly understood why film was considered art, while Antonioni's pictures were so beautifully composed, staged, and shot that I firmly believe one could run out the film of L'avventura and each cell would be a masterpiece of photography. I don't know what y'all's tastes are, and I know these movies aren't for everyone, but below are the trailers for two of each director's works that I am particularly fond of. If you get the chance, add them to your Netflix queue and give them a shot.