Fellas!  So the economy has you down and you aren’t able to wine and dine the lady like years past?  No problem!  Ya boy gotcha covered!  Get yoself some champipple, a box of Blast-O-Butta popcorn and a Blockbuster/netflix movie pass and check out any one of these movies to make sure your cupid arrow doesn’t go unattended to on the 14th! And yeah this list is biased to movies made during the time that I’ve been alive and old enough to appreciate them!

10: Pretty Woman (1990): Richard Gere, Julia Roberts.
Every woman’s fantasy is to be swept off her feet by her Knight in Shining Armor.  In this case, the Knight is a multimillionaire and the girl is a prostitute.  Only in Hollywood can this happen.  Fellas, no matter what they say, you can’t turn a…Oh hum.. into a housewife.

09: Ghost (1990): Demi Moore, Patrick Swayze.
Dog!  You give up a guaranteed trip to Heaven to hang around Earth to follow your girl around?  That’s gangsta or stalking to the Nth degree.  Either way you should expect a little spiritual love connection after watching this flick.

08: An Officer and a Gentleman (1982): Richard Gere, Debra Winger, Louis Gossett, Jr.
If I had to sum up this movie in one word, it’d be “determination”.  If you never give up on your dreams, anything is possible.

07: Jerry Maguire (1996): Tom Cruise, Renee Zellweger, Cuba Gooding, Jr.
C’mon, three words sum this movie up.  You Complete Me.  If you ain’t making out at the end of this movie, I don’t know what else to do for you!

06: When Harry Met Sally (1989): Meg Ryan, Billy Crystal.
This movie explores the taboo topic of “Can two people of the opposite sex be friends even after they’ve slept together.”  This phenomena is also affectionately known as friends with benefits.

05: Love & Basketball(2000): Omar Epps, Sanaa Lathan.
Ever have to chose between something you love and someone you love?  This movie, in short, explores the possibility of you getting your cake and eating it too.

more…

I can’t really explain it.  James Taylor sang about it best.  There is something magical about growing up in North Carolina that maybe only people in boston and new york or michigan and ohio can understand.  It’s often called one of the best rivalries in all of sports–the Carolina-Duke rivalry.  The real 8 mile (sorry Eminem).  The Dean.  Coach K.  Grant Hill straddling the back of a bloodied Eric Montross after a monster dunk.  Danny Green putting deez nuts in Paulus’s face on a one handed jam.  It’s Michael Jordan, Christian Laettner, Jerry Stackhouse, Elton Brand…the list of household names almost seem endless.

Whoever your favorite player or whatever you favorite memory of the series maybe, one thing is absolutely certain.  There is no other basketball game that is as anticpated each year as these 2 meetings.  Two of the four all time winningest basketball programs in the world beating the crap out of each other no matter how many All-Americans or walkons grace the teams year in and year out.  The games almost always go down to the wire to determine the winner, yet in the end everyone wins because we have just witnessed 40 minutes of amazing competitiveness.  This is how the game is meant to be played.  Passion, outstanding individual performances, teamwork and defense, crazed fans and unsung heroes.   In our day and age, when steriods and scandal are running rampant through sports, it’s good to celebrate amateur athletes performing on the grandest stage of them all, fueled by the sheer desire to not lose to the team in the other shade of blue.  Especially if its Dookie Blue!

Aaron McGruder

questioning the President’s blackness, as this one involved Aaron McGruder, the creator of the cartoon The Boondocks.  The Boondocks, for those of you who are unfamiliar with the comic, is a highly satirical  and controversial cartoon that often lampoons popular African-American culture as well as current events and political topics.

“Barack is the son of an immigrant, not the descendant of slaves. It’s like comparing a half-Japanese man to the oppressed Chinese who built the American railroads. Yes, they are both Asian, but it is not an honest or accurate comparison. We all share the common experiences of being Black in America today – we do not all share a common history. A history that in part makes us who we are – and in some cases (as with the psychological damage that still lingers from slavery) holds us back. These are not, I believe, insignificant distinctions.”  — Aaron McGruder

Henry Louis Gates, Jr.