I love Ira Glass. Diane Rehm, on the other hand, makes me want to fill my ears in with concrete.

I'm still too intimidated by the more technical lifts to try mastering them on my own, swinging a barbell around my apartment garage. I'm still doing Starting Strength, but have swapped the power cleans for chin ups. My plan for the moment is to keep working solo on the basics until I'm finished the movie I'm on, then go back to the Crossfit gym I was going to for awhile and start working on the technical lifts.

Yeah, we moved a bit up the long tail, I guess.

Beginning, middle, end.

Not necessarily in that order.

The end.

Oh goddammit, I just unsubscribed from these subreddits.

Pfft, that's a stupid thing to say.

Well Dave, did you survive Tough Mudder? I survived Warrior Dash, but having now experienced it and looking at what Tough Mudder is in comparison, it only cements my feeling that I won't be ready for that one this year.

This guy, on the other hand...

If you think Act of Valor was somehow produced entirely by Navy SEALs and Hollywood only...I don't even know...bought it? Distributed it? How exactly do you think that process worked?

Hollywood and the military partnered up and made Act of Valor to serve their two interests: making money and getting bodies in the ranks. It is the clearest example of propaganda since the Warner Brothers World War II cartoons I can think to cite. But there are plenty of other examples of pro-military material to be found in modern Hollywood - the Transformers movies among them. There's also GI Joe, Stealth, Iron Man, Battleship, etc. etc.  The only difference is that Act of Valor has no magic bean, making it the Kramer vs. Kramer of pro-military propaganda films. (Oh and there's Kathryn Bigelow's movie about killing Bin Laden, which they've delayed only because now they have to go back and make it match real life).

The military is well aware of how it's been depicted in the wake of Vietnam. And in the years since, they've had a pretty clear policy of cooperating with Hollywood productions if and only if they portray the military in a positive light. Want to play with all the nice toys that only the military has? Then you play by the Pentagon's rules. Bay does it the best, that's why his movies have the most and best shots of the toys.

Which is all fine. I make no bones about the fact that I still love watching me some good military porn (at Embry-Riddle, stuff like this but focused specifically on aviation was called Riddle Porn). Propaganda can be fun too, and mostly harmless, so long as you remember you're watching propaganda.

I had no idea this existed. And now I can't wait to watch it.

I actually got to see that commercial before it aired. Guy I do freelance work for a bunch (and used to be Steph Wooten's boss) owns the sound design company that did this commercial. I happened to be in there the week before the Super Bowl and he showed it to me. Then I found five dollars.