March On!

• Random Pop Culture:
• Had an occasion today to go to the movies by myself, so I took in Taken. Here's the plot: twenty minutes of boring blah blah blah, Shannon from Lost gets kidnapped in the scenes they show in the trailer, Liam Neeson spends the next hour going around Paris and obliterating fools. It's awesome. Seriously, the movie is co-written by Luc Besson (the other co-writer is the guy who wrote the Karate Kid movies) and it's very much in Besson's particular style. He writes very dark and intense action films, using better actors, such as Neeson, Jet Li, or Jason Statham, so the films come out a little more serious than your usual martial arts fare. I think I saw the first Transporter film and didn't love it, but Besson also wrote The Professional (one of Gary Oldman's best performances), Kiss of the Dragon, and the tremendously underrated Unchained. I very much enjoy his style of movie and Taken doesn't disappoint along those lines.
• This past week's episode of Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles was so boring and indecipherable that it almost made me not want to watch the show again.
• Random Hatred And/Or Love:
• If tonight's snow in the DC area does end up disappointing, there will be a lot of very unhappy people. First, we didn't really get any snow this year. Second, the weather people hyped the hell out of this one. I was watching The Weather Channel for a second tonight and they were calling it the "Monday Mega-Storm" and trying to explain that even though the storm itself isn't all that large, the name is justified because it will hit the entire East Coast megalopolis.
• It's March!:
• Two weeks from Selection Sunday so it's time to get down to business and let's pay attention to the big boys, the four best teams in the country. Assuming you have no rooting interest in Carolina, Oklahoma, or Connecticut, you should be rooting for Pittsburgh when the tournament rolls around. They've been right on the verge of the Final Four for a while, but haven't yet made it. They have a legit shot this year though, with a lot of talent and a gritty style that's a hell of a lot of fun to watch. The Panthers are powered by the trio of senior point guard Levance Fields (the quintessential tough Brooklyn guard who averages 7.5 assists and can score when he needs to), senior swingman Sam Young (their leading scorer who can hit from anywhere), and sophomore center DeJuan Blair (at only 6-7, he reminds me a lot of Lonny Baxter in how he uses his big frame to overpower taller players, like his domination of UConn 7-3 phenom Hasheem Thabeet). They play tough defense, they can run when they need to, they can bang down low. Fun team to watch. Still on the fence? Still need one more reason? How about a Dixon who wears #3? That would be junior guard Jermaine, Juan's half-brother.