Things I've Often Wondered About The Big Lebowski

I know this is my second Big Lebowski post in a matter of just a few days, but I was rewatching the movie after having written that post and there are some things I've always wondered about the movie, that I'm hoping some of you fine people can help me out with.

First, what's the deal with the bowling teams? The Dude's team seems to have 3 people on it, Dude, Walter, and Donnie, while all the other teams have only 2.

As evidence, "You ready to be fucked, man? I see you rolled your way into the semis. Dios mio, man. Liam and me, we're gonna fuck you up." Clearly indicating only Liam and Jesus on that team.

Also, "Dude, this is Smokey. Look, I don't wanna be a hard-on about this, and I know it wasn't your fault, but I just thought it was fair to tell you that Gilbert and I will be submitting this to the League and asking them to set aside the round. Or maybe forfeit it to us."

For what it's worth, in watching the movie I feel like I remember him saying that his partner's name was Gilbert, while the screenplay I'm cutting and pasting from says his name is Gene. I'm not gonna rely on my memory because I wasn't specifically paying attention for his name. UPDATE: He definitely says Gilbert in the movie, so I changed the quote.

Anyhow, the point is that why does the Dude's team have 3 guys? I can't say this with 100% certainty, but during the movie I don't actually recall the Dude ever bowling, while Donnie and Walter were definitely bowling at one time or another. My contention is that the Dude is just the scorekeeper or something. Maybe he's Donnie's understudy in case of an unfortunate heart attack during league play.

The second thing I've often wondered is this. Do you think Brandt was in on the scheme to steal the million dollars or was it just Lebowski (the other Jeffrey Lebowski, the millionaire) who was gonna keep the money for himself? I don't know if there's really one way to definitively determine this, and ultimately it doesn't really hint at it at all. Given that it's never even mentioned at all and the fact that Brandt seems to really admire Lebowski in a childlike way, it's unlikely. But still it's something I've wondered.

The third thing, and I guess this is sort of arbitrary and doesn't really have an answer, but why does Walter hate Donnie so much? I understand that that's what makes it so funny, but after having watched this movie about a million times by now, I've moved to just analyzing strange things about it. Donnie generally asks legitemate questions, with a couple exceptions ("I don't neet sympathy, Walter. I need my fucking Johnson." "What do you need that for, Dude?"). Maybe Walter is just used to him asking more stupid questions than most people so he's just fed up with him at this point. Who knows? Any reaasonable explanations? Also I'm confident in the possibility that Walter hates Donnie vehemently and only hangs out with him because he makes their bowling team better.

He Fixes The Cable?

There's an article in today's New York Times about a new book of essays inspired by The Big Lebowski. You should read it. It's pretty interesting, as articles about books go.

Anyhow, in order to flesh out this post, what do you think would be on the top of the list for the most obscure Lebowski quotes? And what would be the context in which you'd use them. Like a totally unobscure one would be going "Way to go, Donnie!" whenever something good happens. Or perhaps slightly more obscure, but perhaps not depending on the delivery would be going, "Phone's ringing, Dude," when the phone is ringing (that must be available as a ringtone, no?).

One of the best moments in my life (hyperbole? you decide) was when a whole bunch of you people who are reading this right now were over at my house on what must have been my birthday last year because that's the only time you gies are in my house in the daytime and I was telling everyone about the kids' show, Yo Gabba Gabba, which was created by someone who has a great drug dealer. We happened to have an episode on DVR so I put on the first couple minutes and then said "You can imagine where it goes from here," while hitting the fast forward button. Of course a couple of you immediately said, "He fixes the cable?", which just warmed my heart. And on my birthday, no less.

Incidentally, I think the most underrated character in Lebowski is Maude Lebowski. She's got quite a few quotable lines. And it's really fun to say, "He's a good man. And thorough," whenever the appropriate context boils up.

As the for the most obscure, the one that seems to never get recognized when I do it, almost certainly because of the delivery, is from when Maude is on the phone speaking in Italian and then she goes, "Que ridicolo, ha ha ha ha, ha ha ha". No one ever seems to get that one. It's one of my favorite parts of the movie.

A really good one was the title of Open Bar's former blog, Calmer Than You Are. It's really subtle. You almost have to be watching the movie in order to make the connection.

Any others?

PS - I love how Brand says, "Inner city children of promise, but without the necessary means for a, necessary means for a higher education". Where he repeats the "necessary means" part. I'd love to see a letterhead for the Little Lebowski Urban Achievers in which the phrase is written exactly like that. Someone with Photoshop skills should get on that.

Why doesn't CBS understand this NCAA-college-basketball-tournament thing they've been covering since, like, forever?

Enter "Duke sucks" in a Google Image Search, and this is #9. WTF?

Tonight, as I watch at 8:36 p.m., the score of the North Carolina vs. Mt. St. Mary's (or whatever school) game is 80-52. This has been the featured game since the 7:00 start. It's still on.

I understand that schools like UNC have a large fan base. However, while that utter-blowout-and-therefore-uninteresting game is proving every single person who filled out a bracket correct (There has never been a 16-seed-over-1-seed upset.), there are three other, vastly more interesting games going on. One is 8-seed Oregon vs. 9-seed Mississippi St. (8-9 games being closer because the teams are -- shockingly? -- more evenly matched); another is 6-seed Oklahoma vs 11-seed St. Joe's (not that close at this point, so not so much of a problem with it not being on); and the last is 13-seed Siena up by 10 against 4-seed Vanderbilt. As the Dude once said, "That's interesting, that's fucking interesting, man!" But is that the game CBS chooses to display? (No.)

Last night, the first game on CBS's schedule was 2-seed and all-time-media-fellating-team-that-everyone-else-everywhere-in-the-world (except douchebag rapists who went there) despises, Duke (Except fucking Chuck, who has inexplicably liked Duke since I've known him. In fact, I'm all about removing him from this blog simply for that. I haven't even said something like that about his yankee-liking, so that should give you some idea of the absurdity of his liking Duke.) vs. Belmont.

Yes, the game turned out to be pretty awesome. But that's not the point. No one thought Belmont would give Duke a game. At the same time as that game, 6-seed USC faced 11-seed Kansas State. To the untrained eye, that might not be that appealing, but that game happened to feature the two most exciting (and probably best) players in college basketball: USC's O.J. Mayo (Why, if your first name is O.J. would you go to USC, I might ask. There was a certain Heisman Trophy-winning...) and K-State's Michael Beasley.

So, CBS chose Duke over the two most exciting players in the game facing each other for the first and only time.

Okay, now as I have been typing this, CBS has switched over to the Vandy-Siena game. Whew. I hope UNC's lead is still safe. (It's 94-52 now. Yes, since a few paragraphs ago, UNC went on a 14-0 run.)

The media's affair with Duke is well-documented, so I feel no need to give three examples or anything. Just Google "Duke sucks" or something and you can see (above).

But it still baffles me that CBS, despite having been the network covering the NCAA Tournament since before I can remember, doesn't understand that most people don't watch college basketball except for this tournament. And the thing we all love most about it is upsets. We know that a 16-seed isn't going to beat a 1-seed. We also know that 12-seeds often beat 5-seeds. We know that the 8-9 matchup is the closest, and generally leads to some very exciting games.

What's most exciting about the tournament? The buzzer-beaters. And just today, there were two (kinda). One involved 12-seed Western Kentucky winning on an unbelievable 3-pointer at the buzzer over 5-seed Drake (which ear-raped my bracket, thanks Drake); the other was 13-seed San Diego over 4-seed UConn (which did like a priest just touching my penis -- rather than making me suck his -- kind of thing to my bracket; I had UConn losing next round.).

Ultimately, I guess this is just another fruitless plea to the national sports media to do better. Plenty of sites devote all their energy just to that, and they're worth reading and supporting. But this is just my nickel minus three. (Let me know if that's stupid. I saw a commenter make it somewhere and thought it was clever. Maybe it isn't. But if it is, I'm gonna use it all the time and never admit that I read it anywhere. Except here, I guess.)

Oh, and one last thing.

I haven't done a Friday Classic Video in a while, but I feel like this one is pretty cool. You've all seen the 2 Girls, 1 Cup thing. Wait, I mean, I've seen it, because I'm not a pussy. The other writers of this blog are, in fact, pussies for not watching it. Both of you other readers who actually have penises (or vaginas, but watched it nonetheless, and therefore aren't "pussies" because while your womanhood endows you a vagina, within that vagina lie more balls than my co-writers have put together) would enjoy this.

This does not in any way show the actual video, but if you've ever seen that angry German kid watching that other thing and screaming like Germans are wont to do, this will be pretty funny.


Two Girls, One Angry German Kid - Watch more free videos

(Another stunner -- we've never had a "Lebowski quotes" tag?)

Leave It To The Stoners

Ok, so two fuckheads were in their dorm room over the weekend. One of them opens the window and yells out to some girl who was in the vicinity, "If you're looking for weed, my roommate Ferrante has some for sale". Announcing that he was a drug dealer. Out of the fucking window.

Amazingly, two cops were nearby, heard this, walked up the stairs, and arrested the two kids. Say what you will about the tenets of marijuana's legality, dude, but don't yell out the window that you're a drug dealer. Please.