Men

The Civil War novel that tops "Gone With The Wind"

At Gettysburg in 1964, a father and son set off from Seminary Ridge across wide rolling fields toward Cemetery Ridge a mile to their east. In between them lay the fence rail-lined Emmitsburg Road. After climbing that fence, the duo dashed across the road and neared their destination: A copse of trees on Cemetery Ridge fronted by a low stone wall. The father told the son stories as they retracted the footsteps of General George Pickett's men during their charge here into hell.

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Nature’s crazy mating rituals

As living, breathing creatures, it is within our genetic coding to desire sex for the purpose of mating. Although this has evolved over the years and now we, as thinking creatures, can choose to experience sex for pleasure alone, other animals of the world don’t have it so lucky. Some critters, in fact, have a pretty rough time of mating. Mating rituals of beasts and insects are some pretty bizarre things, resulting in anything from genital mutilation to outright death. But hey, it takes all kinds, right? Here are just a few of the more interesting mating details that I managed to find

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What Is It About Felix?

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Load up on guns
Bring your friends
It’s fun to lose
And to pretend
She’s overboard
And self-assured
I know I know
A dirty word

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M-Pops axs,

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Doc, I would love to read your take on what specifically makes Felix such a rare and unique player/personality.

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As you know, we live to serve :- )

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=== Dirty Words, Dept. ===

Three Valentine's Day reading suggestions for the black-at-heart

Valentine's Day may be all about fountains of cartoon pink hearts, but that doesn't mean you have to lose your mind about it. This Valentine's Day, why not read a book that features some, shall we say, non-traditional romance storylines?

1. Last Exit to Brooklyn, Hubert Selby Jr.
If you're tired of the posh, airbrushed, white-washed 1950s nostalgia of Mad Men, Last Exit to Brooklyn is your antidote.

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Netflix has a big hit with 'House of Cards'

Last night, I decided to dive into Netflix's latest original series, House of Cards. I wasn't disappointed, and I knew I wouldn't be: Kevin Spacey is brilliant in everything. It's a heavy show, packed with tons of political drama and first-rate acting by Spacey, Kate Mara and Robin Wright, among others. If you enjoy a show about the nastiness and backbiting that is politics in America, I'd highly recommend checking House of Cards out.

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What is the most boring book you have ever read?

Upon discovering a list declaring the most boring books of all time, there's at least one choice I disagreed with: Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird. What, that well-crafted tale of a young girl who narrates not only life in a small southern town in the Great Depression, but also how she witnessed both gross injustice in the form of the railroading of innocent black man Tom Robinson and high moral courage on the part of her attorney father Atticus Finch boring? Yeah right!

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The perfect amalgamate of sports and pop culture

Being a sports fan is more than hobby for many people; in fact, sports are more of a lifestyle. Mega fans live and die by the performance of men and women they’ll never meet, and when they aren’t competing, fans are glued to sites like ESPN and Yahoo Sports.

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It’s science! Sperm, big numbers and alien economics

Every day people run around discovering new stuff. Sometimes it’s for the sake of improving society and making life easier for people that they do their research. Other times it almost seems like these revelations were created while under the influence of some mind-impairing drug. But either way, we do end up with some pretty interesting ideas thanks to the work of innovators around the world. This week, I’m going to look at a few “interesting” discoveries I’ve stumbled across thanks to this wonderful thing we call the Internet.

1: Exercise makes you fertile!

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Shanghai, China’s Marriage Market

Arranged marriages are something that have played a prominent role in many cultures throughout time. Back in the day, finding someone to share your life with was more of a practical problem. In fact, the concept of marriage for love’s sake is fairly recent, despite what many historical novels and movies try to portray. It was just simpler and more effective to have the parents arrange something with someone eligible than to try the old trial-and-error method. If statistics are to be believed, arranged marriages even have a higher rate of success than marriage for love.

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If Montero Used ... I'd Be Pretty Surprised

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Q. If Montero was using, how come we didn't see any 440-footers in 2012?

A. I was kind of surprised to see that he actually did hit some home runs pretty hard. I remembered his season, visually, as being like Kendry Morales' ... a big guy who really spent most of his time lining the ball around the park like Johnny Damon.

But Montero did average 104.7 MPH on his HR's and smack three or four pretty good ones. As the GM of the Twins said one time about Scott Erickson in arbitration, "I guess some guys had a lot better seasons than I remember him having."

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Q. You don't think he used?

A. I would assume that he didn't use, certainly, and that despite the allegations. Am wide open to being proven wrong.

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Q. Why not? Montero fan much?

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