As the regulars can tell, the look of the site under went a dramatic change in appearance.  All that was done by the powers that be at SBNation.  There have been some other changes, maybe subtler, in the last couple months and I want to point them out.  This will also serve as an introduction to the newer people who are finding us everyday.

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Welcome to the second installment in the Dead Authors Series.  If you missed the first one, you can find it here.

As the world bids adieu to another All Hallow's Eve, it's time to take a journey through the very place that inspires an entire genre of terror: Hell.  Forget the modern portrayals by Western culture - we are stepping back in time to vicariously experience Purgatory through the eyes of a poet.  In the portion of his Divine Comedy known as The Inferno, Dante details his arduous passage through the Underworld, traversing the interminable descent replete with monsters-human and otherwise.

As inscribed on the Gates of Hell:

Abandon every hope, ye who enter here.

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In the first game of the young season that I missed watching or "monitoring from a boxscore", Manu becomes one of my favorite comic book characters of all-time.  The FSM must hate me.  To compensate for that missed ethereal experience, I thought of just hack 'chopping Manu's head in a decent Batman image. Two images, actually. Here is the first:

It's cold and lonely at the top.

Wow, I don't know if it's me or my browser or what but SBNation blogs look different all of a sudden.  I think I'm high from all this cut and pasting.  Whatever. Jump in to see the lamer second one.

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From the sweet soul of jollyrogerwilco and the twisted, yet brilliant, mind of CapHill:

Some of my favorite moments in nationally televised NBA games are the sideline interviews, especially those with Pop.  His facial expressions and terse answers are priceless, requiring transcripts in the Pounding the Rock game threads for those unable to watch.  Pop's responses to the usual questions about the Spurs system always me make me think of this Jane Austen quote, "One man's ways may be as good as another's, but we all like our own best."  Earlier this summer, while perusing PtR, my mind went into tangent land and started contemplating which character from Pride and Prejudice Pop is most like.

 And then came the brainstorm - why not use the wonderful characterizations of Jane Austen to further explore the qualities of all NBA coaches?  Are not all NBA teams microcosms of society, with the associated multi-layered relationships?  And who better to help us understand this society than Jane Austen, with her mastery of the ironic and her biting commentary?  Seriously, any person who writes the following in a letter to her sister deserves a place in the hearts of all PtRers:

I do not want people to be agreeable, as it saves me the trouble of liking them.

So enter the world of a beloved novelist after the jump.

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From the desks of tomasito, Hipuks and LatinD:

Ahh the summer, a time of sunshine and carefree-ness, a time to enjoy the beach, shed our clothes and immediately be ashamed of doing so. A time to promise ourselves that as soon as the summer is over, we’ll exercise for the next summer, knowing this is as much a dream as one of the beautiful people on the beach promising themselves they will finally read a book.

"But what do you do during the summer if you’re a famous person?" you clumsily ask, your putrid smell making me almost incapable of answering your barely above-retardation question. Well, if you’re one famous Emanuel Ginobili, you take it easy, you relax, you do everything in your power to just have a good time and be safe, and wait for the season to begin.

In the case of Manu, this means swimming with sharks:

From his facebook page: "Guess what lil' animal I found while snorkeling? It was a bit smaller than me, so it was very respectful. (My photo, don't disbelieve me.)"

Notice how Manu was absent from the second movie, and it sucked

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Have you ever been stuck in traffic and wondered why it's not moving?  Or why you had to sit through two lights?  Or why some people think it's okay to text while driving (it's a 2-ton hunk of metal, folks - think!)?  Well, today is your lucky day, as your friendly neighborhood engineer is here to not answer your questions and to make crazy comparisons to our favorite professional sport, the NBA.

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Look at those five dots arranged in a Quincunx. What's a Quincunx? Thanks for asking. Read on to find out.

"I'll five all over this blog."

This is the kind of thing that's said in the comments section of PtR that nags at you and won't let you go until you finally buckle down and make good on your promise.

The second of my Crazy Arguments/Discussions That Would Never Happen Mid-Season continues after the jump. The first, which is completely unrelated, is here.

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