Batson's Blog

At the end of 2012 I blogged about the 6 movies I was most excited to see in 2013. G.I Joe: Retaliation , Man of Steel , The Wolverine , Thor , Iron Man 3 and Star Trek: Into Darkness all made the cut. I saw all of those movies several times this year -- G.I. Joe once in the theatre and twice on DVD, Star Trek in the theatre three times and once on DVD, Iron Man in the theatre twice, The Wolverine in the theatre twice and Thor in the theatre twice. After carefully going over all of the evidence, I have to say that Star Trek kicked the ass of all others. It was definitely the best of the bunch. Thor 2 comes in next -- being almost as good. Jane slapping Thor wasn't needed, despite the fact that Natalie Portman said it was satisfying . She told E! Online: "I found it very satisfying. I think it’s behalf of all my girlfriends who had guys that didn’t call them back or disappeared or just fell off the face of the earth." Man of Steel came in next. Alth...

If you've talked to someone at work this week, watched a news program or spent any amount of time on the Internet, then you know that Beyonce released a surprise album last week -- titled BEYONCÉ . It was called a "visual album" because of the fact that she released 17 videos along with the 14 songs -- all at once on iTunes. Without any buildup or promotion at all, Beyonce's album went to number one. Talk about a marketing plan that worked to perfection! While I've never been the biggest fan of Beyonce (I liked a few of her Destiny's Child songs and enjoyed listening to "Crazy In Love," but I wouldn't call myself a fan), I was impressed with the way she released the album and thought I'd check it out. I've seen a lot of people tweeting about it being flawless and mentioning that Beyonce showed a lot of growth on this album. After listening to it, I can't say I agree. More often than not, the album is boring, plain and has ve...

As the search for Charlotte's best cupcake winds down, it's time to take a look at another candidate. This time I went to Pat-A-Cakes Bakery in Rock Hill, South Carolina. It's a nice little bakery that has Tuesday price specials, so make sure to stop by on a Tuesday. Samoan Cupcake I typically don’t like coconut, so this cupcake had me a little nervous. For whatever reason I do like Samoas though. I figured I’d give this cupcake a shot, but I didn’t have very high expectations for it. There was a giant glob of coconut on top. The woman who helped me told me it tasted like the cookie. I was skeptical, but without good reason. She was right. This Samoa cupcake does taste like the Samoa cookie. This giant glob of coconut doesn’t make the cupcake taste like your typical coconut-covered baked good. The caramel they mixed with it helped create an authentic Samoa taste. That cupcake didn't last too long.