Via Facebook:

I spent every day of my 30′s puttin’ in hard work..

So today, I can turn 40 and say with a big ass smile..

I’m just gettin’ started!

As of this posting, that status has about 90,000 “likes”. Today is Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson’s birthday, and if you haven’t been paying attention … he’s pretty popular.

To help celebrate Rocky’s milestone, we’ve compiled a loosely ordered list of moments, matches and Kung Pao Bitch jokes from his career. Whether you like him or you don’t, it’s hard to deny that he’s one of the most influential and entertaining performers in the history of pro wrestling … and one of two pro wrestlers cool enough to be a G.I. Joe. Three if you count The Fridge.

Happy birthday, Rocky.

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Just kidding, this is an hourlong podcast with “Bad Ass” Billy Gunn. About fourteen minutes into it I start trying to put my head through the computer monitor and die from blood loss.

But no, welcome to episode 2 of the (thankfully) ongoing With Leather pro wrestling podcast With Spandex. In episode 2 we go from pro wrestlers to people who write about them on the Internet and talk to David Shoemaker, “The Masked Man” of Deadspin’s Dead Wrestler Of The Week column and “David Shoemaker” of Grantland.com. We talk about our favorite and least favorite dead wrestlers, our experiences at WrestleMania 28 and the upcoming WWE Extreme Rules pay-per-view. It’s gonna be extreme~!

You can listen to the podcast below. We’ll have it up on iTunes as soon as they stop finding reasons to turn it down.

A direct link to the podcast for your downloading pleasure: Click here.

Your likes, comments, shares and plus-whatevers are greatly appreciated. Worst case scenario, let’s hear your early predictions for Extreme Rules. It’s gonna be EXTREMELY RULED.

Here is a quick list of things that happened on Raw that I would’ve loved to have seen, had I not been trapped in an airport trying to get home from WrestleMania 28:

- Brock Lesnar making his return to WWE to trounce Giant Starbucks Logo John Cena
- The debut of Lord Tensai, who incapacitated Alex Riley with his Mighty Spit-hand
- The return of Abraham Washington, a low-level guy from FCW/WWECW of whom I may be the Internet’s biggest and most vocal fan.
- Mark Henry being awesome again.
- YES~ chants overtaking WWE.

What’s in store for this week’s show:

- The Three Stooges host.

Heaven help me.

- Remember, the top 10 comments from tonight’s discussion will be featured in tomorrow’s Best And Worst Of WWE Raw column, and no, Watchmen references are not automatically included (just kidding, they totally are).

- To nominate a comment you’ve found particularly funny for inclusion as one of the top 10 comments of the week, please reply to it with a +1. Using +1 instead of +something else (like the ever-popular +Rhodes) makes it easier to find them later, but if you gotta +Rhodes something, who am I to stop you?

So, what’s going down on Raw tonight?

[photo credit WWE.com]

I don’t know, that shot to the twisty lighthouse looks fake. (Via The Sun)

- Follow us on Twitter @withleather
- Follow me personally @MrBrandonStroud and Burnsy @MayorBurnsy
- Like us on Facebook.

Links

The Best And Worst Of WWE WrestleMania XXVIII Live |With Leather|

‘Justified’ Q&A With Writers Jon Worley And VJ Boyd |Warming Glow|

Google Would Like To Introduce You To Project Glass, The Eyewear Of The Future |UPROXX|

A Jiggly Scarlett Johansson Highlighted In The First Clip From The Avengers |Gamma Squad|

A Brief History of Nic Cage Being Crazy |Film Drunk|

An Open Letter To Donald Glover… |Smoking Section|

‘I’m Here To Talk To You About The Avenger Initiative’: The Definitive Response GIF Collection |UPROXX|

Meme Watch: Dr. Grover Will See You Now |UPROXX|

The Miseducation Of Nicki Minaj |Smoking Section|

Ryan Gosling is saving chicks from traffic now |Film Drunk|

Bar Refaeli Makes Tennis And Life Awesome |With Leather|

This Sulu Photo Needs More Captions |Gamma Squad|

15 Banned Cartoons You’ll Never See on TV |Warming Glow|

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Pre-show notes:

- First and foremost I’d like to thank my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ give a huge thank you to Bill Hanstock for filling in on the WWE Raw Open Discussion Thread and to Chris Trew for his excellent fill-in job for me on yesterday’s Best And Worst Of Raw. I’ve been in an airport for seemingly the last month and a half so I had to miss everything. Yes, it was spoiled for me before I got home. No, it won’t be as good when I get to write about it next week.

- Comments are appreciated. I’ve gotten a lot of WHERE’S THE WRESTLEMANIA THING feedback, so let’s hear what you thought about the show below. Shares, Facebook likes, Pinterests (?) and Google Plussage are all appreciated.

- Thanks again to THESTINGER for helping me out with show images and gifs. Anything that wasn’t grabbed from TV was taken by me, or someone holding my camera.

- I am extremely tired!

Please click through and enjoy my take on the live experience of WWE Wrestlemania 28. It was … something.

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Pre-show notes:

- Only 52 more weeks til Wrestlemania 29 and 44 more until pointing at the sign season. Hooray!

- Let’s have a party in the comment section. I’ll (guest writer Chris Trew) will hang there all week long and we can discuss how exciting next week is gonna be when Brandon is not in an airplane during Raw.

- Thank you to Casey/THESTINGER for helping me out with gifs and pictures. Be sure to visit his gifs Tumblr for the stuff I didn’t use.

- Follow us on Twitter @withleather, follow me personally @christrew and like us on Facebook.

- Brandon will be back tomorrow with the Best And Worst Of Wrestlemania XXVIII, followed expeditiously by The Best And Worst Of Wrestlemania Weekend.

Okay, it’s my big moment! Here is the Best and Worst Of WWE Raw for April 2, 2012.

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