This Really Ties the VHS Collection Together

I saw this on Val's site, and just thought it was just too good (and thorough) -- and had so much pride of craftsmanship -- not to share. It's a *little* NSFW, but considerably less that you might expect from a trailer for a porno. Not just any porno...  the Big Lebowski porn parody. No nudity here -- just dirty stuff.

Me, I'm curious how they'll handle the scene where Walter explains what happens when you find a stranger in the alps.

Rob

GOP Abandons the Dollar

This just in -- Republicans no longer have faith in the U.S. Dollar, and are suggesting that, when we can't pay cash for our medical expenses, that we barter with the doctor. Here's Nevada senate candidate Sue Lowden*, this past Tuesday.

"I think that bartering is really good. Those doctors who you pay cash, you can barter, and that would get prices down in a hurry. And I would say go out, go ahead out and pay cash for whatever your medical needs are, and go ahead and barter with your doctor."

"Bartering is really good." Not haggling, not bargaining -- bartering. As in, "I can only afford $100 for those blood tests, so how about I mow your lawn all summer to make up the difference? Or would you like some old comic books?" As in, "you're money's no good here -- we only take livestock."

This lack of faith in our currency is really disheartening. I wonder what could get them to respect the dollar again...? Maybe they're holding out until we put Jefferson Davis's face on it.

Rob

How's It Hangin', Marvel?

Got a strange promotional item with my comics today (Flash Secret Files, Jonah Hex, and Jughead, in case you're wondering, which you're likely not). It's a Marvel heroes door-hanger, like those "Do Not Disturb" signs for hotel room doors.

So this is what it looks like when you want to say: Do Not Disturb. Avengers Meeting in Progress.

In other news: If the Quinjet's a rockin', don't come a-knockin'.

Rob

Peep Show

Here it is: The Washington Post's annual Peeps diorama contest.

Happy Easter!

Rob

The White Ribbon, plus a digression

Just got back from a screening of The White Ribbon, a film by Michael Haneke about a small village in Germany in the early 1910s. Strange, malicious events are happening in the town -- a horse trips on some invisible wire strung across a road, injuring its rider; a barn burns down; a child is tortured -- and no one knows who's doing these things, or why. The events of the movie seem like they're part of a whodunnit, but there's something else going on. Haneke exploits our natural curiosity about who would do such things, and instead seems to be saying that anyone might have. Some blame is laid at the feet of the town's children, but which ones? Could it be all of them?

It's a truly unnerving movie, and pretty much the antithesis of a crowd-pleaser.

I'm especially glad I got to see it projected in a theater; a local live theater, the Forum, is screening movies on certain weekends. A couple weeks ago, Kathy and I saw Crazy Heart there. We missed An Education, but were able to catch Coco Before Chanel a couple of months ago. I'm thrilled that they're doing this. For the past few years, I've seen most of the art-house type movies I've been interested in on DVD, where years ago I'd drive into Philly every other week to see something interesting. (In New York, I tend to take the opportunity to see something old at the film Forum rather than something new and unknown.)

Anyway, there are a few things I really appreciate about the Forum's film series. First, not all the movies they show are the exact ones I'd want to watch. Selecting every movie myself, in the Netflix queue, limits my capacity to be surprised by something, and to see movies outside of my usual genres. I was interested in Coco Before Chanel, but it never would have made its way to the top of the Netflix queue.

Second, it's destination viewing. The movies run for a weekend, and might be held over for a second. So there's really no putting off seeing the movie for a more convenient time, which then slips by. I might miss Shutter Island, because I figure it'll be around next week. But if I wanted to see The White Ribbon, I had to go tonight.

Third, it's a local theater, and I like putting my money back into my town.

And fourth, like I said: I used to go see movies like this all the time. And while I like a well-made big-budget movie as much as the next guy, independent and foreign films are usually so much more challenging. And I do like a challenge.

Rob

Particle Fiction

A few days ago, my online pal David Wynne debuted his new comic, Particle Fiction, online. Well. it's available both online and as a printed comic -- and if you decide you'd like a copy (or one of his other books) and order before April 4th, he'll throw in a free sketch. Which is a damn good deal, because his art is terrific.

But regardless, this is a cool done-in-one story, with a beginning, middle and an end, and you can download it as a pdf or read it online in your browser.

So go! Enjoy!

Rob
(And next week, Ami will have a podcast interview with him!)

In Dreams I Walk (and Fly and Sail and Ride) With You

Crazy, crazy dreams last night. Probably (no, definitely) had too many cinnamon crack balls before bed.

First up, I’m in a plane with pals Andy & Jeff. We’re the only passengers on the small airplane, and for some reason we learn that the pilot’s evil. (I don’t think he’s a terrorist in the sense we have in this century; he’s more like a Bond villain henchman.) So, we make our way to the front of the plane (it’s not a commercial flight, there’s no door between the cabin and the cockpit) and we fight the guy, throwing him out of the plane and into the ocean. Not that we know how to fly it. And not that there will soon be much of a plane to fly, given that our scuffle (with guns and knives and a decisive thunk with a fire extinguisher) has somehow damaged the structural integrity of the plane, and the cabin and wings are peeling apart as it drops out of the sky.

We land in the water, and somehow we’re able to keep the plane afloat and moving, even as the water continues to damage what is now the boat. And then we take the boat into New York Harbor, and up into the streets of the city, as we’re somehow able to balance the thing on its two landing wheels. We drive through the city, and photographers are taking all sorts of pictures of us, because of our amazing emergency landing/sea voyage/driving a boatplane, but also because I have lost my pants.

Yep, it’s a dream, all right.

Then another dream. I’m looking for Jeff, planning to have dinner with him. (I am again in pants, by the way.) Then, just as I see him in some distant food court, he calls me on my cell phone and tells me my cover has been compromised. So I go wandering through a deserted college campus with a box of lo mein. The only other person I could see was a security guard walking her rounds.

And then I meet an old friend—actually a giant of a guy I just met in the last six months or so, but here he is an old, old friend—and we continue walking down the melancholy streets. Then, a sweet girl I knew back in college joins us. And the three of us start talking a little about the times we had together, all of us a little sadly. And then the fourth member of our quartet shows up, a girl I went on a date with some thirteen years ago, but here she is another old friend. And I know that she is dead, and has been dead for a long time. And that is why we four friends no longer hang out together.

But we have that night, walking through empty streets and parking lots. One of us, the giant, spots a cardboard box full of clothes outside of a boutique, and pulls out a tattered sweater so big that all four of us could fit into it at once. This is our next Halloween costume, he says—a four-headed axe murderer. And we talk about it and negotiate who gets to put their arms through the arm-holes, and how we’ll all be able to drink what we want at the party, with only two arms for four heads. We resolve to practice.

And then, on a little hill between parking lots, the dead girl, Lora, sings a song. I can’t do justice to it here. It’s a light, flighty song about the insistence of existence.

It begins “Shining like an arrow in your bow,” and ends “You might think I wasn’t, but I was.” And when her song ends, it becomes clear that the four of us never hung out together, were never a group of friends. Our memories are constructed. All of it is false, from top to bottom. Even Lora is alive somewhere, and not dead and returned for this night.

Except her song is true: We might think she wasn’t, but she was. Somewhere, these four people, who do not know each other here, were connected. But even in that place, they could not hold together any longer.

This wasn’t the sort of dream I usually have, where I wake up, laugh it off, and move on with my day. I woke thinking that history was fluid, and that I could be in many places at once: Here in the life I know, and another place, and others beyond that. I felt like universes had revealed themselves to me in a dead girl’s song.

Rob

Which button activates the rotary saws?

New York magazine recently published a slideshow: A History of Obama Feigning Interest in Mundane Things. It's funny stuff ("Obama is back in his pensive mode, except this time he has thrown in an open-mouthed gape to demonstrate how awestruck he is with this jar of dirt."), but it doesn't tell the whole story.

Dean Trippe reveals what's really going on in his slideshow, Barack Obama Looking at Awesome Things.

Trust me: There are some things in this warehouse you don't want to miss.

Rob

When Voices Through the Thin Walls Speak of Abberant Behavior

Okay, RNC Chairman Michael Steele has a bit of a reputation as a clown, going wildly off-message and always saying the wrong thing at the wrong time. He's also got a rep for wasting Republican donors' money, something I am totally down with.

But this is the best money-wasting yet.

Via Washington Monthly, today I learned that the Daily Caller reports that:

Once on the ground, FEC filings suggest, Steele travels in style. A February RNC trip to California, for example, included a $9,099 stop at the Beverly Hills Hotel, $6,596 dropped at the nearby Four Seasons, and $1,620.71 spent [update: the amount is actually $1,946.25] at Voyeur West Hollywood, a bondage-themed nightclub featuring topless women dancers imitating lesbian sex.

(Emphasis mine, but honestly? Probably yours, too.)


The Chairman of the RNC has dropped two grand at a fetish club? Here? Apparently the servers for Voyeur are overloaded right now (understandably; click the link in a day or two), but here's a description for ya.

Kathy and I just watched David Lynch's Blue Velvet last night, which explores the kinky, sadomasochistic  underbelly of small-town America. Maybe it's the 20-some years of life I've lived since first seeing it, but as much as I enjoyed the film, I've got to echo part of Roger Ebert's assessment: "What are we being told? That beneath the surface of Small Town, U.S.A., passions run dark and dangerous? Don't stop the presses."

Still, even though I know this stuff in my gut, the GOP connection still has the capacity to surprise. Not because Steele would go to the Voyeur club (obviously taking others, probably party donors), but that he'd be foolish (and, I suppose, law-abiding) enough to keep records of it for the Federal Election Commission. 

So here's to you, Michael Steele. I raise a glass of Pabst Blue Ribbon in your honor.

[Update: the RNC claims it wasn't Michael Steele at the club, but a "non-committee staffer," whatever that is. Even if that's true: Way to run a tight ship, man. And I still think this is the Best Thing Ever.] 

Rob

Transparency Versus Results

or "I know the secrets that you keep when you're talking on C-SPAN."

My brother sent me a message on Facebook with this video attached, wondering what I thought of it. (He adds that he's for universal healthcare.) The video was called "CNN is finally getting it" (I don't think by Tom). I'm embedding a YouTube video of the same broadcast, since Facebook won't let me transfer it directly.

I like Cafferty a lot, but I think he missed the boat with this clip. (Is it recent, by the way? It seems like the peak of these complaints would arise around the time of the first senate vote, with the Cornhusker Kickback, etc.)*

Obama made that promise, but he shouldn’t have. For one thing, the legislature is its own branch, and makes its own decisions on what to broadcast and what not to. But also, because the proposal sounds a lot better as a promise than it would work in reality. Broadcasting negotiations is pretty much counter to what negotiations need to be – at least in the modern world.

Politicians are taking strong stances to appease their voters. Republicans, in particular, get tons of heat (from the public, usually after being wound up by Rush or Beck) when they deviate from the party line. Democrats get it from the other side, from groups like MoveOn and DailyKos (nowhere near as powerful or influential as Rush, but they do exert some pressure). And neither side wants compromise of any sort – they treat any bending of principles as a deep loss.

But negotiation needs compromise. There needs to be a place where legislators can speak to each other off the record, so that they can each give a little without getting attacked by their respective bases. Broadcasting everything would have given the entire process over to the town-hall chaos of last August.

With healthcare, there wasn’t a lot of compromise between parties in the end. But from the start, the bill incorporated a lot of Republican ideas. If it hadn’t, it would have truly been government-run healthcare, a single-payer Medicare for All. That’s the liberal ideal, and it was compromised from the get-go, and compromised again with the loss of the public option. The individual mandate that some Republicans are now complaining about as unconstitutional is another Republican idea. The final bill looks a lot like what Mitt Romney instituted in Massachusetts; I’ve heard it also looks quite a bit like what Republicans counterproposed in the 90s as an option to HillaryCare, but I haven’t looked into that.

Anyway, I suspect that one of the biggest problems in Congress is that the whole thing is a stage, and there’s too little private time for negotiation and compromise. There are so many opportunities to shout, “Hell, no, you can’t!” and too few opportunities to sit down away from the cameras, and figure out how to make something work without either party losing face over it.

Which assumes that either party would want such a result; the big problem is that it runs counter to a guiding Republican philosophy, articulated by Reagan: That government itself is the problem. It’s hard to negotiate for success when one of the parties is founded on the notion that government can’t succeed, and must be stopped. (I’m sure Republicans have a similar narrative about why it’s impossible to negotiate with Democrats, but they sure seem to have an easier time finding Dems to back their bills than Dems do finding Republicans.)

As for Cafferty’s claim that Pelosi’s congress isn’t the cleanest in American history, fair enough. That’s another awfully big promise to have made, and like Obama's in many ways, one that's not entirely in her control. But even with the Rangel, Massa, and Paterson scandals (who isn’t in Congress, but lets throw him in), it’s certainly cleaner than the last Republican-run congress (with Foley, Cunningham, Ney, Lewis, Vitter, Craig, Ensign, and more, all the way down to the Professor and Mary Anne). I agree she should be more proactive in punishments, and get ahead of these scandals, but there’s little else she can do beyond that – other than not promising to be the “cleanest in history” again.

Then again, she just herded 220 cats – twice – to pass the most sweeping government program since Medicare. I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t inclined to cut her a little slack. Process is nice, but results are what last.

Rob

*Actually, watching it again I realize that this was right after the Senate passed its bill (and, as I guessed, right around the time of all the anger at the last bit of armtwisting to get 60 votes was cresting). I’m not sure what Cafferty thinks the upside of negotiating publicly with the Republicans would have achieved at that point that couldn’t be more efficiently done by just allowing a staffer to hold up a sign that said “No!” every so often.

Oh Hell Yes.

And thankfully, the last volume of the book is coming out in June!

Rob

Into the Maelstrom

This image (I decided not to boost it, so go see!) was absolutely one of the brightest spots of yesterday for me. The Legion's newest artist, Yildiray Cinar, posted an image of the Legion fighting one of the Titans' major villains, Trigon the Terrible. What knocks me out about this -- aside from the linework and style and all-around awesomeness of the image itself -- is that in 1982, in one of the only fan letters to comics I ever wrote, I guessed that Trigon was the mystery bad guy in The Great Darkness Saga that was being published at the time.

It wasn't him, of course -- but I always wanted to see the Legion face off against him, just the same. This piece -- a sample image Cinar created before starting the book -- might be the closest I ever get. But it's close enough to thrill 13-year-old me!

Rob

Terror Firma

Talking Points Memo has put together an interactive map compiling the acts of vandalism against Democratic representatives and their families. Right now, there are six incidents listed, but I would be surprised if it doesn't get updated. There have been widespread reports about Congressmen receiving death threats, as well, but so far they're not on the map.

Teabaggers aren't evil. They're acting like thugs, but they're not evil, per se. They're just scared out of their (limited) wits and are lashing out at anyone their leaders tell them is a threat. Beck, Limbaugh & the rest have got them feeling terrified and cornered, so there's really only one option in the fight-or-flight response.

If the government had been taken over unlawfully, what would you do? If they were going to round up people like you and put you in internment camps, what would you do? If someone were going to kill your grandmother, or your baby, what would you do?

You'd fight. Tooth and nail, you'd fight.

None of those things are happening, but that doesn't make the threat of Armageddon any less real for the gullible and the paranoid. All the lies Fox and the Republicans been telling their audience have been leading to this. Death panels, socialism, fascism, revolution. This is what Beck, Limbaugh, Palin, Boehner, Bachmann, King and the rest have been feeding them. This is the swill they've been living on.

They say guns don't kill people; people kill people. Maybe so. Certainly if you're smart, and unscrupulous, you don't need a gun. Not when you've got access to so many frightened, angry people -- people you've already invested so much energy into frightening and angering. Who needs a gun? Just aim the crowd in the general direction, and someone's bound to get hurt.

Rob

Dead Eye

Here’s a photo of a target I punched a few holes in the other day, with a Sig Sauer 9mm.

Burglars beware! I’m getting better with a handgun! So, if I ever get one:

a) you’ll be sorry,
and b) we’ll finally have an excuse to replace the carpet.

On the other hand, I have literally forgotten how to aim a shotgun. Big Dutt and I split a box of clays at the range, but between last year and this, I’d forgotten the one lesson I have to relearn each time: Which eye to close when looking down the barrel at the bead. While looking out the wrong eye, I couldn’t line up the bead to the target, so I naturally couldn’t follow it as it flew. A good six clays flew by, with no interference from shot at all, before my instructor caught my problem. I think I pegged a couple after that, but I was trounced by Dutton, who really blasted the hell out of them.

Rob

Ain't That America.

Naturally, I'm in a fine mood about Heath Care Reform being signed into law (fingers crossed for the reconciliation fix), but I'm not quite ready to talk about that. Instead, I wanted to look back at an idiom that I've had in my vocabulary since high school.

Sometimes, you just gotta Paint the Mother Pink.

Here's a commercial for a contest MTV ran in 1984, the MTV Party House, in which they gave away a house in Bloomington, Indiana, and, in honor of Bloomington native John Cougar Mellencamp's song "Pink Houses," everybody would get together and "paint the mother pink," as Mellencamp says at the end of the commercial. And because he says it so distinctively (and also, because calling anything a "mother" was rare on TV in 1984), it became a catchphrase of sorts.

The thing is, it also kind of merged with another phrase, extrapolated from Douglas Adams's The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. Here's a passage about the Somebody Else's Problem field, which lets people ignore problems that aren't their own, since they conflict with reality as they expect it:

The Somebody Else's Problem field is much simpler and more effective, and what's more can be run for over a hundred years on a single torch battery. This is because it relies on people's natural disposition not to see anything they don't want to, weren't expecting, or can't explain. If Effrafax had painted the mountain pink and erected a cheap and simple Somebody Else's Problem field on it, then people would have walked past the mountain, round it, even over it, and simply never have noticed that the thing was there.

And lo, someone -- a buttonmaker at a sci-fi convention, no doubt -- shortened all that to "Paint it pink and call it somebody else's problem." And "Paint it pink" has sort of stuck around in that context, but among the first MTV generation? It's "Paint the mother pink."

Anyway, maybe that's why this is coming to me today. Healthcare reform has been signed into law, which, as Joe Biden reminds, us, is a "big fucking deal." And perhaps the biggest part of that big fucking deal is that, suddenly, for all of us who have health insurance that we're currently happy with, there are 30 million soon-to-be-insured Americans who are, astonishingly, no longer pink.

Rob

Wow.

Just combined all my chapters so far into one document. 100 pages exactly, single-spaced. More than 42,000 words.

Looks like I should stop stalling and get to the halfway point, eh?

Rob

Today at the Coffee Shop

On the sofas and easy chairs in the front of the coffee shop, there’s a guy in a bluetooth talking loudly to three well-dressed, good looking younger people, possibly about real estate. At first I thought it was some sort of facilitated speed-dating deal, which seemed odd for 9:30 in the morning. Now, it looks more likely that he’s trying to rope them into some real estate buy. Seems more like an investment than a house—his cadence was more businesslike than the comforting hominess (“Picture yourself spending the next step of your life here…”) home realtors try to project. Instead, he projected that smug aura that I really despise in a salesperson: the certainty that only a shortsighted idiot would pass up what he was offering. He said something about some people not having the guts to change their lives. Between his body language and his overall demeanor, I wouldn’t buy so much as a lemon from the guy.

On the plus side, I just closed the door on Chapter 20.

Rob

A Crash Course in Kurosawa

TCM is suddenly showing a whole lot of Akira Kurosawa movies; if you haven't seen them (as I haven't), you might want to set your Tivo. Included in the bunch are well-known movies like Rashomon, Yojimbo and Seven Samurai, as well as lesser-known movies like I Live In Fear, Scandal, Drunken Angel, and one I'm really looking forward to, Stray Dog. From what I understand, Stray Dog is about a cop who loses his gun in the line of duty, and has to track it down again. I first heard about it on the Filmspotting podcast, which recently had a Kurosawa marathon.

I can't watch all of them, but I've got a few on the agenda. I've just started watching I Live In Fear, about an industrialist who's worried about a nuclear holocaust and wants to movie his family down to South America. (This is 1955 Japan, so "worried about a nuclear holocaust" isn't necessarily shorthand for paranoid; it's like being worried about a terrorist attack in 2010 New York.) Coming up for me are Stray Dog, Yojimbo, and possibly a judo film I can't recall the name of if I can squeeze it in. I've already seen Seven Samurai, but I still won't have seen Rashomon, since its showing conflicts with Lost. From what I can tell, TCM isn't showing Throne of Blood or Ran, unless I've already missed them.

The first was I've caught has been 1957's The Lower Depths, a movie set in absolute squalor. It's based on a play by Russian author Maxim Gorky, and it follows a group of drunks, beggars, thieves and low-level merchants in this one decrepit boarding house. The version I saw had very modern subtitles, which I would bet are from a recent translation. It took a while for me to get some of the characters straight, but when I did, it was very rewarding. The landlady is trying to convince the thief (Toshiro Mifune) to kill her husband; there's some intrigue from that, but there's a counterbalancing force, in an old priest (Bokuzen Hidari)who comes to live with the group, and starts showing them a little hope, and teaching them a little self-worth. But when things start to really go to hell, the priest makes a surprising move, setting up one of the bleakest endings I've ever seen. This play was also filmed by Renoir two decades earlier, although its ending was apparently softened considerably. Oh, those romantic French. Criterion sells both films in a 2-disc set.

Anyway, if Kurosawa is a gap in your filmic experience, you might want to check your listings for TCM. There's some good stuff on.

Rob

Like Star Wars? Like Parks and Rec?

Here's 22 seconds you won't regret.

(And for anyone who dismissed Parks and Recreation after its first season, give it another try. If nothing else, for Ron F***ing Swanson.)

Rob

Abusement Park

Last weekend, Kathy and I headed south to the Monster-Mania horror convention, hooking up with a friend we hadn't seen in years, and eventually sharing an elevator with Gary & Jake Busey. (I get the feeling that if Gary Busey crosses your path, you're jinxed, but I crossed paths with him a second time, hopefully nixing the jinx.)

While we were there, we went to the premiere screening of an as-yet-unreleased film, Closed for the Season. It wasn't remotely good. Which is fine -- sometimes (especially with horror films) "good" isn't precisely what you're looking for.

But what you're looking for is usually better than this.

It's a haunted amusement park story, with Aimee Brooks as The Girl, Damien Maffei as The Guy, and Joe Unger as The Carny. (The character's names are actually Kristy, James, and...  well, the Carny, but they're hardly names you need to know.) Apparently the amusement park is angry at being abandoned after a kid flew off a roller coaster 20 years ago and impaled himself on a tree and just lay there with a severed spine for hours (days?), and years ago Kristy lost a stuffed teddy bear there, and... hell, there's no way to explain this. The movie tries, every now and then, and when it does, it becomes impossible to focus. If you try too hard, your brain will turn into Mike and Ikes.

What's happening is that the amusement part is making Kristy and James hallucinate horrible things that they were afraid of in the amusement park when they were kids. There's the Lake Monster, the alligator wrestler, the notion that mobsters buried people under the rides. There's the giant Civil War soldier who hung people high up in trees until their flesh was picked clean and they became just bones, bleaching in the sun. And there's the creepy carny, dressed like a (creepy) clown. Sometimes he has a backup band.

All the hallucinations give the filmmaker (writer-directer Jay Woelfel) an opportunity to film all the gore scenes he wants (such as, say, an alligator ripping off someone's leg) without having to deal with any of the consequences. Problem is, when these events have no consequences, they also lose any of their effect on the audience. What's the point of watching, if nothing that happens matters? Furthermore, with all the emphasis on disorientation -- the characters are always trying to escape the park, but it never lets them -- it would be good to have some sort of handle on what the baseline reality is. Without that, the action becomes a confusing, muddled mess.

Complicating matters, at some point the characters split off into their own evil selves (in evil clown makeup, natch). In a completely unnecessary scene , we get to see Good Kristy getting raped by Bad James and the Carny, while Bad Kristy (and later, Good Kristy, because it's a hallucination) look on. (Also, her beloved stuffed bear gets kinda rape-y, as well.) This scene only exists--like most scenes in Closed for the Season, it has no bearing on the plot--because the writer/director thought it would be awesome. It's not. It's simply a gratuitous and ugly scene in what is otherwise a nonsensical, unentertaining trifle.

Plus: It's two hours long. It goes on and on, and every ending is a false one. Just when you think they've ridden all the rides and visited all the attractions, there's one more thing they have to check off their haunted to-do list. Their ride on the Ferris wheel -- earlier described as "the world's fastest" -- had all the excitement of cleaning the gutters, but none of the danger. If I'd had a box of Sno-Caps with me, I would have used the nonpareils to saw away at my own wrists.

Rob

Missed a Few Days

I'll be catching up on my posts (I missed Sunday and Monday) soon. Long story short: Sunday, we had a friend stay over, and I chose to be social (and watch Dead Snow, with Nazi zombies), and then yesterday I spent the day editing in the city, followed by a train that got stopped on the track while waiting for a fire to clear south of us. A long day, believe me, and one that ended up with me realizing I was getting sick. So now I'm home, and sick, and I think I'll watch a movie. But here, for you, is the trailer to Dead Snow. Because Nazi zombies, that's why.

Rob

Of All the Horrible Things You Can Do To a Person...

...one of the cruelest is being turned into a lining for a glove.

Won't someone put a stop to this?


Rob

Hey, I Just Found The Year 2000's Internet in the Back of the Fridge!

Just ran my name through the Wu-Tang Clan name generator. My Wu name is "Inebriated Assistant."

That is all.

Rob

Coffee Shop Time Machine

Another low-content day for me, here at LATP central. But just so I don't totally check out, I should mention I bumped into an old friend at the coffee shop this morning, which was a great surprise. After having some breakfast with him and his daughter, I opened up my laptop at my usual table and listened to a crowd of eight old men talk about what would win in a fight: an alligator, a crocodile, or a panther. Passionate arguments were made; it got quite heated.

So: a visit from my past, and a glimpse of my future.

Anyway, here's something funny for you to watch, as the Onion once again deconstructs TV news.

I'm an old guy, so you know you can trust me.

Rob

An Update

Regarding my plan of last week. So far, so good. On the days when I haven't been going into the city to freelance -- and even one day when I did -- I've woken up early (for me), showered, gone to the coffee shop, and made some progress for my book. There's a new character I've just introduced, who seems incidental, but might not be, and I've made a couple of plot breakthroughs I didn't see coming, either. And somehow, I still haven't written the seance that's coming up. But I will, I will.

So that's good. I also made myself a commitment to start a new Twitter feed. It's called Your Daily Lie, and it stems from the realization that one of my favorite things in life is to lie to children. Well, to everyone, really, but it's a specific type of ridiculous lie that no one would ever believe, and it works best when explaining things to children. The sort of lie Calvin's dad would tell him in the Calvin & Hobbes strips ("Up until 1935, the world used to be in black and white," that sort of thing). It looks like I can manage at least one of these a day, so I figure it's safe to tell you about it.

Also, I promised myself I'd do a blog post every day through March. Hence, mere moments before a postless day draws to a close, this update.

Rob

P.S. Also, check this out: Old Jews Telling Jokes!

Put. The Doggie. Down.

So the other night, we're playing Pathfinder -- an offshoot of Dungeons and Dragons that rejects the 4th edition changes and revises the rules more in the 3.0/3.5 tradition, not that you care, or even understand what I just said -- and pal Dave noticed a listing for a weapon called a Dog Slicer. Which made us wonder, and kinda gag. (It also made us talk about how sliced hot dogs can really blimp up in a microwave, and reminded me of these Frankfurterstein machines that would electrocute your wiener, cooking it from the inside. (Remember those babies? My grandmother had one; a 70s-era model, though, not this space-age marvel.)

Anyway, mystery solved: the dog slicer is apparently a goblin weapon, named for pretty much what you'd think:

Dog Slicer: A savage weapon created from castoff bits of sharpened waste metal, goblins named these small swords after the act for which they're most commonly employed. Holes drilled in the blade make them easier to heft by enthusiastic but weak-armed murderers. Most dog slicers are size Small. 

Of course, the other thing that leapt to mind when I first heard the name of this weapon is the one and only Dogwelder, of the Section Eight superteam from Hitman.

God, I miss that book.

Rob

Eavesdropp'd a Bomb

Overheard today in Cooper Square. Dude yelled into his cell phone: "Phillip Seymour Hoffman is WHATing your mom?"

I figured the guy was trawling to see what sort of attention he could get.

i just kept walking, but now, with this blog entry, he belongs to eternity.

Rob

Oscar Grouch

For all the bitching I did about not getting to see the Oscars last night, I should note that I was actually able to see most of them: Cablevision & ABC settled (I've heard rumors of a little FCC armtwisting) and the signal resumed 15 minutes into the broadcast. Right after the opening sequence, which I need to get around to seeing. But happily, Kathy & I were able to sit on the couch and watch the awards.

Not that the show was great, by any means. I really liked the tribute to John Hughes, and there were a couple of great speeches (Sandra Bullock's was funny, and I completely agree that Christoph Waltz won the unberbingo -- I was thinking the same thing). And the uncomfortable hijacking of the mic during the Short Doc award speech for Music By Prudence was certainly memorable. But for all bitched about not seeing the show, I can't say it was worth the anger.


Here's Alan Sepinwal's take on it. I agree with every word of his criticism of Hamish Hamilton, particularly the stuff about the reaction shots. No shot of Clooney during Bullock's speech? No Streep?

And one more link for you: If you want to see the winning animated short, Logorama, click here. (Thanks to the archive of Roger Ebert's Oscar tweets.)

Rob

So Much For The Fucking Oscars

Cablevision and ABC/Disney are in negotiation about the price of carrying ABC. Not a cable channel -- the basic ABC channel, which has Lost, Modern Family, Cougar Town and tonight (no coincidence) the Academy Awards. And as a negotiating tactic, ABC has shut the signal down.

This happened earlier this year, with the Food Network. It was resolved in a few weeks, but for a little while, we had no access to Good Eats, etc. So we already know that Cablevision are giant douchebags.

This is definitely a dick move by ABC. They've got a popular show that most people like to watch live, so they pulled their signal right beforehand as strongarm tactics. Who knows if Cablevision will back down. If I were them, I certainly wouldn't.

I don't know how cable works everywhere, but here? They're the only game in town. We have some choices for Internet, but if we want cable, we've got to go through Cablevision. So our only response as consumers angry at the preemption of some of our favorite shows is to cancel our cable... cutting off all of our favorite shows. (With the preponderance of TV available on the internet and DVD, I'm honestly considering it.)

If there were some alternate provider, who was carrying the Oscars tonight? You can bet Cablevision would be carrying them, too. Because they couldn't risk a mass defection. As it is, they're risking nothing but goodwill -- which they don't need, because they're the only game in town.

Rob

PS. I just couldn't find any suitable Oscar imagery to go with this post. Google Image search terms included: Oscar statue broken, Oscar statue in toilet, Oscar statue in trash, Oscar statue stolen, Oscar statue defaced, Oscar statue satirical, Oscar statue up someone's ass. NOTHING. Who knew Oscar was such a sacred institution? Will Academy members issue death threats to newspapers who print anything but an official image of Hollywood's favorite sex toy? When did Google become a Dutch newspaper?

Not the Senior Citizen's Discount... But Close

Last night, Kathy & I went out to dinner with our nephew, Bill, at the restaurant where his girlfriend works. We had a delicious meal, as we always do there, even if mine was out-of-control spicy. (Totally my fault. Well... maybe 90 percent my fault.) But when the bill came, it was half of what we expected. Bill says, "Oh, yeah -- Ashley told them you're her parents so you could get the family discount."

So we did what any responsible people would do. We told our daughter we were very proud of her, and left her a nice tip.

But the next time I'm posing as someone's dad, I'm bringing a pipe.

Rob

Day Ain't Over Yet.

Only a few minutes left in Saturday -- hardly enough time for a proper blog post. But here's a little odd something for your viewing pleasure.

Rob

Don't Go Near The Light

I won't have much time to blog today, but I wanted to get a post in. I noticed this morning (after a night of drinking and karaoke; turns out REO Speedwagon's "Take It On the Run" is a little too trebbly for me) that I literally chase myself into the shower. I wake up, head to the bathroom, and turn on the light inside the shower (with the curtain drawn) while I brush my teeth in the dim light. Then, when it's time to actually shower, I flip two switches, turning the shower light off and the main bathroom light on. Then, like Gregor Samsa, I go scuttling for the dark.

Rob

Jingle Balls, Jingle Balls

Considering all the medicine that Gus has taken, I'm naturally a little concerned now that he's mostly off the meds. Especially since, although he was up and about when I left for the coffee shop this morning, he was dead tired, and extremely tough to rouse, once I got home and it was time to set the weasels free and give them their medicine. But when I finally took him out of his cube hammock (not so easy do do; it's much easier for him to climb out himself), he ran around like a good little guy. I scattered his jingly balls around the room, and he gamely gathered them up and brought them back to the corner he prefers they stay. And now, up here, I can hear him playing with them, lying on his back clutching a jingle ball to his tummy, batting it with his paws and making it ring. A happy, happy sound.

One more ferret medicine story and I might move on to something else:

The second day of giving Gus the bacteria-building paste, I put it on my finger and let Gus lick it off. (The first day, I hadn't realized it was paste and tried to squirt it directly into his mouth. It was like I was caulking the poor guy.) Gus enjoyed it, and happily lapped it up. Problem was, She-Devil was up and about, too, and wanted to get at it as well. I kept her away until almost the last of it was gone, but figured as a nutritional supplement, it wouldn't do her any harm, and let her have a taste. She loved it too, and battled Gus for the very last tiny glob on my finger.

As paste, it didn't disappear immediately, and she kept licking her lips. And Gus could now detect more of it on She-Devil than on my finger, she he started licking her, too. And for a moment, their tongues were out of their mouths, licking each other's tongues. Full-on ferret tongue-on-tongue porno kissing.

I don't think I've ever seen something so creepy and adorable at the same time.

Rob

Gus, You Can Exhale Now

We had a bit of a scare before the Mardi Gras party. Our ferret Gus was listless, and lacked his customary energy. So during our first big prep night, Kathy took him to the emergency vet, and got what amounted to an "I dunno" and some antibiotics. The next morning, I took him to our regular vet in Ridgefield Park. (She-Devil came along too; they needed their distemper shots anyway.)

After running some tests, the doctor told us that Gus had some blood in his stool, and very little of the bacteria that allow his intestines to work. He gave us a host of medicines: an antibiotic, something to settle his stomach, and some bacteria builders. The schedule was complicated: one thing he was to get once a day, another, twice, and two things three times a day.

Medicating a ferret when he doesn't want to be medicated can be tough. She-Devil is on medication, and is docile and pleasant, happy to get a treat afterward. Gus, on the other hand, trusted us less and less the more medicine he'd get. He peed on Kathy twice in a row when she tried to administer the antibiotic. "Yours!" she shouted.

I'd hold him, scruffed, away from me so he couldn't try the peeing tactic on me. He would swing his body like a pendulum, shaking to get away from the antibiotic, which clearly tasted horrible. It was like he was doing the twist in mid-air, except with claws. A lot of claws.

There was another medicine, sulcrafate, that didn't taste quite as bad (it seemed), but was still awful -- and worse yet, it was in a bulb dropper instead of a press syringe. There's no way to control the pace that the dropper expels its liquid -- especially when you only have a split second to make it happen. Gus would open his mouth, I'd put the tip of the dropper inside, and squeeze before he could push it away. He hated it, and no wonder: I was practically waterboarding him. For his own good, but it's not like I could explain that to him.

Anyway, that's all over. Gus is in much better spirits now, and much more active. We stopped the antibiotic after 10 days, and the sulcrafate has run out. (Another drawback to the bulb-dropper-built-into-the-cap system -- you can't close the bottle until the medicating is over; I knocked it over and spilled some when I reached for the bottle after Gus had wound me up.) All that's left is some of the bacteria building paste (which he likes) and regular droppers of Vivify (a nutritional supplement that he loves). So he's getting back to trusting us again. And I don't have to feel like a monster three times a day.

Rob

(Not sure where our camera is; this old picture of me and Gus will have to do.)

Late Night Post

It's nearly one-thirty a.m. A little earlier than I generally consider a late night, but that's something I'm trying to change. I've been staying up later and later for a while now, turning over almost completely to my night-owl nature. I have very little schedule that I don't make for myself, and that's been taking it's toll. I do freelance work whenever I can, but it doesn't always fill my time. And when I've got nothing to do (or something I can put off), I do what I've always been inclined to do: waste time.

I can't say that's changing for good: I can only say that I've come up with a plan to help me change it, and maybe do myself some good in the process. Tomorrow morning, I'll be waking up early (for me; not early for you, I'm sure) and heading off to the local coffee shop. I'm bringing my laptop, and I'm going to have a cup of coffee and read the last few chapters of the novel I've been working on.

Up till now, I generally tried to sleep in (I say tried to, but it literally takes no effort at all) until Kathy goes to work -- she's not a morning person, and would rather be alone as she prepares for work, so sleeping keeps me out of her way, and it's something I like to do. But it's time to change my pattern. Time to get productive. Time to make things happen like they need to happen in 2010. By the time January rolls around, I want something to show for it.

One more thing: Enough with letting this place lie fallow, too. A post a day, throughout March. Gotta rebuild my habits.

Rob

Another Tiny Dream

I just dreamed that Kathy had booked a Lewis Black concert for our driveway, and had never told me. So while she was going off to work, I had to shovel and put out some folding chairs. And keep stray audience from wandering into the house.

How much should I sell hot chocolate for?

Rob

Why I Feel Like Jesus.

Not the beard, not the sandals, not the long hair I used to have, not even the talking crap to Satan. Didn't walk on water, didn't turn water into wine and walk on that, didn't cure the blind or raise anyone from the dead.

But I did start the night with 36 beers in a snowbank, give everyone plenty of drinks, and pull a full sixty beers etc. out of the snow when the party was over. That's serious loaves and fishes action.

Hey Peter. I can see your house from here.

Rob

A Dame By Any Other Name

I just read on Mark Evanier's blog that a friend of mine from college theater, Scott Mason, has won a contest and been named Dame Edna's honorary understudy for the new show All About Me. Scott's been impersonating the Dame for a while now, but this is taking it to a new level. Congratulations, Scott!

Rob

Smells Like Here Comes Your Man

Y'know, as much as I loved last night's episode of Lost (names! numbers! one awesome effing eulogy!), my favorite part of the broadcast was this Old Spice commercial.

Rob

A Lamb By Any Other Name Would Still Lie Down On Broadway

Kathy & I were in the city last night, and were looking around for things to do, and music to see. (We wound up going to Brooklyn and seeing The Growlers, a spooky-cool California band that sounds like a living breathing Lost Boys soundtrack.) But somewhere in the music listings was an all-woman klezmer band called Isle of Klezbos. Which is a legitimately great name.

It also reminded me of Lez Zepplin, an all-girl Zepplin cover band the Bastard told me about the other day. (Another great name. Other all-female cover bands include AC/DShe, Iron Maidens, and Cheap Chick.)

And it got me to thinking. If I were to start an all-woman cover band (quite a feat, considering I have neither the talent nor equipment for it), I'd be thanking my lucky stars this name isn't taken yet: Vagenesis.

If anyone wants it, it's free for the taking. 

Rob

One of Us! One of Us!

Just saw an interview with Donald Glover from the other night's Late Show with Craig Ferguson. Glover plays Troy on Community, the warm and  funny lead-off show to NBC's Thursday night comedies.

(As an aside, how did sitcoms get good again? In the 90s, they had nothing for me. Seinfeld was good, but I'd only catch is sporadically, and everything else bored my socks off. Then came Arrested Development, and things started turning around, and now I can almost always find a really great ensemble comedy to watch. Even things I had zero to no expectations for (I'm looking at you, Cougar Town) are much better than I could have ever expected.)

Anyway, Glover was on the Late Show, and he expressed an interest in magic. He mentioned that he didn't see any magicians as a kid, since he grew up as a Jehovah's Witness -- but he wasn't one anymore, so now he was digging the magic shows.

Craig is fascinated by this, and he asks: "So you're a rogue Jehovah's Witness?"

And Glover responds, "No, I'm not a 'rogue' Jehovah's Witness; I'm not hiding in shadows or anything."

And with those words, Donald Glover revealed himself to be a D&D geek. No hiding in shadows, Donald? How about sleight of hand? Sneak attack?

You just failed your save vs. geekdom, Donald. We're glad to have you!

Rob

Liner Notes

Okay, most—not all—of my friends have gotten my Christmas mix disc by now. (Yes, it's February. Why do you ask?) And I thought I’d take a look at some of the songs, since it’s been way too long since I posted any text up here.

Thin Wild Mercury. “Poor Phil Ochs, sad and low.” There’s something compelling to me—especially now—about a guy kicked out of the music fast lane as the world changes around him. Judas went electric and he never looked back.

Aramingo Take Out. What can I say? Slo-Mo (featuring Mic Wrecka) was may favorite new find at last year’s Philly Folk Fest. Yes, I said folk fest. Enjoy the rap, my fellow hippies.

Trippin’ In Montana. One side of my struggle with religion: I see it as a get-rich-quick scheme for all sorts of unsavory types. Only the levels of respectability change. In this case, it seems like the Waco story if it were reported on by Jim Thompson.

Love Dog. And here’s the flip side of the argument. Don’t we all want something out there? I know I do; I just don’t know what it is. “Nameless you above me, come lay me low and love me.”

Paranoia in B Major. What can I say? I love the Avetts, especially loose and live, like this track. The first of the love songs, which started growing all over this collection like kudzu. “But if love is a game, girl, then you’re gonna win; I’ll spend the rest of my life bringing victory in, babe if you want me to.”

Fuel. This Ani DiFranco song has gripped me for the past few years – it goes all over the place, and then ties it all back up tight. It just cranks up the tension… or rather, recognizes the tension that’s already here.

Stress. Speaking of tension, we’re not always very good at letting go of it. Plus: Sand fleas. SAND FLEAS!

Good Weekend. The first Art Brut song I ever heard, and it still makes my heart leap with joy.

Boy With a Coin. The first of two Iron & Wine songs; Sam Beam has become one of my favorite modern songwriters. I don’t always know what he’s going for, but I love how he gets there. (Again with the God, by the way: “If God made her eyes for crying at birth, and then left the ground to circle the earth.” Some people say we’re here to find happiness. But what if we’re here to find sorrow?)

The Engine Driver. Another sad love song, but there’s a resilience to it. “There are power lines in our bloodlines.” Plus, I love the bridge, about being a writer of fictions. “I’ve written pages upon pages, trying to rid you from my bones.” Wow.

Shenadoah. The oldest song on the disc, by hundreds of years. I love Richard Thompson’s collection 1,000 Years of Popular Music, and to my mind, this is the prettiest version of this song ever.

Where Is My Love? First of all, no one does longing like Lucinda Williams. Secondly, the lovers she imagines sound like the sexiest guys in existence. Who could compete?

Freedom Hangs Like Heaven. I like this bluesier Iron & Wine song, too. More upbeat than the last one, it’s a glimpse of the potential in all of us. “Ain’t nobody knows what a newborn holds, but his mama says he’ll walk on water and wander back home.”

2:19. This Tom Waits shuffle about love gone wrong always makes me want to dance. “Was that a raindrop in the corner of your eye? Were you drying your nails or waving goodbye?” I think you know, Tom.

Black Lincoln Bomb. Three girls, a night on the town, a stolen car. I’ve always liked Heather Eatman, ever since I saw her (and interviewed her) at my first folk fest fifteen years ago. (Jesus. 15 years.) She always has a way of describing a seamy evening, and the casual, languid instrumentation only adds to the effect.

Shackamaxon. This mix was a long time in the can before I realized that this song was about where to buy weed in Philly. I just liked it because it seemed like a verdant oasis in the middle of the city. “Looking for a place where the grass is green, and the smell is sweeter than it’s ever been.” (And that’s the subtle part.) What can I say? I’m dense sometimes.

Dancing Choose. “He’s a WHAT? He’s a WHAT? He’s a newspaper man.” They had me -- former newspaper man that I am -- with that, but once you throw in a sweater for a Weimaraner and a Flash tattoo, I completely fell in love with this song. In a just world, it would be the type of karaoke challenge that Barenaked Ladies’ “One Week” posed in the 90s.

Wine, Women and Song. Another song where the singer is taking stock of his life. I love the bouncy combination of lyrical playfulness and the bitter, bitter regret.

Shanty. Okay, this one I knew was about weed.

Rob

Mel Gibson Used to Be Able To Act

...but now he can't even act sincere.

 

(Make sure you watch to the end.)

Rob

No Phone Calls, Please.

Rob

BananaGram

Old friends of mine know this story, but I thought I'd set it down.

Years ago -- circa 1992, I think -- a couple friends and I were in a bar in Newark, Delaware, listening to a band that I believe was called Grinch. (If you're interested, here's their Facebook page. This story's not about them.)

Between sets, we ended up talking to this other guy in the bar, who was just starting up a local independent newspaper.There'd be comics, and band reviews, and that sort of thing. And my friends and I, writers all, were hooked. He needed writers, and we needed to get published. Win-win, right? So after regaling us with his plans for his paper, he invited us back to his place to check the thing out. We skipped the second set (sorry, Grinch!) and followed him a block or so to his apartment. Eager young writers were we.

And there, he showed us his fine publication -- an orange tabloid with a demented yellow fruit on the cover, called The Powerful Banana. Which was an odd name, but Newark's a college town. It sees odd every day.

Then we flipped the paper open and paged through it. I can honestly say, I don't recall any of the articles in the paper, if there were any. (There had to be, I guess, but they've faded from my memory. You'll see why in a moment.) I remember seeing some bar calendar advertisements, too, and later wondered if the Stone Balloon had any idea what it was paying for, and was happy with what it got. Because the main thing that caught my eye were the comics.

There were three comics strips, and only one had a punchline. And I have to admit that I remember it to this day. I don't think that's a testament to the humor (it couldn't be), but simply my brain's recognition that there are some elements of shock it wants to remember forever, as a defense mechanism against similar situations in the future.

The strip with the punchline was called "The Gassy Guru." This featured a lotus-sitting guru held aloft by his own farts, who eventually pees on one of his followers, saying "urine lightened!"

Ha!

This was the punchline.

Of the other two comic strips, one was called "Runny & Spooge," about a cat and his hairball (I don't know which was which, but really, does it matter?), and the other one was called "The Violent Pervert," which, well... it had truth in advertising going for it, at least. It was vile. Its only saving grace that it was so crudely drawn that you couldn't really see what was going on.

And my two friends and I just deflated. This guy wanted us to write for his newspaper, and until a few moments before, we'd been absolutely giddy. And then we saw the damn thing, and it was clear to each one of us that not being published anywhere, ever, would be better than even once getting published next to "The Violent Pervert." We made some polite noises about sending him some material, maybe, someday, although things are really hectic right now, and oh, look at the time! And we hightailed it out of there as soon as we could.

Somewhere, I think I still have my copy of The Powerful Banana. It later served as a prop in a short film one of those two friends made, and became such a strange artifact that I couldn't bear to throw it away. But it's followed me through a couple moves by this point, and I'm not entirely sure where in the house it is. Which is probably for the best.

Still, for some reason the other day, I was curious about The Powerful Banana, and decided to look it up online, just in case any vestige of this pre-Internet publication survived online. As far as I can tell, it hasn't. But the name lives on! A Japanese band has been playing under that name since 2001, from what I can find out. You can hear some of their music on their myspace page.

The Powerful Banana is dead. Long live the Powerful Banana.

Rob
(photo from Blobby's Blog.)

At least it wasn't a cricket.

This morning I was on the train, trying to concentrate on a little editing, when I heard a little voice.

"Rob? Rob?"

It was saying other stuff, too, but I couldn't make it out. But I heard my name, clear as day.

I'd just gotten off the phone with Kathy, so I checked my cell to make sure we weren't somehow still connected, despite my having hung up and closed the phone. No dice; it wasn't my phone.

I checked my mp3 player. I've heard voices from it before, but it's never said my name. But I'd been listening to a podcast, so it would have been speech, at least.

But, nothing.

So I thought, This is how my mind finally snaps. At least I'll have someone to talk to.

And then I heard the woman in front of me talking on her cell phone. She mentioned someone named Rob, and I realized it must have been the person she was talking to that had said my name. Twice. Miles away.

So good news! I have super hearing!

Rob

Today's Bit o' Sickness.

Good morning to you!

Rob

Blindsided

It looks like Jay Leno was trying to defuse Jimmy Kimmel's impersonation of him the other night by inviting him on the show for a 10 at 10 interview. Kimmel played along for a couple of questions -- enough for Jay to get comfortable -- and then just dismantled him. Whatever home field advantage Jay had as the interviewer just evaporated... but because of the format, he just doggedly kept going through question 10.

Wow.

Rob

"Hey! There's that guy from that Daily Show segment!"

I'm sure that's the greeting I'd hear on the streets, if I ever were to leave the house. Because among all the supporters and protesters at last Thursday's vote, there was also Wyatt Cenac, a correspondent for The Daily Show. And in between the interviews where Cenac gives the protesters enough rope to hang themselves, there's a shot of me and my friends Sharon and Andrew, standing in line waiting to get into the State House. Our appearance is at 3:18 in the vid: Sharon and Andrew are on the right side of the screen, holding up their signs for the camera. I'm next to them, in the tan coat and black hat, oblivious.

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Dreaded Bliss
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Health Care Crisis

As aired on standard TVs, Andrew was cut out of the shot. He was an HD bonus, most likely because he can only be truly appreciated in hi-def.

Rob

Oh, Hell, Just Call It a Post with a Lost Link and Leave It At That*

Alan Sepinwall has liveblogged the TV press tour's Lost panel. Some of the highlights (major spolier for the season 5 finale, minor teasers for the final season):

• Terry O'Quinn didn't realize he wasn't playing Locke anymore until he got to the point where we found out ourselves. (Highlight over the space for the season 5 spoiler.)

• They're relieved that Obama's State of the Union address has moved from the day of the Lost season premiere. Lindelof: Lindelof: "What's amazing is how fickle your political affiliation... I'm a lifelong Democrat, but when I heard they were considering February 2, I was like, 'That motherf--ker!'"

•  Michael will be back... as will Libby.

Rob
*I'd been thinking of stealing a lyric from Elton John's "Island Girl" for the title to this post...until I looked up the lyrics to Island Girl. No wonder I haven't heard that song in 20-odd years!

Alma

A great little animated short film from Rodrigo Blaas. If you want to do it justice, click onto Vimeo's site and watch it on full screen in HD. 

Alma from Rodrigo Blaas on Vimeo.

Rob

Draft... from BEYOND!

There is a cold, cold, COLD spot in our house, right at the foot of the stairs, in front of the wall-mounted air conditioner.

I can only conclude this means our house is haunted... probably by someone that the air conditioner killed.

Rob

The Prune of the Future!

Courtesy of Stan Freberg and Ray Bradbury.

Rob

Forgery

When we were in Trenton yesterday, there was a preacher from Philadelphia who was brandishing a handwritten sign that said "No Gay Marriage. -- God"

I'm no handwriting analyst, but I'm willing to bet that it was written in the preacher's own handwriting, not God's. If it were so important to God to stop equal marriage, he'd pick up a friggin' sharpie Himself, y'think?

Nice forgery, dude. Next time, sign it "Epstein's Mother."


Rob

Today in Trenton

Never have I heard a "Hallelujah" sound so ugly.

We were in the overflow room of the NJ State Senate in Trenton, waiting for the vote on the marriage equality act, which would have given same-sex couples the right to marry. We'd listened to a number of speeches about the bill, some of them excellent. We'd spent the morning in the cold, holding up signs and singing. The afternoon we spent tracking one particular senator in the hope that she could be persuaded to have the courage and foresight to buck her party affiliation and vote yes (like her colleague, Bill Baroni). And then, there we were, listening to speech after speech, explaining why the senators were voting for the bill (Baroni gave an excellent one, as did Senators Ray Lesniak, Nia Gill, M. Teresa Ruiz, and my senator Barbara Buono) or against it (these speeches were uniformly wrongheaded, but the standout was Sean Kean's craven "I love the gays, everyone should have some in their neighborhoods because they really spruce them up, but I won't let them marry, and stop calling me a bigot or afraid of a primary challenge" speech, that at times had the coherence of a reading of a Scrabble board.).

As the senators for equality spoke, there were regular explosions of applause... but short bursts, as the crowd wanted to hear what was said next. There were more frequent -- and much smaller -- bursts of applause for the anti-equality Senators, from an enthusiastic contingent on the other side of the room from us. (Applauding more often wasn't a problem; there weren't enough of them to drown out the speeches they liked.)

Then came the vote. I'd been expecting a voice vote, like the white-knuckle experience I'd had watching CNN at 1 in the morning a few weeks ago to see the U.S. Senate pass healthcare reform. Instead, the vote was represented in scoreboard form. 14 to 19 in favor of the antis... and then a 20th vote against. The equality bill was defeated.

And then, upon hearing it declared that her fellow citizens would not be allowed to marry the people they love, some woman across the room shouted, "Hallelujah."

I can picture her, years from now, looking back with regret on her joy at this moment. Sitting with her grandchildren, all of whom have grown up knowing married, same-sex couples and their children. Kids who have grown up with marriage equality as the fact that it soon will be, no matter the cowardice of the senators who abstained, no matter the calculations of those who weighed their own political careers against securing rights for their fellow citizens. All of that will have faded into the past, and women and men will have long been free to marry each other, and the world will have kept turning. Change will have come, and brought countless couples into each other's arms.

And she'll think of this day, way back in 2010, when she was foolish enough to praise God for standing in the way of love.

Rob

Why I Am Going to Trenton Tomorrow

Over at Center of NJ Life, Sharon writes why she is going to Trenton tomorrow. Geoff at Gay in Public eloquently, and regularly, expresses why he is going to Trenton tomorrow.

The nuts and bolts of it is here: The NJ State Senate is voting on marriage equality tomorrow, and we're going to show our numbers and to speak to legislators before the vote, to urge them to vote for an equal right to marriage.

And I've been thinking of saying why I'm going to Trenton tomorrow, but I can't narrow it down to one reason. So here's a handful of them. It'll probably come as no surprise that a few of them are selfish.

1. I like weddings, and I don't want to wait until my nieces and nephews and my friends' kids are grown to go to more of them. But most of my straight friends are already married.

2. I don't like exclusive, segregated clubs. And as a spouse, I belong to one: The Married People of America. It's not a club I'm willing to quit, so it's on me to help open the doors for everyone. (Luckily, they've already started opening, and momentum is on our side.)

3. I want to see my friends happy, and treated equally under the law.

4. I want to see people I don't even know happy, and treated equally under the law.

5. I want to see my enemies miserable, and treated equally under the law.

6. I'm an American, and believe that each of us was created equal. Any law, any regulation, and any tradition that doesn't recognize that equality is unacceptable. We can do better.

And tomorrow, we will.

See you in Trenton.

Rob