Recommendation

If you're in Trader Joe's, in the frozen dessert aisle, and you consider buying the "Gone Bananas" dessert because it makes you laugh and think of Gwen Stefani...don't. The chocolate on the outside is OK, but the bananas inside have a decidedly odd taste.

And really, its not that funny when you get them home. It only seemed that way because you were in Trader Joe's, about to go crazy because of all of the (literally) dirty hippie children around you.

What I Want in My Easter Basket

Wine-tasting Jelly Bellies.

Really, this is a great idea. Sort of a novelty, but both fun and educational.

Let the Rain Fall Down

I'm a little late with this link...and I haven't even seen the season premiere yet, as I don't have any sort of cable channels until Tuesday...but this sentence made me happy:

"Saying you like Kristin is the kiddie version of admitting you love Pam Anderson."

So true.

I Want My Tooth Back

Christopher Walken does have an oddly intellectual Martian appearance. That is a great description. And Cooper could've written this article. What it should've mentioned, also, is the legions of impersonators Walken has inspired. A few years ago, we saw Jay Mohr do standup. He was hilarious, overall, and incredibly likable. But his Walken was AMAZING. Set the bar really high for Cooper.

I'm back at home, BTW, but on dial-up. Turns out the first person I talked to at Verizon flat out lied to me. I won't have DSL until August 4th, and that was always the case. At least I have free dial-up, I guess.

Complaining

I'm at the library - AGAIN. Because I'm not going to have DSL until August 4th (even though they'd told me July 25th originally). Verizon and I aren't on good terms right now.

Also without Direct TV, which means I've missed LB, along with Six Feet Under and Entourage. And I'm almost finished Harry Potter (which is soooo good). I'm not quite sure what I'm going to do with myself. Clean, I guess.

A Few Things

First of all, I'm at the library right now. While this weekend's move went amazingly smoothly (thanks again to everyone who helped), my DSL has not yet begun working. Even though it was supposed to be on yesterday. I knew, though, I just knew that the lady at Verizon was lying to me, just telling me what I wanted to hear, when she said it would be on by the 25th. I'm guessing it'll start sometime around Thursday.

Secondly, I finally got the new Harry Potter yesterday. I'm about 250 pages in already - it is such a quick read. Best one yet, I think. I'm torn between wanting to read all the time and wanting to make it last.

Finally, last week, after the Roberts nomination, I posted about how cute I thought his kids were. What I didn't explicitly say, but what I meant, was: this is how I'm going to dress my children whenever I get the chance. Honestly, I had no idea that their adorable outfits were going to get so much negative press (link is to Lileks, who isn't negative at all, but who addresses the whole ridiculous thing). When I read about stuff like this, I really can't help but wonder how some people's worldviews develop.

That's it for now. More later...hopefully from my cushy new office.

Q: What is 65?

A: Alex Trebek's age as of today. I wonder if he gets special categories for his birthday.

More Pictures of the Poconos

I really do love the Poconos. This is Skytop Lodge from the golf course...don't you expect to see Baby and Johnny running out any second?

(the yellow car is, I think, a Ferarri. There was an Italian car show while we were there. More Jersey plates and bleachy hair than I could ever imagine at a place like Skytop. It reminded me a lot of the time I was at lunch near Annapolis with my mom, grandmother and sister and we ran into a meeting of the West River Powerboat Association. All class.)

More pics to follow.

The Whites' Cottage

Where we stay in the Poconos. Just looking at it kind of makes me smile. And wish it was time to go back already.

Cooper Golfing

For as little as he actually golfs, I've seen a lot of pictures of Cooper with a golf club in his hands. No fishing pictures from this trip, though. Not that we don't already have about 75 pictures of Cooper fishing at Skytop...

I like this one, though, even though Sam's back is turned, because of the sunset.

On that Last Post

I'm an idiot. The Black Crowes thing is in the Stereogum post! In my defense, I didn't read that excerpty paragraph because I just reread that part of the book a month ago.

Black Crowes = That 70's Show

(that's cheating, I know. I thought for a second that I made up the above title, but I'm pretty sure I just remembered reading it.)

Stereogum plays my brother's favorite Chuck Klosterman game: match the band to the TV show. Its fun, but I'm not very good at it. He seems to be, though. Rob Thomas = Joey is DEAD ON.

Just Seen on FX

An episode of "30 Days" (the Morgan Spurlock-created show) in which an uber-healthy 43 year old mom binge drinks for a month to try to inspire a get-healthy revelation in her college-aged daughter. It was pretty ridiculous, in that Spurlockian way.

First of all, binge drinking for a month straight isn't what normal college students do; it's what alcoholics do. And there is a difference. College students break on Mondays.

Secondly, the mother was acting like an idiot. I mean, she was doing things that I did in college, and, well, still do on occasion, but she's 43. When you dance on a bar at 43, you look like a desperate divorcee. When you do it at 19, you look fun.

Third, she was doing TONS of shots. Yeah, you do lots of shots in college, but then you sort of scale back on that type of drinking. Everyone knows that, right?

And fourth, please spare me any more teary Lifetime-esque scenes that involve mothers pleading with their daughters to stop drinking to avoid being roofied and date raped. If you actually keep yourself from drinking so you won't get raped, haven't the rapists won? Anyway, I think my mother dealt with this issue appropriately: as my friends and I would leave the house to go out, she'd say, "Hands over the glasses, girls, keep your hands over the glasses." And we still do.

(Of course my mom also helped me get ready to go out by recommending outfits that made me look more like my fake ID. And she helped my sister get her fake ID. She's done a good job of helping us develop socially.)

The show also included the requisite interview with a mom of a girl who died from alcohol poisoning (a very cute girl from Colorado State University, who had a .43 when she died, which is both outrageous and sad at the same time). The story was, of course, sad, but it wouldn't teach college students anything they don't already know - they've heard it before at countless assemblies. You know what made me pay attention? The picture of the girl and her friends in Chi O t-shirts (my sister's sorority). You can't ask for worse press. I couldn't help but think about how not thrilled Nationals must be. (Not to belittle her death, of course, it is tragic.)

Anyway, Spurlock. Dramatic. To the point of irrelevance.

If I Was Colin Farrell

I would stop worrying about whether or not his little sex tape (second item) is going to be distributed it (it is) and more about whether or not I could get a cut of the profits.

Seriously, either everybody's going to see this for free on the internet, or somebody's going to distribute it legally and, again, somebody will make some money on it (plus everyone will see little parts of it on the internet).

I'm not so sure what he's worried about anyway. Its not like he has a squeaky clean boy-next-door image to uphold. And he certainly has a legal claim to at least 50% of the proceeds. Cash in while you still can, Colin.

Priorities

So this morning, Bush's nomination of John Roberts is all the way down third in line in my Economist email (after US agreements with India and news about fighting in the Gaza Strip, which, btw, is in the email pretty much every day). Interesting to see how that ranks. What does it mean? I'm not sure, maybe that he's just not controversial enough to warrant that much attention from the Brits.

I'll tell you what I do know, though, his kids are pretty cute. I'm all over those outfits.

Comments on Comments

At Erin's request, I've enabled the comments function on the blog (I actually thought it was turned on before, and didn't even realize it wasn't until she asked me about it). So...feel free to comment away.

Gentle Readers

I bet that when Miss Manners started writing, she never thought she'd have to answer someone's question about how to politely discuss the issue of wearing thong bathing suits.

What I wonder, is how someone who actually reads Miss Manners ended up involved with someone who would wear something so, um, classy.

Love and Honor and Pity and Pride and Compassion and Sacrifice

My brother just pointed me to a post including an mp3 of my favorite speech ever: William Faulkner's 1949 Nobel Prize acceptance speech. I've written about it here before - way back when I first started the blog. It is very brief, but powerful and extremely memorable. I'd never actually heard it before, but listening to Faulkner say the words in his drawl is much cooler than just reading the speech in my 10th grade English book (though reading it is good, too).

To find the link, scroll down. Its just before the thing about Maroon 5 and Oasis. Naturally.

Foreshadowing Device too Obvious to Use

Last night, I got a fortune cookie that had no fortune in it.

If I was in a short story, I'd clearly be slated for some sort of weird death scene. Or at least a scrape with one, only to be granted my life back because I had some sort of major revelation, with the help of the ghost of Kit past. Or something like that.

Anyway, I thought it was odd. I've never had an empty fortune cookie before.

Well, Duh

Amateur culture is exploding. And the BBC is just figuring this out?

Maybe it's just me, and it's just because I'm planted in front of a broadband internet connection all day every day, but I'm pretty sure this story's been written before. Like three years ago. If not longer ago than that.

Harry vs. The Knights of Templar

The new Harry Potter book sold more copies in one day than DaVinci Code sold in its entire first year.

Whew. And considering almost everyone I know (minus, of course, the silly book snob brother) has read The DaVinci Code...and that I haven't even bought a copy of Harry Potter yet (but I will, and I'm sure there are more like me out there)...the influence of that series is absolutely mind-boggling.

And WOW JK Rowling is rich these days.

Young Love

Pam and Tommy, together again. How sweet.

I'm pretty sure that a black diamond is some kind of bad omen, though.

Yeah Anne Arundel County!

An accountant from Severn came in second place at the World Series of Poker. $4.25 million. Not bad at all.

Misery Loves Company?

Driving to Annapolis yesterday, I was listening to the radio, as I usually do, when one of the perky, MIX stationy DJs said, "Congratulations, everyone, we made it to Friday!"

I realize that this is a fairly innocuous comment...but it annoyed me so much. I realize that I have a pretty nice life right now, what with the working from home and the blending of the weekdays and weekends. And I remember what it felt like to dread Mondays and to be incredibly relieved on Friday mornings. But there was something about the way she said "Congratulations!"...

There are very few actual circumstances in which its appropriate to be that excited about making it through one more week. Fighting a terminal illness, for example, or grieving for someone you love. Existing as a POW in Vietnam. Battling depression. Getting through alcoholism (or other addictions). These are reasons to celebrate the successful passing of a week. But just going to work? No.

Not that its the DJs fault, really. She's trying to create a community among her listeners, and commiseration is probably the quickest way to do that, though definitely cheap. But my first thought was, is it really necessary to belittle truly trying circumstances (like the ones above) by pretending that the whole human condition is so miserable that it warrants a weekly celebratory milestone?

And my second thought was that by doing that - by creating the milestone - she (and every other MIXy DJ out there) is promoting a culture of misery and whining. Which doesn't help anyone, really, at all.

My third, thought, though, was simple: I really hate DJs. Especially mid-morning to mid-afternoon DJs on MIX stations with poorly defined, wide open demographics (like 18-54 is tight?). So it doesn't really matter what she said, I probably wouldn't like it.

FINALLY: yes, I do realize that its quite ridiculous and hypocritical to complain so much about someone creating a culture of whining. I'm still trying to take the high road here. I guess. Blame it on the DJ-created community of commiseration.

Truth in Advertising

Confidential to the driver of the white Dodge minivan with tinted windows and a big white Dodge ram sticker on the back windshield:

Vanity plates don't lie. You really did look like the TOTLPAKG.

Just in Case You Were Wondering

I'd be in Ravenclaw. With Harry's girlfriend Cho.

Saying Goodbye to Britney

Cojo on Mrs. Federline:

If she weren't famous, and you were to bring her to any random high school cheerleading squad in America and put her up against the other random high school "pretty girls" looks-wise she would rank in the lowest third of the squad. We aren't talking about the hottest cheerleaders in the country; we are just talking any average American high school. She would be one of the unpopular cheerleaders. One that doesn't get a date to homecoming.

My Own Boring Life

After reading this New Yorker article about Roald Dahl, I have an overwhelmingly apathetic feeling about my own life: it just seems so boring. (and I do realize that the descriptions of Dahl's interesting life are somewhat tangential to the point of the article itself...I can't help that I latch onto whatever ties back to me).

I'm wondering now if I can cultivate eccentricity, even though I'm really lazy. I'm guessing the answer to that is no. Whining is so much easier than actually doing something.

Dismal, Black, Sooty Future

According to this WaPo article, sailboats have slipped from 2/3 to just 10% of the entire boat market since the 1990's, as more and more boaters switch to power boats. The switchers suggest that they defect not because they don't love sailing best, but for more practical reasons: it just takes less time to get someplace on a power boat and you actually know when you're going to arrive.

But since when was anything about boating practical? Sailing's not about the place you're going, it's about the getting there. Or so I thought. Anyway, I've been on a lot of power boats that break mid-stream.

The article did make me laugh, though, in how it described power boaters (gold-chained). And I appreciate the river distinctions - South River gets the power boaters while the Severn has sail. Let's hope it stays that way.

Making Me Sad

I am already way over Dave Eggers, and have been for some time now. But I'm still holding on to Nick Hornby and I just don't want to let go. Unfortunately, reading this article about the famous-writer-as-rock-critic pushes me one step closer to admitting that the Nick Hornby of High Fidelity and About a Boy is not the same Nick Hornby of Songbook. Or, it is the same guy, but distinctly McSweenified.

Just Seen Outside Target

A "lady" wearing a t-shirt that said "Sex Police K-9 Doggystyle Unit"...pushing her shirtless 1-year old son in a shopping cart.

Grooming the next generation of Cops stars...

Entourage

...is SUCH a good show. I sometimes can't get over how much I like it.

LHIOB.

Age and Experience

Over the past month or so, I've watched the movie Goonies a bunch of times (and now I see online that this year is the 20th anniversary of the movie's release, which explains why its been all over HBO). Aside from being a great movie, Goonies holds a special place in my heart because it was an crucial part of the Waskom family pirated video collection back in the day (other important additions include Better off Dead, Meatballs and Mr. Mom).

The first time I saw Goonies, I was probably 9 or 10. Right around the age of the younger kids in the movie. So of course I identified with them, and I thought the older girls (especially Andy, the redhead) were very, very cool.

Watching it recently, I expected to appreciate the movie in a whole new light. I'm older now and know more about both real estate developments and pirates, so I figured I'd experience the movie in a different context. Instead, I found myself sort of regressing. I still identified most with the kids, and I felt younger than the teenage characters (who are, in the movie, probably 15 years younger than I am in real life).

I've done the same thing with other movies, and with books, as well (Catcher in the Rye comes to mind - I guess I'll always feel younger than Holden Caufield.) Its a sort of strange phenomenon to me, that the first time I read or watched something is such a defining factor in the overall experience of that movie or book for me. More so, it seems, than the content.

Now, I wonder, if I'll be so conscious of how I'm watching old movies or reading old books, that I'll actually change the experience.

Kids Are Bad

Last night, Cooper and I watched Middle School Confessions, an HBO documentary about middle school aged kids the bad stuff they do. While some of it is to be expected - they steal their parents' pre-mixed margaritas and drink, stuff like that - I cannot deal with the way these kids talk about sex. I am positive that things were different when I was in middle school...and that was in the Madonna-fueled, post-Fast Times 80's.

Its a very well-done documentary and it is impressive how open some parents are with their children, but it definitely freaked me out.

Oh, and at the end, Samuel L. Jackson wraps things up for the viewers (completely sans profanity). Weirdest celebrity involvement ever? Yes, I think so.

Seen in Southwestern VA

Friday night, Cooper and I drove down to Roaring River, NC (not near anything) so he could pick up a bed for his new pickup/tow truck. The weather was good and, since we avoided 95 the whole way, the drive was really nice. It reminded me a lot of the drive down to Williamsburg and the happy feeling I used to get when I saw certain landmarks (Horne's at the corner of 301 and 17) - excited to either be getting back to school or going home.

I was disturbed by one, small thing I saw on the trip, though. We stopped for dinner in Roanoke (sorry, Erin - we were on a really tight schedule, and I didn't know we were driving past Lexington until that day, otherwise we would've stopped). At a gas station, I watched two teenage girls get some water out of a spigot attached to the station store. That's random enough in itself. What really bothers me, though, was that neither one of them was wearing shoes.

I blame Britney. I wish her influence could be curbed.

Appreciation

"Often great blessing and great sufferings abide within the same single life, and it was ever thus."

I have a difficult time wrapping my head around everything written in the post linked above (by The Anchoress, link from Althouse). But it certainly does remind me that I am unnecessarily dramatic much of the time, that I haven't exactly faced a ton of adversity and that my "self-analysis" is whinier than it is constructive. Good reminders, all.

Good (not great) Artists and the Origin of Modern Art and Art Criticism

"Braque, for all his extraordinary abilities, needed Cubism in order to enter the modern canon, as Pissarro needed Impressionism."

In this week's New Yorker, Peter Schjeldahl reviews the Cezanne and Pissarro exhibit at the MOMA, often comparing it to the Braques and Picasso exhibit of 1989-90 (which, though I couldn't of seen, since my first trip to NYC was in 1993, seems so familiar it's like I was there). His review is interesting, often referring to the talent gap between Cezanne and Pissarro...also mentioning how difficult it can be to look at Cezanne's work. And that modern art critic's long-standing approval for art that is unpopular with the public has roots in the art climate of 1860s France...the days of the Salon des Refuses and a public unwelcoming to the same artists that are so accepted today that they seem played out (Monet's Water Lilies coffee mug, anyone?).

Also on the KPC Blog

Sometimes I'm not sure where to put things...whether they're marketing-related or just interesting to me in general. This is one of those things.

Tony Blair's Labour government is looking to reality tv for policy ideas and initiatives, according to this Economist article. Go Tony, I guess.

I do love reading about my boy Jamie Oliver influencing changes in school lunch programs. He's so good.