Thu, September 30
Jeanne Update
I took a few days to experience hurricane hysteria, hurricane preparedness, and an actual hurricane itself. If you haven't tried it, you should. I can't recommend it highly enough. (Read more.)
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KHFK—10:01 AM
With the debates approaching, I have to say that my Kerry hate has mollified somewhat. Still, I can appreciate the sentiment expressed by Kerry Haters For Kerry – after all, I did at one point call for the man's assassination.
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Mr. 2000—9:29 AM
Beloved Braves manager Bobby Cox won his 2,000th game last night – fittingly, in the Braves' final home game of this season. I'm sorry I had to be in the air at the time, but I'm awfully proud of Bobby. He deserves it, and he's sure as hell earned it.
Cox reaches milestone with win [atlantabraves.com]
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Wed, September 29
Not dead—9:33 AM
Expect a full Jeanne update later this evening. Thanks for all your messages of concern!
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Wed, September 22
Islands of Fire
With 18 new competitors to meet, the opening episode of Survivor: Vanuatu feels less like adventure-based reality and more like class picture day. Still, even without much time to learn about each other, they quickly clique up and start alienating one another. (Read more.)
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Thanks, Yahoo! Maps!—12:18 PM
You know me. I had to consult Yahoo! Maps to get a direction for that last post about Britney because I never know which way is which in Santa Monica. (The whole town is on a slant! The ocean is to the southwest! It's freaky!)
Anyway, the spa is between Arizona and Santa Monica on fourth, so I entered "Arizona & 4th, 90401" and Yahoo! came back with this stern correction:
We assumed that you meant Arizona, instead of Arizona.
Thanks! I'll know better next time! Arizona it is! (I'm a little spot-shadow-happy since last night's Amazing Race – forgive me.)
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Near-Encounter with Fame, Glamour, Cheetos—12:00 PM
As has become absolutely necessary in this cruel, harsh workaday world, I visited the Burke Williams Day Spa in Santa Monica this weekend for my semi-regular appointment of Pure Relaxation Massage and fifteen or twenty minutes spent casually looking away from dangling middle-aged penises in the jacuzzi.
As I do, I parked at one of the nearby parking structures and walked southeastish on 4th street toward Santa Monica Blvd. Right before the corner, there's a door to a lobby with an elevator that takes you up to BW. Outside the door, on the sidewalk, I noticed a small bunch of people hanging around with various cameras and sound equipment. My first thought was "guerilla indie production" because of the boom mike and video camera, and the way everyone was acting just a little too casual. But as I got closer, I realized that there were way too many still cameras for that, and no talent. So I guessed they were probably paparazzi (didn't notice Sizemore, though). I resisted the urge to spit on them, and headed up the elevator.
I really didn't give it that much more thought, although I did glance around briefly at the check-in desk to see if Tom Cruise was checking out or something.
Lo and behold, today I find out how close I came! Apparently, BW staff had whisked Britney out the back door just before I got there. (I checked in at 3:18 pm)
Britney Spears: The Last Hours Of Singledom [Defamer]
Now that I know who it was, the number of photographers seems kind of small. I wonder how long those chumps waited around before they realized they'd been given the slip. Seems like a weird way to spend the day, waiting to shoot her picture in case she does something embarrassing. Although, these days I suppose the law of averages is on your side as far as something embarrassing happening.
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Mon, September 20
Relax. Yield. Relent.
With boardroom blow-ups, muddy meltdowns, and a broken ox, it's been a wild week in the reality realm. It's kind of a shame that reality programming is the scourge of television, because sometimes it's downright entertaining. (Read more.)
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Week Three
The Benefactor is every bit as pointless as you imagined, but – my stars! – LAX actually packs a modicum of style. Plus, get ready for week four: it's coming at us like a frickin' tidal wave. (Read more.)
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Sun, September 19
Emmys That Actually Matter—11:07 PM
Congratulations to Arrested Development for picking up the Best Comedy Series Emmy as well as the ones for directing and writing. All richly deserved. I still think Jason Bateman should've been nominated, but we'll get there. I'm just glad – for the sake of Fox's continued "support" – the show picked up some major wins. (I'm not doing the research, but I'm curious: how recently has a brand new show won Best Comedy Series? Did Frasier do it? Someone be a dear.)
For the same reason, I'm thrilled that The Daily Show picked up its second writing award in a row. Good for them. Hopefully it will encourage Comedy Central to keep them happy, and encourage Stewart, Colbert, et al, to stay with the show for many years to come.
I didn't watch much of the rest of the show – the little clips the comedy shows send in for Best Writing nominations are always a joy, and Shandling was alternately funny and morbidly Botoxed.
4 comments
Thu, September 16
Arksie on the Vine—12:20 PM
Devoted to our mission of keeping you alerted to any appearance by one of the Onebee Galaxy of Devoted Readers anyplace else on the web, we are delighted to bring you Arksie's excellent question for Sars (of Television Without Pity fame) at her advice column, The Vine – as well as Sars's nearly-excellent response.
You'll have to scroll down to find out which question is Arksie's: I'm not going to tell you, but I'll hint that it's not the one about being a bridesmaid.
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Wed, September 15
Today's List—9:57 AM
Top 2 Reasons to Cancel Your Subscription to "Entertainment Weekly":
- Angels in America: A-
- Jack & Bobby: A-
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Tue, September 14
"We know." "We know."
TAR finally unloads twin albatrosses Kami and Karli, who apparently have already asked their Magic 8-Ball whether they are going to lose. And, on The Apprentice, Raj carries the Phil Hartman Memorial Cane. Reality! (Read more.)
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Party Shuf Love—2:21 PM
If you don't already have iTunes, get with it! It features this thing called "Party Shuffle" which is sort of an advanced, weighted version of "shuffle" or "random play" for all the songs in your Music Library. (Kind of a misnomer, because Party Shuffle doesn't work with your iPod, which means you'd have to carry your computer to a party to actually use Party Shuf in a party environment.)
Anyway, as a result of Party Shuf, the following sequence of music just finished rocking my office:
"Lawyers, Guns, and Money" - Warren Zevon
"Ewok Celebration" - Return of the Jedi Score
That's about as random as you can get. I think it beats the time I was driving home from McThursday and the iPod in the car gave me "Gary, Indiana" from The Music Man, followed by a track from the Wyatt Earp score, then the theme to The $25,000 Pyramid, then "The Gambler" by Kenny Rogers.
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Mon, September 13
Week Two
This is probably one of the better weeks we're going to have for a while, what with Joey (an actual sitcom) and Neal McDonough (an actual actor). I'm with the LAX guy: "Shut it down! Shut it all down!" (Read more.)
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Save Betamax—4:13 PM
This link just arrived in my inbox from the Permanently Disco family: Save Betamax, wherein "Betamax" refers not to the largely ignored videocassette format but rather the "Betamax ruling" which allows us to have recording devices such as VCRs, iPods, and – dear God! – TiVos.
Most times we hear about "Congress is about to..." (whatever sensational thing) it's ridiculous hogwash. "Tax email!" or "Sell Oregon!" But, in the current RIAA/FCC/Valenti climate, with its irrational fear of pirates, I can see something like this getting through. So, follow the link.
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It's Kickin' In!—2:20 AM
We're getting there! Starting today you'll notice a new little sliver on this site's homepage, a bit of abject punnery called "Buzzworthy." Its focus is to bring new things to your attention that you might have otherwise missed. Sort of a "movers and shakers" section. Right now, that consists of Links Of Interest, new updates in our brand new FAQ section, and recent entries that you might have missed because you don't feel like scrolling all the way to the bottom of the homepage. (And God bless you if you don't – it's exhausting!)
The FAQ/Esoterica page lives in the About section of the site, which is where I'm currently focusing my overhauling powers, so a few more new things will pop up there very soon, and they'll find their way into the Buzzworthy box. The FAQ is based on the "wiki" metaphor – "wiki" is a nerdy way of saying it's a web page you can edit. So, everyone can contribute questions and everyone can collaborate on the answers. Sound fun? I hope so.
Once the other new features are up and running, I'm considering taking the entries out of the Buzzworthy list, since technically they are already listed elsewhere on the same page. I'm very open to your suggestions (pro or con) on that idea. Also, I thought it might make sense to do away with the "Your Comments" listing on the left of the homepage and list recent comments in Buzzworthy – since the whole point is that that's where you look to see what's changing and what's fresh. Again, your reactions to that idea are welcome.
Hope you like the new stuff! If not, let me know. If anything looks really weird or out of place, try refreshing your browser to load the new styles – if it still doesn't look right, email me. God knows I left plenty of room for bugs to creep in.
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Sun, September 12
Fixing the Election—10:54 AM
6 Ways to Reboot the System [Wired]
Six quick blurbs propose new ways of thinking about the democratic process – an institution sorely in need of an overhaul. The first three in particular are efficient, elegant, and well reasoned. Why isn't someone putting this into practice?
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Sat, September 11
Religion's Misguided Missiles—8:29 AM
This is always my required reading on today's date and I was reminded of it by Andrei's poster "How Terrorism Works" yesterday.
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Fri, September 10
Dear God! He's Talking About Design!
Depressed funk notwithstanding, it just might be time to move forward with a couple of onebee v. 1.0.1 improvements that have been simmering for a while. (Or, it might be time to curl up on the sofa and watch Trading Spaces off TiVo without moving for 48 hours.) (Read more.)
Interestingly put—5:43 PM
How Terrorism Works [Design By Fire]
(Ack! Design again!)
The "terror" in "terrorism" depends largely on publicity. If nobody finds out about your terrorist attack, then you haven't terrified anyone and advanced the awareness of your cause, you've just murdered some people. So, al Qaeda could not be successful in spreading terror without the assistance of the DHS, the White House, and the broadcast media.
Are these groups intentionally complicit? No, even I'm not going to say that. They each push terror for their own selfish reasons – but until we can responsibly filter their messages of terror and find a way to assimilate them into our lives without allowing ourselves to be controlled by fear... the terrorists will, quite literally, have won.
(Not that this is what Andrei's saying exactly. But his impressively spare graphical representation got me thinking.)
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Collateral in 25 words or more—10:45 AM
I missed going to see Collateral with lots of friends opening weekend because of a prior engagement, and as a result there was a better than average chance I would just see it on DVD. Fortunately Arksie (goaded on by the oppressive heat wave) volunteered to see it a second time, and be my chaperone. I'm super-glad he did.
I like Tom Cruise a lot, but I'm no fan of Michael Mann. The Insider I was sort of neither-here-nor-there on, Ali I didn't see, and Heat I hate like poison. I think mostly for the fact that I'm expected to be excited about Pacino and De Niro sharing the screen and I just don't think De Niro is that good. Also, there's a twenty-minute standoff on some airport runway at the end that just made me want to kill myself to get it overwith.
However, I really really liked Collateral. I thought Cruise was excellent (he nearly always is) and I forgot that Jamie Foxx was Jamie Foxx for most of the movie. (Which is key.) Also, Jada Pinkett Smith, who I like okay as a person but have not been impressed with on screen, not even particularly in The Matrix: Reloaded, was great. Mark Ruffalo and Peter Berg came out of nowhere and were cool. And I just adore Bruce McGill, who is great here. (Arksie has made the point that using Jason Statham for an early walk-on role is a stroke of casting genius, and he's dead-on right about that. This is the benefit of being a Michael Mann movie – people are willing to be in it even in small, microscopic parts, and that makes it more interesting. Hell, even a painstakingly uncredited Marc Maron shows up as a guy whose cell phone gets stolen from him.) Great cast. Amazing performances.
Particularly Cruise, who makes you actually end up rooting for the bad guy. (Not a spoiler: Cruise is the bad guy.) He's just great. And you start to think (or at least I did), "Hey, he's this precise and effective about what he does, even if it's illegal and immoral, he should just be allowed to practice his art." I never felt that way about Ralph Fiennes in Red Dragon.
And there's a fight scene in a nightclub which is quite possibly the most compelling and well crafted movie scene I've seen in years. Go enjoy Collateral, people. You'll be glad you did.
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Thu, September 9
EXACTLY!—9:16 AM
This anti-Manny Perry ad sums it up perfectly. Bonus points to the producers for employing an identical dopey freeze-frame-whoosh transition effect.
Who Watches Movies? [Loading Ready Run via Defamer]
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Wed, September 8
Ken Jennings Jeopardy! Spoiler—2:55 PM
I'm not spoiling it here (although I should; I hate that smug little falsely modest punk so much!), you'll have to click the link and see it. Don't ever say I don't love you. Anyway, follow the link below to learn an uncorroborated report of just how much longer we have to tolerate Ken "That Jeopardy! Guy" Jennings on Jeopardy! and how much he'll lug home with him when it's all over.
Some Ken Jennings News [Kottke.org]
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Campaign Links—11:28 AM
This is an interesting rundown of the presidential candidates from a new perspective: psychology. I like it because it mentions two things I've said myself: Kerry was pretty good on The Daily Show and George W. Bush is sometimes off balance in public appearances, not because he's unintelligent but because he's compensating. (I say, compensating for being a liar, BAGnews says compensating for a possible confidence problem.)
Hail to the Stiff [BAGnewsNotes]
Also, I heartily agree that The Daily Show was in rare form during the Republican Convention in New York. And certainly the best part of it was the mock George W. Bush biographical film, "Words Speak Louder Than Actions." If you missed it on The Daily Show, I recommend viewing it online here:
Read My Lips - Chapter 2 [BAGnewsNotes]
Along the same lines...
Being There [Slate]
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Tue, September 7
Week One
NBC takes an opportunity to dump a couple of its most success-proof shows on us early, so we'll forget about the heartache they cause and return to NBC with open arms when the new season of Law & Order starts. (Also, get a head start on what's premiering this week.) (Read more.)
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Darling Nikki
Last Comic Standing comes back with an adjusted format, and Amazing racers get tired and bitchy, and in some cases way too attached to their precious, pretty hair. (Read more.)
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The tabloids will set you free—5:07 PM
All Hail BenGar: Ben Affleck and Jennifer Garner Getting It On? [Defamer]
Frankly, I don't see why "Bennifer 2" is such a bad name for it. Not that BenGar isn't beautiful, just seems... overthought.
Meanwhile, Alias S3 is on DVD today, so I'm headed to Best Buy to complete my dust-gathering set, and come that much closer to total broken-TiVo-drive replacement!
Seagrave, out!
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I still can't wait to see it.—12:30 PM
I noticed the exact same things (except #5 and #9) this weekend while looking at the cover art for the Jersey Girl DVD. It's somewhere near the top of my Netflix list. I'll see it soon (not the box, of course; Netflix keeps those).
Deconstructing the Jersey Girl Video Box [Defamer]
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TiVo, Netflix Teaming Up—11:01 AM
If you could somehow work Pixar and Skittles into this, it would just about be the best thing ever. In the meantime, while it certainly won't affect me for years to come, I'm delighted that a new deal between TiVo and Netflix has caused confidence in both companies to surge, even if only slightly.
Tivo, Netflix Close to Internet Movie Deal - Report [Reuters/Yahoo]
Both have recently been facing a lot of speculation along the lines of "the first and best company to do something isn't always the one that's successful over the long term," with Blockbuster entering the Netflix domain (after the DVD market nearly ran it out of business) and pretty much everybody entering the TiVo market. I've been ever so delighted to see many, many hip-looking TiVo ads in magazines lately, touting such TiVo-only features as WishLists and Season Passes. I hope the world will understand that paying a tiny bit more for quality is worth it, but typically they don't. Anyway, my TiVo stock is up 16%!
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Mon, September 6
Zumanity
Zumanity is an interesting look at sexuality through the prism of Cirque du Soleil. It's fun, but sadly it skimps a little on the sexuality and a little on the Cirque du Soleil as well. (Read more.)
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Sat, September 4
Greetings from Oahu!—5:36 PM
No September entry yet. That was just starting to bug me. I doodled this while I was watching Letterman today and I thought you'd enjoy it.
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