baggypantsandbravado

2010-04-22T23:57:00.001-04:00

Flat Stanley in Los Angeles

My cousin Eli is seven. His class is doing a "Flat Stanley" project. You can click that link for info, but the gist is this: Flat Stanley is a paper doll that kids send around the world. People take photos of him next to local landmarks and then send them back to the kids so they can learn about other places.

So Eli sent his Stanley to us and we had a great time taking him around LA. Here's the video I made about that.

2010-03-17T17:21:00.001-04:00

Limericks for St. Patrick's Day

Only two this year. So far. Maybe I'll add more. Trying to finish a new script this week.

Said a snorkeling fellow named Massa
“Sure, I fondled some dudes on the ass. A
Little groping of ends
Is good fun among friends.
And rarely leads pols to disassa.”

Die hard liberal Dennis Kucinich
Swore to bring about health reform’s finish,
Saying “This bill is hooey!”
But he’s just banged a uey
To Dems’ Popeye, will he prove the spinach?

2010-02-14T17:47:00.000-05:00

Because …

… once, when frustrated with something Fenway was doing, she said “I’m gonna punch that cat.”

… before we actually got our Wii, it was a frequent weekend activity for us to go to Best Buy and play Beatles Rock Band for free

… she is scheming with other women in my life, who will remain nameless, to get me to grow “star-burns” like the character on “Community”

… she has recently realized how truly and dearly she loves comedic wordplay

… she frequently yells at Democrats in Congress to “Get some ovaries,” which is her equivalent of “sack up!”

… she ran two half marathons and a 10K last fall, and she absolutely hates running

… she is a Harvard graduate who still doesn’t seem to understand the difference between single-camera TV shows and muti-cam shows, no matter how many times I explain it to her

… she loves HGTV even though, I’m convinced, every single show is exactly the same

But especially because …

This summer, we are having twins!

Yep, no joke, people. It’s true. Our due date is late July, but twins often come early. We knew our lives were going to change when we got pregnant, but, well, I guess we decided not to kick and we’re going for the two-baby conversion.

For this reason, I have begun a new video blog here – http://twindadblog.blogspot.com/

Don’t worry, I’ll still use this blog for non-baby-related stuff. But please do visit http://twindadblog.blogspot.com/ for all your multiple-birth-related frivolity needs.

2010-01-31T13:53:00.001-05:00

Wow! I haven't posted anything all decade! Time to write ... something about the last decade ...

Things We Actually Said in the '00s

Dane Cook is so funny!

I’m not a doctor, why would I ever need a cell phone?

It’s so much faster to look up a number in the Yellow Pages than online!

George W. Bush is a uniter, not a divider!

There’s no way Tina Fey’s backstage-at-SNL show will do better than Aaron Sorkin’s backstage-at-SNL show!

I’m a grown man, why would I ever listen to Justin Timberlake?

iPods cost that much and they don’t even come with music already on them? No way am I buying one of those!

Lindsay Lohan is going to be such a huge star!

Zach Braff is the next big thing!

We’ll be welcomed as liberators!

I’m a little surprised I qualified for this mortgage, but, sure, I’ll sign. Why not?

2009-12-31T00:55:00.002-05:00

The Best of the Zips

Hope everyone had a good holiday. Mine was pleasantly low key and is winding down now, quite nicely. Now that we have a Wii, I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised how Mario-intensive the gifts I received tended to trend. But opening Nintendo product after Nintendo product on Christmas morning, I couldn’t help but think “Wow, is it 1987 again?”

Anyway, we are now in the last gasps of this decade. If I’d had this blog ten years ago, I would have been compiling lengthy Best of the 90s lists of movies, TV, and music. As it was, I was definitely buying any magazine that promised such a list. And I would have been shocked if you told me that in 2009 I would have had very little interest in doing the same for the ’00s.

But I don’t. For one reason, this was a truly shitty decade. Not so much in culture – in fact, despite the over-corporatization of everything, this was a pretty good decade for entertainment, especially TV (I don’t care for Reality TV, but its creation did tend to leave only higher-quality scripted material on the air. Sure, we had however many seasons of “According to Jim” but in the 80s there were a dozen sitcoms of that quality that ran for years). But otherwise, this decade will be remembered for fear, war, and division. I’m rather glad to see it go.

(Personally, this decade was very nice, what with the whole “getting married and traveling around the world” thing, but this blog isn’t about me … oh, wait, no, it’s entirely about me … well, anyway … )

The other reason I’m not so much into the lists is I am aware now how little I know. I have genuinely no idea how good or bad most art is. Yes, sometimes it’s obvious, but often it is not. I won’t doubt you if you tell me Syriana or The Constant Gardner were great movies. But they both bored the bejesus out of me. And this is the thing, people constantly confuse “I like this” with “this is good” and, the opposite, “I hate this” with “this is bad.” We all like things that are objectively bad, and we all dislike things that are objectively good.

So these lists are not of the best TV and movies of this decade. They are My Favorites. I think I have decent taste but this is not about quality, this is about the pleasure I received.

MOVIES

When a movie works, you should walk out feeling like you’ve truly EXPERIENCED something. So this is the list of movies I saw between 2000 and 2009 that really made me feel like I had had an experience, been on a journey, been given a new way of thinking.

The Lord of the Rings Trilogy
Knocked Up
Finding Nemo
Anchorman
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
Borat
Ocean’s 11

Yeah, that’s pretty much it. There were other movies I liked a lot or admired as works of art or craftsmanship, but I think this list consists of the only ones that really transported me. Oh, believe me, these are all flawed movies, but they all grabbed me in ways that no other movies this decade did. Most are just entertainment, and the comedies don’t aspire to artistic heights (except possibly the satire of Borat), but when you buy a ticket, you want a ride, and these movies took me for a ride unlike any other.

Underrated comedies: School of Rock, Love Actually

Underrated sequel: Mission Impossible III

TV

What TV shows qualify as being “Of the 2000s”? It’s a judgment call. “Friends” was clearly a 90s show, even though nearly half of its episodes aired in the 2000s. On the other hand “West Wing” premiered in 1999, but it’s definitely a 2000s show. I saw one list that included “Modern Family” as one of the best shows of the decade. Um … no. Sorry. Let’s try again in 2019.

My Favorites

The West Wing
The Office (British and American, both)
30 Rock
The Daily Show
Lost
Arrested Development
Buffy the Vampire Slayer

(“Buffy” is probably really a 90s show, and certainly its best seasons were in the 90s, but I didn’t start watching it until late 1999 and caught up on reruns in 2001 … also, it might not actually have been good enough to make this list. I’m not sure.)

Second Tier

Curb Your Enthusiasm
Alias
Firefly
How I Met Your Mother

Shows I Have Not Seen Much of but Would Probably Like

Battlestar Galactica
The Sopranos
Friday Night Lights

Shows I Am Sure Are Great, but I Have No Desire to Watch

The Wire
Breaking Bad
The Shield

Good First Seasons, Then a Major Drop-Off

Desperate Housewives
Heroes
24

(“24” had good seasons after its first one, but never AS good, and the lows were REALLY low)

Top Five Seasons of “Saturday Night Live” During the ’00s
1) 2001-2002
2) 2000-2001
3) 2007-2008
4) 2008-2009
5) 2006-2007

OTHER STUFF

No, I won’t discuss music or books because I don’t know enough to begin discussing them.

Favorite Inventions of the 2000s: iPods, Facebook, Nintendo Wii, hybrid cars, Coke Zero, Scarlett Johannson

Favorite Harry Potter Book of the 2000s: Deathly Hallows

Favorite Musical of the 2000s: AVENUE Q

Favorite Sports Moment of the 2000s: The Red Sox 2004 postseason … as if I had to tell you that

Favorite Actors of the 2000s: Phillip Seymour Hoffman, Paul Giamatti, Jenna Fischer

Favorite Comedians of the Decade: Mitch Hedberg, Mike Birbiglia, Patton Oswalt, Eugene Mirman

Man of the Decade: Jon Stewart

Woman of the Decade: Tina Fey

That’s all folks! See you in the Teens!

2009-12-24T09:15:00.003-05:00

Merry MixMas

I haven’t written anything about the holidays yet. This is partly because, as we’ve established, my blogging has grown tepid and infrequent, as so many things do in this life. But also because I’ve been rather busy with holiday matters and with a new job.

The job is pretty dreadful and not worth discussing. The holiday things are much nicer. Abe and Jocelyn left New York a month or so ago to move to LA. They’re living with us for a while, while they look for a place of their own. Just this morning, I drove them to the airport to catch a flight back to Mass.

No, Amanda and I are not going east this year. The money wasn’t quite there. Instead, Doyne has come out to spend Christmas with us, which is very nice. We have a real tree this year and it’s all very jolly. Of course, Amanda and I are both working on Christmas Eve. I’m fairly certain I have never, in my life, done this.
But, anyway, all is cozy and merry. So I want to talk about Christmas music. I know. I do this every year. But this time I just want to run down a mix CD I made of Holiday songs. This is not the be-all and end-all of songs I like at this time of year (I can’t believe I forgot The Kinks’ “Father Christmas”) but I think it’s a nice mix.

“Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas” by Judy Garland – I also like the more upbeat Sinatra version, but I give a slight edge to the gloomier, more wistful original. I’ve said this before, but the thing I love about Garland is how she manages to live every ounce of emotion in a song. You really feel like it’s happening TO HER at the exact moment she’s singing it. And I am secure enough in my sexuality to say that.

“Papa Noel” by Brenda Lee – I still can’t understand all the lyrics to this Cajuny, bouncy Christmas song, but I’ve loved it for years. Longtime readers may recall my difficult quest to find it a few Christmases back, since, as I said, I can’t understand 85 percent of the words, and I didn’t know the title, it was hard to search for. I eventually did find it and friend of the blog Fred Hembeck was good enough to send me a copy of Rhino’s Cool Yule CD, off of which I had originally heard it. I used to love to sing nonsense lyrics along to this. I usually can refrain from doing this, if there’s anyone else in the car.

“Snow Miser and Heat Miser” – I found both songs mushed into one MP3. These are the best part of the otherwise lackluster Rankin and Bass special “The Year Without a Santa Claus.” The Miser brothers each control their respective types of weather and sing mirror-image songs to introduce themselves. Snow has the better song, since the guy doing the Heat Miser voice seems exhausted and bored to be there. Also, while it gets points for the internal rhyme on “I’m Mr. Heat Blister” it loses all of them for rhyming “degrees” with “degrees.” I found a few covers on iTunes which were lively, but I prefer the original. I think R&B made a sequel special just about the Miser Brothers this year or last. I did not watch it.

“Linus and Lucy” by the Vince Guaraldi Trio – Only tenuously a Christmas song, but the dueling piano bass line and treble line from Guaraldi’s score to “A Charlie Brown Christmas” certainly gets played on the radio this time of year a lot. I assume I don’t have to tell you how awesome it is.

“Another Christmas Song” by Stephen Colbert – This was the opening song to that special he did last year for Comedy Central, which, for some reason, is not being run ad nauseum this year. Very clever lyrics (“Santa Claus singing on naughty snow/Reindeer ringing in the mistletoe/The manger’s on fire, the holly’s aglow/Hear the Baby Jesus crying ‘ho ho ho’”) performed extremely well by Colbert. Man, that dude is talented. Did you see the episode with his duet with Alicia Keyes on his version of “Empire State of Mind” about living in the suburbs? While still being, without a doubt, a white, white man, he NAILED some very tricky tongue-twister lyrics. This is a man who deserves every ounce of success he has.

“We Need a Little Christmas” by Angela Lansbury and the Cast of MAME – Yeah, again, I went with the original, rather than the more usual radio version. I’ve never seen MAME, the musical, though I know some of the songs, and I worked on a production of AUNTIE MAME, the non-musical adaptation of the same book, once. Some of the lyrics are more show-specific than the pop version, and one couplet is delivered in a faux-Asian accent by Mame’s Japanese butler (presumably played by a white guy in yellowface … squirm …). I’m still not sure what he rhymes with “bayberry” but I’m really worried it’s “slavery.” It also amuses me that Patrick is shocked that Mame wants to put up Christmas decorations even though it’s “One week past Thanksgiving Day.” Maybe that was too early in the Depression, or in the 60s when the musical was on Broadway, but, wow, that’s like the height of the season now. Still no sign of “I Need a Little Chanukah” by Lauren Mayer. It’s not on iTunes, or anywhere else online. (Note: research shows that Ito sings “It’s been a long time since I felt good neighbor-y” to rhyme with bayberry. It’s probably still racist, somehow)

“The Christmas Wish” by Kermit the Frog – This is from the John Denver and the Muppets special and … it’s really great. Quiet and beautiful and earnest, it simultaneously captures nearly everything I love about Christmas and about Kermit in one song. I don’t think I’ve often mentioned by screenplay The Christmas Guy (formerly known as Merry Little Christmas and, before that, We Wish You a Merry Christmas … who knows what it will be called by this time next year), but this song figures prominently in it. I would like to get that movie made just to make this song more popular, in hopes that it might replace that god-awful Faith Hill “Where Are You Christmas?” song from the even-more-god-awful Jim Carrey Grinch movie on holiday radio.

“Dominic the Donkey” by Lou Monte – iTunes thinks this recording of this song is spelled “Domenick the Donkey” but that cannot possibly be right. I have never heard this song played outside of Boston, where, I assume, everyone in the North End just camps out by their phone, speed dialing radio stations and shouting “Play ‘Dominic’!” but I quite like this silly kids song about the Italian Christmas Donkey. Those nutty Italians.

“Christmas Is My Time of Year” by the Monkees – I kind of regret putting this one on the mix. It’s not terribly, but it’s pretty forgettable. The early December I spent driving around the Hudson Valley with Alison and Eevin, we had Cool Yule Volume 2 and a Monkees greatest hits tape in constant rotation, so I thought I would love to hear this song over and over. Cute enough, I suppose, but probably not mixworthy.

“God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen” by the Roches – I wasn’t sure if I was going to include any carols on this mix, but I asked Abe what to include and he suggested this. I don’t think he actually gave it that much thought before answering, but, anyway, I included it. You have to love the Roches’ harmonies and you have to love a carol that mentions Satan in the first verse, so … what’s not to love?

Sorry, no video

“Christmas Wrapping” by the Waitresses – Another song I heard fairly often on the East Coast, but never out here, except for one time in a semi-hip store. I think this is a much better song than their only other hit “I Know What Boys Like” and captures a nice 20something Christmas-in-the-city vibe.

“Snoopy’s Christmas” by the Royal Guardsmen– Simply one of the all-time greats. I may have heard this enough times that I don’t get choked up when the Baron says “Merry Christmas, mein friend!” any more, but I still love this. I wonder what kind of deal these guys had to work out with Schulz about this song. My guess is … none … they assumed it was fair use and Schulz took it as free advertising. Try getting that past the Schulz estate these days. (A little research shows there was a lawsuit over the original “Snoopy vs the Red Baron” song, but Schulz permitted the group to do several follow-up songs)

“Santa Claus is Coming to Town” by Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Brand – I’ve written about this before, but, back in the 80s, the Children’s Theatre that spun off from Summer Theatre, would do a play about Santa and the Elves and every year my uncle Brian played Zip the Elf who did a lip-synch routine to this song at the end of the show. It was pretty much the most awesome thing ever, especially Santa synching to the Clarence Clemons part.

“Little Saint Nick” by Dr. Teeth and the Electric Mayhem Band – I won’t say this is better than the Beach Boys’ original, but it is really fun to hear this sung by Janis, Floyd, Dr. Teeth and, of course, Animal shouting “Run, run reindeer!”

(Couldn’t find video)

“All I Want for Christmas Is You” by Olivia Olsen – I like this song. I love the scene in Love Actually that uses it, and this is that recording. But when I heard Amanda tell me that many of her coworkers consider the Mariah Carey original their favorite Christmas song, it made me want to punch somebody.

“Even a Miracle Needs a Hand” by Joel Gray – This is from the hand-drawn Rankin-Bass “The Night Before Christmas” which is, in many ways, incredibly awful. If you don’t know or recall it, basically a town hears that Santa isn’t coming because somebody wrote an editorial in the local paper saying there’s no Santa. It turns out it was a nerdy adolescent scientist mouse (humans go about their life in this town apparently unaware that the mice living in their houses wear clothes and write letters to the editor). To prove they don’t all think this way, the town builds a giant clock to play music for Santa as he flies overhead. The mouse tries to figure out how it works and breaks it so everyone has to fix it at the last minute. Plot is lousy enough, but the way it’s set up with all the lovable characters versus this loathsome mouse who ruins Christmas for everyone by DARING to question faith and address the world with logic, rationality, and scientific curiosity truly makes it despicable. There’s even a song called “Let Up A Little On the Wonder Why,” that’s all about that. Still, this song is kind of nice.

“Mr. Grinch” by Thurl Ravenscroft – I assume there is no argument on this – this is a truly glorious song, from the lyrics (“You nauseate me, Mr. Grinch/With a nauseous super naus/You’re a crooked jerky jockey and you drive a crooked hoss/Mr. Grinch/You’re a three-decker sauerkraut and toadstool sandwich, with arsenic sauce”) to Thurl Ravenscroft, who has the coolest name and the coolest voice ever.

“The Christmas Song (Chestnuts Roasting On an Open Fire)” by Nat King Cole – I’m repeating myself, but this is the only classic Christmas song I can think of (pretentious title aside) that has one iconic recording that cannot be improved upon. Cole’s voice is so warm and smooth, it’s like he’s the fire you’re sitting beside and the cocoa you’re drinking and the Snuggie you’re wearing all rolled into one. I’m not saying other people can’t do a nice job with this song, but it’s impossible to improve upon it. I heard one of Natalie Cole’s “duets” with her father on this the other day, and it severely damaged the mood of the song. Now, you might ask “What about Bing Crosby’s ‘White Christmas’? Isn’t that also an unimprovable classic?” Well … not quite, no. Yeah, it’s great, but I’ve heard other versions and reinterpretations that I really enjoyed. I’ve never heard another recording of “Chestnuts Roasting” that made me say “I’m glad I heard that instead of Nat King Cole.”

“Mele Kalikimaka” by Jimmy Buffett – Probably not the best recording of this song, but I can’t think of one truly iconic one, so why not Jimmy? It actually is cold-ish in LA this week, so I can’t say this song describes my experience of the holiday, but it is nice to have ONE song that reflects the fact that actually snowfall and sleighrides at Christmas are pretty rare for much of the country.

“(I Want a) Rock and Roll Guitar” by Johnny Preston – What a great, ridiculous song. The actual song parts you can take or leave it’s the spoken semi-verse narratives that are so great, filled as they are with faux 50s hepcat slang: “You want a six-gun like the Lone Ranger has, so you can run around saying ‘Hi-yo Silver’ ‘Kemosabe’ and all that cowboy jazz!” “I don’t want no plane or no train, that ain’t the lick for me!” This was the other truly memorable track from Cool Yule Volume 2 that Alison and Eevin and I never got sick of.

“Christmas Is All Around” by Billy Mack (as played by Bill Nighy) – I am wholly unapologetic about my love for Love Actually, which, with very few provisos, is just about a perfect movie. I really think Nighy should have been nominated for best supporting actor for playing Billy Mack. It’s a note-perfect performance. And the song is so wonderfully, simultaneously great and awful.

“We Wish You a Merry Christmas” by Weezer – iTunes had a free holiday music sampler, which is where I got this and the Colbert song. There’s nothing particular special or groundbreaking about this rock version of the carol, but Weezer is a cool band and it’s a nice way to end the mix.

If I don’t write again before the big day, Happy Holidays all!

2009-12-10T17:13:00.002-05:00

Spices That Could Also Be the Name of Characters in the Lost Shakespearean Comedy “Seasons Out of Season” and the Roles They Would Play in the Story

Tarragon

King of Tamarind, a tiny kingdom in Bohemia. He is plagued by two problems, potential war with neighboring kingdom, Calamus, and the thieves that live in the Forest of Cardamom, very close to the royal palace. To solve the first problem, he has arranged a marriage between his son, Coriander, and Cassia, Princess of Calamus. To solve the second, he has sent his lead constables, Basil and Chervil, to arrest the King of Thieves.

Coriander

Dashing prince, betrothed to Cassia, wealthy princess from another land. To escape this unwanted match, he escapes into the Forest of Cardamom.

Cassia

Betrothed to Coriander, she ventures into the forest to find him. To protect herself, she goes disguised as “Annatto,” a young boy.

Oregano

Cassia’s clownish servant who joins her on her quest into the forest. He encounters Cilantro, King of Thieves, who looks exactly like Coriander. Assuming Cilantro is Coriander, in a fit of madness due to a Forest Fairy’s curse, he plays along with Cilantro’s assertion that he is King of Thieves, and doesn’t recognize him.

Cilantro

Coriander’s identical twin brother. Abandoned in the forest as a newborn, to avoid future questions about the line of succession. Raised by bandits he grew to become the King of Thieves within the forest. He meets Cassia who assumes he is Coriander, but chooses to maintain her “Annatto” disguise to see how deep his “madness” is. She claims to want to join his band of thieves and he offers to train her. During this training he finds he has odd feelings for this young boy.

Salt

Ancient servant to the King who abandoned baby Cilantro in the forest twenty five years earlier. He is sent to look for the missing Coriander but soon runs afoul of Forest Fairies.

Elderflower

Leader of the Forest Fairies. When Salt accidentally interrupts him and other fairies at play, they conspire to bedevil him.

Fennel and Chicory

Two thieves in the employ of Cilantro. They come to a scheduled meeting expecting to find Cilantro, but encounter Coriander instead. Assuming him to be their leader, they greet him convivially. The startled Coriander plays along with these “madmen” and pretends to be Cilantro.

Basil and Chervil

Constables sent into the forest to arrest Cilantro. They see the interaction between Coriander, Fennel and Chicory and assume Coriander is Cilantro. They arrest him and bring him to the cottage of Rosemary.

Rosemary

Earthy forest widow who provides a safehouse for Basil and Chervil’s incompetent questioning of Coriander. Coriander convinces them that his Band of Thieves is probably plotting a rescue and they should stand guard, leaving him alone in the house with Rosemary’s attractive daughter, Tansy.

Tansy

Beautiful daughter of Rosemary who falls quickly in love with Coriander. She sets him free and they slip off.

Nut Meg

A sort of Den Mother to the Thieves. Fennel and Chicory tell her that Cilantro has been arrested. They plan a rescue, drafting the real Cilantro, who is in disguise to teach “Annatto” that art form, to help them. Cilantro is amused that his underlings think he’s been arrested. Cilantro, Chicory, Fennel, Nut Meg, Oregano and the still-disguised Cassia invade the house only to find the confused Basil and Chervil.

Lovage

Forest Friar to whom Coriander and Tansy run to get married. After they are wed, they return to Rosemary’s house to tell Tansy’s mother, only to find most of the rest of the cast, very confused. Basil and Chervil arrest Coriander again, but Cassia, who unmasks herself, is baffled by how there can be two Corianders in one room. Cilantro also unmasks and reveals himself to be the true King of Thieves.

Jasmine, Marjoram and Turmeric

Three Forest Fairies put in charge of bedeviling Salt eventually drive him to Rosemary’s cottage where, convinced his experiences have been divine punishments, he confesses that he abandoned Cilantro in the woods as a baby. Cilantro and Coriander greet each other as brothers and Coriander demands that Basil and Chervil not arrest either him or his brother. He also tells Cassia that he now cannot marry her because he is married to Tansy. Cassia confesses that she does not want to marry him anymore, because she is in love with Cilantro. Cilantro reciprocates this love. King Tarragon arrives for no adequately explained reason and blesses both unions, provided that Cilantro will give up his life of thieving and become Crown Prince. Coriander is happy to give up his position to live a quiet forest life with Tansy. War is averted. Oregano is paired, somewhat randomly, with Nut Meg. The Forest Thieves disband and Elderflower and the Fairies wish all the mortals well.

2009-11-28T23:50:00.007-05:00

Marathon Woman

I have not forgotten that I have a blog!

I've just been getting out most of my Internet thinking through Twitter. Plus I'm spending a lot of time in my secret identity. Some of you know what that is. The rest, I will happily tell you if you ask.

But I do feel REALLY bad for doing my traditional Amanda Picture Post on her birthday. Well, better late than never I suppose. I don't have the full 31 I'm afraid, for two reasons. 1) compared to last year, with the whole "trip around the world" thing, 2009 has been rather dull, and we haven't taken as many photos. 2) When we were robbed a few months back and they took Amanda's laptop, all the photos on it went away, too.

But Amanda has done some really cool stuff in the past few months. These include two half-marathons, and our trip back to New York for my cousin Jess's wedding.

And now, the photos:

THE DISNEYLAND HALF-MARATHON

Yes, it's a 13+ mile race that goes through Disneyland, Anaheim Stadium and other parts of Anaheim. Amanda's time was 2:10, which was ahead of the average pace, and she probably would have done a little better if there weren't such a bottleneck at the start of the race.

I don't have any photos from inside the park because, well, we weren't allowed in to take them. But Amanda was indeed cheered on by costumed characters. Hey, why not?

NEW YORK AND THE WEDDING OF JESS AND SHANE

In October, we flew back to NYC, first time there in nearly two years. Very nice to get a little autumn. We don't have that in LA. The only seasons are Pilot Season, Summer Blockbuster Season, TV Premiere Season, and Awards Season.

No actual pics of Jess and Shane here, btw. This is supposed to be about Amanda. Sorry, guys.

Obligatory trip back to Alice's Teacup.

And then, the wedding

But the morning of the wedding, of course, Amanda ran a 10K in Prospect Park. Part of Nike's "Human Race."

Then, just a couple of weeks ago ...

THE MALIBU HALF MARATHON

Yeah, I was starting to worry about her sanity at this point.

Luckily Amanda doesn't need to do any more of this fresh air and exercise bullshit, because now we have a Nintendo Wii. Why ever leave the house?

I love, you, Amanda. Happy belated birthday! I'm excited to be with you for the long run.

2009-10-08T13:15:00.005-04:00

RAPUNZEL at Makeshift

Hey all. So the gang at Makeshift is doing my RAPUNZEL script this month. Here's the info:

RAPUNZEL
written by Noah Smith

There's more to Rapunzel than just her long, long, hair! Locked in a high tower as a baby, she grew up, raised by Gothel, the witch, and her parents who talked to her from the ground. Rapunzel's father, fancying himself a scholar, taught her how all the planets revolve around a flat earth, and her mother, who thought herself wise in the ways of the world, taught Rapunzel never to have an opinion of her own. One day a goofy prince rides in on stick horse and vows to free her. But here's where the traditional story changes. Our heroine frees herself and learns how to survive on her own by becoming a hairdresser and getting her own apartment. She returns to tell them all that she will make her own decisions now. And as for a "happily ever after," let's just say perhaps the ending is more of a beginning!

Tickets are $10 for adults and $8 for children. Come see
us at the following locations:
The NextDoor
Theatre Winchester, MAOct: 10 @ 10 am & 2 pmOct: 11 @ 2 pm
The Regent TheatreArlington, MAOct:
17 @ 10:30

They're using the weird give-away-the-whole-plot summary from my publisher here. Kinda wish they weren't but I'm THRILLED they're doing this show. If you're in the Boston area, please consider checking it out.

I really love their poster. Here it is twice for their two venues.

The promotional photos look very nice, too.

2009-09-18T11:18:00.002-04:00

Just found this short "review" of my JEKYLL AND HYDE script on a Jekyll and Hyde fan page. I love the last phrase.

The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde Host: Playscripts Inc.A partial preview of an adapted play by Noah Smith. Comments: Another interesting take on the story. It really brings in the characters of Enfield and Lanyon more than the others, and really uses them as characters in the plot, and it also has more prostitutes.

2009-09-17T16:37:00.002-04:00

Thoughts from the Paley Center

Amanda and I attended a few “parties” thrown by the Paley Center last week and this. These were small events thrown by Paley and TV Guide where each network had a night to trot out their new shows, do a panel about them and then screen them for the audience. Open to the public but very small scale and not highly publicized.

The Paley Center is a nice building in Beverly Hills, formerly known as the Museum of Television and Radio. Its walls are really quite stark, with some great framed Hirschfeld caricatures and a few illustrations from a recent Hanna-Barbera event being the only decorations. Fun fact – it seems the Legion of Doom from “Challenge of the Superfriends” was, at one point, going to include The Joker, Catwoman (seems redundant to have her AND Cheetah …), and Sivana instead of Braniac, Riddler, Giganta, Toyman and Bizarro. Also, Sivana was all-chalk white, like he was a ghost or something.

The real “musem” aspect is the video library, I guess, which I suppose you can call up on the computers they have everywhere. But we have never done that.

Anyway, at these events you come in, you can watch celebrities pose for photos and do quickie interviews. Some people clamored for autographs, but that’s never really been my scene. Not because I’m too cool or anything, just because I can never keep anything in decent condition, so collecting pieces of paper is unwise.

Free drinks and hors d’oeuvres are served by aspiring actors trying desperately to charm you in case you might be in the business (look at my shoes, kids, there’s no way anyone making Hollywood money would wear these). Then you find a place to watch, either in the library, on the roof, or down in the lounge. Before the evening starts, you watch an endless loop of stars of new shows talking about them. At one point the guy who plays Finn on “Glee” says the show is like “’Gossip Girl’ meets ‘Magnum: PI’” … if he was joking, that’s pretty funny. If not, I seriously question his sanity.

Here’s a rundown on what I saw

NBC
The first night it was just me, because Amanda had to work, and I was actually in a rush because I had another thing to go to and the garage I’d parked was closing early. So I only saw the first half of “Community” before leaving. It’s quite good, as you’ve heard. Joel McHale does have an uncanny ability to be endearing and likable while playing a total sleaze. This stands him in good stead on “The Soup” where he manages not to seem mean while mocking stupid people being taking advantage of on television and it works here. Supporting cast is solid, too. I don’t know if they did a panel after the screening but McHale, Chevy Chase and the other actors I didn’t recognize were all there.

CBS
We got stuck on the roof for this one, which is beautiful, but was a little cold and didn’t really offer good seating. The panel was for “Medium” a show I’ve always liked just fine, but, well … find me one person who would call it their favorite show.

Well, apparently it was the favorite show of the moderator, who fawned rather a lot over the cast and creator. He also pointed out the real Alison Dubois in the audience, who is a “real psychic” who works with the Phoenix police department. Of course, to me, this meant he was introducing a shameless liar who pollutes the criminal justice system and steals money from taxpayers and it reminded me that this show glorifies this woman who should probably be in jail or a mental institution. But, hey, that’s just me.

Still, the cast and creators were pleasant enough and the child actors were engaging without being cloying, but the panel was way too long.

“Medium” of course, is not a new show, just new to CBS and the episode they showed was no big change from before. Apparently they have abandoned the plotline featuring my old high school friend Ebon Moss-Bachrach, so … well, that sucks.

Next was “NCIS: Los Angeles” and … wow … Okay, I have never seen an episode of regular “NCIS” nor of “JAG” off from which it was spun. But, well, let’s just imagine writers for “The Simpsons” or The Onion or somewhere like that were trying to come up with an absurd cast for a cop show. Could they create anything better than Chris O’Donnell, LL Cool J, and Linda Hunt?

That’s right LINDA HUNT! She, of course, plays the hard-edged boss of the NCIS: LA squad and they just love putting her in scenes with LL Cool J, because she is small enough to use one of his absurdly tight t-shirts as a house.

O’Donnell’s character, by the way was raised in an orphanage and only goes by “G” because “nobody ever told” him his full first name.

Is satire dead or just obsolete?

So, yeah, the show is ridiculous, including the bizarre headquarters of the team which seems to be a high-tech fortress built on top of an open-air Anthropolgie store full of wicker and Persian rugs, where it is apparently always just before sunset.

I’m sure the show will be a big hit and I want to offer some suggestions for future spin-offs:

NCIS: Houston – Judd Nelson and Gerardo are the leads and their tough-as-nails supervisor is played by Alf. Nelson’s backstory is that he was found washed up on the shore as a baby, wrapped in seaweed and has webbed toes.

NCIS: Seattle – Elizabeth Berkely and the Iron Sheik are the leads and their tough-as-nails supervisor is old footage of Charlie Chaplin, spliced in with Judy Dench’s voice. Berkely’s backstory is that she was abducted by aliens as a child and forced to appear in a teen Saturday-morning sitcom.

NCIS: Guam – James Van Der Beek and the Fat Boys are the leads and their tough-as-nails supervisor is played by an orange with googly eyes. Van Der Beek’s backstory is that he is actually a hyper-evolved osprey developed in a lab by NASA but only his “father” Sammo Hung knows the truth.

Anyway …

“The Good Wife” is quite good, with Julianna Margulies as the ex-wife of a cheating, now-imprisoned politician (Chris Noth), putting her life together as a defense attorney Great cast, fairly smart pilot script. This might be the feminist legal show that “Ally McBeal” tried and failed to be.

ABC

Got there early enough to get library seats. Go us.

This one had a massive panel representing four different shows. Each one got limited time and “Flash Forward” seemed a little out of place surrounded by three family sitcoms. But it was kind of cool to see David Goyer (who cowrote the recent Batman movies) Sonya Walger, Busy Philipps (I missed “Freaks and Geeks” when it was on, but I’m watching it now and I’m not sure if I love her, hate her, or love to hate her), Patricia Heaton (who is a first-ballot-inductee into the Hall of Fame for actors whose plastic surgery didn’t make them look like freaks – she looks fantastic), Julie Bowen, and Ty Burrell interacting – Heaton seemed fascinated and baffled by the premiise of “Flash Forward.” Nothing terribly interesting revealed in the panel, though.

“Hank” – No cast or creator representative for this show, and no wonder why. It’s terrible. This is the one with Kelsey Grammer as a New York executive laid low by the recession who has to move back to Virginia. No need to worry that the rebounding economy will hurt the show’s premise, as I’m pretty sure it will be canceled by Christmas. Grammer, one of the best sitcom actors of all time, is awful in this, trying madly to oversell weak material. The rest of the cast is unrecognizable and unremarkable except for David Koechner, who is reasonably funny as Grammer’s brother-in-law.

“Flash Forward” – In the post-“Lost” world, there have been a lot of shows that have tried to capture that same sense of ongoing mystery. The first season of “Heroes” did it, but nobody else, to my estimation. “Flash Forward” seems likely to pull it off though. The premise is more convoluted than “Lost”’s was at first (remember, in the pilot all we knew and all we needed to know, was that a plane had crashed on a weird island with a monster, some polar bears and a recording of a French woman), and they explain it a bit ham-handedly. Briefly, everyone in the world blacks out for two minutes and has a flash-forward to six months in the future. Of course, planes and cars crash and rioting ensues but life picks up more or less as normal, except that everyone knows what’s going to be happening in late April, 2010 … or DO they? Also a good cast and fun mysteries. Special effects in the pilot don’t look great, but presumably they won’t be relying on them for the rest of the series run. Amusing to see Joseph Fiennes and Sonya Walger playing scenes as husband and wife, both doing very good but not quite flawless American accents.

Amanda and I wondered what would happen to us in this scenario and … well, since people passed out at 11AM, we’d both just be slumped at our desks at work and, at worst, wake up with post-its stuck to our foreheads. And, since the flash forward was to 10PM at night, we’d probably just be watching TV … ah … the bliss of one’s thirties.

“The Middle” – Patricia Heaton plays an overworked mother of three kids with an uninvolved husband. Yeah, I know, wasn’t that show called “Everybody Loves Raymond”? It was, but this is different. Heaton is not playing Debra Barone again by a long shot and the tone and premise are really quite different. I like this show a lot. To be honest, working/lower-middle class sitcoms have never grabbed me. I won’t argue with you if you say “Roseanne” and “Malcolm in the Middle” were great shows, but I just didn’t like watching them very much. This one works. Maybe it’s a little over-directed, but even with some broadness the characters and situations seem honest and relatable. Quirky without being precocious, this was probably my favorite of all the shows we saw.

“Modern Family” – This one has more buzz than “The Middle” and it’s also very good. This is the one with three families – a gay couple raising a baby, a 40ish couple with three kids, and a 60something guy married to a much younger woman with a son from her first marriage. Generally funny and charming with a few howlingly funny moments. Good characters and a pilot twist that I should have seen coming but didn’t. Julie Bowen was clearly quite pregnant when they shot this, but there was presumably a long lag before they shot the second episode so they’ll be able to show her below the neck for the rest of the episodes. It does rely on characters speaking to the camera in “interviews” which is getting a little old-hat now, but since we’re in pretty different territory from “The Office” or “Parks and Recreation,” I think it has potential.

“Cougar Town” – Not as good as the other two, but WAY better than its name or premise and only slightly disappointing compared to its creators’ previous show, “Scrubs.” Courtney Cox was probably the weakest actress on “Friends,” but is an able enough comedienne here as a 40ish divorcee raising a son and trying to have sex. The kid from “Aliens in America” plays her son and he and their relationship seem genuine and funny. The show is probably a B at best, but I liked it much more than I expected to.

So, yeah, amazingly there are three family sitcoms on ABC that I actually want to watch. The last time this happened I probably still had braces on.

Okay, more than enough said.

2009-09-11T12:50:00.002-04:00

As always, I want to use today to remind everyone to consider a blood donation.

Slight pain and inconvenience for you, and the chance to save a life. Plus cookies.

https://www.givelife.org/

2009-09-10T11:57:00.000-04:00

Some responses my recent tweets have gotten from total strangers:

goldengirlsfansRT @smithnoah: that "biggest gift would be from me" line from the GoldenGirls theme suggests a pretty mercenary approach to friendshipabout 10 hours ago from web

goldengirlsfansSeems @smithnoah is really thinking about this one. We'll file this under "things that make you go hmmm..."about 10 hours ago from web

deafmom@smithnoah I'm thrilled for @MarleeMatlin --she's a trailblazer.about 4 hours ago from web in reply to smithnoah

areucrazy@smithnoah I don't know that there were other deaf actresses. It is something I have always wanted but never even considered trying!about 10 hours ago from web in reply to smithnoah

MichaelRubinCOM@smithnoah Join the facebook group "Congressman Joe Wilson Must Resign" http://bit.ly/WhbFq 26 minutes ago from web in reply to smithnoah

2009-08-26T12:03:00.003-04:00

Edward Kennedy, 1932-2009

While we cannot and should not overlook his personal failings, there has been no greater foot soldier in the battle for progressive causes in the last 40 years than Edward Kennedy. This man, born into astounding privilege, truly understood the responsibility that privilege imparted. Few rich men in history have done more for the poor and disadvantaged. For the most part, he did not accomplish these things purely on his own -- his accomplishments all required cooperation from allies and foes, all of whom he worked with masterfully -- but his fingerprints are among the largest and most distinctive on the greatest government acchievements in recent memory. Here is a short list of things we should thank Senator Kennedy for, today:

For being an early and vocal supporter of the Civil Rights and Voting Rights Acts

For calling Vietnam a “monstrous outrage”

For fighting to lower the voting age to 18

For fighting to abolish the draft

For helping to establish OSHA

For helping to create Meals on Wheels

For fighting for sanctions on South Africa over apartheid

For fighting for the Americans With Disabilities Act

For helping to create S-CHIP

For pushing for peace in Northern Ireland

For keeping Robert Bork off the Supreme Court

For federal student loans

For the minimum wage

For Title IX

For calling his vote against the Iraq War “the best vote I’ve made in my 44 years in the United States Senate”

And, of course, for being perhaps the earliest and staunchest warrior in the fight for Universal Health Care.

The best way the Democratic Party can honor the memory of Edward Kennedy is to muster up a fraction of his courage and tenacity to overcome the lies and bluster of the enemies of health care and pass a bill with a strong, viable public option. You should do it for the tens of millions of Americans without health care and for the 18,000 Americans who die every year because of inadequate health care.

But, failing that, do it for Teddy.

2009-08-20T15:56:00.003-04:00

How Tweet It Is

Tweets from the end of June through early August. I'll try to aggregate more frequently from here on out.

Sen.Franken! One step closer to my dream of an all-comedy-writer govm't.
President Smigel, anyone? "What a nice bill...for me to poop on!"
2:07 PM Jun
30th from web

spatch@smithnoah President Smigel would always appear
on television with someone else's mouth superimposed over his own.

A coming trio of D-list celeb deaths starting with Billy Mays? Dreamt last night that Jenny McCarthy & Harlan Williams died in a plane crash
11:04 AM Jul 1st from web

Republicans have officially completed their transformation into the villains from a Marx Brothers movie http://tinyurl.com/mjq2fq
11:09 AM Jul 1st from web

RIP Karl Malden. How many editorial cartoons are being drawn right now making some Pearly Gates/"Don't Leave Home Without Them" AMEX joke?
1:31 PM Jul 1st from web

I admit it. I would watch a sitcom about Diana Ross having to adopt and raise
Michael Jackson's children. Title: "Baby Love."
8:17 AM Jul 2nd from
web

Heyes@smithnoah what, not pretty young
things?
10:18 AM Jul 2nd from Adium in reply to smithnoah

@Heyes that would be good, too, with "Love Child" a distant third.
12:13 PM
Jul 2nd from web in reply to Heyes

Independence Day: great holiday, truly, truly terrible movie.
11:15 PM Jul 4th from web

Since Kid Rock saved time by lifting a Skynyrd melody and Zevon baseline, you'd think he'd have enough time to find a rhyme for "things"
10:31 AM Jul 8th from web

Lunchmeat king Oscar Meyer dead at 95 http://tiny.cc/LJzU4 . But he's so full of preservatives that he'll keep in your fridge till 2015.
12:27 PM Jul 8th from web

TWEETS FROM SEATTLE, FOR ABE'S
WEDDING

I'm in Seattle for the first time in my life. Apart from it
being sunny, it really looks the way it looks on TV. LA is like that,
too.
4:20 PM Jul 9th from web

I've been here
for 30 hours and I'm ready to say it--Seattle is the most beautiful city in
America. Also, it's still the 90s here. Awesome!
4:39 PM Jul 10th from
web

Okay, if you ever meet my
not-quite-two-year-old cousin, Phineas, you HAVE to get him to do his Obama
routine!
2:43 PM Jul 13th from web
Further evidence that Seattle is the coolest city on Earth -- the marquee at a small movie theatre that listed Ron Paul as the star of Bruno
11:22 AM Jul 20th from web

The label on my tuna can is upside down. I find this oddly disconcerting.
12:06 PM Jul 14th from web

Amanda's recent purchases at ThePaperSource include a "Xyron machine," and a "heat gun." I think she's planning to destroy the Superfriends.
8:16 AM Jul 17th from web

Obvious statement about Mr. Cronkite: Any list of the most important people in television history needs him at or near the top. RIP
7:18 PM Jul 17th from web

Does anyone else think that the Li'l Wayne cameo on that "Let It Rock" song sounds more like Zach Braff?
12:13 PM Jul 20th from web

RIP to Les Lye who played the adult male roles on "You Can't Do That on
TV." At age 84 he lost his finally battle with "one sneaky kid."
9:20 AM Jul
23rd from web

To which Mr. Lye, listening from
beyond, shouts, "Daah, I heard that!"
9:20 AM Jul 23rd from web

"You Can't Do That On TV"'s Les Lye will be cremated. Where
will his ashes be scattered? What do you think's IN THE BURGERS?
#tackyhumor
2:00 PM Jul 24th from web

This must be a really old episode of "House." House is actually acting a little bit like a human being.
9:02 PM Jul 24th from web

There's a word gentlemen do not use, but I think Palin's farewell speech might have been the that-word-iest speech of all time.
8:24 AM Jul 28th from web

Obama will be drinking BUD LIGHT at today's cop/professor summit??? This is by far the worst thing I have ever heard about the man.
8:22 AM Jul 30th from web

Did Henry Waxman begin his political career as Mayor of Whoville? What was his Grinch policy? Did it help him get elected to higher office?
1:49 PM Jul 31st from web

Had the frightening realization that I am now roughly the same age adult Kevin Arnold was when he was narrating his Wonder Years.
11:00 AM Aug 4th from web

1) hoping people near the Eagle Rock fire are okay 2) as a former ER resident I'm annoyed that the news keeps calling it "The Glendale Fire"
6:25 PM Aug 4th from web

No one is surprised that I'm thrilled my new license plate includes JJJ because it reminds me of J. Jonah Jameson from Spider-Man, right?
2:09 PM Aug 5th from web

Many questions about Squeaky Fromme being set free. Is she mad Ford died of natural causes? Has she seen the musical? Is Charlie a birther?
2:21 PM Aug 5th from web

I'LL TELL THE FULL STORY LATER, BUT ON AUGUST 6th OUR HOUSE GOT
ROBBED

I thought spilling lunch on my shirt today sucked. They we came
home and found we'd had a break-in and our stuff was stolen. Suckier.
6:29 PM
Aug 6th from web
Oh well, at least the Red Sox aren't
getting annihilated by the #$%&ing Yankees or anything. Oh ... wait
...
6:49 PM Aug 6th from web
Things looking up! Just
had dinner at North Hollywood Diner one table away from voice over legend Chuck
McCann http://www.chuckmccann.net/
9:19 PM Aug 6th from web

Yes, we took the
dog to the dog beach yesterday, even though she proved herself a failure as a
watch dog last week.
1:07 PM Aug 10th from web

The lady from Allstate who handled our renter's insurance
claim was very nice. But I really wanted to talk to Dennis Haysbert
himself.
10:06 AM Aug 12th from web

Keeping open mind about the Spider-Man B'way musical, but horrified to learn it features new villain "Swiss Miss" http://tinyurl.com/d82cpz
9:09 AM Aug 7th from web

So the Sox/Yankees game is on in Spanish, but not English? Thanks, Time-Warner!
1:15 PM Aug 8th from web

Sorry, didn't hear you. I'm imaging graphic, gruesome ways for the Yankees to die. Then their fans would choke on their own tiny mustaches.
6:18 PM Aug 8th from web

I'm not saying I truly WANT him to die, but I won't exactly be sad when Alex Rodriguez DOES die.
7:26 PM Aug 9th from web

You know it's a weird summer for movie comedy when Apatow and Baron-Cohen swing and miss and Ephron hits her first home run in a decade.
11:14 AM Aug 9th from web

I would only see "The Goods: Live Hard, Sell Hard" if you told me Piven's character gets beheaded by samurai monkeys in the first 20 minutes
12:10 PM Aug 10th from web

Just spoke with my cousin who is 100% okay, as is her 23-month-old son, after they were run off The Mass Pike! Rolled their minivan twice!
1:36 PM Aug 11th from web

I like having two middle names. It means I'll never become a famous assassin.
3:21 PM Aug 11th from web

JACK NEARY SAID: Okay, you're in trouble on a TV show. Who's the best go-to guy?
Jack Bauer or Andy Taylor. Discuss.
7:23 PM Aug 11th from web

I SAID: @jackneary2 I go with Andy. Jack may save the WORLD, but 80% of his
close acquaintances wind up dead.
10:18 PM Aug 11th from web in reply to
jackneary2

Today's "Politician Who Must Have Been Named by Charles Dickens": Steve LaTourette, the cussin' rep from Ohio http://tinyurl.com/lj49ua
10:50 AM Aug 12th from web

Celeb sighting: Mario "AC Slater" Lopez at candy store in Burbank. Wasn't sure it was him so I said "time out" to freeze time & double check
9:58 AM Aug 13th from web

"(500) Days of Summer" is the movie I might have written at 25 if I hadn't met Amanda at 22 and started being, like, happy.
8:14 AM Aug 13th from web

2009-08-13T18:57:00.000-04:00

Fireworks

Okay, trying to get back into the blogging swing of things. I have a ton of tweets to share, so I’ll do that. But I want to start with an exchange I had with some right wing jackass.

As you’ll recall, Sarah Palin announced her resignation on July 3rd. Since I had the day off and Amanda was off doing girly things with her visiting mother, I had plenty of time to tweet. These were my two jokes:

Sarah Palin is stepping down. Apparently she wants to spend more time crassly exploiting her family.
12:56 PM Jul 3rd from web

TOMORROW'S HEADLINE TODAY: Sarah Palin Steps Down. Nation Celebrates with Fireworks
1:01 PM Jul 3rd from web

I got a quick response from the aforementioned right wing jackass:

GrassrootsPatri@smithnoah Oh yea of small minds.....Is bashing a Mom in Public ofc the best you can do to celebrate our nations finest holiday??? LIB
1:15 PM Jul 3rd from web in reply to smithnoah

To which I responded:

@GrassrootsPatri I see the mixup. I meant the crass way P exploits her family as a POLITICIAN. She can exploit them as a mom all she wants.
2:13 PM Jul 3rd from web in reply to GrassrootsPatri

@GrassrootsPatri If you meant my fireworks joke. Those are to celebrate 4 all the rape victims who WON'T have to have their rapists' babies.
2:15 PM Jul 3rd from web in reply to GrassrootsPatri

@GrassrootsPatri BTW, can I get copies of all the letters you wrote to the comedians who "bash"ed HIllary Clinton over the last 16+ years?
2:22 PM Jul 3rd from web in reply to GrassrootsPatri

Yeah, I was a little worked up. Looking at it now, I’m kind of see how I go from hipster irony to genuine nastiness (second one is a bit harsh … accurate, but harsh) to something approaching logical debate.

Why did this person piss me off so much? Clearly there were plenty of people supporting Palin and sorry to see her go. I imagine my joke would have offended a lot of people.

But here’s the thing, this person doesn’t follow me on Twitter. This person did a search for people tweeting about Palin and responded with insults to any he didn’t like. If you’re looking to be offended, I am happy to oblige.

I don’t think I even noticed until now that he had included “LIB” as some sort of zinger at me. Ouch.

And by the way, this guy hasn’t tweeted since July 6th. No response to the people who responded to his bullshit.

So, to wrap up, fuck him in the eye.

2009-07-31T00:01:00.002-04:00

My old pals at Makeshift Theatre are doing my RAPUNZEL script. Here's the audition notice.

Makeshift Theatre Co.
Announces Auditions for:

RAPUNZEL
By Noah Smith.

Directed by Shaine Carney

Auditions will be held on August 17th and 18th, 7-10pm. Please email for location.

Performance dates: Weekends in October, Possible mornings/early afternoons.

The auditions will consist of cold readings from the script.
To schedule a time please submit a head shot and resume to Vin Morreale, Company Manager at

Vinnie@makeshifttheatre.com

Rapunzel: Daughter of Wilhelm & Sabina. Has lived in a tower her whole life but is very smart, strong and worldly. Truly loves everyone but wants to expand her life.

Strutz: A minstrel and singer. Some rhyming narration needs to be sung but some is recitative. Helps to tell the story with Fretz. Can be played as either male or female.

Fretz: A minstrel and guitar player. Guitar playing is a plus. Helps to tell the story with Strutz. Can be played as either male or female.

Gothel: an old woman, said to be a witch. Locked Rapunzel in a tower because her parents stole rampion from her garden. Truly cares about Rapunzel but doesn’t know how to show it. Can be played as either male or female.

Wilhelm: Rapunzel’s father. Thinks of himself as a scholar yet tells Rapunzel that the sun revolves around a flat earth.

Sabina: Rapunzel’s mother. Thinks of herself as wise in the ways of the world yet tells Rapunzel to never have an opinion of her own.

Prince Ruput: A goofy and very silly prince. Rides in on a stick horse and wants to marry Rapunzel.

--
www.makeshifttheatre.com

Very nice, though they misspelled "Rupert." And I hope they do cast a woman as Gothel. My friend Andy played the role in Worcester and was very funny in the role. But, well, as I've said in the past, when I try hard to write an interesting role for a woman because I think women have been getting screwed in the interesting-role department since ... the invention of the art form, and then a theatre gives the role to a man ... well, it's a little frustrating.

Regardless, I think they'll do a great job with this play. Also, the director is Art Carney's granddaughter so ... that's cool.

2009-07-16T13:01:00.030-04:00

Pacific Northwedding

Wow! I haven't blogged in some time!

It's been a busy little while. Over the past week I've ...

Flown to Seattle
Rehearsed for my brother's wedding
Explored Seattle
Attended a Mariner's game
Been best man at my brother's wedding
celebrated my OWN anniversary
Flown back to LA
Done some semi-secret playwrighting stuff which I will happily tell you about if you email me
celebrated my birthday at Disneyland

So, yeah, it's been a big week.

Of course the really, REALLY big thing was Abe's wedding. Normally I post photos of me and Amanda on our anniversary (July 12) but I think this year we should honor Abe and Jocelyn.

(Oh, and if you want photos of me and Amanda's wedding, I just put up a bunch on Facebook)

These photos were all taken by Amanda and my cousin Ben. This means that the two of them are underrepresented. Sorry about that.

We got into town on Thursday and ... wow ... Seattle is every bit as cool as I assumed it was when I was 15 in 1991-1992. Seriously, what a hip, comfortable city. And very possible the most beautiful in the US. I can't think of another city that more perfectly blends its natural features and its man-made additions. I'm sure there are ugly, impoverished, or just plain boring parts of Seattle. But I sure didn't see them.

We also had beautiful weather. When we went to the Space Needle with my uncle Brian and cousin Griffin on Friday morning (no photos here, sorry) they told us that Mount Baker was visible that day, and that only happens about fifty days of the year. We did finally get a little rain on Sunday, which was good -- get a glimpse of the real Seattle, you know. It's still beautiful in the rain, of course.

No pics from the rehearsal, either, sadly. But Ben got some nice ones at the game. Jocelyn's mother scored a platoon of tickets for us all. Safeco is a great modern park and the game was quite good, even though the Mariners lost. Also, DELICIOUS garlic fries.

My cousin Jane with her son, Phineas. He is not quite two and does a GREAT Obama routine. Explaining it here wouldn't do it justice.

We got Abe that shirt in Japan. Ohbiki is the shortstop for the Oryx Buffaloes. Amanda and I have shirts of him, too. No, we didn't see any Buffaloes games, but it seemed like a cool souvenir.

The happy couple with Abe's and my former roomate, Dorien.

My cousin Jess and her fiance, Shane. They are the next family wedding, coming in October.

Then came the day itself.

Saturday was a beautiful day. Just a little cloud cover to keep us from cooking. The wedding was at a rose garden outside the city zoo. And yes, we did do a lot of strolling through the zoo in full regalia for pictures. We got a lot of attention from zoogoers. Abe always told them we were going bowling.

And, when you get married at the zoo, your "backstage" area tends to have a bear skeleton ...

Okay, now here's the ceremony ...

The wedding was perfect for Abe and Jocelyn. Beautiful, musical, peculiar, and slightly silly. The flower girl and ring bearer entered to "I've Got a Brand New Pair of Rollerskates" and the wedding part to "Lithium" by Nirvana, during which we stopped processing during the chorus to dance wildly. The ceremony was performed by a cowboy blacksmith who works on a ranch Jocelyn's family owns (or has some connection to ... I can't recall) in Montana. A group of friends sang "In My Life" by the Beatles, with Jocelyn's father on guitar. The couple wrote their own vows, with Jocelyn's going into great depth on bacon sandwiches. And Abe did crush a wineglass at the end, as the crowd shouted "Mazeltov!"

But all these disparate elements were perfect together. Everything came back to love and specifically to the love Abe and Jocelyn share. It was truly one of the most beautiful weddings I have ever attended.

And, of course, if you have your wedding near the zoo, you have to have champagne and appetizers in front of the jaguar cage.

The jaguar seemed pretty mellow, though I think he though Phineas looked delicious.

I missed much of this sing-along because I and the Man of Honor were setting up my cousins Joe, David, and Griff to decorate the van I would be driving Abe and Jocelyn away from the ceremony in.

They did a great job with that, of course. I especially liked the one window on which they wrote ABE AND JOCELYN! LOVE ROCKS! because at first I didn't notice that first exclamation point and I thought the van looked like it belonged to some very enthusiastic geologists.

On to the reception where, after a delicious dinner we started some speechin'

I'm happy to say mine was well-received. I quoted the Beatles, talked about a game Abe and I played as children that involved me hitting him on the head, and used the word "bullshit" only once.

And I think the rest of the evenign is best told in pictures ...

I promise you! AMANDA WAS THERE AND SHE LOOKED GORGEOUS! I'm sure there are, at least, SOME photos to prove this. Working on it.

After the reception we started to walk back to the van. I was eager to see Abe and Jocelyn's reaction to the decoration. But then they got into a cab! Those bastards!

In truth, they were going to get everyone a late night snack from Dick's a local hamburger stand (which I would rank above In-N-Out, btw). I called them and told them to send the cab away, we were coming to pick them up.

And when we did, this is what we saw:

Sorry, no good pics of the decorated van. But, um ... it was cool.

The next day we did a nice brunch at Jocelyn's parents' house where my cousin Aaron made a point of posing with Abe's celebrity friends

Yes, that's Sam Levin from "Freaks and Geeks"

And comedian Kyle Cease. Abe has cool friends.

Well, that's the story. Pretty awesome.

Abe and Jocelyn are in Spain now, so I certainly hope they aren't wasting time reading this. But let me say again what a wonderful weekend it was and what an honor it was to be a part of this event.

I love you guys and I am very, very happy that your anniversay will, forever after, be one day before mine and Amanda's. It's nice to share.

2009-06-29T19:36:00.002-04:00

More archived tweets

Dinner at a pho place with "Expose Yourself to Art" (trenchcoat guy flashing a statue) poster in men's room. That joke works in Vietnamese?
9:54 PM Jun 16th from web

El Pollo Loco #fastfoodrestaurantsthatsoundlikesexacts
1:56 PM Jun 18th from web

Lost dinosaur valley in IceAge3? Fine. But how do the characters know what dinos ARE? A lot of wooly mammoth paleontologists in the Ice Age?
6:42 PM Jun 18th from web

I think my a-ha moment came when I was trapped in a black and white cartoon world full of 80s Norweigan pop and had to body-slam my way out.
8:54 AM Jun 19th from web

"Steve Jobs had liver" is a Trending Topic? Why not "Bill Gates had some fettuccine"? What ... oh, he had liver SURGERY? Never mind.
10:25 PM Jun 19th from web

Had a dream about The Order of the Stick, now off to Disneyland. Nice start to a weekend. (Childish, but nice)
5:49 AM Jun 20th from web

New pet peeve -- People who say Standard Time when they mean Daylight Time.
12:05 PM Jun 21st from web

Damn you, popular culture for making me care a tiny, tiny, tiny, tiny bit about Jon and Kate's announcement tonight.
9:04 AM Jun 22nd from web

Jib-Jab: Because if you have cool animation, no one will notice you're not funny and your lyrics don't rhyme! http://tinyurl.com/lsxwho
11:36 AM Jun 22nd from web

Was there just one comedian in the 80s who noticed all porn soundtracks went “bow-chicka-bow-bow” or was it one of those bits everybody did?
8:48 AM Jun 23rd from web

Just learned yesterday that Joanna Gleason A) went to Occidental and B) is Monty Halls’ daughter. Huh.
3:48 PM Jun 23rd from web

Would the opposite of "relentless" be "relentful"?
8:10 AM Jun 24th from web

So now we know why he didn't want the Federal money. Mark Sanford had his own stimulus package going on. http://tinyurl.com/ny5pe2
11:51 AM Jun 24th from web

Amanda’s relative in the military was moved from Hawaii to Kansas. Facebook friend called it “bittersweet.” Pretty sure it’s just bitter.
3:30 PM Jun 24th from web

Cali legislature requires "supermajorities" and "laws scribed in runes on scrolls" and such. Constitution written by stoned Dungeon Master.
8:17 AM Jun 25th from web

While Sanford was apologizing to his wife, Jenny, was anyone else waiting for him to say, "I'm not a smart man, but I know what love is?"
9:01 AM Jun 25th from web

Btw, sorry Iran, but you're last week's news. Now we have a governor emailing about tan lines and boobies! Get in the back with Jon & Kate.
9:51 AM Jun 25th from web

My friend Max said:
Max Silvestri: Susie Essman is standing across from me,
also staring at her phone. Does she know about MJ? Should I tell her?4:13 PM Jun 25th from Tweetie

@maxsilvestri No, you fat fuck! ( <-- Susie Essman voice ) 4:14 PM Jun 25th from web in reply to maxsilvestri

Some loved him; some hated him, but nobody was HAPPY to hear reports of Michael Jackson's death all over the news. Well, maybe Mark Sanford.

A sad day. To add to the sadness, enough people don't know how to spell to
make "RIP Micheal Jackson" a Trending Topic 4:15 PM Jun 25th from web

(and, yes, I realize I just made it worse) MichAEl! MichAEl! MichAEl! 4:16
PM Jun 25th from web

6:28 PM Jun 25th from web Poor Ed McMahon. Even in death, he starts the show, then has to slide down the couch to give bigger stars the spotlight. 7:59 AM Jun 26th from web

Michael Jackson is dead, the President is competent ... it's a tough time to be a comedy writer. 12:16 PM Jun 26th from web

My friend Alison said:
Alisongreenwill: maybe instead of piling clothes on top of the cedar chest, I
should actually store the knitwear *in* it.12:59 PM Jun
26th from TweetDeck

@alisongreenwill Brilliant! Now you know how the Earl of Sandwich felt:
"Eureka! I'll put the meat BETWEEN the bread!" (smiley face)
1:02 PM Jun
26th from web in reply to alisongreenwill

9/20/08 SNL jokes about Todd Palin having sex with his daughters. 10/18/08 Sarah Palin appears on SNL, unoutraged. I'm just sayin'.
12:38 AM Jun 28th from web

My friend Andy said:
Warrhodes: should I be doing more with me days off?
2:15 PM Jun 26th from
web
@warhodes no, just keep on working on that Popeye impression
2:23 PM
Jun 26th from web in reply to warhodes

I apologize ahead of time for the time-sensitive, but otherwise highly
insensitive joke I am about to tweet.
11:10 AM Jun 28th from web

Normally celebrity deaths come in threes, but if we act now, Billy Mays
will throw in a fourth for free!
11:11 AM Jun 28th from web

Seen on street: car with broken window. Cardboard covering it reads "NO AXE SPRAY INSIDE SO FUCK OFF"
2:12 PM Jun 28th from web

I was about 35 minutes into "Away We Go" before I realized it wasn't, as I thought, a Jackie Gleason biopic.
about 23 hours ago from web

Celeb sighting: Robert Forster at Trader Joe's in Studio City. Cool guy. I can't even blame him for being on that crappy season of "Heroes."
about 20 hours ago from web

I'm happy about Madoff getting 150 years, but the judge referred to his crimes
as "evil." Sorry, but what's the legal definition of "evil"?
about 6 hours
ago from web

Where did you study law, your honor? Hogwarts? Let's keep
abstract fantasy-fiction concepts out of a courtroom, okay?
about 6 hours
ago from web

2009-06-26T15:13:00.002-04:00

Spangled Socks at Half Mast

So, interesting day yesterday.

I think I’ve said before that I don’t really get death. I’ve lost loved ones and family members and it’s been sad and strange and all of that. But there are also people in my life who I was friendly with at one time but, because of circumstance, I will probably never see again (Facebook mitigates this a little). From a logical perspective, aren’t those people as good as dead, as far as I’m concerned?

I’m well aware this seems cold and callous. I don’t want to be. I imagine this will change if and when I have children myself. But I’m just trying to put things in context of how I approached yesterday’s news about Michael Jackson’s death.

For that odd period when half the news sources were saying he was dead and half had him in a coma or in surgery, I was rooting for him to make it. This is was partly because I never actually root for someone to die, but in particular I wanted TMZ to be wrong, lose credibility and get a much deserved smackdown.

Then, once it was clear that this was no rumor and he was gone, came the flood. I check Twitter and Facebook far more often than a person should and EVERY post was about Jackson. There were a few jokes, but mostly it was heartfelt memories of a lost artist.

But here’s where my callous logical side kicked in. For one, the man was probably a child molestor. I am a believer in “innocent until proven guilty” and he was never proven guilty. But, well, Peter Sagal (from NPR’s “Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me”) put it very well on his blog:

“I do believe he was a pedophile and a child molester, because people who are
innocent of child molestation do
not pay 20 million dollars to people who accuse them of molesting their
child (nor should people demand such a payment in return for such a crime, but
that’s another issue)” – Peter Sagal

That said, I am a firm believer in loving the art and hating the artist. I can enjoy Wagner without agreeing with his anti-Semitism. But, logically again, Michael Jackson had not recorded a memorable song in more than 15 years, nothing truly good in more than 20 years, and nothing genuinely brilliant and classic in over 25 years. If we are addressing him purely as an artist, and not as the man unworthy of our respect, what is the difference between him dying now and if he had died in 1992? So I was a little offended when I heard him compared to Joplin, Hendrix, Buddy Holly or any other great young artist who died while at the peak of their creativity. Jackson was decidedly in 1970s Elvis territory and had been there for some time.

I didn’t say anything myself. Clearly many people were going through grief and I had no desire to mock them. I even deleted a tweet I wrote when I thought this was just a minor heart attack. Highlight to read it: #tackymichaeljacksonheartattackjoke Q: What did Michael Jackson's cardiologist say to his heart? A: Beat it!

Then I got into the car to drive home and, of course, every station was playing his music. At one point one station finished “Thriller” and I pressed my next preset just in time to catch the beginning of “Thriller” once again. And, y’know what … those were damn good songs. Michael Jackson was truly a great artist for the first thirty years of his life and that is always worth remembering.

After all, when Jimmy Stewart, probably my favorite movie star, died, I certainly didn’t complain that he hadn’t made a classic movie in thirty years or more. But, on the other hand, Jimmy Stewart hadn’t died at fifty and spent the second half of his life desperately trying to reclaim the glory of his youth.

I do still think that, amidst our fond memories of The Jackson Five and his first two solo albums, we can’t forget the way it all ended. Jackson serves as a cautionary tale of an abused child who went on to abuse others, of a man deprived of a childhood who went to absurd extremes to give himself one in adulthood. And, yes, of talent hurt by fame and personal failings. I know we should not speak ill of the dead, but we also should not ignore reality. Love his music, sure, but don’t let that cloud your good judgement.

For someone my age, Michael Jackson was possibly the first celebrity we were aware off. We knew Big Bird, E.T., and Superman, and we were somewhat aware that the same actor played Han Solo and Indiana Jones. We knew Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan were important people and we knew who Charles and Diana were. And I, myself, was aware of the music my parents liked, so I had some understanding of who the Beatles and the Stones were. But if you were five or six when Thriller came out, as I was, Michael Jackson was the first celebrity who entered our lives in the way celebrities do, as artists, as phenomena, as people real and unreal at the same time. Thriller was the first album I ever owned. “Weird Al”’s “Eat It” was perhaps my first introduction to the idea of parody, as light and non-critical a parody as it is.

And watching Jackson turn from genius to has been to freakshow and now to memory has been a key pop-culture ride for us. We weren’t really there from the beginning, but we saw it through to the end.

So, if you’re sensing some conflictedness in how I’m responding to all this, you’re right. As a pop-culture person, I’ve just lost perhaps the most prominent pop-culture touchstone, for good and bad, of my lifetime.

And I must admit that I owe something to the man. That first attempt I made at writing jokes featured a big batch of Jackson jokes. I look back at those now and they seem amateurish and unfunny, but they helped get me the SNL gig and that helped in other ways. So, yes, I personally benefitted much more from Jackson the freak than from Jackson the genius.

The good news – I can buy Thriller on iTunes and feel good that the money will go to his deeply in-debt estate and not to the man himself.

Rest in peace, Michael Jackson. For good or bad, you were always THERE and the world will be a markedly different place without you.

2009-06-25T15:59:00.002-04:00

58 ... He's finally one better than Heinz

Today is my father's birthday and I like to honor him here by linking to some of his writing to be found online.

Dad has had quite a bit of luck with contests run by the British Spectator magazine. Here are a few of his recent triumphs. Oh, and for those who might not know or had forgotten, Dad's name is Chris O'Carroll:

Write a poem containing the first or last line ‘Whenever you see a rhinoceros’.

Provide a pithy definition of hell

I was moved by Dad's rhino rhyme to try one myself. Yes, I know this is supposed to be about my father, but it's my blog, dammit!:

Old bride, horny as a rhinoceros
For her gifts said, “Don’t cup-and-saucer us!
Lingerie is much smarter”
But friends bought her no garter
At the wedding she just had to toss her truss.

The first line's a bit wonky but I'm rather proud of those rhymes.

Happy birthday, Dad!

2009-06-24T16:49:00.001-04:00

Great, so now Elizabeth Taylor will have TEN titles to pronounce wrong

So I’m intrigued by this announcement that the Academy Awards will nominate 10 films for Best Picture next year rather than the standard five they’ve nominated since 1943 or so.

Well, my gut instinct is that this is a bad idea and will make a nomination seem less special. But it will probably help smaller films. Many people have suggested it will help out genre pictures, too, rather than just the standard assortment of five dramas or four dramas and one small, quirky comedy.

Perhaps a bigger question is – will there be 10 films worthy of nominations next year. Let’s apply this retroactively to the past two years

Nominess for the 2009 Awards
Slumdog Millionaire
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button
Frost/Nixon
Milk
The Reader

Other Films Nominated in Other Major Categories
Changeling
The Dark Knight
Defiance
Doubt
Frozen River
Grand Torino (not nominated, but probably on the cusp for a few categories)
Happy-Go-Lucky
In Bruges
Rachel Getting Married
Revolutionary Road
Tropic Thunder
Vicky Cristina Barcelona
The Visitor
WALL-E
The Wrestler

I think it’s safe to assume the additional five nominees would have come from that list. My guess:

The Dark Knight
Doubt
Rachel Getting Married
WALL-E
The Wrestler

That’s a decent group of movies and would certainly be a more diverse nomination pool.

But what about the year before:

Nominees for the 2008 Awards
No Country for Old Men
Atonement
Juno
Michael Clayton
There Will Be Blood

Other Films Nominated in Other Major Categories
American Gangster
The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford
Atonement
Away from Her
Charlie Wilson's War
The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
Eastern Promises
Elizabeth: The Golden Age
Enchanted
Gone Baby Gone
I'm Not There
In the Valley of Elah
Into the Wild
The Kite Runner
La Vie en Rose
Lars and the Real Girl
Once
Persepolis
Ratatouille
The Savages
Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street
3:10 to Yuma

Huh … from this list what do we add?

The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
Once
Ratatouille

and, um …

La Vie En Rose

and, let’s see, maybe …

The Savages? Atonement? Sweeney Todd? Kinda hard to find that tenth nominee.

So … I don’t know how I feel about this new plan. Seems like some years it’ll be great. Others, there’s gonna be some headscratchers.

2009-06-22T16:54:00.000-04:00

A Decade

It was ten years ago today that Amanda and I got together. We had known each other for a few weeks and there had been some flirtation and other cluings-in of interest in one another, but it was June 22, 1999 that we actually left that bar together.

Okay, that doesn’t sound quite right out of context. I told the whole story here on the occasion of our fifth anniversary. Five years seems remarkably puny now, but ten years seems completely impossible. How did ten years go by without either of us turning 30? Ahem.

In these ten years we have …

… gotten married

… both received Masters Degrees (and Amanda got her BA, too)

… moved at least ten times and lived in five states

… visited 21 foreign countries and made a complete circumnavigation of the globe

… adopted three pets

… voted in three presidential elections (once for a winner)

… worked at nine colleges (combined, with a few that we both worked at)

… been to seven major-league ballparks

… attended eight weddings and two funerals together

… kept the same car for almost the whole time (just traded in our 1995 Saturn last month)

… made roughly 4,000 visits to Disneyland and never once been on Autopia

… spent roughly six weeks, combined, inside Ikeas

… eaten gallons upon gallons of Tom Yum Noodle Soup

… watched every damn episode of Lost

… laughed and cried, gained and lost weight, jobs, and friends. With a few exceptions, it has been a pretty typical journey. But I cannot imagine making it with a better partner.

I love you, Amanda, and I plan to for many, many decades more.

2009-06-17T13:06:00.000-04:00

There's no way to portmanteau "Tweets" and "THOTS" without sounding dirty

Hey all, so as I said before, and as my new sidebar attests, I'm on Twitter. It's like a neverending THOTS entry. Yeah, I know I haven't done a THOTS entry in a year and probably never will again, but I think I will occasionally archive some of my more interesting Tweets here. And, yes, I'm egotistical enough to think my Tweets are interesting. Why do you think I have a blog in the first place?

Okay, gotta think of a clever first Tweet ... okay, okay, I can do this ... something pithy and smart ... gotta watch that 140-character li
9:22 AM Jun 9th from web

guy in the next office is playing "The William Tell Overture" and, yes, it is making me work faster
3:08 PM Jun 9th from web

Oh, so that was a half-TABLEspoon I was using, not a half teaspoon. No wonder last night's fish was so over-seasoned.
8:07 AM Jun 10th from web

I have no problem with Newsweek's new format, but the new covers are unspeakably awful. Logo=70s Photos=bad freshman photography experiment
12:31 PM Jun 10th from web

Ah, Los Angeles, where it's sunny all winter and people only get Seasonal Affective Disorder during "June Gloom."
3:26 PM Jun 10th from web

Fingers crossed for ongoing Sox domination of the Yankees tonight.
3:24 PM Jun 11th from web

Hee hee ... poor Yankee fans and their teeny tiny mustaches.
7:57 PM Jun 11th from web

I wasn't hating on the Lakers this year until I saw the massive Hummer with a giant Lakers cover on the spare tire. Now I want them dead.
9:16 PM Jun 11th from web

spatch: Were we ever told just what exactly a real estate novelist was? I can't remember. 3 days ago from web

smithnoah: The Interest Rate Also Rises -The Fall of the House of Usher's Resale Value -Escrow of Eden -Huckleberry Finance @spatch #realestatenovels
jrnafziger: Prime and Prejudice, The Scarlet Lender, A Tale of Two PITIs, To Kill a Mortgagor @smithnoah @spatch #realestatenovels
spatch: The Sound Investment and the Fury, Paradise Foreclosed, Fannie Mae and Zooey, The World According to APR @smithnoah #realestatenovels
I know I'm supposed to find Megan Fox attractive, but all I can think when I see her is "I bet she doesn't smell very good."
9:46 AM Jun 15th from web

Kent Jones actually said something funny on Rachel Maddow last week. My universe is shaken.
about 24 hours ago from web

In the reality of a musical, are all plays and movies musicals? Like, if a character from RENT watched Taxi Driver, would Travis be singing?
about 2 hours ago from web

briangrosz: @smithnoah Somehow, I can picture Travis Bickle singin "working long hours 4 a long hustle" - & somehow, i might wind up writing it today..
smithnoah: @briangrosz if you're offering to collaborate on a Taxi Driver rock opera, I'm %100 down with that
briangrosz: @smithnoah i'll add it to my to do list. right after the Book of Revelations Song Cycle and my collection of dirty songs for children.

Bloomsday! When we celebrate Joyce's "Ulysses" with beer, gorgonzola sadwiches, and promises to get around to reading the book someday.
about 1 hour ago from web

Reading old Letterman jokes to find one I can pretend to think is about me. Then I'll complain loudly to see if he'll apologize.
less than 5 seconds ago from web

2009-06-16T00:16:00.004-04:00

There was a request a while ago for more video of Lois. So ... here are some. These are from our first visit to a dog friendly beach in Long Beach. We've been there twice, and Lois has gotten much braver and much more capable in the water. But here are two mildly cute and mildly interesting videos of her first venture into the Pacific.

2009-06-12T14:38:00.002-04:00

In which I rant about Sarah Palin and David Letterman for 1500 words

Okay, this is driving me nuts here.

As I have said before, I really despise Sarah Palin. I think she represents some of the absolute worst of American society – the arrogance, proud ignorance, intolerance, and self-aggrandizement. But I think it’s an inescapable truth that this woman has shamelessly and disgustingly exploited her family for her own gain.

Boasting about your son in the military is one thing, and acceptable. Mentioning your challenges raising a mentally challenged child is a little tacky but nothing out of the ordinary for politicians. Trotting out your pregnant daughter and her unwilling redneck douchebag boyfriend to help your campaign against choice and against sex education is hypocritical and exploitative, but, again, not surprising for a politician. Forcing this daughter to recant her statement about abstinence and then turning her into a pro-abstinence spokesperson is reprehensible.

And now, deliberately misinterpreting a joke and claiming it was about your 14-year-old daughter getting raped, then insinuating that David Letterman is a pedophile, in order to buy yourself more airtime, is so thoroughly disgusting that it makes me question the Palins’ very humanity.

Let’s look at the jokes in question.

“Sarah Palin was in town this week. The hardest part was keeping Eliot Spitzer away from her daughter.”

There is genuinely NOTHING objectionable about this joke. If you have ever told the parents of a pretty girl “you must have to fight the boys off with a stick” you are saying essentially the same thing. This is a joke directed at Spitzer’s well-deserved reputation as a horny slimeball and could have been used for any attractive woman visiting anywhere in New York State. If anything, this joke makes the Palin’s look GOOD, looking out for the welfare of their daughter.

Now here’s the other one --

“One awkward moment for Sarah Palin at the Yankee game. During the seventh inning, her daughter was knocked up by Alex Rodriguez.”

First of all, I fully agree that this joke is, as Letterman admitted, ugly and not especially funny. But it was a joke based on two premises

A) Bristol Palin got pregnant by having unprotected sex
B) Alex Rodriguez cheated on his wife, divorced her, dated Madonna, and is therefore developing a reputation as a sex fiend

Trying to claim, as the Palins have, that this is a joke about their 14-year-old daughter getting raped is preposterous, offensive, and transparently self-promoting.

Attention, far-right conservatives and the Palin family – NOBODY EXCEPT YOU HAS ANY IDEA SARAH PALIN HAS A 14-YEAR-OLD DAUGHTER NAMED WILLOW

I know that you memorize everything about this disastrously fucked-up family like 12-year-olds memorizing baseball statistics. But the rest of us have not. The rest of us who have been desperately trying to forget everything we learned about the Palins last fall vaguely remember that she has a large family with one son in the military, a daughter who just had a baby, and one infant with Down’s Syndrome. We might also vaguely remember a cute five-or-six year old holding the baby. But none of us have ANY IMPRESSION of what Willow Palin looks or acts like. And most of us were not aware at all, or were at best vaguely aware that she even exists.

So there is no way any rational human being could think a reference to “Sarah Palin’s daughter” is a reference to Willow. If I made mention of “George and Barbara Bush’s son” would you think I was talking about Marvin? Of course not.

And you now say that Bristol wasn’t on that trip to New York, so obviously it was a joke about Willow. Again, I might point out that 99% of America has not, in fact, memorized the particulars of your itinerary. But, yes, okay, the joke (which, again, was not an especially good joke) is flawed. The premise is faulty. But imagine a joke that went something like this:

During his speech in Cairo, President Obama said we need to open a dialogue in the Middle East. Then Joe Biden started talking and the dialogue turned into a 3-hour monologue!

Here is a legitimate complaint about that joke – “it’s stupid and not funny.” Here is a non-legitimate complaint about that joke – “Joe Biden wasn’t in Cairo that day.”

Late-Night comedians tell jokes with flawed premises all the time. The jokes don’t need to stand the test of time, so they can have flimsy foundations. The best jokes DON’T have weak premises, but no one is claiming this is a good joke.

So, clearly, anyone who claims this joke was about Willow Palin is either lying or so cataclysmically stupid I can’t understand how they can still be breathing.

So this leaves the question, “Is it okay to make this joke about Bristol?”

Just to be clear, the premise of the jokes is that Bristol had consensual sex with Alex Rodriguez and was impregnated. There is utterly no implication of rape. If the joke had been about Kobe Bryant or Mike Tyson, yes, then you could make a legitimate point that rape was implied. But, as much as I dislike Alex Rodriguez, he has never been accused of anything remotely like rape. Claiming this was a rape joke is deeply offensive to rape victims, to A-Rod and his family and fans, and to anyone who speaks fluent English.

Is THAT an acceptable joke, then, that an 18-year-old girl had consensual sex with a sports star and became pregnant, as she had once before?

Well, it’s pushing it, but it’s hardly worth this kerfuffle.

But what about the question of whether Bristol herself is fair game? Well, she is over 18, and legally an adult. So purely technically, yes, it’s okay. But good taste might suggest that a female public figure should be 21 or older before jokes like this become at all acceptable.

But is it ever acceptable to make a joke about unplanned pregnancies, or women being promiscuous in this deeply sexist and misogynist world? Well, that’s a very valid question, but seeing as comedians have been making jokes for years now about Paris Hilton, Madonna and a host of other women with reputations for being particularly sexually active, I would like to see the letters of complaint you wrote about all of those jokes before we continue this discussion.

Of course all of those women chose to live in the public eye. Bristol Palin did not. She was thrust into the spotlight by …

HER FUCKING MOTHER!

Yes, Sarah Palin, this is YOUR FAULT. You chose to exploit your family for political gain. You forced your daughter to become a spokeswoman for abstinence. We would have happily forgotten all about your family. But you chose to use them not only in the campaign (which, as I said above, was tacky, but not out of the ordinary) but AFTER it. In order to keep your name in the papers, you trotted out your daughter to promote the disastrously failed concept of abstinence. You have exploited your daughter, Governor Palin, and you are now seeing the results.

Would I say the same thing to a male politician? Well, I like to think I would. I’m well aware there is a double standard and that the media would not have been half as interested the pregnant daughter of a Male VP nominee. I’m not forgiving the media for exploiting Bristol in the first place, I’m just accusing Sarah Palin of taking that exploitation and exacerbating it.

Let’s look at the example of a politician who did this right. Al Gore’s son, Albert III, had two arrests a few years back for marijuana possession. He went to trial and treatment. The Gore family made some statements, dealt with it personally, and moved on. That was exactly how they should have handled it.

Imagine if Al had forced Al III to become a spokesman against marijuana use. That would have been outrageous and I would have gladly attacked him, just as I am attacking Sarah Palin. Anti-pot laws are equally as absurd as the pro-abstinence movement, and forcing his son to do that would clearly have been unforgivably bad parenting in the name of political advancement.

(The comparison isn’t perfect, since Gore will probably not seek elective office again and therefore doesn’t NEED to pander to conservative voters. If anyone can think of another example with a male politician, I would be happy to consider it)

Oh, and now Palin has essentially accused Letterman of being a pedophile. Could this woman be any more utterly devoid of class? Conservatives, is this really the whiny, self-serving liar you want to rally behind?

So, what’s going to be the fallout from all this? Well, probably both parties will prosper. Palin gets her name in another news cycle, solidifies her base, and builds her utterly false image as a victim of “liberal media.” (She’ll still get crushed in the 2012 primaries) This also came along at the perfect time for Letterman who has now totally knocked Conan O’Brien out of the late-night spotlight.

So, Letterman tells a couple of weak, tacky jokes. Palin pretends to flip out, further exploits her family and both of them do well. Man, what a great country.

Relevant video clips below.

null

2009-06-11T11:30:00.002-04:00

Beware, semi-dark cancer humor ahead, highlight to read:

There was a piece about agent Ari Emmanuel on NPR this morning, mentioning, of course, his brother Rahm and other brother, Ezekiel, an accomplished oncologist This promted Amanda to ask if Ezekiel treats his patients with the same Emmanuel obscene gruffness "You have cancer, you fucking idiot!" Or does he treat the cancer itself that way -- "All right you piece of shit melanoma! I am going to fuck you like I did that malignant tumor in Cabo!"

2009-06-10T11:35:00.001-04:00

I was able to attend Abe's bachelor party last weekend since I was, like, 3000 miles away. So I sent this video in my place:

Somehow this video has been view almost 150 times on YouTube. Either they played it on a constant loop at the party or many people did a search for "bachelor party," watched ten seconds, and were highly disappointed.

2009-06-07T11:56:00.000-04:00

Inevitable news ...

I'm on Twitter now.

So many of my posts here have practically been Tweets anyway, I kinda figured "what the hell?"

2009-06-05T12:54:00.002-04:00

A Log Line Ago in a Galaxy Far Away ...

I was listening to the Lost Podcast with Jay and Jack recently and a listener asked for a quick explanation of Star Wars, which had been prominently discussed in the latest episode. They declined to do this, since it would take too much time. So I wondered, how quickly could you describe Star Wars to people who know nothing about it? Let’s see:

SUPER QUICK: Star Wars is a series of six science fiction/fantasy movies set in a distant galaxy, where an ancient order of “Jedi Knights” use a magical power called “The Force” to uphold a democratic Galactic Republic. The first three movies are about a successful plot by evil Dark Jedi to overthrow the Republic and replace it with a Galactic Empire. The second trilogy is about a Rebel Alliance trying to defeat the Empire, succeeding in the third film.

Well, I think that covers it. Seems oddly impersonal, though. (No need to mention that the second trilogy came first)

SLIGHTLY LONGER: Star Wars is a series of six science fiction/fantasy movies set in a distant galaxy, where an ancient order of “Jedi Knights” use a magical power called “The Force” to uphold a democratic Galactic Republic. In the first movie, while trying to save a planet from invasion, two Jedi Knights find a young boy, Anakin, who has potential to be a powerful Jedi. In the second move, Anakin has grown up to be a Jedi and falls in love, while evil Dark Jedi are starting a war against the Republic. In the third film, afraid that his wife will die in childbirth, Anakin is tempted to turn to the Dark side and does so, taking the name Darth Vader, killing many Jedi and helping to turn the Republic into the evil Galactic Empire. Vader is maimed in a battle with his former mentor and becomes a black-clad cyborg. The second trilogy jumps twenty years ahead, Anakin’s son Luke has grown up not knowing the truth about his father. In the first film he joins the Rebel Alliance to battle the Empire and becomes a hero by destroying a powerful weapon of the Empire. In the second movie, he trains to become a Jedi, has his first real encounter with Darth Vader, and learns that Vader is his father. In the third film Luke attempts to bring his father back over to the side of good. He succeeds and Vader sacrifices his own life to kill the evil Emperor, ending the Galactic Empire.

Okay, so that reduces it to the story of Anakin and the story of Luke. Skips most of the fun stuff.

THE SHORTEST POSSIBLE MOVIE-BY-MOVIE RUNDOWN THAT MANAGES TO INCLUDE ALL THE MAJOR CHARACTERS

The Phantom Menace – Jedi Knights Qui Gon Jin and Obi Wan Kenobi, with help from an alien named Jar Jar Binks and a robot (or “droid”) named R2D2, rescue Queen Padme Amidala when her planet, Naboo, is invaded. While stopped on another planet, Tattooine, for supplies, they find a young boy named Anakin who has potential to be a powerful Jedi. On Coruscant, the capital planet of the Republic, the Jedi Council, led by Mace Windu and Yoda, a small green alien, says Anakin is too old to begin training. Senator Palpatine from Naboo becomes Chancellor of the Republic. Back on Naboo, the heroes defeat the invasion, but Qui Gonn is killed in battle with a Dark Jedi (or “Sith Lord”) named Darth Maul, who takes orders from a mysterious cloaked figure, unseen by the heroes. The Jedi council relents and allows Obi-Wan to train Anakin.

Attack of the Clones – Ten years later, there is an attempt on now-Senator Padme’s life. Obi-Wan is sent to investigate, while Anakin is assigned to guard her life. Obi-Wan’s investigation leads him to discover an army of cloned soldiers that were apparently ordered by a long-dead Jedi many years earlier. The clones are made from the DNA of Jango Fett, the bounty hunter behind the assassination attempt, who is raising one juvenile clone as his son, Boba. Anakin and Padme fall in love. He senses that his mother is in pain on Tattooine and they fly there to discover she has married, but has been kidnapped and killed. In a rage, Anakin slaughters the kidnappers. On Coruscant, there is concern about a growing Separatist movement. Chancellor Palpatine convinces Jar-Jar, substitute senator for Padme, to support the creation of a Republican Army. Obi-Wan tracks Jango Fett to the planet Geonesis, where he learns Count Dooku, a former Jedi, is behind the Separatist movement. Obi Wan is captured while informing Anakin of this. Anakin, Padme, R2D2, and C3PO, another droid that Anakin built as a child, fly to Geonesis to rescue Obi-Wan. A huge battle ensues, ended when Yoda arrives with the Clone Army. Jango Fett is killed by Mace Windu. Dooku escapes and tells his master, the mysterious cloaked figure, now called Darth Sidious, the news. We learn this was their plan all along, to start a Clone War. Anakin loses his arm in the battle and he and Padme secretly marry.

Revenge of the Sith – The Clone War is raging and Dooku seems to have kidnapped Palpatine. Obi-Wan and Anakin rescue him and Anakin kills Dooku. Anakin learns that Padme is pregnant and starts having dreams about her dying in childbirth. Palpatine begins to mentor Anakin, telling him of the Dark Side of the Force’s ability to stave off death. Obi-Wan goes on a mission to kill Separatist General Grievous. Anakin learns that Palpatine is Darth Sidious and tells the Jedi Council, but then decides to join Sidious, thinking he can help him save Padme. Anakin helps kill Mace Windu and becomes Darth Vader. Sidious orders his clone troops to kill their Jedi commanders. Only Obi-Wan and Yoda survive. Vader kills all the Jedi on Coruscant, including young children. He then kills the Separatist leaders. Obi-Wan and Padme confront Vader on the volcano planet Mustafar. When Padme rejects him, Vader nearly kills Padme and he and Obi-Wan fight, leaving Vader scarred and dismembered. Yoda battles Sidious and loses, escaping with help from Senator Bail Organa from Alderaan. Padme gives birth to twins, Luke and Leia, and dies. Sidious rescues Vader and saves his life, turning him into a cyborg. Before the senate, Sidious, as Palpatine, accuses the Jedi of treachery and turns the Republic into the Galactic Empire, with himself as Emperor. Yoda goes into exile, telling Obi-Wan that Qui-Gonn has learned how to contact the living world from beyond the grave. Organa adopts Leia and takes Artoo and Threepio, wiping Threepio’s memory. Obi-Wan brings Luke to Anakin’s step-brother and becomes a hermit on Tatooine.

A New Hope – Twenty Years have passed. The Empire has built a massive space station called The Death Star, which is capable of destroying whole planets. The Rebel Alliance, a revolutionary group attempting to overthrow the Empire and restore the Republic, have stolen plans for the Star, but the ship carrying them gets captured by Darth Vader. Princess Leia, one of the rebels, is captured, but hides the plans inside R2D2. He and Threepio are sent to Tattooine in an escape pod to find Obi-Wan. (Neither Vader or Leia know they are father and daughter) On Tatooine, the droids are captured and sold to the Lars farm, where Luke now lives as an adventure-seeking young man. Artoo flees to find Obi-Wan and while Luke is looking for him, Imperial Troops kill his aunt and uncle. Obi-Wan tells Luke about the Force and gives him his father’s light-saber. He also tells him that Darth Vader “killed” his father. Luke, Obi-Wan and the droids hire a pilot, a smuggler named Han Solo (indebted to gangsters) and his co-pilot an enormous, furry alien named Chewbacca. They escape Tattooine to try to rescue Leia. They are drawn by tractor beam into the Death Star, which has been used to destroy Alderaan. Luke and Han rescue Leia while Obi-Wan shuts down the tractor beam and duels Vader. Obi-Wan allows Vader to kill him in front of Luke. The heroes escape and the rebels plan an assault on the Death Star’s one weakness. Han declines to participate in the attack, preferring to look out for himself. Luke joins the attack and is quickly the only pilot left who can hit the target. Vader attacks in another ship, but is repelled by a returning Han. Obi-Wan’s spirit tells Luke to use the Force to guide him. He does, and successfully destroys the Death Star.

The Empire Strikes Back – Some time later the Rebels are based on an ice planet called Hoth. Luke has a vision of Obi-Wan who tells him to find Yoda and train to be a Jedi. The Empire finds the Rebel Base and attacks, sending the rebels fleeing. Han, Leia, Chewbacca, and Threepio are pursued by Vader and by several bounty hunters, including an adult Boba Fett. During their escape, Han and Leia fall in love. They decide to seek refuge with Han’s friend Lando Calrissean on planet Bespin. Luke and Artoo find Yoda and Luke begins training as a Jedi. Before his training is complete, he has a vision that his friends are in danger and leaves to rescue them. Yoda prophesizes that, if Luke dies, there is another possible Jedi. On Bespin, Lando betrays Han and turns them over to the Empire. Han is placed into suspended animation so Fett can transport him to Jabba the Hutt, the gangster who placed the bounty on his head. Lando has a change of heart and helps Leia, Chewbacca, and Threepio escape. Luke arrives and fights Vader, who defeats him, cutting off his hand. Vader tries to bring Luke to the Dark Side, confessing that he is his father. Luke escapes and is rescued by his friends. He is given a mechanical hand.

The Return of the Jedi – Lando, Leia, Luke, Chewbacca and the droids rescue Han from Jabba, killing him and Fett along the way. Luke has built a replacement light saber. Luke returns to Yoda, who is dying. Before dying, Yoda tells him that his training is complete, but he must kill Darth Vader. Luke is convinced that his father could return to the good side. Obi-Wan’s spirit tells Luke that Leia is his sister and could also be a Jedi. The Empire is building a new Death Star and the Rebels have a plan to destroy it, but first they must shut down a shield generator on the Moon of Endor. Han leads a team to do this with Chewbacca, Leia, Luke and the droids, while Lando leads the attack in space against the Death Star. On the planet, Luke hands himself over to Vader who takes him to the Death Star to see Emperor Palpatine. While Han’s team battles the Imperial troops, with the aid of an indigenous species, the Emperor tries to seduce Luke to the Dark Side. When he refuses, he threatens to go after Leia. A three-way battle erupts between Luke, Vader and the Emperor, which ends when a repentant Vader kills the Emperor before making peace with Luke and dying of his own wounds. Luke escapes the Death Star. Han’s team shuts off the shields and Lando destroys the Death Star. The Empire is dead and the Rebels are victorious.

Huh, well there you go ... not exactly sure why I did it. But I sure ... did ... do it.

Yep.

2009-06-02T11:01:00.001-04:00

I know it's just a tie-in for Night at the Museum 2, but it still makes me very, very happy that one of the Happy Meal toys this month is an Albert Einstein bobblehead.

2009-05-29T16:37:00.000-04:00

I had two very LA experiences last weekend. It has occurred to me that I never write anything personal on this blog anymore so I shall relate these stories.

On Saturday night we went to see an outdoor screening of To Catch a Thief at the Hollywood Forever Cemetery. Yes, a movie in a cemetery. It was great fun, though we did get a bit cold. You can never discount how cold LA gets at night. It is essentially the desert, after all.

This is not the optimal way to view this movie, of course. The sound wasn’t great and in a movie where many characters have French accents, that can make following the plot tricky. I’ve seen a lot of Hitchcock, but oddly not this one. Still the movie is worth watching, if only for views of the South of France and the chemistry of Grant and Kelly.

The place was packed and many people had ingenious food and seating options. We will be better prepared next time. We also smelled more than a little marijuana in the air. I mention this because, if there’s that much pot around during To Catch a Thief, imagine how much there must have been the next night when they showed, no kidding, Dazed and Confused.

On Memorial Day night we went to a gay bar in West Hollywood. No, seriously. We were invited by a coworker of Amanda’s after she mentioned our fondness for musicals. This particular place, called “11,” as in “Eleven O’Clock Number” does a night every Monday where they screen scenes from movie musicals as well as video clips from Broadway shows and Tony performances. Then they have a live singer do four or five numbers. It was a great place and a fun time, though it was less crowded because of the holiday, and I imagine I might have liked it less if it were more packed.

Then, of course, the next day, the Supreme Court failed to overturn Prop 8.

Yep, very typical LA weekend.

2009-05-28T11:15:00.000-04:00

I do not get this trend of tying small stuffed animals to the rear bumper of your automobile, so they they dangle just above the road. "I think Snoopy is so cute I want to drag him behind my car!"

2009-05-27T11:41:00.000-04:00

Pretty clever, and I think the choreography might be better in this than the original:

I'm not sure why Danny is an airline pilot here, why they couldn't find a blond-haired Lego woman for Sandy, or why one of the girls seems to be bottomless, or maybe only wearing a thong. But that one Three Stooges-style sound effect almost kinda works in this version.

2009-05-21T13:16:00.000-04:00

If you can be at someone's beck and call, can you just be at their beck?

2009-05-15T00:45:00.001-04:00

What exactly were all the dreams that Laverne and Shirley were going to make come true? I don't recall either of them having much in the way of ambition.

2009-05-13T21:43:00.002-04:00

Something I learned at a company-wide training session I am attending at work this week for undetermined reasons:

The people leading the session are from Virginia. I have learned that Southern people seem to have an overdrive switch. They're talking along, with their accent, and then, if they think it'll make a point they'll suddenly get REALLY southern for a sentence or two. Northerners don't really have this option. I suppose if you have a slight New York, Boston, Philadelphia or Chicago accent you could step that up. But what about people like me? I have no such option.

2009-05-08T11:59:00.001-04:00

Yeah, I'm VERY upset about Manny, but let's remember one of the good guys

Everybody sing!

Better than his brother, Joe!
Dominic DiMaggio!

2009-05-08T11:38:00.000-04:00

It seems that Jonah Hill has gained all the weight that Seth Rogen lost.

2009-05-07T12:20:00.002-04:00

Saw a vanity plate today that read "ORGAN MN"

Transplant surgeon or porn star?

(Or, I suppose, tribute to a small town in Minnesota I had not heard of?)

2009-04-30T23:55:00.000-04:00

I really love how every story about Obama's First One Hundred Days has to open up with a disclaimer about how stupid it is to do a story about Obama's first hundred days.

2009-04-29T23:19:00.001-04:00

Very possibly the best line of the TV season, from the "Chuck" finale.

"Why are you letting Sam Kinnison and an Indian lesbian ruin your wedding?"

2009-04-19T23:58:00.000-04:00

Have we all heard Britney Spears' "If You Seek Amy"?

Secretly spelling obscenities is clearly the new black, so I have some new song titles for Britney:

"(All I Want) Is A Chai Tea"
"See You In Teaneck"

And, um ... that's all I have. Look, dammit, this is hard, people!

2009-04-15T23:33:00.000-04:00

This piece is definitely responsible for my hardest laugh of the year:

The Colbert Report

Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c

Better Know a District - New York's 25th - Dan Maffei

colbertnation.com

Colbert Report Full Episodes

Political Humor

Gay Marriage

Colbert has actually interviewed several people who represent places where I have lived. This guy is not one of them, but

Aaron Shock -- represents the area in downstate Illinois where I used to live

Javier Becerra -- was my representative when we lived in Eagle Rock

Brad Sherman -- was my representative during my first stint in LA, when I lived in Sherman Oaks

John Hall -- Represents Poughkeepsie.

Two of these men have famous shirtless photos of them. My homes have weird tastes.

2009-04-08T00:37:00.000-04:00

One thing I noticed, around the time of the election -- "I'm a Mac/I'm a PC" seems to have replaced "A, X dollars; B, Y dollars; C ... priceless" and "Got Milk?" as the go-to commercials to parody for simple recognition. And I, for one, am grateful.

2009-04-07T14:57:00.000-04:00

I'm pretty sure I had never heard of Easter Peeps until college.

2009-04-06T00:16:00.000-04:00

One thing I have learned in my old age is that the best spot in the parking lot is not the one closest to the store, but the one closest to a cart-return.

(Of course, as I have also learned, Amanda and I are the only people on Earth who ever return shopping carts, apparently most people think they prefer to roll freely through the lot or sit patiently in spaces that certainly weren't going to be filled by cars ...)

2009-04-05T22:32:00.000-04:00

I was thinking how much I hate the new Old Navy ad campaign, with the talking mannequins. Then I remembered how much I hated the old Old Navy ads with the glasses lady and the dog. Has Old Navy had nothing but terrible, terrible ads?

2009-04-04T16:25:00.000-04:00

And, in news obviously created to make Noah feel 10,000 years old ...

The original, now seventeen-year-old "Nirvana Baby" from the cover of Nevermind has recreated the cover.

2009-04-03T21:37:00.001-04:00

Something I Never Thought I'd Say:

Iowa is awesome!

2009-04-02T23:05:00.000-04:00

Julian, our cat, likes to sit on our alarm clock radio. Doing this, he frequently turns it on. It is usually tuned to NPR. We assume this means he is a big NPR fan, though I don't think he donates during pledge drives.

I think I have told you that Amanda will often say to the pets, when we leave the house, "Make good decisions!"

I now like to think that Julian responds, "And don't drive like my brother!"

2009-04-01T13:56:00.003-04:00

April Goals (dear lord, that barely qualifies as a pun!)

Since I have barely posted anything in all of 2009, I think we should probably make April like August of last year, where I posted something every day.

So, let's kick things off with something that requires no additional work from me! Here's the newest newsletter from the Makeshift Theatre, mostly about their upcoming production of my THREE MUSKETEERS script, with an additional announcement that they'll be doing two of my plays next year. Click to enlarge.

2009-03-26T13:53:00.000-04:00

A Play On Words I Will Never Get to Use Unless I Become a Fashion Writer and a Very Particular Fabric Trend Takes Off

Charge of the Light Brocade

2009-03-20T14:19:00.003-04:00

Nipping it in the bud

Okay, just so conservatives won't be able to say that liberals never go after Obama for his gaffes ...

The Special Olympics joke was offensive. While the President's apology seemed genuine and heartfelt, making the joke in the first place demonstrated a distressingly dismissive and arrogant way of looking at the disabled. While I do not believe any punitive action should be taken, the President screwed up and should be upbraided for doing so.

Now, as Jed Bartlet would put it:

You heard the man. Break's over.

2009-03-17T13:56:00.004-04:00

Erin Go Brarack

Long time readers will recall that St. Patrick's Day is usually limerick day here at baggypantsandbravado, and maybe I'll write some later today, but for now I wanted to share this with you. You may have seen it, already, since it was semi-big during the election, the new Irish folk song "There's No One More Irish Than Barack Obama":

There's an animated one which is sung better, but overproduced and not as clever here.

And, never being one to leave well enough alone, I've written my own verses:

Today in Chicago
The river flows green
And the streets fill with lasses
Named Peg and Colleen
Who all stop and salute
The new top banana
There’s no one more Irish than Barack O’Bama

He was good to his Mam
He enjoys a few beers
When he tells a sad story
It’ll bring you to tears
He’ll sing “Too Ra Loo Ra”
To his girls in pajamas
There’s no one more Irish than Barack O’Bama

Some things about him
Might not smack of the Isle
Like in the debates
When he couldn’t be riled
We saw McCain’s Irish temper
But Barack was much calma
Still there’s no one more Irish than Barack O’Bama

Out here in LA
We’re all falling in line
We’re painting shamrocks
On the Hollywood sign
If you’re called Colin Farrell
Or Wilmer Valderama
There’s no one as Irish as Barack Obama

Join us, Sean Hannity
Bill O’Reilly as well
Come on down to the pub
With Rahm Emmanuel
We’ll sing “Oh Danny Boy”
And not “Oh Susanna”
The whole country’s gone Irish, like Barack O’Bama

Obama is Irish
And now you all know it
You can tell when he talks
For he sounds like a poet
He’s more green than an O’Neill
Or Shavian drama
There’s no one more Irish than Barack O’Bama

Happy St. Patrick's Day, all!

2009-03-10T22:54:00.002-04:00

I wrote a ten-minute play for a contest this week. The play had to be about "maintaining relationships in the age of technology," which, of course, is right in my wheelhouse. I've already written that at least twice.

But there was a weird rule -- I was not allowed to use any brand names. The contest was sponsored by Dentyne. Yeah, I know. I guess I could understand why I couldn't, say, have a character mention how much she loves Hubba Bubba. But I can't use "Google" as a verb? "iPhone"? (crap, I think I left a mention of an iPod in there)

The play was going to be called TWITTERPATED, which I liked as kind of a related title to my old play INTERTWINED. But since I can't say "Twitter," I invented "ChitterNatter." And the title is now THE CHITTERNATTERERS.

Which, I must admit, is kind of a fun title.

2009-02-26T18:58:00.002-05:00

Holy crap! Did you know that Dolly from Family Circus went trick-or-treating dressed as Sarah Palin last year?

2009-02-24T12:11:00.001-05:00

I might have more Oscar thoughts later, but for now ...

Am I the only one who thought the song from Slumdog Millionaire was called "Tally Ho!"?

2009-02-16T14:09:00.001-05:00

If you haven't seen this ... it's cool

2009-02-14T17:50:00.000-05:00

Because …

… she does an excellent impression of Benjamin Button saying “Seven. But I look a lot older.”

… during the primaries last year she decided which candidates our pets were endorsing. Fenway and Lois were Clinton boosters, but Julian was for Obama. And no, she assures me, it’s not just because he’s also half black and half white.

… she’s realized she’s not really a feminist, since feminists believe in equality of the sexes and she’s pretty sure women are superior.

… she hates exploitation of women’s sexuality, yet she loves watching “The Girls Next Door.”

… she makes “that’s what she says” jokes almost as often as I do … okay, maybe more.

… she constantly refers to The Human Torch from The Fantastic Four as “Flamer.”

… she always falls asleep while we’re riding Pirates of the Caribbean, even when the city is burning down around us.

… she was very, very excited to acquire a “Furminator” pet hair brush.

… our trip to Japan made her an official miso snob (it is way better over there).

… she occasionally will bring up a hilarious scene from an old episode of a show we like and then realize the scene was actually from a spec I wrote.

… she thinks I’m cool enough to get away with wearing dorkier glasses.

2009-02-13T22:06:00.002-05:00

Something that just occurred to me: You know who Tyler Durden would really hate? Brad Pitt.

2009-02-12T11:38:00.002-05:00

A grammatical observation: People often write "lead" as the past tense of "lead" when they mean "led." Understandable mistake. But I feel like people never write "mislead" as a past tense, expecting it to be pronounced "misled." If this is indeed true, it's has a clear enough explanation I suppose -- there's no metal "mislead"-pronounced-"misled." Still, I find it interesting. My wife will not.

2009-02-06T17:39:00.003-05:00

Okay, here's one: Is it gross to chew gum while you're in the bathroom?

I don't mean taking out a new piece while you're in there and popping it in your mouth. I mean that you're already chewing gum when you enter the room. Do you have to spit it out? Can you keep chewing? Can you keep it in your mouth but not actively chew? Do the length of time you plan on being in the bathroom and the purpose of your visit factor in?

I demand that a large portion of the stimulus bill be devoted to getting to the bottom of this.

2009-02-06T13:05:00.003-05:00

I've seen a lot of people spelling "a lot" as "alot" a lot lately. It bugs me a lot.

This isn't like "alright" or "goodnight" where it's semi-acceptable to compound the words. "Allot" is a word that has its own meaning.

Grumble.

2009-02-04T12:18:00.002-05:00

All For One ... EMC Point (not really)

Makeshift Theatre in the Boston area is doing my THREE MUSKETEERS
script. It's one of my all-time favorites, and here's the audition
notice:

Makeshift Theatre Co. announces auditions for it's final production of it's 08/09 season!
THE THREE MUSKETEERS
adapted by Noah Smith

Directed by Andrew Rhodes

We'll be rounding out this season with the swashbuckling tale of the The Three Musketeers. This version is a little different though, since the Musketeers are all women. Portia, Athena and Artemis have to save the King and Queen of France from the dastardly Duke Richelieu. There will be sword-fights, derring-do and at least one outrageous French accent.

Seeking: 4 Men, 5 women, and 3 extras

Auditions will consist of cold readings from the script.
Please send head shot and resume to Company Manager Vincient Morreale to schedule a 10 min audition time.
vinnie@makeshifttheatre.com

Auditions will be February 16th and 17th 7-10pm.

Rehearsals will be Mon/Tue/Wed 7-10pm. Possible fight rehearsals on Thursdays as needed and available. Show runs every weekend in April

Parts:
King: King of France. Older. Lovable, honorable, but a bit bumbling, and trusts in his wife's opinion on all things.
Queen: Queen of France. Older. Kind, smart, the woman behind the man, wears the royal pants in the family.
Porita: Female. Leader of The Musketeers. Loves her job and is good at it. There is nothing she would rather do than serve her king and be a Musketeer.
Athena: Female. The social one of the Musketeers. Loves a good party, and jokes, and having fun.
Artemis: Female. The studious Musketeer. Loves books, studying, and would be addicted to the history channel.
D'artagnan: Male. Young, head strong, fearless, and brave. Has come to Paris to become one of his heroes The Three Musketeers.
Constance/Lady De Winter: Female. Character doubles as Constance, the queens maid, and D'artagnan's love interest. Also the vicious Lady De Winter. (some french accent required)
Duke Richelieu: Male. Evil. Greedy. Scheming. The classic villain. Pompous. Haughty.
Rochefort: Male. Not the brightest bulb, not even close, but eager. Vile and stinky. Top henchman to Richelieu.
3 extras: M/F. Guards, knights, All extra parts

For all roles except the king, Queen, and Constance, we would prefer some stage combat experience, but it is not an absolute. But be prepared to do some sword fighting.

Andrew Rhodes,
Artistic Director
Makeshift Theatre Co.
617-767-6504
www.makeshifttheatre.com

Looks like fun, eh? Let your Boston-area actor friends know.

2009-02-02T23:53:00.001-05:00

I'm so glad they're rebooting the Friday the 13th franchise, because those movies really were getting bogged down in their own detailed and complex continuity.

2009-02-02T15:50:00.001-05:00

Is it me, or is "Michael Phelps smokes pot" the least suprising story of 2009 so far?

2009-02-02T14:46:00.001-05:00

So apparently I should have wagered a lot of money on the game yesterday because my prediction was uncannily close to the final score.

Also, I should make one exception to my "teams in the Mountain Time Zone shouldn't exist rule."

The Denver Broncos can continue to exist.

2009-02-01T14:33:00.002-05:00

... I don't even know her bowl ...

So I don't really have a horse in this race. Usually I have another team I like or at least don't hate. But today's matchup ...

Well, the Steelers have a good fanbase and they're a great historical team. But they just won a few years ago, and, as Abe pointed out to me, if they lose then the Pats are the only team to win two Super Bowls this decade.

On the other hand ... the Cardinals? I think a part of me just thinks teams, of any sport, in the Mountain Time Zone shouldn't exist, or, at least, shouldn't win championships. (I feel roughly the same way about Florida teams other than the Dolphins ... I still hate the Dolphins, but I think they should be allowed continued existence)

But here's a question for you. Are the Cardinals the only professional sports team whose most famous player is a fictional character? Seriously, is there a Cards player better known than Rod Tidwell from Jerry Maguire? I can't think of anybody before this year. Yeah, Kurt Warner and Matt Leinhart are famous, but much moreso for their previous teams (Rams and USC).

Any other examples of this? Amanda points out that Crash Davis and Nuke LaLoosh are probably more famous than any real life Durham Bulls players. Well, they're probably not more famous than Bulls alums, like Johnny Pesky or Chipper Jones, but those guys aren't famous as Bulls.

But restricting ourselves to the big leagues ... I don't think "Wild Thing" Vaughn or Pedro Cerrano are as famous as Bob Feller or Satchel Page. So I think Rod Tidwell has a peculiar spot in history.

... which could get erased today.

PREDICTION: Steelers 28, Cardinals 24

2009-01-30T21:36:00.001-05:00

This has been all over Facebook for a week. You're supposed to list 25 "Random Things" about yourself. Well, it sounded like fun, though I think we all need to declare a moratorium on the word "random" for all of 2009.

Here goes ...

1. I skipped second grade then repeated third.
2. I have a very tiny third nipple on my left ribcage … basically a freckle.
3. Ever since I was a kid, I liked taking fake names. At times I signed papers Francis (my middle name), Smith: French Detective, and Francis Bacon Smith III. In recent years I’ve come to think that, if you have something to say, you should back it up with your real name. Yet, in the past few months I’ve had reason to use two different pseudonyms. It’s very possible I will become much better known by those names than by my real one.
4. Actually, I have two middle names – Francis and Emanuel – from my two grandfathers
5. Alan Alda and I (and some other people) once helped a movie usher find a dead rat in the aisle.
6. I appeared on “Win Ben Stein’s Money” and didn’t.
7. I have never eaten a Twinkie. Pretty much every other Hostess product, sure, but no Twinkies.
8. I have played Cinderella’s Prince, The Frog Prince, and Snow White’s Prince. (I used to be cute)
9. I thought the movie “The Number 23” was really stupid. Still, I did start dating Amanda 23 days before my 23rd birthday.
10. I’m just a little bit under six feet tall.
11. I lost ten pounds in a week at age 12, thanks to salmonella.
12. I’m going to be the best man in my brother’s wedding this summer. This is going to be awesome but I’m nervous about the toast, partly because Abe gave the greatest toast in the history of weddings at MY wedding, and partly because several of his other groomsmen are very successful professional comedians who could probably toast him much better than I.
13. Amanda and I bonded early over a mutual dislike of tomatoes. But now we both kinda like them.
14. I have written 21 ½ (one was a one-act) produced plays for children and rewritten one of them as a musical (music and lyrics by David Nields, with who I have collaborated on seven musicals). I’ve also written one unproducable children’s theatre play (it’s an adaptation of “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone,” to which, of course, I don’t have the rights) and one more that hasn’t been produced yet but probably will be, soon.
15. Amanda gave me a deadline to propose to her, which I beat by three days. I would have proposed sooner, but it kept raining and I was waiting for nice weather.
16. I have been an extra in ads for Budweiser, Rolling Rock, and Miller. I have consumed maybe a grand total of 16 ounces of beer in my entire life.
17. As a child I could recite chapters of “Winnie-the-Pooh” from memory, but then I learned how to read for myself and lost the ability.
18. I’m still wearing a cloth Brazilian wish bracelet that was tied around my wrist as I got off the ship in Salvador de Bahia almost a year ago. It’s ratty and gross now, but I’m supposed to wait for it to come off naturally or my wish won’t come true.
19. Amanda and I moved four times in just over one calendar year from 2006-2007. The first three were in a span of about four months.
20. As a child, I thought “Christian” and “Catholic” were two words for the same thing. So when I heard John F. Kennedy was our first Catholic president I assumed that meant all the previous presidents had been Jewish.
21. At one time I had four blogs. Now I only have one. (Well, sometimes I’ll post something on the Red Sox blog, but I’ll also post it on the regular one)
22. My iPod only plays in one ear. Luckily I mostly use it for podcasts, so I don’t really miss the stereo.
23. I lived a few blocks away from Fenway Park when the Red Sox won their first World Series in 86 years.
24. For some reason, I can still remember the strength levels of most major Marvel Comics characters from The Official Handbook to the Marvel Universe: Deluxe Edition (published around 1985-1987). For example, The Hulk can lift (press) more than 100 tons, but the Thing can only lift (press) 85 tons.
25. Amanda and I have visited 20 foreign countries together, if you count short in-an-outs in Austria, Belgium, and Argentina.

2009-01-23T13:24:00.002-05:00

Let's be honest, ladies, if your husband had just become the most powerful man in the world, and he was dancing with you while Beyonce sang live, just to him ... wouldn't you suspect his mind might not be entirely on you?

2009-01-21T12:43:00.001-05:00

Inaugural Thoughts

Well, I was impressed. I dug the speech, the pageantry, the music. I even found Rick Warren marginally tolerable. The mild fumbling of the oath aside (and I think it will be forgotten quickly), this was a phenomenal way to begin anew.

For this, I will write only positive things today. I might have some less positive things to say down the line, but today is about celebration, not gloating or tearing down. My thoughts are a bit scattered at the moment, but I’ll settle down as I get going.

One has to wonder of those present at the first inauguration, 220 years ago, could have conceived, or believed you if you told them that one day an event like this would be orchestrated by a Jewish woman, and included the swearing-in of a black President and an Irish Catholic Vice-President.

I was pleased that Obama acknowledged the “non-believers” (though I could say that a lot of Shintoists, Buddhists, Bahai and others kinda fell through the cracks).

Interesting facts:

With Clinton and Bush43 we have the first presidents to serve two terms each, back to back, since Madison and Monroe (with Jefferson, they were actually three two-termers back-to-back-back). Interesting, eh? How did it take so long to happen? Let’s look at who was elected to two terms …
Reagan – followed by a one-termer
Nixon – resigned during second term
Eisenhower – followed by JFK who was killed before finishing first term
FDR – an odd case, since he didn’t finish his FOURTH term. Followed by Truman, who was elected to one term of his own, but declined to run again (he could have, though now that would not be the case)
Wilson – followed by Harding, who died in office
McKinley – Assassinated early in his second term, succeeded by TR who was elected once to a term of his own, then passed over by his party for renomination
Cleveland – Elected to two non-consecutive terms, succeeded by McKinley, anyway
Grant – followed by Hayes, a one-termer
Lincoln – assassinated shortly into second term. Johnson succeeded him and HE was succeeded by two-term Grant, making this the only instance where two men won two elections each in a row (other than Jefferson/Madison and Clinton/Bush43).
Jackson – followed by one-termer Van Buren

Between Jackson and Lincoln a period of 24 years, no one was reelected. Eight men held office, but only four finished one full term (including Zachary Taylor, the only president to die in office who wasn’t elected during a year ending in zero).

The past three presidents have all been named after their fathers, though Obama is the only one sworn in under the exact same name as his father. William Jefferson Blythe, Jr. took his stepfather’s name of Clinton, George Walker Bush is one Herbert short of being a true George Bush, Jr. But Barack Hussein Obama’s father’s name was Barack Hussein Obama. To the best of my knowledge, though, he has never used the suffix “Junior.”

Technically Obama was wrong about 43 men before him taking this oath – Cleveland counts as two presidents, but he’s only one man.

I’ve said this before, but it’s very possible now that we will never have a president born in the 1950s. I did a quick search for the likely candidates for 2012 and 2016. Here are the ones who were born between 1950 and 1959 -- Jeb Bush, Charlie Crist, Lindsey Graham, Mike Huckabee, Gary Johnson, Mike Pence, Rick Perry, David Petreus, Janet Napolitano, Claire McCaskill, Kay Hagan, Rahm Emmanuel, Tim Kaine, Mark Warner, Evan Bayh, Brian Schweitzer, and Mark Udall. Among those, who has a real chance? Petreus, Kaine, Warner, Graham … maybe. Of course, it could be someone completely out of left field. We weren’t exactly talking about the likelihood of a President Obama on January 21, 2001.

But, anyway … what if we never got a 50s president? How odd would that be? More Americans were born in the 50s than any decade in history, and we might skip over the decade entirely. It saddens me to think of the Baby Boom generation as essentially a failure but … well, that’s kind of exhibit A.

Personal weird observations:

I have not yet had the experience of having a president who is younger than me. But I’m getting closer. Essentially, this is the first president young enough to have been my baby sitter. Obama started at Occidental College the year I started nursery school.

Speaking of Occidental, it’s an odd thought that the President probably took a variation on a class I have taught. I wonder how Barry did in Freshman Comp in the fall of ’79.

I often wondered what I would talk about with George W. Bush if we were trapped in an elevator together. I usually assumed it would be baseball. With Obama, I’d probably have a million things I could say, but, let’s be honest, we’d probably talk about Spider-Man.

I’m very optimistic about the next four years. When I was choosing between Obama and Clinton in the primary, I was wary about falling under the spell of Obama’s cool. I didn’t think he was a phony, but I also didn’t want to let my personal fondness for him cause me to overlook any flaws. What I hadn’t really taken into account was his ability to use that cool so well. The man truly is the uniter that Bush claimed to be. Bush and Clinton both have great personal magnetism, I am told, but an equal capacity for turning people off, for seeming artificial or political. I’m sure there will always been diehards who resist Obama’s charm, but the way he has handled the transition indicates that he truly has a gift for building coalitions through a combination of logic and personality. I’m sure he’ll have off days, but at this point I think he has just the right set of gifts and skills to take on the enormous job he has before him.

Somehow, and perhaps this is his doing, perhaps it is just his nature, and perhaps it’s just us imagining him as the knight astride a steed we desire, but I think Obama has an uncanny ability to be all things to all people. Think of these recent articles about him collecting Spider-Man comics, which ran right next to articles about him putting together a cabinet of great basketball players. There are a plethora of dualities in our perception of the new president: The soaring orator and the witty jokester. The supreme intellectual and the regular-guy father of two.

Heck, he’s even able to be black and white at the same time.

In 1993, liberals invested far too high hopes in a basically decent but deeply flawed man. Are doing it again? Well, beyond the fact that Obama doesn’t seem to have any of the glaring flaws that Clinton did … yes, it’s possible. We are putting all our eggs in one basket – a good basket, to be certain, but we’re doing that very typical liberal thing of setting ourselves up for massive disappointment.

Then again … do we have any other choice?

Like the man said, we chose hope. And I couldn’t be happier that we did.

2009-01-19T23:31:00.003-05:00

The Gift That Kept On Giving

I'm certainly not the first to observe this, but the end of the Bush years is a serious blow to comedy. While I'm thrilled to the gills about the end of our national nightmare, I admit that it's going to be much, much harder to write jokes about a decent, honorable, intelligent man I like and admire. Seriously, is it going to be four-to-eight years of big ear jokes?

So here is a sampling of the jokes I've written about George W. Bush over the years. Enjoy.

To mark George Washington's 275th birthday, President Bush visited Mount Vernon and met with a George Washington look-a-like, to whom Bush said “Oh, hi, Mom.”

Monday was President's Day, when Americans remember what it was like when we had a president.

In his final speech before the UN General Assembly, President Bush urged the organization to do more to prevent terrorism "instead of only passing resolutions." The General Assembly immediately passed a resolution that they don’t give three craps from a crippled duck what George Bush has to say.

A mental patient in Illinois has pleaded guilty to threatening to castrate President Bush, but was released after being credited with time served. Besides, as the judge put it, after the midterm elections, castrating Bush would be a little redundant.

President Bush is hoping to raise 500 million dollars to build his presidential library. Unlike most libraries, there will be no fines for overdue books, even if you keep them out much, much, much longer than you said you would.

President Bush, who is visiting Vietnam this week, rejected links between the Vietnam War and the war in Iraq saying, "I see the differences. I really do." ... "For instance my father’s friends are still looking for a way to get me out of Iraq."

President Bush spoke Monday at the groundbreaking of the Martin Luther King, Jr. National Memorial on the Mall in Washington, DC. Bush and King have a lot in common. King had a dream and Bush has spent the past two weeks desperately hoping that he was just about to wake up from one

President Bush signed a bill Thursday authorizing 700 miles of new fencing along the US-Mexico border. Sadly, Tom Sawyer later tricked the president into painting the fence himself.

President Bush threw out the opening pitch Monday at Cincinnati's Great American Ball Park, but the pitch was high and inside, two words that also describe George W. Bush during Vietnam.

There is concern that if Saddam Hussein and his co-defendants keep interrupting their trial, the judge in the case will try them in absentia. Upon hearing this, President Bush immediately asked Congress to allow him to use military force to liberate the people of Absentia.

In a speech defending his Iraq policy, President Bush compared the war to World Wars I and II. When asked which one he thought Iraq most resembled, Bush said, "Oh, probably the one with the Ewoks."

Republicans are upset with Hillary Clinton for a speech she gave in which she compared President Bush to Mad Magazine's Alfred E. Neuman and his "What, me worry?" attitude. GOP representatives sent Clinton an angry letter, which would have been more powerful if they hadn't signed it "The Usual Gang of Idiots"

This week President Bush met with Nelson Mandela in the White House, but Mandela never mentioned his fierce opposition to the war in Iraq, mostly because he kept having to explain to Bush that he wasn’t the guy from Million Dollar Baby.

Many in the Senate are calling the Republicans' plan to get rid of judicial filibusters, the "nuclear option." Or, as Bush calls it, the “stop trying to make me say that word” option.

House Speaker Dennis Hastert had kidney stone surgery at National Naval Medical Center on Wednesday. So he finally has something harder to pass than the Bush Social Security plan.

President Bush on Tuesday demanded that Syria leave Lebanon saying, "The Lebanese people have the right to determine their future free from domination by a foreign power." Bush asserted that he is very concerned about the future of the Lebanese people and has been ever since John Kerry pointed out that Dick Cheney has a Lebanese daughter.

While entering for his State of the Union address, President Bush waved to John Kerry. Kerry responded with a thumbs up. Poor John Kerry, one state away from the White House, two fingers away from what he really wanted to say.

Various groups who oppose President Bush are urging demonstrators to gather in Washington, DC for Bush's inauguration and turn their back on his motorcade when it passes. Well, Bush will be seeing the backs a lot of Americans over the next four years, while he’s busy fucking them up the ass.

Tailor Georges de Paris, who has made clothes for every president since Lyndon Johnson, is upset that a Bush spokesman blamed him for the bulge in Bush's suit during the first Presidential debate. So, now it’s official … every French person in the world hates George W. Bush.

Apparently, President Bush's nickname for Condoleezza Rice is "Arroz," the Spanish word for rice. Rice reportedly prefers this to Bush's old nickname for her, "Uncle Ben."

President Bush signed an annual proclamation to declare United Nations Day. He recommended Americans celebrate the day by completely ignoring it, then sheepishly asking it for help several months later.

The elementary school national newspaper, the Weekly Reader, conducts a poll every election year and has successfully predicted every presidential election since 1956. According to this year’s poll George W. Bush will be reelected. Experts say this is the first endorsement President Bush is likely to read himself.

In a related children’s magazine endorsement story, Highlights has split its choice for the first time, with Goofus supporting the President and Gallant endorsing John Kerry.

At a campaign stop, President Bush said that his performance in the debates highlight his record. The Kerry campaign responded, “Yeah, that was kind of our point.”

A new poll shows that Bush and Kerry are back in a virtual tie. Having heard about the “virtual tie” Bush immediately made plans to start campaigning inside the Matrix.

President Bush has called for the appointment of a new “Intelligence Czar.” He has expressed a hope that they get, “somebody really smart for the job, so he can figure out how the letter Z got into the word ‘czar.’”

During the first White House t-ball game of the year, one of the children accidentally ran past second base and into centerfield. President Bush immediately named the child the new director of the CIA.

A site called the Nonverbal Communications Web Project has photo evidence which they claim shows President Bush isn’t very good at shaking hands. They do concede that he’s quite good at fetching sticks and playing dead, though.

It’s looking more and more likely that, if President Bush is reelected, Colin Powell will not serve another term as Secretary of State. To add insult to injury, the Bush administration is planning to replace him with Dick Sergeant and hope nobody notices.

The film The Day After Tomorrow opens soon. In the movie, terrible weather destroys both the east and west coasts, leaving only the states in the middle. George W. Bush called it the feel-good movie of the year.

First Lady Laura Bush stumped for her husband in Las Vegas on Tuesday. Las Vegas seems a likely place to find people willing to reelect Bush, seeing as it's full of people who keep putting their money on the same number in roulette no matter how many times it loses.

Reports out of California indicate that Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger hasn’t done much yet to support President Bush’s reelection campaign. Wow. You know you’re in big trouble when a guy whose idea of good investments includes Planet Hollywood and Jingle all the Way doesn’t want anything to do with you.

2009-01-15T17:19:00.002-05:00

Wordplay Cascade

There’s a big ol’ scandal a-brewing. It seems there’s a trend called “sexting” where high school students send each other nude or near-nude photos of themselves via cell phone. There was recently an arrest in Pennsylvania and several kids were charged with distributing pornography.

But that’s not the only shocking trend involving teens and mobile phones. Today’s teenagers are also …

Sending photos of themselves eating Multi-Grain cereal mix, or “Chexting”
Sending photos of themselves wearing large sombreros, or “Mexting”
Sending photos of people with red dots on their faces, or “frexting”
Sending photos of metrosexual English soccer stars, or “Bexting”
Sending photos of large carnivorous dinosaurs, or “T-rexting”
Sending photos of themselves wearing glasses, or “spexting”
Sending photos of themselves not eating, or “anorexting”
Sending photos of their chest muscles, or “pexting”
Sending evil dark magic spells, or “hexting”

And, of course, sending pictures of themselves in ten-gallons hats, or “Texting”

Oh … wait …

2009-01-12T14:05:00.001-05:00

2009-01-09T21:49:00.002-05:00

This morning I heard an NPR reporter say that there was hope "a durable cease fire agreement" in Gaza. I, of course, heard this as "an adorable cease fire."

I hope they do get one. Heck, I hope it's just the cutest cease fire ever.

2009-01-08T23:39:00.000-05:00

I finally found some photos from that Alabama production of PUSS IN BOOTS. They're spectacular, very possibly the best production values a play of mine has ever had. I got these from the MySpace page of the guy playing the Ogre, so they're a little ogre-centric. Awesome.

2009-01-07T21:58:00.003-05:00

More Deleted Scene Theatre

I got some good advice about my "30 Rock" spec so I'm doing some big rewrites on it. That means I'll have to cut a scene I quite like. I don't mind cutting it, because I think the script will be improved. To set it up, Liz is dating a new guy who is very passionate about life, and trying to bring similar passion out in Liz. This has led to a tense moment in the writers' room as the writers all left the room to protest on Liz's insistence that they write more relevant, passionate sketches.

INT. STUDIO - DAY

Not much is going on. Liz sits in the audience bleachers.

Jack enters and sits next to her.

JACK

Seems to me that booger sketch could

have worked.

LIZ

You heard about what happened in the

writer's room.

JACK

Yes. Quite a little outburst. So

passion fruit is the flavor of the

month, eh?

LIZ

No, Jack, this is not a phase, like

when I kept writing in obscure

regional dialects.

CUT TO:

INT. SOUNDSTAGE - DAY

A driveway set, with a dirty car. Jenna and Josh are playing

a couple with distinctive Central Pennsylvania dialects.

JENNA

This car needs warshed! Get some

wooder!

JOSH

Oh, the car's about dirty. That'd be

odd.

JENNA

Redd up now or I'll slap you one!

CUT TO:

INT. STUDIO - DAY

Back to Liz and Jack.

JACK

This new beau has had quite an effect

on you. I bet when you dated the

sensitive English Major sophomore year

you pretended to like Byron, too.

LIZ

You can laugh, Jack. But Xander has

really opened my eyes. A life without

passion isn't worth living.

JACK

Passion is all well and good, Lemon.

But are you sure it's for you?

LIZ

Oh, what, so you can have passion for

business, but it's impossible for me

to have it for my work?

JACK

I'm not a man of passion. Passion is

messy and unfocused. It's obsession

that gets the job done. A passionate

man dreams of soaring with the eagles,

but it was my obsessive nature than

let me train one to fetch the paper.

Lemon, I'm all in favor of you having

a vigorous and high-impact sex life,

but are you certain this man's right

for you?

LIZ

I'm very certain.

JACK

I'm writing a new book that could help

you. It's called Life and Business

the Goldilocks Way.

LIZ

Is this one of those gimmick books

that depends on one big analogy, like

"Be the laces, not the shoe" or

"Tossing salad, Ivan Boesky style?"

JACK

Being dismissive like that is a

typical Mama Bear tactic.

LIZ

I'm a Mama Bear?

JACK

I divide people up into the archetypes

from the story. Papa Bears do

everything the hard way out of a sense

of guilt or obligation.

LIZ

I though those people were called

"Catholics."

JACK

Mama Bears, like yourself, are drawn

towards comfort and avoid excitement

and conflict. Baby Bears achieve

balance. They are "just right."

LIZ

So you're trying to make everyone a

Baby Bear?

JACK

Baby Bear is a people pleaser who eats

lukewarm porridge and winds up with a

broken chair. I want people to become

Goldilocks, the adventurer who takes

what she wants with little fear of

consequences. I was born a Papa Bear

but I've transformed myself into a

Goldilocks.

LIZ

And I'm a Mama Bear?

JACK

Yes, but you're convinced you're

living a Baby Bear lifestyle. But

Xander is clearly a Goldilocks and I

fear that you'll wake up one morning

and ask "Who's this sleeping in my

bed?"

Jack rises to go.

LIZ

Wasn't Goldilocks almost mauled to

death by bears?

JACK

Almost.

The script was called "Goldilocks" (after previously being called "Monkee Love" ... I also brielfy considered "The Passion of the Lemon") so I'll need a new title, too. The plan is to call it "Limousine Liberal" ... I'll let you guess why.

2009-01-05T23:14:00.001-05:00

So my new theory is that Gossip Girl actually is Veronica Mars, and she's just doing this whole blog thing as part of an investigation.

Why she also wanted to go undercover as the wimpiest, whiniest supervillain of all time is beyond me.

2009-01-03T03:31:00.000-05:00

let's start off the new year with a tacky joke thousands of people have probably already made about the passing of an artist whose work I truly liked and admired ...

Are we sure Harold Pinter is really dead? Maybe he's just pausing.

2008-12-31T21:25:00.002-05:00

Should Old Acquaintance Be ... dammit, how does that line go?

Well, Oh Eight was quite some year, especially, for Amanda and me, the first four and a half months and the first Tuesday in November.

We're back home in LA after seeing family in Massachusetts and Pennsylvania. We picked up the pets from the Pet Hotel and now we're settling in for some home sushi making (wish us luck), and a pretty mellow evening to end a decidedly non-mellow year.

Hope you and the ones you love are well. See you next year!

2008-12-29T21:52:00.002-05:00

The Palin-Johnston baby has been born and named Tripp. Well, at least that's kind of a real name, if a little similar sounding to uncle Trig. I was pulling for "Joe the Baby."

In all seriousness I wish the young family well. For several reasons I hope I never ever hear about them ever again.

2008-12-24T22:14:00.001-05:00

Disney Holiday Overlays That Didn't Make It

Disney does special things at this time of year. Not just decorations, but doing new parades and fireworks and shows, and holiday overlays on attractions like Country Bear Jamboree, Haunted Mansion, and Small World.

But did you know that there were plans for a lot more holiday overlays which didn’t work out, for one reason or another? Let’s take a look back to the history of the Disney Holiday Attractions that never quite came to be.

(Look, just give over to the premise without complaint, okay?)

The first idea that didn’t work out was to turn Splash Mountain into Nog Mountain by replacing all the water with delicious eggnog. Who doesn’t like eggnog, right? Well, yeah, but, while park guests don’t mind getting a little wet, spending all day sticky and covered in nutmeg doesn’t really make most people think “holiday cheer.” So that one didn’t last.

They also considered something called the Mad Chanukah Party. This was a pretty simple idea, where they would just replace the teacups with giant dreidels you could ride in. This made some sense, except that dreidels only spin for so long before they have to tip over. So they were giving it a test ride and it landed on gimel and three people riding it broke their wrists.

On paper, turning the Jungle Cruise into the Jingle Cruise sounded fun. But it just didn’t make any sense for it to be snowing in Africa. And why was there a polar bear in the Ganges River? And could you really get a hippopotamus to pull a sleigh? But it was kind of cute how they made it look like the people being chased up the tree by the rhino were just climbing up to put a star on top.

Even less successful was the Enchanted Turkey Room. ‘Cause it’s fun to watch animatronic singing parrots, but much less fun when it’s four cooked, stuffed, headless turkeys serenading you. It was cute when the plum pudding sang Mele Kalikimaka, though.

Over at Epcot they were going to turn the whole Wonders of Life Pavillion into the “It’s a Wonderful Wonders of Life Pavillion.” Now, I love the Jimmy Stewart classic It’s a Wonderful Life. Great movie, but did you really want to go on rides called Clarence Command, Bailey Wars, or The Making of Zuzu?

Maybe the worst idea was Star Tours of Bethlehem . I’m not saying you CAN’T mix Christianity and Star Wars, but it was a little offensive when they told us See Threepio was the gold thing the first King gave the baby Jesus. Also, I just didn’t buy the idea of shepherds watching flocks of tauntauns.

Then there were the ones that never got off the drawing board -- Reindeer of the Caribbean, Honey I Shrunk the Fruitcake, Tinsel Talk With Crush, It’s Tough to Be an Elf. Etc. etc.

Merry Christmas Everybody

2008-12-21T17:53:00.001-05:00

I hadn't been to a dentist in several years. But I finally bit the bullet and went, yesterday. She told me to stop biting so many bullets.

2008-12-19T15:33:00.007-05:00

Miles and Miles

Sorry for the long gap between blog entries. I was doing a stupid thing I’ve done before … trying to make something special.

You see, this is the 2000^th entry here on baggypantsandbravado. So … here goes …

Yay!

2000 is an interesting number. I was pretty obsessed with the millennium, back in the mid-nineties. Why? I dunno, it seemed like an interesting thing that was happening and it seemed to tie together some things I was observing in culture. So I wrote a lot of plays with millennial themes and … well, actually I kinda ran out of steam for it all by the time the actual millennium rolled around.

Still, 2000 is a nice number and deserves some commemoration. So … I dunno, how about a look back at some of my favorite entries. This is nothing definitive, just a few that come to mind.

So what’s the future of this blog? Well, it’s likely mostly the same as it’s been for the past few months. A few posts a week, often very short. I doubt it will ever return to the scope or depth of, say 2004, but back then I would have been surprised to hear I would still be blogging at all in 2008. So, it’ll be a long time before we hit post 4000.

But, hey, it’s been fun getting here. And there should be some more fun on the way.

Honest!

2008-12-08T22:17:00.006-05:00

These BOOTS were made for rambling

Today is the birthday of my friend Kevin Maher from Vassar. He's a very funny guy who is currently producing some very funny videos for AMC and some others. They can be found at his blog ThisKevin, which is the latest addition to the blogroll. He also was kind enough to allow me to steal a character name from him for CASEY AT THE BAT, back in 2001. At Vassar he had co-written a sketch about Mayor McCheese (yes, they built the giant cheeseburger head) dying of a drug overdose and getting replaced by a lookalike, as in Dave. Anyway, Kevin played the character of (if I remember correctly) a reporter named John Evilman, who assured everyone that his name was pronounced like Goldman or Silverman, and should not be inferred to mean that he is an evil man ... though, of course, he was. When I needed to name my villain in CASEY, I wrote Kevin to ask to steal the name and joke, he okayed it and Bob Evilman was born.

Anyway, for Kevin's birthday I wanted to send a semi-interesting Facebook message, so I Googled "Bob Evilman" to see if there was anything interesting online about "our" character. I found something kind of interesting, a kid who played the role in school has taken the MySpace name "Maximillian Evilman," which is especially funny since, according to his page, he's quite a devout Christian. How does his priest or minister like "Maximillian Evilman"? Why not "Lucifer McSinnerpants"?

Anyway, doing this gave me an idea. As an unemployed egotist, I spend a lot of time Googling myself and my plays. The problem, of course, is that my four published plays all have familiar titles. Google "Casey at the Bat" and you go through MANY pages before you get anywhere near me. And adding my name only works a little. If I'm searching for things like newspaper reviews, blog entries, etc., they often don't bother to mention the author (as we found out with RAPUNZEL last summmer) But, I thought, what if I searched for the unique character names in my plays, along with the titles? Might turn up some actors' resumes, at least, right?

Of course, in those four plays, there are only so many unique character names: JEKYLL AND HYDE has Cybel the prostitute, but the other names come from the book. PUSS IN BOOTS has Ugolin the Ogre, but the other character names are generic (Genevieve), un-Google-able (Guy ... as in Guy de Maupassant), or unlikely to be reproduced online (King Jean-Louis-Robert-Jacque-Jean and Queen Marie-Annette-Yvette-Suzette-Marie). RAPUNZEL has Strutz and Fretz the minstrels. It also has Prince Rupert, but the only results for "Rapunzel Rupert" turned up this blog ... Don't worry; I'm pretty sure those were just placeholder names, and they named the twins something else. And CASEY has Evilman and, I supposed Phred the Phan.

Anyway, Ugolin turned up something I'd been looking for for a while. I've been eagerly awaiting Fantasy Playhouse Theatre, the theatre in Huntsville, AL that did the show last winter, to put up some photos from PUSS IN BOOTS. I did learn that the production was nominated for a zillion local awards, and won a few technical ones. No luck yet, but I did find a very cute blog entry from a family that saw the show, and they took pictures of the cast during post-show autographs:

Okay, I love the makeup and the costume. But ... kinda bugs me that they cast a guy in the role. There are so few good roles for actresses and I was very proud of the character of Boots and the opportunities it gives a good, nimble actress. So why waste that by casting a guy? There are three good parts in the play for men. It seems that this actor is, like, the big star at the theatre. So I understand why they wanted to give him the featured part. But, c'mon, NO women auditioned who could do it?

There's no doubt that the Puss character in Shrek has increased the popularity of the play. I'm grateful for that, but now I wonder ... are people always casting men in the role? Are they playing the character with a Spanish accent even though the play is very clearly set in France? Sigh.

I LOVE these costumes for the King and Quuen. Very French. I wonder how they made them seem to be turning into a cow and a chicken.

Um ... did they over-make-up these kids to make them look "extra Asian"?

Very cool Ugolin the Ogre. Probably my favorite I've ever seen.

There's no jester in the play. I'm guessing they had the costume around and used it for one of the townsfolk. Read the blog entry for some very sweet stuff about the family's eldest daughter having a crush on Guy here. In general, it's a fascinating read. Life in Alabama is really different from what I grew up with.

2008-12-08T01:42:00.001-05:00

ME: Wow. Three of the four Desperate Housewives are actually acting like decent human beings this week.

AMANDA: Marc Cherry must not have had much to do with this episode.

2008-12-04T10:39:00.002-05:00

Here's an article that mentions a production of my JEKYLL AND HYDE script. I mention it because it's my first international production. Barely. The Canadian side of Niagra Falls. As close to America as you can get and not be in it. So my ability to claim to be an international playwright is only slightly more legitmate than David Rice Atchison's ability to claim he was president.

2008-12-02T15:48:00.003-05:00

So, as a Hillary Clinton admirer I'm pleased to see she'll be Secretary of State, but I'm even more psyched to see that JAMES EARL JONES is going to be National Security Advisor!

I don't think there's a man alive who could possibly make me feel more secure! Heck, he can intimidate our enemies just by saying "hello!" His deep comforting/ominous baritone can be the greatest weapon in our diplomatic arsenal!

2008-12-02T01:52:00.002-05:00

I've mentioned the live peacocks roaming through people's yards in Arcadia, California. Peacocks are, of course, very lovely, but they're also noisy, messy, and destructive. Apparently, according to Amanda, they were brought in when "Fantasy Island" was shooting nearby and some escaped and have been running wild ever since. So basically, if your lawn is covered in peacock poo, you have Ricardo Montalban to blame. In other words ...

"Khaaaaaaan!"

2008-11-27T12:04:00.003-05:00

Happy Thanksgiving everybody. I hardly need to say that we all have a lot to be thankful for this year. So, I won't. I'll just say something snarky.

Why do public schools serve turkey and fixings for school lunch on the day before Thanksgiving? What's the logic here? We're all about to eat GOOD turkey dinners the next day, so why would we want to eat a crappy approximation of it for lunch the day before? I'm sure the people who make school lunches are hard working and do the best they can, but, c'mon, when they go much beyond grilled cheese and French bread pizza, they usually fall pretty flat. Why not go in a wholly different direction for that last Wednesday? Tacos! Chop Suey! You're not doing anybody any favors.

2008-11-27T02:54:00.003-05:00

I hate linking to the New York Post, seeing as it's the worst newspaper in the world. But this is so ...

Shouldn't they have the hang of this kind of thing after eight years?

Oy vey, Maria.

2008-11-26T19:01:00.003-05:00

Disneyland Shorthanded

We planned a Disney trip for Amanda's birthday (the day before, techinically, on the 15th). Without our annual passes, these visits have become "special occasions" only, but, what's more special than that?

But, well, the best laid plans ...

We rose early to have a hearty breakfast before setting out and while preparing said meal I managed to burn my hand with scalding hot bacon grease. Doctors are right. That stuff is NOT good for you.

This effectively put the kibosh on Disneyland for the day. It may be the happiest place on Earth, but I’m guessing it would be substantially less happy if seared chunks of my flesh were falling off during the loop on California Screamin’.

So, one week later, with my hand much better and my wound disguised under an “energizing support glove” we went for “take two.” The glove was a great find by the way – it kept my bandages clean (I put an extra rubber glove over it for water rides) and hid my kinda-gross-looking wounds from onlookers, since I had no desire to traumatize young children by being the scariest part of Tower of Terror all by myself. The glove is sold under the brand name “Futuro,” which I especially love because it sounds like the name of an evil robot that would have fought the Justice League of America in the early 60s.

After a few rides in Disneyland, we headed across the way for the opening of California Adventure. This was our first chance to ride the new Toy Story Midway Mania and we wanted to beat the line. Being savvy visitors we decided to split up so Amanda could FastPass Soarin’ Over California while I got in line for Midway Mania.

But here’s where we outclevered ourselves. Because what should Amanda encounter just outside of Soarin’? Why, it was three cast members handing out Dream Fast Passes that let you get onto all the most popular rides without waiting in line or using the standard fastpass system, where you put your ticket into a machine and it tells you when to come back and ride.

I don't know how we do it. We went to Disneyland two or three times a month for about half of the two-year Year of a Million Dreams celebration and got NADA in terms of prizes and now we show up for the first time in six months and BAM.

But hey, awesome, right? Yes, absolutely … except that I’m off in the Paradise Pier area and the cast members aren’t allowed to give Amanda two passes. And just what good is it going to do us to have ONE of us have a Fast Pass?

Aha! But here’s where it gets good again. As Amanda realized, once you have a good-any-time fastpass, suddenly you also have the ability to get multiple simultaneous regular fast passes. Since you only need one for each ride, and you have two park tickets … you see what I mean? So it was a piece of cake to fastpass, say, Indiana Jones and Splash Mountain at the same time, without having to wait for the second one. The result was a day that didn’t have the all-out freedom of a Dream Fastpass, but did have the structure that we would have lacked if we could have waltzed on to any ride at any time. Part of the fun of a Disney day for us is always figuring out how to make it work for us, and this added wrinkle made that all the more enjoyable. “Okay, so I’ll get in line for Matterhorn, while you take both our tickets to Fastpass Space Mountain and Buzz Lightyear! Got it? Break!” We live for this stuff. We left the park with our usual sense of exhaustion and elation, but with an added degree of accomplishment. It was a pretty good birthday.

So my lessons learned are

1. Don’t burn your hand with bacon grease
2. If you do burn your hand with bacon grease, get a Futuro Energizing Support Glove. The only Energizing Support Glove endorsed by the Legion of Doom
3. If only half your party gets a Dream Fast Pass, don’t panic. It can still work for you.
4. Feel free to overeat at Thanksgiving this year. You’ll still fit on small world because they've made the boats and the canals bigger to accommodate ... differently girthed Americans.
Oh and
5. Apparently they give you a bag with seven free tortillas in the Tortilla Factory at DCA if you come in wearing a birthday button.

Oh, and my hand is doing fine. Thanks for asking.

2008-11-23T12:02:00.000-05:00

Why can you only be squeamish? Has anyone every been full-on squeam?

2008-11-21T17:54:00.001-05:00

Yep ... The Onion is brilliant.

2008-11-19T00:24:00.002-05:00

One way in which life in LA is different from life elsewhere:

In Western Mass, when our local NPR did a pledge drive there would be matching challenges from wealthy locals, banks, small businesses, etc. This morning, on our LA NPR affiliate, there was one from Tom Hanks and Rita Wilson.

2008-11-19T00:20:00.002-05:00

Two observations about some "Seinfeld" reruns Amanda and I have recently watched:

For a show that captured so much about life in the nineties, so well, the show almost completely fails to acknowledge the Internet. Just a few references to email. That's it, I think.
A huge number of "Seinfeld" plots wouldn't work if the characters had cell phones. Of course, this is true of most farce.

2008-11-16T15:05:00.020-05:00

Woman of the World

Hey! It's November 16 and we know what that means, right?

That's right! It's George S. Kaufman's birthday!

Oh, and Amanda's, too.

Today is the big three-oh and, as is our tradition, I will show you one photo for every year of Amanda's life to make it clear why I love her so much.

This year's photos are, of course, all from our Semester at Sea.

2008-11-14T23:57:00.003-05:00

Very cute video about a high school production of my RAPUNZEL script. So cute that I'll forgive them for doing eight performances and only paying for two.

2008-11-11T23:18:00.001-05:00

I have a lot to say about the election. Just haven't typed it up yet. For now, enjoy a tour of our new house, hosted by me in all my beefy glory.