Can't blog...Simpsons Marathon

Can't blog...Simpsons Marathon
Can't blog...Simpsons Marathon
Can't blog...Simpsons Marathon
Can't blog...Simpsons Marathon
Can't blog...Simpsons Marathon
Can't blog...Simpsons Marathon
Can't blog...Simpsons Marathon
Can't blog...Simpsons Marathon
Can't blog...Simpsons Marathon
Can't blog...Simpsons Marathon
Can't blog...Simpsons Marathon
Can't blog...Simpsons Marathon
Can't blog...Simpsons Marathon
Can't blog...Simpsons Marathon
Can't blog...Simpsons Marathon
Can't blog...Simpsons Marathon
Can't blog...Simpsons Marathon
Can't blog...Simpsons Marathon
Can't blog...Simpsons Marathon
Can't blog...Simpsons Marathon
Can't blog...Simpsons Marathon
Can't blog...Simpsons Marathon
Can't blog...Simpsons Marathon
Can't blog...Simpsons Marathon
Can't blog...Simpsons Marathon
Can't blog...Simpsons Marathon
Can't blog...Simpsons Marathon
Can't blog...Simpsons Marathon
Can't blog...Simpsons Marathon
Can't blog...Simpsons Marathon
Can't blog...Simpsons Marathon
Can't blog...Simpsons Marathon
Can't blog...Simpsons Marathon

See you in 12 days...

A Blog to Hold You Over

Where o where shall I be going?  I put this bold question out because I will be in fact taking a short, but well deserved vacation and will switch from doing very little in New York City to doing very little in another location.  To say this vacation is well deserved is an understatement for many reasons that I’m sure all my faithful readers know by heart.  I’ll wait as you remind yourself of them.  I will not be able to keep up my vigorous three times a week blogging schedule and will be forced to forfeit writing a few of these lovely posts.  To hold you over until my next post, I have presented a few possible blogs I would have written.  Read any two on each blank blog day and you’ll never be apart from me.  That’s a promise.

1)      Something about Bob Dylan touring/new album update/or being the man that very few people will read because it’s getting a bit repetitive…to them.  I, however, shall never tire talking about the Minnesota bard.

2)      A vaguely abstract post about a certain emotion that developed into an internal/external physical sensation brought on by a strange situation that I feel compelled to write about.  This weeks could be about, oh I don’t know, that weird feeling that comes when you see somebody you dated way back in the day and the oddness of having to be near them after so long.  Maybe I would explore a feeling of emptiness or the childish ways I tried to impress/best/creep on said person.  This is all hypothetical of course; it totally didn’t happen, but then again, we all know I have a penchant for lying in these things.

3)      A bullet point article that consists of either snappy one liners or paragraph long mini rants.  Here’s a snappy one liner that could come from this example essay entitled “Things to do in August”: Keep your sunglasses on at night.  Everybody will think, or rather, know you’re the coolest person at the party.

4)      A sports update.  I’ll share my wild card fever or discuss the NBA offseason in my patented signature style.  Take that Grantland!

5)      An article that starts a boatload of comments and discussions.  Nah, just kidding, but one can dream.  One can dream.

6)      A repost of an essay I wrote for a film/history class in an effort to slack off but still fit the blogging schedule.  Take this title: “Walter Benjamin and Mechanical Reproduction” and let your imagination run wild with a five page essay.

 I hope that will fulfill you, my loyal readers, for the time being.  So I release you from my iron grip and will allow you to pursue other reading passions and other worthy blogs in my absence.  Stray my friends and let us enjoy our time off for when I return we will come back stronger than ever and continue to have a whoppin’ good time.

On the Next Arrested Development..

Yesterday Netflix announced that they were raring to go on season 5 of Arrested Development (link for those too lazy to google: http://www.cnet.com/news/arrested-development-to-return-to-netflix-for-another-season/), and as a fan of the show I could not be more excited.  I wish I could say that I proudly championed the show during its original run and sent letters to protest a rather premature ending, but that would be a very poor lie.  I, like many viewers, was late to the Arrested Development game and only started watching the show when I heard about it getting a fourth season on Netflix (I know, I know).  Initially I resisted watching the series because of my own foolish pettiness.  A bunch of my friends and associates would come up and ask if I had seen the show and would implore me to begin viewing saying that I would love it.  I hate when people say that something is right up my alley or that I would love it so I stayed away from the series to spite these said people and to remain a petty contrarian.  In short, I was being a fucking idiot.  So during one of those numerous empty weekends in Stony Brook, I decided to play a few episodes to see what all the hype surrounding the show was.  After barreling through 53 episodes of pure Bluthian madness and brilliance, I couldn’t get around thinking about how there must be a better way in proving I am a petty contrarian.  I was like Squidward when he ate his first Krabby Patty; all the wasted years melted away as I quickly watched and re-watched the series.  In the Jason Thompson pantheon of television shows, I would rate Arrested Development as my favorite non Simpsons show (so my second favorite show of all time).  I quickly quoted lines to any semi-relevant circumstance and even performed GOB’s magic act at an open mic night (the video is on this very blog, oh curious traveler).  I had morphed into what I had originally feared to become: an obsessive super fan and I could care less.  It was fun to find a new obsession and be in on the craze. 

I had already watched the series a few times by the dropping of the fourth season, so needless to say I was very excited.  I watched the fourth season in bunches and enjoyed the season on a whole and a bit more than other people I spoke to.  Like most viewers I had a few complaints about the season and they generally lined up with what others had said.  I felt that the real weakness of the season was that the family wasn’t together to bounce off each other and I didn’t like the extensive use of green screen which contributed to a fake feeling in some scenes.  The early episodes fluctuated in quality and the season didn’t hit its stride until the appearance of everybody’s favorite gentleman honey farmer.  Every episode after that point was great and I ended the season with a positive feeling.  There was no way that they could ever match the hype that surrounds a six year hiatus, but the fourth season mostly delivered and that was good enough.  With news of a fifth season, my hope is that these shows will feature the Bluths interacting more with each other like in the good old days.  Reading interviews with Mitch Hurwitz seems to suggest that he agrees with this criticism and will work to get the whole family back in the model home/penthouse.  So I say huzzah to new episodes of Arrested Development and can’t wait to see what else happens to our favorite family of rich fuck ups.  It will most likely be off the hook.        

Rage. Anger. Humiliation

Rage begins when your vision starts to blur and everything zooms out of focus.  The stomach concaves in and your internal temperature swells up to an unfathomable degree.  In short, it has become very, very hot in your general vicinity and that may be contributing to your incredible lack of eyesight.  Instead of focusing in on specific objects like a person or a lamppost, your vessels of sight have moved beyond our puny spectral plane and into the dimension of pure anger.  The problem with this rage and anger is that it frequently becomes a rather impotent one in which the only solution is to log off of Facebook and check the score of the game.  Usually that only dilutes the feeling of rage and petty anger leaving you with the option of taking a nice cathartic walk.  For me, a long walk into darkness and heat can takes away the sting of a simmering rage, but then again, how many walks can you take?  The magic of the sweaty cathartic walk can wear off if used one too many times, or so the legend says.  Luckily, I have not found this out to be the case so the walk shall serve as my main deterrent to having a stroke. 

In short, being angry is not fun, but what are you going to do?  The other option is to be the bigger man and brush it off but that isn’t really that fun.  Plus, how many times can one be the “bigger man” before just being a permanent sucker?  Sometimes giving in to rage, petty anger, and ultimately the dark side can be a great thing.  Stepping on to the ledge of no return and irrationality is thrilling fun where consequences are thrown to the wind.  In short, being angry can be sort of fun, but vey exhausting.  All the hating, built up anger, and then eventual punching of people is just so very tiring.  In short being angry is not that fun, but it can be.

So listen to the Emperor and give into your anger and your hate or at the bare minimum get off of Facebook because that sure as hell isn’t helping.  Take a walk and let that rage simmer down into pent up frustration and hatred that will burst out at an inappropriate and unexpected time.  Now that’s what some good old fashioned rage is all about. 

Birthdays of Note

Birthdays of Note –

1^st birthday – You haven’t died yet so there’s that.  Time to congratulate your parents by not pissing in their face or by keeping the crying to a minimum or by letting them sleep for a whole 6 hours.  This will be the first of many birthday parties where you have no memory of what happened or who you were surrounded by.  

  

10^th Birthday – There’s no going back from here.  You’ve hit the double digits and you’ll probably die in this age group.  But a tenth birthday is no place to be reminded of the cold emptiness that is mortality.  The party has ice cream cake, a million big and boxy presents, most of your 5^th grade class plus your other friends that don’t attend your elementary school thus making it one of your first parties with strained mingling and splintered factions. 

13^th Birthday – If you’re Jewish it’s the one where you become an adult but still can’t do anything that makes being an adult tolerable (voting, going to war).  If you’re not Jewish or are Jewish and simply don’t care, it’s just the first teenage party (braces and pimples galore)!  The presents start to take the form of envelopes or squishy clothes boxes.  Kind of cool I suppose.

16^th Birthday – If you’re not appearing on MTV or getting a car then this birthday means nothing.  Move it along people.

18^th Birthday – This would have been the cool birthday back in the day.  Now it’s just ceremonial as you can only vote, go to war, be charged as an adult, and appear in various barely legal pornos.  Celebrate in the appropriate fashion and by that I mean start making some pornos.  It’s better than going to war.

21^st Birthday – Try not to be the obituary in the paper that eventually makes it into the freshman alcohol education course.  This is also the birthday where you find out that bars are very expensive and that they sort of suck.  It’s all downhill from here.

27^th Birthday – This is a big one if you are a rock star.  If you die now you become an immortal.  If you do choose to live it out, immortality is still a viable option but you’ll miss out on joining this most elusive of clubs.  Choose wisely for this could be your crossroads.

30^th Birthday – Important only if you live in Logan’s Run.

35^th Birthday – Where does it all go right?  And why are you the only one of your friends without a stable job, spouse, or kids?  I’ll tell you why, because your friends with a heap of suckers!

40^th Birthday – You sold out man.  A wife?  Two to three kids?  And a lame job in finance just because Doug’s wife called you a fuck up.  You folded man.  But whatever, 40 is super depressing but at least you’re not alone.  At least you’re not so very alone like Doug’s bitch wife will be once she finds out what Doug has been doing on his extended business trips…

50^th Birthday – This is officially the midlife crises or halfway point day.  You’ve actually made it through 50 torturous years of existence and would be considered ancient if this was 1785.  Now you’re distinguished or simply “paunchy”.  But it’s been quite a 50 years.  The birthday party has been a bit subdued due to the  kids still reeling from your divorce and subsequent remarriage to Doug’s wife (she’s actually super cool), but at least a host of work friends and family members are enjoying the open bar.  What a bunch of letches.  Things are going well I suppose.

65^th Birthday – This was supposed to be a combination birthday/retirement party but those bastards on Wall Street made sure to spoil that.  According to your financial advisor that combo party will have to wait till your 75^th.  Now it’s time to sit back and hang out with your family and friends to reminisce about the days when you could hear each other reminisce about the good old days.  Good times.

75^th Birthday – You are old buddy and its super weird.  This birthday is shaping up like your first one but only because you have dementia.  So enjoy the cake the nice strangers gave you?

90th  Birthday – You’ve been dead for 8 years.  Sorry you had to find out this way.