Catching Up Is Hard To Do: The Culture

Last year, when I attended these same two conferences, I gave laboriously detailed instructions to my wife to make sure she took out the VCR tape on Tuesday night before JEOPARDY!, lest the six hour recording be cut off and I miss recording one of our shows. This year, I didn't have to worry about that because we have a DVR. All I had to be concerned about was the fact that the memory was up to 87% and that I had to watch or purge some programs.

So what did I think of the finales of Everybody Hates Chris, Scrubs, My Name Is Earl, The Office, and Gray's Anatomy? I don't know; I haven't seen ANY of them yet, or indeed the penultimate episodes of ANY of those series (three back with Gray). Also, as is often the case, I watch the series finale of a show I used to watch, but then stopped. Previously, that's included Friends and Seinfeld; this season, it was West Wing. Haven't seen that either.

The only finale we DID watch was Gilmore Girls. I was disappointed. But then I read Tosy and I've totally changed my mind. Really.

I hadn't read many of the bloggers until recently. I hadn't seen Eddie's review of my recent compilation or Lefty lifting heavy books or even Fred dissecting the Pen 15 club back on May 11.

I did answer Lefty's question about boycotting musical artists. I tend to operate opposite of that. The Dixie Chicks are putting out a new album this month, and I'm most inclined to get it because of their troubles.

(Although now that I think of it, there IS one artist I did boycott, or more specifically the product she endorsed: Anita Bryant and orange juice, until her contract ran out.)

There's a special on Springsteen and the Seeger Sessions on CMT that I've missed twice already, and will record tomorrow (Thursday) at 6 pm.

I almost forgot Pinkersterfest on this Saturday past (!) until my wife reminded me; it's a VERY BIG DEAL around here. Maybe it was the gloomy forecast, but actually Saturday was the one day it DIDN'T rain - at least in daylight hours - in about a week.

More than that, I almost missed They Might Be Giants playing in the park for free! In any case, they were great. They did "We're the Replacements" from the very first EP of theirs I have from 1987. Of course, they did "The Egg", one of at least three venue songs they performed. One of things they were promoting on stage was "Experimental Film" from Homestar Runner. Very early on, during their description of the sun, they described their politics, talking about a "failed foreign policy", a "failed domestic policy", and "a failed Presidency"; they also describe themselves as "tax and spend liberals." Their last song before the three-song coda was "Istanbul", which was written the year I was born.
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Friend Dan sent me this a while back:
"Thought you might find this amusing. Think about it... so many comic covers these days have blatant female T and A in skintight outfits, and no one objects. I sure don't, lemme tell ya.
But what's good for the goose is good for the female bird, right?
So... are these covers obscene, or are they the male equivalent of female depictions?"