My 2004 Television Awards

Ok, it's about four months into the year and I've now just got around to writing my 2004 TV wrap up. I apologize. Things got a bit hectic and here I am. Basically, what I'm doing is writing about the shows that I TiVoed last year. Most of them aren't from 2004 and there's a lot of crap that I'm not reviewing (Aly's stuff). And I'm using a surprise as the ratings meter. I'm sure you've seen him before (especially if you were a kid in the 1980s) and if you don't know I'll reveal the name at the end of the column.

(BTW, there is no order to this list)

Chappelle's Show This is probably the best sketch comedy on television now, however there hasn't been a new episode in about a year. That's ok because the second season was so strong, from Rick James to Prince playing basketball, Chappelle was awesome. During the fall, Dave Chappelle was give a $40 million contract for the next two seasons of the show. Since then the rumors are that he has hit a writer's block wall and was supposedly acting weird at a San Francisco show. This contract could be an albatross around Chappelle's neck and coupled with high expectations from studio execs and fans, I'm not expecting big things from the third season of the Chappelle Show. I hope it's just as good as the second season, but I doubt it will be. Good thing I don't grade on potential.



Law and Order This is an Aly show that I've sort of started to watch. I like it, don't love it, but it's a good show. As you know it's broken up into two halves: the cop part and the lawyer part. I like the cop part way better than the lawyer part because of two reasons: Jerry Orbach (he's a funny dude) and I hate that smug Sam Waterston. Aside from when they prosecute child molesters, I actually root for him to lose every case.



Mission Hill I'd be surprised if you'd actually heard of this show, much less watch it. This show was originally on the WB from September 1999 until July 2000, but I'd be surprised if it was actually shown on two consecutive weeks. It found a home on Cartoon Network's Adult Swim where I love it. Created by two of the Simpsons executive producers, Josh Weinstein and Bill Oakley, this show has a lot more edge than the Simpsons (seriously) and the art is terrific. Very subtle, yet jokey this show is a winner that went over a lot of people's heads. One thing to watch is the way that the color of the art sets the mood of the scene. It's sort of hard to explain, but if you watch, you'll see.



Mostly True Stories Eh. Sort of a poor man's Straight Dope which did a much better job explaining things and shooting down legends when it was run on A&E during 1996, but it's ok. The problem is that they cobble together these shows which make it seem the news are ones that you've seen before.



The Daily Show As sad as this sounds, this is where I get a lot of my news every day. Pathetic, but I have been listening to WBZ the local news radio, so ... but enough of me. I love this show, Jon Stewart is the best. His sarcasm, his zingers and the way he doesn't bullshit is awesome. And the rest of the crew rules too. The one thing that sort of bugs me is that during this election they were the media darlings of everyone, you can't help but go down from there.



24 Say what you want about the Terminator, John McClane or Rambo, Jack Bauer would've destroyed all of them in less than a day. This is literally one of the most action-packed hours on television. Each week is like a mini movie. The acting is pretty good and while the plots have some holes (the 24 writing crew is famous for having a sketchy story arc and filling in the rest on the fly) you have to remind yourself that a. it's a TV show for God's sake and b. lots of stuff explodes. BTW, if Aly was going to leave me, the only person she can leave me for is Jack Bauer. She is already aware of this fact.



Animal Faceoff I had such high hopes for this show when it first came on, I was literally counting the days until it premiered. Too bad it sucks ass. When I was in college my friends and I use get drunk and debate over what would win in a fight, a bear or a gorilla. This show was going to put that debate to end as well as a bunch of other ones. Too bad all it is is a bunch of nerds bragging about how their computer simulation is better than the other and worse off, they made it boring. I hate you Animal Faceoff, you almost ruined my faith in TV.



Arrested Development You know how I feel about this show, I think it's the greatest thing since free cheeseburgers. I've written at length about this show so much that I have nothing new to say. There are days when I'm not sure what my name is but I know this, this show better be on next year or I'm going on a cross country killing spree that will make "Natural Born Killers" look like the "Great Space Coaster".



Aqua Teen Hunger Force I was really into this show for a while, but I sort of fell out of it. The Mooninites are still cool (those little Atari things that think that they're hot shit) and there are a lot of funny things, but I think they're starting to run out of ideas. Screw that, this show is still friggin funny, probably the funniest thing on Adult Swim. Forget about those last couple of sentences. I did hear that they're coming out with an ATHF movie next year. That should be cool.



Best Week Ever Funniest show when it first came out because it was real people who happened to be comedians (not exactly celebrities) ragging on celebrities. Then it got too slick, the regular group of comedians became celebrities themselves and they started doing skits. Nothing kills a funny show faster than skits. Remember that kids.



Beverly Hills 90210 The high school years are the best years, the college years are ok and when they graduated college, it completely sucked. Sort of the reverse of everyone else in the world, I guess. Any show with Ian Ziering has to be a top tenner though. I wonder what that dude is up to now a days? And who doesn't want to relive the Brenda-Kelly-Dylan love triangle? The best part is waiting for your favorite episodes and lines. Man, rereading that line makes me feel like a tool. Forget I said it.



Decisive Battles This is a pretty bad ass show, they take all of these battles (no shit) from history and reenact them with the aid of video game technology. This is everything that "Animal Faceoff" should've been but wasn't. Though nerdy, it's very cool to see Hannibal and his elephants coming over the Alps or seeing Xerxes and his Persian army get their asses kicked by a bunch of Greeks.



Harvey Birdman Normally I hate lawyer shows, but Birdman is defending old Hanna Barbera cartoons, which is such a great concept that I can't believe that no one had though of it before. The animation is done with Flash animation and Steven Colbert (from the Daily Show) is one of the voices as is Gary Cole (Yes, Lumbergh from Office Space). He's Birdman, BTW. Awesome show, better than Aqua Teen.



Justice League A comic book cartoon that stays true to the comics and it's pretty serious too. I've been waiting a while for this and this show doesn't disapoint. Depth, pathos, spandex, this show has it all. While I do sort of miss the cheesy days of the Superfriends (oh Aquaman) this show is light years better.



King of the Hill Underrated Fox cartoon that has held up a bit better than the Simpsons. Each season is pretty fresh with interesting story lines that aren't rehashed. Some of the stuff gets sort of played out, but if you don't like Bobby Hill, than you don't like televison.



Mr. Show These are the neutered reruns that are on TBS. They took out a lot of swearing and chopped the show up from when it was on HBO, but the shell is still there. Not as good as it originally was, but there are still a lot of funny bits.



My Big Fat Obnoxious Boss the first two episodes were spectacular, the rest sucked. Then it got cancelled. I never did find out who the "Big Boss" was, so if you know, let me in on the secret.



Newsradio I love this show. Phil Hartman dying was probably the worst celebrity death of the last 20 years. The four seasons that he was on the show are about as perfect as an ensemble show can be. Sharp writing, actors who knew and understood their characters, funny plots, they rarely make them like this any more. Stupid Bryn Hartman.



Pardon the Interuption The best of the sports debate shows. Tony Kornheiser and Michael Wilbon are funny (important), smart (also important) and it seems that they like each other (most important). It feels as if you're over hearing a bar room debate between knowledgable buddies. There is rarely an episode where I don't learn something. Easily the best show on ESPN.



SeaLab 2021 I used to be a huge fan of this show, now the plots are so fucked up, I can't even follow them any more. They're actually pretty stupid, and the art, which used to be old clips from SeaLab 2020, has just fallen off because they're trying to draw the characters. And the problem is that they're just not good artists, which is too bad. Also, they're too self-referencing. That gets old. The one great episode from the last two years was "Tin Fins" and the Grizzlebee's ads. "You'll wish you had less fun!" That was funny shit.



Survivor Last year the All-Star version ruined me for all other Survivors. I didn't watch the fall episodes until there were three left. They were just boring. On All Stars, I knew everyone and I didn't have to waste a lot of time trying to figure out who the "cocky one" was or who the "sweet one" was. I'm back with this new season, but All Stars was the pinnacle.



Bernie Mac I used to be a big fan, now I usually just delete it without watching it. Fox bounced it around the schedule so much I just got sick of trying to find it. Plus, you can tell Mac just wants to make movies, so he sleep walks through the shows that I've seen hoping that his show will either get cancelled or his contract won't be renewed. Which ever comes first.



The Brak Show Cancelled. And not a moment too soon. They started making the show all about Brak's dad, simply known as Father. And while he is funny in small doses, he can't carry the show. I wanted more Brak and Zorak. You can't always get what you want. The Ramones were right. (I know the Stones sang it, it was a Simpsons reference, jackass.)



The Larry Sanders Show Like Mr. Show, this shouldn't be on syndicated televison. That's where I had to catch this show, on the local UPN affiliate. I didn't have HBO back in the day. While funny, it doesn't have the same bite as it did on pay cable. I'll probably have to buy the DVDs some day. Though cut or uncut, Hank Kingsley (Jeffrey Tambor from Arrested Development) and Arthur (Rip Torn) are probably two of the greatest characters ever created for television, though for completely different reasons.



This Week in Baseball Aside from the fact that they run the same damn episodes every other day, this is really cool because they reshow the old TWIBs from the 80s and 90s. That was the Golden Age of This Week in Baseball. Cool stuff. Really cool stuff. How many days do you get to see a story about the Red Sox outfield/DH combination of Tony Armas, Mike Easler, Dwight Evans and Jim Rice?



Tom Goes to the Mayor This show is bizarre and it took me a while to get used to it, but I really like it a lot. Rats off to ya! Also a part of the Adult Swim Sunday comedy block. Hopefully, they'll make more than the four that they show over and over and over again.



I left off five shows: "Leave it to Beaver", "Seinfeld", "The Simpsons", "Family Guy" and "Curb Your Enthusiasm" because they're all favorites and I've seen every single episode a million times, so I don't TiVo them.

Each gets four Gary Gnus. Yes. That's what that thing is Gary Gnu from the "Great Space Coaster". Give yourself a pat on the back if you knew who he was without me telling you. Also, give yourself another pat on the back if you read the words "Gary Gnu" in the posted pictures.

See you on Saturday for my 2005 Red Sox preview.

Comic stuff and more

I enjoyed my little Marmaduke bitch session, and I got a couple of emails from other people who enjoyed it too. I'm going to stay in the domesticated animal kingdom and look at another pet whose mother should've heeded the words of Bob Barker about being spayed or neutered.



Not really inspiring is it? Let's see what it looks like if we read this in the Mexican Daily Bugle.



Looks like the Spanish comics can see into the future because I'm going to talk about Cathy tomorrow. Today is Garfield. The reason why there is no Garfield in Spanish is because the link is broken. Who said it sucks to live in Peru?

Ok. Let's look at the Garfield strip. Let me say, first off, that I'm not going to just bitch about strips, there are a lot of comics that I like, but I want to discuss the ones I hate first. Marmaduke is by far the worst one, but Garfield is a close second, though it isn't for the same reasons. Sometime in the late 1980s, Jim Davis completely and totally sold out to Madison Ave. I do not begrudge him this, he had a hot property and struck. That's the American way and more power to him.

Since then, and this is where I have a huge problem, he has completely and totally coasted. As long as he can sell another Garfield window sticker, he doesn't put an iota into his comic strip. I doubt very much that he even draws or writes the strip anymore. The guy who does Marvin was a Garfield artist and if you look at his older strips, they have the same style.

Quick aside, I just looked for a few examples of Marvin to compare and contrast between Davis' style and Tom Armstrong (who draws Marvin) and his comic is completely different. Gone are the "Garfield-like" eyes, the chubbiness sameness of everyone in the strip, the expressionless faces. It is a more streamlined Marvin. Strange. I wonder when and why he did this.

Back to Garfield. Look at the three panels. They are essentially the same three panels except for a few differences: in the first, Garfield is walking Jon's expression is blank. In the second panel, Garfield makes a gesture with one of his arms. His face has not changed at all, neither has Jon's. In the third panel, Garfield's arms are thrown open and Jon mood seems to have soured. However Garfield's expression has not changed since the beginning of the strip, despite delivering the punchline.

Pardon my pun, but he needs a lot more animation. Davis has a unique style and it's obvious that he's a hell of an artist, but his jokes are often flat and hacky. From hating Mondays to loving lasagna, Garfield is a one-trick pony. And though he may be one of the only comic characters that recognizes his own birthday (often the same "Woe is me, I'm old, I hate my birthday" strip every year), Garfield has not grown. About the only change that has happened in the Garfield universe during the last 25 years is the disappearance of Odie's owner Lyman.

And this is where Davis has failed. Garfield will always be a relic from the 1980s where nothing really changed too much. The 1990s were the fast forward decade, while the previous ten years were like a time warp when life was the same on January 1, 1980 as it was on December 31, 1989. Garfield, and Davis, are stuck in that quagmire. The only difference between the two is that Davis is making a lot of money being stuck in neutral.

Aside from thinking about Garfield, this weekend was pretty laid back, though I ate like a damn pig. Saturday Aly and I went to her parents place in Franklin for a combination birthday party/Easter dinner. It was Roy's birthday, he called it his "Maris year" because he turned 61. He looks good for 61, and I'm not just saying that because he reads this blog. He did ask me, "Who the hell is Aquaman?" which cracked me up. He thought it was one of my friends, which I took as a compliment as it means that I can write another voice and make it sound different from mine.

We did nothing but eat and watch college hoop all day. That is literally all that we did.

Sunday, we went to church (it was Easter after all) and then went to Amesbury. We had a good time, it's definitely a little different than a Manasso gathering, but that doesn't mean it's any better or worse. My mom fed us like we'd never seen food before. And that's all we did on Sunday was eat.

There was a bit of drama, but that was later in the evening. My uncle showed up to the house with a new Jaguar. At Christmas this guy was destitute, but now he's driving a new sports car. And it's not a shitty one either, it's pretty nice. This pissed my folks and uncle off because they know that he got the money from the sale of my grandfather's store.

Supposedly it wasn't making money and Joseph, who pretty much ran it after my aunt (his mother) couldn't work there anymore, was up to his ears in debt (store and gambling) sold it. After paying his creditors off, he had quite a little wad, so he started to live large again. My mom and her brother are more than a little pissed that none of the money that he received went to them. And to be truthful, they have a point. My grandfather worked in that store until the day he died, their grandparents (like Joseph's) started the business. Why shouldn't they get a cut?

They're not. And this is going to fester like a scab that will only be picked on holidays. I have a feeling that within a year or two, this will come to a head and it's not going to be pretty. That was the dinner theatre on Sunday evening.

Marmaduke, philosophy and Kafka

Look at this:



It's been a while since I've ragged on this orange piece of shit, but look at this panel. It's fucking terrible. About the only thing that Brad Anderson drew well were the legs of the kids. Look at how the chairs are pulled against the counter and they're sitting on the knees. That's something that a kid would do if they bellied up to a counter, you don't see people do that at a bar, do you? So kudos to you Brad, you actually remember what it's like to be a kid.

Everything else about this comic literally sucks. For one thing, it should be the older sibling (the sister) telling the brother that Marmaduke can hear the spreading of peanut butter. It just makes more sense and aside from the "humor" of the strip, it allows a passing of knowledge from the older generation to the younger. It's something that we can all look at, understand and laugh about.

Maybe it's not about spreading peanut butter quietly so your idiot mutt won't come begging, it could be about the time you were cautioned about putting a wiffle ball bat in your spokes, but you did it anyway. It's sort of an every-man right of passage, but since Anderson is lazy and is going for the easy joke, he lets the younger one say it because it's "more cute".

Look at the art in this particular panel, terrible. For a guy who has been drawing (I can only assume Anderson is drawing and writing this claptrap and some poor soul hasn't been trapped into doing this for the rest of his or her miserable life -- this would be a bad choice that I speak about this later) he is very sloppy when drawing his bread and butter. Speaking as an artist, every time I draw one of my characters, I take great care as to how they look and how they interact with their surroundings.

Anderson does none of this. Look at Marm's front leg, it looks like a table leg. Look at his chest, it's box-like and horribly misshapen. His jaw line calls to mind a rotting jack o' lantern and his calling card (the ears) look like the horns of Satan himself. Is this the message that Anderson wants to convey; that Marmaduke is a nefarious pig that will slobber and devour a young child's only form of sustenance and nourishment? If so, what does that say about Marmaduke ... and what more does it say about his owners?

Who is the real pet (dog) in this relationship? It certainly isn't Marmaduke. Does Anderson's sloppy art belie a truth that even he may not be willing to admit? Is he the dog in his world, forever bedeviled by shapeless orange lumps who steal his food, destroy his comfort and make his life a hell? We will be going over more Marmaduke comics in the coming weeks and the answer will become more apparent.

Since I've been walking a mile to get my car every day, I've had an opportunity to think a lot. After the usual thinking rigmarole of home, work, money, the Sox, television, etc. I began pondering about something that I haven't thought of in a long time.

When I was in high school, I used to work at Friendly's in Newburyport as a dishwasher/soda jerk. It wasn't a bad job, hot chicks, free grub, not a lot of responsibilities. One of the guys that I worked with was an older dude (about 23, how ancient!) named Steve Zappala. Steve was cool, he was one of the first people that was older than me that didn't talk down to me and I appreciated that.

He liked baseball as much as I did and got me into a Stratomatic league with his buddies, where the drafts were more fun than the actual games. All we did was drink, which put me at a distinct disadvantage in the latter rounds because I was absolutely shitfaced picking up guys like Ron Karkovice and Kurt Manwaring while they chose normally. The cool thing about drinking with Steve is that unlike other older dudes that ran packies for us, he'd get us what we wanted. If we gave him $20 for a case of Rolling Rock, he'd come out of the liquor store with the Rocks and change. Most guys would tell you that they were out of whatever you were looking for and give you a six pack of Meister Brau and tell you it cost $20.

Not only did we share the same likes, but he introduced me to some new stuff like the Doors, Nietzsche, different ways of talking to chicks and Whippets (which were the old canisters of whipped cream that were filled with CO2 and got you high for a little bit if you did enough of them.) I wasn't reminiscing about Steve, but something he said to me once.

We were talking about Nietzsche when he went off on a tangent about a philosopher (whose name I can't remember) who said that every person has millions and millions of alternate reality people who live the same life except for little differences. I had no idea what he meant, but he broke it down even more: basically every day you make hundreds of choices, even though you may not realize it. For the most part these choices are yes or no. Should I get up at 6:30? Should I cross the road now? Should I eat lunch after working out?

When you come to one of these choices it's like coming to a cross roads, inevitably you choose one road and head down that road. The other you, the one in the alternate world, chooses the other one. Take this for example: you wake up, get in the shower and decide whether you want to put conditioner in your hair. You decide not to, but the other you decides to use it. Down that other path the extra moments you expended to condition your hair could mean that you're late for work, which pisses your boss off, which gets you fired. Or it could mean that your hair looks better, which turns the head of that hot secretary, which leads to a night of awesome sex.

Every decision, no matter how innocuous, has consequences and the consequences are played out in millions of shadow worlds that you will never see. What I have been thinking about is two things:

1. Have I made the optimal small choices? I don't worry about the big stuff, I'm very happy with Aly, with my job, with where I live and everything, but if not waking up earlier did that save my life (maybe a speeding car would careen off a rock and slam into where I am), did something good not happen to me because I wasn't there at the time? I don't know. And this not knowing can drive a man to madness.

2. How do I know that I'm not living in the shadow world? What if I'm just an alternate reality of the Byron who has it worse (or better) than me? I have no idea and the sucky thing is that I'll never know.

Good old Kafka. For years I've been threatening to read something by Kafka, but I've sort of held off because I was always a bit frightened by the author. I heard that most of his stuff is very dense, multi-layer and tough as shit to figure out. Last week I dove right in with a collection of his short stories and letters to friends.

According to the preface only one of his stories (The metamorphosis) was intended for the public. The rest of his stuff was released by his friend and editor after Kafka's death, even though K. asked him to burn all of his stuff. His friend couldn't do it because the writing was so good.

"The metamorphosis" was very good, basically it's about a guy who wakes up and discovers that he's a bug. You probably have heard of it, it's his most famous story. Anyhow, it deals with his day to day life and how he is trapped in this body but still has his human intellect. The story unfolds perfectly, it wasn't slow and it moved well. I beginning to think that my earlier trepidation about Kafka was all for naught.

Then I moved on to his other stuff: "The Judgement" and "The Great Wall of China". I couldn't get past the fifth page in each case. Boring, confusing, just not very good. I put the book down and started to read something else. I am going to attempt to read it again in the summer. The reason? I read during my lunch hour, which I take at my desk in the winter. Unless it's an awesome book, I am constantly distracted by checking my email, Internet, talking to coworkers.

However in the other seasons, I'm eating in my car for an hour to 45 minutes, where I have nothing to distract me. So, I have to give Mr. Kafka an incomplete.

SBC

What does SBC mean? It is an acronym coined by my buddy Ryan and it stands for Stupid Boring Crap. This isn't stupid or boring if you are me or if you know me, but it might be if you aren't or don't. It's not all going to personal stuff, so you just have to pick and chose the bullets you want to read.

Ready? OK!

* Saturday night, the month of babies continued unabated as my friend Mi-shu showed up to a party I was at pregnant. Had no idea she was with child. She's having him/her in September. Another friend of mine is also going to have a child, however I can't say anything because they swore me to secrecy. Also, Archie and Jenn had a daughter (their second) as did the Phillipses who had their second child about three weeks ago. Seriously, what the fuck? This is a lot of kids.

* The party that I mentioned briefly in the previous bullet was held at Clery's bar in Boston. The throwers of the bash? Nick Giordano and his girlfriend Debbie. The reason? Nick and Debbie run the Boston Marathon every year and they need to get some scratch together for charity. I think the charity is leukemia research, but I'm not 100% sure.

It was a good time, he had some food laid out, prizes (Mi-shu won three of them) and I saw some people I haven't seen in a while, like Nick's friend James, his brother in law, Mark and Mi-shu's sister Jenna. Reddish came over before the party and we got something to eat at Solas before we hit the party. Since I was still a bit hungover, I didn't drink as much. It was still a good time though.

* For the last two weeks we have been doing our fantasy baseball draft, guess who I chose with my first pick? Barry Bonds. Seems like a pretty safe pick, right? Wrong. Today he came out and said that he's hurting and wouldn't be back until the All-Star Game at the earliest and he actually may be out for the entire season.

In all of the years I've played fantasy baseball, I've had Barry a grand total of once and that was for a trade that happened at the end of the season. Totally sucks that he's not going to play for a while. Already there are conspiracy theorists who say that Barry is being forced out of baseball by Bud Selig the same way that Michael Jordan was told to retire in 1994. I don't know if I buy it, at least that Selig is making him do it. As I wrote in a SOSH post earlier today:

For you lone gunman folks out there: I think one of the larger questions is whether Selig is this strong of a presence to force him out of the game or was it someone more powerful? A Senator or Congressman, perhaps?

From what we've been hearing for the last 12 years or so, Selig couldn't squash an ant hill. Now he's running the best player out of the game on the precipice of him breaking one of the most sacred records in the game?

This coming from a man who has:

* Cancelled the World Series
* Realigned baseball divisions
* Introduced Interleague play
* Added an extra round to the playoffs
* Watched as a hallowed record (single season dingers) fall under strong suspicion of steroids
* Watched as homerun totals have jumped by leaps and bounds

I'm not saying that Selig is a wuss or anything, but him stopping Barry Bonds from passing Ruth and Aaron does not seem consistent with things that have happened under his watch. And as shown by the list above, sentimentality does not run in his veins, no matter what you think of him.

This isn't Bowie Kuhn suspending Mantle and Mays for being greeters at a Vegas casino or halting Fingers and Rudi to the Sox and Vida Blue to the Yanks for "the good of the game." And it's certainly not Kennesaw Mountain Landis kicking out the eight Black Sox for gambling.

I think this goes a bit higher than Bud.

Sounds sort of far fetched, but you never know.

* What happened to us as music listeners? The other day I was at the gym and they usually have the local Top 40 station blaring. As I was working out, I heard Poison's "Every Rose Has It's Thorn". On other occasions I've heard songs by Guns N Roses and Def Leppard. Now, I have a soft spot in my music heart for these tunes, but they were played to target young kids, and this is the biggest thing, without a hint of irony.

When I dragged out my old tapes 10 years ago and created the "Hairy Velveeta" mix tapes of crappy music it was done for drunken fun and to be ironic, and everyone got the joke. Now this stuff is actually being programmed as Top 40 music. What has this country come to? I'm moving to a fucking island.

Upsets and hang overs

Last night Ryan, Kristen, Keri and Byrnie came over to check out the new pad. We got some food from the Smokehouse and watched hoops. Doesn't sound like much, eh?

Things got better. We ended up drinking half the town of Brookline and now I can barely type. Man, we had a lot to drink and the house looks like a bomb hit it. I mostly stayed on the side of beer, but Byrnie and Rye made some mammoth rum and Cokes. They ended up staying over until about 1:00 am or so. Then I went to bed and attempted to watch "Diff'rent Strokes".

The cool thing about our new cable company is that they have a bunch of free stuff on their On-Demand channel. One of which is a bunch of old reruns. They have "Maude", "The Partridge Family", "Starskey and Hutch" and a bunch of other stuff. It's interesting in a whole, I remember that episode sort of way. But it also sort of sucks because the shows aren't as good as I remember.

For instance, on DS, I remember thinking that everything about that show was cool. The house, Arnold and Willis' one liners, Ms. Garrett. Now when I watch it, the show is nothing but a laugh track with a few lines thrown in. The stories are flimsy and full of so many holes that it's tough to watch it without a million questions coming to mind. The one that I watched on Thursday had Mr. D's new landlord coming up to the house to tell the Drummonds that they were being booted. Too many drugs? Wild parties? Bigotry? Pets?

No. It's because the Drummond household had a preteen living in the apartment. He shows the lease to Mr. D and of course, after looking at it for a total of 20 seconds, he is completely flumoxed. "Looks like we're in trouble kids," is all that he could muster. Oh yeah, then they tried to dress Arnold up in stilts and pass him off as Willis' older brother Arthur.

Save the stilts. First off, bring the contract to a lawyer. He can think of something. Secondly, have you ever heard of the Fair Housing Act? You can't throw people on their asses because of age, race, gender or religion. Yet, they take this shit lying down. The only way that they were able to stay in the place is because Arnold spied the landlord (who looked like Steve Martin) having an affair.

The landlord's wife was furious when Arnold innocently brought it up in front of her. In about 12 seconds, the losing of the apartment was completely dropped. The Drummonds didn't even get a chance to use Arnold's news as leverage or blackmail. It really didn't make sense ... and I was sober on Thursday night.

Last night though, I was wrecked. So I had to watch the show with one eye closed because I was seeing double.

What was the cause of my drinking? A little thing called March Madness. Up until 7:00 last night, I was cruising right along: 19-5, none of my Sweet 16s had lost and a few of my upset specials were working it for me. Then came the Syracuse/Vermont game. And here's the main reason why I don't bet: this game was awesome, lead changes, holy-shit! shots were made, the underdog Catamounts were really giving it to the heavily favored Orangemen and all I could do was sit there and watch as one of my Final Fours flamed out.

It drove me insane watching missed picks, sloppy passes, retarded shots become the norm for the Orange. They were supposed to be one of the top teams of the Big East, but they blew it. Because I was so dispondent over the Cuse loss, I didn't get to see Kansas lose to the Bucknel Bison. There goes another Elite Eight team, right in the old crapper.

But, that's college hoop and why I love this time of year. There's nothing better than that first Thursday when you fill in your brackets, look at them and say, "Yup, this is the year I have everything all figured out. No way none of my picks are going down." And every year the sheet ends up looking like downtown Beirut. My only consolation is that I bet a lot of people took Kansas and Syracuse very far.

At least, that's my hope.

The Trial of Aquaman

AM had such a good time writing again that he wanted to do another entry this week. One quick bit of house cleaning, I wanted to make my last entry better, so sometime this week I am going to edit the hell out of it. I reread it on Monday and was embarrassed at how crappy it was. My apologies.

Here's AM:

Thanks, Sparky. You're right on, Sunday you were terrible. Shape up or ship out. That's what we say down on the ocean floor. Speaking of the ocean floor, remember that jerk Dino from last week? He made good on his threat, lawyers are now involved in our dispute.

Just to catch you all up: a few months ago I was drinking with the boys in the middle of the ocean and we wanted to go surfing, so I punched a hole in Dino's boat and grabbed a piece of wood to surf on. Well, his boat sank and he yelled at me about getting him a new boat. So I found a piece of crap dinghy and threw it in his yard.

Last Thursday I was chilling pool side, still giggling about my Punk'd trick, when a guy in a SCUBA suit came up to me. Quick tangent, did you know that SCUBA is actually an acronym? It stands for Self-Contained Underwater Breathing Apparatus. That's pretty cool. You know what I call my self-contained underwater breathing apparatus? Lungs. You air-breathers are fucking pussies.

Anyway the guy couldn't talk so he gave me something, I had no idea what it was and then he wrote on a dry-erase board, "You've been served." I thought that the guy was going to start break dancing or something so I quickly changed into a green and orange pair of Zubazz pants and put on my best headband, but apparently it's lawyer talk for dragging someone to court.

That fucking Dino is suing me! What an asshole. Seriously, if he can't take a joke, he's a total wimp. So I wrecked his boat. So one of friends died in an accident that I caused. So he has a gigantic hunk of trash in his yard. I mean, aside from the death of his buddy, most of this stuff is pretty funny.

Usually I keep an attorney on retainer, but I was done paying orthodontist bills for the guy, so I fired him a few months ago. Plus, how hard is it to tell your side of a story to a judge? I see people do it on Divorce Court every day, and Judge Keane seems like a pretty cool dude ... I hope I get a guy like him. Like the old saying goes, "A person who represents himself has a fool for a client." Since I don't have a client, I'm not the fool.

The summons said that I had to be at the court house on Monday morning at 9:00 am. That's one am that this AM doesn't do. I'm not usually up before noon, so I rolled into the court at about 1:15 or so. I was up late the previous night watching "Robot Chicken", "Mission Hill" and pounding Brew-Dogs by myself, so I was feeling a bit irritable. Man, I had no idea I was going to be stuck with such a stickler for the law. I had Judge Paul Walker.

He was all, "Nice to see you, Mr. Aquaman, we were starting to think that you weren't going to show up today." You know, very sarcastic-like. I told him about my night's activities and tried to chat him up about it, to show no hard feelings about the sarcasm and that I was a regular dude like him. Judge Walker told me to sit down and get ready for court.

Even though I've caught literally millions of crooks and I hang out a place called the Halls of Justice, I had never been to a court before. Imagine my surprise when I found out that I was the only one dressed casual. Judge, whatever happened to casual Mondays? Seriously. Dino's lawyer was dressed really nice, which just told me that he isn't the brightest bulb. Being well dressed doesn't mean success as my mother said.

Anywho, Dino went on the stage, er stand, and started telling his sob story about how he was doing nothing, blah, blah, blah. I rolled my eyes at the jury and made the jerking-off motion with my fist. I was fined $500 by Walker. What the fuck? After about 20 minutes of mellow drama, it was my turn to question him. This is where I shined.

Me: "You say you were doing nothing, Dino. But weren't you, in fact, fishing!"
Dino: "Yeah. Me and my friends were fishing, so what?"
Me: "Didn't you say, UNDER OATH MIND YOU, that you were doing 'nothing'?"
Dino: "Yeah. We weren't bothering anyone."
Me: "Your honor, the witness has just admitted to perjury!" Then I moved in real close to Dino, so he could see my steely blue eyes and then I said, "Case closed, motherfucker!" And walked away and began to gather my oyster crackers and eel juice.

The judge said that wasn't technically perjury and that I was fined another $500 for swearing in court. He asked if I had more questions, I protested that the guy obviously is a liar and that he must be wearing asbestos pants because they are so on fire. He asked again if I had another set of questions. I said no, because I thought my case was air-tight.

Then Dino's friend, Hershel took the stand. He boo-hoo-hooed about losing his brother, Albert. It's a good thing I can swim really good because there was a river in the court room. Again, I looked at the jury and made that same whacking off motion, luckily I didn't get caught. When Hershel finally composed himself he told everyone how I threw the other boat in Dino's yard.

"Objection," I yelled. "I did not throw the boat in his yard, I placed it there. Your honor, if these witnesses can't master the English language, then I move for a new trail."

"You mean trial?"

"Yeah, sure, whatever you say, Judgie."

Judge Walker wouldn't bite. So I asked Hershel if he knew that I was drunk, he said he didn't. Here was my chance, "As a person on a boat, you have to be aware of your surroundings at all times. You weren't aware of this, so I feel that it's your responsibility for your brother's death. Sucks to be you, pal. No further questions."

That was such a wicked good point, but the judge had the remark stricken from the court records. What a douche. Anyway, it was my turn on the stand. I told everyone exactly what happened, from the drinks with the boys, to the surfing, to the boat in the front yard. I brought my pocket sound effects machine and punctuated my story with the effects. The judge confiscated it after two effects. And he charged me an extra $500.

Then Dino's lawyer had at me, I was so ready for any question he would ask me. He said that he didn't have anything for me, he said that since I admitted to everything that he really had nothing else left to say. Point, Aquaman. It's not often that you can shut a lawyer up ... especially one that gets paid by the hour. I went back to my desk confident that the jury would see things the AM way.

An hour later they came back with their decision. I winked at a hot chick on the jury, she licked her lips (which may or may not have been towards me), but thought for sure that I was so getting laid that night. I was going to get one of the court pages to give her my phone number but that fucking judge interrupted me. Damn him. I wish someone would put him in contempt of court. The court of getting some ass ... I rule that fucking place.

Anyway, he read the decision: that douchebag Dino won! Can you believe it? I have to pay that jackass for a new boat, plus an extra $250,000 in mental suffering, plus I have to get someone to take the old boat off of his front lawn (I bet Apache Chief would do that if I gave him a fifth of something) and to top it all off, I still owe the court $2,000.

I was completely railroaded! How can a man who has devoted his entire life to fighting for justice get so screwed over? It's just not fair, but as Mike Brady once said, "You can't fight City Hall." Mike Brady may have been gay in real life, but man, was he right about this.

In any event, I'm going to give Dino his $250,000 in sand dollars. They never said how I had to pay him. So, once again, Aquaman gets the last laugh. Eat that, Judge Walker.

I am the Lizard King ... I can do anything

Before we get to an indepth book review, a little bit about my weekend: we didn't do too much. Headed to Danna and Rick's place in White Plains on Friday night. We ended up getting there pretty late, and I was dead tired. I pretty much was driving by memory after we left Hartford, I was so dead tired.

Saturday, we just hung out. That's the cool thing about going to their place, we don't do much, but it's nice to get out of Boston and to relax and just unwind. At night we ended up going out to dinner with their friend Tim Zanni and his fiance Kristen. Tim is quite a few years older than me, but he seemed cool. A little bit arrogant, which I guess comes from pulling down $2 million a year in salary, but he was a cool guy.

Kristen was about my age and she was really cool. Aside from being a Yankee fan, he really knows his baseball, so it was interesting talking to him about how his team is going to do and his perspective on the Sox. He (like Rick) aren't typical Yankee braggerts, they love their team, but keep it cool. BTW, Tim's father was a pitcher in the major leagues, here's his baseball-reference page:

Tim's Father

Looks like he was pretty much a middle-relief guy who didn't get into a lot of games.

Sunday, we did even less and were on the road by 2:00 pm. We were home by about 5:00. The one thing that sticks out about Sunday is that I finally saw "Rosemary's Baby". Yeah, I know, where the hell have I been for the last 30 years, but it's not like it's run ad naseum by HBO. Aly and I caught it on AMC. Very cool flick, sort of hokey in some parts, but Mia Farrow did a tremendous job acting and Roman Polanski did an awesome job directing.

Much like "On the Road", I'm sure this movie had a bigger impact in the time it was released. A lot of the "twists" could be seen coming a mile away, but in 1966, I'm sure it was revolutionary and unexpected. Should there be a remake of this flick? I think it would be cooler with the same story but with a bit more suspense and less of an emphesis on the cartoonishness of the next door neighbors.

I don't normally do this, but I had the same dream two days in a row and it's sort of bugging me. Actually, it's not the same exact dream, but it has the same theme. On Thursday I dreamed that I was a member of the 1979 Baltimore Orioles and it was the seventh game of the World Series against the Pirates. I get called in to keep a late inning lead and I can not find the plate. The ball is going everywhere. I throw as hard as I can and it bounces ten feet in front of the plate. Then I'm trying to aim it into the mitt. I wake up feeling completely freaked out.

Friday night, I was asleep and I found myself in a New York Mets uniform. It's the present day and I'm in Spring Training trying to make the team. Again, I'm a pitcher and I'm trying to show the squad my stuff but I'm bouncing everything and I start resorting to aiming the ball, which results in the opposing hitters crushing everything. Again, I wake up concerned.

Why I am dreaming about this? One of two things: on Wednesday I read an article about Rick Ankiel, who completely melted down in a playoff game and was never the same pitcher since. That day he announced he is going to try and become an outfielder. The only other thing I can think of is that I'm worried that I'm going to fuck something up.

On Saturday I finished my latest book, "Jim Morrison: Life, Death, Legend" by Stephen Davis. Aly gave this to me for Valentine's Day, and it was probably the best present I've received in a while. Just a tremendous book that actually left me sad that it was done. Usually, when I am under 100 pages left I start reading quicker so that I can get to the next one. Here, I actually read slower because I didn't want it to end.

I'm not sure how the rest of the band like it, I would bet that Ray Manzereck didn't like it too much, but Davis did a fantastic job piecing Morrison's life together in a way that wasn't too boring (which is hard to do) or over the top. He seemed to tell it the way it was, without any appologies. He did bring up the possibility that Morrison was a homosexual and also brought up that everyone in the band hated him and that Jim hated them. Previously, I thought that only John Densmore despised Morrison, but it turns out Robby Kreiger didn't particularly care for him as well.

This book rekindled a sort of Doors renassiance with me. There are six bands that I have been completely obsessed with: Living Colour, Public Enemy, the Doors, the Beastie Boys, Led Zeppelin and Pearl Jam. Each time I hear a song from one of these groups, I instantly go back to where I was when I was really into them. But of all six, the Doors were MY band.

There was a time in college where Jim Morrison was my idol so much that I would try and lead a debaucherous life like him. It didn't work, I never had the balls to really go all out like he did. Which is both good and bad. Bad, because I've never lost complete control of myself for a long period of time. Good, because I didn't end my 27th year as a fat, bloated, drug-addled corpse.

While there was more than one side of Morrison, most people only saw the drunk asshole that was more pitied than glorified at the end of his life. It was quite a sad existence actually. And while I still have a great deal of respect of the man and his work, his life is not something that I would want to lead. Morrison always talked about "A feast of friends", but often times at his banquet table he was joined by sicophants and hangers on. The dregs of society.

The book managed to inspire me a bit more in my writing and hopefully within the next few entries I will try to be a bit more creative and less factual, I did this, this and this sort of log.

It's cold and new boats

I hate this freaking weather. It's like 10 days before the first day of spring and it's so cold that Aquaman's balls are ice cubes. This shitty weather coupled with the Doors book I'm reading is going to prompt me to back up my shit and head out to LA in like three days.

BTW, I'm falling back into a Doors phase, which is sort of embarrassing because a 30-year-old man should not be going back into a music phase that he had in college. Ah well, maybe the next entry will be about the rationalization of that.

I got an interesting email the other day

Dear Douche Bag,

I know my last entry sucked sea cucumbers, but give me another shot, I really have something on my mind this time. It's a good story that's both poigniant and true. I want to let all the people know.

Yours in Christ,

Aquaman

How can I turn down a sweet letter like that? Here's Aquaman with one last chance to make you laugh. If he sucks, I'm cutting bait.

Ha, ha, fucknob. I get it, cut bait ... fish ... Aquaman, you're a real laugh a minute. Where did you move? Brooklyn? Real interesting entry last time about the trials of moving. Wah, I had to lift a box of books. You're no SuperFriend, you're a SuperPuss.

Anyway, I'm not here to make fun of you, I'm here to tell you why I don't stick around after I mop up the floor with criminals. I know most of you out there in the real world think that it's pretty cool to be a super hero. You get to live a life of adventure, meet interesting people (like the cast of Flipper) and you get 15% off all oil changes at Jiffy Lube.

There is a dark side though, and it's not bad guys. It's freaking ingrates. Take this tale for example. Since I've blogged, people know where they can reach me. Last month I got an email from a guy named Dino. Check this crap out:

Dear Aquaman,

Do you remember me? I bet you don't, so let me refresh your memory. I was about two miles away from shore on a beautiful August afternoon fishing with a couple of my friends on my new boat. Absoultely perfect day. The boat wasn't huge, but it sleeps three comfortably ... or at least it did.

You destroyed it, you son of a bitch and I want my money for a new boat. My friends and I had to swim back to shore, and one of them drowned. You better get back in touch with me at: dinosboatfund@hotmail.com or I'm sending lawyers to Atlantis.

Dino

You know what I did with this letter? That's right, the cynlandrical file, the old waste basket. Screw Dino. So maybe I did ruin his piece of crap boat, but I had just cause. Me and the boys were drinking fuzzy navels all day and decided that we wanted to go surfing. Unfortunately, I didn't bring my board and none of the fish want to hang out with old AM when he drinks, so I couldn't surf on their backs. Screw them, they suck, let's see where I am when they need ME.

Anyhow, we wanted to surf, so I said, "Let me handle this!" and I punched the first thing that I saw, so I could at least grab a piece of plywood and hang ten. So I punched his boat, because it was made of wood. All of a sudden we hear a bunch of people crying, "Wah! I can't swim!" and "I saved my entire life for this boat!" Wah, wah.

If you can't swim why are you in the ocean, Jackson? Right, you should stay on land with the rest of the nonswimmers. So, me and my friends were trying to stand on top of our makeshift surfboard when we remembered that we don't even know how to surf! I guess you just had to be there, but everyone was laughing their asses off.

Of course, this jerk Dino was there, but he doesn't think it's very funny. Dude, get a sense of humor! I mean really, I DON'T KNOW HOW TO SURF! That shit is funny!

So I emailed him back:

Dino,

You're right, I owe you a new boat, and it will be in your front yard tomorrow.

Yours in Christ,

Aquaman

From the email I got back, Dino was very happy. He wasn't the next morning when I dropped this in his front yard:



Here's the thing, no one tries to scare AM with lawyers. I'm not afraid of that crap, I rule three quarters of the earth, do you think I'm afraid of some pencil pushing attorney? Hells no. But it's funny because again, I was drunk and the boat is a piece of crap, Dino didn't say he wanted a new boat, he just said I owed him a boat. Actually, he did say he wanted a new boat ... but that's what makes this prank funny. Dude, you got PUNK'D! Where's Ashton? Right here!

Again Dino, didn't find it funny and said that a lawyer in scuba gear will be down to the palace with a lawyer papers (he actually said what they're coming down with, but I think he's trying to punk AM). So, I'll be waiting for him ... with a school of barracuda. Get it? A school of barracuda for a barracuda! (That's what they call lawyers some time! I should really have my own show.)

I'll let you all know how this turns out ... if GrandMaster Jackass (Byron) allows me to. Peace. Out.

Live from Brookline ... It's Sunday Afternoon?

For pretty much 19Thoughts entire life, I've come from you from my bedroom in Somerville. Sure, there were a few Amesbury and one Brookline dateline, but this is the first one from the spare bedroom in the new 19Thoughts Mansion.

If some of you can't remember, or were wondering why the heck I wasn't around, it's because I've been moving. Actually, Aly AND I have moved. It's one step closer to being married and to be honest, it's actually pretty cool. Gone are the days when Aly and I have to add an extra hour to whatever we were doing so that we can travel to one or the other's home to get clothes for the next day.

That's just awesome.

And the place is pretty cool too. It's a basement apartment, which originally didn't sound too appealing, but there are some pluses in living underground. For one, there aren't many stairs to climb. Just about every place I've lived in, I've lived on the second floor (at least). Here it's just one flight down. That made moving a freaking breeze (or in the very least, easier).

So, the scorecard goes like this: (since college) Amesbury to Winthrop to Amesbury to Danvers to Wakefield to Amesbury to Somerville to Brookline. Before that it was Lawrence to Amesbury to North Andover (Andover). From three moves in 21 years to eight in nine years. I feel like a military brat.

Even brats have friends. Last weekend, a bunch of people helped Aly and I out and without them, I'd still be moving boxes from Somerville to Brookline. It all began last Thursday when I moved some stuff from Aly's place here. The following day I took off from work and moved Aly's entire room, which took about three hours of loading and unloading my car. Then it was off to Somerville when I made a trip with my books (which weighed a freaking ton) and other crap that I've collected over here as well.

Friday night, we stayed in Franklin, where we got a 16-foot truck that we loaded up with engagement party booty and some furniture from Bob and Lauren's place. We made it to Somerville around 11:00 and started to unload it all. The one sucky thing is that the couch that we were given wouldn't fit into the house. That blew.

Then Skaus, Jay and Connolly joined Bob and I in getting the rest of my crap out of my room. For a guy with one bedroom, I shoved a lot of shit in there. I mean, A LOT of crap in there. Just loading it into the truck took about three hours. Then we went to Aly's where it took us ten minutes to load her stuff in there. The guys were awesome, better and more efficient than a moving company ... and worked for less cash (pizza, beer and Anna's Taqueria).

While we were moving, our families were helping Aly get everything unpacked and situated. Jackie, Lauren and mom cleaned the rooms from top to bottom, while my dad and Roy put together a few pieces of furniture. We finally got everything in and returned the truck to Franklin. By the time we got home it was 8:00, we were asleep by 9:15.

The next day we woke up and just started to go to town on the place; unpacking, setting up the stereo and TV, hooking up the computer (but no internet), making sure stuff was where we wanted it to be. Since we went to bed early, we were up even earlier. Al and I worked a good 12 hours, but by the time we went to sleep most of our stuff was in the right place.

During the week, we would do a little bit more: making sure the bathroom was set up ok, we bought a futon (which was a pain to set up), got the phone up and ringing, stuff like that.

As much as I like living here, there are a few things that are sort of tough:

1. Parking. This is fascist Brookline, so the Fueher will not let you park on the street. This means that I have to park in a lot or in my case a garage. This is the most difficult adjustment I've had to make because in all of the other places I've lived parking was free and my car was always outside my house. Here, it's $90 a month (which is actually pretty low) but the garage is at least a mile away from Casa de Magrane.

There a few silver linings to this dark cloud though: a. it's covered, so I don't have to dig it out of the snow and b. I am trying to lose a bit of weight so walking two miles and hitting the gym every night should allow me to shed a few lbs. The reason why I want to lose weight? I was showing Aly some pics of me and Debbie (she had never seen her and was curious as to what she looked like) and I looked really thin. I'd like to be that thin again.

2. The light. Where we put our bed is across from a street light that shines right in my eyes. Consequently, the first week of sleep have seen me wake up at least four times a night. I am a notoriously light sleeper and any little noise or change in light wakes me up. This puts me in quite a shitty mood. The obvious solution is to get dark curtains, which we will.

3. The smoke alarm. Every time we use the stove, the smoke alarm goes off. It is one of those really high pierced beeps and drives me up a tree. Tuesday was the first day it happened and I was in a bad mood. I tried to disable it, no dice. Finally I got so pissed I punched it. Hard. This didn't break it, though it did break a lot of the plaster around the detector. Also, it left my hand bloody. Not smart.

Despite those three things, I really am enjoying the new pad and especially living with Aly.

This weekend was pretty fun. Friday night we just chilled out, we went for Indian food at a restaurant called Rani. I don't usually eat Indian food, but I love it. Hopefully, this will become more of an every day thing. The meal was very good and I can see us making this our place. It's on Beacon Street near Coolidge Corner.

After that we got "Twisted" with Ashley Judd, Samuel L. Jackson and Andy Garcia. It wasn't very good, in fact I'd say that it almost sucked. There were so many plot holes that it made the movie a pain to watch. Most of the time you were saying to yourself, "Wait a second wasn't that guy the ... ?" Judd is hot and everything but she hasn't played any other roles other than the one that she plays here. Skip this.

Saturday was Jackie's birthday and we had the entire Manasso brood over for brunch in Brookline Village followed by cake at our place. Everyone was there, including her brother (who came up for the day from Atlanta) and Grandma Connie who took a train from New York City for the occasion. It was a lot of fun. Good food, good company and all around good time.

That night we went to Johanna and Brian's engagement party. I like Jo and Brian, we hung out with them last year in Washington DC, and it sort of sucks that they live there because otherwise I guarantee we'd be good "couple friends". The party was cool, held at her parents' place in Andover (near Phillips Andover, where her dad is a minister) and I got to meet a bunch of Aly's American University friends.

Another good time. The only thing that sucked is that we were beat from entertaining all day, so we left early and crashed hard.

Spicing up the old Blog ... though not yet

I've been using freestats for the last month or so and during these past two weeks, no one has been visiting the Blog. Twice I've received upwards of 70 hits in one day and kept a consistent hit count of 40 for a few weeks. But, now it's down to the low 20s.

I can't figure out why, so I'm going to have to retool and I'm moving this web site to Brookline, Massachusetts AKA "Fun Town USA!"

Tonight is going to be my last night in Somerville. The last night I get to sleep in my misshapen room, with it's nooks, crannies and mice. I'm a little sad that this is the end of my time here. When I moved in two years ago, things were a lot different, I dispised my job as an editor, I had recently been dumped and life was just one depressing day after an other.

Now things are looking up, I don't completely hate my job (though it has been getting really busy lately) and I'm about six months away from getting married. The last two years have seen a lot of changes in my life, but one thing was consistent: 162 Central St., Apt. 2 in Somerville.

The time is right to move though. I'm really getting sick of driving everywhere and living out of a bag and it's time to move in with Aly. It just feels right. That being said, I'm going to miss Andrew and Eddie, who were great roommates. But I won't miss Josh. He was an ok guy, but I never really connected with him. I don't think it was a lack of trying on my part, he's just very content being himself and doing his thing and not really giving a shit about the world that revolves around him.

I was bored last night so I tried to go through my old roommates:

Freshman year: Scott Mooney
Sophomore year: Chris Aprile, Bob Shaw, Jim Lawlor
Junior year: Shaw, Lawlor, Mooney
Senior year: Mike "Archie" Kane, Dan Reid, Matt Fitzpatrick, Skaus
Winthrop: Reid, Jamie Chamberland
Danvers: Scott Maglio, Melissa (I can't remember her last name)
Wakefield: Neil, Drew (no idea their last names)
Somerville: Andrew, Eddie, Josh, Mark Bowles

Including Jay and Aly, who will probably be my last roommate ever, I've had 19 roommates. Coincidence? I think not. Lots of different people that I'm glad I've met. Rooming with people can be the best thing that happened to a friendship or the absolute worst. There a few people on that list whom are great people but I'd never live with them even for a weekend trip.

Basically, I'm putting off packing for a little bit ... I hate doing it, though I obviously have to at some point.

Hunter S. Thompson committed suicide on Sunday night. I'm not a die-hard HST guy, but I was sad when I read the news. I'm a big fan of the two books of his that I read, "The Rum Diaries" and "Hell's Angels", not to mention his ESPN.com Page 2 stuff. He was a unique and gifted writer, one that will be missed. He didn't bullshit and didn't like bullshiters, calling everything like he saw it.

When people were falling over themselves talking about what a great guy Richard Nixon was when he died, Thompson said that he was a pig (more or less). Just lambasted him. I admire him for his stand. BTW here is a link to all of HST's Page 2 columns (not sure how long this will last)"

Hunter S. Thompson stuff

The person that turned me on to HST was my friend Tom Abrams. He was one of the most learned and well-read guy I've ever met, Tom was. I worked with him when I was at the Revere Journal, he worked for the East Boston Tribune. He went to American University (like Aly, though he didn't know her) and this dude just read and read and read, and he had a mind like a steal trap.

When he and his girlfriend (now wife) went off to discover America, they loaded up a van and just drove around for a summer, I didn't see him for about three months. Then we reconnected when I moved to Danvers and he moved to Peabody. We'd hit the gym, play hoops, smoke dope, study for the teacher's test and just talk about literature and shit. I haven't seen him in over a year.

He and Ingrid got married last year, I was invited, but didn't go. I wish I went because I miss the guy. It's weird how the death of one person you've never met can remind you of a friend that you do know, but aren't in contact with. Maybe I'll email him once I get settled.

Mahalo.

The rest of the long weekend

So the last time I left you, I was about ready to drop the keyboard and pick up the pencil and start drawing. I was detoured by an opportunity. I went to SOSH and found that there was a thread on a secret number to call for Sox/Yanks tickets ... which includes Opening Day.

I've been wanting to go to this game since Keith Foluke flipped the ball to Eye Chart (I can't spell Mienkevitch) for the last out of Game Four. Especially since it's the Yanks. So, I spent about 15 minutes trying to get seats and on my last try (which is a stupid thing to say, because why would I try again) I got tickets. There probably the worst seats in the house, but I don't care. I got four duckets for April 11. I can not wait to go.

However, giving away those seats is hard. Well, the first two weren't, they went to Ryan and Skaus. The last one was a bit more tricky. I was thinking about giving it to Aly, but she's a Yankee fan and it's going to be in April and she would not like to be there. So, I called up my mother to tell her that I got some seats. All of a sudden she said, "Sure, I'll go!" I was like, "Uh, what?" So I guess she's going.

Originally, I was thinking of Nick or Brownie or Jay, but my mom is going. In one way I'm glad, because she was the person who introduced me to baseball and she was one of the happiest people I spoke to last October. On the other hand, I'm going to be in the bleachers with two of my buddies and my mom. I told her what was going to happen that day, probably drink beers at my place, then go out to a few bars, watch the game and then go out after. I asked her if she really wanted to do this, she told me she'd think about it.

Her friend Joanne may get better seats, so hopefully that'll pan out.

Saturday night Aly and I went out with Reddish and the Connollys (that would be a pretty cool name for a band, BTW). We went to the Village Smoke House. The food was awesome, I got the Texas-sized baby back ribs, but the service was terrible. Beyond poor. The waitress was arrogant, forgot to bring us food and when we told her about it, she ignored us. So we left her 10% for a tip. A complete slap in the face, but she was awful.

After that we made our way over to Matt Murphy's Pub. I love that place, such an authentic Irish bar. Anyway, it was packed. We had a couple of beers than left. Jim and Sara left before that, so Reddish, Aly and I went back to Aly's place and drank some more. Jim offered to borrow his brother's truck on Saturday to help us move, which is going to be a huge help.

We got back to Al's around 11:00 or so and we drank just about everything in the apartment. It was great because Reddish is one of the easiest people to talk to mainly because he has his opinion, but doesn't knock you over the head with it also he doesn't make you feel like crap for spouting off your opinion. And another thing that's pretty cool about him (besides being a loyal 19Thoughts reader)is that he gets a lot of the stuff that I'm into, especially television and pop culture, so it's not a chore to talk to him about stuff.

The one problem that has happened over the past few years is that I've been losing contact with some of my college friends. Because of work obligations and other things, I haven't been talking with Reddish as much as I used to and it sucks ... I'm pretty bummed about it. He said he was thinking about getting a place in Brookline, which would be awesome. We could hang out a bit more.

Sunday we woke up and I was busted. I felt like complete shit, cotton mouthed, logey, slow, unresponsive ... yup, I was hungover. Aly and I hung out in Brookline for a bit, but we had to go to Franklin to watch Murphy. By the time I got to her folk's house, I was feeling even worse, so I puked and felt much better. We just kicked around for the rest of the day and went out to dinner around 5:00.

For one of the first times in my life, I couldn't eat. I ordered dinner, but I had them pack it up as a leftover, though I'm not sure that's what you could call it, since I had one bite. Then we went to the movies where we saw, "Sideways". Great flick.

Paul Giamati and Thomas Hayden Church (the guy who played Lowell on "Wings") were a couple of buddies who go on a white tour of central California. There they realize a bunch of stuff and a lesson or two is learned. It's really much better than this, but I hate giving away too much in the movie.

The way I looked at it was this: it's a great buddy/road trip picture that isn't too slapstick. There are a ton of funny stuff and a bunch of well written, well acted and well shot scenes. Do yourself a favor and see this movie, it's truly one of the better flicks of the last year or so.

Monday we spent most of the day packing stuff for our imminent move to Brookline on Saturday. We have a lot of crap to bring to our new place ... it's going to suck moving. I absolutely hate moving. I am trying to think myself past it, but it's going to be a lot of work.

Monday evening we went to Lauren and Bob's place for dinner. We had a pork roast, some potatoes and DelMonte peas (my favorite). It was great. I like hanging out with Bob and Lauren, we always have a good time. Lauren had to listen to us crab about the grocery store (another thing I hate) and suggested that we start using Pea Pod, which is a grocery delivery service. I think we may have to do just that.

BTW, if you've been reading the tabloids, you're undoubtedly aware that Paris Hilton got her Blackberry hacked into and there were a lot of celebrities' phone numbers available. From SoSH, here is that link:

Be a star fucker!

Also, in other SoSH news, a poster over there by the name of Eric Van has been hired by the Red Sox as a stat guy. Though I've had a couple of arguments with him in the past year or so and I find his way of boiling everything into numbers a way of dragging the fun out of baseball, I have to hand it to the guy. He's living the dream. Congratulations to him.

Too many books

Today, I started to pack for the big move next weekend. I have already filled up five large produce boxes with books. Why do I have all of these books?

Obviously I enjoy reading. However, I think that the bigger issue is that I have an insane fear of forgetting stuff. I'm not sure whether I'm going to be walking down the street one day and just start forgetting trivial shit. Supposedly having these books around will allow me to look up anything that I potentially forget.

If I ever got Alzheimer's Disease, I swear that I would probably kill myself. I used to have an Uncle Pat who slowly went through a dementia that would keep him up at nights crying because he couldn't remember who his third grade music teacher was (mine, BTW, was Mrs. Azeile (Ay-zeal-ay) ... I don't know how to spell her name). Apparently, he would start calling people at like 2 am asking, begging, them for the answer.

Nine times out of ten, they couldn't help him and they would either tell him to go to bed or they'd lie. But Pat was lucid enough that he would know that they were lying to him and that would make him cry even more. The strange thing was this guy wasn't crazy or anything. His memory started going and it literally drove him insane, and as the days melted into years, he completely lost it.

My mom told me about this when I was younger (he was actually my great uncle) and it became sort of a joke around our house when we couldn't remember stuff, "Who are you Uncle Pat?" But it seems that it made a huge subliminal impact on me, mainly because I can actually picture him in his bed thrashing around, trying desperately to search his brain for a name that will never come. I couldn't handle that. No way in hell.

Aside from packing up some stuff, not much is really going on. I plan to start my fourth cartoon after I get done with this entry, then Aly and I are going out to dinner with the Connollys and Reddish. I'm looking forward to this because I haven't seen those three guys in a long time ... more than six weeks for Reddish and it's been at least two months since we were at Jim and Sara's house.

They're all coming down to Aly's place and we're going to have a few drinks there before we go to the Village Smokehouse. After that we'll end up at Matt Murphy's for a few beers. We ended up there on Tuesday night for dinner with two of Aly's friends, Brian and Karen. I ended up having the Sheppard's pie, which wasn't as good a the Burren's, but it wasn't too bad.

Last night, we did nothing except go to Franklin to dog sit. By the time we got down there we grabbed some grub at the Rome (which is a kick-ass restaurant) and watched most of "Goodfellas". I love that movie, though I haven't seen it in a while.

I forgot to tell you about this, Aly got me a kick-ass Valentine's Gift, the book: "Jim Morrison: Life, Death, Legend" by Stephen Davis, who also wrote the Led Zeppelin tome: "Hammer of the Gods". That's one of my favorite rock biographies. I started reading it yesterday and so far, so good.

Thursday I finished another Manasso gift. This one was from Aly's brother John and it was "Fall River Dreams" by Bill Reynolds. This was a tremendous book, probably one of the better sports books that I've ever read. Basically, Reynolds spends an entire year with the Durfee High School (which is in Fall River) basketball team during the 1993-94 season.

The star of the team is a young (he was a junior) Chris Herren who ended up playing for Boston College before moving over to Fresno State. From there he went to the NBA, but because of bad choices (drugs, mostly) he was washed out within three years. However, this books paints a picture of Herren before all of his troubles began.

Reynolds does a great job of tying the fortunes of the basketball team to the pride that this depressed city has. When the team is doing well, despite the abject poverty most of its citizens face, the city is alive. Even though the book is set 10 years ago, the way that the city comes to the games and supports the boys remind me of "Hoosiers" or the high school stories that older people talk about from when they were kids.

It's almost as if the town stops for two hours while the game happens. Reynolds could've taken the easy way out and simply have written about the team and the players, but there is a lot of Fall River (and Lizzie Borden) history interwoven through out the tome. Another interesting thing is that one of the main characters, Jeff Caron, went to Merrimack and played on the hoop team during my Senior year. When I read his name I thought to myself that the name sounded familiar. In the epilogue it revealed what happened to the stars and that's when my suspicions were confirmed.

The one negative part of the book was that the editing wasn't very good. Misspellings, grammar syntax errors pop up through the book. It's not Reynolds' fault, but it was a tad annoying. I would give it four Mayor McCheeses.

Steroids? Is 19Thoughts on STEROIDS???

No. Unfortunately it is not. Thought it has been pumped up a bit.

See these two guys:



When I was a kid I worshiped these two guys, aside from Bo Jackson, Cam Neely and Michael Jordan, they were my favorite athletes. Over the last few weeks it has come to my attention that these two dudes (Jose Canseco and Mark McGwire) were hopped up on steroids for most of their careers.

Naturally, a lot of people are pissed about the alegations that Canseco raises in his new memoir, which is cleverly titled "Juiced". He said that baseball is full of roid heads and he should know because he has pretty much introduced everyone to the growth drug.

Controversy isn't the word for it, people are screaming about taking away past MVP awards, adding asterisks to every record broken in the last 15 years and drawing and quartering everyone that has put on even a pound of muscle since 1989. Normally, I would think that this was a huge over reaction, but in this case, I agree.

People love baseball. They put their faith and trust in the sport. Even when the idiots who run the game fuck it up, people always take baseball back. Why? Because it's a game that is hard to cheat at. Sure you can scuff up a ball, cork your bat, but other than that it's a pretty fair and square sport. Canseco and his band of freaks found a way to pull the wool over everyone's eyes.

And as much as people love baseball, they love homers more. When Greg Maddux and Tom Glavine said, "Chicks dig the longball" in that Nike comercial a few years ago, they weren't kidding. But it's not just chicks, it's dudes too. We are all in love with the home run.

I'm sure this story has happened to everyone once in their life, we've all been dicked over by someone that wasn't what we thought. For example, in college I fell head over heals for a chick who I thought was the most perfect girl ever. In my mind's eye I had built her up as the hottest, smartest, funniest and most pure girl ever. I respected the shit out of her.

We went out once, hung out a few other times and nothing happened (more my fault because I really liked her and didn't want to screw it up by being too forward). She got bored, which is the natural reaction, and she never talked to me again. As the weeks went by I found out more and more about this girl. She wasn't the pure, virginal chick that I thought she was. She was a fucking slut. She nailed half the school.

I was pissed because I thought she was lying to me. But the thing about my thinking was, and it's not something I realized until many years later, the signs about the way she really was were there however I was just too dumb to notice. That's how the baseball public feels right now, they feel like I did.

For over a decade these guys have been growing bigger and bigger and bigger and have been absolutely crushing balls into orbit. Yet, we just make excuses like, "These athletes train year round" or "They eat better" or "They use andro." Bullshit, they've been doing some real shitty stuff right under our noses, but we didn't want to notice.

Now we get pissed when they tell us that they've been cheating. If there's anybody we should be mad it, it' ourselves. We allowed ourselves to fall in love with an idea of a purity that had zero evidence of being pure. We were wrong and who likes to be wrong?

I had a bunch of other stuff to write, but I can't remember what I was going to say ... hopefully I'll remember the next time.

WOW! What a Wicked Weird Wednesday!

Seriously? No. Nothing much has really happened since I last wrote, which was on Monday, I believe. I just like illiteration and there aren't too many times that you can pull that off with W's.

Tonight I decided to spend some time over my parents' house. I had a few loads of laundry to do, so I've been doing that all night. I know what you're thinking, that is fucking fascinating, please tell me more. Ok, I will. When I was folding my clothes, I discovered that I probably have one of the most strange habits ever. It has to do with my underwear, I will not stack the same pattern of undergarmet or the same pairs of boxers that I know that I've bought at the same time, back to back.

In other words, if there are two pairs of polka-dot undies, I need another pair to act as a buffer ... like a pair of stripes. And say I bought three pairs of boxers at the Gap one day, aside from the first three days of wearing those pieces of clothing, I will not consciously place them next to each other ever again.

As I was doing this, I tried to think of the genesis of this insane fixation that I have. I've come to the conclusion that while no one, with the possible exception of Aly, sees me in my boxers, I still think that someone may see me wear the same type of undies and chastise me for (what they perceive) as me wearing the same pair two days in a row.

Strange, I know, but there is no other way of explaining it ... though there is that theory that I've been kicking around that I'm screwier than a shit house rat, but that hasn't been proven yet. Or has it?

In other non-underwear news, Aly and I are signed, sealed and delivered to our new place. We move next weekend, so if anyone wants to help, you know my email address. We originally wanted to move in this weekend, but Pauline (who is the liason between us the landlord) said that they wanted to redo the floors.

That's awesome news, because they really looked like shit. We asked them to redo them last week and they said they would, for an extra $100 a month in rent. We told them to pound sand. BTW, that's a really funny expression, and we didn't really tell them that, we actually said, "No thank you." But, they're doing it for free anyway.

The strange thing about tonight, is that it's probably my last night ever staying at my house in Amesbury after work. Not like I do it every week or something, but I do it maybe once a month. It's sort of nice to get the old inflatable bed and sleep in the room that you spent almost 20 years of your life in and has since been turned into an office.

The funniest thing was on the day that I moved to Somerville about two years ago, I had everything on Central Street, but I forgot something. I flew back home (I wasn't even gone for five hours) and my dad had moved all his shit in MY room and erased every last vistage of who I was. That dude wastes no time, I guess.

It was sort of shocking because I always felt that my room would always be the way I had it ... sort of a museum to me. That's not the way it was though. And now that I think about it, I can't blame them. It's not like my father is Aaron Spelling and we live in a 100-room mansion. My parents' house has eight rooms (including a bathroom), why would you keep a bunch of crap on a wall that was considered tacky 15 years ago?

My boss has been going like crazy this past week. She's running around at a million miles an hour at all times of the day, and she's a stress case. I have no idea why, but I'm trying to stay the fuck out of her way. Even though I got an awesome review last week, in the back of my mind I'm waiting for her to call my in her office and bitch me out.

I don't know why, I've settled in quite well at my job, I know what's going on ... more importantly, I'm on top of shit, but there's that nagging suspicion that I have the Sword of Damocles hanging over my head just waiting to drop. I remember when Ryan and I worked together at the Journal, I told him that I work better when I'm paranoid.

At the time, I thought I was joking, but it's true. When I think I'm in trouble, I work better. It sucks though, because when I'm paranoid, I'm obviously nervous and that makes my stomach feel like shit. Apparently, have to feel like shit in order to succeed. Like Rye said when I told him that, "Paranoia will destroy ya."

I almost punched him in the face for that, but then I thought that my boss might be watching and got right back to work.

So my brother got his wisdom teeth out yesterday. He said it wasn't too bad though the right side of his face is swollen like a balloon. He was in the dentist's chair for no more than 20 minutes. And he didn't seem to be in a lot of pain when I saw him today.

When I got my wisdom teeth pulled, I was about 19-years-old and they were really impacted I guess. I went to the hospital and they knocked me the fuck out. The first thing I remembered was waking up in a hospital bed with my mom to the right of me. I said, "I have to piss" and just whipped it out and started peeing. My mom grabbed a bed pan and caught whatever was coming out of me.

So not only was I in terrible pain but my mother saw my junk. That's just fucking wonderful. The next three days were a complete blur except at night when I awoke with a gigantic pain in my mouth that took a handful of perscriptions to kill.

Not Jay though, he's full of piss and vinegar and is "bored out of his mind" because he's been stuck in the house for two days. That's what happens when your favorite thing to do is watch TV. I told him to read, he told me he hates reading. I told him to draw or paint a picture, he told me to drop dead. So I told him to go cry, that'll take some time.

Two other things, Jay doesn't have any insurance, so he paid for this entire operation out of his pocket. That has to be a kick in the balls. And according to the dentist he has 16 pin-prick cavities. SIXTEEN! Unless he's been eating sugar packets for dinner and washing them down with Jolt for the last five years I have no idea how he got 16 cavities.

After I reread this, I guess I did have more to say than I originally thought I did. Good for me!

The Curious Case of Arrested Development

Before I go on my little rant, I'd like to print a correction. Yesterday I said that Danu was an Irish folk band. They're not. According to our musical notes man, they are an Irish traditional band or trad. So there you go.

The best show on television may come close to being cancelled. The reason? It's too good. Yes, this is a charge that most people who love a show throw around, but this time it's true. The show, an awesome ensemble called "Arrested Development."

Here's the thing: most people don't want to watch a program like "Arrested Development." They want to watch the same show over and over and over again. Tell me the difference between "Everyone Loves Raymond" and "The King of Queens". Both are ugly or overweight guys who act like retarded five-year-olds. Each has an incredibly beautiful wife who is a shrew of a ballbusting woman. And each has mettlesome parents/in laws.

This is just an example of two shows, the Jim Belushi Show, the one with Damon Wayans, just about 90% of all sitcoms follow this formula. Nobody wants to watch anything new or different. They just want to watch their cliches get figuratively and literally kicked in the balls every week.

How does this work with AD? Well, it's a different show. For one thing, AD is not a show that you can just jump into one day and start watching. Like a good book or a worthwhile movie, you have to start at the beginning to understand the nuances of the show. There are eight characters, each with a separate way of looking at the world and a unique comic voice. While some of the characters are archetypes (the know-it-all brother, the controlling mother, the vapid socialite sister) they also have other layers. Each layer is loaded with laughs.

Judging from the ratings, not many people are watching. This concerns the Fox network. Crappy ratings means cancellation. On Thursday, it was announced that AD will be cutting their episode order from 22 to 18, meaning that instead of ending during the sweeps month of May, their run will end in April. Check out this article from Wednesday:

AD Wednesday story

One of the stars, David Cross went on the Jimmy Kimmel Show and completely lost his shit, saying that Fox is replacing AD with a show called, "America's Cutest Retards." Which is pretty fucking funny. He has given up ship, which completely flipped out a majority of their fans.

I don't think Fox was aware of how this was going to freak people out, and this came out on Thursday, telling fans that they're behind the show 100% and that it's not being cancelled. Sort of bullshit, but here you go:

Fox's rebuttal

Which lead to this SFGate.com story about how the shelving of AD for the May sweeps could be considered a good thing. If you read this, it actually makes sense and may buoy your spirit:

Do you feel better?

So after a few days of positive press, which included star Jason Bateman hosting Saturday Night Live, Fox showed an episode of AD on Sunday night. It was a pretty good one (not one of the best, but certainly better than anything on TV), what does Fox announce following the show? AD is going on hiatus for three weeks.

What's my prediction? I think Fox is going to let this show twist in the wind for the next three months. If it gets picked up, it's going to be on a very short leash ... for some reason Fox doesn't believe in letting a show find its audience or not preempting it or moving it's time slot around. But the chances are good that AD is going to join the long list of Fox shows shot down before it reached their prime. Shows like "Action!", "Undeclared", "Andy Richter Controls the Universe", "Family Guy (which is coming back)" and "The Tick".

The one weird thing is that Fox does take the chance on these shows, but they have to stick by them. That's the bottom line.

BTW, here is an awesome interview with the creator of "Arrested Development""

Mitchell Hurwitz

Busy, busy weekend

I haven't done this in a bit, but here's another Jim story:

For some reason, Jim loved to chase squirrels. And it was funny, excpet you had no idea when he was going to do it. You could be walking to class, talking about a test you were about to take or a girl and he'd be listening and talking back. All of a sudden he would just start running after the squirrel that he'd spy. It was unsettling because he would bolt, no warning, no "Oh my God, a squirrel!" He'd just go. He never caught one of them though.

This was a busy weekend, but we had a blast. Friday night I had planned to go to the gym right after work, I was half way there when I got a call from a show that the pharmaceutical people were supposed to go to on Sunday. Apparently, the conference throwers hadn't been paid yet and they wouldn't let my people in until they got $6,000.

I had to turn around and give them a credit card, that I hope had $6,000 left on it. So far, I haven't gotten a phone call about the show, so I am praying that everything is cool. We shall see tomorrow.

The plan for that evening was to meet Aly, Ryan, Keri, Byrnie, Bill, Ellie and Byrnie's parents at the Burren in Somerville. We had a concert to go to that night at the Somerville Theatre. We saw these guys, Danu:

http://www.danu.net/

Before I get to the band and how awesome they were, first things first, besides the Guinesses we polished off, we also ate at the Burren. I've never had food there before, so I order the shepperd's pie. It was so damn good. I want to go back there tomorrow night. Besides my mother's recipe, this was probably the best sherpperd's pie I've ever eaten in my life. Aly got the Guiness stew which wasn't as good.

So then we went to the Somerville Theatre which is in Davis Square. I've never seen a show there before, but I have seen movies. For one thing, the place is in an old vaudeville theater with balconys and old chairs and the whole nine yards. It's such a cool place to watch a movie and watching a music act was even better.

Check this out for more info on the theater: Somerville Theater stuff

While the venue is condusive to a great show, Danu provided the rest. I wasn't sure if I was going to like them a lot. They are a traditional Irish folk band, and while I like Irish music, I don't love it as much as Keri, Rye, Byrnie and the rest. But, Danu was awesome. They were great, their musicianship is top notch, their singing was harmonious and they just put on a great show.

Listening to that music reminded me of all the great times I had when I was in Ireland in 2001 and 2003 and made me want to go back again some time to sit in a pub, sip a pint and just listen to some quality music. Aly liked them a lot too. As she said, "I wouldn't run out and buy their CD, but the live music really moved me. It was just awesome."

After that we went to Sauce, which is about a block away. It's sort of a trendy bar in Davis Square, but we had a good time, drinking brews, shooting the shit and having a bunch of laughs. It's definitely what I needed after such an exausting week.

This little bastard was with us:



His name is McNugget Buddy and he is sort of the official mascot of the Foley family. Ever since Ryan and Keri were kids, they would sneak him into each other's suitcases so that the other would find him after they open their case. Over on SoSH, Ryan did a whole story about him. Funny shit. Really good stuff.

Aly and I left around midnight, but we should've stayed. Drew ended up meeting the rest of the gang afterwards and they went to the Burren where they ran into Danu. Rye said they spent the rest of the night drinking and swapping stories.

Saturday was just as busy as Friday. We woke up early to take Aly home, she had a hair appointment and I was planning on using the time to either read or write in my Blog. I walked into Aly's place and had to do an about-face. It fucking reeked. Her roommate and her boyfriend decided to spend the previous night drinking their faces off and smoking like chimneys. Add that to the cat puke and the never-cleaned litter box and the stench was enough to chase me out of there.

I ended up going to Dunkin Donuts and spent most of the time just reading. After that, I walked over and got Aly and we took a walk up Harvard Ave. to the Upper Crust. They have phenomenal pizza there, and since we were starving we got a large prosciutto pie. After we ate, we walked around for a bit, looking around for stuff that we may need for our apartment (which we got, BTW--we just have to return the lease tomorrow.)

After that we got some wine and a block of cheese, tonight was going to be our Valentine's Day dinner, even though Valentine's Day isn't until tomorrow. We had reservations at this restaurant for 9:00:

The Federalist Restaurant

You may notice that this is actually a web site for XV Beacon Hotel. You are very perceptive. This is because there is no Federalist web site. Don't ask me why, they just don't have one. In any event, this is one of the fanciest places in town.

Before we ate, we had some cheese and crackers and a bottle of wine, Il Bastardido. Very good (not that I know any better). The mood was very relaxed, we had some Sinatra in the background (we found our wedding song, "The Way You Look Tonight") and then it was off to the Federalist.

We sat down and the decor was a combintion of funky with a lot of old Boston thrown in, mostly through busts of the founding fathers all around. I had the Caesar salad and Aly had the lobster bisque. Then the chef sent out a mussel and potatoe dish, free of charge, which was pretty cool. For an entree I had the sirloin steak, with fries, after I pussied out of the venison. Aly had the rack of lamb. For dessert we had a chocolate/peanut butter tort. We also had a nice bottle of wine.

The food was great, some of the best I've had in a while. The one thing was that the portions were a little small, especially for the money ... but thanks to the Pats, it wasn't too expensive. The air of the restaurant was very old school and stiff. Aly looked around and noticed that we were the only people relaxed, laughing and having a good time.

I enjoyed going there, I like trying new restaurants whenever I can, but it's not really an "us" sort of place. It was a very good night however, and I'm glad that we went.

Today we went to Amesbury, where my mom took Aly and I out to get supplies for our new place. We went to a discount store and we loaded up, anything we wanted, mom got for us. It was a very generous thing for her to do. We're in a really good position right now.

After that, mom had Nina up and we all (including Jay and Dad) had lasagna, chicken parm, salad and brownies. A great meal to end a great weekend of eating.

BTW, Jason broke up with his girlfriend. Can't say I didn't see that coming, but it still sucks for him.