This conversation I had kinda bummed me out

I had to take our car into the shop last week and I had a conversation with the owner I've been thinking about ever since.  Because cars are mysterious and temperamental creatures, I had to take it to a different place than we usually go to.  Anyway, the owner - super nice guy BTW - was taking my info and when I told him my address he said "Oh, I grew up like two blocks from there."

"No kidding," I said.  "Where do you live now?"

"Over by Lake Merced," he said.  Then he said the interesting slash depressing thing I've been thinking about ever since.

"But we're looking to move," he said.  "This city's getting crazy."  I nodded like I knew what he meant, although he could have meant any number of things.  Then he said, "Amd we've got a kid now and we can't send him to San Francisco schools."

I didn't really ask for clarification because, hey, he's a guy working on my car and we're not here to debate the merits of San Francisco schools but MAN IS THAT DEPRESSING.  I have a kid who's going to be going to school in a couple of years and it never occurred to me to just dismiss SF public schools out of hand like that.  I mean, we fully intend to do the whole lottery thing and whatever and see what happens.  (I assume he meant "San Francisco public schools" when he said "San Francisco schools" but who knows, maybe he just can't conceive of his kid attending any school in the city limits in which case never mind.)

It occurs to me that this attitude might be more prevalent among SF natives like this guy than with people who have moved here in the last, say, 26 years like me?  From what I understand, SF public schools used to be worse and have been improving greatly over the past few years, so maybe that's it?

This picture has nothing to do with this story except it's a cool picture of San Francisco. From some astronaut's Twitter, I think. 

The second depressing aspect of this brief exchange - and yes, I can manage to extract two depressing points out of a 20-second conversation - is that this is the kind of guy San Francisco desperately needs and can no longer keep.  A regular, middle-class guy who runs a local business and is raising a family in the city and isn't trying to commodify parking spaces or figure out yet another way to get food from a restaurant to your door.  I feel like we're losing the Normal Guy demographic and that's a vital part of this city or any city.

(Again, I'm making some assumptions here based on the fact that it's a guy who owns an auto repair shop and lives out by Lake Merced.  Maybe he's actually a billionaire who created Repair.io the auto repair app but I didn't get that vibe.)

That's about it.

You should have brunch at La Urbana

When La Urbana, the sleek and expensive-looking fancy Mexican restaurant was going in on Divisadero, I have to confess I was predisposed not to like it.  A, I'm kind of an asshole and not above judging places without knowing anything about them and B, it seemed like the most conspicuous symbol of the Divis Corridor's transformation from a regular SF neighborhood with a 5-and-10 store, a pretty good Thai restaurant, an agreeable neighborhood bar, an auto repair shop, and so on, into Valencia II: Son of Fleece Vest, and that kinda bummed me out. But then it was Mother's Day and that's the hardest day of the year to score a brunch res for and they had availability and one thing led to another and we brunched at La Urbana yesterday.

I am so sorry I thought those mean things about you, La Urbana.  That brunch was fucking great.

FIRST OF ALL it was Mother's Day and they were handing out free champagne.  Maybe just to Moms?  I had a Mom with me - not mine, God forbid, but the mom of my child - and she didn't want hers and they seemed cool with just giving it to me instead.  I'm not 100% sure if they'll be giving out free champagne next weekend but I guess you can ask.

One of the things on the brunch menu is tortillas and avocado.  It's an appetizer I guess and it costs $4.  ORDER THIS.  These tortillas are dreamy and tasty and soft and melt in your mouth and why have I been eating those corn-flavored discs all these years.

L-R: Kid's plate, mid-avocado destruction, Strawberry Drink, aforementioned avocado, the Ur-tortillas, few strands of Wife's hair.

Also in this picture: a shot glass with some kind of strawberry liquid that you get as an amuse bouche.  My kid held it up to me and said "THIS IS STRAWBERRY DRINK!"  She then ate an entire half of an avocado.  (She pronounces it "abogado" which means "lawyer" in Spanish and will no doubt lead to a hilarious Three's Company-style misunderstanding if she's in Mexico in the next year or so and asks for an attorney.)

I got the Frijoles Puercos - pork & beans, essentially - with a big house-made chorizo link that was fantastic and some volcanically spicy refried beans and excellent scrambled eggs sprinkled with cotija,  Also some chipotle salsa that mostly avoided because I was burning up from the beans.  Delicious.  Wife got chilaquiles but she wasn't feeling 100% and so wasn't totally into them.  They looked great, though.

One of the problems brunch enthusiasts such as myself face is that most places have the same things.  There's a benedict, that's an omelet, here's a scramble.  That's wonderful and I love all that stuff but just finding something that feels DIFFERENT is nice.

I want to go back and get the carne asada hash next time.  Jesus that sounds good.

Total bill before tip was like $46 which is pretty good for 3 people for brunch in this town.  Of course, the booze was free and so if you're normal let's say $100.

One small complaint: I know you're a sleekly modern and grown-up City Restaurant, but you could throw together a kid's menu of some kind for brunch.  We ended up ordering kid an order of scrambled eggs and it was fine but there were a LOT of kids there and it's always nice to see 3 or 4 things that are kid-sized.  Just a thought.

Here's what they don't tell you in parenting class

On the occasion of Beyonce's third birthday, here's what I've learned about having a kid, so far, in part.

1. They start out eating just one thing, then will pretty much eat anything, then go back down to one or two things.

They start off with milk (and formula too, which is totally fine despite what militant breastfeeding types will tell you).  Then she started eating pretty much everything we were eating.  Her first two words after "Mama" were "bus" and "tortilla," if that gives you any clue.  I think her first favorite food was pad thai, which she'll still eat on occasion.  I never even heard of pad thai until I was like 23.  Then as she got a little older she got pickier.  No more broccoli.  No more corn.  Mostly mac and cheese.  She loves mac and cheese like teenage girls love One Direction.  I'm exaggerating about only liking one or two things, but she definitely won't eat the rainbow any more. Luckily she still likes fruit.

2. "It goes by so fast" is bullshit.

The biggest lie the baby-industrial complex has ever foisted on the American public is that "time just flies, you'll wake up one day and she's off to college."  Total crap,  She just turned 3 and it seems like it's been about 6 years.  I don't even remember her not being here.  DON'T GET ME WRONG I love her to death and wouldn't have it any other way but she gets up by 6:45 am at the latest every day and basically never stops talking.  It's kinda exhausting.  Time does not fly under those conditions.

3. Kids are kind of hilarious

Yesterday morning she wanted me to sing "Happy Birthday" to her so I did.  Then she had her sunglasses sing "Happy Birthday" to me in a funny voice even though it wasn't my birthday and her sunglasses are not sentient creatures as far as I know.  Shit like that cracks me up.  She also got "actually" from another kid at preschool and now says "actually" all the time like she's #notallmen on Twitter.  "Actually I would rather have cereal."  OK then.

4. Kids have the emotional response of Britney Spears that day she shaved her head

Sometimes they just lose their fucking shit for no reason.  We have literally asked her "Why are you crying right now?" and she's said "I don't know why I'm crying! AHHHHHHHHH!!!!"  One second she'll be happy and totally chill and then she gets the bad news that we're not having cupcakes for breakfast and WHAM total fucking meltdown.  I know it's all a totally normal developmental stage blah blah blah fine but just get a Livejournal already and let it out there.

5. TV is your secret weapon. Use it but don't abuse it.

There are parents who say "We don't allow our kids to watch TV." They are lying.  Sometimes you really just need 30 minutes to put some laundry in or stare blankly into middle distance and there is nothing wrong with letting Dora co-parent for a spell.  We keep a lid on it and don't just park her in front of the screen for hours on end but I firmly believe there is nothing wrong with catching some shows.

6. Overall, it's great

Big picture?  So far it's pretty great.  We're probably on the lucky end because apart from a few tantrums here and there, our kid is pretty chill and goes to bed without any trouble pretty much every night and is usually down for whatever, but on the whole, yeah, it's great.

Happy Birthday, kid.

Lyric Deconstruction: "Animal Crackers in my Soup"

Shirley Temple, 1935



Oh, look at the cute little girl singing about animal crackers in her soup!  How sweet!

WRONG.  This shit is fucking DARK.  I didn't really know any of the lyrics until I played it for my kid one day and listened.  It was like a Southern Baptist listening to her kid's Faster Pussycat album for the first time.

Animal crackers in my soup
Monkies and rabbits loop the loop,
Gosh, oh gee, but I have fun,
Swallowin' animals one by one.
In every bowl of soup I see,
Lions and tigers watching me,
I make 'em jump right thru a hoop,
Those animal crackers in my soup

Not too bad so far.  But wait, here comes the second verse:

When I get hold of the big bad wolf
I just push him under to drown
Then I bite him in a million bits
And I gobble him right down!

Holy shit, Shirley.  I'm prettty sure holding an animal underwater to drown it is felony animal cruelty.  Can't you just picture the wolf thrashing violently in the water under Shirley Temple's tiny hands, gasping for breath as the curly-haired monster forces the life from him?

When they're inside me where it's dark

I walk around like Noah's Ark

I stuff my tummy like a goop

With animal crackers in my soup!

The image of a menagerie of animals sloshing around and slowly dissolving in Shirley Temple's stomach acid is too much to bear.  I hope they all died a merciful death before she could sentence to the misery of her portable miniature ark.  Also, "goop" as a term for a kind of person must have gone out of fashion at some point in the last 80 or 90 years.  Maybe it should be "I stuff my tummy like a GOOP," but only if by "stuff my tummy" you mean "browse over a carefully curated selection of hand-grown tropical fruits and high-mountain imported quinoa."

It goes on, but more boringly.  Let's focus on the horror.  No wonder it says "Advisory - the following lyrics contain explicit language" on MetroLyrics.

I would say have a good weekend but I don't think that's possible now.

I'm on hiatus

It's that time of year. Time to engage in some uncomfortable air travel and see the relatives and whatever.  I'll be back.

The One-Offs

Oh, California Department of Public Health Most Popular Baby Names 2009-2013, how I love thee.  Everyone already knows that the most popular California boys' names in 2012 would be Jacob and Ethan and Matthew and, God help us, Jayden.  So go on with your Emilys and Mias and Sofias.  We all see you.  The best part of the CDPHMPBN is that it lists how many babies in a given year got that name.  So, for example, in 2012, exactly 1,007 Zoes arrived in California, followed closely by 1,006 Madisons.  There is a 100% chance there will be a Zoe or Madison in your California life at some point.

But we don't care about them.  We care about the ONE-OFFS.  That's right, those names that were bestowed just one time in the State of California in a given year.  And we've learned that, if nothing else, California parents are fucking CREATIVE AS HELL.

So for example in 2012 precious ZEPLIN and ZESAR and ZIPO zipped out of some forward-thinking Moms.  "Popsicle you have, now to me you must give," young YODA might say.  SOCRATES and PERICLES are giving democracy a spin, while SAW and BLAYDE are just cutting up.  MOBY and TIESTO and ZEDD will be manning the playground decks, while CHAOS seems to be in trouble all the time.  No worries though, BUD's here.  And why settle for just one when you can have ERICS?

The girls are having just as much fun.  In fact, they're a RIOT.  Wait, is SANSA a Game of Thrones character or a beta blocker?  I forget.  TAEDYN seems like the wreckage left after two more popular names collided.  Maybe CASHLYNN can help pick up the pieces.  I hope SNOW WHITE and CINDERELLA are in the same class; the other kids' minds will be fucking blown.  I hope they go to Disneyland with RAPUNZEL one day.

Finally, presented without comment:

There's gotta be a story, right?  I hope there's a story.

If you're Bored at Work, feel free to go mining and do share any good gems you unearth therein.  Have a good weekend, everybody!

The world according to kid

WARNING: Content may be construed as daddy-blogging.  Enjoy or avoid as your preference may be.

This is our kid.  She's about 2 1/2 years old now.  She's like a little person now.  I mean, she was a little person the whole time, but when they're like 6 months old they're basically just a blob you put food into and remove waste from the outside of, and now she is starting to get independent and talks in roughly complete sentences and has LOTS OF OPINIONS ABOUT THINGS.  Maybe they will interest you.  Maybe they won't.  The Wife is out of town for a while here and I'm putting these here for her benefit just as much as yours.

On Food

"This tastes like orange" (eating an orange)

"This tastes like a pouch" (eating a pouch)

(After hearing what we're having for dinner) "Oh, that sounds really delicious"

"I want juice and milk in the same cup."  (Ew, no.)

On Familial Relationships

(Apropos of nothing, to me) "I'm your daughter."

"Mama's a big daughter"

(To every other guy boarding the N Judah) "That's not my dada."

(One guy said "No it is not," with a sense of relief? Or something?)

Misc.

(After I tickled her) "You need to calm down." (Pause) "We both need to calm down."

Her: "Shit. Shit. Shit."

Me: "What are you saying?"

Her: "Shit. Shit. Shit the odor."

Me: (lightbulb going off) "Shrek?  Shrek the ogre?"

Her: "Yes. Shit the odor."

While driving the car

"I'm looking for a parking spot."

Obviously a San Franciscan.

As I alluded to on Twitter, the experience of solo parenting (day 5 of 10 today, yay) has imbued in me a newfound respect for single parents.  We're very lucky because she's a pretty easygoing kid and is usually great to be around, but still, sometimes you just want to hand them off and be like "Here, you deal with this for a while" and having someone else around makes that possible most of the time.  So hats off, single parents. 

Journalism! Oh well. Part 2.

I'm going to assume that Time magazine has gone to some kind of vanity press model where you can publish anything you want on Time.com as long as you pay them enough because that's the only rational explanation I can come up with for this sub-Debra-J-Saunders pile of drivel.  Or maybe it's just a naked, trolling pageview gambit because if any editor at Time thought this piece had any more journalistic worth than Weekly World News filler, journalism really is dead and US Weekly is our new New York Times.

The piece I am referring to, of course, is "Netflix’s New Parental Leave Policy Could Make Things Worse for Women," by one "Suzanne Venker."  It begins thusly:

No doubt people are dancing a jig with Netflix’s announcement Tuesday that the tech company will allow its employees to take unlimited maternity or paternity leave during the first year after their child’s birth or adoption—while earning their normal pay.

I'm dancing a jig!  No, I'm not, because I don't work at Netflix.  Also, who has used the term "dancing a jig" since FDR's fireside chats?  "Twenty-three skidoo, Ethel, I'm dancing a jig over the new warshing mechanism!  What's a Netflix?"

Suzanne Venker darkly sees many problems with Netflix's fantastic and generous policy that is a great benefit to employees and which I desperately wish my wife's company had:

First, offering an unlimited leave policy in the first year to new moms and dads means the remaining employees who don’t fit the bill will be left to pick up the slack. This will likely, in turn, strain relations among co-workers and make the workplace environment less effective.

[citation needed]  It will likely strain relations among co-workers!  This sounds serious!  I'm sure this is a well-documented problem that Suzanne Venker can support with studies and research.  Oh, when it's "likely" you don't need evidence.  This is the equivalent of Ancient Aliens' common use of the term "Isn't it possible that.....," as in "Isn't it possible that the stones used to build the Great Wall were quarried by ruby lasers attached to the foreheads of barely-sentient orgone slaves imported from Io?"  You can get away with anything like that!  Sure, Suzanne, it's likely!

Second, it isn’t fair to babies. By encouraging mothers, who are the still the primary parent at home, to bond with their baby for a long period of time with the expectation they’ll return to work at the end of the year means the baby will become even more attached to his mother, and separation may become intolerable.

Suzanne Venker is on much firmer ground here, because a vast amount of research supports the notion that separation may become intolerable when a mother returns to work after a year.  Oh no, wait, it's exactly the opposite!  I suppose it "may" become intolerable, sure.  If even one baby has trouble adjusting, we shouldn't do it at all!  Good thinking, Suzanne!

Offering new parents full pay for up to one year is akin to putting a band-aid on a gaping wound. The needs of children are huge, and they do not end at one year. On the contrary, they just begin. Taking a year off of work to meet those needs merely scratches the surface.

Get the message, Mom?  NEVER LEAVE YOUR CHILD'S SIGHT, NOT EVEN FOR A SECOND.  Any absence creates a "gaping wound."  Hope your college fund is for 2, because you're going with him/her!

It goes on and on in this vein, trying to shame women into staying at home instead of going to work.  Which, if you can do it and that's your choice, fine, but a lot of women either can't or don't want to and that's fine too and the last thing we need is Suzanne Venker trying to make someone feel bad with completely fabricated arguments supported by zero evidence.

We will later learn, although it is not disclosed anywhere in the article or the author's note, that Suzanne Venker is the kind of person who tweets things like "The war on men is real. And it has only just begun" or "Feminism is evil in disguise" so I'm starting to get the sense that Suzanne Venker isn't a 100% neutral source on this topic.

Fuck's sake, Time magazine.

Million Dickhead Listing SF: My monastery floors are better than your monastery floors

Sorry this is so late.  The past two weeks daycare has been closed so I've been babysitting I mean parenting in the mornings which means I've been cycling between the park, the bus[*], back to the park, and then the couch to watch Big Hero 6 AGAIN AND AGAIN.[**] This means I have less time for the Things That Matter, like blogging and whatever the fuck else it is I do.

[*] The kid loves Muni so much.  She thinks it's magical and wants to ride the bus or the train whenever possible.  JUST WAIT, KID.

[**] Her taste in Big Hero 6 is now exquisitely refined to the point where sometimes she just wants to watch "THE MASK THE MASK THE MASK" - i.e., any action sequences featuring the villain, who wears a kabuki-type mask.  Also, it's a pretty good movie so I guess we're lucky.

ON TO THE SHOW.  Ruh Roh is still trying to move the A/C unit on Octavia.  Whilst showing some idle rich around, he drops the, to my mind, stunning detail that the floors were taken from a "Benedictine monastery in Austria."  WHAT THE FUCK.  WHAT THE ACTUAL FUCK.  This had better be a lie, or it moves that apartment from "ugly" and "uncomfortable" to "actually evil." We can at least be consoled with the fact that tearing up floors from a monastery to put them in your yuppie box is a fucking 100% guaranteed express ticket to a Hieronymous Bosch-style hell.

GOOD LUCK IN YOUR NEW LOCATION

Roh's also in on the Bernal Heights place from last week - you remember, the one that's in a slum so grotesque it makes a Rio favela look like Chestnut Street at brunchtime.  He's representing some potential buyer and human-shaped eye roll Andrew has the seller.  They sit across a table from each other and negotiate like two mildly developmentally disabled fifth graders playing Risk.  The place sells for $1.9 million.  Everybody eats salad.  The universe continues to entropy.  Eventually - not soon enough for my taste - the Sun will swallow and vaporize  the Bernal Heights property.  It will then be worth much less.

Meanwhile, Justin has been engaged by a dentist who may not be a dentist but might be an actor playing the dentist from "Little Shop of Horrors" because that's what he seems like.  He lives in a penthouse in Pacific Heights and is friends with Kathy Hilton and had his picture taken with Prince Charles once so I guess that's about everything you need to know.  He wants to sell his place for $4,000,000,000 or something.  Justin can't make anyone pay that much.  He laughs nervously and everyone dies.

Back at Andrew's place, his gay fiancee says he maybe wants to fuck some chicks.

IT'S GO TIME on Monastery Manor.  The seller, a pointy man with round spectacles, insists on $2.6 million.  Roh's seller won't pay a penny more than $2.599 million.  This isn't a joke!  I'm not making this up!  In the big-balled high-pressure world of real estate, YOU WIN if you convince the seller to accept 99.9999997% of his asking price.  I wish spectacles had turned him down.  "YOU INSULT ME WITH YOUR PROPOSAL. I SHALL BROOK NO FURTHER TALK OF THIS SORT.  GOOD DAY TO YOU SIR."  Instead, that jackoff takes it!  HAHAHA YOU JUST GOT ROBBED, MY MAN.  $2,599,000 instead of $2,600,000!! What a fucking rube.  You think thousand dollar bills grow on trees?  Idiot.  Whew boy.

[Ed. note: I'm well aware that many, if not most, places in SF go for over asking in today's go-go Webvan Pets.com-style economy. For whatever reason, that doesn't happen that much on this show. Maybe they're all overpriced to start with? Anyway, fuck these people.]

Anatomy of Date Night gone wrong

When you have a kid, Date Night is a big deal because you get to go out with your Life Partner and someone else is taking care of your deal and so you want everything to go right because it doesn't happen that often.

Last night, everything did not go right.

The first part of the plan was to meet up with some friends at a Restaurant That Shall Not Be Named at around 6:30.  This plan was immediately complicated by the existence of April 20, which used to just be the day in April between the 19th and 21st but somehow in the past few years became 420, a big party in Golden Gate Park near our house where a bunch of stoners stand outside and smoke pot inside of sitting in their living room and smoking pot like normal people.  As a result, thousands of brain-damaged youth get someone to cover their shift at Carl's Jr and drive their cars from Concord or Antioch or whatever into a tiny corner of the city where my house is.  A trip of about 10 blocks leaving my house and heading for the Mission took about 15 minutes.  We were going to be very late.

[Not sure why this GG Park thing started.  It didn't happen a few years ago.  I blame Facebook.]

We got to the RTSNBN a little before 7:00, so actually not that bad!  It was very crowded.  Very, very crowded, which seemed odd for a Monday.  But the waitress appeared relatively soon and we got our drink orders in by say 7:00 p.m.

The FIRST INSTANCE OF CREEPING DREAD came when the waitress disappeared for the next 30 minutes.  No drinks, no taking our orders, nothing.  HERE is where I should reveal the rest of Date Night: we were going to see Porchlight, a monthly storytelling series at Verdi Club.  As it happens, one of our friends would be performing.  To make it more interesting, he was going on first, at 8:00 p.m.!  There's no way we wouldn't be done with dinner by 8 if we arrived at a nearby restaurant at 7, right?

Right?

Drinks appeared around 7:20, brought by Someone Who Was Not Our Waitress and in fact did not seem to know the names of the drinks.  We still have not ordered food.

The SECOND INSTANCE OF CREEPING DREAD came when I managed to flag our waitress down like I was a Semaphore Flag Operator in the Navy in 1942 so we could order food.  Now, at this point, I'm thinking, "OK, 7:30, get the food by 7:45, choke it down violently like a wolf eating a dismembered rabbit, and we can still make it by 8:00."  I asked for the check as we ordered to make this impossible dream feasible.

The THIRD INSTANCE OF CREEPING DREAD came when we passed 7:40 with no sign of food, waitress, drinks, anything.  I pulled out my Flare Gun and shot a flare at the ceiling.  It bounced back onto floor and spun crazily, sparks shooting out in every direction.  The waitress somehow saw us.  "We're trying to make an 8:00 show," I said.  "Is there any chance we'll have our food soon?"  She said she would check.

Having already paid, we finally got up to leave at 7:55 p.m.  We never got any food.  There was a manager type at the door.  He explained he knew what was going on, presumably because the waitress who could have been using her time getting us food or drinks was talking to him.  There was some confusion about whether he could just box it up or whatever but I think we concluded he would just credit our cards back.  TO RTSNBN'S GREAT CREDIT, it looks like they completely refunded the whole meal, drinks and everything.

We made it into the Verdi Club right around 8:00.  Saw our friend perform.  He was great.  At 8:15 I walked/jogged in a dizzy low blood sugar daze to the McDonald's on 16th and Potrero and Jose set me up with a Quarter Pounder with Cheese (for me) and a Filet O Fish (for my Date).  We ate them huddled in the corner of the Verdi Club like animals.  It was delicious.  

Last Night a QPC Saved My Life

By then, all the seats were filled and neither one of us felt like hearing any stories.  We watched a little standing in the back of the room and split.

I want to reiterate that RTSNBN did the right thing, maybe even more than the right thing, by totally refunding us.  The 2 free drinks apiece were nice.  But still, man, you gotta get your shit together if you're serving the public.

There will be other Date Nights, but there will never be another QPC that tastes as sweet.

Look upon the face of evil

Robert Lopez and Kristen Anderson-Lopez wrote the songs for "Frozen." If you have a child[*], these are who you can blame for having "Do You Want to Build a Snowman" stuck in your head for the last year.

[*] I don't have a male child, so I don't know if Frozmania is gender-nonspecific, but as far as I've heard, it seems to be at least a girl-centric phenomenon.  The protagonists are both girls, then young women, and the men in the film tend to be either lovable goofs or duplicitous schemers.  Maybe that's why.

You may not probably don't know this, but Robert Lopez also co-wrote The Book of Mormon, a fairly overrated but somewhat enjoyable musical better known as a creation of the South Park dudes.  The only thing Frozen and The Book of Mormon have in common are the fact that they both involve musical notes.

It is also claimed that Robert is an EGOT winner (i.e., Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, and Tony), but he won a Daytime Emmy, which I think you can win just by wathcing enough episodes of Judge Judy.  I might have won a Daytime Emmy and the notification is stuck in my spam folder.  Until he wins a Real Emmy, his EGOT comes with an asetrisk.

Anyway, those of you without kids may be wondering what I'm going on about because you don't have to listen to the Frozen soundtrack - or, indeed, watch the Disney film of the same name - over and over and over and over.  I don't know what it is about that movie but our 2-year-old is absolutely entranced.  It's basically the only thing she will sit still and watch all the way through which is actually kind of nice when you're home and need to unload the dishwasher.  What's not so great is how we have to listen to "Do You Want to Build a Snowman" and "Let It Go" EVERY SINGLE MORNING in the car on the way to day care.

I guess I'm kind of glad she isn't that crazy about Olaf's song any more, because I actually kind of like it and it hasn't been ruined by being forced to hear it 250 times.




Not bad, huh? If that really is Josh Gad singing, he's pretty good at singing!

There's no real point to this post.  I'm just sick of the Frozen soundtrack and needed to let it out.  The other day I had this realization, and the actual words as they formed in my head were "Blogging is just about seeking and sometimes obtaining validation."  This is so blindingly self-evident that I felt bad for even thinking it.  So this post, I guess, like every other post, is a naked attempt to get validation, in this case for the relatively uncontroversial position that kids like Frozen and the soundtrack is wearing me down.

Here's what I have to look forward to, I guess.  These are movies I have never seen but expect to see a lot of, soon:

The Lion King
The Little Mermaid
Beauty and the Beast
Any of the Cars movies
Aladdin
Pocahontas
That one that looks like it's set in New Orleans that I can't remember the name of

I hope I never have to watch Up again.  That was a total snooze.

Can you eat at the Rainforest Cafe and live to tell about it? Possibly!

Last Wednesday was my daughter's second birthday.  Happy Birthday Beyonce!  We took the day off work and went to Fisherman's Wharf to see the sea lions and ride the carousel and that kind of shit.  A couple of observations: (1) if you have to go to Fisherman's Wharf, it is much, much better to go on a Wednesday in March than, say, a Saturday in August; and (2) Pier 39 is still as terrifying and touristy as ever.  A shop that just sells puppets!  A man wearing a Bikini Inspector t-shirt!  Italians!

Then we went to eat at the Rainforest Cafe, which is what would happen if the Jungle Cruise at Disneyland opened a restaurant.  Lots of animatronic animals that go off every few minutes and a very loud soundtrack of Reggae for White People.  You enter, of course, through the Gift Shop, where one might purchase such items as a "Bag of Rocks" for $6 I swear to God I am not making this up.  I was hoping it would just be a random bag of gravel and sand but it's those polished rocks but still.

The actual restaurant is upstairs.  The best way I can describe the odor is that it smells like a wet dog.  I guess after years and years of dampness (and it is really humid or something in there) you just can't get the smell out of the carpet any more.

GODDAMIT this picture turns sideways when I post. Fucking Blogger.  Seriously I should have broken up with you a long time ago. Is it impossible to edit pictures in WordPress?  Because in Blogger you have to fucking join Google+ or some shit just to edit pictures.  Fuck that.

That was the view from our table.  The tiger would go off with a loud recorded roar every five minutes or so.  The elephant in the background flaps its ears back and forth.  The kid, of course, found this all delightful.

The food was not as bad as I thought, somewhere between airport and hotel banquet.  It was expensive as fuck, though.  Lunch was $64 after tip for 3 of us and we didn't even have booze, although RC is not shy about pushing fruity tropical drinks on you like you're on spring break.

But fuck it, the kid had a blast and it wasn't anywhere close to as bad as I imagined it would be.  Plus our server, Oscar, was incredibly friendly and nice and he must get stiffed by Europeans all day and to stay that nice must really take it out of you so I tipped him like 25% and should have gone higher but by that point I was starting to feel dizzy and overwhelmed and that tiger kept yelling at me.

There's also a downstairs bar that wasn't in use when we went.  On the way out there was a guy using a selfie stick (ugh) to take a picture of himself in the empty bar.  Where are you in your life when you're using a phone on a stick to take a picture of yourself alone in an empty Rainforest Cafe bar.  Are you shooting an ad for Despair?

Anyway, if I had an extra $100 burning a hole in my pocket and was at Fisherman's Wharf around lunchtime, I might go back.  Not alone, though.

The Bachelor: You fucked up, dude

We seem to have found ourselves in Bali, which is odd for this season because it's not in the Rust Belt and doesn't appear to be a featureless wasteland.  ABC sure saving the money this year though because even the resort doesn't look as swank as they usually do. Three and a half, four TripAdvisor circles tops.

First date is with Kaitlyn and poor Kaitlyn's hair has fought the good fight but has been utterly vanquished by Bali.  They're heading into some temple which features a statue of my corner store guy when someone takes too much change out of the Leave a Penny cup.

There's some walking around Bali which actually looks a little rundown tbh and then they're OH MY FUCKING GOD THERE'S MONKEYS ALL OVER ME OH GOD MAKE IT STOP oh wait I guess it's supposed to be like that?  Fuck that.  The only primate I want crawling all over me is Kaitlyn.  LOVE YA GIRL.

Outdoor dinner in a faux jungle temple setting of some kind.  K has a "weird fear of loss from my last relationship" but she keeps picking skin or something off her lips and that's giving me a weird fear myself.  Anyway blah blah blah and it's OFF TO THE FANTASY SUITE with a bathtub full of cherry Jell-O.  "It's rose petals," The Wife says.  Oh.  Farmer is "excited about the potential they have" which hopefully involves full-body antiperspirant because brosef is sweating like a fat man in a sauna.

Day 2.  While Kaitlyn walks of shame Farmer is off to meet Baby Voice at the docks.  Apparently Baby Voice can't hug anyone without jumping on them and wrapping her legs around them which must be supes awkward at family reunions.  They're off for some wine boating and face mashing and Baby Voice spends the whole time explaining why her sister is such a fucking bitch and WHOA girlfriend's got some serious rugburns on those knees.  Did she already Fantasy Suite with someone?

Doesn't matter, he's not listening to anything she's saying anyway.  Their outdoor dinner is at a slightly nicer resort.  Farmer's all worried that BV won't want to live in Abandoned Hellscape, Iowa, but she's all no problem!  I'll just quit my job that I've wanted my whole life and move to Depression Junction and squeeze out as many puppies as you want!  You're an inspiration for women everywhere, BV.  Off to the Fantasy Suite with you.

Day 3 with the Virg.  There's some boring walking around rural Bali and they drop in on the village psychic who big surprise tells them they should hit it tonight, so he's not really that good at psychicing.  Farmer says "No matter what we do it's gonna be fun" but THAT'S WHERE YOU'RE WRONG, SWEAT LODGE.  Their outdoor dinner is the same place as last night.  There's a lot of talk.  Are all virgins this boring?  She's also wearing a dress last seen on an episode of Three's Company.  Meanwhile he's sweating like Albert Brooks in Broadcast News.  Oh, here comes the Fantasy Suite card.  Virg voiceovers "He doesn't know he's going into the Fantasy Suite with a virgin."  Doesn't have to come out with one VA VA VOOM!!!!  Anyway, off to the FS where she breaks the bad news and he says "GET THE FUCK OUT" no I'm totally shitting you, he says he respects that, which is what you have to say.  The shitty thing is now he HAS to keep her or he'll look like a total dick who dumped her just because she's a virgin.

The next day.  Farmer stares meaningfully at the ocean, as required.  He is confused and this calls for a sit-down with Chris Harrison, who does not seem to suffer from the Bali Flop Sweats like Farmer.  They have a long talk about something, I don't know, I kinda zoned out at this part and then looked at my phone for a while.

Day 5?  7?  A milllion? Who cares.  The Rose Cer is going to be at the Most Sacred Temple in Bali where no touching is allowed so it's perfect for the Virgin.  Baby Voice has taken on an odd hue that does not go well with her coral lipstick.  Oh, wait, Farmer has to go have a private chat with the Virg but instead of dumping her like a sane and normal person he drags her back out.  Of course Baby Voice gets the first rose.  Then  the Virg, duh, just like I said.  You fucked up real bad dude.  He escorts Kait to the Crying Boxy Minivan where she actually has her shit together pretty well.  Farmer uses his ABC-issued sweatpad to try and blot up some of the rivers of sweat as she pulls away.  This is dumb.

This video of a chick taking stuff out of a plastic backback is my daughter's "The Wire"

I'm not sure exactly how she stumbled upon it - it was most likely on one of those YouTube sidebars of "other videos you might like" while she was watching one of her OG Elmo or nursery rhymes videos - but somehow our 22-month-old daughter discovered the below video and it has now become her own personal "Spitter" episode of Seinfeld.  She will watch it again and again.

WARNING: Do not watch it unless you're interested in a pair of hands with complicated nails remove a series of smaller toys from a plastic backpack and then, in turn, open those smaller toys.


Not exactly the last season of Breaking Bad, is it?  I'm not really sure what is so attractive about this to our kid.  I have theorized that there is some kind of child-level ASMR thing going on, and I will admit the sound of the toys going back into the backpack makes a satisfying "klunk" that my daughter and I both find soothing.  (Well, I imagine she does.  She likes to watch the shit out of it but she's never said "Dada, I find this soothing.")  The parents in the article linked below also share my ASMR theory, to my somewhat surprise.

THE PLOT THICKENS.  Turns out the fancy-nailed Dora backpack opener is THE HIGHEST PAID YOUTUBE EARNER IN THE WORLD.

HOLY.  FUCKING.  SHIT.

That's right.  This anonymous chick (and if you read the linked article, she seems pretty vigilant about being anonymous) made FIVE MILLION DOLLARS LAST YEAR opening and assembling Disney toys on camera.  She came in ahead of #2, TAYLOR FUCKING SWIFT.

This fact is so mindblowing to me partly because until some time last year I had no idea there was such a thing as "unboxing" videos and until a few days ago I really didn't know you could make five million dollars a year making them.

(SIDE NOTE: #4 on the YouTube Walk of Fame is Little Baby Bum, which produces a seemingly endless series of animated videos that I assume if you have a kid you're as familiar with as I am.  They are as addictive for toddlers as oxy is for Kentuckians.  I could - and perhaps will - write a whole other thing about the LBB world and its characters.)

Anyway, I'm sure the Dora backpack video will blow over at some point just like other once-favorite videos have been discarded.  It's just one of those Inexplicable Things about kids.

The Bachelor: Farmer in the Gel

One circle of Hell probably looks like a featureless, sunbaked street in Los Angeles County where a semiautonomous organism waves a "I [heart" Chris" sign that someone has handed her because that's where we're starting out this season.  HI EVERYONE I'M WATCHING THE BACHELOR AGAIN because I have so much love to give. Apparently the first hour of the show is going to feature helicopterloads of prior contestants in some kind of faux Academy Awards red carpet show except with disease vectors instead of actors and lowered expectations instead of statuettes.

LET'S MEET OUR BACHELOR whom Chris Harrison gaggingly refers to as "Prince Farming" when Field of Screams or Plower Bouquet or Bodily Farm was available.  Chris the Farm Man is proud to "feed the world" which means putting high fructose corn syrup into M&Ms.  He wants what his parents and sisters have, which appears to be livestock with numbered tags in their ears.  Since he has exhausted the romantic possibilities in Arlington Iowa, he feels that "this is the best way to find love," which means he has never heard of FarmersOnly.com.  Chris dons a comically oversized motorcycle helmet and heads west to meet some emtpyheaded hair product support systems.

Back at the Oscars of Desperation, Chris Harrison is doing red carpet interviews with people I have only a vague memory of, while in the background cavort others we longed to forget like Droopy Face and Too Much Product and Who the Fuck Is She Again.

Let's bounce and meet some chicks.  Britt is a waitress in Hollywood and looks like an Olsen twin on a crash diet in a concentration camp.  There is a not zero chance she's done coke with James Woods.  Amanda is a ballet instructor with Keane painting eyes and a legitimately krazee vibe. Whitney is a "fertility nurse" who has found the perfect job for someone with the voice of a toddler.  She longs to be fertilized as well!  Kelsey is an exotic-looking widow in Austin whose husband's heart just stopped one day!  If he was walking in Austin anytime between May and September I can understand.

Cut to the Red Carpet where there is a Nixon-Frost length interview with Nikki about Juan Pablo and her life and anything else in the entire universe.  Gotta put something in between yogurt commercials, I guess.

After an hour of bullshit and the Nikki Documentary, we're finally ready to get started.  Following establishing shots of Chris trying on clothes for the first time ever and gettin his visage fixed with the pitcher machine, we're ready to start unloading the Cattle Cars.  Out pops Britt who latches onto C like he's a kidney donor and she can't process waste.  The Widow Kelsey claims to be "just a regular girl" but she's on this show so I'm not 100% sure about that. I was starting to think we were going to largely avoid Gimmick Intros when Human Tissue Salesgirl Reegan arrives with a biohazard container full of what she says is a human heart but is probably just human lungs or a spleen.  Lame.

THEN THERE'S TARA.  I kinda love Tara.  She hops out in a Sexy Farmgirl Halloween costume with cowboy boots and Daisy Dukes and proceeds straight to the bar and orders a Jameson.  SWOON.  Then for some reason she changes into a cocktail dress and gets out of the limo again? Not sure why, but we get to see her killer White Trash Tatt:

It's kind of hard to read but I think it says either "LOVE IS PEE * BRIDE OF RESIN" or "FINE BY ME * WHISKEY & GINGER."

More chicks.  Amanda takes her bipolar and goes flying by. Hairstylist Ashley says she's 24 but maybe means she's been a hairstylist for 24 years?  I know Kaitlyn With a K is probably getting all the press for telling C "You can plow the fuck out of my field any day" but that's the Space Pants of farmer pickup lines. So played.

The ladies are at Cuban Missile Crisis levels of concern because THERE ARE ONLY 15 OF THEM.  No one can process this world-shatteringly bizarre turn of events.  OH WAIT IT'S CATTLE CAR ROUND 2.  The First 15, now in various stages of intoxication, peer from behind the blinds as Wedding Cake Decorator and Tandra on the Motorcycle and Nicole Who Is Wearing a Pig Nose Not As a Statement on Society But For Other Inscrutable Reasons arrive.  Karas and Jades and various other dubiously-employed lifeforms emerge.  There are 30 women now!  Or as DiCaprio calls it, Tuesday.

FINALLY, we are at the Cocktail Party, i.e. Lord of the Flies Sponsored by Sephora.  C passes haplessly from Plus Size Model to Fourth Grade Teacher like a speed dating tetherball.  My two fave drunks are Ashley from Brooklyn (not that Brooklyn, though - no full sleeves or dumb hat or boring anecdote about her solo show) and of course Tara, who winningly says she "cares for that kid," hopefully meaning C and not an actual child because Tara should not involved in any child care scenario. Human Teeth Whitener Britt gets the First Impression Rose, raising the combined IQ of her and the plant to 80.  JUMP CUT back to the Live Show where Famous Loser Michelle Money meows "I heard she doesn't shower" about Britt. What the fuck Michelle.

ROSE CEREMONY.  God, they better not do these fucking 3 hour shows every time. I'm barely keeping track at this point.  Who's staying? Kaitlyn, Jade, Poor Man's Mischa Barton With Black Hair, The Widow Kelsey, Megan the Simple.  Meanwhile Drunk Tara is hanging on like Just Standing There is a roadside DUI test.  It's touch and go about whether she's gonna end up on the floor before this is over but YAY she gets a rose.  Sadly, Ashley from Brooklyn does not.  There are other roses given and withheld.

Meanwhile, Tara has confused her rose for Domino's and is going house on it.

My only wish for this season is a long run for Tara and a high enough Jameson budget to make it worthwhile.  *winks* Love ya girl.

QUOTE OF THE WEEK: "I went to school for sports broadcast news but now I sell cadaver tissue."  Has there ever been a better metaphor for life?

Exercise is getting weird

HOLY SHIT ARE YOU IN THE OFFICE TOO of course you are. Why would you be reading this on your own time? I can't believe we have to be at work.  Fuck.

Anyway, it's a brand new year and that means everyone has decided to exercise for the first time.  You could do normal things like that fake bicycle ride in the gym or running on a treadmill or lifting a heavy piece of furniture up and down but what's the fun in that?  There is no fun in that.

Based on my observations, people exercising outside have collectively decided to just go "FUCK IT I'M DOING WHAT I WANT FUCK YOU WORLD." This very morning, driving through San Francisco's Golden Gate Park on my way to drop off my offspring at daycare, I personally and with me own eyes observed the following:

- One gentleman walking quickly/almost jogging in the bike lane, swinging his right arm back and forth in a wide arc as if to ward off a cloud of invisible flies that were surrounding and troubling him, or maybe pretending his arm was a single windshield wiper and his body was a car driving through a terrific rainstorm

- A lady fast-walking and rhythmically tapping herself on the head with BOTH HANDS, elbows at ear level, as if she was playing a simple drumbeat on the bongo that is her very own skull

- An otherwise normal-appearing jogger with those neon shoes everyone likes now, also running in the bike lane at a very high rate of speed and through an intersection against a red light as a bus bore down on him, making me believe I was about to see what literally "getting hit by a bus" looks like and wondering (not totally unreasonably) if this was going to make me late for work because I would have to give a statement to investigators while they placed pieces of the jogger and his ugly shoes into a bag

Google Image Search result for "weird exercise." YEP YEP YEP.

In fact, the Running in the Street thing (which is actually mostly Running in the Bike Lane) has become so prevalent that I see it on the reg now.  What's up with that?  Isn't there a perfectly good sidewalk for that?  Is it revenge for bicyclists biking on the sidewalk?

One time I was driving AT NIGHT on a street with no bike lane and this girl was jogging in the street alongside all the parked cars WEARING BLACK. Either she had an exercise-related death wish or she was a terrible cat burglar making the world's worst escape from the scene of her latest cat burglary.  Either way, I can't imagine she's still alive.

My favorite tweets of 2014

Once is an incident; twice is a trend. Three times is a tradition.  Welcome to TK's Top Tweets of 2014.

2014 could've been better... pic.twitter.com/fOxJAFwDtg
— Will Menaker (@willmenaker) December 26, 2014

It's hard to say any year totally sucked when you have a kid because they light up your life and give you hope to carry on etc but 2014 was kind of a garbage year. Between everyone in our family dying including the fucking DOG and the world pretty much going to shit what with the police brutality and the Isis and what have you I'm not sad to see it go.

It's mind boggling that we trained a seal to kill Osama Bin Laden.
— Bert (@BertCarrillo) December 1, 2014

Nevertheless there were good parts and these tweets are part of the good parts.

Ma'am I'm doing everything I can pic.twitter.com/7xy0g9FWKg
— White V Black Twitta (@WhiteVsBlackTwt) November 18, 2014

"You promise you didn't get me bees again" [me from a distance] just open it
— Cat Damon (@CornOnTheGoblin) November 11, 2014

"Did we do good, Barry?" Real good Joe "Tell me bout congress Barry" Democrats far as the eye can see [Obama raises gun behind Biden's head]
— acetaminofun (@crylenol) November 5, 2014

Harold Reynolds doing World Series analysis... pic.twitter.com/1fk2SE8hOo
— Daren Willman (@darenw) October 27, 2014

JESUS: now, I'll turn water into wine GUY: misdirection. the wine's up his sleeve JESUS: don't—Luke, don't write that. this doesn't go in
— acetaminofun (@crylenol) October 3, 2014

TOGETHER WE CANT EVEN
— Dan Jackson (@DanJackson415) September 26, 2014

I actually went to look up what was happening with the Giants on Sept. 25 that made Dan tweet this, which perfectly summarized a season that was beyond frustrating right up until they won the fucking World Series. The Giants were playing the Padres and were up 6-0, then gave up 8 runs in the 6th and 7th innings. My forensic analysis of the timestamp on this tweet leads me to believe that's when Dan sent this out. As it happens, the Giants then came back, scored 3 runs in the bottom of the 7th, and clinched a playoff spot. Unbelievable.

Opening a new cocktail bar with @cdouble2073 called "the motherfuckin hood tho" serving only $14 drinks and lite bar fare. White folks only
— Richie Nakano (@linecook) August 22, 2014

who the fuck sac bunts in the little league world series SMH
— Lindsey Adler (@Lahlahlindsey) August 15, 2014

i'm beginning to regret my subscription to The Ominous Times pic.twitter.com/IHQ9JIaV9Q
— MarkusJ (@MarkusJ) August 7, 2014

How the hell we supposed to trust Atlanta to keep ebola quarantined when Gucci Mane released 8 mixtapes from jail?
— Larry Beyince (@DragonflyJonez) August 1, 2014

*Jaden Smith in school *raises hand Teacher: yes? Jaden: How Can Mirrors Be Real If- Teacher: Jaden I swear 2 god I will get u expelled
— ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ (@YungOutline) June 16, 2014

REPORTER: Mr. President, what's your favorite Wu Tang album? OBAMA: What kind of question is -- [biden grabs podium] BIDEN: LIQUID SWORDS
— blupman (@blippoblappo) April 26, 2014

Every eHarmony ad looks like they do a good job of matching up 6's.
— Saucy Peeps (@saucypeeps) March 11, 2014

FYI those little crosses along the interstate aren't for squirrel crucifixions. I was wrong. The article I wrote about this was wrong.
— Jason Miller (@longwall26) March 4, 2014

Philz is playing Sugar Ray, which is having the same effect on customers as filling the place with bear spray.
— Kevin Montgomery (@kevinmonty) February 28, 2014

@linecook Ramen is a flat circle, if you look from the top. We are all eating noodles in eternity forever. Yellow King add-on $4.
— Andrew Dalton (@dolftown) February 20, 2014

THE YEAR IS 2016. FACEBOOK DOWN FOR TWO YEARS NOW. AMERICA'S NEW MOMS ROAM THE STREETS. IS MY BABY PRETTY? THEY SAY. PLEASE LIKE MY BABY.
— Mark Agee (@MarkAgee) August 1, 2014

This is the worst analysis of anything ever written in history http://t.co/XrZ1KamPcV pic.twitter.com/WYUJ1hB5qh
— Julia Carrie Wong (@juliacarriew) August 23, 2014

If there was any better summary of San Francisco in 2014 than a techie's Mom writing to tell seniors and the disabled to get the fuck out of the way of her son's road to wealth, I can't imagine what it was.

Time to go, 2014. You don't have to go home but you can't stay here.

Urban Etiquette: Motoring in the City

Since I live in San Francisco and work in San Francisco I obviously take Muni to work since there's nowhere to park at my job that doesn't cost $18 a day.  So I never used to drive that much.  Just on weekends, pretty much.  Like, literally I would not enter my car M-F unless it was street cleaning.

Now I take my offspring to day care in the mid-Sunset area, so I drive every day.  It's been an eye-opening experience.  Everyone is a terrible driver.

1. For the love of all that is holy, USE YOUR FUCKING TURN SIGNALS

Why are you stopped in the middle of the street?  Have you died in your car and now it just sits there, unattended, while your body rots into the seat?  No?  You're waiting to turn?  Your car is almost certainly not a pre-1939 Buick and thus is equipped with a mechanism designed to let others know your intentions vis-a-vis turning.  FUCKING USE IT.

2. How Stop Signs Work

It has become apparent to me that most drivers believe that Stop signs work like this: "I see a Stop sign.  I pause briefly, then continue on.  It matters not if there are other cars at the intersection, in the general area, or anywhere else on Planet Earth.  I have paused briefly and will now be on my way."

This is not how Stop signs work, you maroon.  Print this out and tape it to your dashboard:

We cool?

3. Green light means go

Why are you just sitting there?  Depress the accelerator pedal.  The odds of the North American Plate suddenly lurching to life and moving under you so as to propel you through the intersection without you operating your car are vanishingly small.

4. Double Parking: Is It For Me?

Double parking is mostly OK if you just have to run in for a second and it's a fairly wide street so the rest of us can get around you without too much trouble.

DO NOT DOUBLE PARK:

a. Anywhere near an intersection.
b. Anywhere, at any time, on Fell, Oak, Gough, Franklin, Turk between Van Ness and Divisadero, any of those little tiny streets in Bernal Heights or those alleys in the Mission, or anywhere else you're going to royally fuck up traffic.
c. When there's a perfectly good parking space right there! What the fuck are you thinking? Take the 30 seconds and park!  Christ!

5. There is no point in tailgating.  It almost never makes the person in front of you go faster and you just look like an asshole.

I'm sure I've forgotten some big ones.  Enlighten me in the comments if you wish.

Binge watch alert

I know, this is turning into 40 Going On TV, but that's sort of my life right now.  When you have a kid who goes to bed at 7, you are bestowed two gifts: (1) a fairly substantial period of time before you go to bed, and (2) the total inability to leave the house.  Either we become serious g4m3rz, read books next to each other on the couch, the steady tick tock of the clock punctuating the passing silence, or we fucking watch TV like normal people.  We watch a good amount of TV.  Although, to to be fair, probably no more - and maybe less - than the average American household.  The average is about 5 hours per day, and I doubt we get anywhere close to that.

Jesus, that was a long preamble just to talk about one show: Peaky Blinders, now streaming on Netflix.  PB is a British drama about a crime family in Birmingham (England, not Alabama, duh) set just after World War I.  How could I elevator pitch this?  The Sopranos crossed with Downton Abbey?  No, not really.  Maybe Boardwalk Empire with British accents?  I've never seen Boardwalk Empire, but I understand the comparison has been made.  Anyway, it's really good and we're currently just beginning to binge watch it.

It stars Cillian Murphy, mostly known to American audiences as The Creepy Irish Guy in Different Stuff.

It's got all the elements you want for a Complete Binge Watching Experience: a dark antihero, several intertwining plots, an even darker antiantihero, explicit violence, flashbacks, one or more mysteries at the center, and a woman with a secret.  There's also Sam Neill struggling valiantly with a Northern Irish accent.  YOU GO SAM NEILL, YOU'LL BEAT IT.

We're only three episodes in and I kinda love it.  I think there's only 12 episodes total, so you could easily knock it out before more stuff starts/comes back early next year.  (I also think it's the show they're discussing this Sunday on TV on the Radio so there's an excuse to at least catch a few eps.)

TV Roundup

I'm back!  I've been on hiatus.  This included air travel (surprisingly not that bad; travel on Monday and Friday of Thanksgiving week if you like avoiding crowds); family (great); and the incredible biscuits of the Loveless Cafe (incredible).

A girl and her breakfast (NB: bacon does not come pre-shredded).

ANYWAY, now we're back.  Sorry for the long layoff and whatever.  We are now in Peak TV Season what with some series finales and mid-season finales and basically all kinds of great shit going on so let's take a minute and reflect on the wondrous bounty the Lord has giveth upon us.  And by the Lord I mean Comcast Xfinity.

SONS OF ANARCHY - Blessedly in the final season, with the series finale December 9.  This season sort of mirrored the show as a whole; there were some good parts and some really, really bad parts.  Luckily, it seems like they're pulling it together towards the end.  The last few shows have been excellent, so I'm pretty optimistic they can pull off a satisfying end.  At first we thought everyone was going to die but maybe not.

90 DAY FIANCE - Everybody's on the train(wreck) now.  Just read Beth's outstanding recaps at Your Slow News Day. Watch it now, because this is the last season it's going to be good.  From here on out, the couples will all be totally self-conscious and playing it for the camera, just like Jersey Shore with Central Americans.

THE WALKING DEAD - Just got to its mid-season break with a SHOCKING DEATH of a formerly minor character who was given lots more screen time this season so we could get invested and then moved by her SHOCKING DEATH.  Hey, at least something is fucking happening this season.  Kill 'em all, if that's what it takes.  Why am I even watching this show.

PARENTHOOD - On a break until January 8 I think. My ideal series finale would be Zeek drowning Max in a bathtub and then sitting in his prized classic convertible in the garage with the engine running but instead it'll probably be more of Ray Romano's stupid family hogging all the scenes.

I would be remiss if I did not mention the indispensable TV on the Radio show on BFF.FM, everyone's favorite Internet radio station, every Sunday morning at 10 a.m., in which the ladies discuss TV shows and life itself.  Perfect to enjoy with your half cap and cruller or bong hit or whatever it is you do.