All posts tagged with "pop-culture"

One night this week, I started watching Who is Erin Carter on Netflix, and I've got to tell you, I have never seen a more sloppily-written piece of television. I got 35 minutes into episode one. Good thing I'm here to tell you what's wrong.

Back before the days of blogs and digital images, Mrs theskinnyonbenny and I got married and took a follow-up trip to Ireland. We toured around for a bit and happened to end up in Dublin at the same time that then-president Clinton was in town. You young uns won't remember, but back in the day, terrorists would occasionally blow up buildings in Ireland...

I have some great ideas for TV shows that they should make.

The dentist chair is a good place for the mind to wander. This week, I took those mind-wanderings and started typing them out as a post. Whose music is dentist-office appropriate, but still good? Let the debate begin.

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You would think that the people in Hong Kong Phuey's city would figure out his true identity.

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I was just reflecting on a couple of the missed opportunities that I let get by recently. Sometimes, you get a perfectly good -- maybe even great -- web log entry staring you in the face, and you get busy doing other things and never get it posted.

The most unintentionally funny person on television is CNN Headline News's Nancy Grace. If you aren't familiar with Nancy, she has been a regular guest on the mother network's Larry King Live for a couple of years.

How do you like that? It's been more than two weeks since I posted anything here. I've gotten a couple of irate emails, and I'm sure lost a few of my 10 or so regular readers. I just wasn't feeling like spending my free time at the computer lately. I do spend my entire workday staring into the retina-melting screens you know.

I am currently reading Phil Jackson's book, <i>The Last Season</i>. It has a subtile which I can't remember. From reading the text, I'm pretty sure that Phil intended the subtitle to be, <i>...and Kobe Bryant is a no good whining bastard</i>, but the editors probably shot that down. (Actually -- to be honest -- I downloaded an mp3 copy of Phil Jackson's book, and I've been listening to it while I walk the dog in the evening. It's not the same as reading the book, but I don't really have the right verb. "I'm currently listening to the book," doesn't work, because I'm not currently listening to it. I'm currently typing on a laptop. You see the problem.)

Does anyone besides me like that song, The Day Ted Nugent Killed All the Animals? The IPOD picked that song for me while I walked the dog last night. It got me thinking that someone could go out and put out a whole page explaining the cultural references in that tune. I'll go ahead and do it myself.

It might be coincidence, but it seems like this week has brought us more than the usual amount of incompetence in broadcasting. My standards really aren't high. I just don't think these broadcasters are trying to entertain me as hard they used to.

I went to Voodoo Fest this past Saturday. There was beautiful weather, and it was good to be outside hearing live music. Let's jump right in with a review of the headliners' performance:

I have no interest in letting this become the site for celebrity obituaries. However, the passing of Christopher Reeve moved a reader enough to request that I comment, so I'll share a quick Superman story, and then move on.

I was a little saddened to hear that Rodney Dangerfield died this week. I remember watching Rodney doing stand up on HBO and being or delivering the punch line in the Lite Beer From Miller Gang commercials back when I was a kid. I've decided to memorialize Rodney with a brief review of all of his movies. Okay, not all of them, but all of them that I could come up with off the top of my head.

To a sophisticated kid of the 1980's, it turns out to be majorly disappointing when you finally see the move. It's really not all that gruesome or scary by today's standards, or even not by the standards of movies 20 years ago.

Let's start with the good: the Madonna concert started with Vogue, and the concert could have ended at the end of that number. We would have said something like, "she could have sung a few more songs, but man, it was really good."

On Sunday night, I will be at the Madonna concert in Atlanta. I fully expect the most awe-inducing show that I've ever seen. I'm also pretty excited just to have a couple of days off work, and a weekend away from yard-slave laboring, even if it is just for a road trip to Atlanta.

I'm still not real impressed with the summer movies that I've seen previewed so far. We went last night, and I had a flash of excitement seeing the submariners from Hunt for Red October on the screen. Wouldn't it be exciting to take those guys and make a new movie, without being constrained by a Tom Clancy plotline? But no, it turns out that is was just Sponge Bob Square Pants, playing with a toy submarine that was causing the crew so much havoc.

Work conversation this morning included an allusion to Long Duck Dong before 9:00 am. That's bodes well for your day. I'm inspired to share some pop culture observations. I suppose I should start with American Idol.

I don't seem to find myself as excited about what's on TV lately. And since I have nothing else to tell you all about, allow me share some complaints.

I saw a commercial for the local Lincoln/Mercury car dealership. This particular commercial has the dealership full of young families: 30-somthing parents, with cute active kids. The problem with this whole thing is that there's no way in hell that any of these people are going to buy a Lincoln or a Mercury. I really thought that you had to be collecting social security before they would even let you into the dealership. At the very least, they must have an AARP discount.

It seems like most people are either raving fans or harsh critics of reality TV. Actually, the ratings show that there are more fans, but at least some of us reality fans aren't willing to admit it.

Today, I wipe the sweat off my brow, having avoided the Oscar season's obligatory geezer movie. We generally spend January in a frenzy of movie-going. The weather is crappy anyway, so we try to catch as many of the Oscar contenders as possible.