willhines.net

I’ve lived at five different addresses in NYC since 1996. Since I diligently avoid cooking, I can do most of my shopping at corner delis and bodegas. The one item which I have never seen carried at said delis and bodegas? Kellogg’s Frosted Mini-Wheats (bite-sized or otherwise). I can get sushi at 4 in the morning delivered to my door, but Mini-Wheats I apparently have to smuggle in from Westchester County Pathmarks.

This was not true in Boston, Cape Cod or in Danbury, CT. So I would put the lack of easily-accessible Frosted Mini-Wheats as one of my top annoyances with NYC. And here is the complete list:

Top Annoyances With NYC:

• No Frosted Mini-Wheats
• Slowly-walking [...]

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This week, Entertainment Weekly explains “Why Charlize Theron Isn’t Afraid Anymore.” I’m glad, because I worried about Charlize. After all, the only weapons she has to fight life’s obstacles are wealth, beauty, fame and successful careers as a model and movie actress. A tough road.

This continues a long line of questions that desperately needed answering:

• How will Halle Berry succeed as a movie actress despite being completely beautiful?
• Will Albert Einstein ever achieve anything in the realm of physics despite having an incredibly high intelligence?
• How will professional basketball players deal with the challenge of being good at basketball?
• How will trees handle the daunting, near-daily task of photosynthesis?
• How will dogs ever manage to take their next shits?

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• ESPN.com has a hilarious article about gaudy baseball uniforms of the 70s and 80s in our of our current World Series participants, the White Sox and Astros.
• I’m trying to make a place where I read all my friends’ blogs at once. Here’s my attempt at that so far: The Grey People. (edited: now it’s My Fellow Jerks)
• May God forever bless Rubber Soul, even its remakes. Any album that can make “You Won’t See Me” seem like a good song is a work of genius.

Edited: The name “The Grey People” is too confusing. So instead it’s called “My Fellow Jerks.”

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I walked into a deli — not my usual one — to order a ham and cheese sandwich, with lettuce, tomato and mayonnaise.

“I’m out of tomato,” the guy said.
“Oh,” I said.
“I’ve got lettuce,” he offered.
Then neither of us said anything.
“I got the mayonnaise, too,” he added.
Nothing again.
Then I said “I’ll come back some other time.”
The guy shrugged his shoulders.
I said “I’m sorry,” and left.

I wasn’t really sorry. I just didn’t know what else to say.

• Eliza and I finished watched first season of Lost. I predict this show will be a hit.
• I put some more pictures up.

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• Can I marry The Cardigans? Because I’ve been listening to their album Life and it makes me want to. I’m not even talking about just lead singer Nina Persson. I mean the whole band, the sound they create.
• Entertainment Weekly has done an article looking back at The Watchmen. I love that book too, but can someone please write about comics without ever, even once, mentioning that “comics aren’t just for kids anymore?” We know. We’ve always known that. Just talk about the story!
• Had a very funny discussion with Primal Bias last night before our show at The Project: Could you win in a fight with Albert Pujols if he were fighting only [...]

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So while Eliza and I wait for more DVDs of Lost to arrive, I’m watching Seasons 1 and 2 of Moonlighting. I’m pleased to learn that I still love this show, and shouldn’t regret how in 1986, at the age of 15, I purchased Ray-Ban sunglasses, a copy of “Limbo Rock” (on cassingle) and Billy Joel’s The Bridge in an effort to be more like Bruce Willis.

But the main thought to occupy my brain as I watch has nothing to do with the snappy dialogue, 40s movie references, unconsummated sexual tension, or simultaneous talking. What I mostly think about while watching Moonlighting seasons 1 and 2:

“Wow. They had no email OR cell phones.”

So [...]

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John Reynolds turned me onto Johnny Ryan’s Angry Youth Comix. I love them. They are making me laugh very much.

Er, they’re horrible, by the way. Lots and lots of dick jokes, gratuitous violence — disproportionately but not exclusively towards women — juvenile obnoxious characters (Wad the joyful neighbor with hairy man-tits that lactate flesh milk is a mild example).

But it’s also SUPER FUNNY. I don’t know what makes the difference for me. Some people are funny when they get crude, and some are just annoyingly angry. I do NOT mean to overintellectualize it, but I think it’s that some people have a poetic sense of being ridiculous — the stories make [...]

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I’ve updated my notes on my “call for albums” thread. Thanks to Garret, Cragg, Tanouye and Jarrett for getting some music to me so I can whittle down this list.

http://www.willhines.net/albums.html

Also, I told some improv classes I was teaching that I’m looking for new music. A guy brought in a disc with 252 songs! Awesome! But also: daunting! I forgot that we live in a time where that can happen — where a piece of plastic can hold days and days of music.

In defense of my friend, he asked me first “Do you want a LOT of songs?” And I said “Yeah! As many as you can fit!” But now that I’m plowing through this catalog, it prompts the question: [...]

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I threw out almost all the jewel cases and liner notes for my CDs recently. I think it was a mistake, but that’s another story.

What I’m happy about today is that among the very few liner notes I kept where the ones for the Rhino Records re-issues of Elvis Costello CDs. Elvis wrote these himself, and they are just like him: funny, pretentious, honest, self-mythologizing. I already had all of Elvis Costello on CD but when the mood strikes I’ll buy the Rhino version just for these notes. You can read a sample of them at The Onion’s A.V. club.

So last week, Get Happy! arrived from Amazon. Besides being a fantastic album — the [...]

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My car: 1987 Honda Accord 4-door, approx. 190,000 miles

Current flaws:
–air conditioning broken
–vents leak heat onto driver and passenger’s faces, even in the summer
–thing that sprays wiper fluid on windshield long since broken
–driver’s side door can’t lock from the outside
–driver’s side window opens and closes slowly
–passenger’s window closes slowly
–top of windshield leaks onto driver’s and especially passenger’s seat
–battery loses charge if headlights are left on for over 2 minutes
–fails to start 1 out of 30 times
–parking brake might not do anything
–no spare tire or jack
–horn sounds like a sad animal moaning far away

Pros:
–engine seems solid
–decent sound from stereo
–new tires cost only $40 each

Someday I wll try [...]

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