Random Ramblings about my BFF: Television

Hiya, cheeky monkeys!  I'm not making any OOBH Stew this week - sorry.  I just... well, I just don't feel like it, and since I AM the boss of ME here on my blog, I'm just not gonna do it.  Instead I'm going to ramble on about one of my favorite subjects - television - just for the helluvit.

The True Blood finale is this Sunday night, and it will be EPIC, but I'm sure gonna miss having it as my Sunday night ritual.  This show has easily become my favorite hour of television each week.  Now what am I gonna do - find real porn to watch?  Sheesh.



The good news is that Dexter returns soon, so my craving for clever, well-written hour-long dramas with lots of sexy violence will be satisfied once again. Last season was one of the best ones yet; John Lithgow was SUPERB as the Trinity Killer.  Did you all hear about what poor, confused John said in his Emmy acceptance speech, btw?  He thanked the wrong network!  Dexter airs on Showtime, but he thanked HBO.  OOPS!  That's a pretty big pile of faux-pas to step in.

On the comedy front, I'm looking forward to another season of some the few sitcoms I watch: Modern Family, 30 Rock, Community, Parks & Rec, and to a lesser extent, The shark-jumping Office.

The older I get, the less TV I watch.  I've abandoned pretty much all reality TV except for Top Chef, even though I should really quit watching that one because it never fails to give me the munchies.  It's 10 o'clock at night and Jim and I start combing the fridge because of all the savory goodies they're making.  Bad!




I'd be remiss if I didn't remind you all that one of my comedy idols, Chelsea Handler, will be hosting the MTV Music Awards this Sunday night.  Just FYI!  She might even make it watchable.  Maybe.





Anywhooooooo.  I hope you all have a fun weekend.  Here's one last thing to (hopefully) give you the giggles.  I know it made me laugh!

That's all she wrote!  Have a great weekend!
XOXO

I'm rooting for the Fox Hole!

Programming Note:

Today I'm gonna do something that I hardly EVER do here on the OOHB; I'm gonna mention religion. Not bashing, just mentioning, so no hate mail, please. THX.

The Management

I just came across this story on my beloved Dlisted, and I knew right away that I had to write about it. The story goes that in a small town in Ohio there's a strip club called The Fox Hole (BRILLIANT, right?). For the past four years members of a nearby Christian church have been showing up every weekend to picket the sinful activities happening within the walls of the Fox Hole, even going so far as to post pictures of the stripper's license plates on the internet to "out" them as the shameless strumpets that they are.

How very... Christian... of them...?

Oh, come now. Does this look like the face of a meth addict devil-lover?

Wait, don't answer that.

At least the owner of the Fox Hole is a stand-up chap... with a sweet mullet, to boot!



The ladies of the Fox Hole got sick of being on the receiving end of the righteous folks' scorn, so they showed up at mass last Sunday and did some picketing of their own.

*slow clap*

Right ON, ladies. Right. Effing. ON. Ya' gotta admit that picketing a church takes some major cojones!

Regardless of how scummy they may be, I happen to believe that these folks have every right to shake their money-makers for a living. Live and let live, I say! Are they hurting anyone? Are they forcing anyone to come into their den of iniquity and get a lap dance? Hell no. They're just going to work, and their work happens to be exotic dancing, thankyouverymuch.



Of course, the church members have a right to peacefully protest too, so I guess they're at an impasse. Sucks to be them. I am glad that I am neither a stripper nor the judgmental type.

The local news package - yes, I said package - is below with the full scoop.

I'd like to point out that this might be the worst example of TV news reporting that I've ever seen, and I worked for a pretty crappy TV station myself. How about you make your voice a little more monotone, guy?

So there you have it. Team Fox Hole or Team Holy Roller?

I may be tired, but at least I'm not tired.

Hi all!
I'm extremely tired today, so I can't guarantee that this post will make much sense.

Yeah, yeah, like that's any different from any other day! I know. I'll keep this short and sweet - two things.

Different spokes for different folks:

This morning while driving to work I saw a man on a bicycle. He was fit, in his mid-thirties, and wearing the customary biking gear. The only thing remarkable about him was the fact that his skin-tight biking shirt had hiked up in the back, revealing what can only be described as a tramp stamp.

"Might as well be a bullseye."

NTTAWWT... except there totally is something wrong with that.

I try not to judge, but a dude with a lower back tattoo? It just looked wrong, somehow. If I could have snapped a pic of it I would have, but the light turned green and I had to pilot my motor car so as not to kill anyone.

Next order of business: admit it, this baby dances better than you do.



After I stifled the maternal instinct that told me to get the baby off the goddamn table before he falls and cracks his skull open, I thought this was really cute. Look at him, bustin' a move! Shake what yo' mama gave ya, baby!

That's all I've got today. TTYL, you gorgeous people, you! I need to go find an I.V. caffeine drip.

Shrinkage?!

Nah, not that kind of shrinkage. Simmer down, fellas.

The other day in the grocery store I saw that Cheez-Its were on sale for $1.99/box, so I threw a box into the cart for the boys. A day or two later, Jim had the hongries so he got the box and was munching away when it suddenly occurred to him that there was something awry. The box was really, really small.

Small boxes - men hate those, right?

*whistling innocently*

Anyway. Looks like the Sunshine Company has pulled a fast one on us. The box is now several ounces lighter and is square instead of rectangular. It's basically now postage-stamp sized, but roughly the same price as the old packages. Jim held the box up and examined it before declaring that it was "freaking him out."

Not long ago I noticed the same thing about ice cream. As a kid, we'd get half-gallon containers of my favorite Breyer's ice cream, but a few years ago I noticed that I was able to palm a carton of ice cream when removing it from the freezer instead of having to use two hands. It seemed slightly smaller because it was - it had shrunk from a 1/2 gallon (2 quarts) to 1.75 quarts. No big deal, right? It's not like my waist needs that extra half a cup of smooth, delicious ice cream, right? However the price... it didn't get smaller, now did it? Recently they shrunk the Breyer's containers even more. Now your money will buy you 1.5 quarts and the container looks positively Lilliputian to me.

Last September Mala made a similar observation about her giant man hands the mini bottles of Corona that she bought accidentally. I'm really not pleased about these products that make our hands look massive.

Across the board things have gotten smaller; everything from bags of chips to paper towels are smaller but cost the same price. Apparently, inflation causes shrinkage. Since many Americans are overweight anyway I guess it's not a huge problem if we get 2 less ounces of fat-laden potato chips into our gullets, but still... I noticed.

Have you noticed? What else has gotten smaller?

Worst. Movie. EVER!

Last night after the kids were safely tucked up in their cozy beds, dreaming their kiddie dreams, the hubster and I decided to watch a movie. I had recorded The Watchmen a few nights ago after hearing about it from our friends Mr. & Mrs. Mala. That is to say, we had heard that it wasn't very good but that there was a rather scandalous "practically soft-core pr0n" scene in it that had made a mother and her teenage son leave the audience when they saw it in the theater.

Of course when they told me about the booty scene, I was sold! I can dig a comic book movie from time to time; I've suffered through every Batman & Spiderman movie ever made and can even add both craptastic Hulk movies to my resume. The Superman movies are classics, IMO; even the dreadful Superman III has it's moments! So I figured, how bad can it be, especially if there's a good bit of super-sex to spice things up?

It was the worst movie I've ever seen in my entire life. I HATED IT. As in, it was so bad that it made me angry.

First of all, it was boring. Each dark, rainy scene was more dreary and dull than the last, and even two hours into the movie we still weren't 100% sure about the details of plot. What is the point? Something about nuclear war? Something about Richard Nixon (worst movie make-up job I've ever seen, btw)? I really couldn't tell you.

Secondly, it was gory. Gratuitous compound-fractures punctuated every fight scene, and if I wanted to watch someones hands being cut off with a circular saw I'd go rent one of the umpteen million torture pr0n movies out there instead of a movie about supposed crime-fighters.

Third, and this isn't a complaint so much as a WTF kind of thing - since when is full-frontal male nudity suitable for an R rating? The blue dude was hanging low and loose throughout the entire movie! Again, not complaining, but... weird! What is UP with Papa Smurf's shlong? We saw it so often it was practically its own character in the movie. Get some BVDs on that guy!

Oh, and the sex scene wasn't all that great either. Sure, we saw Patrick Wilson's gorgeous, firm hiney doing the bump & grind, but we see that in Little Children a lot more and it's A LOT HOTTER. Like, a lot hotter.

So, after watching this piece of trash for two hours I paused it to see if it was going anywhere and found that it still had an HOUR to go. An f'ing HOUR more. Three hours? Really?!

We threw in the towel and agreed that it was the worst movie we'd ever seen, which is saying something because I've seen some real piles of road apples disguised as film in my 30-some-odd years of movie-viewing.

We actually felt dirty afterwards and decided to watch something else so we could go to sleep without horrible images etched onto our mind's eyes. It's bad when you put on TLC's Hoarders and it soothes you back into feeling like the world is a normal place.

So, there you have it: the worst movie I've ever seen, ever.

What's yours?

Today's thoughts, in no particular order:

Each day I am edging closer to the brink of insanity because of the rattling of the rear hatch in my car. It started off as just a small squeak when I'd hit a bump or run over a squirrel (don't look at me like that) but now it's a constant, persistent rattling sound that occurs no matter how smooth the road surface and regardless of my speed.



Every day I intend to ask my husband to come out with a screwdriver and tighten up the latches to fix it because he had success quieting it once before. By the time I get into the house, unburden myself of my coat, boots, and various holiday packages, I inevitably forget to mention it. Or, I'll mention it and Jim will then forget to go out and do it, so either way I end up back in the car at 7:30 the next morning cursing my noisy rear entrance.

Oh, come on, you KNEW I had to make a noisy rear entrance remark. This is ME, people.

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It's below-zero here this morning so my hair froze in the 1 minute it took me to walk from the door to the car. I really need to remember that air-drying is never an option in December, even when I'm so bundled up that I resemble a Jawa, as I was this morning. I hate it when my hair freezes because:

1. It's bad for your hair. Duh.
2. It guarantees a horrible flat, staticky hair day.
3. I might catch Swine Flu and diiiiiiieeeee. Ok, probably not, but still. I could.

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Those of you who subscribe to comments probably saw that our friendly neighborhood Asian spammers were back last night. I had comment moderation on for over a week and got exactly two comments to reject in that time. Turn off comment mod and within two days I have TWENTY-FIVE spam comments overnight. FMFL!

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By this time tomorrow morning I can go off my doctor-mandated diet of twigs, reeds, and assorted berries. YAY!!! I will try not to go salt-crazy after restricting all things tasty for the past 10 days (minus last Saturday night, when I ch-ch-cheeeeeeated. Shhh), but I will be having a very naughty lunch tomorrow. I don't want to give it away, but it rhymes with Shocko Hell, and I CANNOT WAIT. Don't hate. I know it's disgusting, but sue me - I'm a fan, man.

Today, however, I'm having a bland chicken stir fry over plain, unsalted rice, and for dessert: a pear. Try not to be too jealous, ok?

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Tomorrow night is my company's dinner party. Considering how much I dislike talking to my coworkers under normal circumstances, the opportunity to mingle with them socially in the company of our spouses does not particularly appeal to me. This year Mala and her hubby aren't even going! Now I will be forced to make small talk with the toolbags instead of simply ignoring them & talking to Mala while I drink free wine & eat spicy Seafood Fra Diavolo like I usually do. Crud.

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Eight more shopping days till Christmas. I'm officially hosed.

Later, taters. Stay warm!

Me and Braggy McGee

I don't get braggarts. I've never understood what causes people to toot their own horns or try to one-up others in a conversation, and I've noticed that it starts really young. There's a kid up the street, and because of his multiple annoying qualities let's go ahead and call him Little Douchebag - LD. This kid is always bragging and lying to Danny, and he blatantly lies to all of us in the process. It's kind of funny, except that my kid actually buys his BS and I don't like how that makes him feel sometimes. One time LD came over and started spouting off about how he plays Rock Band on the expert level, which is total BS. I love the game, but only play on Medium difficulty - the Expert level is ridiculously hard!

So we just said, "Sure, ok LD, have at it." and watched as he got boo'ed off the stage over and over again within seconds of starting a song. Jim and I just stifled our smirks and asked if maybe he'd like to try a different level, and the little turd actually lied again and said that he was used to Guitar Hero (which is much better, in his opinion), so naturally it's our game which is at fault, and not his superior playing skills.

It's easy to see right through 'em, isn't it? I wonder if they know that we see that they're full of shit?

Jim seems to attract the boastful type to him like flies to honey. Perhaps it's because he is so confident and non-competitive that they feel the need to best him. IDK, all I know is that the worst tall-tale-tellers I've ever met have been acquaintances of my husband. His cousin B used to be the WORST for that. He spoke fast, like a coke head, which only added to his resemblance to Quentin Tarrantino. B loved to brag about himself and his accomplishments, which gets old about 90 seconds into a conversation.

Last weekend Jim went to Oregon for the wedding of an old college friend. A second wedding, as it turns out, since all of his college buddies are now moving on to their 2nd unions as they approach their 40's. Jim was really surprised when his friend T started yacking about his sex life with his new girlfriend, in vivid detail. This old friend T, whose wedding we went out of our way to attend in fraking Delaware just a few years ago, is newly single and dating a gymnast.

I'm sure you can see where this is going. Gymnasts are flexible. She is younger and they are enjoying the first blooms of romance, so they get it on like horny teenagers several times per day. The bastards. T apparently went into embarrassing detail about fantastic positions, frequency, and of course, tall tales of his own sexual prowess. He did his best to make his audience of college buddies believe that he is an epic and skilled lover who "opened the door and turned on the light" for his girlfriend, sexually. Yes, he actually used those words. *retch*



I was trying to think of something I might have been guilty of bragging about recently; aside from my glorious rack, that is. I'm sure I've bragged about my kids, but I reserve the right to do that whenever I feel like it. ;) Another thing I thought of was kind of bragging to myself, which I'm not sure counts. See, there's this radio program that I keep catching every morning after I get D on the bus - a caller has to answer 5 pop culture trivia questions and then the female DJ tries to answer the same questions. So far, no one has beat Kennedy the DJ, but I know the answers every day! I need to get that number and call in myself, because I'm convinced that I can beat Kennedy's smug ass.

Anywhooooo, thus ends my rant on bragging. We are all guilty of it from time to time, I'm sure. I'm not talking about the casual, recreational braggarts. I'm talking about the pros - the blowhards, the self-involved yahoos. Knock it off! It's unbecoming and narcissistic, and nobody buys it anyway.

I'm watching you....

Week in Review

Hello, lovelies! It has been quite a week, huh? What have we learned? Let's review.

Manscaping is alive, well, and taking things to a whole 'notha level. Oh, and there are a LOT more pubic hair styles than I ever imagined possible (read the comments).

Kate posted a new blog entry recently, and somehow many of us missed it and she only got a measly five comments. ::snicker::

Sorry I missed one, Kate! (air kisses... you know I love to stalk you!) Actually, that goes for all of you -- I've missed some of your latest offerings, but it doesn't mean I don't love you like a rock. Give me time. I'll catch up eventually.

Any picture is better when you add a squirrel to it.

Steven Tyler got old and now looks like an elderly Nicole Richie.

Someone we know hit 100 Followers this week (actually, he hit 102, but what am I, some kind of smarty-pants scientist type for whom numbers are of any importance? Uh, nooooooo.). He did a kick-ass post in which he actually had something nice to say about each one of us. Wow. And I thought MY job was boring.

Oh, and people who know me in person, please back me up: I do NOT have Boston accent, right? Sheesh. I'm from VERMONT, people. Not Massachussetts (NNTAWWT). Don't make me vlog!

Mala is good at diving. Who knew?

She also makes amazingly realistic dolphin sounds. Coincidence? I think not!

You're never too old to enjoy being dragged behind a motor boat on a tube.

Today I am sore in places where I didn't even know I had muscles.

Belly Flops even look painful.




Spending good times with good friends sure beats working! Oh, and (500) Days of Summer was cute, but doesn't live up to the hype, IMO.

In related news, my girl crush on Zooey Deschanel now goes to "11."




It's back to the grind now, with school starting for the kids next week, the hubster going back to work (he's a teacher, FYI), and me having to actually work my full four days/week (don't hate!) from now until the holidays. No more well-rested Bev. Boooooo.

Oh well, sleep is totally overrated, am I right?

This weekend should be interesting. Jillinator's big 40th birthday bash is tomorrow night, and I have a feeling things might get a little unruly. We all know that she's a (not so) secret Superfreak, so I'm looking forward to seeing what goes down at her adults-only party. At the least, shit's getting broken. At the most, there will be nudity (not mine). Rest assured, I am bringing my camera, and... say it with me:

THAT'S GOING ON THE BLOG!

kiss kiss!

Romance?

As I say the word "romance," feel free to picture me with my head cocked to one side, like a dog listening to a high-pitched sound coming out of a squeaky toy.

If you were sitting here with me right now, I'd throw a Seinfeld quote your way just because that is the way in which my media-sodden brain works. I picture what Elaine looks like when she is tilting her head and curling her lip and saying, "Grace?"



Of course, if you were sitting here with me right now at my dining room table, I'd probably have to go put on some pants, so it might be better that you are there and I am here.

My point, and I do have one, is that I miss romance too, sometimes. This morning I read an excellent post from the always entertaining and oftentimes seductive Mr. Condescending. Seriously, go look at his blog and try not to get a little turned-on by all of those artsy pictures of sexy people doing sexy things. But, go read it later, ok? I'm not finished with you yet.

Mr. C asked his readers to share their most romantic memory, and I started racking my brain because it has been a while since I've had anything truly romantic happen in my life. I'm not talking about sex, because heck, I am married and I do think sex ("Coitus. The physical act of love.") is indeed a "zesty enterprise." I'm not even talking about lust, an emotion with which I am also intimately familiar (but don't tell my husband). Ha ha.

I'm talking about romance. I'm talking about bodice-ripping, breath-taking, starry-eyed, endorphin-producing romance.

Obviously, I love my husband and would lay down my life to save him from an oncoming bus if need be, but over the course of our long relationship our feelings have morphed and shifted into something much different, and much deeper, than the romantic lovey-dovey shmoopy phase. We've been in a committed, monogamous relationship for almost 13 years, married for just shy of 8 of those. In that time we've partied heartily together, moved together, linked ourselves financially numerous times, survived cancer together, survived the deaths of loved ones, survived two pregnancies and births together, and somehow, somehow... we are surviving raising our children together.

It's hard to feel romantic when you're sleeping in shifts and every restaurant visit wraps up with that moment when you have to get the check RIGHT EFFING NOW or risk an embarrassing toddler melt-down. It's hard to be romantic when your day to day conversations are about work, kids, and the "business" part of your lives instead of the fun stuff.

We love each other. We are affectionate to each other. We get each other and never really fight. However, it would be nice to be swept off my feet once in a while, and I'm sure he feels the same way. In fact, I made him read this post earlier today, before I put it up (for the first time - yes, I chickened out and deleted it once already), and he agreed that I spoke the truth, but then declared that he obviously needs to step up his game a bit. Heh.

I have hope that someday, when our children don't need us quite so much and we're able to have a conversation without being interrupted twenty times by a child asking us where his light saber is, we will get some kind of second-wind in the romance department. Eventually, when the little attention-vacuums leave the nest, you rekindle the spark and have some sort of second honeymoon phase. Right?

I'm choosing to believe that that is exactly the case. Until then, we are partners in poopy diapers, comrades in crappy kid attitudes, and soldiers in the war against insanity that rages in our household every day.

Things that I think, Thursday edition

I'm pretty sure I put a contact in backwards today, because it's bugging me. Or, it might still have glitter on it from yesterday; Mala and I were trying our hardest to sample every fugly eye shadow in Sephora, and one of them was Drag Queen Sparkly and I got it everywhere, including in my left eye. Glitter doesn't come off with a tissue or make-up remover, did you know? Yeah, it doesn't.

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I just realized while talking to my boss that is impossible for me to say the word "type" without holding my hands out in front of me on an imaginary keyboard and wiggling my fingers in a typing motion.

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I described a shirt I was trying on yesterday as "Mrs. Roper chic," and then I bought it anyway.

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Mala wants me to pick my new ringtone for her cell phone, and I can't for the life of me think of what my "signature song" will be. Previously she used Weezer's Say It Ain't So, but only because we like Weezer, not because it was specific to ME. I was toying with the idea of making it Jet's Cold Hard Bitch, but I'm really not; I'm actually kind of a softie, to be honest.... Hmmm. Suggestions are welcome!

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Speaking of ringtones, I changed my husband's the other day. Now, when my lovable space cadet calls me, I hear, "This is Major Tom to Ground Control...." Heeee.

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I got an awesome surprise b-day gift today in the form of a new Lebowski bobblehead of my fave character, Maude! She is now perched on my desk right next to The Dude in his bedroom slippers, thereby completing my desk's "I'm still cool even though I work in this stuffy financial office" theme. Today's subtitle is courtesy of Maude, who has some damn good lines in that movie.

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I really want to go see the new Harry Potter movie. Don't hate - I love HP. I know, I know - NERD ALERT! Whatev, STFU. :)

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The new perfume I got yesterday smells amazing, but comes in an ugly bottle. Annoying.

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Finally, here are a couple of cell phone pics to be the cherry on the crap sundae that is this post.

Lunch yesterday, which we had to ingest so quickly (b/c we were running late to pick up Mala's kidlets) that I actually got a little tummy ache. It's okay, though - it was nothing a glass of white wine couldn't fix.

and last but not least, me and my BFF sitting in the car, stuck in an inexplicable rubber-necker-traffic jam on I93:

What's funny about this picture (aside from my red eye from the aforementioned glitter issue) is that I'm actually tan (for me) right now, but I still look like Casper's ugly kid sister next to my bronzed-goddess buddy Malomatic. Awesome.

Better go get some work done. Later, taters (heh heh)!