tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-220029792024-03-14T02:23:08.933-04:00Escar-go-goBy Robert David Sullivan (escargot555 at yahoo dot com)Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger221125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22002979.post-14770766846566071782011-01-24T19:57:00.000-04:002011-01-24T19:58:10.616-04:00New blog addressI am now blogging at <a href="http://robertdavidsullivan.typepad.com/">Robert David Sullivan</a>. Thanks for reading!Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22002979.post-28109108367131262008-04-07T23:02:00.002-04:002008-04-07T23:08:15.661-04:00I'm moving again...Same name (<a href="http://escargogo.typepad.com/">Escargo-go</a>), different host (Typepad). It's what I use for my workplace blog (<a href="http://massinc.typepad.com/beyondredandblue/">Beyond Red & Blue</a>), and it's easier to use the same host for both.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22002979.post-61218153759494898412008-04-03T11:15:00.002-04:002008-04-03T11:30:00.844-04:00The War of the Omelets; the (kind of) return of Queer NationA couple of items that former Bostonians (who make up a big part of this blog's readership) might find interesting.
First, the <em>Somerville News</em> reports on a <a href="http://somervillenews.typepad.com/the_somerville_news/2008/04/truce-offered-r.html">feud</a> between the owners of two brunch spots in the <a href="http://www.somervillema.gov/newsDetail.cfm?instance_id=854">"best-run city"</a> in Massachusetts, Sound Bites and the Ball Square Cafe. (Thanks to <a href="http://www.universalhub.com/node/13818">Universal Hub</a> for pointing me to the story.) I've only been to Sound Bites, and the long lines are inexplicable to me. If I'm going to wait in the cold for brunch in Somerville, it's going to be at <a href="http://www.johnnyds.com/menu_brunch.html">Johnny D's</a>, where you can get catfish with your eggs as God intended.
Second, Christopher Muther reports in the <em>Boston Globe</em> on the <a href="http://www.boston.com/ae/events/articles/2008/04/03/take_over_this_bar_often/">Guerrilla Queer Bar</a>, a gay-and-lesbian group that secretly targets a different straight bar on the first Friday of each month and takes it over by sheer numbers. They've turned such places as Somerville's Burren Pub and Faneuil Hall's Bell-in-Hand Tavern into gay bars for a night. (The former, at least, is not exactly frosty toward gay patrons on any night.)Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22002979.post-16354323195141289222008-03-30T20:22:00.003-04:002008-03-30T20:37:38.088-04:00I am furious (yellow)<b>Things I Don't Miss:
</b>Slate.com has a history of the <a href="http://www.slate.com/id/2187035/?from=rss">phone book</a>, a practically obsolete item that refuses to go away quietly. Even before the Internet, I hated them for the space they took up in my small apartments. I felt like a philistine putting the Yellow Pages next to real books on bookshelves (what would be next, counting Banana Republic catalogs as reading material?), so they ended up in kitchen cabinets or underneath couches, about as unobtrusive as bricks of plutonium. Plus, as someone named Sullivan, I hate anything that's organized alphabetically. (You're not getting my business, AAA Pizza!)
The managers of my new apartment building simply put a little sign in the lobby telling tenants that the new phone books were there if they wanted them. I hope that they all ended up in the trash, but I'll bet that if four tenants out of 200 asked for them, that would be enough to guarantee another full shipment next year.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22002979.post-23173679696498555652008-03-27T17:43:00.002-04:002008-03-27T17:51:28.576-04:00Worst movie everOh yeah, I have a blog. But I've been too busy with my day job and my <a href="http://massinc.typepad.com/"><em>other</em> blog</a>, not to mention <em>In Treatment</em> and <em>Lost</em>, to keep up with this one. I promise more soon, but for today check out this Joe Queenan essay on <a href="http://film.guardian.co.uk/features/featurepages/0,,2267064,00.html">the worst movies of all time</a>.
My vote goes to Barbra Streisand's <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0117057/">The Mirror Has Two Faces</a>, which may be the last movie I paid for and then walked out on. The scene in which the "improved" Streisand sends a classroom full of college boys into a sexual frenzy is perhaps the most cringe-worthy moment I've ever witnessed on film or TV.
<blockquote><a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000659/">Rose Morgan</a><a href="http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000659/">: What, what? Yes, I have breasts. They cannot, however, be the subject of one of your papers.
</blockquote></a>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22002979.post-73911803078656423922008-03-11T18:04:00.002-04:002008-03-11T18:10:32.811-04:00Three cheers for the BoltBus!The <em>Boston Globe</em> is reporting on a new, Greyhound-run <a href="http://www.boston.com/business/articles/2008/03/11/rediscovering_the_bus/">bus service</a> that will undercut the price of the <a href="http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2006/09/06/34_hurt_in_troubled_bus_lines_latest_episode/">Fung Wah</a> and will offer one-way fares as low as $1.50. Great news for a fairly regular traveller to New York like me. I can now take the regular Greyhound for $20 ($5 more than Fung Wah) and not be bothered by loud college kids saving their money for drinking marathons.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22002979.post-37703192702970616602008-02-22T23:02:00.003-04:002008-02-22T23:06:39.921-04:00Stupid spending: Everyone does it?<p>
[Cross-posted from <a href="http://massinc.typepad.com/">Beyond Red & Blue</a>]
</p><p>Elizabeth Kolbert writes in <i>The New Yorker</i> about all the ways <a href="http://www.newyorker.com/arts/critics/books/2008/02/25/080225crbo_books_kolbert">we <i>don't</i> behave as rational consumers</a>. According to "behavioral economists" (as opposed to the old-fashioned economists who believe that human beings are just calculators with arms and legs), we're constantly doing making dumb choices like paying an outrageous amont for a car just because it comes with "free" oil changes for a few years. Kolbert admits that she's padded Amazon.com orders with stuff she doesn't need in order to qualify for free shipping. I've done that, and I've also got a box full of subway fare cards from various cities because I always take the "buy five rides, get one free" kind of deal even when I know I won't be in the city long enough to use my free ride.</p>
<p>The public policy angle in Kolbert's piece comes with she discusses Richard H. Thaler and Cass R. Sunstein's <i><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Nudge-Improving-Decisions-Health-Happiness/dp/0300122233/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1203705675&sr=8-1">Nudge: Improving Decisions About Wealth, Health, and Happiness</a></i>. As Kolbert explains:</p>
<blockquote dir="ltr"><p>[People are] effort-averse. They hate having to go to the benefits office, pick up a bunch of forms, fill them out, and bring them all the way back. As a consequence, many eligible employees fail to enroll in their companies' retirement plans, or delay doing so for years. (This is the case, research has shown, even at companies where no employee contribution is required.)</p></blockquote><p>Thaler and Sunstein suggest that companies enroll employees in retirement plans without their consent but give them the option of filling a lot of paperwork to get <i>out</i>. This point makes me think about the debate between Democratic presidential candidates over universal health insurance. Barack Obama seems to operating on the assumption that if insurance premiums are low enough, everyone will get health coverage because it will be irrational not to do so. And Hillary Clinton's idea to require all individuals to get health coverage seems to rest on the assumption that it would be irrational not to get insurance if there's a penalty (a tax fine, or the garnishing of wages) for failing to do so. But maybe the best approach would be to automatically enroll all uninsured people into a health insurance plan and then say, "If you don't like it, there's a long, complicated procedure for withdrawing from the program." In other words, there would be a de facto mandate, but without the need to come up with a mechanism to enforce it. </p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22002979.post-50071650521907871002008-02-19T15:34:00.002-04:002008-02-19T15:53:07.525-04:00What is public TV good for?<p>The <i>New York Times</i>'s Charles McGrath asks whether <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/17/arts/television/17mcgr.html?ex=1204002000&en=425da884aae336cf&ei=5070&emc=eta1">public TV is worth saving</a>:</p>
<blockquote><p>The average PBS show on prime time now scores about a 1.4 Nielsen rating, or roughly what the wrestling show “Friday Night Smackdown” gets....</p>
<p>Scanning the PBS lineup, in fact, it’s hard to detect much of a bias toward anything at all, except possibly mustiness. Except for “Antiques Roadshow,” all the prime-time stalwarts — “The NewsHour,” “Nova,” “Nature,” “Masterpiece” — are into their third or fourth decade, and they look it.</p></blockquote>
<p>If those comments distress you, go to the <a href="http://community.nytimes.com/article/comments/2008/02/17/arts/television/17mcgr.html">reader comments</a>, where you'll find plenty of hyperventilating ("In the wasteland of television there are but two channels I want or need: PBS for the quality and depth of shows that exist nowhere else, and NESN to be able to watch the Red Sox."), and it's entirely possible that one or two of the respondents are under 80 years old.</p>
<p>OK, if you don't have cable, you might enjoy being force-fed middlebrow programming by PBS. And even if you have 300 channels, I'm not aware that any of them caters to people with terrible taste in music the way PBS does. Otherwise, its bright spots are so few that it's easier just to forget it exists.</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22002979.post-7014691186958932162008-02-19T10:50:00.003-04:002008-12-11T23:16:50.744-04:00Breaking news: Suzanne Pleshette is still dead!<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_dQQP7AmYsPI/R7rsyUEJqOI/AAAAAAAAAIk/ubNsiAeEpd4/s1600-h/Suzanne+Pleshette.jpg"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5168703871484799202" style="DISPLAY: block; MARGIN: 0px auto 10px; CURSOR: hand; TEXT-ALIGN: center" alt="" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_dQQP7AmYsPI/R7rsyUEJqOI/AAAAAAAAAIk/ubNsiAeEpd4/s320/Suzanne+Pleshette.jpg" border="0" /></a>
<p>Dear Boston.com and Boston Globe:</p>
<p>Yes, I know that Suzanne Pleshette is dead. Please stop using her photo as an enticement to "Take a look back at the notable deaths of this young year" every time I look at anything on your website. (Scroll to the bottom of the <a href="http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/">home page</a> or look in the right column of just about every Globe story. I'll be happy if this is no longer the case by the time you read this.) I'll wait until the end of the year (and the roll call of the dead at the Oscar awards) to contemplate my mortality. I don't need to perform this ritual every morning beginning on Valentine's Day. Thank you.</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22002979.post-39852724938136134172008-02-15T11:44:00.002-04:002008-02-15T11:56:04.697-04:00London fogThanks to <a href="http://hubblog.blogspot.com/2008/02/wrong-sorry-lets-try-another-question_15.html">Hub Blog</a> for pointing me to <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=512087&in_page_id=1770">this story</a> about dumb Britons who think that Winston Churchill was a fictitious character but that Sherlock Holmes was a real person. It's fun to read about stupidity in other lands, though I am suspicious of the poll that the story is based on. I mean, if someone with a clipboard stopped me in Downtown Crossing and quizzed me, I think it would be great fun to say that the Beatles' "Eleanor Rigby" was reportage but that <i>Gandhi</i> was a work of science fiction. If I were especially playful, I'd even claim that Lyndon LaRouche actually exists.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22002979.post-26004533425314221482008-02-12T12:00:00.000-04:002008-02-12T12:15:37.948-04:00Revival of independent bookstores?<p>Will the Internet kill off chain bookstores and leave the independent sellers to flourish? Matthew Yglesias mulls the <a href="http://matthewyglesias.theatlantic.com/archives/2008/02/chain_bookstores.php">possibility</a>.</p>
<p><blockquote>...what the brick and mortar store has to offer is, increasingly, not practical advantage but a bookstore experience. And though I think the chains actually do deliver a decent experience, they don't really match the better independents and I'm not sure they ever can since part of the experience of a well-liked independent bookstore...
</blockquote></p>
<p>A nice thought, but I'm not sure that an independent bookstore is enough of an anchor for an urban shopping district. The seemingly most successful independent booksellers in the Boston area -- the Brookline Booksmith in Coolidge Corner and the Harvard Bookstore in Harvard Square -- are both near larger bookstores (a Barnes and Noble and the university-run Harvard Coop) and movie theaters. Could they attract enough customers if the Internet claims other businesses around them?</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22002979.post-40348090684554870392008-02-11T15:46:00.000-04:002008-02-11T15:59:02.099-04:00There Will Be DeadwoodMaybe three or four times a year I'll go out to a movie. This weekend <em>There Will Be Blood</em> made the coveted short list of films I'll see even if it means associating with other people. Imagine my joy when the central character in the movie, an oil-drilling entrepreneur played by Daniel Day-Lewis, has a long speech about how he hates every other person on in the world! He drinks their milkshakes, in case you haven't heard.
Not only was it a great movie, there were similarities with one of my three or four favorite TV series, <em>Deadwood</em>. The second and third seasons of that show also feature a character (mining magnate George Hearst) who has a long speech about his own misanthropy, and how he views other people as pests to be swatted away while he "listens to the earth."
If you like one, you should like the other. That is, unless your favorite part of <em>Deadwood</em> is the assortment of stong, distinctive female characters. Not much of that in <em>There Will Be Blood</em>.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22002979.post-62063863609409069632008-02-09T12:30:00.000-04:002008-02-09T12:48:06.263-04:00Wintertime fun in Montreal for those who hate snowToday there's a scavenger hunt in the <a href="http://spacingmontreal.ca/?p=594">Underground City</a>. Alas, the list of items is not available to nonparticipants. I assume that it includes insanely specific descriptions of napkins and straws from the hundreds of subterranean fast-food places, but maybe you also get points for finding abandoned hats, gloves, and half-eaten bowls of poutine. There probably isn't a prize for finding a <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/My_Man_Godfrey">forgotten man</a> (un homme oublie), but there's sure to be a few of those hanging out down there.
Is anyone up for organizing a scavenger hunt in Boston's tiny version of an enclosed city (i.e., Copley Place and the Prudential Mall)? I'd love to see people encouraged to steal those damn TV monitors who sole purpose seems to be plugging bad shows on CBS.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22002979.post-54899403326063540542008-02-08T16:53:00.000-04:002008-02-08T17:03:39.644-04:00Do one-way streets kill cities?<p>In a <i>Louisville Courier-Journal</i> op-ed, Matt Hanka and John Gilderbloom say that one-way streets are bad for pedestrians (because cars go faster on them), bad for businesses (fewer potential customers go by), and bad for homeowners (because they lower property values). They also say that one-ways can cause more crime:</p>
<blockquote><p>One-way streets also create greater opportunities for crime in urban areas. Having one-way traffic reduces overall use, allowing for negative vacuums to be created. One-way streets are the gun, drug and sex distribution centers for a city.</p>
<p>Why? You need a two- or three-lane one-way street where you can pause to negotiate the deal and get out of there quickly. You can't do that on a two-way street because it slows down traffic. That's why the one-way two/three-lane street works best for pimps, drive-by shootings and drug dealers. If you break the law, it's better to drive 50 mph on a one-way with no obstacles.</p></blockquote>
<p>I now live on a one-way street, and I don't feel unsafe (maybe because it's not a throughway), but the lack of activity at night is a bit spooky. And the two things I remember from several trips to downtown Lynn were that the place was practically deserted and that almost every street seemed to be one-way. Then again, one-way streets don't seem to put a damper on life in New York City.</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22002979.post-44173884453882445192008-02-06T12:04:00.000-04:002008-02-06T12:10:49.085-04:00Book-CD-DVD-tchotchke-store bans browsingYesterday at lunch hour I discovered that the downtown Borders store had put all their television DVDs in locked glass cabinets. That means that if I want to peruse the box for the first season of <i>That Girl</i>, I need to share my shame with the nearest employee who has a key. And I can't grab <i>Are You Being Served?</i> and immediately sandwich it between <i>The Sopranos</i> and <i>The Wire </i> in case someone spots me as I scurry to the checkout.
Score one for Amazon.com.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22002979.post-14479566851412331052008-02-05T12:34:00.000-04:002008-02-05T12:46:42.171-04:00Election Day in Malden CenterI voted this morning, despite the rain, and the only person in front of me was an older woman who didn't understand what the even older poll worker was asking her. ("A dress?" "Yes, address!" "I don't understand. My dress?") I got my ballot, voted for president, and ignored the other stuff on the ballot. As I recall, I was supposed to choose "no more than 35" party committee members and there were only about 12 names on the ballot. Then I fed the ballot into the electronic scanner and worried that my vote won't be counted because I colored outside of the lines of the oval next to my candidate's name. It was all very stressful, and I'm glad I don't have to do it again in the fall, thanks to the Electoral Collage making all votes cast in Massachusetts meaningless.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22002979.post-23229820374517877312008-02-04T10:49:00.000-04:002008-02-04T11:08:02.007-04:00Patriots lose. HA-ha!Sorry to get all <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nelson_Muntz">Nelson Muntz</a> about the Patriots losing the Super Bowl, but I can't take another victory parade trapping me inside my office building. The first time they won, I had a doctor's appointment scheduled on the morning of their parade, and when I went back to the office, I made the mistake of exiting Park Street station through a turnstile that wouldn't let me back in. Too late, I saw that Tremont Street was a solid, if rather doughy, mass of Patriots fans. I had to squeeze my way through the crowd and take refuge in the nearest building (it was cold that that February!), which was the St. Paul Episcopal Church. The church let people in the front door but wouldn't let anyone all the way through the building to escape out the back door (bastards!). So I spent about an hour and a half hiding in there while the Pats fans went nuts. I felt as if I were hiding from a sudden political revolution, hoping that whichever side won didn't have a problem with the church I had joined that day out of pure cowardice.
So I hope the Pats lose again next year! It's OK if the Red Sox win the World Series again, though.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22002979.post-38477592068993551462008-02-01T11:41:00.000-04:002008-02-01T11:54:51.929-04:00"Lost" vs. the presidential debateI watched both last night. The Clinton/Obama showdown tried the patience of the most dedicated policy wonk -- at least in the first half hour, which was all about the minor differences between the two candidates' health insurance plans.
So it was a treat to move to <i>Lost</i> afterward, and I was never so happy to be shelling out the extra 12 bucks a month for a DVR. How did I sit through all those commercials back in 2007? As I flew past the chaff with my thumb on the fast-forward button, I noticed that ABC was relentlessly pushing a new show that was premiering after <i>Lost</i>. Remember when a TV network could force a show into becoming a hit by scheduling it after another hit? Yeah, I don't miss that either. No doubt half the people watching <i>Lost</i> live immediately logged on their computers afterward to check the message boards anyway. Good luck, dumb-looking new ABC show!
Anyway, <i>Lost</i> is all about the flash-forwards now, which reassures me that the producers actually have some thoughts on how they're going to end this thing in 2010. They're also making it impossible to kill off certain characters before then, which makes me wonder if ABC is assigning bodyguards, chauffeurs, and food tasters to certain cast members.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22002979.post-39131431729464865762008-01-31T17:33:00.000-04:002008-01-31T17:45:14.574-04:00I've been forced to wake up and smell the coffee<p>I guess I'm never going to get an alternative to the two Dunkin' Donuts in my neighborhood. From the <a href="http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080131/ap_on_bi_ge/earns_starbucks">AP</a>:</p>
<blockquote><p>As part of a broad push to revitalize its business, the company said it plans to open about 425 fewer domestic stores and 75 more overseas than previously planned, for a global total of 2,150 new stores. Starbucks has more than 15,700 worldwide.</p>
<p>...the slowdown in U.S. growth will allow the company to make better use of its time, money and staff and could reduce "cannibalization" — easing pressure some stores experience when a new one opens nearby.</p></blockquote>
<p>So open some stores that aren't near other ones!</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22002979.post-36357911560885683922008-01-31T10:55:00.000-04:002008-01-31T11:22:35.221-04:00TV diary: better TreatmentHBO's <i>In Treatment</i> -- which is trying to become the first scripted late-night sensation since, I don't know, <i>Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman</i> in the 1970s? -- got a bit more absorbing last night with the introduction of Wednesday regular patient Sophie, a teenager sent to therapy because of suspicions that her bizarre accidents are actually the result of suicidal tendencies. The first session between a shrink and patient is one of the most worn-out situations in TV and movies, as Tuesday's <i>In Treatment</i> episode with Blair Underwood showed. The patient is always skeptical and even contemptuous of the therapist, who calmly accepts the hostile comments and finally throws out a question that puts a dent in the patient's armor -- just before saying, "I'm sorry, but our time is up." Doesn't anyone on TV ever go into therapy expecting to get some good out of it?
But at least Sophie (Mia Wasikowska) was amusingly hostile, peppering the therapist played by Gabriel Byrne with questions such as "Are you this much of a pain in the ass with your daughter?" and "Why can't you just act like a professional?" Maybe the cliche works better with teenagers, who naturally like to test authority figures, rather than adults like Underwood's character. At any rate, hump day seems to be the best day for this series so far.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22002979.post-6211711766449351482008-01-30T13:02:00.000-04:002008-01-30T13:15:18.002-04:00Attack of the 60-foot Oscar winnerThe T now has <em>two</em> recorded announcements before a train pulls into a station. One says that "the next Orange [or whatever color] Line train is now approaching," and about 15 seconds later we get "the next Orange Line train is now <i>arriving</i>."
I don't know the purpose of having dual announcements. The "approaching" one sounds like a warning. ("The next gigantic reptile is now approaching, and he's hungry!") So I find myself cringing a bit when I hear that the beast is "now arriving," giving us no time to run for our lives.
At least I know longer think of a good friend's impersonation of Katherine Hepburn when I'm on a subway platform. He likes to portray the linguistically proper New Englander at the moment of maximum sexual excitement: "Oh, Spencer! I'm arriving! I'm arriving!"Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22002979.post-50783613258731498422008-01-29T17:38:00.000-04:002008-01-29T17:53:22.143-04:00A smear against Blue Man Group?From <a href="http://www.boingboing.net/2008/01/28/man-claims-blue-man.html">Boing Boing</a>: A guy in Chicago is suing performance artists Blue Man Group, claiming that they dragged him on stage during a show and forced an "esophagus camera" down his throat while he struggled to break free. Sounds like an absurd claim to me, and he apparently has no witnesses, but a local TV station plays it down the middle (see <a href="http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22830870/">written report </a>and <a href="http://video.nbc5.com/player/?id=209198">video</a>).
If a local newscast isn't able to offer some clarification on whether it's safe to go to the theater without the protection of a hockey mask, I don't think I trust its weather reports either.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22002979.post-42664194463348149342008-01-29T10:44:00.000-04:002008-01-29T11:17:30.908-04:00When we get behind closed doors...Last night HBO premiered the half-hour drama <i>In Treatment</i>, which will run five nights a week for nine weeks, with each episode depicting a therapy session in almost-real time (one character every Monday night, another every Tuesday night, etc.). Based on the first episode, I'm willing to commit, mainly because of Gabriel Byrne as the therapist and because the premise, borrowed from a highly successful TV show in Israel, is intriguing -- even though Monday's patient isn't very interesting so far.
One moment I did like: At the end, when the patient runs out of the office in great distress, Byrne starts to follow her but stops short at his own door, as if he's afraid to cross the threshold. Is he a prisoner of his profession?
It struck me that most of my favorite TV series show what goes on behind closed doors. <i>The Sopranos</i>, of course, also had the voyeuristic appeal of letting us spy on therapy sessions, and the <i>The Wire</i> lets us see what happens behind the scenes not only in a police department but in a big-city mayor's office and, now, in the offices of a major daily newspaper.
That may be why I don't care for reality shows (it's not voyeurism if the participants are actually performing for the camera) or sci-fi series (in an entirely fabricated universe, there's not as much tension between the scenes set in public and those set behind closed doors). And this might explain why, given my druthers, I'll take a movie or TV series with a lot of sex (private) over a lot of violence (well, at least garishly public violence like shoot-outs and car chases). But maybe we all have our own kinks and perversions to explain our TV-watching habits.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22002979.post-68025053502365109642008-01-25T17:21:00.000-04:002008-12-11T23:16:51.029-04:00I'll let you open my junk mail for only $10!<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_dQQP7AmYsPI/R5pTK18y8pI/AAAAAAAAAIc/bwt-UBA-KXU/s1600-h/chainmail.jpg"><img style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_dQQP7AmYsPI/R5pTK18y8pI/AAAAAAAAAIc/bwt-UBA-KXU/s320/chainmail.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5159527768852198034" border="0" /></a>
I'm practically giving away good changes and heart's desires!Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-22002979.post-88088158913643603232008-01-25T16:03:00.000-04:002008-01-25T16:45:14.830-04:00But what do I know about politics?This is one of the more surreal presidential election campaigns I've ever experienced for several reasons, but one that really puzzles me is that I seem to have gained a reputation as a naive dunce who doesn't know the first thing about politics. I memorized Electoral Collage stats before I had ever heard of the World Series, I began campaigning for presidential candidates when I was in high school, and I've been writing about politics for 20 years. But this year friends and relatives have been shaking their heads sadly in disbelief when I share my perceptions of the candidates. The popular consensus is that <i>all</i> politicians are irredeemably corrupt, intellectually dishonest, and completely self-serving, with only minor differences in degree, and only a fool would think otherwise. I'd certainly apply that description to most politicians, but I think it's illogical to believe that the election process never attracts anyone with any integrity. I mean, it's not that hard to get on the ballot; a few people must do it without selling their souls to Satan.
Experts on a particular subject are often wrong, of course. Tremendously well-informed people got us into Vietnam, ignored warnings about terrorism before 9/11, and have repeatedly guessed wrong about the stock market. The best doctors make misdiagnoses, and the best chefs use too much garlic. People in ivory towers can know everything about global warning and not have enough sense roll up their car windows in a rainstorm. So I'm not arrogant enough to claim that my political opinions are always right. In retrospect, I can think of plenty of times that I've chosen the wrong candidate, whether for president or for school board member, and I'm sure that I'll keep making bad choices. But one thing that I have learned over the years as a journalist is that politicians do not all have the same character. If I can offer just one idea as an expert, it's that saying "they're all the same" is not a sign of cynicism. Instead, it's the most naive attitude of all.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com3