"I thought we were going to Kew Gardens"

A sweet, surreal and ridiculous clip from a British children's show featuring Morrissey, Johnny Marr, Sandie Shaw and a bunch of school children.

Adventure Rocketship

The video for Robyn Hitchcock's "Adventure Rocketship." Robyn rules.

A Hitchens Christmas

Well not exactly but a pretty interesting interview with him on The Onion's AV Club.

Laundry

What an exciting title for a blog post. I am not a fan of doing laundry and especially of going to the laundromat. Unfortunately for me, I don't own a washer or dryer and my apartment comes with neither. I also have to wear white, button down, oxford cloth shirts to my job and they get pretty dirty so I can't put off doing laundry for much more than a week. All I use on my white shirts is bleach and a stain remover, it gets them nice, white and clean. Around the corner from my house is our local Colonial Laundromat, I go there for several reasons, they are clean, they are open 24 hours and there is always an attendant on duty who can answer any questions I might have about how to get my clothes clean. The last time I was doing laundry was over the weekend about two hours before I had to be at my job. Everything was going fine until I took my shirts out of the dryer, there were spots all over them as if they had been splattered with oil. I was furious. I showed the attendant who was very sympathetic but told me what I already knew, that there was nothing she could really do about it. I think I told her because I was upset and really just wanted to tell someone. She did refer me to a customer service phone number that was posted on the wall. I figured I would call them first thing Monday but I also assumed that there was nothing they could do, they also have a sign stating that they are not responsible...yadda yadda yadda. In the meantime I had to buy some shirts so I would have something to wear over the weekend. I bought four shirts which cost me over $60. I called first thing Monday and the woman I talked to told me she would give my information to Jerry, the owner and he would get back to me. He called me less than an hour later and told me that were going to try to get my shirts clean and if they couldn't they would reimburse me for the replacement shirts. I want to thank Jerry and Colonial Laundromats for great customer service and responding so quickly and effectively to my problem. It's nice to know that there are companies that still care!

I don't really need a reason

Rock and Roll Hall of Fame

Here are your Rock and Roll Hall of Fame 2008 inductees:

This Ain't No Picnic

Here's a video by one of the most underrated punk rock bands of the eighties, The Minutemen. I would imagine many people might recognize their song "Corona" which is used as the theme song for "Jackass." "Corona" is actually a pretty great song but there are so many more, the classic album, "Double Nickels on the Dime" contains 44 of them, including this one. Bassist Mike Watt went on to form the band fIREHOSE with Minutemen drummer George Hurley and Minuteman fan Ed Crawford after the tragic death in a traffic accident of singer/guitarist D. Boon.

The Wire

Just a reminder that the fifth and final season of the best show on television, ever, "The Wire," begins broadcasting on Sunday, January 6 at 9ET/PT. Even better, those of us with HBO on Demand will be able to catch the season premiere on New Years Eve, with each subsequent episode airing the Monday previous to the cable broadcast on Sunday nights. Does that make sense? I hope so. There are some specials about the final season coming up too according to this promo:

I assume they will also be available on demand if they aren't already.
Here is a teaser promo for season 5 (there are mild spoilers)

And here is a scene from season one (I think) in which cops Bunk and McNulty use different forms of one very special, very adaptable, not very work-safe word.

The Year in Music

If you are looking for a great wrap up of this year's pop music head on over to the NPR website and find All Songs Considered's Year in Review. Some of the stuff you might expect is discussed like Wilco, LCD Soundsystem and Radiohead, but there are surprises here too including...well I guess they wouldn't be surprises if I told you would they? No they wouldn't. Anyway explore the rest of the site too there's hours of stuff from reviews to interviews to streaming radio. NPR is the best.

Annyong!!

My friend Brooke has alerted me that the rumors of an Arrested Development movie are a little bit closer to not being rumors anymore. Here's a story on MTV's website (I knew MTV was good for something.)

Grouchy Christmas

This video contains one of my favorite parts of any Christmas special, Oscar the Grouch's "I Hate Christmas" from the classic Christmas Eve on Sesame Street. If you want to skip right to the song it starts at about the 4min 29sec mark.

Free Music

A free holiday(ish) mix to download. It's on the ReadyMade blog and it features several great musical artists including Thurston Moore of Sonic Youth, John Vanderslice, Ted Leo and the Pharmacists, and even Death Cab for Cutie. Did I mention it's free? it even comes with a printable cover.

(link)

No Country For Old Men

I went to see the newest Coen Brothers movie last night and it is truly a return to form for them. Tommy Lee Jones' and Javier Bardem's performances are Oscar worthy. Jones is an aging and increasingly world weary Texas sheriff and Bardem a menacing sociopath who kills his victims with a captive bolt pistol, a tool used to kill livestock. I cannot remember the last time an actor's performance filled me with as much dread as Bardem's does in this movie. Even when he wasn't on the screen, when his presence was merely implicit, I was on the edge of my seat, waiting for him to strike. His character, Anton Chigurh is one of the great movie villains. Josh Brolin is also good as Llewelyn Moss, Chigurh's prey. Roger Deakins' cinematography is as stunning as usual and Carter Burwell's score is perfectly understated. After the near-miss of Intolerable Cruelty and the unnecessary remake of The Ladykillers, it's good to see the Coens back to their quirky, superbly original style of filmmaking and storytelling.

Fix-It Ticket

Y'know when you get a ticket for a broken tail light or some other small car problem and you go get it fixed, bring the receipt to court with you and they throw the ticket out? Well in my town apparently (maybe everywhere for all I know) you now have to get it fixed by sundown on the next business day or else it doesn't count. Local government sucks.

Worst. Blogger. Ever.

Every day I see this blog (it is on my Netvibes homepage) and every day I say to myself, "Self, you should really write about something. Anything!" and then I forget about it till next time I think about it. I've even had specific ideas about what to write about. I am the laziest man alive.