Cap’n Crunch Peanut Butter Crunch is surely the cereal they eat in Heaven.

It’s a sad, sad world when the new movies you have to choose from at your local feet-stuck-to-the-floor multiplex are: Joe Dirt, Crocodile Dundee in Los Angeles, Escanaba in da Moonlight, Freddy Got Fingered, and Josie and the Pussycats. Gak. 2000 was a crappy year for movies, and apparently 2001 will be even worse. What the hell were they thinking?

I guess I’ll just pop the Fight Club DVD in again. (Are you out there, Mosey?)

I was a little disappointed to see that after just a few performances, John Larroquette is out of The West Wing as White House Counsel Lionel Tribbey. He’s cool overall, and seemed to enjoy himself as the hothead Tribbey. One of the many things to love about this show is how they can use high-profile actors in smaller roles (Stockard Channing, anyone?) and mix them in so well with the regulars. In Larroquette’s place was new counsel Oliver Platt (I like him too, but still), in an episode that had about six too many subplots. The main plot, about the president’s MS, remains brilliant, especially as it becomes a funhouse mirror of the Clinton situation – the coverup is what gets you, not the act itself. Amazing writing and acting throughout. “Bring it on.”

Take that, TV Turnoff Week. (And Survivor tomorrow!)

Saw Rachael Leigh Cook on The Daily Show tonight, and I have to agree with one “Josie and the Pussycats” reviewer who said she “looks like she had plastic surgery directly on her DNA.” Scary.

Very interesting thing going on at Plastic. A while ago I said Plastic was cool, but their design had way too much chartjunk, i.e. boxes and other elements that clutter up the page rather than impart information. Well, they’re at least demoing a new design that’s so much better in this regard. (You may have to click ‘switch views’ to see the new design, but that’s cool since you can instantly see the difference between the old and new.) They heard me! They really heard me! 🙂

My friend Patti is quick to say that I was raised by the TV. I’ll confirm that – they just plopped me in the cardboard box with the hole cut pointing at the TV, and tossed a pork chop in there occasionally. (Just kidding, Mom.) So I have intensely ambivalent feelings about TV Turnoff Week, currently in force. I understand that many people watch TV just as an anesthetic or as a habit. But I also get really ticked off at people who love to tell everyone within shouting distance that they “never watch TV,” at the same time getting that face on like they are tasting a lemon. You just know that those are the people secretly glued to the set for the entire “Facts of Life” marathon on TV Land.

As for me, they’ll have to pry The West Wing, Survivor, King of Queens and The Simpsons from my cold, dead hand. So there.

Two new additions to the carnival that is “words mean things”: a links page and an about page. You can reach them through the links at left. Enjoy.

Speaking of parents, it’s my mother’s birthday today. Rather than get all goopy and sentimental (and I definitely could – she is a flat-out amazing woman), as a tribute to her I offer one of my favorite moments from that other Mom paragon, Marge Simpson:

Marge: I just don’t understand what ‘being cool’ means. Kids, am I cool?
Bart and Lisa (look at each other, then simultaneously): No.
Marge: Well, I don’t care. I don’t care whether I’m cool or not…….And that makes me cool, right?
Bart and Lisa (bored, simultaneously): No.

More interesting art by way of my father.

My current favorite advertising slogan:
Nothing says ‘I love you’ like flame-broiled beef.