Tonight is going to be a rather interesting posting. Steve the Bartender who a) owns my favorite bar, b) is a fellow Illini and c) has been serving me drinks from literally my first week in town has decided to take a break from the bartending arts starting this evening. This means that I am both distraught as well as feeling the effects of spending the past few hours at the bar celebrating his last night. When a bartender tells you, “Hey, could you show up on Monday night?” you listen. (Note to Donna and Joey, don’t worry, you are still tops on my list of favorite bartenders. I’ve had many bartenders serve me without my actually ordering. You two are the only ones to serve me without my technically being in the bar at the time.) So, let’s just say that if this isn’t coherent there is a reason. Why the other nights aren’t coherent we will just blame on my lack of talent. Anyway…
1) Lots of Hollywood deaths this weekend. We lost Don Knotts, who is alternately known as Barney Fife, that dude in Three’s Company who wasn’t John Ritter or that guy with the bad perm, or the star of about a dozen Disney films you were subjected to in grade school to celebrate your good behavior. Yes, growing up in the early 80’s was that depressing, if you didn’t get a detention during the year you got to watch The Incredible Mr. Limpett (on film, no less). Plus, at least according to the headlines we lost the star of The Christmas Story. When I saw that I thought, “Wow, Peter Billingsly died? He was so awesome on Real People.” But instead it was the dad, who it is hard pressed to count as the star of the film. Well at least we still have Scott Schwartz, the kid who got his tongue stuck to the flag pole, was in The Toy, and starred in a film that you could, uh, get in the back room of the video store, around.
2) Some of you reading this outside of KC may have heard of the following story. Those in KC know it very well because it has been on the news non-stop. They captured the fugitive couple who orchestrated a rather ingenious prison escape. See, she ran this program in which convicted felons worked with dogs and trained them to help people and she hid a convicted murderer in one of the dog storage crates and snuck him out of the prison. They finally captured them in Tennessee after they made the fatal mistake of leaving the cabin that they were renting and went to a Barnes and Noble. Not exactly the original ending of Bonnie and Clyde but you take what you can get. We of course now get the film footage of what was found inside their cabin (junk food, guitars, a half finished puzzle and porn, gleefully reported by the local press). Still, we are waiting to find out the answer to the biggest question, how in the world does a woman, who is a wife and a mother who runs a dog training program for crying out loud, fall for a convicted murderer, plan his escape from prison and runs away with him? I’m pretty sure it’s just because the guy likes dogs. I could also go into how a convicted murderer apparently has an easier time getting a girlfriend than I do but I so don’t want to go there right now.
3) We had a new episode of How I Met Your Mother tonight, thank God. Found out some useful facts, such as that Barney graduated college in 1998. I’m going to estimate that this makes Barney two years younger than me (I know, I graduated in ’95 but I was incredibly young and odds are it took Barney more than four years), which would make him Super’s age (see I told you that you could sue). Plus, we’ve gained the origin of the phrase “Suit Up” and to be honest, good clothes and wealth does apparently win out over substance and heart. Try as I might, that sure seems to be the story.
4) On the show, I want to comment on ESPN’s The Sports Guy describing the show as a chick show. I’m of mixed emotions here. First of all, I’m happy for any attention this show gets since that would equate to higher ratings and a greater likelihood of their being a second season. But I just don’t buy it as a chick show along the line of Grey’s Anatomy or Desperate Housewives. First of all, it is genuinely funny and well written and I swear it has captured entire portions of my life perfectly. It gets a little corny at times but even the example he uses, the wedding episode, is surprisingly close to events that have happened to me. You can claim that it is unrealistic, that no guy would spend the night with a girl promising not to make a move, but the entire episode is saved by the moment where he, after spending hours trying to figure out who she is, finds her and her first words are “Thank God.” That was just an awesome scene. So for every bad romantic comedy moment there are some real quality laugh out loud jokes and mirror images of life and for that it should rank as a must watch show, especially in this age of Howie Mandel hosted game shows.
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