Of course I'm happy about the 180-degree turn on a dime the nation made on Tuesday, but there are so many points to cover about why this is a great thing for everyone that I'll have to wait until the weekend to write a really good post about it. I'll be sure it includes a few scalding sarcasms, and then one of my four readers can make shitty posts to me anonymously, thinking I'm too dumb to immediately figure out who it is.
So until then I'll write the other kind of blog entry I write where I tell you about the latest music and movies I've purchased, and a few other opinions I have to offer.
Two or three years ago I bent to modern technology and bought a $30 off-brand DVD player, an Apex. The thing worked well except that it made a rumbling sound that rivaled the volume of the DVDs I was watching. So last weekend I spent the extra $20 to go first class and got a Sony DVD player at Brands Mart for $53! To feed it I satisfied my jones for a Metallica video and got the old Cliff `em All! video, which I already had on VHS. I found it used at a local store for $7 with a sticker that said "Inspected, Cleaned, Guaranteed." Upon opening it I guarantee you it was neither cleaned nor inspected. It went back the next day. Then I took a look at what this now-rare DVD was going for used on E-Bay and Amazon and ran back to the store to ask them if they still had that copy and snagged it.
A few days later I was back at that store and saw the Woodstock movie for $9.99, used. I hadn't been in the market for that one but it's an old-time favorite so I figured what the heck. At the register it rang up as $7, also! Once home I checked E-Bay and found I had gotten a mint copy for less than half what people are paying for them! The acquisition of Woodstock completes my collection of all the concert videos we watched obsessively when I was 20, and Alvin Lee will play guitar for me whenever I want. Excellent.
While I was browsing the Metalli...hey, wake up...while I was browsing the Metallica DVDs on E-Bay I also found one called A Year and a Half in the Life of Metallica that's from around the time of ...And Just for All and the black album. Now A Year and a Half is on the way to my DVD player for $11.
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Consumer Advisory: Steve Carell
Yes, I'm sure everyone else was hip to Steve Carell five years ago, but I've only just now caught onto his NBC TV show, The Office. I largely don't give a crap about television but man, am I glad I came across this show!
The whole cast is great but Steve Carell in particular is great because...as a 12-year-old I used to love the old Late Night with David Letterman show, of course, and there were a few guests you would stay up for on a school night. If you heard Jay Leno, Howard Stern or Pee Wee Herman was gonna be on, you stayed up until 1:30 a.m. no matter what because it was going to be an event. Recently Steve Carell was on the Tonight Show and it was the first time I've had that kind of vibe from a celebrity in years: a celebrity worth celebrating! His appearance was really off-the-wall and hysterical. He seems like he's a sincerely cracked guy, he doesn't just play one on TV, and I admire that.
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My Kinda Mexican Gal
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In a previous post or two I've ranted about illegal immigrants from Mexico. This evening, however, I caught a couple of minutes of the ABC-TV show Ugly Betty, produced by Salma Hayek, and Salma made an appearance on this one. God...if truckfulls of Salma Hayeks were creeping across the border, I would be in San Diego working as a coyote yesterday! For some reason the Mexican girls like her don't wind up behind the counter at the Burger King I frequent.
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Michael Anthony's blog
Michael Anthony, now officially ex-bass player of Van Halen according to Billboard.com, has a blog on Blogspot now, too. It's here: madanthonyblog.blogspot.com.
And the girl that plays Ugly Betty (America Ferrera) is actually very attractive as well.