I sat down to watch Heroes last night with my boyfriend, who hadn't seen the show since the second season. "Don't worry," I said, "nothing much happened last season." I then sat in vain trying to come up with a single thing he needed to know to understand the current season. "A bunch of people died...." I said. But then when I started listing off Nicki's husband, the painter guy, etc., he pointed out that all those people died in the last episode of the first season.
Finally I hit upon something. During a commercial break when it seemed Noah was in jeopardy, we had the following conversation. Him: Eh, I don't care about him anyway. Me: No, he's good now. He did all this stuff last season...uh, to take care of Claire and stuff. Him: Oh, so he's paid his dues and we're supposed to care about him now? Me: Mm-hmm. Him: OK.
Yep, I guess that pretty much sums it up. Unless I want to get into the twins, and Claire's boyfriend (what happened to him again?), and Peter losing his memory, and Hiro in the ancient past, and Ned Rierson, and a whole lotta other plot points that apparently don't matter anymore.
Perhaps this is the reason for the demise of America's teenagers--no, not abstitence-only education--they don't have Mrs. Garrett to show them the way.
Anyone who's read much of this blog won't be surprised to hear that I'm practically hyperventilating over the season premiere of the final season of The Shield on Tuesday. In celebration of the best show ever made, here are my 5 favorite Shield moments.
Warning: for anyone who hasn't seen all six seasons, MAJOR SPOILER ALERT!, as they say. 5. “On the Jones” (season 6) One of the interesting things about The Shield being on FX—away from major sponsors trying to reach millions of people—is that it moves organically: it doesn’t try to cram into one huge “special television event” what should really take a few episodes to tell. After season 5’s finale in which Shane kills Lem, last season’s premiere finally closed the chapter on the chilling Lieutenant Jon Kavanaugh (played by Forest Whitaker, who in between seasons won an Oscar). After Kavanaugh has what can only be described as a Macky-induced meltdown, Vic visits him in prison and tells him, “You’re stepping onto a whole new playing field; hope you know the rules.” Vic no longer has his posse (except for Ronnie), but once again he’s come out on top.
4. “Back in the Hole” (season 4) There are so many good episodes from season 4 (“Tar Baby,” featuring Dutch singing “Hungry Like a Wolf” comes to mind), but this one, which takes place mostly at the Barn, is my favorite. The strike team does something unusual and tells (their version of) the truth about Shane’s involvement with Antwon. The scenes with Glenn Close grilling Anthony Andersen (now on Law & Order!) show how a well-done TV show can actually be better than a film. Meanwhile, Vic tells the team to go find out what really happened to the dead little girl—“and make sure you get some collateral this time.” Unfortunately, that collateral comes in the form of a bag of heroin…that makes its way straight into the hands of IAD. And in Aceveda we have one character on the show who decides he’d like to stop the downward spiral, as he “breaks up” with the prostitute he’s been having a destructive relationship with. The only bad thing about this episode is Vic’s unfortunate choice of t-shirt for most of the ep, a plain blue blob that Michael Chiklis says on the DVD’s commentary “makes me look like a blueberry.
3. “Scar Tissue” (season 2) Now here’s Mackey in a hot t-shirt—a tight, bright green hold-over from the previous ep with “Shamrocks” written on it (and the episode ends with him getting some much-needed lovin’). But that’s not the only reason it makes my list. After Claudette makes her first chink in Vic’s armor (talking to his ex-wife),Vic prepares to pay the consequences for…well…one of his crimes: burning Armadillo’s face on the electric burner of his stove—a scene seared (sorry, I couldn’t resist) into the memory of every Sheild fan. Of course, he’s only because he feels he owes it to the newly disfigured Ronnie, and before he can confess, Lem and Shane cop a deal with a former inmate with a grudge. Best scene: Danny confesses to what was then the only other female officer that she almost kissed Dutch after solving an assault-with-bug-spray case. As they’re talking, Armadillo gets stabbed to death in the cage, which ends up being a defining moment in Danny’s career.
2. “Slipknot” (season 3) The first episode Michael Chiklis directed is one of confessions: Acaveda finally confesses to his wife that he was sexually assaulted (her chilling reply: “how could you let this happen?”), Cassidy confesses that she’s the one who keyed her mom’s new boyfriend’s car, and Mara confesses to Shane that she stole the $7,000 from the money train stash. Though much of season 3 set up the relationship between Shane and Mara, this scene is the turning point: when Shane realizes that his actions are now going to have consequences for someone other than him. (We won’t get to see the destructive whirlpool these two wallow in again until season 6, when Mara yells at a beaten, sobbing Shane, “You want to shoot me? You want to shoot yourself? Do it.”) The end of the episode shows one of the best quintessential Strike Team moments: the boys taking back the streets, which somehow involves busting into a house and flipping over the dining room table.
1. “Circles” (season 1) And TV show that begins with a riot and actually gets more exciting is one you know is good. There are plenty of characteristically awesome Shield moments in the episode—Vic busting through a fence in pursuit of a suspect, Shane telling Vic he’ll kill Gilroy for him—but the one that gets me is when Vic calls home and finds out Gilroy is there. More than ever before in the amazing first season, the viewer can kind of see how Vic backs himself into a corner and makes decisions he thinks he needs to make for the greater good. While he allows Acaveda to take credit for bringing Gilroy in, he has what is perhaps one of his first tear-his-heart-out moments. His reaction to his family leaving him is simultaneously hard to watch and impossible to turn away from.
p.s., if this still isn't enough Shield for you, check out hulu's Shield page, which has all sorts of interesting interviews with the cast.
While I'm waiting for my cousin to get here, I thought I'd finally get around to scanning a couple of things I found at my parent's house last year. Both are from my third grade file....(click to englare)
If you're wondering, "neon" is still my favorite color, and jogging suits are still my favorite thing to wear. Also, I believe "Dady Davedo" is "Danny DeVito," star of such 80s classics as Throw Momma from the Train and Twins.
This one is one of the "Week in Review" essays we had to write each week. Apparently, just as now, sometimes a TV show was one of the most exciting things to happen to me all week. And to my teacher.
In honor of tomorrow night's return of Grey's Anatomy, I've updated my helpful spreadsheet of the intricate social network of Seattle Grace. Print it out and reference during the show, or give to friends who've just started watching. It's color-coded for your convenience!
I hadn't updated it in six months, so I had a lot of Alex's squares to fill in--he's now head-to-head (pun intended) with George in the interhospital bangs race. I had to introduce a new color (orange) in an attempt to define Derek and Meredith's ridiculous relationship (which everyone is so sick of that the creator of the show has promised to get them together for good). But most surprisingly to me, the only red ("in a relationship") square on the current chart is Dr. Bailey and Mr. Bailey's, in which I was forced to note "in trouble." This, of course, means there are dozens of possible couplings. Here are my predictions:
The sure things 1. Hahn and Sloane 2. Derek and Kissyface (afterwards, he will reunite with Meredith, of course) 3. George and Lexie
My dream hookups 1. Karev and Izzie (um, again) 2. Derek and Addison (afterwards, he will reunite with Meredith, of course) 3. Cristina and anyone—when is that girl gonna get laid already?
My nightmare hookups 1. The Chief and Bailey 2. George and Bailey 3. Callie and Bailey (actually, I would love that one, but if people start crossing the fence it's really going to screw with my spreadsheet)
Well, I just finished watching season one of Friday Night Lights on hulu. It's joined the ranks of Six Feet Under, Lost, Heroes, and The Shield as TV shows I've binged on. And yep, I guess it's the latest show I'll try to get you to watch. After watching 20-odd episodes in 3 days, here were some of my thoughts:
1. Kyle Chandler is fucking hot! I imdb'ed him and it turns out he's the dude from Early Edition—remember that show? where the guy gets a newspaper from the future every day? I didn't remember seeing anyone this hot on the ads for that show, so I checked out the archival footage. Sure enough: not hot (it's the 90's leather jacket!), BUT I did discover that it also starred Fisher Stevens! (??!). So I'm hoping maybe, after Fisher's successful turn on Lost, he can go guest star on Friday Night Lights? But I digress.
2. It's a constant shock to me how little nudity there is on this show! How is it possible we haven't seen Riggins' ass yet?! I didn't realize NBC was so prude...but maybe they're trying to make it a "family" show? In any event, I'm mad I don't get to see the Coach follow through on this bedroom eyes.
3. Hulu needs to get some more corporate sponsorships. At the beginning of each episode, I would cross my fingers and say, "Please not Chili's!" Their 15-second spots invited the viewer to "Pepper in some WOW!" with their "big-mouth bites." In the 30-second spots, a bunch of 20-somethings are in a car trying to decide what to do. Then one of the girls (who were thin as a rail and twice as attractive as their male counterparts) gets the AWESOME idea to go to CHILI's to get their "Smokehouse Bacon Burger," (follow that link, you won't regret it) whose tagline is literally "the thickest strips of bacon you've ever seen." Ironically, the company that has the best ads is Cisco (and one of them even features the executive phone!)
4. Have I mentioned how sexy Kyle Chandler is? I've never found football remotely interesting until now. Suddenly I find it kind of hot.
5. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe this is the first TV show to ever portray a wheelchair-bound person in such a major role. I have no idea what I would think if I was in a wheelchair, but the writers seem to do a good job with it. As soon as I thought, "wouldn't Mexico be less handicap accessible?" Jason can't get over a curb. I should also mention that Scott Porter, who plays him, is excellent, as are all the other no-name teenage actors on the show.
6. ...the actresses, on the other hand, I can't decide if I like or not. (And could Layla look any less like her parents?) I also don't get why there are no awkward, unattractive, or really smart women on the show.
Like many of you, I am a long-time NPH fan. (That's Neil Patrick Harris, for all of you not in the know.) Granted, I haven't seen anything he did between Starship Troopers (a movie that I have seen half-a-dozen times, thanks to some inexplicable obsession the boys in my high school had with it) and Harold and Kumar. Here's a little gallery of NPH-related video clips I thought you all might enjoy.
When I saw Harold and Kumar, I had taped it off tbs. They had overdubbed this scene--where we learn that the Doogie line always works on strippers--to the point of non-comprehension. Luckily youtube had it in its entirety.
Want to see NPH and Jason Segel sing a duet from Les Miserables? I thought so. Here is the best moment ever to air on the talk show of the lady who played Karen on Will & Grace.
Speaking of my new favorite show How I Met Your Mother, this behind-the-scenes clip of NPH talking about the "Beyonce pose" that he strikes after getting out of the shower is priceless.
Unfortunately, Hulu doesn't have "Summer of '91" (aka the ep where Doogie loses his virginity to Wanda), but it does have the prom episode:
Neil Patrick Harris: Is there anything he can't do?
the fancy phones, but the ones in my office have a lovely photo taken from a parking lot.
I think it's entirely appropriate that my last post about work (a year and a half ago) was about my phone, because today we got new phones in the office. We were warned, however, that they weren't "going live" until May, and until then, we could only receive calls on our old phone. Unless someone called from one of the new phones. Such was the joke all day when someone would call. "You're supposed to call me on the new phone!!" "Ooops, sorry."[click] This was especially fun because our new phones come with a kajillion different ringing options ("ring tones" as the kids call them). Everything from "saxophone 1" to "chirp 2" to "CTU-24," which sounds exactly like the phones...well, in CTU on 24.
It wasn't long until we bottom-dwellers began to notice that our bosses had different phones than us. Equipped with a touch-screen with a gorgeous photo of one of our retail stores on it, these symbols of our corporate caste system seem to have no different features than our own phones. Though the Cisco website does note that while our phones are considerd "entry-level," (it actually says that) the fancy phones, ""provide a high degree of flexibility for exciting new productivity applications." Oooo.
Honestly, I'm not sure I want one of the Executive phones, even though (according to the internet) theirs cost $600 and mine only cost $200. Even my lowly one, with all its special features, makes me feel old. "I don't need all this technology!" I grumble, as my LCD-screen informs me that I have a voicemail and an mp3 of the message appears in my email inbox. I don't even know how it did that. And it opens in iTunes, where I keep old David Bowie songs and my entire Radiohead collection.
But that doesn't mean I'm not going to try to figure out how to get a picture of my ass on every phone in an office with a door.
Look kids, it's like a quiz, where you pay us for something that you can get for free! Isn't that "whack"?
Here's an ad that appeals to us Bachelor lovers. The only thing thing that could have made this ad better is if they put "woo" in quotations marks, rather than capitalizing it.
Come on, a kit? All you need is a $3 pair of nylons—anyone who subscribed to my high school e-newsletter knows that. But the ad gets points for its picture, which is just on the verve of graphic.
hulu is a pretty freaking awesome new website where you can watch Fox and NBC shows for free. It's definitely worth checking out, because they have the entire series of Arrested Development...and Hey Paula! I was excited to find Dragnet, the TV show I listed on a "favorites fill-in" in 3rd grade. I watched a lot of Nick at Nite back then.
For a retro TV addict like me, the real thrill is being able to see TV shows I've heard about (not on the streets or anything...I edited a couple of TV encyclopedias) and never seen. Here are some of my choices:
McHale's Navy: I'm disappointed they don't have the episode starring Guiseppe McHale, McHale's identical cousin. But one where the sailors adopt an orphan girl can't be that bad.
Simon & Simon: I think this show is about a 1970s Shane Vendrel, his gay buddy, and their dog Hooch.
Johnny Sokko and His Flying Robot: Entertainment Weekly described it as "crazy, dubbed '60s Japanese sci-fi starring a winsome kid and his giant robot."
St. Elsewhere: I just want to see Howie Mandel with a fro
Hart to Hart: Even though it isn't backed up by a single viewer star-rating, I decided to go with the episode "Murder in Paradise," because of the first five words of the description: "At a Hawaiian croquet tournament...."
p.s. you can also watch shitloads of Movies on hulu. They have The Jerk, but no Space Camp.
Since I'm an editor, you may be under the mistaken impression that I'm a good speller. But historically, I'd whip through diagramming sentences on a sheet of notebook paper, but put me in front of that week's 2-page spread in the spelling workbook and I'd suddenly become completely uninterested. So I'm still a bad speller. But since I'm an editor, a) all of my superiors not only have pristine spelling, my boss sometimes uses words I have to look up in the dictionary; and b) if I ever misspell anything at any time, some one inevitably says, "you're an editor, you should be able to spell!" I always get picked for the spelling questions on Cranium. A bad spellers worst nightmare.
To that end, I have striven to become a better speller. Afterall, by my estimation, I type more than 12,000 words a day (2.5 hours a day typing at 82 words per minute). But there are some words I can never seem to get straight:
necessary - is it two Cs, one S; or one C, two eses? I can never remember traveling - I'm sorry, but the rules of spelling dictate that a short vowel (the "e") should have a double-consonant after it if adding -ing. The British do it correctly...so why only one L? This baffles me. occasionally - the only way I could get myself to remember that there were two Cs is to start to pronounce it in my head wrong: OCK-casionally. But since I type it more than I say it, I always want to say it wrong now. Michael - the "a-e-l" just seems so unnatural. Every time I type it I have to say in my head "m-i-c-h-A-E-L!" I have to say it with an exclamation point, too (therefore, it always makes me happy to write it). their - my fingers somehow started spelling their as "thier" all the time. I have to retype it the correct every time. But I've typed it wrong so many times, I'm never 100% sure how to write it when I'm writing longhand now. Renaissance - ugh. there is no hope for me and this word absorption - I actually totally know how to spell this word, but I always have to pause when writing it. I find the changing of the "b" in absorb into a "p" absorption to be awesome, and how often do you get to write "absorption"? When you do, take a moment to appreciate it.
Each of you, if you have souls, are secretly waiting for that ONE SHOW to come back from the writer's strike--whether it's The Office, or Ugly Betty, or [SHUDDER] even Boston Legal. My secret show was How I Met Your Mother, which returned yesterday in a brilliantly timed St. Paddy's day episode.
I know you're all secretly relieved we get a little more new TV before summer, and those of us who invest in DVRs have not been getting our money's worth. So to pay back in karma this proverbial groundhog running back into its hole, I command that you all watch a yet another well-written, critically acclaimed, awesomely acted show that no one watches: How I Met Your Mother.
I know you all don't want to watch it, because it's a sitcom, and the sitcom was proclaimed dead around the time that According to Jim and The King of Queens became popular. But it wasn't dead--remember overlooked Arrested Development? And remember how you regret not watching that show when it was on? Well, now is your chance to make up for that. If, anything, it's got: * Free episodes online. * adorable Jason Segel (recently hired to write the next Muppets movie) * Alyson Hannigan (aka Willow). * Bob Saget in the Daniel Stern narration role. * Neil Patrick Harris on The Price Is Right (pre–Drew Carey) * Neil Patrick Harris playing Patrick Swayze's role in the "c'mere, loverboy" scene of Dirty Dancing. *Neil Patrick Harris' abs. No, seriously
In fact, the only caveat I have about HIMYM is its laugh track. Though I hardly notice it anymore, it adds a campy quality that the show doesn't need. Though it does harken back to Seinfeld, which had a laugh track and was the only other show with such great New York specific lines as Barney's already infamous area code break down:
She might dress like she's 718, act like she's 212, but trust me, she's 516. Oh, and her husband, letting her out alone on St. Paddy's Day? If that dude's not 973 I'm 347.
But whatever, I'm done spending my free time trying to convince a small, imaginary audience to watch a show for the sake of the art of television. If you don't believe me, at least watch it next week: It's Brtiney's primetime debut.
Even in this, the most awesomely awesome of all Lost seasons, you know the Jin/Sun episode is gonna suck. Sure, Sun was part of the Oceanic Six, but what did we get to see of Jin? Some throw-away story? We wasted that time on Jin's dumb story when we could be figuring out what the eff is going on with Michael.
But if that wasn't bad enough, the punctuation in the subtitles of the Korean they were speaking the whole episode was all wrong. We're talking double hyphens instead of em dashes, missing commas, even misplaced periods! For those of us intimately familiar with correct punctuation, this is not only distracting, but disheartening. Are we the only ones who care about proper punctuation?
But hey—maybe it's hard to find good copyeditors in Hawaii. If that's the case, you just let me know, Lost producers, and I'd be happy to move there in a minute.
There's no denying that one of the juiciest benefits of cable is Project Runway, and with the strike going on, it's amazing that I've been able to NOT watch the addictive show, especially with as many times as Bravo reruns it. I HAVE been DVRing them, and after my friends and I watched the first 7 eps in a row we vowed to save the next seven.
I have somehow managed to avoid watching any episodes of Project Runway and have avoided all airings of it, as well as blog posts, RSS feeds, office gossip, and ads about it. I have no idea what "the twist" was, and I didn't know who the finalists were. Until just now, when I was innocently watching a Lifetime movie waiting for Law & Order to come on so I could get my Jeremy Sisto fix. The clock tolled 10, and my DVR, forced to choose between the 2 shows that I had set to record, chose not L&O but Project Runway!! And there were the fat guy and the bald guy.
Jimmy Kimmel, previously found to be mildly irritating by myself and everyone I know, made a music video so fucking hilarious that the one person at the NY Times who's in charge of keeping his finger on the Inter of the Web sat up and took notice.
It features pretty much the only thing that could top oft-genius girlfriend Sarah Silverman's video "I'm Fucking Matt Damon"—Brad Pitt as a FedEx guy. Not to mention a bevy of other celebs that would cause my father to demand, "is that what's-his-name? from that movie? with the guy?"
In case you've been living under layers of Bea Arthur's shedding skin (or your overlords block video, like mine) and haven't seen the "viral videos" (as the myspacers are calling them), don't read the Times' awful descriptions of them. Just watch 'em:
(jimmy and sarah actually have great chemistry, I think, almost making up for him hosting "the man show")
("every once in a while hollywood rallies itself for a worthy cause," kimmel told the Times.)
The interesting thing isn't so much that this is Ben's best performance since Bounce, but the blatant use of "fucking," even though it's bleeped out. (Or as the Times puts it, "One vulgar word describing the coital relations between, on the one bed, Ms. Silverman and Mr. Damon, and on the other, Mr. Kimmel and Mr. Affleck, was repeatedly bleeped out for the broadcast of each video.") After the videos got more than three million hits combined on youtube, abc.com put Kimmel's (still censored) on their homepage, which loads the video immediately when you hit the site.
Did Jimmy Kimmel and Sarah Silverman produce something so funny that they proved that the power of the internet can topple networks' concern over the wrath of right-wingers? Well, not so fast: When the Times questioned ABC about it, they cited NBC.com's UNcensored "Dick in a Box" precedent. And though very careful about their family-friendly image, parent company Disney has long stood up to right-wingers on issues like gay rights.
Of course, maybe the real issue is, why do we censor shows at all? With the V-chip, there's no reason parents can't block shows with profanity (and I bet those cable boxes they're going to force everyone to get will have V-chips). Then, of course, Jimmy would have to cancel one of his best bits: "Unneccesary Censorship."
you find yourself thinking something, and it suddenly makes you rethink your whole lifestyle. That just happened to me. I'd just finished watching the Chappelle's Show/Shield/Soul Train Saturday-night line-up on the CW11, when a blue screen came on and a deep voice said, "The following is a paid advertisement from the Time Life company." I picked up the remote to change the channel, then thought:
Oh wait, I bet this is one of those ads for old music. These are actually pretty good.
So now I'm watching Ashford & Simpson host a retrospective of soul hits of the 80s. And Ashford (or is it Simpson?) has just instructed me to hold on to my dancing shoes, because we've just begun. There are 168 R&B jams in this deluxe box set, and it's not sold in stores, so I guess we have a lot to cover.
Apropos to the conversation I got into in the ladies room today, one way to survive the WGA strike is to watch America's Next Top Model, which is how MTV is surviving the strike. If you get it during an especially good "cycle," you can see things like future winner Nicole (who doesn't know what Bollywood is) say, ""Are you serious? You know that's whack." to Jayla, who has confessed to cameras: "I am extremely confused by this competition." Not to mention the Bre vs. Kim the Lesbian showdown involving some Red Bull, a granola bar, and who's still in the running to becoming America's Next Top Model.
I'm just hoping they replay season 1, which was so innocent that when two Christians refused to pose without their clothes on, one was eliminated because Jay Manuel, then not "Creative Director" but lowly make-up boy, confessed to Tyra that Robin had jiggled her naked boobs at him. Priceless.
I went to see I am Legend tonight, and came to the realization about one of the archetypes of disaster films. You know the characters who are always the first to give up? In PG movies, the other characters rally them until they realize their potential. In PG-13 movies, they attempt suicide. In R rated movies, they're the ones that jump into the East River to escape the monster.
If I were faced with the end of the world as we knew it, that'd totally be me.
First off, I'm a total pessimist. I'm sorry, but if a giant spaceship/alien/virus is coming towards me, I'm not really having a "I'm gonna live to fall in love another day" attitude. And two, I don't really have a lot to give society. I couldn't come up with a cure, or fly a shooting spaceship. I'd pretty much be done with life as soon as the coffee ran out.
But I think there might be one plot twist that would keep me from being the wife in Cormac McCarthy's The Road. The concept is: the only way the United States can beat the aliens/terrorists/virus is by giving a twenty-something idiot savant directions on how to work their vessel. In order for the awkward hipster--who only responds to witty prose that connects with his generation--to understand the dry, scientific directions of the military manual, someone has to edit it.
I'll get from Brooklyn to DC by stealing a horse from the Kensington Stables and riding her over the Verrazano Bridge.
It all started the other day at my local market. I was out of toilet paper, and they were out of Charmin Basic, my preferred brand not only because it's the perfect thickness (not too rough, but not so soft I feel like I should be upholstering my freegan chair with it), but because it doesn't hide behind words like "original" or "super" or "nacho cheesier." It's just "basic," and that's OK.
But I digress. One Stop Market was out of Charmin Basic, so I picked up some Cottonelle. But this wasn't simply Cottonelle, it was Cottonelle for kids, which, if I am reading the graphic on the package correctly, supposedly shows kids how much toilet paper to use by putting a picture every 4 squares.
"This is hilarious!" I thought, and what normally happens after that I utter that phrase once again happened, as I smacked down money for something that was decidedly less funny once I got home and remembered that no one ever comes over.
What gets me about the Cottonelle for kids, besides the uncomfortable feeling of shoving a dog into my yammy, is that the puppy is pictured in two poses. One, with his tongue out next to a parrot, and the other, in a canoe with a monkey. No, seriously, in a canoe with a monkey:
As someone who works in a creative field for a big corporation, I am really trying to picture the meeting that occurred before these illustrations were commissioned. There must have been a lot of excitement about this thrilling new product, the downer of the group must have mentioned that they could only spend the money to have two different illustrations done, everyone immediately thought puppies should be involved...and then here is where I am drawing a blank. Jungle puppies? Jungle puppies in canoes steered by monkeys? Sgt. Joe Friday used to come after the type of people who would think up such things.
In the meantime, I have almost four whole rolls--"double rolls" even--to get through. Someone drink some prune juice and come over!
