Stadium Arcadium

Previewed here a number of months ago, the Red Hot Chili Peppers' new album Stadium Arcadium is great! Surprisingly, I gotta disagree with Allmusic.com's review here. They thought it was ok but too excessive and indulgent, I think it's a great, grandiose masterpiece on the scale of The Beatles' White Album. Decide for yourself!

Star Trek Cribs - The Director's Cut

...and for all of you Trek fans, check out Star Trek Cribs. Hilarious! While you are at YouTube, check out the other Star Trek videos too. Star Trek 2.0, weeknights at 11 on G4.

Memorial Day Weekend 2006 Picks

Here we are again! Memorial Day weekend 2006. The summer begins! Here are my media picks for the long weekend:

Music:

• Welcome to My World: The Music of Daniel Johnston (Eye Music)
  
• Pop Music: The Golden Era, 1951-1975 (Sony)
• Rob Zombie - Educated Horses (Geffen)

Film

• X-Men: The Last Stand (20th Century Fox)

DVD

• Videodrome - Criterion Collection (Criterion)
• Match Point (Dreamworks)

TV

• Sci-Fi Channel Memorial Day Weekend Movie Marathon
• Lost: Season 2 Finale (another viewing)
  

Games

• World of Warcraft (Khadgar server - leveling Neq)

Ghost Rider Trailer!

Get your Ghost Rider trailer here! Woot! It's looking great!

Favorite 2005-2006 TV Series

With the 2005-2006 TV season concluding, here is my list of favorite TV series of the past year (in no apparent order):

The Office (NBC)

• OMG, did Jim really kiss Pam??? Prepare to venture into territory unexplored in the original British series.
  

Big Love (HBO)

• I never thought a TV series about polygamy would be so cool...or so emotionally resonant. IMHO this series will be the heir apparent to...
  

The Sopranos (HBO)

• Tony in and out of a coma, with terrific multi-episode fantasy dream sequence. Vito comes out of the closet and eventually is put into the ground. Everyone gets set to depart. I've never been so proud to live in New Jersey.

Lost (ABC)

• I lived, breathed and slept this show all year long. In the next life, I want to be a Tailie.

Doctor Who (Sci-Fi Channel)

• All hail the return to the States of The Definite Article. And Rose isn't bad either!

My Name Is Earl (NBC)

• Reminds me of when I lived in...oh never mind. Jaime Pressly is hilarious.

Attack of the Show (G4)

• 7 pm weeknights is reserved for all things geek.

Carnivale (HBO)

• So great and so atmospheric. And so canceled. A pox upon you HBO.

And there it is. Bring on 2006-2007.

Lost Season 2 Finale: Let the Waiting Begin!

What can I say except that it's gonna be a long summer! I can think of a couple things. For example, where is this "home" that The Others are going to take Jack, Sawyer and Kate to? Are Locke, Eko and Desmond still amongst the living? Especially since the latter twisted the key and apparently nuked The Swan! And what of the newly reunited Michael and Walt? Was Jack's final glance at Kate the acknowledgement of his "plan?" That's more than a couple things...but you get the idea.

Batman Begins Redux

When I went to see Batman Begins on its opening day last year, I had a curious reaction: I didn't like it. What, Mr. All Things Comics didn't like what was possibly the best reviewed and received Dark Knight film ever? Well, after watching it for a second time tonight on its HBO premiere, I am happy to say that I liked it much better, thank you. Why the sour first viewing? I think it was due to the fact that, for one reason or another, I may have snoozed through at least half of it. Blame it on a long work week and those comfy chairs in the theatre.

Unanswered Questions

1. Isn't making a smoking section in a restaurant like making a peeing section in a swimming pool?
2. OK.... so if the Jacksonville Jaguars are known as the "Jags" and theTampa Bay Buccaneers are known as the "Bucs," what does that make the Tennessee Titans?
3. If 4 out of 5 people SUFFER from diarrhea...does that mean that one enjoys it?
4. If people from Poland are called Poles, why aren't people from Holland called Holes?
5. Do infants enjoy infancy as much as adults enjoy adultery?
6. If a pig loses its voice, is it disgruntled?
7. Why do croutons come in airtight packages? Aren't they just stale bread to begin with?
8. Why is a person who plays the piano called a pianist but a person who drives a racecar is not called a racist?
9. Why isn't the number 11 pronounced onety one?
10. If lawyers are disbarred and clergymen defrocked, doesn't it follow that electricians can be delighted, musicians denoted, cowboys deranged, models deposed, tree surgeons debarked, and dry cleaners depressed?
11. If Fed Ex and UPS were to merge, would they call it Fed UP?
12. Do Lipton Tea employees take coffee breaks?
13. What hair color do they put on the driver's licenses of bald men?
14. I was thinking about how people seem to read the Bible a whole lot more as they get older; then it dawned on me .....they're cramming for their final exam.
15. I thought about how mothers feed their babies with tiny little spoons and forks, so I wondered what do Chinese mothers use? Toothpicks?
16. Why do they put pictures of criminals up in the Post Office? What are we supposed to do, write to them? Why don't they just put their pictures on the postage stamps so the mailmen can look for them while they deliver the mail?
17. If it's true that we are here to help others, then what exactly are the others here for?
18. You never really learn to swear until you learn to drive.
19. Ever wonder what the speed of lightning would be if it didn't zigzag?
20. If a cow laughed, would milk come out of her nose?
21. Whatever happened to Preparations A through G?
22. Did you ever notice: When you put the two words "The" and "IRS" together it spells "Theirs."

Thanks to Barb Wood, who always finds the best jokes.

Some Favorite Quotes

"Don't believe anything the Bush administration tells you. In fact, play it safe: don't believe anything anybody tells you." George Carlin

"Instead of getting married again, I'm going to find a woman I don't like and just give her a house." Rod Stewart

"Getting divorced just because you don't love a man is almost as silly as getting married just because you do." Zsa Zsa Gabor

"Rock and roll will always, always, always overcome, eventually." Pete Townshend

"Why buy the cow when the milk's free?" Anon.

5/17 Lost Tidbits (Spoilers)

Another great Lost episode tonight, which is the last before the two-hour season 2 finale next week. Here are my impressions (highlight text to read):

• We got to see Walt in The Others' camp!
• The Others want Jack, Kate, Sawyer and Hurley ONLY!
• Walt says The Others are not who they seem!
• Michael tells one of the others that he wants Walt and "the boat"(in exchange for Jack, Kate, Sawyer and Hurley).
• While burying Ana Lucia and Libby, we see a boat heading to shore!
• Claire has made up with Charlie!
• A new Hanso Foundation web site address appears in the third fake commercial: http://www.letyourcompassguideyou.com.

Is this going to be the longest week or what?

A Smorgasbord of Alan Moore Interviews

You may also know that I am huge fan of Alan Moore: my favorite comic book writer of all time. I hope to be just like him when I grow up. I have been a fan since Alan's work at DC Comics in the early '80's, when he was writing Swamp Thing and creating characters like John Constantine. We were doing collection development in the library today and Alan's name came up, connected with the upcoming Lost Girls hardcover. I found a clearinghouse of recent interviews with Alan and many of them are quite amusing and informative. Definitely check out the two-parter with Cinescape, and a fascinating interview with Alan by MTV and the SuicideGirls interview in which he talks about why he is a pedestrian. Alan Moore, I bow to you, even though you aren't interested in the film versions of your works.

Carnivale Died a Miserable Death

So I finally got to see the final (second season) episode of Carnivale. Great stuff. But, it was depressing to realize that it won't be back on HBO since it was canceled. It ended at a weird cliffhanger ('natch). We can only hope that an entity like Sci-Fi will revisit the series. Incidentally, HBOZone begins rerunning the entire series again from the beginning of the first season on Friday, May 19th. I'm gonna watch it all over again, it was that good! :)

Desperate For Season 2 Now!

I watched the final episode of season 1 of Desperate Housewives tonight (you do remember that I'm catching up via the DVDs, right?). OMG, what a great episode and what a great season! How could I have missed this!? So, now I am faced with a dilemma. I only have the last 4 or 5 season 2 episodes recorded. With the season 2 finale coming in less than a week on May 21st, there's no way that I'm going to dive headlong into the second season now, not without the premiere episode. So, I have made a decision: if they aren't going to rerun the initial season 2 episodes during the summer, then I am going to stay away from season 2 until the DVD set comes out at the end of August. And I will scream if the August 29th release date turns out to be just a fantasy.

Retrospective Archiving

Now that classes are over and I have some more free time for the summer, I'm cleaning up some of my "To-Do" list. One of the items on that list is to transfer all of my blog entries, movie and music reviews and sundry dated entries from DavidLisa.com over here. Why? I want all of my writing to be completely indexable and searchable here, while still being housed on my own domain. So, this will make it quick and easy for you to search for anything I've ever written on my blog about any particular subject. When this whole project is over, we will have an archive of writing that will span back to 2001 and possibly further back into the past. Cool, huh? So, I am half done with 2004 now. I'll post more updates soon on this project soon.

Lost - May 10th Episode Recap

Entertainment Weekly always has (IMHO) the best weekly recaps of Lost episodes. Check out the May 10th episode recap here. Yes, I am an unpaid shill for Entertainment Weekly. No, they have not anointed me Obsessive Fan Of The Week yet.

Unshelved

OK, so you know that I am a librarian. But, do you know what it's like to work in a public library? Well, if I had the time, the inclination or the art chops to publish a comic strip about being a public librarian, then it would be more or less just like Unshelved. Check it out and vicariously experience our dangerous profession for yourself.

Carnivale Ends (for me) Tonight

It's been wonderful catching up with the first two season rebroadcasts and I finally get to find out how the HBO series Carnivale ends tonight. Don't tell me! (Covers ears) Lalalalalala...I can't hear you.....

David Lisa Visits Wisteria Lane

This weekend I will finish catching up on the first season of Desperate Housewives, courtesy of the DVD set. I missed it the first time around (I was playing too much World of Warcraft and obsessing over Lost I guess) but I'm digging the series now. Afterwards, I will be bringing myself up to date on second season shenanigans courtesy of some recorded episodes still lingering on my DVR and through blow by blow updates from friends. Then, when the second season DVD set arrives in August, the circle will be complete.

It's Official - It's The Draeni!

The New York Times reports that Blizzard has announced at E3 that the new Alliance race in the World of Warcraft Burning Crusade expansion will indeed be the Draeni. Check out the article here.

Todd Rundgren - Something/Anything

For the last week or so I have been listening to Todd Rundgren's magnum opus Something/Anything, while driving to New Brunswick and committee meetings, while playing World of Warcraft, while putting the finishing touches on grades for the Spring semester and while just sitting around. Oddly enough, I am experiencing this album largely for the first time, even though it was first released way back in 1972. There's so much excellent material here that this 2 disc set begs multiple listenings just to sort it all out. After you do that, your jaw is likely to hang open in disbelief. So, you've most likely heard the hits I Saw the Light and Hello It's Me, but I bet you will not experience another more superbly crafted song as Couldn't I Just Tell You. And as for Black Maria and songs like One More Day (No Word), It Wouldn't Have Made Any Difference and Saving Grace...well, they make me wonder why it took me 34 years to discover this richly diverse, wonderful pop music masterpiece.

David Blaine Is Still The Man!

Did you see David Blaine try to hold his breath for 8 minutes 58 seconds last night? I did and I was disappointed to see that he wasn't able to do it. However, to stay submerged in water for a week straight takes cahones, so I take off my hat to him. And he gets all the hot models! So, for many reasons, I say that David Blaine Is Still The Man!

Return: A Warcraft Saga

One of the many great things about World of Warcraft is that the game's creators, Blizzard Entertainment, allows players to create their own stories based within the universe. One of the best is this short film (or machinima) called Return: A Warcraft Saga. Check it out!

Subscribe to this Blog!

After not being available for a number of months, once again you can subscribe to this blog's RSS feed! If you have any questions about how to do this, please contact me!

Red Hot Chili Peppers on SNL Tonight

Just a reminder that the Red Hot Chili Peppers will be on Saturday Night Live tonight. The new CD Stadium Arcadium will be out this Tuesday, May 9th!

Free Comic Book Day 2006!

Saturday, May 6, 2006 is Free Comic Book Day! Go to your local comic shop on that day and get a pile of comics, absolutely free! Around here in this area of Monmouth County, NJ I'll be going to my favorite comic shops: Comics Plus in Oakhurst, Jay and Silent Bob's Secret Stash in Red Bank, Amazing Stories in Shrewsbury and MC Comics in Old Bridge. Please support your local comic shops! Hope to see you there!

Prepare for a Shock - Lost Season 2 Finale May 24th

As if the May 3rd episode of Lost was not harrrowing enough (and the Hanso Foundation phone number difficult enough to get through to), Sci-Fi reports that the Season 2 finale of Lost, airing on May 24th, will be a shocker. Check out the article.