Not A Dollarshort

Sean Trott in the news

I tried to tell this kid that a vote for Nader was a vote for Bush. But did he listen?

Airport Security

Cory's account about acquiring "contraband" at the airport's gift shop caused me to recall a little non-incident that happened on our way to North Carolina last month.

After passing through a rigorous security screening in which I had to take off no less than three articles of clothing, I wandered into the terminal gift shop to purchase some flight reading materials (I always buy really trashy entertainment magazines for plane trips -- it's a guilty pleasure). There, in the gift shop, on a pile of magazines lay a (worker's ?) abandoned, massive 12-inch screwdriver -- something that would have certainly been confiscated by airport security. Another customer in the gift shop picked up the screwdriver and brought it to the store clerk who immediately gave a big fat whatever look and thus confirmed the notion that people who hate their jobs and aren't too intimate with common sense should not work near airplanes.

Kids in the Hall

In last week's Entertainment Weekly (the one with "Big Ben" on the cover), there's a short interview with the Kids in the Hall about their upcoming pay-per-view special broadcasting on February 8 and the movie they're working on -- tentatively called Not Brain Candy 2. The pay-per-view special is a tour documentary similar to Same Guys, New Dresses but instead documents last year's Tour of Duty. It will also will be available on DVD on March 18.

24 Hour Party People

We had reached that point in our Netflix relationship where, either based on complete laziness or utter busyness, we couldn't bring ourselves to watch and return the two DVDs that we had received two months prior. What began so beautifully eight months ago, now seemed a bit like a noose upon our movie-watching necks. Why couldn't we bring ourselves to watch The Big Lebowski? Why couldn't we exert the energy needed to slip Scooby Doo into it's sleeve and ship it back to Netflix? For two months and at least once every other day, we would look at these Netflix envelopes on top of our DVD player and say "hey, we've got to return those movies tomorrow." But, of course, nothing was ever done. Thankfully, when 24 Hour Party People (better trailer at Apple) was released at the end of January, we were finally motivated enough to walk to the mailbox across the street and jump-start our Netflix lifestyle. For those not familiar with the movie, 24 Hour Party People is a dramatized documentary about Tony Wilson, Factory, the Hacienda and the artists (mostly Joy Division, New Order and The Happy Mondays). I enjoyed it immensely (so much so that I watched the audio commentary). But, I really like Steve Coogan, so perhaps I'm biased.

Pet Sounds

I've tried -- I've really tried -- to understand why The Beach Boys' Pet Sounds is such a highly-regarded album. Yes, it may be pleasing, but is it good enough to be consistently rated as one of the top rock albums of all time? What am I missing?