Crankcase

Two bags of jelly beans, a ten-year old and a Tilt-A-Whirl.

Time to play "Guess the Product." I'll show you the product mascot and you guess the what the item is. Ready? Here we go:

I'll give you a hint: I bought these at an Asian food market.

The answer next week!

posted by: Jiggsy at 11/23/04 11:44 | link | comments (3) |

What’s this, a free moment to type? I’m not sure what to do with myself. I mean this is all so sudden. (Briefly hyperventilates into paper bag) There, that’s better.

So what to talk about? Do I comment on the elections? No, that’s a horse long dead and already beaten to a fine paste by thousands before me. If you ask Bush or Kerry, I’ll admit to my vote: Green Party. While I’ve always regarded Bush as a wild eyed Texas Marshal bent on taming the world to his desires and political supporters, there was something about Kerry’s incessant “I have a plan” statement that just wigged me out.

Well, I guess I should start with an update on myself. Still going to the gym about three times a week. I haven’t shed an ounce since my last posting. However, waking up each morning to a flatter stomach, the thinnest trace of a V-shaped torso and arms that went from flabby water wings to cleanly sculpted curves is worth not losing the weight.

Work is good. I won’t bore you with any of the crappy banality or the banal crappiness of my job, but suffice it to say that this is normally the start of the holiday workload slump and it’s just not happening this year. We’ve got work up to the ceiling and overtime is plentiful. I always prefer a full day of work over a slow day with work coming in fits and starts.

And now for something completely different: House. No, not mine (it’s still in one piece, arguably) but the new show on Fox. I watched the premier last night and loved it, definitely worth a regular viewing. For those who didn’t get to see it, Gregory House is a cantankerous-but-brilliant doctor who doesn’t seem to want to do the regular doctor shtick. The regular cases are maddeningly boring to him (one patient claims to have Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, which House “medicates” with breath mints stuck in a pill bottle). The only thing that interests him is the rare cases, the unsolvable ones that stump the best of doctors. The writing is sharp and funny and the cast is tight, albeit a bit too Hollywood looking to be convincing as frazzled doctors in a mid-sized town.

This brings me to my only hang-up about the show. It’s supposed to take place in Trenton (good choice, as I can obviously see strange maladies arriving at House’s door from Philly and New York and their associated airports). But the exterior shots of the hospital look like a recruitment video for MIT. Trenton is a cramped little town with cramped little streets and a general feeling of seediness about the whole place. To show shots of a sprawling medical facility just throws the whole idea on its ear. Stuff his office in a converted broom closet in a century old hospital with cracking plaster and an overcrowded parking garage next door and you’ve sold me completely.

posted by: Jiggsy at 11/17/04 11:52 | link | comments |