Godspeed, Dana.

Dana Reeve, wife of actor and activist Christopher Reeve, has died of lung cancer.

Read more here.

Race From the Oscars

You can read my amazingly insightful commentary on the Oscars here.

Birthday Madness

Here's a link to Steanso's blog. See KareBear and The Admiral in action as my mother gets hosed, arms herself with a sword and dons a large hat.

Go now.

Weekending, March 5th.

This weekend marked my mother's big birthday. Jamie and I did not attend as my folks and Jamie's folks will be here next week. I hope her birthday was a good one.

Friday night we headed out to Mesa, just north of Chandler to see a band at a coffee house. Asleep in the Sea rocked most of the coffee house. But, because this is PHX, the show was cut short. Cheba Hut, a local stoner-themed sandwich shop chain was next door. Apparently the rocking and rolling was disturbing the patrons of the coffee shop, so there were exasperated sandwich shop and coffee shop employees causing a fuss during the brief set. And I thought the whole thing about being a stoner was that you were supposed to be mellow... You stoners sit on a throne of lies.

For whatever reason I was wearing my Superman shirt at the show, and was approached by a very, very drunk gentleman who explained that he was a wizard, mumbled something about his wife, daughter and the Mormon Church, something about "the seventeenth is big (bleep) day", then did some tai-chi. I suddenly remembered why I used to like going out.

A short while later, a middle-aged lady and her teen-aged son came by and the nice lady engaged me in a conversation about Superman comic books. Apparently she's been collecting since the early 60's and has vast runs of several series. I was quite jealous.

Still, once the band was done they turned on ugly overhead lights which is sort of the universal sign in a nightspot for "get out". It was only 9:10ish. On a Friday night. At a coffeeshop.

For those of you who like to tell The League that he needs to find the good out here in the desert, please understand that there is a pattern we've picked up here. Fun cannot last past the hour of 9:00pm.

So we ended up at The Village Inn near our house, a place I only like to go to when I'm feeling sort of Marge, and I had a bowl of soup and tried hard not to think too much about the alt-rock guys running the coffee shop being pissy about rocking too loud and too late into the night.

The freezer in our old fridge gave up the ghost some time ago. This week it started to smell badly. So badly, in fact, that the smell went out into the fridge as well, contaminating food that was not vaccuum-sealed. So we went and got the new fridge. Peabo, my friend, I never made it to Home Depot. Sears was running the same deal as Home Depot and Jamie had identified the fridge of her dreams.

Ice maker with ice holder in the door (more freezer space). Crushed ice or cubed. Pur water filtration system for both water and ice. Clear plastic shelving. Moveable shelves... Yes, it was a middle-class consumer's dream.

The guys showed up literally five minutes before the end of their 10:30 to 12:30 window. They took out the old fridge (leaving the filter in our front yard, I might add), brought in the new fridge which was not the correct fridge, removed the wrong fridge, wheeled in the new fridge, connectyed it and then broke the water main into our house, elaving us without water. Pretty cool. So we called Sun Devil Plumbers and Carl not only fixed the problem, but put a new valve on our main that had a swing arm valve rather than a stem. Hurray!

I did not tip the delivery guys who ended up setting me back more than $100. They did tell me "that's a million to one, that happening." Well, lucky me. I should have played the Lotto this week.

I also watched "Smokey and the Bandit" this weekend. I hadn't seen it since I was very little. Almost all of Jackie Gleason's lines were overdubbed, so I don't know if he was cursing or making racial epithets or what. I am not clear as to what the point of the movie was, but it's a flashback to a part of American culture that seems to have fallen by the wayside. At least it doesn't exist in any tangible form in AZ.

Tonight are the Academy Awards. Jamie will watch. I will be organizing comics. The League cares not for fancy dresses. He also saw only a smattering of the nominated movies and thinks it's silly to give awards to movies and actors. At least we think it's silly when movies like Gosford Park which were not very interesting, or original and were made-up as the movie went along win for "Best Screenplay".

But, we know you people love the Awards shows, so go to town on your Oscars. We do not hold it against you.

From the upcoming series 52

Greetings, Loyal Leaguers.

I haven't been posting much as there's not been much on my plate I felt was worthy of discussion. Not that complete boredom has been a deterrent in the past, but I just haven't had the energy. Plus, I've been watching gobs of porn.

Little joke there, Judy.

The Mellies results are coming in. I don't know if it's the group of Leaguers sending in answers this year or what, but the responses are a pretty colorful bag. I'm expecting the results to be content fodder for about a week, which is great, because lately, Leaguers, I've got nothing.

I think I've now got 7 responses, including two from people with whome I do not believe I've ever had any previous correspondence. It's that sort of effort, Tamara and Natalie, that makes it all worthwhile. I'm trying to get Steanso to revise his responses as he sent in only one word answers. Dedman will surely make something of that. One word responses are not really in the spirit of the whole thing. We need your comments and criticisms up here in black and blue, and we want a little explanation.

That said, other Loyal Leaguers (such as my wife) have as of yet to respond. Nathan has been curiously silent. Where are these Leaguers? Where is Shoemaker? Where is Harms?

Oh, and a special note for Jim D., RHPT has sent in his responses. And he managed to do it without writing a novel (ahem).

KareBear's big birthday is just around the corner, so I'm also losing precious blogging time working on a much requested gift. The League has been asked to create some work of art for KareBear. Well, The League was getting close to completion on Tuesday night when we totally screwed up what we were doing, and now we're trying to figure out if we should start over or try to salvage the piece by turning it into something different. Only time will tell.

Our refrigerator's ice machine died this fall, and being poor, we could not afford to fix it, nor could we get a new fridge. Now the ice machine is giving off a foul odor that is omnipresent in the freezer as well as in the fridge. The smell is in the food. It's in the g-d food. Now I gotta go get a new damn fridge. And refrigerators aren't cheap, Leaguers. Not with an ice machine and water filter. Well, I am fairly certain the fridge left by the previous occupants of this house is VERY cheap, but I am going to be looking for a more robust design and a 3 year warranty on anything I buy.

The best part is, now I get to go to Sears and have somebody spend like an hour telling me about the benefits of a wide variety of refrigerators. This is a topic I have never once before pondered. It's a brave new world for The League.

Oh, and I've asked Jamie for a word to update you regarding her pneumonia. She says "Hack-cack". Nice.

I don't have any idea if she's feeling better or not. "I never really felt sick. I just kind of felt fevery," she says, reading over my shoulder. "It's great having everything I say documented," she adds.

Now she is curiously silent... "How to get your wife to shut up. Oh GOD! STOP!" She insists with just a hint of Erica Foster in her voice.

Again... the horrible silence.

She pats me on the head like I'm Mel. It is nice. Until she points out a type-o which I fix. There is much sighing and rolling of eyes. Now a rapid departure and an addendum. "How to get your wife to leave..."

She is eating ice. And now she's gone.

I think that's all for today, Leaguers.

Keep it real.

Arrested Development to Showtime?

It's a rumor! And that's good enough for The League. Read here.

The irony of this, of course, is that we just got rid of like 15 movie channels. Just when you think you're out...

Mr. F!