I'm Super Cereal

It looks like I'm ahead of the Internet. I was going to write about the current promotional box for Post "Just Bunches!" cereal is the worst looking cereal box I've seen in my entire life, but I can't find a single picture of it online. I'm thinking about sneaking a camera into the grocery store next time I go. How often do I get the chance to break a story on the Internet, particularly a story about a hot topic like poorly designed cereal boxes? Yeah, I have to do this. I know I'll regret it for the rest of my life otherwise.

On the subject of cereal boxes. have I ever linked this site? I know I've been looking for an excuse for a long time, possibly since the time of the last blog challenge. Click around for a minute or two and you'll start to see why I get so worked up over the hideous design of most modern cereal boxes.

Shiny Buttons Excuse-Off!

Today's excuse: Nintendovertime. I got to work all day, which is fine, 'cause I like my job and they were paying me more than usual, but I did not enjoy the part where it was hot today and the air conditioning was broken.

You See? Excuses!

This one's almost legitimate - I start at Jet City Improv tonight, right after I finish my other job, and I don't think I'll want to do much blogging when I get back, assuming that I even make it back before midnight. Sorry, kids.

Observations About Public Bathrooms are Hilarious

Have you ever noticed that in public bathrooms, hand-washing turns into a competition? Start using the sink at the same time as another person and watch how they bury their hands in mountains of soap, scrubbing and rinsing endlessly, afraid to be the first to shut off the water. Of course once they do make their way to the paper towel dispenser, the act is done. Does the paper towel land securely in the trash can, or does it bounce of the precarious stack of discarded waste and fall to the floor? Who cares? At that point, looking like a slob is no longer an issue. What if there is no paper towel dispenser, but rather one of those useless blow dryers? No matter, just wipe those meticulously cleaned hands on your pants, because, let's face it, cleanliness may be next to godliness, but showing off is more important still. It's the same reason you'll regularly find public toilets unflushed - if no one's watching you, there's no one to impress.

While I'm on the subject, I'd like to send an open message to the guy in the stall today who was having a long, serious conversation on his cell phone - that's gross, man.

The Shiny Buttons standings have been updated:

#1
Jake

#2
Nicole

Flush!
Nora ♥ Phil ♥ Joanna ♥ Taylor ♥ Jaime ♥ Vera

Yes, with not much more than a month to go, Joanna has missed her second day. So close, but now we are down to are final two contestants. Obviously I'm going to make it to the end, no problem, but does Nicole have what it takes? Stay tuned to The Shiny Buttons Blog-Off! to find out.

How Bad It's Gotten

I've caught myself, rather than thinking of topics to blog about, habitually brainstorming excuses for why I won't be properly blogging, when in fact, there's no reason I shouldn't.

Don't think anything's going to change just because I've said it.

By the way, California is an idiot.

Taking Care of Business

After a fourteen hour workday, I don't want to blog. I hope you'll understand.

Two Thumbs Up, Ten Toes, One Knee, and Pro'ly a Couple o' Elbows

More movie watching. Last night I ended up going with Run Lola Run, followed by You Don't Mess With the Zohan. Lola was good, a very cool movie based on a very cool concept. The editing was a little twitchy and over-caffeinated for my tastes, but the awesome techno soundtrack made up for it. If you're not familiar, the movie's rooted in chaos theory. Lola's boyfriend has 20 minutes to get 100,000 marks or he'll be killed. (This is a German movie, by the way, and a little older than the Euro. My assessment of Germany based on what's presented here - I wouldn't mind visiting the country and listening to the language, but I much prefer France and French.) Lola runs to him and tries to get the money along the way. She's too late and she doesn't have the money. So we rewind and watch things play out again, but with the slightest twist, which ends up changing everything. Nothing great, but worth watching.

You Don't Mess With the Zohan is absolutely as stupid as it looked in commercials. I rented it 1. Because I was amazed to find a recent, mainstream movie at the library, and 2. Because I generally like Adam Sandler movies. Don't get me wrong, the man has made some terrible movies (Click, Anger Management, Going Overboard...), but some of his dumber looking movies have managed to surprise me (did anyone expect Little Nicky to be good?). This one's pretty harmless and I got a few laughs out of it, but I can't really recommend it to anyone. It's American, but most of the characters are Israeli or Palestinian. It didn't make me want to visit America or Palestine, or speal in their languages. I might consider visit Israel based on its portrayal here, if not for the fact that I'm not a big fan of seeing Adam Sandler's naked butt, and apparently that's pretty common there.

Then we come to the movie I watched tonight. Funny Games. German director. There was an American version made a few years ago, but I watched the original Austrian version, and I can assure you that if this is what Austria is like, I never want to go there. The may be the most intense, brutal movie I've ever seen. It's hard to watch. It is not enjoyable. It's a work of genius.

Almost the whole time I was watching it, I was asking myself why. You just feel sick and disgusted. I wondered why I didn't just turn it off, but I didn't move, and I didn't know why. I kept trying to make sense of it the whole time I was watching, and I couldn't. I knew it had some meaning, but I couldn't figure it out. A few minutes after it was over, it all clicked.

It's a deconstruction of violence in movies. Maybe more. I think I'm losing some of the meaning again. The moment of clarity has passed. Jeez, this movie is crazy. One thing I did notice while watching it was that, while it is, as I said, one of the most intensely brutal movies I've ever seen, very little of the violence happens onscreen. What you do see is the build-up and the effect. The emotions of people affected by violence; the emotionless people who inflict it. It's a strange movie to write about. I don't want to give anything away in case any of you want to see it. It's so amazingly intelligent and meaningful and crafted, but it's also not consumable entertainment. This is not an easy, fun movie to watch. I'm so impressed by it, and glad I stuck around through the whole thing, but can I recommend it to anyone? I don't think so. I can tell you that it exists. If you choose to watch it... Your choice. I can't recommend it, and I can tell you that there are reasons you might not want to see it, but I also can't recommend not seeing it.

In other news, I bought a real bed today! No longer will a poorly made futon mangle my spine and cut off circulation to my legs!

Godzilla Against Lola

The movie I checked out last week were due today, but the library was kind enough to give me a new stack. Trying to decide whether to watch Godzilla Against Mechagodzilla or Run Lola Run.

By the way, has anyone noticed that I've written something about the library almost everyday for the past week, but I still haven't picked up where I left off with my library thoughts from last week? My blog is awesome.

Oh, and when I was walking back to my apartment today, a goose started walking toward me and hissing threateningly. It was weird.

Also, I bout a bike tire tube yesterday with the following warning printed on the label: "WARNING: Harmful or fatal if swallowed. Do not induce vomiting. Keep out of reach of children."

So there you go, blog audience. Blogdience. A personal anecdote and a some wacky packaging. I am the greastest blogger in the world.

PS: I'm mad because I spent too much of my weekend, that time when I don't go to my video game testing job, playing a stupid computer game, and when I got to the end, the game crashed. It's like doing a puzzle where the last piece is missing - I know I'm not really missing anything, but come on.

Boring!

I owe you kids an apology. It's not as though I don't have anything to say lately; just that I don't have much of an urge to bother with all that typing. I'm blogged out. I will make it to the end of this bloggy challenge, though. Just a little over a month remains, and hopefully I'll put aside my blogging ennui often enough during that period to result in a blog that's at least intermittently interesting.

Tonight, though, I'm just not feeling it. Thank you, whatever loyal readers I have at this point. It's nice to have an audience, though I can't help but wonder what it is that keeps you coming back during my lazy periods, and sorry I let it get this way.

I'm Sick of Symmetry

At last, it is time to reveal the answer... Why did I rent The Phantom of Liberty? Are you ready to learn the truth?

There's an Of Montreal song that alludes to the title.

So, yeah, no real reason beyond my recognition of the name, but I'm quite pleased with what I found. It's a funny, absurd bit of experimental French movie-making, and it's very good. In terms of plot, it's tough, perhaps unnecessary to describe. The whole screenplay is a deliberate attempt to break the conventions and principles of cinema. Rather than telling a full story, you'll see a scene of people, but once you start to understand their situation, some incidental character will pass through and suddenly become the new focus of an unrelated scene.

To quote my mom, who was quoting some other, unnamed source, "In the 'film' or as you would say movie, Bunuel attacks society's false pretensions to freedom, and its distorted ideas of liberty..."

This is true. That's a fair summary, but for me, this movie has left me with three thoughts:

1. '70s cameras rule.
2. The French language is très magnifique.
3. I want to visit France.

Also, it has this:

You Won't Find Me Living For the Screen

I've gotten into the habit this week of watching a movie each night. Last night was Planet Terror (great, but watching it alone on a small television is nothing like opening night on the big screen); tonight was There'll Always Be an England: Sex Pistols Live from Brixton Academy, which consists of a full concert shot two years ago and interesting documentary-type thing in which members of the band wander through different parts of England and share thoughts and memories. It's the sort of thing I only got because the library allows me to take as many DVDs as I want for free, but most of the good stuff has been reserved for the next three years. Regardless, I enjoyed it.

Even with all the members in band in their fifties (with the possible exception of the bassist, though I really don't care about him, since the real bassist is dead), those boys rock hard. It's insane. Johnny Rotten completely stops singing on multiple occasions after forgetting the words to his own songs, and they still rock as hard as any other band I've ever seen. The people in the audience are all lunatics, and they're delightful to watch, tirelessly jumping around and passionately shouting along to every song. It's fun to watch, and I know it'd be even more fun to be there.

I think what I like best about the DVD, though, is watching Johnny Rotten ride around on a double-decker bus and shout at poor people, yuppies, and architecturally displeasing buildings. It's both hilarious and thought-provoking.

Tomorrow I'll be watching The Phantom of Liberty. I have absolutely no idea what it is. So why'd I rent it. First, obviously, because libraries let me take things I don't care about for free (and yes, I will finish talking about libraries someday), but there's another reason, as well, which I'll reveal tomorrow, but there are bonus points available to anyone who can guess the reason now.

No One in the World Ever Gets What They Want, and That Is Beautiful

If you think my blogging has been lazy lately, just wait until next week when I start my volunteer work at the improv place.

Is it really Wednesday? Don't worry, I'm still loving the job, but there's something about this week that I just don't like, and I want it to end. Urgh. Whatever. I didn't watch Gigantic today, but this post needs something, so how about another TMBG video? Watch it. Or don't. I don't care.

Fibber Island

Ah, poop. Did I mention that in addition to hours of other bonus features, the Gigantic DVD includes a feature-length commentary track. Sorry, kids. I know you've been waiting patiently for my thought-provoking views on libraries, but I don't have time for that stuff tonight.

How should I react? These things happen to other people. They don't happen at all, in fact.

Don't Let's Start

Whoops. Along with a big stack of books - I'm currently reading Jon Stewart & friends' America: The Book and Tenessee Williams' Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, and loving both so far - I swiped a few DVDs from the library yesterday, and I made the mistake of turning on Gigantic (A Tale of Two Johns). As a movie, it's not the best I've ever seen, but as a huge They Might Be Giants fan, I don't care.

It's a documentary about the band They Might Be Giants, but not one of those documentaries that's informative or insightful or dramatic, or anything else of that nature. It's composed of fans praising the band and John Flansburgh and John Linnell being witty and charming, with footage of music videos and live performances frequently spliced into the mix. The whole thing is a big, fluffy, pleasant reminder that this is a great band. In addition to a fun movie, the DVD is also packed with so many bonus features. Like, too many. I haven't made it through everything yet. All I know is that I started watching a few performances by the band, and then it was suddenly the middle of the night and I hadn't had dinner.

I've also been having bike problems over the past few days (woohoo!), so I need to be ready to leave for work a little earlier than usual in the morning in case I have to walk. Basically, what I'm getting at is that my ongoing library chatter will be postponed for at least another day.

Nicole, my earlier prophesy has been fulfilled!

Book It!

You know what's weird? Libraries.

Think about it. There's a big building filled with books, and you can go there and take a big stack of them for a few weeks. You don't have to pay by the book. There's no subscription fee. Aside from trivial fee taken out of your taxes and the occasional late fine, it costs you nothing.

It's an idea that stretches across time and space. If there's a society that's developed enough to allow time for reading and writing, there's probably a library. Most cities and towns have public libraries, and s****ls and some businesses are expected to have smaller libraries, as well. When was the first library created? I have no idea. Shortly after the invention of the movable type, maybe? Probably before that. Were there libraries of handwritten books? I bet so, though not in the same sense as the modern public library.

Whatever the case, we've reached a stage where libraries are accepted and taken for granted. Most people tend to think of libraries as always having been a part of the world. When an author writes a book, do they curse libraries for cutting into their sales? Maybe privately, but I've never heard an author give a lecture, or read an interview in which an author has issued such a complaint. Really, though, it must make a severe impact. I checked out seven books from the library today. If those weren't free, there's no chance I would've done that. I simply wouldn't read these books, but I would still have the desire to read something, so maybe I would've purchased one or two books. As it is, someone is gaining a reader and missing a sale.

As stated, we accept that books are handed out to the world for free. Readers, authors, publishers - no one really questions it or speaks out against it. Think, though, of what it would be like if other media were handled this way. Imagine walking into your local Blockbuster and being able to take anything you want for free, and if they don't have the movie you want, you can add your name to a list and it will be ordered for you from another branch as soon as possible. Imagine getting music and games the same way. People would go nuts!

Remember Napster? The debates (and the lawsuits) over the legality and ethics of taking music for free are still going strong a decade later. No one wants to create art without compensation, it seems. Of course, it is a little different - libraries have to first purchase books before publicly lending them, so there is a sale, first. Many libraries also loan movies and music, but the selection is usually limited enough that they don't pose a significant threat to record shops and video stores.

What about video rentals, though? This is getting longer than I hoped it would, so you'll have to wait until PART TWO to find out.

Stay tuned for tomorrow's thrilling conclusion.

There's Something Very Wrong With My Brain

Why was this little piece of madness playing in my mind?



Even worse, why do I think that it would so rad if someone recorded a heavy metal cover of the music from this cartoon?

On a different note, here's the coolest question I was asked today: What is my opinion of aging?

I was fairly quick to answer when the question was posed, but the more I think about it, the more there is to think about.

Cheer Up, Jakey

I thought I found a Golden Ticket in my package of off-brand Oreos, but I was deceived by a bit of reflected light. There's nothing in here except for chocolate sandwich cookies.

Woohoo! Chocolate sandwich cookies!

COMPLETELY UNRELATED UPDATE
Just discovered: The funniest thing on YouTube. Seriously. Make sure your will is in order before you watch this - there's a good chance you will die laughing.



Found on Julia Segal's unfairly funny tumblr page, skull swap, not to be confused with her other unfairly funny tumblr page, !SEGALS! david/julia.

JAKE is confused! It hurt itself in its confusion! JAKE fainted!

Never let your roommate borrow your hot glue gun and sewing supplies without first asking why, or you may end up living with someone who makes a Pokémon Trainer costume to wear to Super Smash Bros. tournaments.

Not okay.

Guess Who I Saw at Work Today

Nintendo's Executive Vice President of Sales and Marketing and former Yahoo! Chief Marketing Officer, Cammie Dunaway!


I love my job.

No Sir, Eye Don't Like It

Fun Fact: I just started a job that requires me to stare at a video game for eight hours a day.

The job part is awesome; the eye-strain is not. I did get used to it after a little while last summer, but now, only two days into the job, my eyes are still adjusting. Looking at my computer and typing something interesting is not what I want to do right now, so for the rest of the week, give or take a little, expect me to phone in my blogging.

For instance, instead of coming up with something of my own to say today, I'll direct you to a very funny article by a very funny guy.

Lore Sjöberg's The Craigslist Free-Couch Blues

Enjoy.

My Job

Is awesome.

That's all I can tell you about it. That, and I got to play Donkey Kong today, because my job is awesome.

"JOIN THE NINTENDO FUN CLUB TODAY! MAC. "

I'll be going back to my job at Nintendo in the morning. I'm glad. I like that job, and having a bit of income also sounds pretty nice. Cheers all around!

Today, I discovered one more reason to love Nintendo:



Editor's Note: The thing I'm loving here is commercial, though the game looks fine, as well.

The above commercial probably doesn't mean much to you if you haven't played Punch-Out!! on NES, which makes it an odd bit of advertising. Actually, I'd love to knowwhat you think of this commercial if you've never played Punch-Out!!, so, please, leave a comment before reading further.

But, yeah, Mike Tyson's Punch-Out!! (later reworked into Punch-Out!! featuring Mr. Dream after Nintendo decided it would be best not to be associated with Iron Mike) is considered one of the great NES classics. I've been obsessed with Nintendo for most of my life, but I somehow missed out on Punch-Out!! until about five years ago. I was aware of the game, and wanted to play it, but the opportunity just didn't arrive until long after the days of the NES. When I did finally play it, I thought, "Eh." Didn't really do much for me, but I had only played it for a minute or two and an old friend's house, so I assumed I might like it a bit more if I got a chance to play it at a bit more length. Then, a few months ago, I bought a copy and... still didn't love it. I just wasn't getting the appeal.

Now there's a new Punch-Out!! on the way, though, and I've been following it since it was first announced. It looks like it will be very similar to the older games in the series, but it has pretty graphics, so I've been looking at all the new videos that get released and checking out all the still images, and somewhere along the way, I was convinced to go back and try the original again. I'm happy to announce that my initial impressions were wrong.

I don't want to go too in-depth, here - in fact, I doubt many of my regular readers have even made it this far, as my posts where I gush about video games never seem to be too popular, so I'll just go over the basics. Punch-Out!! looks like a boxing game, but it's not really. It's simply a video game-y video game with a boxing theme. The opponents all follow different patterns. You learn their patterns, and figure out how to exploit them to win fights. It's a rhythm and puzzle game.

What I think I like even more than the game part, though, are the characters. They're completely horrible! All of them! Awful! The first boxer you fight is a wimpy French guy named Glass Joe. In the Wii game, croissants fly out of him every time he gets punched. What interesting is that he's probably the most sensitively portrayed character in the game. Next up is German stereotype, Von Kaiser, followed by Don Flamenco from Spain, who dances around the ring with a rose in his mouth before the fight. Great Tiger from India has a turban and magic powers. Piston Honda says inspired lines like, "Sushi, kamikaze, fujiyama, nipponichi..."

Part of the fun is just witnessing what kind of playful racism the game was able to get away with, without raising any controversy. I was surprised to see that the characters are back, and just as stereotypical as ever on the Wii, but I'm not really offended. Ignorance and prejudice in the form of things like racism and sexism generally tend to bother me, but for some reason, this doesn't phase me at all. Maybe it's just that all of these characters are so far over the top. It's an equal offender, though it's worth noting that the protagonist is American, and that the previous games in the series were developed in Japan.

I'm not quite sure why I'm okay with these racist, stereotypical characters, but I do know that they're endearing and memorable. There are probably people who haven't played Punch-Out!! in 20 years who can still remember all the characters, and maybe even give you a quote or two from each.

This post has gone in a different direction that I planned. In short, Punch-Out!! is lots of fun, even if the characters evoke mixed feelings. Also, racism is terrible, but political correctness is taken too far by people who are afraid that others will think they're racist. If you're really worried that other people will think you're racist, maybe you are.

Happy Mother's Day.

One Indication of a Good Game

Huh. The sun was definitely up when I started playing No More Heroes.



Whatever. I'm nearly to the end, so I guess it's back to the dog race for me.

Check Out the Pythons, Baby!

Tiffany's been pretty into wrestling video games lately. I was watching him play one the other day which includes the ability to create your own wrestler. You get to change every detail of the character: Change the height, change the default direction their eyes face, give them blue skin, pick their outfit, pick their wrestling moves, pick the way they walk, etc. Within the mountains of menus was a choice that I thought summed up all of wrestling culture fully and beautifully.

The options: "Woman" or "Normal."

My Thoughts

I watched the last episode of Scrubs today, and I can safely say it was one of the best shows I have ever seen. Definitely in my top five. It was absolutely fantastic.

Excluding one very weak clip show, every episode was at least good, and most were great. It's exactly my type of entertainment. Funny, but not afraid of emotion. It's probably the most dramatic show I've ever watched, but the trademark quirky fantasy sequences rarely seemed out of place.

To me, real life is not a comedy or a drama or horror or any other genre. It's made up of so many different experiences. Scrubs certainly aimed for comedy above everything else, but it wasn't a never-ending series of jokes, smiles, and high-moments. Like life. I've never followed a straight drama for more than a few episodes be constant earnestness and gravity bore me. Life simply cannot be serious all the time. We, as humans, are not equipped to handle it, and I think it makes poor entertainment.

If you want me to care about a character, then that character better make me laugh. Scrubs was one of the few shows that could make me care and laugh. If you've never watched it, now would be a fine time to get started.

It's Not My Birthday

It's not today. It's also not my mom's birfday, or at least it isn't in my timezone, but according to the clocks where she lives, this is the time for lighting cake-dwelling candles.

Happy birfday, Mom!

Make Like a Tree

I've lived in two apartment complexes in the last two years, and during the summer at each, a team of lawn care-type people has been sent out every morning in the summer. At 7:00 or 8:00 each morning, a whole swarm of guys with lawn mowers and leaf blowers goes out to have competitions to see who can make the most noise, and it continues all day. They were out there for at least eight hours today. How can one little apartment complex really require that much work? Is that even possible?

Well, no, of course it isn't. The roommates told me that they saw three of these guys outside today sitting in a parking space with their leaf blowers turned on, pointed at nothing in particular.

How Was Your Day?

Today, I peed in a cup and did not start playing WiiFit early enough to leave time for proper blogging.

That sentence is ambiguous and strange.

Yet More Annoyances

Jumbo Shrimp: It's not an oxymoron. Shrimp are pretty small animals. "Shrimpy" is an adjective derived from the name of the animal used to describe something as small. Some shrimp are large relative to other shrimp. Even the biggest shrimp are small relative to humans, but they may be large for their species. A jumbo shrimp is larger than a typical shrimp. There's nothing contradictory about it.

Gravity Defying: If, for example, an X-treme skateboarding dude does an X-treme skateboard move where he gets mad, sick air off of a gnarly halfpipe, someone may say that his ability to get said mad, sick air is gravity defying. It is not. Jumping really high is well within the laws of gravity. Flight is in no way gravity defying or it wouldn't work. You can't simply stop obeying physical laws which govern movement. There's no way.

New: What, Do You Own the World?

A few days ago I offhandedly blogged my disappointment over the popularity of digital film. I hope, if anyone even paid it any attention, that it didn't come across as too critical. I don't hate the look of digital film, but I do love the way life looks through a traditional video camera.

I'll take one more step back from this: I have nothing against the present and future; in fact, I like them both, and the same goes for the past, and the technology of all time periods. What I don't like is the way we follow trends. I don't like one way coming along and dominating the world. Some people are very backwards-thinking, others look constantly to the future, and others live only for the current moment, and I don't approve of any of that. The past has happened, the future will happen, and we living now have been given the luxury of being able to think about both.

I'm always amazed when someone starts telling me that I need a cellphone or I have to get on Facebook. Human life... hundreds of years.... people have managed to do pretty well without cellphones. What benefit does it give me that a phone in my room doesn't? It's easier to lose, I'll give it that. I could give it an obnoxious ringtone or send text messages or something, but those don't sound much like positives to me. I'm not an important businessperson who needs to be accesible at all times, and I'm not so overcome with the fear that I could be the victim of an emergency that could be solved by the ability to make a phone call that I'm going to carry around an expensive toy everywhere I go and pay monthly fees for the privilege to do so. And you Facebookers: Now that you're on the latest "social network," how often do you check your MySpace? Is that still important and necessary? What about your Xanga page?

Now is great; I love now, but it doesn't at the cost of then. Digital cameras exist and they have all sorts of wonderful benefits, but traditional cameras also have advantages of their own. You can apply effects to digital video that are supposed to replicate the look of old film, and the results can be alright (Grindhouse is awesome, for example) but it's never quite true. Financially, it makes sense to shoot a movie digitally, and it makes editing much easier, but there are still old cameras in the world, probably available for purchase. Moreover, the technology for making cameras in the classic way still exists.

I'm talking old, by the way. Old, if you can consider fifty years ago old, that is. Here's what I was watching when I started thinking about all this:



Beautiful. I don't want everything to look like that, but ignoring the content, the film itself is eye pleasing. Digital just doesn't look like that, and I think there should be room in the world for both, and many more styles, too. Which, of course, I've just sort of proven there are by presenting a clip from the past. There it is, still a part of the world.

Here's what this is really about: I want a '60s camera. Also, a record player. I've been checking turntables out at thrift stores recently. I might get one soon. We'll see. Maybe tonight. I don't know why I've been putting it off. It's not like they're getting any cheaper. Old cameras are tough to find, though, and I bet it's even tougher to find film. What a shame.

Oh, on the subject of shame, have you heard about this?

I don't want to spoil the surprise about what I'm linking, but I do want you to click it, so I'll link it ten more times.

One
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The Office

Ever watch The Office? Not the American one; the real one.The American version is alright, I guess. I dunno, I can't watch it. It's not the worst show around, but it does nothing for me. The original British series, though, is absolutely brilliant.

I always feel kind of stupid and pretentious saying that sort of thing. "Oh, yeah, I was into The Office before it was cool. Americans don't know what they're missing." I don't like being that guy, but it's true. Every time I catch an episode I'm surprised to find that my impressions of of the show were dead on. It's one of the funniest shows I've ever seen.

The concept of the series is great and the writing is superb, and it does so many other things well, but for me, what really makes the show is the acting. The direction is fantastic, too. Okay, forget the "one thing;" everything about this show is good. Going back to the American version, though, you see that the execution really does make all the difference. To make a very, very general statement, the British version is believable and restrained, whereas the American version is a wacky sitcom.

I'm straying from my point again. I meant to talk about how the British The Office is a funny show; not about the American version being a dumb show for stupid people.

Alright, this is rambling, even for me. I like this show. You might like this show. It may very well have the best acting I have seen in any TV show ever. I can't even think of another show that rivals it. Ricky Gervais is one of the funniest people alive, and yet all the other actors in the show are just as funny as he is. Dwight Schrute has nothing on Gareth Keenan. Poop - I did it again.

I don't know why it's taken me so long to look this show up on YouTube, but I finally did and there are many clips available for watching. They are hilarious. I don't know how much you'll get out of them outside of context if you've never seen the show, but don't let that stop you. You should watch some.