Tag: Television

April 1st

Oh shit… it’s April Fools Day. Never have I ever had less interest in playing along with this bullshit. The fascist states of america is already filled to bursting with fools and idiots and pure, unadulterated evil. Why anyone would think fake stories on the internet is entertaining during times like these… I just don’t get it.

Change of subject. The Red Sox are off today. We will be spared the slaughter and the constant strike outs. In five games thus far this season the team has struck out 123644258686134 times with about 86358629357 being Devers alone. Unfortunately, the Bruins are not off tonight. They will be annihilated by the Capitals. Times are tough in Boston sports-land these days. Why not? Times are tough everywhere.

Change of subject again. When was the original Star Trek given the Star Wars Special Edition treatment? After finally getting through Star Trek the Animated Series the other day, I decided to watch the original show all the way through. I’m through the two pilots and up to episode five now. I just watched Sulu take on the bridge with a sword while the Irish guy sings badly over the ship’s PA. I’m a little put off by most, if not all, of the exterior shots of the Enterprise being replaced by CGI. When did that happen? It doesn’t affect the episodes at all, but I still kinda don’t like it. I want my 1960’s models back. I want the pure form of the show back, even if it is less impressive and cheesy looking.

Change of subject again, again. Sticking with television, what is the deal with the month of April? We have the start of new seasons of The Handmaid’s Tale, Andor, The Last of Us, and Doctor Who. We’ll also see the last two episodes of Yellowjackets this month. This feels like collusion. This feels like the television industry conspiring to keep me from sleeping for the foreseeable future.

Again with the change of subjects again, again. I did not participate in the RPM Challenge’s Record Every Month thing. I wanted to. I was going to. I just didn’t. I’m thinking of maybe compensating for my failure by trying to do an April album in a month instead. Write and record 35 minutes worth of new music before the month ends. Will I be able to muster up the motivation? Probably not, but let’s give it a shot, eh?

Okay. Time to go and get ready for work. Welcome to April. Stay away from those damn April Fools jokes. It’s going to be a long and painful day on the ol’ internets. Good luck, everyone.

Rewatching The Leftovers

Is The Leftovers the best television show in history? I think it might be.I just started a rewatch. Season one is BRUTAL. I remember season two being incredible. Almost there. I cannot overstate how good this show is. If you haven't watched it, and you're a sucker for punishment. Watch it.

— Rob (@robj1971.bsky.social) 2025-03-30T03:31:07.097Z

I’m seven episodes into season one. Unreal. Just… unreal.

Oh… I’m 80% asleep… please pardon my grammar error in the second to last sentence of the bluesky post. Sorry ’bout that.

Privacy

There is an episode of How I Met Your Mother where Lily thinks Marshall (her husband) is cheating because she finds credit card receipts showing that he is checking into hotels every work day. Turns out the truth is that he’s checking into hotels so that he can take a shit in private. He’s too embarrassed to take care of business at the office and he can’t just go home and do it, so he goes to hotels.

I want to state publicly that the writer of that episode is a genius. Never has there been a work of fiction that reflected real life as perfectly as this. It may be the most relatable 22 minutes of television ever made. Absolute genius.

In closing, here are a couple of sleeping cat pics I took last night.

Daredevil: Spoiler Free Review

First off, I promise I am not going to just cross post crap from bluesky to this page (assuming I don’t delete this account outright, which I am still seriously thinking about). I might do that once in a while, but twice in one day? Come on, Rob. Don’t be a lazy asshole.

Still, in this case… I just watched the two episodes of Daredevil that Disney+ gave us today (Born Again season one episodes five and six, I think) and I wrote a detailed, in-depth spoiler free review over on the bluesky and thought I’d just cross post it here just this once so that I wouldn’t have to type it all out again and yadda yadda blah.

Anyway… spoiler free review of episodes five and six…….

Holy shit, Daredevil. Woah!

— Rob (@robj1971.bsky.social) 2025-03-26T02:35:49.415Z

Friday at Last

It’s Friday. Finally!

We have yet another contractor coming today. The arrival window we booked opens at 8:00am. They texted us at 7:00am saying they were on their way. We assumed that meant that… ya know… they were on their way. Well its 8:02am now and they still haven’t arrived. So I guess they weren’t actually on the way.

Today is a monumentally huge day for the entertainment industry. Well… for my personal entertainment industry preferences. Alex Lifeson of Rush is releasing a new album today with his other band, Envy of None. Now while I will say that that sort of gothy/synthy/poppy vibe Envy of None gives off is not generally my personal bag, I did enjoy the first record and I have been enjoying the first three songs they snuck out from the second record even more. They are winning me over.

Along with that, there is a new Throwing Muses album out today. Technically there are two new Throwing Muses albums today, but only one is going to streaming services. I’m going to have to actually go somewhere and find a copy of the other one. Moonlight Concessions is the one you can stream. The singles they gave us ahead of time are seriously working for me. I haven’t started listening to the full album yet but I am really excited to give it a spin.

Even more important, Kristin Hersh sent out an email to her mailing list today (which I’ve been subscribed to for about as long as email lists have been a thing) and it lists some new tour dates. They are all in Europe, which is great for folks in Europe but not very helpful for me. There was some good news for those of us who live in the nazi states of america. Just read the last line on this screen shot from the email…

US DATES COMING SOON!!! Robert is excited. Robert’s wife is probably going to be slightly less excited, but my finger are crossed that she’ll be okay with going to another show with me.

On top of the musical gifts we get today, there is also a new episode of Yellowjackets where they actually talk about DATs. Digital Audio Tapes. I never owned a DAT player but somewhere around here I do have a couple of DAT tapes because I spent some time in a recording studio in 1993. There is also a new episode of Severance. I think that show might be losing me a little. I have found my attention drifting while watching the last two episodes. I am just thinking that we’re so deep into the black box that we’re never going to find out exactly what’s going on and maybe I am just trying to subconsciously protect myself from disappointment. I don’t know. The show is still good but I am getting worried.

The contractor is here. He rang the door bell at about 8:10 or so. Right when he was supposed to. That’s good news. Maybe we’ll get lucky and he’ll be finished before I start work.

Speaking of music, I started noodling out an idea for something for the Record Every Month challenge. I am thinking of continuing along with the acoustic 12-string stuff I was doing last month. I also got my 6-string acoustic guitar back from my singer, who borrowed it 10000 years ago. Right on queue, today’s That Pedal Show episode is talking about 12-string guitars and the guys are bitching about how difficult they are to play. Just like me!

Right then. Time to go and get ready to start my work day. Happy Friday, everyone. Enjoy the new music.

ADDENDUM: The Envy of None record was originally supposed to come out today, March 14, 2025. It did not though. The new release date is March 28, 2025. Bummer, dude.

There is a Rush 50th anniversary boxed set scheduled for release next week. I wonder if that’s why they pushed the EoN release? Who knows.

Late

I had a million things to do before work this morning, then a million things to do during work, then a million things to do after work… so obviously I was going to oversleep, right?

Frustrated sigh.

Oh well. The big question for Friday mornings these days is do I watch the new episode of Severance while I do my morning exercise, or do I watch the new episode of Yellowjackets. Today I went with Yellowjackets. No spoilers for season three episode five, but if there is one thing that show needs (a lot) more of, it is PJ Harvey music. I started watching Severance (season two episode eight, I think) but I haven’t the faintest clue what’s going on. I’ll finish it before I sleep tonight. Promise.

We had a contractor at the house yesterday. We have another one coming this morning, any minute now, and we have another one coming this afternoon. Things are getting weird around here.

What else was I going to mention this morning? Oh yeah, I woke up at about 4:00am this morning. I think it was the wind that woke me. It was blowing around like a hurricane out there. It was bad enough that it knocked over the bird feeder. I have to fix it, but the ground is still frozen so it might have to wait a little while. It’s March so the thaw out is coming, but it’s not coming soon enough for me.

Today is also the NHL trade deadline. I expect it’s going to be a sad day for Boston Bruins fans as we’re far enough out of the playoff picture that we will be sellers. Here’s hoping for a lot of high draft picks while also hoping that none of my favorite Bruins get dealt away. Fingers crossed.

Apple Music just let me know that there’s a new Bob Mould album released today. I’ll give that a listen while stressing about everything under the sun. Sounds good to me.

The first contractor has arrived. I’d best let him in…………

I Can’t Wait for This

April 22nd, Star Wars: Andor returns for its second and final season. The first season was the best Star Wars we’ve had maybe since Empire Strikes Back in 1980. It was that good.

I can’t wait!

As Good as TV Gets

Man, television is just killing it these days.

This morning before work I watched today’s new episode of Severance. No spoilers, but holy shit! Tonight as I was sitting up in bed I watched today’s new episode of Yellowjackets. Again, no spoilers, but holy shit!

Who would have ever thought that so much TV could be this consistently spectacular. That’s not even the best of it.

There is a Star Wars television podcast that I listen to pretty regularly. A few weeks ago they started a rewatch of the first season of Andor. Season two is kicking off in April, I think. Not too far away. I was playing along with this rewatch, I’d watch an episode, listen to the podcast, wait a week and repeat. It worked for the first three episodes and then the podcast had a delay. It was over a week before they put out their coverage of Andor episode four and frankly I just got tired of waiting and started watching ahead.

I just watched One Way Out. Season one, episode nine. I don’t think I am alone in stating that it is one of the best episodes of television I’ve ever seen. The tension in the prison, the tension in the senate, the speech Luthen gives at the end. Fuck me, it’s as close to perfect as you can get. Stellan Skarsgård, Andy Serkis, and Genevieve O’Reilly all give career defining performances. It’s just unreal how good everything is during that slightly less than one hour program. Damn!

Okay. It’s almost midnight. I really need to get some sleep. I have so much to do tomorrow and I want to get through it as fast as humanly possible so that I can have some time to work on music and, totally unrelated, so that I can go to the store and buy a new belt. Not that you asked or anything.

Go watch Andor. Then watch Severance and Yellowjackets too. Throw in The Last of Us and The Leftovers while you’re at it. If they are going to make television that is this good, the least we can do is watch it all, right?

Self Distraction

Here is a picture of a cute kitty to distract us all from the end of civilization and the unchecked rise of evil in the largest nuclear power on Earth. Yippee for cute kitties!

I am completely on edge. I’ve actually caught myself a couple of times today sitting at my desk working while my hands are balled up in fists, white knuckles and all. Nothing’s going badly at work. All is a-ok. It’s just the rest of the world that has me so tensed up.

On the drive in today there were a bunch of times when I saw someone driving like an asshole (this is Massachusetts after all) and I thought to myself, I bet he voted for that nazi fuck and is driving like that because he knows he can get away with anything (including treason) so long as he wears that stupid fucking red hat. As I said this is Massachusetts so the chances of randomly running into a maga cult asshole are much less than 50/50. Still, I am so mad at the state of things right now that even here in the happy Blue State I am seeing fascists everywhere.

I hate him. I hate what he stands for. I hate those who figuratively suck his dick in exchange for being able to openly express their bigotry and hatred and racism and misogyny and antisemitism and anti-everyone who isn’t a straight white male. Fuck, I hate all of this nazi bullshit.

Breath. Count to 10. Look at the cute kitty*. Deal with it. It’s only been two days, but that’s two days closer to being able to kick these fuckers to the curb.

*Fans of The Walking Dead will note that I did not say look at the flowers. No… that would mean something entirely different and much, much darker. Look at the flowers, Lizzie. BLAM.

Friday

It’s Friday. One week from today I am going to be writing about how I only have an eight hour work day standing between me and a full week’s vacation. I am already hyper focusing on it. Crazy.

I just watched the season two finale of Silo. It was very good. I sort of screwed things up though. The show is based on a series of books. A few weeks ago I got tired of waiting to see what was going to happen on the show so I started reading. I’m going to finish the third and final book probably this weekend. When the super confusing twist happened in today’s episode I knew what it was and I knew it was coming. I spoiled myself. I don’t care though because the books are good, the show is good, and the books and the show are just different enough that I can still feel engaged with both.

This week I also watched the season (series?) finale of Star Wars: Skeleton Crew and I am down to the second season (series?) finale of The Alienist which I am enjoying a lot even though it’s creepy as hell. Fortunately season two of Severance came out today. I’ll watch that tonight before bed, I think. Silo is over, but I still have a Friday show to watch out for. That’s nice.

Last night I watched a video on the youtubes. Five Watt World’s Short History of the Les Paul Deluxe. My first “real” guitar was a Les Paul Deluxe. I didn’t learn how to figure out the date on a Les Paul until years later so I have no idea what year it was made. I think it was very late 70’s or very early 80’s. I bought it in 1988 at Russo’s Music in Lowell, MA. All of the knobs had cracked off of it and I never replaced them. I was a kid. I didn’t have the money or even the know how of how to get replacements that would fit. It also had a nasty gash in one of the frets, and I seem to remember that one of the inlays was coming unglued. I didn’t care. I loved that guitar. I adored that guitar.

On a Sunday night/Monday morning in November or December (pretty sure it was December) of 1990 it was stolen out of my car. That was pretty much the end of the world for me. I have never really recovered from the violation of it all. I bought my Les Paul Custom a short time later and that is still my number one guitar… but some days I really find myself missing that Deluxe. I would have loved to have taken it to a good shop and had all of the negatives fixed up. It would have been epic, mini-humbuckers and all.

Watching this video made me feel all the feels. Steve Hackett, Pete Townsend, and me. All of us, Les Paul Deluxe veterans.

Okay. Time to stop farting around and get ready for work. Happy Friday, everyone. The weekend awaits.