Forget the Super Bowl, man. This year’s Academy Awards telecast had three of the coolest, funniest and most heartfelt commercials I’ve seen all year. And best of all they came in one big beautiful clump up near the front of the show, you know, when people were still watching the Oscars! Here are my three favorite Oscar ads just in case you missed them. Enjoy!
Filed under Dads in Ads, Movie Stuff, TV Stuff
I know Trailer Thursday’s are usually reserved for movies, but, this upcoming miniseries “event” on NBC looks just too crazy and bad/good not to share. I don’t know much about The Slap except that it is an American adaptation of a UK miniseries that actually won some acting awards and shit. And since this version features a cast of heavy-hitters (Peter Sarsgaard, Uma Thurman and Brian Cox in a miniseries? On NBC?! insanity!) and is directed by Oscar-nominated writer/director Lisa Cholodenko, I figure it’s either gonna be really good or really crazy bad.
Either way, our DVR has been set for weeks. Enjoy!
Filed under Date Night TV, TV Stuff, Writing Stuff
Move over sexy Frozen costumes, there's a new king in town. Or, should I say, Earl, as in Chasing Fireflies' totally awesome Downton Abbey Earl of Grantham costume for kids. That's right, amigos, they have store-bought Downton Abbey Halloween costumes for kids and they are freaking adorable!
Currently, there are four Downton Abbey costumes available for the wee ones: Servent Jimmy, Lady's Maid Anna, The Earl of Grantham and Lady Grantham herself, the Countess of Grantham. And lest the kids have all the fun Chasing Firelies also offers adult versions of the costumes as well. And with a dedicated line of Downton Abbey accessories — including white servent gloves, jewelry and an adorable teddy bear decked out in Lady Grantham's signature white and black ensemlble — how can you lose?
The only downside to this amazingly geeky venture is the price tag. Chasing Fireflies' Downton Abbey children's costumes range in price from $64.50 to $89.50, and the adult versions top out at a whopping $119.50. I'm not saying that these beautifully-tailored costumes aren't worth it, but, man, at that price I'd hope they throw in a fancy Dowager Countess wig or something to boot. Yikes!
Just when I thought that our beloved summer TV trashfest Big Brother couldn’t get any more weird and totally geeky, they introduced comic books to the mix. That’s right, amigos, Wednesday nights’s Veto Competition revolved around the houseguests trying to remember the exact order of a series of specially designed BB Comic books featuring hilarious artist renderings of the cast.
The covers were so cool, in fact, that rather just tell you about them, I decided to post them here as well. So, enjoy! Oh, and in case you were wondering, I’m kinda partial to “The Beard,” but, what I’d really love to see is a Chenbot comic book! Talk about suitable for framing…wow!
Filed under Daddy stuff, Date Night TV, TV Stuff
Greta and I have been watching this sweet, beautifully produced TV spot from Dove Men+Care all week, and everytime we watch it, we cry. So, in honor of my upcoming fifth Father's Day as a dad this weekend, I figured I'd share this awesomeness with you guys as well.
Honestly, they had me at the title, but the fact that I know one of the dad's in the clip from my old Westside Dad's Meetup Group makes the clip that much more special. My buddy Trevor is the bald dude kissing his tow-headed little boy, Miles, near the middle of the commercial…you can't miss them. I think that's them in the insect costumes later on too. Either way, congrats, guys!
And to the rest of the weary, hard-working dads out there (stay-at-home and otherwise!) Happy Father's Day and enjoy the clip!
Filed under Uncategorized
Kelly Clarkson has been all over the radio and talk show circuit this season — she was even the guest DJ on one of the all-Christmas music stations on Sirius/XMRadio last week! — but, if you’ve heard her new Christmas album, “Wrapped in Red”, you know that the girl has every reason to be proud of it. Loud, fun, sweet and beautifully-produced, Clarkson has called “Red” her favorite album she’s ever done, and I’m tempted to agree with her.
Every song on “Red” — which features a very cool mix of holiday classics and new material mostly written or co-written by Clarkson herself — is infused with Clarkson’s genuine love of Christmas music and the album has songs for every kind of holiday music fan. Clarkson’s rendition of “Silent Night” (sung with Reba and Trisha Yearwood) is just plain beautiful and her recording of “My Favorite Things”, whether intentionally or not, proves that there is only one true American Idol this holiday season. Sorry, Carrie.
But, of course the real gems are the raft of new songs Clarkson wrote for the album. “Underneath the Tree” is already an instant classic (not to mention Greta’s favorite new song to sing!) but the title track and the songs “4 Carats” and “Winter Dreams (Brandon’s Song)” are sure to be around for a while as well. We have over 75 Christmas albums in our collection and, trust me, it’s rare that you find one from a major pop star that feels so artfully-crafted and produced. Seriously, Clarkson knows her Christmas music, yo.
So, if you tired of the glut of mass-produced lump of coal Christmas albums that usually bubble to the surface this time of year, check out “Wrapped in Red” instead. And if you get a chance to catch her NBC Christmas Special in reruns or video on demand, watch that too, it’s freaking hilarious!
So, just as I was getting ready to go to bed and stop blogging about Christmas trees and crafting one’s own Middle-Earth entirely from LEGOS, I came across this amazing, one-of-a-kind Christmas wreath and just had to share it with you guys.
I heard about this nerdtastic ode to Christmas and Star Trek II: The Wrath of Kahn from a friend’s status update on Facebook, but, apparently the Wreath of Kahn –has been taking the internet by storm for a few days now. It might not be the first Wreath of Kahn out there, but, it is pretty damn cool. According go her twitter feed, the wreath was designed by NYC-based Annie Shapiro. I don’t know her personally, but, in the spirit of the season, I love her already.
Kudos to you @apianoshrine for sharing your awesomeness with the world, may you and yours “live long and prosper” for many Christmas’ to come!
– Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Filed under Holidays, Movie Stuff, TV Stuff
OK, even if I wasn’t currently working for an aviation-themed magazine, I would still think the new “have not” bedroom on Big Brother 15 is freaking ingenious. Yes, we watch Big Brother, like, religiously. It’s one of the only shows that made the cut when Greta was born, and even if we have to stay up way after she’s gone to bed to catch up on some not safe for kids episodes (especially this season, which is already off to a homophobic, racially-charged start!) we’ll do it.
For those of you not familiar with the show, randomly selected contestants called houseguests are picked to live in a house where their every move is taped all day for the entire summer. Their only contact with the outside world is with the lovely Julie Chen — who fans affectionately refer to as “The Chenbot” for her alluringly robotic demeanor — who appears on the show once a week for a live elimination episode.
Aside from arguing, drinking and running around half-naked in the backyard, each week contestants compete for all sorts of insane food prizes and something called “Head of Household”, which means they get to sleep in a fancy private bedroom upstairs and nominate two houseguests for eviction during their reign. Meanwhile, the rest of the houseguests compete to see which of them will be “haves” and eat normal food for the week, and which will be “have nots” and eat something called slop (which looks like really grey oatmeal) for the week.
Another awful thing the “have not” houseguests must endure during their week is a stay in the “have not” bedroom. In past seasons, “have nots” have slept on cots or even the floor, but, this year, the BB producers have outdone themselves with an aviation-themed “have not” bedroom that utilizes actual airplane seats for beds. Ha!
The room also features stacked suitcases in lieu of dressers and airplane-style overhead storage bins for anything else the “have nots” might want to stow during their stay. Hilarious! Luckily, it looks like the armrests on the chairs do fold up, so, at least there’s that.
But if you’re like me and the concept of sleeping on airplane seats for a couple of hours makes your back hurt. Just imagine how jacked up you’d be after an entire week of fetal position side sleeping. Urgh…I’ll take the floor, thank you.
– Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Location:Burbank, CA
Filed under Date Night Movie, Date Night TV, TV Stuff
I was never a regular viewer of The Sopranos when it was on, but, I saw enough episodes to know that it was, like Twin Peaks or The X-Files before it, totally game-changing television. And though I loved James Gandolfini on the show, I think I loved him even more in some of his smaller supporting roles in movies.
For instance, I don’t remember one goddamn thing about that piece of crap Brad Pitt, Julia Roberts movie The Mexican except that I loved Gandolfini in it. I also loved him in more recent stuff like Zero Dark Thirty and that crazy-good TV movie Cinema Verite with Diane Lane. He was one of those guys who just walked in, read a few lines and totally stole the movie. But, even better than that, I liked watching him on interviews where he seemed like a genuinely humble regular dude who just happened to fall into massive Hollywood fame. Guys like that don’t come around too often, and when they leave us at such a young age, man, it makes the loss even greater.
So, for that and for the fact that I totally agree with what he says about people who like to meet up for breakfast (unless it’s a late breakfast at noon, can’t stand em!), I salute the late, great James Gandolfini in his own words. RIP, Mr. Soprano.
“I read [The Sopranos pilot]. I liked it. I thought it was good. But I thought they would have to hire some good-looking guy, not George Clooney but some Italian George Clooney, and that would be that. But they called me and they said can I meet David [Chase] for breakfast at nine a.m. At the time I was younger and I stayed out late a lot, and I was like, ‘Oh, for fuck’s sake. This guy wants to eat breakfast? This guy’s going to be a pain in the ass.'”
Location:Los Angeles
Filed under Daddy stuff, Movie Stuff, TV Stuff
I know I usually only post really sappy commercials with dads in them, but, ever once in a while, a truly great mom commercial comes along that has me weeping into my coffee in the morning. This Mother’s Day spot from Verizon gets me every time. I was weeping so vocally the first time I saw it that I think Greta thought I’d fallen and hit my head again. Seriously, so beautiful. Love that they use redheads too. Go, gingers!!
Filed under Dads in Ads, TV Stuff
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Stay-at-home-Yeti 
