You Criticize the Practice By Murdering Their Plants, Ignoring All The History, Denying Them Romance

(Vampire Weekend, The Kids Don't Stand a Chance)

I'm feeling a little tired and achy. Sinuses are killing me. I'll try not to let that get in the way of my enjoyment of what will hopefully be a good episode of Top Chef, but all I really want to do is go to bed. It's times like these I wish we had a TV in the bedroom.

Stephanie and Antonia are empowered and ready to fight. New Zealand looks like he's ready for a hit off the gravity bong.

Quickfire Challenge. Oprah's personal chef is the guest judge, and they're loaded up with Uncle Ben's rice. They have to make an entree in 15 minutes, and they get to use microwavable rice. Next week's Quickfire Challenge will be who can make the best PB&J sandwich with Goober Grape. Stephanie makes a seafood pancake, which I would be terrified to order at IHOP. Nikki's fried rice looks awesome. Spike's stuffed tomatoes also look really good, and it seems like Oprah might see them on her dinner table soon. So far everybody's rice dish looks really good except for Antonia's rice salad and New Zealand's miso-glazed turkey, which looks like it has been slimed. Antonia's rice salad takes the prize, which gives her immunity, and Stephanie is in the bottom 3 again at yet another Quickfire Challenge.

Elimination Challenge. A nuritious, delicious meal for a family of four, on a budget of $10. Adding insult to injury, they're still sending them to Whole Foods, with their ten bucks. Maybe they can stock up on the free samples, because ten bucks at Whole Foods ain't going very far, especially with the high price of food for snobs. I don't understand how these people are filling their carts and baskets on ten bucks! I was at Whole Foods today, and you can spend ten bucks there without even touching anything.

They're all getting a little kid as a sous-chef tonight. Hey kid, chop this onion, will ya? This is kind of cute, actually. This is definitely going to add a LOT of likability to some of these chefs. Richard already seems like a good guy. Lisa still seems like a bitch. It's amazing how you throw a kid into the mix and you can immediately cut through the BS of somebody's outward personality and get to who they really are inside. Not surprisingly, all of the chefs seem like really fun, nice people. Not nearly as interesting as the normal drama, but sort of refreshing. I also love that the kids are eating the dishes as well as the judges. The strange thing is, though, that Colleccio is just standing in the kitchen eating each dish, instead of sitting with the judges in the dining area. Maybe he can't sit with them because he's been exposed as a nerd, like Patrick Dempsey at the end of Can't Buy Me Love.

Richard wins the feelgood award for saying that while he wants to win the competition, he loved cooking with the kids, and after seeing Antonia cry when the kids came out (because she missed her own daughter), it made him "want to go home and make some babies. Some little Blaise's." Maybe there's more to him than just a completely ridiculous fauxhawk. I wonder if the little Blaise's are going to all have fauxhawks.

Judges' Table: Andrew, Nikki, and Antonia are the top three of the night. I love my man Andrew, but Antonia's totally winning this one. That's my prediction, which, well, maybe you shouldn't put your money on Antonia just yet. But this has totally been her episode, with her phone call to her daughter, her excitement to be working with kids, etc. And ... MONEY! I AM MONEY!! Finally, I make a prediction that sticks!

Bottom three are Lisa, Stephanie and New Zealand. Let's see if I can keep the streak alive. Lisa's a goner. (Wishful thinking? Absolutely.) I'd be sad to see New Zealand go, because he's like a character from some stoner comedy from down under, and Stephanie, man, she's too good to have been in the bottom three for two weeks in a row. Colleccio says that Lisa's underseasoned beans were shocking. Oprah's cook doesn't like the way she handled criticism. All signs point to ... me hoping she gets the boot. Looks like my streak of correct predictions has ended as quickly as it began, since Lisa is safe and New Zealand is packing his knives and heading, well, back to New Zealand, I guess. He says something about enjoying the experience, but I can't really understand much of what he says, so that's just a guess.

I was going to say that Dale's "FUUUUUU(beep)" from next week was a great way to end the show, but then Andrew mentions that he has a "culinary boner right now." And ... scene.

See, I LOST My Money and I LOST My Wife, Them Things Don't Seem to Matter Much to Me Now

(Bruce Springsteen, Darkness on the Edge of Town)

Wow, so, it feels good to have Lost back in my life, if only for a few more weeks. This season has been so good that I don't want it to end, and January 2009 seems so far away. Last night's episode was awesome, I thought. A few questions answered, a few new ones to ask. Par for the course, I guess.

1. Everybody saw the code on the invisible sonic fence, right? 1623. THE NUMBERS!! I love the numbers, and while I've sort of resigned myself to the fact that they probably don't have some sort of overarching importance to unlocking any of the show's secrets, I still get all giddy when they show up.

2. The look on Locke's face when the phone rang was priceless. He was like the Unfrozen Caveman Lawyer. "Your ringing voice-transmittal machines scare and confuse me!"

3. The jury's still out on Ben, though I guess it's entirely possible that he's a good guy who is also an enormous douchebag. Sort of like Bill Clinton. I mean, really? Using the "she's not really my daughter, so go ahead and shoot her" angle? The scene when he went to "say goodbye" to her before leaving the barracks was a little forced, but the closeup on Ben's face right after Meaney shot Alex showed, I thought, really excellent acting. The guy's facial expressions are money. (Say what you will about Godfather Part III, but this is how you grieve a daughter who's just been shot in front of you. This gets me every time. The silent weeping of Pacino, man, that's just powerful.)

4. Aside from the Nikki/Paulo debacle of season three, has there been a semi-regular character on this show who contributes less than Charlotte Staples Lewis? All she does is stand around looking surprised and pissed, like somebody crapped in her shoes but she didn't realize it until after she put them on. The other helicopter people are working overtime, man, earning their money. The pilot (the Nick Nolte lookalike), he's a likeable guy who hung out on the boat with Sayid and Desmond until being sent on a run to Costco for more lima beans, Miles has already been imprisoned and released by now, and Daniel Faraday actually seems to be one of the more important characters in the overall explanation of the time/space thing. But Charlotte, man. Do something, already!

5. Ben's flashforward was pretty solid, and opens up a whole new can of worms. October 25, 2005, he checks into a hotel in Tikrit under the name Dean Moriarty, which was the name on the passport that Locke (or Sayid?) found in Ben's little hidden closet earlier in the season, and also happens to be the name of the character in Jack Kerouac's "On The Road." Interesting book. Lots of heroin. Ah, the 60s. Good times. I like how Ben basically manipulated Sayid into practically begging him to give him more people to kill. You can take the torturer out of the Republican Guard, I guess, but you can't take the Republican Guard out of the torturer. That sly smile as Ben was leaving that alley was great. (see: facial expressions, Bens = awesome)

5a. I loved how, when he was in the Sahara and was found by the two dudes patrolling what looks like the worst patrol beat possible, he dispatched of them rather handily with that asp baton. I played with one of those things before, a number of years ago. I was told that they were illegal for personal ownership, but whatever, a friend of mine who will remain nameless (but has lots of weapons, and may or may not be very tall) had one, and I was messing around with it. Trust me when I say that you do NOT want to hit yourself in the head with one of those things. Not even lightly. Please.

5b1. So Ben goes to visit Widmore (the artist formerly known as Caleb Nichol) in the middle of the night, not to kill him, but just to talk a little smack about how he's going to kill Penny (which, btw, I called as soon as they showed "London, England" on the screen at the beginning of the scene), oh, and by the way, Charles, you really shouldn't drink so much scotch. I wonder if he ever considered the fact that these nightmares of his might be scotch-induced? I bet he tried Ambien already but didn't enjoy the side effects. Anyway, here's point number one: He asks "Are you here to kill me?" to which Ben replies, "We both know I can't do that." Why can't Ben kill him? And if we are to believe that Ben really can't kill him (which would also likely mean that Ben also can't arrange for his death or have anyone kill him), then Charles Widmore cannot be the boss of the woman that shot Sayid in the "The Economist" episode earlier in the season, because Sayid was clearly under Ben's orders to kill that man, whenever he finally showed up. So who was that man Sayid was supposed to kill?

5b2. Ben's going to kill Penny, because Widmore "changed the rules" and his men killed Alex. I wonder how Desmond is going to feel about that. And since Sayid is now Ben's angel of death, is he going to send Sayid after Penny? And if he does, will Sayid really kill Penny, especially since he knows who she is after spending time with Desmond on the boat?? And is Desmond going to be there to try to protect her?

I'd have more to say about the smoke monster, Sawyer's new paternalistic sensibilities, or Bernard's convenient Morse Code knowledge, but I need to get some work done.

Update (10:55 am): OH. MY. GOD. I think I just realized why Ben can't kill Charles Widmore. It has been brought to my attention that Ben's flashforward might not have been a flashforward, that it might have been him travelling through time (based on his sickness after waking up in the desert, and asking what year it was at the hotel). If that is the case, he needs a constant, someone who he has a strong emotional connection to. His daughter, Alex, whom he clearly loved (almost enough to save from execution), is dead, so she can't be it. Ben's constant has to be Widmore! He doesn't have to love him, it just has to be a strong connection, and I'd say hate is a pretty strong emotion to attach to someone. And if Ben's constant is Widmore, he can't kill him!! Otherwise, Ben wouldn't be able to time-jump and do his nefarious deeds!!

Am I Happy, Or In Misery? Whatever It Is, That Girl Put A Spell On Me.

(Jimi Hendrix, Purple Haze)

Let's recap the past three weeks of Top Chef. Three weeks ago, it was a pretty cool episode, but I didn't get to write about it because the computer was (painfully) slowly importing a CD into iTunes. Two weeks ago, the episode was boring me to tears. Last week, I didn't get to watch, and it was an AWESOME episode with two awesome challenges. So this week, since I'm sitting at the computer, it's probably going to be a snoozefest. Either way, though, I'm excited to engage in what Amanda just referred to as my "computer blogging." Evidently my wife is 75 years old. Welcome to the new millennium, sweetheart.

It would be pretty cool if Stephanie won tonight. It was clear to Collecchio, at least, last week, that she is consistently in the top 3. As far as who I'd like to see lose, well, Lisa still holds that honor, though I'm really getting sick of Jennifer saying that she's "doing it for Zoi." Give it a rest, already.

Quickfire Challenge: Padma is wearing a skirt far too tight to be surrounded by all that pastry, but let's be honest, she's not eating any of it anyway. They're making dessert for the Quickfire, and the winner gets to put a recipe in the Top Chef cookbook. Dale is making something called "Halo Halo" (which sounded like "holla holla"), so I definitely hope he wins. That's awesome. Spike wants to show his balls. Ok, yeah, a souffle shows balls, I guess. Antonia, Spike, and New Zealand end up in the bottom three. So much for showing those balls, Spike. Dale is in the top three. Holla! Lisa, much to my chagrin, is also in the top 3, along with Richard's fauxhawk, who overpowers his other contestants by threatening to stab them to death with his hair, and wins the challenge, and gets his recipe in the cookbook. He's got a restaurant here in the ATL. I have GOT to try this place.

Elimination Challenge: This is awesome. They're going to a Second City improv show, which is so cool! New Zealand comments that Richard, of course, is wearing pink. Their challenge seems to be an improv cooking challenge. Awesome. Now this is cool. Lisa says something about being a huge bitch, I think. I don't really listen when she talks anyway. Spike says "Andrew looks at me, I look at him..." Ace and Gary are back, ladies and gentlemen! New Zealand and Nikki have teamed up to make purple depressed bacon, and to help their effort, they're wearing matching sunglasses while shopping for their food. Classy. Dale and Richard are working with green perplexed tofu, and Dale says they bring "perplexing" to the table, which is perplexing in itself. Lisa and Antonia are supposed to make magenta drunk Polish sausage, but they decide to nix that and use chorizo instead. Jennifer and Stephanie are making the orange turned-on asparagus, which actually sounded like the dish I would most like to try to make out of all of tonight's dishes. There's no electrical equipment in the kitchen, though, which is going to make it difficult for Ace & Gary's yellow love vanilla, which they're trying to make into a soup. That actually sounds very disgusting. And, as if on cue, Spike tells Andrew he "knows how to work a sack." Thanks for making this easier for me, Spike.

Improv, huh? Now they have to pack up in 20 minutes and go finish at home, where they will be serving their dishes to the Second City folks. Their house kitchen is tiny, though, and everybody is on top of each other. The whole group seems to love the yellow love vanilla soup. The orange turned-on asparagus has been fashioned into a menage-a-trois of food, which makes everyone at the table laugh like 10-year olds, until they start eating it, because evidently it sucks. The green perplexed tofu seems to be hitting its mark, except Dale told everyone that they bought beef and rendered the beef fat to make it, when actually they just got some beef fat from the grocery store. I hope that doesn't hurt them at Judges' Table. The magenta drunk Polish sausage (sans Polish sausage) goes out and Lisa makes friends with everyone by doing a shot of tequila and not giving any to the guests, and then laughing about it to their face. Please, PLEASE get rid of her! The purple depressed bacon looks pretty good, and they give everyone wine with the dish, and everyone (except Lisa) knows that alcohol is the way to make friends!

Judges' Table: Dale, Spike, Andrew and Richard are called up first, and were the favorites. The soup was a huge hit. Spike says the love is in him all the time, and also in Andrew. What? Dale and Richard are the co-winners of the challenge, and were both in the top 3 of the quickfire - impressive show for them. They each win $2500 worth of Calphalon pots, which I think is like 2 pots. Jen, Stephanie, Antonia, and Lisa (Lisa!) are in the bottom tonight. Man, I've got my fingers crossed right now (which is making it hard to type). I really can't believe Stephanie is in the bottom. She really seems to be killing it week after week. Jen wanted the plate to look phallic. She must really miss Zoi. She's not going to be missing her for much longer, though, because she's packing her knives and going home. Richard seemed surprised (but then again, that's how he always looks), and now he's the only fauxhawk remaining. I can only hope Lisa sucks again next week.

But That Train Keeps-a Rollin On Down to San Antone

(Johnny Cash, Folsom Prison Blues)

I was discussing the state of the NBA playoffs the other day with my friend Howard, who is a rabid Lakers fan, having gone so far as to buy a tiny Kobe Bryant jersey for his dog, Mocha, presumably in the hopes that other dogs will fear Mocha as a potential rapist and stay the hell away. In any event, we were talking about what makes an NBA dynasty, and if the Lakers would be considered a current NBA dynasty if they were to win the championship this year, which they are certainly well-equipped to do.

Not surprisingly, Howard's opinion is that, if the Lakers win it all this year, they should be regarded as a dynasty. I am of the opinion that they should not. (It is worth noting that Howard is also a UCLA grad, and therefore has a serious dynasty complex.) Of course, over the history of the NBA, the Lakers are certainly a dynasty, but we're only talking about what makes a current dynasty (current meaning over the past 10 years), and under those constraints, they just don't stack up. Let's look at the vital stats:


The Lakers have won three titles in the past 10 years, and made it to the finals a fourth time, missing the playoffs only once within that span. Impressive, but not as impressive as the Spurs' four titles in four trips to the finals, with a current 11-year streak of making the playoffs. The Lakers and the Spurs both won their titles under the direction of the same coaches, Jackson and Popovich, respectively, but the Lakers' "three-peat"* was a Shaq/Kobe driven run, and that nucleus was irreparably dismantled when the team inexplicably stood by (see: wrong horse, backing) while Shaquille O'Neal, one of the most likeable players in the history of the NBA, was thrown under the bus by the Eagle County Rapist, who spent the next 5 years constantly demanding trades and threatening to play elsewhere. The Spurs have ridden Tim Duncan's back to all four of their titles, with longtime nice-guy David Robinson retiring after the first one, and a solid nucleus of Duncan, Tony Parker, and my personal favorite, Manu Ginobli (who could just as easily have played soccer for the Italian World Cup team, if he wasn't from Argentina), for their last three.

My point being, the Spurs team was largely in tact throughout their dynastic run, and still is, with the exception of the Admiral, and that is a team that has brought home two regular season MVP awards (both for Duncan) and one coach of the year award for Popovich, as opposed to no coach of the year awards for Jackson, and only one MVP award for the Lakers, for Shaquille, who isn't even there anymore, and went on to win another title on his own a few years ago (though Kobe may very well win the MVP this year).

True, the Lakers did win three in a row in 2000, 2001, and 2002, which was impressive, and at that point, qualified them as dynastic. And if they win this year, that will make four titles in the past 10 years, but in my opinion, to be a true sports dynasty, a team cannot have a drought between titles that is longer than the number of titles they have won, within a certain period. And the dealbreaker for the Lakers, even if they win this year, will be that they had a dry spell of 5 years between their 3rd and 4th championship. The Spurs, on the other hand, have already won four times in the past 9 years, but even if you discount their first win because of the shortened NBA season (which I do not), they have still won three championships in the past five years. That alone makes the Spurs a current NBA dynasty, regardless of what you think of the 1998-1999 season. And it is for that reason, above all others, that even if the Lakers win this year, it can only be the start of a new potential dynasty, rather than a continuation of an established one. Sorry, Howard.

* - Please don't sue me, Pat Riley!

What Would You Do If I Sang Out of Tune, Would You Stand Up and Walk Out On Me?

(The Beatles, With a Little Help From My Friends)

So, as mentioned in my previous post, I did not watch Top Chef last night (though it is still being held within the safe harbor of my DVR for later viewing), opting for a viewing of There Will Be Blood instead. Wow, what a movie. I mean, this was awesome. I will have to write about it soon, I think.

However, I was ecstatic to get the following email from my friend and former roommate, Josh, this morning, and this is just too fun to not post in place of my weekly review. Come to think of it, this episode was tailor-made for Josh, as he is not only a force to be reckoned with in the kitchen, he's also the biggest Bears fan I know, which makes sense, considering the fact that he was born and raised in LA.

Though I haven't watched the show yet, I do have to say that I find Josh's final comment a bit disheartening, and in stark contrast to my own desires. But that might just speak to the demographic of the Bravo network's viewership.

Bear Down, Josh. Thanks for getting my back.
____________________________________________________

Ben -
Since you didn't review this ep of Top Chef yet, I did it for you.
Actually, I was just so jazzed after watching the episode, that I had to write about it. So I used your format.
(Feel free to quote any of it you want.)
- josh
--------------

Title: Make every play pave the way to victory!

("Bear Down," Chicago Bears Fight Song)

First of all, I have to say that this may have been my favorite Top Chef episode, ever. (And I've seen every episode of Top Chef, and I've loved a lot of them.) A few reasons:

1. I finally feel like there are some cheftestants that I like.

2. It was a good cooking challenge, and the people who aced it seem to have really aced it. (That's hard to know for sure as a viewer, since I didn't taste the food... but I'm taking Chef Tom's word for it.)

3. The Bears. The Bears. The Bears. Especially Gale Sayers and the Fridge. The frickin' Fridge. My only complaint about the whole episode is that he should have been the guest judge. His nickname is a piece of kitchen equipment for frick's sake.

OK... On to my thoughts.

The Quickfire
The whole idea of the quickfire challenge was to have each chef pick a kind of beer, and then whip up a dish to go with it. It was cool that they got to pick the beers, and it was definitely cool to see them all (in all their cheffy snootiness) look a little intimidated by a bar full of beer. Beer, beer, beer.

I'm a little irked that Jen won it, because I think she's annoying and I was sick of her whole "I miss my girlfriend" shtick about eight seconds into the episode. I also wasn't all that interested in eating her food. It seemed a little too easy to me, and it wasn't as well thought-out as Stephanie's.

Speaking of Stephanie's dish... Wow. She tasted her beer (Hoegaarden, one of my favorite beers), and picked a food that went with it. She also used some of the beer in the dish. The clincher for me: Hoegaarden is usually served with a slice of orange, and she used citrus in the dish. Perfect. It made the guest judge's top three, so it could of won. And it should of. Jen annoys me. This challenge sealed Stephanie as my favorite female cheftestant.

Also, I'm hesitant to bring up the following, because it's probably not a fair criticism. It's even less so after the inappropriate (bigoted?) lesbian comment Spike made after Jen won (which totally should not have been put on the air). But the judge was a butch chick with tattoos, and she picked the dish by the butch lesbian contestant. I think -- all things being equal -- that might have given Jen that little edge she needed. Then again, maybe I'm just bitter because I wish Stephanie won. Also, some of my best friends are butch lesbians.

Elimination Challenge
Rena was watching with me. The minute Padma announced what the challenge was, I said to her: "The smart ones do sandwiches, chicken wings, sausages, and ribs." The chicken wings didn't make the top three (and they didn't really get mentioned after the clip of him buying wings at the bucther's counter), but they were a great idea. Nikki's sausage were a good idea horribly executed. And ribs and a sandwich made the top three.

Lets start the analysis with the bottom three.

Mark gets a lot of credit in my book for a few reasons. First, even though he's from New Zealand and (presumably) knows little about tailgating, he understood the essence of a midwest tailgate in cold weather. He served grilled food (skewered meat), slaw, and a warm soup. Good idea. Second, he gets a shitload of credit for cooking on charcoal. Colicchio mentioned this at judges table as a flavor decision (as if the rest of the chefs chose gas because they didn't need the flavor of charcoal). That's crap. The rest of the cheftestants chose gas because it was easier. Gas doesn't need to be hand-lit. No coals that need TLC. No heat management. Lots of horizontal grill space. Charcoal, on the other hand, is how real men cook. (And -- if my chauvinism bugs you -- it's also how real midwesterners cook. This is Chicago, not Napa. Coal, coal, coal.) Mark -- the Australian for gossakes -- cooked like a true tailgater. He botched the execution, but he deserved to live for another week.

Much was also made of Mark's being sloppy and unsanitary. I get that all these guys are professional chefs who cook in professional kitchens, and they take this stuff seriously. They should take this stuff seriously. But lets get a grip for a sec. Mark is cooking on a finicky grill, outside, surrounded by hundreds of rabid Bears fans. This is how manly men football fans cook. Taste the sauce, then put the spoon back? No problem! Come on, Chef Tom. Get a grip.
Nikki blew this challenge much more than Mark. She didn't really cook anything. She sautéd some freakin' peppers and onions? Any moron can do that. Store bought sausage? Nothing to see here, folks. Just a lady cooking food that anyone can make in their own kitchen with virtually no effort. They were right that she should have made her own sausages, and they were right that she should have made a more complicated dish.

But at least she understands what to serve at a tailgate.

Dooooshbag McGee, err, Ryan, deserved to go home. Poached pears at a tailgate? When Padma announced the challenge, he told the confessional camera that he's a metrosexual who doesn't do sports and doesn't do tailgating food. He's a sophisticate. He's a snob. He's an idiot who somehow convinces himself that if he cooks his hoity toity poached pears with créme fresh well enough, the peasants of Soldier Field will suddenly see the light, put down their polish sausages, and start eating haute cuisine. (I have this image of Alec Baldwin trying to serve shweddy balls to the Superfans.) He deserved to go because he's an idiot, and because his food was boring, even for his kind of food. Poached pears? Seriously?

As for the winners...

I kinda like Antonia. She's got this can-do spirit, and she's always smiling. She also seems really normal. Of all the contestants, she's the one who would fit in with me and my friends. Her dish looked pretty cool, and doing a sandwich was smart. Doing a sophisticated -- but not too sophisticated and not too scary for Bears fans -- sandwich was even smarter. Colicchio says she should have put the pineapple and the banana on the sandwich. I don't believe that fruit goes on pizza or on sandwiches. So I agreed with Antonia, personally. Also, I'm not sure tropical flavors were right on for a Bears tailgate. (Then again, Dale did it too, and I was very impressed by him, so whatever.)

I've already said that I like Stephanie. I like that she's humble. I like that she's thoughtful and smart. I like that she's friendly. I like that she doesn't try to use fancy gadgets or weird abstract concept dishes. She just cooks. And she cooks food that looks like I want to eat it, pretty much every time. Her pork dish looked really great. Tenderloin is easy to do on the grill (bravo for a good choice at the bucther), and bacon and potatoes go together like... like lamb and tuna fish. (Maybe you like spaghetti and meatball? You more comfortable with that analogy? But I digress.) She's this season's Casey, but maybe better. And the judges are noticing. She should go very far.

Dale deserved to win this competition. First, he made ribs. Second, he made them with strong flavors. Third, the Fridge loved his ribs. I was very proud of him. He started off the episode on a bad foot, with the half-ass apology to Lisa that was all the more awkward with the camer man hanging out over his shoulder. And then he had to endure being in the bottom of the quickfire challenge. But he redeemed himself, and he won me over with his boyish glee at being at Soldier Field, and his heartfelt appreciation when he realizes that he's standing right in front of Gale Sayers. As the only cheftestant who recognized Gale Sayers, he deserved to win the challenge. Other things I like about him: He's got incredible knife skills (see the Quickfire a couple of weeks ago, when he pulled out the "Vegan Sashimi Platter"), which I admire. Last week he argued against doing lame Asian flavors to please Ming Tsai, even though he's the token Asian guy on the show. He doesn't like Lisa, and neither do I.

So now I have two favorites. Stephanie is just plain likable, and Dale is a fellow Bears fan who cooks cool food. And I like Antonia too. She's got a restaurant in LA that Sara and I should try.

Other random comments:

- Andrew loses points for the "When was the last time they won the Superbowl?" comment. Not that its a problem that he doesn't know about football. Virtually none of them do. But don't pretend to be a Bears fan, then ask the question. Any fan of any team knows the last time their team won the championship. It's a lose-lose question. If the Bears had won last year, he looks like an idiot for not knowing. If they haven't won in a while (like, say, 23 years), he pisses off the fans. I have to say that I like Andrew for marching to the beat of his own drummer, but I think he needs to stop saying stupid things at every opportunity. Also, was Gail flirting with him?

- It would have been awesome if Dale took his prize Bears jersey and asked, "Um, what am I gonna do with my name on a Brad Maynard jersey?" Anyone else think it was weird that all the judges wore the punter's number? Like I said, woulda been cooler if Fridge had been the guest judge, and then they all could have worn 72.

- Why does anyone care if the guys like to hang out in the tub? The awkward thing wasn't that they were in the tub together, but that the producers tried to get milage out the whole "straight guys acting gay" thing. It wasn't funny, and it was uncomfortable. What if they were two gay guys? Or two girls (gay or not)?

- Nikki can't last much longer. She just isn't that talented of a chef.

- My current guess at the final four: Stephanie, Dale, Richard, Antonia. I can't stand Richard, and I'm glad we barely saw him (and his freakin' paté burgers... Just call them pork burgers and get over yourself, asswipe), but I think he's going far.

- Antonia says on the Top Chef website that her favorite recipe is baby beets with goat cheese, which has been my favorite food for the last few months (because it turns your poop purple).

- You know something about this show's audience when more people responded to the survey that they'd rather touch Tom than Padma.

Blood Runs Through Your Veins, That's Where Our Similarity Ends

(Editors, Blood)

Just so nobody freaks out (Brandy), I'm not going to be watching Top Chef tonight, b/c we're headed over to casa de bloomfield to watch There Will Be Blood. I have to say, I'm very excited to see this movie, in no small part due to Daniel Day Lewis's robust mustache, and I'll check out Top Chef as soon as I can.

Well Can't You See Me Standing Here, I've Got My Back Against the Record Machine

(Van Halen, Jump)

I never really liked the Lakers much (though I did enjoy sitting almost courtside once, thanks to a friend whose boss liked to splurge on tickets), and as much as I'm sort of anti-Kobe Bryant, you can't argue with the fact that he's one of the top 3 players in the NBA today.

Also, you can't argue with this. This is unreal. It's hard to tell if this is rigged or not. If it is, then screw him, he's still a douchebag. If it's not, then he is Superman, and if I'm in the Laker's front office, I'm going to have a talk with him about not doing ridiculously stupid things, no matter how unbelievably cool they might look.

But yeah, this is just unreal.

I Wanted to See You Walking Backwards and Get the Sensation of You Coming Home

(Counting Crows, Time and Time Again)

After a week of listening to the new Counting Crows album, Saturday Nights & Sunday Mornings (buy it on Amazon), I think I'm ready to make my thoughts public. I realize I might have been a bit harsh on R.E.M., after only one day's worth of listening, and I wanted to be a bit more even-keeled for this one. Counting Crows, at one point, were also my favorite band, and still occupy a special place in my heart and mind. They were my primary soundtrack for the summer of 1999, which I spent in Israel as a counselor for 40 or so 16-year old kids, who really were a great group to be around. That's also when I became friends with Dave and Wendi, and over the years, the three of us have spent a great deal of time listening to and talking about the Crows, and calling each other from their concerts. Somehow, Dave even ended up backstage last year. That's him in the blue, trying not to let Adam Duritz's sweat drip on him.


Though the Crows aren't my favorite anymore, Amanda says they're still her favorites. She's seen them more often than I have, which means more than twice. We saw them together in LA, and it was an awesome show, much better than I thought it would be, because they mainly stuck to the meat of their first two albums, which stack up against anybody's. August and Everything After is as good of a debut album as it gets, and is probably in my top ten favorite albums of my generation. Recovering the Satellites was a great follow-up, and although This Desert Life and Hard Candy had some good songs on them, they weren't really up to par when measured against those first two.

It's hard to believe that Saturday Nights & Sunday Mornings is only their fifth studio album. The problem is, I can't be totally objective about it. I can try, but I won't really get there, not completely. I even decided years ago that if I had a daughter, I wanted to name her Elizabeth, after Goodnight Elizabeth, but Amanda put the kibosh on that idea (though I'm still holding on in the hopes that I can wear her down by the time we have kids). I guess I just have too much of a sentimental connection to their music, but isn't that what music's all about, for the most part?

The bottom line is, I really like this album. I really like it. And I really like it for some of the same reasons that Amanda is disappointed by it. Part of what I love about their music (primarily August and Satellites) is their imagery. They repeatedly refer to the same places, the same girls, the same dreams of Michelangelo, which gives their music a common thread and keeps it all tied together and interrelated. To me, that's awesome. And they'd sort of gone away from that in their later work, but on Saturday Nights, they've brought that aspect back into the fold, and I couldn't be happier. Amanda thinks that's lazy of them, to rely on old names and phrases instead of thinking of new material, which I guess is valid, but since that's one of my favorite aspects of their music, it's not a position I hold. To each his (her) own.

I will freely admit that it's not 100% a great album. In fact, some of the songs are downright terrible, but strangely enough, even thinking that sort of makes me happy. I do like the fact that they put the terrible songs at the very beginning of the album, which is ballsy, but we get them out of the way early. 1492 is just too hard and disjointed. It's this album's Children in Bloom (which, over time, I have come to enjoy as well). Hanging Tree and Sundays are both almost good songs, they're just not quite there. Maybe a little too much like Hanging Around, or maybe a little too Shrek-esque. I do like Los Angeles, though. Great song, and it really is a good place to find yourself a taco. I also enjoy Insignificant a lot. And once we get into the middle of the album, the tempo slows a bit and the warmth of their imagery just sort of washes over you. I know, that sounds pretty cheesy. I told you I couldn't be objective, remember?

The highlights of the album are all in the second half. Washington Square is a great song, and is already one of my favorites in their catalog. It's this album's answer to Sullivan Street, just a great conflicted song about home, which you have to take for its good and its bad. When I Dream of Michelangelo is another one that belongs up there with Round Here and, naturally, Angels of the Silences. And, just to prove that it's not only the slow songs that jump out at me, I absolutely love the bonus track Sessions, which is an awesome bluesy rock song about psychiatry and prescription mood-altering medication.

I love that this album is a return to what made their first few albums great. To me, that's worth the sacrifice of "new" material, and it also makes the wait since their last album worthwhile. Listening to this album takes me back 10, 15 years. For an hour and 20 minutes, that's just fine with me.

Lord Knows When the Cold Wind Blows It'll Turn Your Head Around

(James Taylor, Fire and Rain)

I missed last Wednesday's writeup. Sorry, Brandy. The computer was tied up. I haven't even posted anything since that afternoon, so after a week off, I'm feeling a little rusty. We'll see how it goes...


Zoi is pissed that she got called out last week, but I bet she wouldn't trade places with Manuel, so she should relax a bit.

Quickfire Challenge: Guest Judge Ming Tsai from Boston's Blue Ginger restaurant is here to help ruin somebody's life this week. And, to make my point, he immediately says that somebody without a sensitive pallette might as well pack their knives and go home. Weird. They're not cooking anything, they're just smelling and tasting 2 different things, and trying to notify which is the high-end product. Padma blindfolds Ryan, and I really wish I was a contestant on this show. He kills it. Stephanie likes the cheap crab meat. Richard did well, but they forgot to blindfold his fauxhawk. My man Andrew didn't do so well, but Stephanie took the lowest score. Ryan and Jen tied for second place, and Zoi complains about being beaten by her lover. Welcome to Halle Berry's world, sweetheart. Antonia wins immunity, which means we have to wait at least one more week before she gets kicked off and leaves more interesting people to watch.

Elimination Challenge: Earth, Wind, and Fire. And Water. And, not really wind, but Air. They're working in teams based on the elements, and Andrew and Richard are on the same team AGAIN! This is starting to look a little rigged. Spike is upset about being on a team with Antonia, which is a valid concern, because she could saute dog poo and not get kicked off this week. Lisa gets called out by Dale as being very negative, which is a very generous description. She's like a grown up female Napoleon Dynamite. I hope tonight is her night.

They're cooking for Meals on Wheels, so naturally they're going to spend 37 times more than they should on food from Whole Foods. That's like Al Gore taking a private jet to a Live Earth concert. Lisa wants to knock Ming Tsai's pants off with Asian food. I've got a feeling she's not going to nail it as well as he could, and she has now voiced her unhappiness approximately 95 times since they walked into the store. Her teammates are legitimately frightened by her right now. There's no way they're going to be successful in this challenge, and Stephanie and Dale are going to throw her right under the bus. That's my prediction, which probably means she's safe this week.

Andrew, Richard and New Zealand decide to cook in a different room from everyone else, presumably because Andrew wants to stab Richard with his own fauxhawk without other people watching on. Spike doesn't seem to be on a very good team tonight, and he's wearing some sort of bamboo baseball cap, which is almost as weird as the yellow fedora he usually wears, which I think he stole from the Dick Tracy costume department. Dale doesn't like Lisa's "observational negativity," which is code for "she's a complete bitch." Nikki tells her team that when they curse, it draws attention to them. Clearly she hasn't been listening to anyone all season, because this group makes my conversational style seem G-rated. Richard thinks his team needs to have a strong rapport with Colleccio, and then immediately creeps him out, which is like, Pot, meet Kettle. You're black.

Maybe I'm just tired, but the part of the show where they're plating and serving the food is just boring the crap out of me tonight. Richard left scales on all the salmon pieces. The "fire" shrimp dish goes over well, and looks awesome. Team Air is happy with their product, which Nikki emphasizes by wearing a weird beehive hairdo. Hello, 1957.

Judges' Table: Fire Team gets called out first, because their shrimp dish was awesome, and also because I predicted that they were going to lose and get Lisa kicked off. Why am I so BAD at this?!? Stephanie did the shrimp, Lisa did the bacon, Dale must have just been there for moral support. And the winner is ... Lisa. I am such a f'ing idiot. And, I'm also pissed, because she SUCKS!! Dale is bitter. I feel your pain, brother.

The worst teams are Earth and Water. Could Richard be on his way back to the ATL because of his scaly salmon? All of the judges are pissed about the scales, and Richard is scared out of his mind, but that's how he always looks, because of that damn fauxhawk. New Zealand takes credit for the parsnip, but he can't really justify its use. He might as well have smeared vegemite all over the place. Zoi says her teams concern was that they didn't want to overpower the meat. Yeah, right, babe. No one's buying that. And, yes, I am a 12-year old.

Wow, right before the commercial, Dale goes balls to the wall, yelling at Lisa. Clearly, he wasn't kidding about the bitterness. But, I don't disagree with him in the least. She is a bitch, it's a scientific fact. Look it up, if you don't believe me.

Goodbye, Ruby Tuesday. Also, Goodbye Zoi. Wow. Looks like I was about 2 weeks early with that one, huh? Jen is pissed. Richard is crying. I am tired. Spike is yelling at Antoinia. Antonia is yelling at Spike. Jen is yelling at Spike, and a little scary in doing so. Dale is yelling at Lisa, while gripping his sack. Jen starts kicking over chairs like she's a member of Motley Crue. Lot of tension here, and I love it! Can't wait for next week.

The Last Thing I Remember Was Climbing Up the Stairs, I Threw the Window Open In Challenge and Despair

(R.E.M., Accelerate)

REM has long been one of my favorite bands. In high school, they were THE band, for sure my favorite, hands down, above all others. I even went to one of their concerts my sophomore year of college BY MYSELF, because I couldn't find anyone else that wanted to go, but I needed to see them that badly that I was willing to go stand there alone and enjoy the music. And it was unreal. Since college, though, I haven't listened to them much, possibly because the albums they have put out since New Adventures In Hi-Fi (1996) have been about as much fun as listening to John Kerry talk about just about anything.

That's why I was super-excited for the release of Accelerate, their 14th studio album, and first since 2004's Around the Sun. I'd heard that it was a more upbeat, rock-driven album. Even the title suggested that the band was kicking it up a notch. I read yesterday that Pitchfork gave it a 6.7 out of 10, which I figured was just their usual snobbery talking, and I'd decide for myself. I downloaded (legally, of course) the album after I got home from work yesterday, and over the course of the past 20 hours or so, I've listened to it about four times. And I have to say, I think Pitchfork might have nailed it.

I don't want to say this was a lazy effort by the band, because I don't think it was, but I read that they made a conscious effort not to "overtinker" the songs on this album, and I think these songs might have benefitted from a bit more tinkering, or at least some "let's sleep on this album for a few weeks and really think about it before it's release."

Accelerate, the title track, is a good one and my early favorite. I also like Houston and Until the Day is Done. I don't know if I like those best because they are the best, or because they are the 5th, 6th, and 7th songs on the album, which I hear after the initial feeling of disappointment fades, but before it picks up again toward the end of the album. The two bonus tracks stand out as well, but not on their own merit. Redhead Walking lifts the drum beat directly from Santana's Oye Como Va, and Airliner is a 50's-ish guitar/drum collaboration, without lyrics, that brings to mind their own Underneath the Bunker, from Life's Rich Pageant, released in 1986, which is kind of a shame, because the association only makes me think about what a far superior album Pageant was (probably their second best, and only because nothing is going to overtake 1987's Document).

It is definitely an improvement on their last three albums, though. And they've definitely remedied whatever doldrums they'd been stuck in, as most of the songs are fast, fuel-injected, and heavy on the guitar. I like it, but I don't love it. Maybe the lyrics are a bit forced, or maybe they're better suited, at this point in their careers, making the music that comes natural to them, but these songs don't feel too natural. The songs are all pretty short (half of them checking in at under 3 minutes), but they feel a little pushy. I don't want to be pushed through a rock and roll song, I want to be pulled into it. I want to be led. Bruce Springsteen doesn't push you into a rock song. Bono doesn't push you, he pulls you in with both hands.

I bring up Bono and The Boss, though, because I think I might like Accelerate a little better in a few months. When U2 released How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb in 2004, I wasn't a huge fan. But after a few listens, then shelving it for a year or two before breaking it out again, I rediscovered it with a much greater sense of appreciation, and now I probably listen to it more than any of their other albums aside from The Joshua Tree (which will go down in history as the greatest album of my generation). I had a similar (but speedier) experience with Bruce Springsteen's Magic, released last year. On the first few listens, I thought it was a good but not great album, with not enough "classic" in the classic rock. But over the past two or three months, it's been heavy in my rotation, and I would even go so far as to say that three or four of the songs on the album are some of his greats.

So, bottom line, it's a step in the right direction. Hopefully I'll have the chance to see them when they pass through Atlanta later this summer, and hopefully Accelerate will grow on me a bit. I have a feeling it probably will, but for now, I might have to let it steep a bit more.

In the meantime, in honor of the release of their 14th studio album, here's a list of my Top 14 favorite REM songs, in no particular order. Enjoy.

I Believe (Life's Rich Pageant)
Radio Free Europe (Murmur)
The One I Love (Document)
Disturbance At the Heron House (Document)
Fall On Me (Life's Rich Pageant)
Don't Go Back to Rockville (Reckoning)
Get Up (Green)
Driver 8 (Fables of the Reconstruction)
Try Not to Breathe (Automatic For the People)
Nightswimming (Automatic For the People)
Exhuming McCarthy (Document)
Man On the Moon (Automatic For the People)
Crush With Eyeliner (Monster)
Orange Crush (Green)

I've Got to Admit It's Getting Better, A Little Better All The Time

(The Beatles, Getting Better)


And, in case you're interested, longtime Clinton-hater Christopher Hitchens has yet another scathing article about her on Slate.