And the Nominees Are... Part 4: Comedy Acting

Let's begin with the leading ladies: I don't have a single complaint with this category. I think the academy got it just right. Tina Fey was nominated but didn't win last year, so I'll certainly root for her, but I'd kind of like to see Julia Louis-Dreyfus win this time. Her Christine Campbell is self-centered and competitive, but she comes across as a real person with good qualities as well as flaws. I also think Christina Applegate did a fine job as amnesia victim Samantha Newly, trying to make amends for her past behavior on Samantha Who?, but this was the show's first season, and I think the character needs time to develop and hopefully grow a bit more complex. America Ferrera won last year for Ugly Betty, so even though she's nominated again, I'd like to see the academy spread the love and choose one of the others. Oops, I forgot Mary-Louise Parker on Weeds. Nice job, maybe next year?

Actors: once again the academy is stuck in the James Spader rut of nominating someone over and over, even though he doesn't necessarily deserve it over and over. I'm referring specifically to Tony Shalhoub's Adrian Monk. Ricky Gervais won last year for Extras and I had no problem with that, but prior to that, Shalhoub had been nominated six times (not counting this one) and won three times for Monk. We get it, already: he has OCD and about a squillion quirks that go with it, but he's still a detective genius. Give someone else a turn, why don'tcha? Like, say, Josh Radnor as Ted on How I Met Your Mother. It's an ensemble show, but he's the central character, so I would say that qualifies.

Alec Baldwin's portrayal of loopy but sly network exec Jack Donaghy is one of the absolute best things about 30 Rock. Think what you want about him as a person, he's dead-on in this role. Steve Carell should probably win one of these years for his antics as the nightmare boss who wants to be everyone's friend on The Office. Newcomer Lee Pace did an excellent job as the deadpan center of Pushing Daisies, but it's probably too soon. Charlie Sheen? Funny enough on Two and a Half Men, but like the show, the performance is one-note. I'd have preferred to see Jason Lee get a nomination for My Name Is Earl; even though I thought the jail and coma storylines were not that effective and the show had a very uneven season, Lee made us admire Earl for his sincere efforts to be a better person, and he has first-rate comic chops and timing.

Supporting actresses: The nominees: Kristin Chenoweth for Pushing Daisies; Jean Smart for Samantha Who?; Amy Poehler for Saturday Night Live; Holland Taylor for Two And A Half Men; and Vanessa Williams for Ugly Betty. Naturally I would have liked to see Jenna Fischer get nominated for The Office. I'd probably give her Jean Smart's spot on the list. I liked Smart as Samantha's doubtful, pushy mom, but I thought she overplayed it a bit.

Vanessa Williams is a hoot as the wicked-witch Wilheilima Slater on Ugly Betty, but I thought Judith Light brought more depth to the character of long-suffering matriarch Claire Meade, while also making her extremely funny. Chenoweth is a Broadway vet who gave verve and spunk to Olive's unrequited love on Daisies. As for Poehler, what more needs to be said? She's hugely talented, and it's great to see her getting this recognition. Taylor has been nominated four times, including this year, for her role as Evelyn, Charile and Alan's iceberg of a mother on Two and a Half Men. She's easily the best thing about the show, and maybe it's time for her to get a statue, so she can move aside for new blood.

Supporting actors: eh. The nominees: Jeremy Piven and Kevin Dillon for Entourage; Neil Patrick Harris for How I Met Your Mother; Rainn Wilson for The Office; and Jon Cryer for Two And A Half Men.

Let's start by throwing out Piven and Dillon (sorry, guys) and replacing them with Jack McBrayer and Tracy Morgan from 30 Rock. Both their characters--McBrayer's addled hayseed Kenneth Parcell the NBC Page and Morgan's (intentionally?) outrageous actor Tracy Jordan--are completely insane, in completely different but equally hilarious ways. Next, let's get rid of Cryer (see Sheen, above) and slide in Jason Segel, who makes Marshall's quirks so sweet and lovable on How I Met Your Mother.

Last, substitute John Krasinski for Rainn Wilson. Same show, totally different vibe. Wilson's Dwight is intentionally overplayed, but it's getting harder to find the funny Dwight moments among the annoying Dwight moments, and the character of Dwight is the biggest reason people are turned off by The Office. Krasinski's Jim Halpert is given much more to work with by the show, and does much more with it. People get hung up on his puppy-dog eyes, but Jim has grown into a much more complex and rich character as he gradually realized it was time to grow up, while maintaining the mischievous edge we love (my favorite prank: putting Dwight's desk in the men's room).

But even with all those changes, my choice for this category is Harris, as womanizing bro-meister Barney Stinson on Mother. Sure he's an arrogant pig who uses people, but he has also shown us how much he cares for his friends Ted and Marshall. Harris's gift is in bringing all Barney's disparate strands into one whole person, and somehow making him likable in spite of his selfishness. Deep down, Barney just wants to be liked, just like everyone else. He just doesn't know how to show it, yet.

So, there we go. I guess I'm going to have to watch the awards this year. We'll revisit my ramblings on September 22nd and see how I did. And yes, you would be justified in concluding that I spend far too much time watching television.

And the Nominees Are... Part 3: Comedy Shows

Television comedy has been having something of a fallow period for the past few years, which is not to say that there aren't any funny shows on, but compared to a decade ago, the number of comedy shows currently on the air is much lower. Part of the problem is that new shows take time to gain traction with audiences, and networks are notoriously impatient for immediate ratings successes. Also, a lot of shows just aren't funny (how is According to Jim still on the air?).

Networks have tried to freshen their comedy offerings by turning away from the traditional three-camera sitcom, shot on a soundstage in front of a live audience, to single-camera shows without laugh tracks such as Arrested Development and The Office. Personally, I prefer shows without a laugh track--I'm comfortable figuring out when I'm supposed to laugh--but it's more important that a show is funny. One of my favorite shows is How I Met Your Mother, which is done on a soundstage with a laugh track. I wouldn't care if it was filmed in an alley, it makes me laugh after a long day.

This year's Best Comedy nominees represent NBC (30 Rock and The Office), HBO (Curb Your Enthusiasm and Entourage), and CBS (Two and a Half Men). I think the academy got it about half right. I don't have HBO, but I have sampled both its entries on DVD, and I don't like either of them. Curb is very much an acquired taste, due to the persona of its creator and central character, Larry David. I watched a few episodes and found him to be more despicable than funny. I know that's supposed to be the point, but I couldn't stand him or anyone else in his orbit. But then, I never cared for Seinfeld, which David was also behind. I found the characters on that show incredibly unlikable, which for me largely precluded finding them funny.

The bits of Entourage that I've seen just bored me. The general consensus among critics is that this past season was not its best, but academy voters have shown a tendency to nominate shows somewhat retroactively, i.e. it was good before, so let's just go ahead and nominate it again.

As for Two and a Half Men, I watched it pretty regularly for a few years, and it's fairly funny, but it's a one-note show. Ninety percent of the jokes are of a crude sexual nature, which can be funny but not over and over and over. The other ten percent of the jokes seem to be about youngster Jake's bodily functions, har har.

30 Rock's gleefully absurd take on the behind-the-scenes workings of a sketch-comedy show is filled with so many jokes, sight gags, and tossed-off lines that it almost requires you to watch each episode twice (which I often do, thanks to my TiVo).

The Office is a sardonic and often surprisingly real look at what life at work is like for many cubicle dwellers, albeit with an exaggerated buffoon of a boss in Michael Scott (Steve Carell). I'll admit that I occasionally grow tired of Michael's infantile behavior, as well as that of his sycophantic and clueless underling Dwight Schrute, but when that happens, the other characters always manage to make up for it, particularly Andy, Kevin, and Angela.

I love both 30 Rock and The Office, both of which have previously won this award (in 2007 and 2006, respectively). I also have fairly large crushes on both Tina Fey (the Saturday Night Live alum who created 30 Rock and stars as harried head writer Liz Lemon, who must play ringmaster to her circus of writers and actors as well as her flaky boss, gloriously played by Alec Baldwin) and Jenna Fischer (The Office's sweet and plucky receptionist Pam Beesly, who holds things together at Dunder Mifflin's Scranton office). The Mrs. refers to them as my "TV girlfriends."

Given the nominated shows, I'd pick 30 Rock to win, mostly because I feel like its creators work really hard to make each episode as funny as possible. If I were choosing the five nominees for this category, my list would include The Office and 30 Rock, ABC's freshman fantasy Pushing Daisies (which was on the list of semifinalists), and CBS's How I Met Your Mother and The New Adventures of Old Christine.

Daisies is a candy-coated visual acid trip wrapped around a throwback detective show, wrapped around a classic story of life, death, and true love, and it's thoroughly original. But it isn't a comedy in the traditional sense--in fact, it defies a label of any kind--and that may have thrown the academy voters. Mother is a three-camera ensemble comedy in the tradition of Friends, but with sharper characterizations and the framing device of a father in 2030 relating to his children the stories of his friendships and relationships as a younger man (shown in flashback as the primary action of the show). Old Christine is also a traditionally shot soundstage show about a divorced woman (Seinfeld's Julia Louis-Dreyfus, somewhat more likable here) trying to raise a son and maintain a cordial relationship with her ex-husband and his new love, also named Christine but younger and dumber. This show succeeds mainly because of the hard-working cast, and because it's genuinely funny. Hopefully, as these shows evolve they will get the recognition they deserve.

Still to come: comedy acting nominees.

And the Nominees Are... Part 2: Drama Acting

(NOTE: This entry was originally part of the first Emmys post, but I decided to break it up. No particular reason.)

As in the show category, Jon Hamm's portrayal of Mad Men's central character Don Draper was a wonder to watch and he's probably going to be the favorite, but I wouldn't be terribly surprised if Michael C. Hall's Dexter Morgan managed a dark-horse win. Hugh Laurie could get the nod for House, and if it happened I wouldn't say he didn't deserve it, but I'd feel Hamm was robbed. The surprising but deserved nomination of Bryan Cranston for his intense and fearless turn as a science teacher turned meth-maker on Breaking Bad made me happy, and I've also heard good things about Gabriel Byrne's shrink on In Treatment, though I haven't seen the show.

As for the ladies, I feel about Glenn Close's Patty Hewes the same way I feel about Damages, but my gut tells me she's going to win. (My choice among this year's nominees would be Kyra Sedgwick for The Closer.) I don't watch Brothers and Sisters, so I don't have an opinion about Sally Field (though I'll point out that she won last year), and I can't even watch the commercials for Saving Grace, so I don't have anything nice to say about Holly Hunter in this role.

Mariska Hargitay on Law & Order: SVU finally got her statue a couple of years ago, but I think the show peaked right around that time, and has gone downhill since then in general. She usually gets one or two really good episodes each season, which is why she keeps getting nominated (presumably those are the ones that get submitted to the nominating committee), but it would be nice to see the academy loosen up a little. I think part of the problem is how "lead actress" is defined; I think Mad Men's January Jones deserved a nomination as Don Draper's wife Betty, but I suspect her role was not considered a leading one because Don's domestic life took a back seat to his work (and his indiscretions with a client and a bohemian Greenwich Village artist).

In the supporting-actress category, I don't have much to say about the women, only because I don't watch any of the shows in contention. I used to watch Grey's Anatomy, but halfway through this season, around the time new episodes dried up due to the writers' strike, I gave up. I couldn't stand the whining anymore, and I didn't feel that the storylines were going anywhere interesting. The two performers from the show who did get nominated, Chandra Wilson and Sandra Oh, probably annoyed me the least and deserve their nominations. When I was watching, Dr. Bailey was easily my favorite character, so I'd like to see Wilson win, but I think some of the women on Lost should have been nominated here, especially Elizabeth Mitchell (Juliet) and Yunjin Kim (Sun).

For the supporting actors, the only real disappointment is knowing that it's impossible to acknowledge the great work of all the excellent actors in the Lost ensemble, but at least they got it right with Michael Emerson's riveting, enigmatic Ben. [Okay, I lied before about not mentioning Boston Legal: how the hell does scenery-chewing William Shatner get nominated over Naveen Andrews (Sayid), or Henry Ian Cusick (Desmond), or Jorge Garcia (Hurley), or Daniel Dae Kim (Jin), or Josh Holloway (Sawyer)? How? It's inexcusable.] If any show deserved to have more than one actor nominated in this category, it's Lost. I so hope Emerson wins, for all of them.

Elsewhere in the category, I've never cared much for Ted Danson's work, even on Cheers, but the way he played the numerous facets and shades of gray of Arthur Frobisher, the target of the litigation on Damages, was fantastic, and for me it was the best part of the show. Zeljko Ivanek, who played his attorney, was also nominated. He's been around TV for a couple of decades, and it's nice to see his work get acknowledged as well, but this slot probably should have gone to one of the Lost guys mentioned above.

Phew, that was tiring. And that's just the drama categories. We'll tackle comedy a bit later, or perhaps tomorrow.

And the Nominees Are...

With yesterday's announcement of this year's Emmy nominees, I thought I should start acting like what I claim to be (someone who cares about good TV) and offer up a few thoughts. This year the academy took the unusual step of announcing the category semifinalists a couple of weeks ago, which allows for both some insight into the nominating process, and for some snarky second-guessing (which is where I come in).

One criticism leveled at the academy is that its members do not make nominations based on the totality of a series's season, but on selected individual episodes. The best evidence of this is the inexplicable, perennial nominations for Boston Legal. I know a couple of people who watch and enjoy this show, and more power to them, I guess, but its selection over Friday Night Lights (which I don't even watch, but I'm well aware of its acclaim) or The Wire (ditto) only makes me wonder what flavor crack the academy members have been getting in their gift baskets year after year.

Also puzzling is that there are six nominees for best drama instead of the usual five; it's as though the academy intentionally bent the rules to shoehorn this insipid, ridiculous show into contention as a favor to someone (and did the same thing with the show's star James Spader in the best actor in a drama category). I won't dignify any of the show's nominations by discussing them; instead I'll simply ignore them and pretend they don't exist. Each nomination this show received means another, more deserving show or actor was shut out, and it isn't right.

Now that the ranting is out of the way, the real news in the Best Drama category this year is the nomination of not one, but two series that air on basic cable networks, Mad Men on AMC and Damages on FX. This is heartening because it affirms that the shows being produced on these channels are as good as, or better than, the big networks' offerings, and that prestige shows don't necessarily have to be on premium cable channels like HBO or Showtime. Hopefully this will demonstrate to show creators looking for homes for their projects that cable networks can provide a hospitable and nurturing environment for quality shows, without as much ratings pressure as at the big networks.

While Damages was certainly an entertaining show, I'm not sure it deserves to be nominated for best drama, because I felt it just wasn't in quite the same class as the other nominees. Mad Men, on the other hand, is one of the most nuanced and most quietly fascinating shows I have ever seen, and is my pick to win the category. The second season begins next Sunday, July 27th, and I'll have more to say about the show next week.

Lost had an awesome season, as it continues to fascinate, perplex, frustrate, and challenge viewers with the mysteries of the plane crash and the island. Aside from a few concrete answers, what more could you want in a show? A thoroughly deserved nomination.

House invigorated itself by bringing in a new group of doctors for Dr. House to torture, but the cases mostly followed the show's now-familiar formula, and the series still rests on Hugh Laurie's shoulders. That's not to take away anything from him or his portrayal, or any of the other actors, for that matter, but the show is not quite as intriguing as the character is.

Dexter: I have not yet seen the second season, but you already know how I feel about the show after having seen the first one. Season 2 drops on DVD on August 19th, and I'll be buying it right away.

On the Wrist

I've been buying (and selling) stuff on eBay for nearly a decade. It was a slog back in the days when I still had a dial-up internet connection, so lunchtime surfing became (and still is) a regular part of my workday. My long-term relationship with eBay came about because of my long-term interest in old watches. Not pocket watches (though there's nothing inherently wrong with those), but wristwatches, primarily mechanical watches from the 1960s and 1970s.

Ever since I was a kid, I've loved watches. I got my first one when I was in first grade; I think it was a Christmas present, but memories from that far back are getting a little fuzzy. It had one of those striped ribbon-type straps, and a piece of plastic surrounding the watch face that was supposed to resemble a saddle. (I was six, and didn't know any better, but that would change.) In ninth or tenth grade I got what was then a bold new bit of technology, an LCD watch. Never mind the LED models; I skipped right over those. But by the time I graduated from high school, I had a renewed appreciation for watches with hands.

These days, many people don't bother to wear a watch; when they want to know what time it is, they look at their cellphones. But to me, a watch is much more than a utilitarian object; it's a bit of style as well as a bit of substance. A well-chosen watch shows that you pay attention to the details. The best of them are little pieces of art that you attach to your wrist and carry around with you all day. I often look at my watch not to see what time it is, but just to appreciate the craftsmanship and style of it.

(I like modern watches too. A $30 quartz Timex will keep better time than a 40-year-old wind-up mechanical watch, even an expensive one, ever could, so I appreciate them for different reasons.)

Before the internet, I rarely came across old watches for sale, except for the occasional find at a flea market or antique store. So the discovery of a vast marketplace largely free of geographic limitations was a joyous occasion. The first item I ever bought on eBay was a watch. The most recent thing I bought on eBay was a watch, which leads me to what I was getting to all along: for the first time since I started using eBay, I received the wrong item.

According to the seller, the item was in its original packaging, and he did not look inside the box before shipping it to me. The watch I received was similar to the one shown in the listing (I'm guessing he used a stock image from the manufacturer's web site), but different enough to matter, to me at least, so I've returned it. As someone who has sold items on eBay, I question his explanation, but it's not worth making an issue of it, as long as he refunds my payment. I'll just have to keep looking, and the searching is at least half the fun of it.

That's Entertainment?

You know you've been married a while when your spouse suggests a "night out" at the local furniture emporium... for the food. And you agree.

Let me point out that we had other plans. We were supposed to see one of my coworkers perform at the Comedy Studio in Harvard Square, but the show had already sold out. He'd warned us, too. He put up a flyer in our office kitchen listing his upcoming shows, and it said "This show WILL sell out." So, my bad. He's performing there several more times over the next couple of months, so we will definitely catch one of those shows, and I promise to not be a doofus and buy the tickets ahead of time.

So yes, we spent our Saturday evening at Jordan's up in Reading. You all know by now how much we love Richardson's ice cream, which is sold inside the store. Well, there's a Fuddrucker's hamburgers inside the store as well. They are not the world's greatest hamburgers, but they are decent, and when you're hungry, a juicy burger and some delicious ice cream sounds like a pretty good combo. Plus, you can eat yourself silly for around $10.

We looked at some furniture, too, mostly to kill time between the burgers and the ice cream, to allow some digestion to occur.

Watch Where You're Pointing That Thing (Crazy Gadgets Unit)

You sure do find some interesting stuff on Amazon.com. I never knew I needed one of these, but now that I know I can get it so easily and cheaply, well, maybe I'll get two.

(Insert obligatory Buffy the Vampire Slayer reference here.)

Bring one of these to your next performance review or salary negotiation. Just walk in and set it on the table, but don't look at it or acknowledge it in any way, and see how things go. Of course, if your employer does not have a sense of humor, you might find yourself looking for work elsewhere.

Oh, the fine print: "Crossbows, Bolts and Compound Bows cannot be shipped to NC; D.C.; MA; Canada or Puerto Rico." Man, our state is no fun at all. Guess I'll just have to have the package sent to my mom's address in RI.

(Source: SlickDeals.net via Consumerist)

Holding My Water

I don't drink soda, and I've generally had my daily allotment of coffee by 11 AM, so I tend to drink water throughout the day. The easiest way to do this at work is to keep a bottle at my desk filled with the nice chilled, filtered water we have available in the kitchen.

Until recently, I would buy a one-liter bottle of Aquafina and reuse the bottle for a couple of months. (I like the Aquafina bottles because they have a wider opening, which I find easier to drink from and refill.) However, it was pointed out to me that these bottles are not supposed to be reused for extended periods of time because they will probably give me cancer or some other unpleasant disease, so I decided to get something more suitable.

Let me say here that I am not an outdoor person. I think most of you have already realized this, but I would seriously rather listen to John Mayer, Jack Johnson, and Dave Matthews on a continuous loop than spend a night in a tent, so I don't often find myself in REI or EMS or any of the other places where outdoorsy people buy their water bottles. I see people carrying water bottles all the time, but it's just not something I had paid any attention to before.

One of my coworkers has an eye-catching aluminum bottle made by a Swiss company called Sigg. I had never heard of them, but apparently this is what all the cool kids are using now. I stumbled across some for sale last week at Whole Foods (still not a place we shop regularly, but sometimes we go there for chicken salad from their deli counter) and was shocked to learn that these things cost $20-22. For a bottle? I know everything is expensive these days, and I imagine these would cost more to produce than plastic bottles, but it just seems excessive. I guess you're paying for that precision Swiss manufacturing, just like with a watch.

I took a look on eBay, and there were plenty of bottles available. Most seemed to be going for full retail, which doesn't make much sense. If you're bidding on an item on eBay and end up paying the same as what you'd pay in a store, plus shipping, you're missing the point. And anyway I felt that bidding on a metal bottle was kind of a waste of my time.

Over the weekend I happened to be at the L.L. Bean store in Burlington, where I saw the same pricey metal bottles, as well as the more traditional plastic Nalgene bottles for $9. Fortunately the whole BPA thing has already played out, and the manufacturers have introduced reformulated bottles (with a big sticker that says "Now BPA-Free!").

Maybe it's just me, but I still think $9 is too much for a water bottle, but at least the Nalgene bottles are made in the United States. I probably should have checked in Target or CVS, but I did not feel like devoting more time and energy to this task, so I bought one. It's swell, I guess. The water tastes fine, but the price of the bottle leaves a bad taste in my mouth.

Holiday Weekend: The Lazy Edition

Did everyone have a nice holiday weekend? I hadn't planned on being completely absent from posting, but when you get into the "rhythm" of doing nothing for a couple of days, it's all too easy to forget about things like blogs, or laundry, or household chores.

We are not trek-to-the-Esplanade people, so we spent most of the Fourth just hanging around the house. I made it an even lazier day by sleeping until a bit past 11 AM, after having gotten up around 8 to walk the dog. As soon as my feet hit the floor I thought, "I'm going to try to go back to sleep when I'm done walking her." I don't usually sleep so late on my days off, but I never get enough sleep during the work week, so I'm on a constant sleep deficit, as I imagine most people are, and I guess it just caught up with me.

In the evening we met a friend of the Mrs. at the Showcase in Revere and saw the action flick Wanted. It will never be mistaken for a great movie, but it's plenty entertaining and has some really impressive stunts and action sequences, and sometimes that's more than enough. If you're any kind of fan of the action genre, you'll enjoy it. Saturday was more or less a repeat of Friday, except I didn't sleep quite as late, we saw a different movie (Forgetting Sarah Marshall) at a different theater (the Capitol in Arlington), and no one joined us.

Yesterday we met a couple of the Mrs.' former coworkers for breakfast at SoundBites, then we did some errands and shopping. We left the house fairly early and were gone all day, until almost dinner time. It was weird to be up and out so early on a Sunday, since it's not our usual style. Each time I looked at my watch during the afternoon, I expected it to be about two hours later than it was.

Today it's back to the reality of work, laundry, and household chores. When's the next holiday?

Seasonal Attire

My bus route seems to carry a fairly diverse cross-section of the local population, but I don't see too many men in full business dress, especially in the summer. When I got on the bus this morning, there was a guy sitting near the back wearing a light tan suit, light blue dress shirt, and a striped tie. He looked fairly put-together, in spite of the summer warmth.

I sat down across from him, and noticed that he was also wearing a pair of flip-flops, in almost the same color as his suit. He was holding some sort of bag, which probably contained his office shoes, but who knows? Maybe his employer has a peculiar seasonal dress code that still requires suits and ties but allows summer footwear. Maybe it was "flip-flop day," in the vein of the "Hawaiian shirt day" in that minor classic, Office Space.

Fortunately my job has a very relaxed dress code, so I spend the summer wearing shorts and sneakers to work. But if I did have a job where I had to dress up year-round, I think in warm weather I would carry my office clothes with me and change when I got to work. Riding the T is just too unpredictable; most of the buses have air conditioning these days, but it doesn't always work that well: on my way home last night, for example, the bus's AC was blasting, but for whatever reason it wasn't cool inside the bus. And every now and then I get on a subway car without working AC. In a suit, dress shirt, and tie, you could end up drenched in sweat by the time you got to work, which is not a good way to start the day, and probably wouldn't go over too well with your coworkers either.

Orthographically Yours

Dear Simon & Schuster,

I saw the very pretty full-page color advertisement for Chasing Darkness, Robert Crais's new Elvis Cole thriller, that you placed in today's New York Times. Good stuff. Usually I just skip over these things (last week I think there was one for James Patterson's new book, but who reads his books anyway?), but this caught my eye. I have to confess that I have not managed to get around to reading the Elvis Cole series, but I know that the books have generally received good reviews, and I do enjoy a good mystery, so I'm sure I'll get to them someday.

I hate to nitpick, but there is something I feel I have to bring to your attention. The ad copy makes reference to "a series of grizzly deaths." Really? How terrible. How many grizzlies died? Oh wait, did you mean "a series of grisly deaths"? Yeah, because that's something kind of different. Somebody over there in marketing screwed up big-time, huh? Damn that spell checker in Word. It's smart enough to know if you've spelled a word correctly, but not smart enough to know which correct spelling is the right one for a given sentence.

And none of those bright, shiny employees of yours caught the error, eh? Embarrassing. You do have people who proofread these things, right? I work in publishing, so I know how it is. Stuff needs to be right before it goes to the printer, or you can end up looking pretty stupid. I know a couple of people who are good at this sort of thing that are looking for work, so if you need some help in that area, just let me know. Have a nice day.

Your intrepid blogger,
Some Assembly Required

Ow

We had a decent weekend. Went to see the Indiana Jones movie Saturday evening, which I mostly enjoyed, except for the ending. I'm not going to give anything away, but a big chunk of the action is based on a premise that turns out to be a little, well, stupid. Maybe that isn't the right word. How about "ridiculous"? But hey, the Somerville Theatre now sells Richardson's ice cream, and boasts a satellite location of the Museum of Bad Art as well.

Yesterday we went to a barbecue. Normally I would not have even ventured outdoors in such unpleasantly muggy weather, but this is a once-a-year event and worth a little discomfort. Everyone positioned their chairs so that we were sitting in a shaded area adjacent to the hosts' garage. But being in the shade was not really the same as being out of the sun, and last night the Mrs. said to me, "Your head got sunburned."

When I got up this morning, it was obvious that my forearms and the tops of my knees had also been burned. I had meant to bring both a hat and some sunscreen, but in our haste to get ready and leave the house, I forgot both. I really should know better, because I've had to protect myself from the sun my whole life. Hopefully a couple of days of painful hair brushing is all I'll have to endure.

Nap Time

Last night, I was coming home from work on the Orange line, as usual. I was reading my paper and not paying much attention to anything else. There was an empty seat to my left that was filled at State by a guy who looked to be around 30, wearing typical office attire.

As we left North Station and started up the grade to come above ground, the guy's weight shifted and he kind of leaned into me a little. When we finished ascending the grade and leveled off, he was still leaning on me. He was a fairly tall guy, so the weight pressing on me was not insubstantial, and even though the AC was on, it wasn't that comfortable in the subway car. I very gently pushed against his right shoulder with my left one, to try to get him to shift his weight off me, but it didn't work. Shortly after that, the train made a bit of a lurch, and the guy abruptly lifted his head and shifted so that he was no longer leaning on me. That's when I realized that he had been asleep.

Between Community College and Wellington, he dozed off three or four more times for maybe 20 to 30 seconds at a time. Each time he would jerk back awake and lift his head, seemingly fighting the urge to catch a quick T nap. When I got up to leave, I wondered what would happen. With no one sitting next to him, would his next doze send him slumping over sideways? Would he wake up at Oak Grove and realize that he'd meant to get off at Malden Center?

Apple Slice

We had a good time on our trip to New York. Getting there and getting home was much less traumatic than last year, when we were stuck in traffic so bad that we opted to exit the highway and work our way to Manhattan via surface streets in the Bronx. But last year we were trying to get into the city on a Friday evening, and this time we did it early on Saturday afternoon, which made a big difference. We still hit a bit of a slowdown in the same area of the Bronx as last year, but things opened up again pretty quickly and we made excellent time overall.

As much as we enjoy visiting New York, we also enjoy coming home. I don't really want to stoke the old rivalry, but everything about New York is just so... to the nth degree, I guess. On the sidewalks and streets, there is no such thing as personal space. No one will move out of your way, for any reason. Tables in restaurants are about six inches apart. I'm not complaining, it just takes some getting used to. I'm sure that if I had ended up living there, I would have gotten along fine. I'm even starting to feel like I have a decent grasp of the subway system, after only a decade or so of regular visits.

We stayed way downtown again, right around the corner from Wall Street. I like it downtown, especially on weekends. It's quiet. I think I feel this way about lower Manhattan because it reminds me of downtown Boston. The streets go in all directions; no one had yet bothered laying them out on a grid. You can walk around with a bit more room, without having to elbow people off you. The streets are easier to cross because they're very narrow, and many of them were blocked off to vehicles.

We never went above 14th Street on this visit, preferring to stick to the Village and Soho and downtown, the older parts of the city. And for us, a visit to New York would not be complete without a stop at Junior's in Brooklyn for breakfast, and cheesecake to bring home. It's the kind of place that makes you feel like a local, even if you're just stopping by on your way home.

We're Off...

We're off to New York for a few days. Gotta drop off the dog at "camp" (aka my mother's house) on the way. More when I return...

Jesus Lights Our Way

The picture to the right is our Jesus night light. (Sorry for the lousy pic, but it was not easy to photograph.) It's been lighting our bathroom for well over a decade. The Mrs. found it in a long-gone dollar store in the Twin City Plaza near Lechmere, and ended up buying several more to give to friends. If I remember correctly, they came in pastel blue and pink, as well as the white we have.

You might ask why we have such a thing, and your question would certainly be justified. I guess the best answer I can offer is, why not? We are not religiously observant, and we're not really into kitsch as a decorating theme, so I guess it's a little touch of oddity for its own sake. We just thought it was so peculiar that we needed to have it in our lives. The base part that holds the bulb is not even original; that burned out years ago, but fortunately the plastic Savior part fit onto a standard night light base, so His light could keep on shining.

When I look at it, I wonder why someone thought it was a good idea to make them at all. How did they end up in a strip-mall dollar store? Were they originally manufactured to be sold in a religious store, like that one that used to be downtown behind Macy's (does anyone know if that place is still there?), or were they destined for the dollar stores from the moment the hot plastic hit the mold?

Back when I was first thinking about starting a blog, one of the things that held me up (besides mustering sufficient motivation) was coming up with a satisfying name. One day I was wandering around the house, hoping for inspiration to bump into me. I walked into the bathroom and looked at the night light. For a moment I wanted to call the blog The Jesus Night Light, which is why I took that picture in the first place. I still like that name, but I was afraid that people would misinterpret it, either taking it too seriously or taking offense at it, so I moved on, for better or worse. But I thought it was time to share what could have been.

Bonus!

Today there was an envelope in my mailbox at work. There's rarely anything in there, and this was on office stationery, with my name and address printed on it, so I was a bit puzzled as to what it could be.

It turned out to be a letter from our two top bosses, informing me that I will be receiving a bonus with this week's paycheck. I had known that the company awards bonuses, and that they would be announced near the end of the fiscal year, but I was not hired as a full-time employee until a year ago; before that, I was here for almost 18 months through an agency on an ongoing temp assignment. So until this year I was not eligible for a bonus, and I had more or less forgotten about it.

I thought a worker bee like myself might get maybe a couple hundred dollars, but it turned out to be significantly more, and certainly more than I would have expected. This is the first time in my entire career that I've ever received a cash bonus. I used to get jealous around Christmas when I would hear about the bonuses my friends and family members got. Over the years I've received my share of company-logo-embroidered hats and fleece clothing; I've gotten paid time off; I've received gift cards and gift checks, and there were plenty of years when I got nothing more than a "Merry Christmas!" from a manager.

So this is kind of a big deal, and needless to say, I'm quite pleased. I don't even care that it's not happening at the holidays. In fact, the timing is really good, because the Mrs. and I are going to New York this weekend, and this way we can enjoy ourselves without guilt, and maybe even splurge a little. We're already being sensible by banking our tax refunds and the forthcoming stimulus check, so this time we're going to have a little fun.

How I Spent My Weekend Doing Nothing

The Mrs. went away on Friday to attend a close friend's baby shower, and she's due back later today. So what did I do with my weekend of freedom? Pretty much nothing. (Obviously I didn't post any new blog entries.) I mean, I cleaned up the kitchen so it would look tidy and presentable when she gets home, and I did some laundry yesterday, but other than that, I more or less watched movies of questionable quality for the better part of the past three days.

It's not like I haven't seen True Lies or Paycheck before. I've also seen Eraser, but I watched about half of that again too, fully aware that it's one of the most preposterously implausible movies ever made. I managed to lift my butt out of the chair long enough to walk the dog a couple of times, and to go to the Italian deli down the street for a salad and an order of chicken, ziti, and broccoli, which was more than enough food for Saturday's and Sunday's supper.

But it wasn't all drivel. I also watched the Beatles biopic Backbeat, which I had not seen since it came out in 1994. It's certainly several notches above those other movies in quality. And I watched Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, because it was on and because I don't think I'd seen it since it came out either. I have not seen the new one yet, so I figured this would get me in the mood. And the modern Ocean's Eleven is one of those movies I can watch over and over, any time it's on. Since by now I know the movie by heart, it's fun to step back and watch the assortment of techniques, lighting, and camera angles employed by Steven Soderbergh, or count the scenes where Brad Pitt's Rusty is eating something.

I watched an oldie from 1975, The Killer Elite, which was directed by Sam Peckinpah and stars James Caan and Robert Duvall. It's ostensibly an action movie about two friends who work for a shadowy organization that does things like contract killings for the CIA. There's definitely action, but by today's standards the movie chugs along for slightly more than two hours with lots of character and story exposition, occasionally interrupted by a gunfight, car chase, or hand-to-hand martial arts battle.

It was interesting, but I wouldn't exactly say I enjoyed it. I got the feeling Peckinpah was trying to evoke or mimic the Dirty Harry movies, due to the San Francisco setting and blunt violence, but without their social commentary or anything close to Eastwood's charisma, it felt like a curiosity, a cultural artifact, like finding a perfectly working 8-track machine at a yard sale: kind of cool once, but definitely outdated now.

Multitasking

I notice that I've done a number of posts about strange things that happen in the restroom at work. Well, here's another one...

I just witnessed someone brushing his teeth while taking a leak. I mean, that is so many kinds of gross and disgusting I don't even want to contemplate it. But I still had to share it with you, my loyal readers.

Iced

I have my issues with the cafeteria at work, which I've previously mentioned. But the coffee is consistently good (though they frequently seem to run out of the blend I prefer, so I suspect it's the favorite of a lot of other people as well), and if you bring a travel cup (instead of using and discarding a new cup, lid, and heat sleeve every day), they give a pretty generous discount off the regular price, and it's obviously better for the environment.

Now that we're in the firm, sweaty grip of the heat and humidity, my thoughts naturally turn to the refreshment of iced coffee. Once I asked the worker who makes and tends to the coffee why the cafeteria did not offer iced coffee. He told me that they had tried offering it a couple of years ago, but it didn't work out. He was vague on the details, so I just left it at that.

This morning I went to get my coffee as usual, and as I entered the serving area, I said hi to the coffee guy. He returned my greeting and pointed at the coffee urns, which at that point were behind me, and said, "We have iced coffee." I guess they decided to try again, so I figured I should at least give it a shot and see if it was decent.

I picked up a cup and looked around, but there was no ice anywhere. I thought that was a little odd; you can hardly call your coffee iced if it isn't chilled by ice cubes. (This was probably one of those vague details about why serving iced coffee did not work out before.) For a moment I was worried that the coffee in the new urn would be hot, or warm. But it was really more like slightly cooler than room temperature. Since I knew we had ice cubes in our office kitchen's fridge, I decided to forge ahead.

The coffee turned out to be okay, but not great. I may have added a little too much cream, but I think really it wasn't brewed as strongly as iced coffee should be. I'll try it one more time before giving up on it. But if I do decide to keep getting it, I'm going to need a bigger travel cup.

Smile

This is kind of stupid, but I went to the dentist today for my regular cleaning and check-up, and the hygenist told me that I had a lot less plaque on my teeth than on my previous visit. I mentioned that I had been paying more attention to what I eat, and I've been having salad for lunch a lot. She said that vegetables and roughage work naturally to clean plaque from the teeth, so that may have helped. It's such a tiny thing, but it's nice to have some independent semi-confirmation that you are doing something that's good for you.

I'm also considering getting braces, something I've wanted to do my whole life. My teeth have always been crooked, but when I was growing up, my parents did not have the money for me to have orthodontia, and then a little later it was get braces or go to parochial high school, and my parents decided on my behalf that they felt my education was more important. My dentist deals specifically with adult braces, and the mechanics have advanced quite a bit--no more rubber bands, no more sharp edges on the metal, fewer office visits spaced farther apart. And my insurance will pay for some of it, so it will take some of the financial sting out ot it.

No Cameras Allowed

Our friend Sunny got us a pass to see the preview screening of the new Adam Sandler comedy You Don't Mess with the Zohan. The showing was last night at the big multiplex across from Boston Common. The movie started at 7, so the Mrs. and I agreed to meet in front of the theater. I arrived around 6:10, and she arrived about ten minutes later.

We went inside and upstairs to where the line had formed. The staff was already letting people into the theater, so we didn't have to wait too long, but it did seem that the line was moving rather slowly. As we got closer, we heard a voice saying, "Please have your cellphones out and turned off." The Mrs. thought they were just going to check our phones to see that they were in fact turned off, but I realized that they were collecting everyone's phones in an attempt to prevent illegal copying of the movie.

I haven't been to a preview screening in a long time; I think the last one we went to was the first Harold & Kumar movie back in 2004, and things have changed a lot since then. Not only do most people now have a cellphone with a camera, but many of those cameras can record video, and there are other types of video cameras that are small enough to be easily concealed.

The guy behind us in line grumbled to his companion, "What's the big deal? The movie's going to be out tomorrow." But with the right equipment and a fast internet connection, a pirated copy of the movie could be online an hour or so after the screening ended, or copied onto DVDs a couple of hours later, so to the movie studios, the potential lost revenue is kind of a big deal. (I'm not necessarily defending the studios' general business practices, but I do think they have the right to protect their copyrighted material.)

We surrendered our phones and were given tickets that matched up with numbered brown paper bags arranged on tables. We went into the theater and discovered that the upper section, with the more viewer-friendly stadium seating, was already filled. There was no place in that whole section with two adjacent available seats. The first two rows were empty but reserved, presumably for reviewers and assorted "VIPs." That was a total of about 50 seats, and I couldn't help but wonder if it was really necessary to hold aside so many seats at such an event.

The five rows in the forward section of the theater were nearly empty, because most people understandably don't like to sit so close to the screen. Given the choice of sitting there or not seeing the movie, I was content to sit close, but the Mrs. wasn't. I took a spot in the last row of the front section, and I thought at least she would sit down with me to see if the viewing position was tolerable, but she was already somewhat irritated by the whole scenario, so she left. I felt badly about it, but it was her choice.

And the movie? Good, not great. Could have been a little tighter and thus a little shorter, and the last 20 minutes were kind of a limp across the finish line, but the basic conceit--Sandler as an Israeli superspy who is tired of war and violence and just wants to be a hair stylist--works, and there are quite a few good laughs and funny bits. And since it is an Adam Sandler movie, of course it has the general air of pervasive raunchiness for which he's known, so if you like that sort of thing, you'll probably have a good time.

Indian Food in Medford!

The Boston/Cambridge/Somerville/Arlington area has many fine Indian restaurants, but once you cross over from Somerville to Medford, there are none to be found. When we moved two years ago, we were surprised by this, especially considering that the Salem Street corridor from the Fellsway to Medford Square has all kinds of food places. But if you stop to look, most of those are sub & pizza joints, with a couple of Chinese places thrown in.

We have been satisfying our cravings by going over to India Palace in Union Square, or Passage to India in Porter Square. So we were pleased to notice that recently an Indian place by the name of Kabab Corner had opened in the Wellington Circle Plaza, behind the CVS. Now, this is barely in Medford, but it's very convenient to our house, so tonight we decided to get take-out, on the theory that if we liked it, we would go back for a sit-down meal.

Our initial impression is that it's quite good. We shared an order of aloo naan, which had a thin layer of mashed potato inside the bread; kabab samosas, with ground lamb and peas; and garlic lemon chicken, which was cooked in the tandoori oven. The chicken was served on a bed of cucumbers, onions, and tomatoes, which was a nice touch. Everything tasted fresh and was well-prepared. The staff invited us to sit at a table while we waited, and brought us glasses of water.

The location is a bit less than obvious, but I did notice that sign boards announcing the restaurant had been placed on the edges of the parking lot on both the route 28 and route 16 sides, so hopefully word will spread and the place will get reviewed by the Globe or the Phoenix. I'm doing my bit by mentioning it here. And hey, there's plenty of free parking. Tell your friends.

Breakfast, with Insult on the Side

Today the Mrs. and I went to have breakfast at the Ball Square Cafe, where SoundBites used to be before moving next door. If I understand the story correctly, the newer place was opened by a guy who used to be a cook at SoundBites. We've been there twice now, and we like the food.

Today, though, I had a weird encounter with the owner. I was pouring cream into my coffee, and I was bent over looking at it closely in order not to spill it. The owner walked by behind me and said, "Looks like you're analyzing it. What are you, a scientist or something?"

Those of you who know me, and those of you who have been reading for a while, know that I have poor vision, and that I often have to get up close to things to see what I'm doing. Also, I'm a bit touchy about it, having endured people's ignorant comments all my life. As I went back to my seat, I stopped and said to the owner, "I happen to be legally blind, which is why I was bent over so close to the cup, so I don't appreciate your comment."

First he apologized, which was fine. But then he kept talking, which in such a situation is usually the wrong choice. He first tried to minimize the offense by saying that he was just kidding around, and anything he says should be taken with a grain of salt. Then, because I was ignoring him, he kept going, and tried to turn it back on me, basically saying that it was my fault for being so sensitive about it.

The Mrs. asked me if I wanted to leave, and I said no. I was hungry, and I wasn't going to give him the satisfaction of walking out in a huff. I was going to sit there and eat, and hopefully continue to make him uncomfortable about what he'd said.

I don't know what comes over people sometimes. It's one thing to see a situation and think such a comment to yourself, but to say it out loud, in a public place, is a whole other level of rudeness and ignorance. The lack of basic human respect just blows my mind. And I would have been just as upset if I had seen it happen to someone else. There's simply no excuse for that sort of behavior.

Live Music Alert

Our friend Dave's band, The Rationales, is having a CD release show this Friday at TT the Bear's in Cambridge. Last time I managed only one day's notice before the show, so now I have doubled that.

Their sound is, by their description, "roots-influenced American rock mixed with a dose of power pop energy and a sense of indie experimentation." The songs on their MySpace page are a sampling, but in my opinion their sound really comes together live. It's sure to be a good rockin' show, and according to the TT's calendar, they are playing at 9, so you can make it part of a multi-stop evening if you wish. I hope you'll consider coming out to support the guys.

Playing Dress-Up

Now that the phone is working properly again, I can turn my attention to other things. Over the long weekend, in between a vet visit for the dog (ear problem, since resolved), having drinks to celebrate the end of a friend's unpleasant tenure at a job, going to the movies, and driving to Rhode Island for clam cakes and Del's frozen lemonade, I've been catching up on some sections of the newspaper that I hadn't had time to read.

The New York Times's Thursday Style section usually has at least one article that interests me. Sometimes I read things just to make a pretense of keeping up with what some editor thinks is culturally significant--last week's article about steampunk, for example. I've been aware of this fashion/style movement for some time, and I really couldn't care less about people's neo-Edwardian hot-air balloon fantasies, but you never know when someone might mention it at a party and, having read the article, I might manage to say something halfway intelligent about it.

This past Thursday's lead Style article was about the contrasting visions of menswear designers Tom Ford (formerly of Gucci, now running his own label) and Thom Browne (formerly a design director at Club Monaco, now running his own label and also designing a line for Brooks Brothers), though really it was mostly about Browne. Browne's clothing follows what might charitably be described as the Pee-Wee Herman aesthetic: very tight-fitting suits with shrunken jackets that fail to cover one's bottom, and pants that stop a couple of inches above one's shoes.

The author of the article raises a question that has been on my mind since I first saw some of Browne's designs in GQ a few years back: who exactly wears these clothes? Very few men could pull off such a mannered look to begin with, and if you were to wear such a suit in a traditional business environment, say a law firm or a brokerage where men are still expected to dress in suits, I suspect your colleagues would laugh you out of the office.

I suppose it could work for men who work in the fashion industry, and that clever catch-all, "creative types" (art directors, movie producers). But it's far, far removed from the average man's reality. Say you need a new suit to attend a wedding. Even if you're willing and able to drop $4,000 for one of Browne's suits, do you think your significant other is going to let you show up at such an event looking like you raided your nephew's closet at the last minute? And if you have that kind of money to spend, wouldn't you be more likely to have something custom-made for you? I certainly would.

I don't mean to knock Browne personally; for all I know he's a super-nice guy, and obviously he's a pretty sharp businessman, and I give him credit for trying to get American men to start dressing up again. But if he presented his ideas in clothing that was just a bit less extreme (see Ralph Lauren's Black Label line), I bet he would attract a wider audience. I predict that we're going to be seeing a lot of clothing designs influenced by last summer's retro-tastic TV show Mad Men. Set in 1960, the men all wear snappy Rat Pack suits with narrow lapels and narrow trouser legs, but the suit jackets are still the proper butt-covering length (which helps shorter men look taller, by the way) and their pants still manage to properly reach their shoes.

Even so, Browne's influence is being felt in men's fashion. Take a look around next time you go shopping; mainstream men's clothing retailers have slimmed down their patterns, or at least started offering a choice of fits. Slimmer-fit clothing is swell for younger guys, but when you get into your 40s, even if you are fit and trim, comfort is synonymous with freedom of movement, and an extra inch or two of fabric in a shirt or a pair of khakis can make a big difference in terms of everyday comfort.

At the opposite end of the spectrum, Ford's designs are meant to evoke an image of old Hollywood glamor blended with old English nattiness. I have less of an issue with this sort of style, although once again it is distant from the reality of how most men dress, though perhaps less so than Browne's. Men who like to dress up even when they are not working can probably find clothing they will appreciate in Ford's line. The rest of us will keep looking, and when it's time for that wedding suit, we'll probably just go to the nearest midrange department store and hope the clerk has a clue.

Hello?

Our home phone works again. (And there was much rejoicing...)

Yeesh, what an annoying slog it's been, mostly in order to save money. But of course, time is money too. During the course of this problem, I considered various options, like ditching Vonage and going back to having phone service through Comcast, or even going back to Verizon, but for me, the bottom line is the bottom line: I am not at the point where I am willing to go without a home phone line, and the Vonage service provides us with that line at the lowest monthly cost (short of Skype, which is a little too geektastic for me) with the fewest restrictions.

I want to give due credit to Vonage's customer service. The rep I dealt with, a guy named Kim, handled my case from my initial call through to its resolution. He made it his business to ensure that my problem was resolved to my satisfaction. He called me back several times at various stages of the process to update me, and even contacted the previous owner of the adapter I had bought on eBay in order to confirm that he had sold the device to me (a step required by Vonage before the device could be reassigned to me). I am grateful for his dedication, but I hope I don't have to go through anything like this again.

Not Quite Yet...

Well, the Vonage guy offered to call me back, instead of having me sit there on hold, listening to their horrible music loop (same song, over and over). So that was nice. Of course, it will take about 24 hours for their engineers to effect this massively complicated transfer. Who knows, maybe it really is complicated. And maybe by tomorrow night, our home phone will work again.

Phone Progress

So, I contacted the person who sold me that Vonage adapter, and it turns out he was the person who had originally activated it. I didn't really think I would get that lucky, but he was able to contact Vonage and deactivate the device from his account. Now I am on hold with Vonage as they root around and try to make it work on my account. Fingers crossed...

Some Band from England

My sister is in town for the weekend to do the Avon Walk for Breast Cancer, so last night after work, I met her and her best friend and walking partner at Joe's American Bar and Grill on Newbury Street to have a couple of drinks. The Mrs. joined us after getting the dog squared away. Eventually my sister and her friend headed back to their hotel, because they had to get up really freakin' early to get the shuttle to where the walk starts. The Mrs. and I decided to stay and eat dinner at the downstairs bar.

A while later a few guys came in who appeared to be regulars. The bartender, who looked to be around twenty-five or so, knew their names, and chatted with them for a few moments. When we were almost done, he came back down to our end of the bar and said to one of them, "Who does that 'USSR' song?" The regular said, "You mean the Beatles?" "Yeah, that's the one." A few seconds later, "Back in the USSR" started playing, and I figured out that they were talking about the jukebox.

Ladies and gentlemen, I give you... the generation gap, '00s style.

Phone Hell

My saga of phone insanity just keeps getting better worse stupider. The Vonage adapter I bought on eBay arrived within two days, which was great. But I could not get it to properly configure itself so the phone line worked. Yesterday I was poking around the support area of the Vonage web site (on my lunch break, okay?) and I realized that I had missed a step. All the adapters have an alphanumeric code on the bottom which must be entered so the adapter is "assigned" to your phone line, and I had completely forgotten about that.

When I got home last night, I immediately went to Vonage's site to enter the code. I received a message saying it was not a valid code, so I called customer service. Yes, Vonage has actual, living, sentient humans who offer tech support, and as near as I can tell, they are not in India. (Instead of numeric menu options, you have to wade through a few minutes of an insipid "helper" voice that can only be parsed by speaking your requests. I hate these things, but that's a topic for another time.)

The guy I talked to sounded like he was from South Carolina. It turned out that the adapter I'd just bought on eBay is still assigned to another person's account. Whoever that person is doesn't owe Vonage any money, but their account is still considered active, so there is no way I can use this adapter on it unless the person cancels their service or deactivates this device. Yay. Of course, Vonage will not contact that customer on my behalf, and they certainly will not give me the person's contact info.

How does this happen? I'm guessing, but I think I know. The adapter appeared to be unused, with everything wrapped in plastic and packed... in a plain white box. Electronics and computer products in plain boxes usually indicate one of two things: either it's an OEM product (sort of like wholesale, like if you get a cable modem or DVR from your cable company, they get it from whoever makes it in a plain box, versus retail packaging) or, more likely in my situation, a refurb product. Refurbs get repackaged and resold in plain boxes. I don't know how the seller acquired this one, but he also claimed it was unused, so either he didn't know, or he lied.

I have contacted him, not to ask for a refund, but to see if he happens to know the person he got this adapter from. I don't really care about the money, because it was only a few bucks, but if he does know who was using it before, there might be a chance of getting that person to deactivate their account, or at least this device. Long shot, I know, and I doubt I'll get any results that way. But I have to try, that's just how I am. And maybe I'll help prevent someone else from making the mistake I've made.

(Still) Hanging on the Line

So, the phone saga continues. On Monday, four days after I bought the replacement Vonage phone on eBay, I got an email from PayPal saying that my payment had been refunded, with a note from the seller reading "sorry I ran out." (His auction was for multiple units of the same product.)

Having had a few days to think about it, I decided I did not want another one of the same phone, since it had died after slightly less than two years. I decided to buy one of the Vonage adapter boxes that I could plug any telephone into. I think this makes more sense for a long-term solution because someday, hopefully, the FIOS service (TV, internet, and phone through fiber optic cable) is going to be available where we live, and I would be inclined to get it, which would mean going back to using the phone jacks, and I would have to replace the special Vonage phones at that point anyway.

Anyone want to buy a couple of Vonage extension handsets, cheap?

Hanging on the Line

When we were getting ready to move two years ago, we had to decide whether or not we wanted to continue to have a home phone line, and if so, what kind. For years we'd had regular phone service with Verizon, but a couple of years prior to the move I had switched the line to Comcast, because we already had cable TV and internet and getting phone service in a bundled package from them was cheaper than what we were paying Verizon.

I had heard about Vonage and the other internet phone services being offered and decided to look into it. Vonage pushes its $25-a-month unlimited service, but if you look around a little on their site, you'll find that they also offer a less expensive plan. It's kind of like cell phone service: it offers 500 minutes per month with calling to anywhere in the US, and no charge for incoming calls, for $15 per month plus tax.

With Vonage, you need at least one piece of special equipment to put between your telephone and your internet connection. At the time they were giving away the basic box, but there was also a two-handset cordless phone system that uses the 5.8 GHz frequency, which plays much more nicely with home wireless networks than older 2.4 GHz phones like the one we had, which can cause interference. It was only $30 after a rebate, so I bought it.

Since we were probably going to end up buying a new 5.8 GHz phone anyway, it seemed to make more sense to solve both problems at the same time, and we could put one handset at either end of the apartment. The service was fine. There were times when there was a little static on the "line" when I made a call, but everything worked as it was supposed to. In the event of a power failure, you can set it up so calls automatically get forwarded to another number.

When we got back from our vacation a couple of weeks ago, the indicator light on the base station was out. The light is usually green, blinks if there's a voicemail, and turns red if the internet connection is lost. But I had never seen the light not on. The handsets were fine, but there was no dial tone. That meant that either the base unit or its power supply had bitten it. Vonage wasn't going to be any help, because it's not their device, it's only a device that works on their service. I rooted around on the web site of the phone manufacturer in a vain hope that they might sell spare power supplies.

Meanwhile calls were being forwarded from the home number to my cell phone. They were usually calls for the Mrs., and callers would invariably say, "Oh, what are you doing home?" I would have to explain that although I was not actually at home, I was answering the home line. Or it would be a message about a doctor's appointment, and I would have to call the Mrs. on her cell phone and relay the info, or attempt to. I could have changed the forwarding to her line, but she has a tendency to turn off her cell phone's ringer, so she might have missed the forwarded calls anyway; she misses most of my calls. I suppose at least then she would have the voicemail messages on her cell line.

After considering a couple of options, I broke down and went on eBay to buy another base station set. It comes with one handset, which I don't need, but with this sort of track record for the base unit, who knows? This way I can figure out which piece is dead and swap it out. The $20 is probably close to what I would have paid for just a power supply, not knowing if that was in fact the dead part. But this is all naggingly complicated compared to the old days when you just plugged your phone into a jack in the wall.

What?

I got to hear a sampling of the new Madonna album this morning, courtesy of the young woman sitting across the aisle from me on the bus. Yes, she had her music turned up so loud that, for the second time recently, I could identify the artist from the tinny, muffled overflow coming from someone else's headphones several feet away.

Once again, I'm astonished at how loudly people listen to their music. I'm not such an old geezer that I can't stand listening to music above library volume, but this sort of thing is just plain unsafe. I want to assume that people know better, but I'm not so sure.

A Celebrity Sighting

The Mrs. and I had a night out on Saturday. Her birthday is coming up, so for a slightly early present, I had gotten us tickets to see Kathy Griffin at Symphony Hall. I know she's one of those performers that people either really enjoy or can't stand, and I totally get why that is. We count ourselves in the first category. The show was hilarious, and there's no way I could do justice to it by trying to summarize or paraphrase any of her stories, but I will say that her observations tend to be on target.

We arrived fairly early, due to the need to build in enough time to find a parking spot. A Saturday night Red Sox home game made things a little more tricky, but we prevailed (tip: try Columbus Ave. west of Mass. Ave.). The show started fairly early, even though there was no later show scheduled, so we decided to go inside and have a drink, and wait until afterward to eat.

We got our drinks but all the tables were occupied, so we stood to the side of the bar, where we were out of the flow of patrons and would not have to move unless the bartender needed to come out from behind the bar, which was unlikely due to the brisk business he was doing. (I did not know that Symphony Hall had full bar service, it's a nice amenity.) We were positioned in such a way that we were looking across the corner of the bar to where other patrons were ordering their drinks. I was kind of looking around, people-watching, when the Mrs. grabbed my arm, pulled my ear down closer to her mouth, and said, "Ricky Gervais is standing right in front of us."

I looked across the bar, and he was maybe six feet away, waiting for his drink. My wife said, "I couldn't think of anything clever or interesting to say, and I don't think he would have wanted to be approached anyway." He was definitely giving off a vibe of wanting to blend in and not be noticed. As soon as he got his drink, he and the two people he was with slunk away to a far corner. Of course, they managed to find an empty table.

I seem to remember hearing that Gervais is working on a movie up in Lowell, and Kathy Griffin performed in Lowell on Thursday night, so you'd think he would have caught one of those shows. Maybe he was too busy, or maybe he's staying in Boston and traveling back and forth to the set every day. Probably not on the commuter rail, though.

The Cost of Change

I didn't do any shopping while we were in California. I mean, I shopped, but I didn't buy anything, other than a pound of coffee beans. Downtown Santa Cruz is one of those places that is valiantly resisting being homogenized into resembling every other urban shopping strip in our country, and while I applaud that spirit, the stores tend to be aimed at a customer base somewhat younger than me.

The downtown area of Pacific Avenue has an excellent independent bookstore, one of the best I have found anywhere. Interestingly, Borders has taken aim at them and installed a branch a few blocks down the street. I did not go into the Borders, but I was in Bookshop Santa Cruz for about 45 minutes, and it seemed as busy as it always has, which is good. I suspect the Borders will pick up some business from tourists, but BSC will keep on serving the locals, the students, and those like us who prefer to support independent businesses.

Not surprisingly, the clothing stores along the street tend to reflect the lifestyles and pursuits of the people who live in the area, so there's plenty of outdoorsy stuff for hiking and backpacking, and several stores that sell a version of the surfer style that's persisting out there on the other coast. Neither of these has any interest for me. There is a good Patagonia outlet store in Santa Cruz; it's not on the downtown strip, but it's not far away either, and worth a visit if you find yourself there.

As you would expect in a city like Santa Cruz, there are lots of little galleries, craft boutiques, and one or two examples of what used to be called head shops when I was a kid. But over the course of several visits, I have noticed that the downtown is starting to change. There's a lot of construction going on. Buildings are being converted to condos, and there is also new housing construction happening.

Folks who choose to live in urban areas and who can afford this type of real estate tend to expect certain amenities nearby, and the retail mix has started to shift. In anticipation of the influx of affluent residents, landlords start raising rents for their retail tenants, forcing some independent stores to close or relocate, and gradually they are replaced by national retailers who can afford to be there.

The coffee chains were, naturally, among the first to infiltrate, but as with the bookstores, the indies are holding their own against Starbucks and Peet's. There's now a Gap, which was not there six months ago, and American Apparel, which has been there a bit longer. I actually overheard a teenaged girl say to her friend, "Isn't there a Banana Republic around here?" I wanted to say, "Check back in another six months."

Back Home Again

We're back from California. The trip was good, though the travel was a bit more arduous this time. I know there are plenty of jaded folks who travel all the time on business and have had every possible thing happen to them. It wasn't that bad, but it wasn't great either.

The first leg of our flight, from Green Airport in Rhode Island to Chicago, was one of the bumpiest flights I've ever been on, and we were in a 737, not some little prop-putter (that would come on the way home, ha). I had a crying baby directly in front of me and an extra-wide person to my left whose right thigh was taking up some of my seat as well. Oh, and this was my first time (and if I have any choice in it, my last) flying Southwest, with their charmingly low-rent non-system of not assigning seats, so I got stuck in a middle seat, and the Mrs. got the middle seat directly behind me. When we had arrived at the gate and deciphered Southwest's needlessly arcane boarding sequence, the Mrs. said to me, "I think we could have checked in online and gotten a better spot in the line." Oh.

It was raining in Chicago, so the landing was kinda rough, and it seemed like we were going way too fast when we hit the runway. But that flight was only two hours, so it was over soon enough. After we pushed back from the gate for the remaining leg, the rain kept us sitting on the approach lane for about 25 minutes before we were cleared to take off again, but after that, the rest of the flight to San Jose was mercifully uneventful. We were closer to the front of the boarding line this time, and somehow we were able to score a pair of seats together only five rows back from the exit door, so we were out quickly once we'd reached the gate.

After a brief restroom stop we proceeded downstairs to the baggage claim, and to Southwest's credit, the baggage was already hitting the carousel, and somehow, my bag was among the first dozen or so to emerge from the chute. (The Mrs. had chosen not to check her bag.) Someone was out there hustling those bags off the plane.

San Jose is one of those airports that is constantly under construction, and the rental car facilities, which used to be right in the lower levels of the central parking structure, are now located in a satellite lot. Getting there involves walking the length of the garage, crossing the access road, and getting on a shuttle. The shuttle goes around to the other terminal, then takes a long, leisurely cruise to the far reaches of the airport property, crosses a little bridge, and then cruises for another three minutes or so to get all the way around the outer perimeter of the various lots to pull up to the building with the agencies' service counters. Fortunately, the late hour meant that there was no line, so having touched down at 10:30 PM Pacific time, it was still only 11:00 when we drove off in the rental.

Travel tip: if you are arriving at your destination at a late hour and are picking up a rental car, you're going to get the bottom of the barrel in terms of car choice. I did not fully realize this until we were returning the car, and saw that the people ahead of us returning compacts were unloading a shiny, if somewhat awkward-looking, Nissan Sentra, and a brand-new 2009 Toyota Corolla. Neither of these cars is exciting, but either one would have been more pleasant. For us, there were only two compacts left, a Dodge Caliber (a funny-looking tall hatchback thing that replaced the craptacular Neon) and a Chevrolet Cobalt (an incredibly dull sedan that replaced the craptacular Cavalier). The decision was made for us when the Mrs. noticed that the Caliber had crank windows. The poor lot dude stuck on night duty had already started to fill out the paperwork for the Dodge, but she made him switch us to the Chevy.

(Notice that these mediocre cars are from American companies? Just saying. The nicest rental we've had was a Hyundai.)

We arrived at our ultimate destination at about 11:45, but in the deep, densely wooded darkness of the Santa Cruz hills, we could not find the house itself. A couple of U-turns and another run up the hill revealed that we simply hadn't gone far enough up the road: there, on a little green outbuilding, was one of those huge metal signs you order from a catalog, with the number and name of the street, with a light angled onto it. The house itself was on the opposite side of the road, but it was the same shade of green as the shed, so we knew we were in the right place.

Dog Arrangements

We're off to California again today. Our usual dog-sitter fell through (we have one of our friends stay at our house to provide continuity for the dog in our absence), and our back-up fell through as well. But we're flying on Southwest this time around, which means we have to drive to Rhode Island, and my mother lives a couple of miles from the airport, and we were going to leave the car at her house anyway, so she has been pressed into service for emergency dog care.

At first she was reluctant to do it, thinking it would be too difficult to walk our dog along with her own, but I pointed out that since she has an enclosed back yard, our dog won't really need to be walked; running around and sniffing things out there will be plenty of activity for her. She finds our dog pretty irresistible in general, so she agreed.

As before, I may or may not post while away, depending on how things go.

Forced into the Groove

On my commute home last night, I ended up sitting next to a guy with his iPod cranked up so loud I was forced to listen to his music, distorted and scratchy, blasting out of his ears. I couldn't identify the music, but it had the general parameters of a funky groove. In other circumstances this is something I would probably enjoy, but I was trying to read, and my brain could not block out this intruding stimulus, so I kept losing the thread of the article and ended up rereading the same section several times before giving up. I shot the guy a couple of annoyed looks, but he was blissed out in Funkland and never noticed.

It reminded me of the old days (which is to say, the 80s), when people would get on the subway carrying gigantic boomboxes blasting Run-DMC or whatever the hot hit was at the time. But in fact the blaring-headphone phenomenon is closer in spirit to when you're stopped at a red light and the car adjacent to you is bleating and vibrating with the driver's music choice. Invariably the sound is buzzy and distorted, because the music has been on so loud for so long that the vibrations have loosened the screws that attach the speakers to the back window shelf. Yeah, it was like that.

Patriots' Day

Here in Massachusetts, today is Patriots' Day, which is observed as a state holiday in commemoration of the Battle of Lexington and Concord that started the Revolutionary War. It's also the day when the Boston Marathon is run, and it coincides with school vacation week in most cities and towns.

But here at the office, it's one of the only holidays that we don't have off, and with everything going on in the city today, getting to and from work was a bit more tricky than usual. Not terrible, because I stayed away from the Copley Square area. Usually I get off the Orange line at Back Bay and take the 39 bus down Huntington Avenue, but that route (along with many others) gets altered on Marathon Day, so I just stayed on the train to Ruggles, where I got on one of the many buses that runs through the hospital area.

Last year I took the day off, but we are going away again later this week, back to Santa Cruz for more family stuff related to the Mrs.' father's passing a few months ago. I'll be out of the office for four days, so it didn't seem necessary (or a good use of my vacation days) to take today off. And anyway, I would rather have off the day after Thanksgiving, or Christmas Eve, or the week between Christmas and New Year's, which are all paid holidays for us.

Snippets

It's deadline week again, but things are going well. Once again I am ahead of schedule, and hopefully I can maintain this from month to month.

Otherwise I feel like I haven't had much to say, which is not good from the perspective of you folks who visit here looking for fresh content. I feel some degree of obligation to post semi-regularly, so I thought I would collect some miscellaneous bits that aren't necessarily postworthy on their own.

--I finally have a boss again, after a period of more than six months. He started this week, but oddly, I have not yet spoken to him. You would think that someone would have brought him around and introduced him, but that didn't happen. I saw him yesterday at our weekly bagel breakfast, but as soon as he was introduced to the group, he fell into a conversation with our publishing director and remained so for the next thirty minutes. Even as the gathering was breaking up and people were heading back to work, they were still talking, so I guess I'll catch up with him at some point.

--The Mrs. has a job interview today. While not remarkable in and of itself, this is her first one since she decided to attempt to go back to work, and it's with her former employer, which is a bit ironic, though the position in question is in a different office and is somewhat different in nature.

--My sister is participating in the Avon Walk for Breast Cancer next month. I am not soliciting donations on her behalf, but perhaps you too know someone who is planning on walking that you could support. It's 40 miles over two days, and she has been training for a couple of months, walking gradually longer distances with her walk partner, and even going to a gym three times a week. This is impressive because, like me, she is fairly averse to physical exertion in all forms.

--For the first time in several years, the Mrs. and I are getting both a federal and a state tax refund. This was largely due to me being unemployed or underemployed, and one year to my not having enough withheld. For the past couple of years we have used out state refund to pay the balance we owed the feds, but this year we're getting a few hundred bucks back from each.

--We're probably going to use some of that refund for a memory foam mattress, and since Jordan's Furniture is doing their Red Sox promotion again this year, we'll probably buy it from them. Given that Jordan's issued refunds to about 24,000 customers after last year's World Series victory by the Sox, they decided to make it a little harder this time: in order for us to get back whatever we end up spending (excluding tax and delivery charges, of course), the Sox must not only reach the World Series and win it, but they must do so in a four-game sweep. But hey, that's how they won it in '04 and '07, so who knows?

The (Your Company's Name Here) Life

The Mrs. doesn't read this blog, but she suggested this post: while reading Entertainment Weekly, she came across an ad for George Michael's upcoming tour. (Twenty years ago, while still in high school, she was a fan, so it's understandable.)

The tour's shows were listed by date and location, but no cities or states were given, just the names of the venues where is to perform. Out of 21 dates, all but three venues have corporate-sponsorship names like American Airlines Center and General Motors Place. The exceptions? Madison Square Garden (it seems quite odd that naming rights to it have not been sold yet), The Forum (ditto), and the San Diego Sports Arena (sounds like they're just lacking imagination).

So how long, then, before promoters start selling naming rights to the actual tours? Like the Ensure George Michael Yep, That Geezer's Still Around Tour? Or the Energizer Huey Lewis Needs a Retirement Home Experience?

(Thanks, Mrs.)

T'd Off

According to an article in today's Boston Globe, men who wear visible crewneck undershirts under their button-front shirts are committing a fashion crime. Wow, who knew?

I found this article pretty ridiculous, for a couple of reasons. First, I had to read the article twice to discern that the writer's specific complaint seems to be against guys who wear dark T-shirts under light dress shirts. I don't necessarily disagree with this (I do think it looks dumb when you can read a T-shirt's graphic through the shirt on top of it), but it seems like a pretty flimsy hook on which to hang a feature story, and it's poorly executed.

Second, it's a weak argument, and the author proves it himself by pointing out how he sees men dressed this way all over. If that's the case, I would say that the guys wearing the style are right and the author is wrong. Third, the author's regular gig for the Globe is reviewing movies, so how exactly does that qualify him to tell us how to dress?

He seems to think guys should wear V-neck undershirts, but there are quite a few of us who prefer to keep our chest hair covered when we're in public. Modesty is so underrated these days.

Rock On

Eesh, where were we? Too long since the last post. It's not like I've been swamped with work, or doing anything especially exciting (unless you find household errands exciting, in which case, well...)

I did manage to finish a book that I had started a couple of months ago, but hadn't made much progress on until about two weeks ago. The Sound of Our Town is a history of Boston rock & roll by Brett Milano, who has been covering local music for various newspapers and magazines for decades, so he knows his subject. He starts with local doo-wop groups in the 50s and works chronologically up to the present day. It's definitely worth reading for anyone who's a fan of local music, and a good introduction to Boston's rich rock history for those who are not familiar with it.

Flopped

I just saw a guy in the restroom wearing flip-flops. I should point out for those of you visiting from elsewhere that rain has been pouring down all day today here in Boston, and it's about 40 degrees.

Sometimes I just want to ask people, "What's wrong with you?" But I don't. Should I?

This Is Why I Married You...?

Last night I asked the Mrs. if she wanted to come into town and meet me for lunch. She thought about it for a few seconds (not a good sign) and said, "Not really."

I asked, "Why not?"

She: "Because I'd have to drive in, and find a place to park..."

Me: "Well yes, you're so busy these days." (The Mrs. is still enjoying a life of leisure after leaving her job at the end of October.)

She: "I see you all the time anyway."

Me: "Well, I see you all the time too, but I still asked."

Shack Attack Flashback

A couple of months ago, I got a new high-definition TiVo to go along with my high-def TV. I was going to write about it, but most of my friends have been hearing about my TiVo obsession since I got my first one in 2005, and everybody else, well, usually people just roll their eyes. Either you're already a believer, or you don't care at all. Anyway, I wanted to move the older TiVo into the other room and hook it up to the other TV. I needed some network cable, the round stuff with the connectors that look like wider phone-line thingies.

I asked the IT guy at work if he had any cable lying around, and he dropped some off at my desk later that day. I brought it home and put it somewhere, but I didn't move the TiVo right away because there was some stuff on it that we hadn't watched yet. After we did get around to watching those shows, I didn't move the TiVo right away, out of laziness more than anything else.

On Sunday I was feeling somewhat industrious, so I started doing a bunch of little things around the house that I'd been meaning to get to, and eventually I got around to moving the old TiVo. Of course, this was the point when I realized I didn't know where I'd put the network cable, which I needed to connect the TiVo box to my cable modem so it can obtain programming information via the internet. (TiVos can also do this through a phone line, but our home phone is the voice-over-IP kind, and for some reason, these two pieces of electronic gear don't always play well together.)

I spent about two hours looking for the cable. Our apartment isn't that big, and there are only so many places it could be, so I looked in those places over and over again, along with every other likely possibility. It's also ten feet long, so wherever it was, it would be fairly obvious. I did not find it, which led me to the conclusion that it may have been accidentally thrown out. I don't know if that's what really happened, but believing that's what happened makes me feel a tiny bit better about my inability to find it.

So last night we were going to Trader Joe's on Memorial Drive, and I realized that I could pick up a cable at the MicroCenter across the parking lot. I used to go there fairly frequently, but I hadn't been in the store in several years. I also knew that I could get a cable cheaper online, but the frustration of not being able to find the original made me impatient and disinclined to wait another week in order to save a few bucks.

Normally a trivial errand like this wouldn't be worthy of a post, but when I went to pay for the cable, I was confronted with the ghost of Radio Shack. Since the purchase was only a few dollars, I chose to pay in cash. See, MicroCenter likes to send you promotional flyers in the mail, just like the Shack used to a generation ago, back when they were still vaguely relevant in the consumer electronics marketplace. If you buy something with a credit card, MicroCenter gets your info from the transaction and puts you on their mailing list. If you pay cash, they ask you for your name and address, so they can put you on their mailing list.

You would think that a $10 network cable would not be considered a significant enough purchase to trigger the address request, but I can recall buying something like a $2 headphone adapter at the Shack and getting asked for my name and address, so I suppose I should not have been surprised that the MicroCenter cashier asked me. I started to give a fake name and address, almost on instinct, because it's what I used to do back in the Shack days, but then I stopped. I looked at the cashier and said, "Can we just skip this nonsense?"

I amended my question by making it clear that I understood she was just doing her job, and I wasn't trying to give her a hard time. She shrugged and took my money, so I guess they aren't too rigid about it, but it all just seems so silly. Regardless of what MicroCenter thinks, the presence of a flyer in my mailbox is not going to make me any more likely to shop there.

Bargain Clicking

Over the weekend, I started putting away some of my heavy-duty winter gear, like my parka and the seriously insulated boots (Chippewa, made in the USA) that I bought after that first December snowstorm. Am I worried that we might get a storm in April? Nope, I'm not even considering the possibility. Having worn one pair of boots or another pretty much every day for the past four months, I've reached the point where I'm kind of tired of them. I'm ready for the weather to warm up, so I can break out some of my favorite retro sneakers. In fact, I'm tired of most of my winter clothing. Happens every year around this time.

In a similar vein, one morning a few weeks ago I was getting ready for work when I realized that I was tired of wearing jeans every day. For a long time I had thought myself lucky because I had jobs where I did not have to adhere to a dress code, but suddenly I found myself wanting more variety. It's not like I don't own any other pants besides jeans, but when I took a closer look, I found that in fact I had little else: one or two pairs of khakis that fit, one or two pairs that no longer fit, and a couple pairs of corduroys.

Beyond wanting to mix things up, I think this also has something to do with environment. At my previous office job, the company's founders (two around my age, one about a decade older) and most of the other employees dressed like the computer programmers and web developers they were: jeans, T-shirts, sneakers, the occasional button-front shirt, shorts in summer. One guy took off his shoes as soon as he arrived in the office, and padded around in his socks all day. I took my cues from the rest of them, and adjusted my manner of dress slightly so it more or less aligned with what everyone else was wearing.

The same thing is now happening at my current job. I've been here for more than two years; I started as a contractor, and was hired as a full-time employee almost a year ago, so I feel established and like I belong. The guys in this office don't dress up, but they do dress one or two notches better than the guys in my previous office, so I am reacting to that by wanting to elevate my own dress accordingly.

On my lunch break a day or two after this realization, I was poking around on eBay and drifted into the clothing section. I've bought shoes on eBay, but no articles of clothing other than a coat a couple of years back. After a few minutes, I realized that there were tons of brand-new clothing items for sale, much of it dirt cheap.

As a result, over the past couple of weeks I have picked up several new pairs of khakis at an average transaction price of around $11 each plus shipping. One of the pairs of pants that no longer fit me was a style I particularly liked, a nicely broken-in khaki made by Polo and inspired by World War II uniforms, that I found on clearance a few years back at Bloomingdale's in Manhattan. They are well-made and (at least when I first got them) fit me extremely well.

I love these pants and was really bummed that they no longer fit me, so I was very excited to find some of them available in my current size on eBay. (Note to self: make an effort to prevent waistline from expanding any further.) Finding them at all felt like a victory, since they are not carried by many stores; in those that do, they retail for around $100 a pair, so finding them so cheap on eBay was a double bonus.

I also scored an $80 pair of L.L. Bean shoes for $20, and a vintage Woolrich shirt-jacket (a good layering item during the transitional weather of April) in excellent condition for $10. There are a couple of other auctions that have a few more days to go, but other than those, I think I'm set for a while. On the other hand, there's a part of my brain that says I should buy as many pairs of these favorite khakis as I can find, and hoard them.