Buried in the middle of Lindsay Ellis's terrific dissection of the musical Rent is a particularly trenchant observation for this particular moment in time. (If you don't watch everything Ellis makes, you should. She's brilliant.) Ellis talks about how hard it is to create
I have, since 1991 became 1992, felt a kind of keen sadness as December 31 rolls over into January 1. Some of this is realizing my favorite part of the year – roughly October 1 through January 1 – is over. Some of it is the leavetaking that accompanies the end of
The way you knew my grandparents' house was close, in the dark, on a cold Christmas night, was when you reached the bottom of the long, snowy hill, your headlights would flash across a single spot of red, reflective tape, then catch the ghost of a cardboard cutout in
Writing on the internet means never quite knowing when you'll get swept up into the middle of a whole bunch of people taking something you've written the wrong way. Sometimes, they're completely justified. Sometimes, it's a difference of opinion. And sometimes, they&
There was a lot of good TV in 2016, and a lot of that good TV was new TV. Naturally, some of those new shows either made my top TV list or just missed it (and, no, I won't tell you which show was which). But there were
It's "best of" season, and you know what that means: Lots and lots of exasperated groans from TV critics about how there's too much good TV on. And it's true! There's a lot of good TV right now, so much
I set far too many New Year's resolutions. Only informally, to be sure. I'll get to the first week of the New Year and idly promise to, say, lose some weight, or work on a personal writing project every day, or stop eating out so much.
"I just don't know, Linus," sighed Charlie Brown. "I just don't know." The two were leaning, as they so often did, on the brick garden wall, overlooking the snowy expanse in their little neighborhood. This would be a baseball diamond come spring,
(Fluffy Bunny's Guide to You Know What? Technically not a cutaway gag!) Like many of you, I'm sure, I spent much of the long weekend watching the Every Simpsons Ever marathon (which has now ticked over into season 10 and reached the point where the series
(Scott loved drawing sight lines on screencaps, which he called "eye lasers." Hence the image.) I first got to know Scott Eric Kaufman in the comments sections of various culture blogs around 10 years ago. The political blogosphere had been going great guns for several years, but the
I am spending the weekend in the Midwest for a family event, and the stay has finally confirmed something I have long suspected but didn't want to think about too hard: There is no good food in the Midwest. The very ethos of the Midwest is anti-flavor. Now,
I have a map of the United States that refers to every river, every city, every state, by what it means when translated from its original language into English. So, for instance, South Dakota becomes Southern Land of Friends, Wisconsin becomes Red River Land, and California becomes Land of the