April 1, 2008

I find myself back in the arms of Los Angeles for the week. Sitting atop the freeway in the Angeleno Hotel, listening to the constant roar of the 405. It’s like they designed this to be a traffic themed hotel. It even looks like a parking garage.

March 24, 2008

So many cardboard boxes. We’re still digging out from the cross country move. Kellie and I are fighting the cold. AGAIN. Which meant we spent Easter in the Emergency Room at Chester County Hospital. They didn’t have any marshmallow peeps or honey baked ham there, but they did put me on anti-biotics which I hope finally kill this damn cold once and for all. Good news is that I don’t have pneumonia or influenza, but whatever I have has got ahold of me good. And no amount of extra spicy Thai takeout is helping! But given that I’m eating so much of it, I want to give a shout out to the fine folks at Ghang Thai in Brooklyn. It’s still early, but in the new-to-the-city takeout competition of 2008, they’re pulling ahead.

March 16, 2008

One of the many reasons why I love Tracy Morgan. Watch this. But also mainly for things like this clip from Totally Awesome. Did that movie ever come out?? Peekaboo, I wanna hump you! (Which, it should be noted, should never be said while wearing the Eliot Spitzer mask below. *shudder*)

March 12, 2008

Lots to discuss now that we’re in NYC. Sorry for not posting more. Surrounded by moving boxes, metro cards, and figuring out where to eat at work. Finally joined Facebook, so that’s something to look forward to. Also, Obama has math on his side. And Eliot Spitzer has nothing on his side. Who votes for this as best Halloween mask in 08?

February 15, 2008

And on the jorb front, this is a pic of the Park Avenue Armory, my new place of employment. Sorry that all my images of New York are old-timey, but I’m just excited to be going back to a place that actually has history, as opposed to the relentless new of the West. I’m going to be Program Manager of this crazy space which served as a social hall and drill facility for the military. Other bits of interest, this is where Louis Armstrong lay in wait during his viewing. You can see more about the Armory here.

February 13, 2008

Kellie and I are back from the -6 degree wind tunnel of New York, capping off what is surely one of the most productive weekends ever. Found a lovely place in the heart of Carroll Gardens, one block from the F line. Thanks to the copious amounts of diners, I rediscovered how much I like having breakfast at any and all times a day. In other news, Obama continues to exhibit the signs of a winner; I’ve almost gotten over this cold; and we’ll finally get some new episodes of the Office back on TV. Keep it goin, 2008!

February 8, 2008

Yargh. Sniffle. I am gonna blame that Leonard Nimoy. Or I am going to blame myself for shaking his hand, even after he coughed into it. Anyway, I caught some kind of Vulcan Space Flu and it’s desperately trying to bring me down. Dammit Jim! In other news, I think I caught a political fever and it’s breaking my brain. I’ve overdosed on Hardball and Wolf Blitzer and because I can’t avoid gazing upon the master of evil, Karl Rove, on Fox. This primary season is like being on a Tetris bender. My eyes close and the only thing I see are delegates and super delegates. Oh and not sure if this is connected or not, but last night I dreamt that Kellie and I gave birth to a mixed race kid who looked exactly like Micah on Heroes.

February 4, 2008

First half of the day: Watch Superbowl.
Second half of the day: Watch Hamlet.
This was the to-do list at the Bewley house today. We’re hosting a talk between Casey Spooner and Liz LeCompte at the museum, and since I’ve been dying to see a Wooster Group performance since my days as a performance art tadpole, Kellie got us tickets to see their production for Christmas. Largely a reimagining of the Richard Burton 64 television experiment in theatrical broadcasting, the staging is reminiscent of the classic KML sketch “James is Dead” - but in case you missed that - it makes live actions out of the peculiarities of video tape movement. Rewinding, zooming, edits, etc. While also telling the story of the cursed Prince, and managing to mine Burton’s vision for plenty of funny moments. Ingenious and commanding, the show is a great one and if you are in LA, go see it at the REDCAT theater. Oh, and my dinner with Leonard Nimoy was cancelled as he caught that cold that everyone in America had. Maybe we’ll have another chance…

January 28, 2008

Had a meal last night with some titans of the progressive movement. (Apologies to those 500 some people who could not get in to the public program at the Hammer….always hard to turn people away). Felt a little bad after dinner thinking about persimmon bread pudding immediately after discussing the hardships of Nigerians, so opted for just coffee. Around the table were Naomi Klein, Robert Scheer, Richard Kim, the Galefs, Ian Masters, Christina Pickles, and some folks from The Nation and truthdig. Naomi is both foxier than you would think and as smart as you would expect, which makes for a deadly combination. (Hey, Obama need a running mate?) Every word of her book The Shock Doctrine is worth reading over and over again. I also have to give props to the enchanting Christina Pickles, who along with doing a pilot with my friend Michael Cornacchia and my someday friend, Fred Willard (why did no one pick THAT up??), has some terrific stories, which I cannot repeat, about working on Friends and the sticky realities of doing voice overs for E! True Hollywood Stories. Up for tomorrow night, dinner with Leonard Nimoy. What a funny job I have.

January 25, 2008

I couldn’t be prouder. Kellie’s show has hit the airwaves. Tune into CMT to catch Gone Country. Bobby B! and Marcia Brady seem to be really hitting it off, though her being tied up in the lasso was one of the stranger things I’ve ever seen. Most importantly dig that beautiful set! It’s Barbara Mandrell’s cabin as reimagined by Mrs. Bewley!

January 25, 2008

For one thing it’s raining. Like really raining. Like the rain that flooded my apartment in the early-2005-all-the-time-seriously-stop- typhoons-must-be-easier than this, rain. And of course everyone in LA immediately forgets how to drive when it rains. So we just sit on the freeway together, praying that the lines are where we think they are. The sound outside of a million wipers all going at once must be intense. On the bright side, went to the Griffin last night and they had a pouring problem of a different sort, and one that when applied to an 18 year old scotch, certainly worked in my favor! Here’s to the mighty generous Griffin! Ca-Caw-Gur-Growl! (or whatever sound a Griffin makes).

January 21, 2008

I’m screening a mini-marathon of the Bob Newhart show to celebrate the life of Ms. Suzanne Pleshette, one of my original TV crushes. I know I’m not alone in having Emily Hartley impressed in my young 70s-boy-mind as the template for the ideal woman. Smart, brassy, and downright sexy, she ranks right up there with Lynda Carter on the greatest brunettes of all time list. The fact that she married Tom Poston late in life only makes me like her more. What were those dinners like? Watching Newhart again also reminds me that a) Chicago looks exactly the same and b) I need to own a Botany 500 suit sometime in my life.

January 18, 2008

Yeargh! What the hell is happening on MSNBC?!? I recently switched over to them from CNN cause I just couldn’t take anymore Showbiz Tonight at 9am (ugh, it’s called Showbiz Tonight, CNN!). MSNBC also has hotter babes. What they don’t have is better sound delay reduction technology. The anchor tosses a question to a field reporter, the field reporter or worse, a guest that is unfamiliar with being on TV, waits an entire, deadly 3 seconds, then responds, often overlapping with the next follow-up-point from the anchor, making for an awkward pause, then an attempt to speak, met with another anchor-panic-moment trying to fill time and on and on. You’d think the whole place ran on Vista. Oh wait…

January 18, 2008

I am addicted to the Peter Frampton Geico ad. Especially the line “I wanted to pull my hair out”. Just sing that when you’re stressed. It’s got such a classic rhythm to it. That guy talks through his guitar! Far out.

UPDATE: This post somehow managed to catch the attention of insurance bots all over the web, creating a tidal wave of comments all saying nothing. Internets is weird, y’all.

January 17, 2008

We hosted a lecture by Vancouver photographer and all around nice guy, Roy Arden tonight. One of his series - which I’ve grabbed a cropped sample of for this post, is called Terminal City, the old nickname for Vancouver. I was happy to have caught Arden’s major exhibition at the Vancouver Art Gallery during a failed bid for a relocation. Seeing this series again I was reminded of a major project that our civic leaders should pay attention to and that’s the real estate along our nation’s train tracks. If you’ve spent anytime on the Amtrak’s Northeast Corridor, you know what I mean. We have the same problems in the international terminals of our airports. Landing in LA or JFK is like landing in a janitorial closet. Is this really the way we want to welcome people to our cities? We’ve got a lot of work to do, America!