Any day is better with AbbA

I think it was when I saw Muriel’s Wedding that I realized there is an underlying sadness to Abba’s music, an incredible sound that Generation X takes for granted an music snobs dismiss as "disco". So many of us probably have personal memories of Dancing Queen and the first time we heard it, but if you’ve seen the incredibly funny and sad Muriel’s Wedding (a movie worthy of its own blog entry), it’s forever changed the way you listen to Abba.

Dancing Queen itself has tinges of despair and desperation. Yes, it’s a feel-good song at Karaoke and retro dance clubs (just look at how many people hit the floor when the song plays), but there’s an urgency to it, a self-conviction that everything (EVERYTHING!) will be all right at night when it’s time to go out on the town in search of love and attention. Even so, there’s no escaping that first familiar note and the way it sweeps in over you…pure pop magic decades later.

Money, Money, Money offers up a very cynical approach to romance, far from the sweetness of the love songs you’ll find in 70s hits. The vulgar honesty of the track is saved by infectious beats and that distinctive Abba harmony. It’s so appropriate that the Broadway musical (and movie) take their name from the happiest of Abba hits, Mamma Mia. This song is pure joy and hard to resist. Fernando (a song I haven’t heard in years until recently), is so sweet and beautiful it almost hurts, hardly the stuff of elevator music. And Waterloo just makes me break out into huge smiles, maybe because it reminds me of goofy moments from my childhood. It’s as happy and carefree as Mamma Mia. The Name of the Game marries lovely harmony with heartbreaking plea and vulnerability, while Take a Chance on Me is all about the plug and is full of confidence and you-won’t-be-sorries.

Thanks to the Broadway musical and the reissues of older Abba albums, there’s never been a better time to give Abba another listen. And if you’ve heard all the hits and think you know every Abba song, why not check out Arrival (Abba’s fourth album) and a recent addition to the Library)? I thought I’d heard every Abba tune, but there are several tracks on here you may not recognize that certainly deserve a listen. Tiger shows the darker, aggressive side of Abba while Why Did It Have to Be Me? is a cute, disco-meets-country type affair which you might not want to end up liking, but do anyway.

This is from Magnet magazine...



Juliana Hatfield was an unwitting alt-rock gossip girl, emerging from the early-’90s Boston scene with the Blake Babies. But all anyone wanted to talk about was her fling with Lemonheads pin-up boy Evan Dando. All this and more is detailed in her new memoir, When I Grow Up. In this exclusive excerpt, Hatfield remembers being America’s most famous 23-year-old virgin.

In 1992, my first solo album, Hey Babe, was released on Mammoth Records. It was my first work since the Blake Babies had broken up. Mammoth was a relatively new label based in Carrboro, N.C., and they were putting a lot into the promotion of my new album. It generated a lot of press attention, especially for an independent release. The head of Mammoth, Jay Faires, had designs on being a big player in the industry, with ambitions of one day selling his label to one of the major ones, so he was really pushing me, gambling on me. Faires wanted to prove that he could succeed at building a viable, profitable record company from the ground up; and I, along with some of the many varied acts on the roster such as the Melvins, Victoria Williams, Seven Mary Three, Squirrel Nut Zippers and Fu Manchu, seemed like a good bet to help make that happen. (Seven Mary Three and Squirrel Nut Zippers went on to sell a million albums each, and Faires sold Mammoth to Disney in 1998.)

When Hey Babe came out, Mammoth hadn’t yet established itself as a serious player in the record business. By the time Seven Mary Three exploded onto the charts with “Cumbersome,” Mammoth had aligned with Atlantic Records and was much better equipped to break a band in a big way. I did sell 60,000 copies of Hey Babe, which was considered very respectable for an emerging artist on an independent label. To me, those numbers were astonishing—a definite success. The Blake Babies’ first, self-released album sold fewer than 1,000 copies.

It was new for me, and kind of exciting, to be featured in national magazines, because it meant that my music was being introduced into more people’s lives. I wanted so much for my music—for my voice and my words and my feelings—to be heard, because I had been so desperately shy and so hidden and so mute and ineffectual in my personal relations for so long. Music was the one way I could communicate, and one way to open more ears to my music was through the press. Of course the press was a big, complicated truth-and personality-distorting monster, but I hadn’t learned that yet.

While promoting Hey Babe, I did an interview with a journalist from Interview magazine. Our talk turned toward love and relationships, since a lot of the songs on Hey Babe seemed to explore this subject matter in tortured, obsessive depth, and the interviewer thought readers might appreciate some more detailed, specific insight into who, if anyone, was breaking my heart in all of these songs and how. I could tell from the way he was posing some of his “boyfriend” questions that the journalist seemed to have some preconceived erroneous ideas about me and whom I was or was not dating. It was making me uncomfortable; I was becoming concerned that he might misrepresent me in his article if I didn’t clarify something. And that was when I let slip, casually, that “I’ve never gone all the way.”

It was a true statement. I was 23 years old.

When the article hit the newsstands, I was shocked by the amount of attention generated by that one little six-word declaration of virginity. It was my first real taste of the flies-on-a-discarded-piece-of-meat aspect of the media. People jumped on the quote, tripping over each other to get to it, as if what I had tossed out flippantly was something really important or scandalous. Almost every subsequent article written about me referenced the quote. I couldn’t shake it; my recorded words were like an incurable disease. The fact of my admitted advanced-age virginity was restated and reprinted all over the place, again and again, reverberating for months and months and even years afterward, whenever anyone mentioned me or my music. (Even now, people refer to that article.) It was the go-to Juliana Hatfield quote, and it helped define me and my public image for many years, for better or for worse.

I could be disingenuous and say that by admitting my virginity I was just being honest, just going with the flow of the talk, and that I had no reason not to tell the truth, and, well, what’s the big deal with being a 23-year-old virgin, anyway? But I must have known that saying what I said, publicly, would have some effect, even if it wasn’t 100 percent consciously calculated to do so.

My intention had been to make a statement about my individuality, my independence. I was proud of the fact that I was still a virgin. To me, not giving away that part of myself before I felt I was ready was an assertion of my strength and my freedom and my ability to trust my instincts and to think for myself. It meant that I would not compromise my integrity and that I was impervious to outside pressure or influence when it came to making the important decisions in my life. Rather than being a cheap grab for attention, “I’ve never gone all the way” meant that I was in control of my body. It meant that I didn’t need to be half of a couple to be interesting; I was interesting on my own, I thought, regardless of all the constant speculating and rumor-mongering that went on. People were always trying to link me to whatever guy I happened to be hanging out with on any given day, and that annoyed me.

I’d hoped this would also clear up the misconception that I was Evan Dando’s girlfriend.

I did an interview with a man from GQ a year or two later, and the conversation veered toward the subject of Evan, my friend and musical collaborator, as interview conversations often did in those days. (Everyone was eager to hear any details pertaining to our assumed “relationship.” The Lemonheads—Evan’s band—and the Blake Babies had bonded early on in Boston, when both of our bands first started gigging. As Evan and I gained fame, we stayed connected to each other and to each other’s music, and this connection was a fascination for some people.) At one point, the journalist threw out a seemingly innocent, randomly curious question about Evan, who had recently dyed his hair very blond: “So, what is Evan’s natural hair color?”

I answered, innocently, “Mmm, it’s kind of dirty blond.”

Later, after the interview wrapped up and the man had gone, I realized that he had tried to get me to divulge some particular intimate detail of my and Evan’s so-called private life. “What is Evan’s real hair color?” was code for “What color is Evan’s pubic hair?” It didn’t dawn on me until later how incredibly rude and obnoxious the man’s question really was. How had that gotten past me? I had been tricked into a false confession. Evan’s real hair color was dirty blond, but I only knew this because I had spent enough time with him to know that the hair on his head was naturally dirty blond.

I thought that by admitting my virginity I was being subversive, declaring my right to choose how to live. I thought feminists and anarchists and free thinkers and outsiders and late bloomers everywhere would cheer when they read the interview. Maybe people misunderstood me and were unable to decipher my motives simply because there is no archetype of a female loner-by-choice, especially in the pop-rock music world. The strong, silent, individualistic, solitary outsider—the lone wolf—is historically always male. But that is how I saw myself: standing alone, off to the side, with a tight grip on my own original, quixotic ideas, and not as a pathetic waif, desperate for some record executive to make me a star; not as a delicate shrinking violet waiting eagerly to be swept up in the arms of my future husband who would ravish me in a dramatic, yearned-for defloration. I thought everyone would understand where I was coming from. But that’s not what happened.

Some people thought I was lying about my virginity and that my words were cynically and strategically chosen and placed in order to shock, to grab people’s attention—to build on my fame—or possibly to reinforce the vulnerable, delicate, little-girl, coy image that had attached itself to me—an image that I hated and considered a grave misrepresentation of who I believed myself to be.

I was honestly pretty clueless about the big bad world of the publicity machine. I never had any media training like young bands do today. I never practiced or mastered the art of the well-crafted, well-timed, well-placed soundbite. If I had, I would have realized that my admission of virginity would be the sensationalistic shot heard ’round the alternative-rock world that it turned out to be, not what I intended.

I wanted to tell the truth about myself, to be understood. I believed honesty was not a bad thing, and was even a good thing, and honorable and sensible, and much more interesting and entertaining than the made-up stories many celebrities and their publicists issue to the press to gloss over the more unconventional details and untidy truths of their complicated real lives. I didn’t have many stories to tell, yet; no scandalous love affairs to recount. Sure, Evan and I had fooled around a little, but I wasn’t ready for a real boyfriend. Music came first. And that’s not a very interesting story, is it?

No one does "Fever" like Elvis

It's late and I can't sleep and I'm listening to Elvis and thinking his version of "Fever" is the best of all the ones ever recorded. And that definitely (most definitely!) includes Madonna's rather unusual one off of her "Erotica" album...

Elvis's cover is electrifying, though possibly less known than Peggy Lee's infamous take.

Give it a listen sometime:

http://music.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=music.artistalbums&artistid=1190284&ap=0&albumid=8082634

music magazines

I am addicted to music magazines, especially the ones that come with free CD samplers, but really any that have good reviews and introduce you to "new" groups...

here's one group I discovered thanks to Rock Sound magazine:

http://www.myspace.com/mdbride

Not sure I like them yet, but they definitely have a "sound" :)...



and here are some websites for great music magazines (though I still prefer print form the best):


bigtakeover.com

pastemagazine.com

nme.com

Random thoughts on Hell

In the new movie "Drag Me To Hell" the main character is cursed and tormented after evicting an elderly woman from her house. I haven't seen it yet, but I'm sort of intrigued by the title and the poster and by thoughts of what exactly does a person do that sends them into Hell?


...if Hell exists, what is it exactly? and why are some people so sure they know who's going? my friends and i like to joke that if we're going to Hell, at least we'll all be together, but somehow I don't think it's a social club down there...






more soon...

Listen to The Pinker Tones

I love these guys...they're like Wham for the early 21st century, only sort of jazzy and a lot more witty! Their album "Wild Animals" is full of great sounds. My favorite songs are: "S.E.X.y.R.O.B.O.T" (as wacky and sexy as you'd expect!)..."The Whistling Song" (cute, irresistible and funky with a little ub40 sound thrown in)..."24" and "Happy Everywhere" (so so so danceable in a Franz Ferdinand kind of way!)

You might like The Pinker Tones if you like: The Scissor Sisters, The Office, Peter Bjorn and John...



Here's one of their songs 'til Im back with more info:

A novelist takes on Marilyn Monroe

I read THE RETURN OF MARILYN MONROE by Sam Staggs when it first came out in the early 90s and liked it so much I wrote the author. Not long after I sent off the letter, I received a personal reply from him. He wrote of his sincere respect for Marilyn Monroe and her work which is evident on every page of this amazing book.

Unlike many of the biographies and fiction about the popular blond actress, Sam Stagg's novel carries some hope with it and shows the smarter, less self-absorbed side of Miss Monroe that is rarely given much press. The author works from the idea that Monroe didn't really die that infamous day in August of 1962; instead her body was substituted with one closely resembling hers.

Staggs does link Monroe with the Kennedys (they arrange for her to be kidnapped and have the body switch made), but once she escapes from her abductors and seeks out life in the big city under an assumed name, the novel takes on a tone that is more positive and less sensational.

For Marilyn Monroe fans who always thought she was more than just a dumb blonde (that she could indeed have played Grushenka in "The Brothers Karamazov"), THE RETURN OF MM is pure delight! Some of the scenes are just wonderful, especially one where she enters a Marilyn Monroe look-a-like contest a few years after her "death."

The Children's Hour

Like much of the lesbian pulp fiction of the 1950s, "The Children's Hour" comes from that era when homosexuality was considered the "worst evil of all." I'm not sure if William Wyler meant to or not, but in this film the director finds a surprising sympathy for his main character Martha. Despite its emphasis on the supposed lesbianism of the two leads, "The Children's Hour" is not really a story about being gay. Instead it focuses (or tries to) on how one bad little girl can ruin two adults's lives forever simply by opening her mouth.


With relative restraint rather than melodrama, Wyler illustrates the power of a child's words. A student at the boarding school "Karen" (Audrey Hepburn) and "Martha" (Shirley MacLaine) run, "Mary" (Karen Balkin) spreads malicious rumors (are there any other kind?). On the surface these rumors aren't true, but as things progress and Karen and Martha interact in their strong friendship and professional partnership, we see that Martha may indeed have "unnatural" feelings for her best friend.

Things reach a fevered pitch as Mary's grandmother takes action and decides Karen and Martha are not to fit to run a school for young girls. Legal action is taken, careers are destroyed and a friendship that once was fun and light-hearted is now fraught with tension.

I don't like to reveal endings to movies, so I won't do that here. All I WILL say is that Shirley MacLaine gives the performance of her life as she unravels emotionally, devastated at what is happening around and inside her. Filmed during a time when gays and lesbians were treated as criminals and freaks, "The Children's Hour" is not as harsh as it could have been. Some people would probably call Wyler's film unfashionably dated, but the sad truth is it's coming back in style now that we are slowly returning to an era that demonizes gays and lesbians and won't let them have a happy ending.

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Long Distance

Can you be haunted by an album...listen to it more than a dozen times and never tire of it, feel that it has helped you through bad times and good times, improved your heart rate and your dreams?

If you don't think so or you're not sure, you should give Ivy's LONG DISTANCE a try. I kid you not when I say it will never be away from your music player for very long. Repeated listens never dull the album, but instead enrich it.

The album is beauty in slow motion, a perfect production that is every bit as natural as breathing and it's so wonderful you might think you imagined it.

Track by track, LONG DISTANCE never disconnects. There are the vulnerable dreamboat songs like "Edge of the Ocean," "Let's Stay Inside," "Midnight Sun" and "One More Last Kiss" (this is where I almost gasp it's so wonderful. I picture myself at the beach, utterly at peace, the sky blue, the breeze a friendly tease.)

Then Dominique Durand walks on air with more uptempo (but equally relaxing) songs like "Blame it On Yourself" (very catchy!!), "Lucy Doesn't Love You" and "I Think of You."

I'm not saving the best for last (everything here is "best for last"!!)so much as I'm saving the most devastating for last...the songs that should scorch your heart with sadness, but somehow don't because Ivy reminds us that even when things are bad, there's still loveliness in life.

One example of this is the brilliantly ironic (but not cynical) "While We're in Love." In the wrong hands, this ballad could be mean-spirited, but here it is utterly beguiling and heart-wrenching with its sincere, realistic look at the fleeting happiness of relationships. It's also very mystical and alluring, two qualities familiar to any Ivy fan.

There is no poison to be found in Ivy's music, just lots of time for reverie...It even ends on a playful note with the sweet "Digging Your Scene."

How I adore this album...it's hard to explain just how transforming the listening experience can be! My review could never do it justice...All I can do is ask you to listen and then, THEN you'll hear for yourself.

helpful article from slate's online magazine

I read Slate a lot and saw this article this morning:

Eight Tips for Conquering Anger and Irritability

Posted Wednesday, April 29, 2009 6:12 AM | By Gretchen Rubin

Every Wednesday is Tip Day.
This Wednesday: Eight tips for conquering anger and irritability.

Hah. It’s really quite preposterous for me to offer up a tips list on this subject. A tendency to fly off the handle is one of my most disagreeable and persistent traits and something I battle with—largely unsuccessfully—every day. For me, anger is the most tempting of the seven deadly sins. At best, you could describe me as "edgy."

This list shows the strategies I try to use to keep myself patient and mild-mannered, but I certainly can’t claim that they’ve been wholly successful. I still lose my temper far too often; however, I do think I’m doing a better job than I would be if I weren’t following these tips:

1. Pay attention to my body. Being too cold, too hot, and, especially, too hungry makes me far more irritable.

2. Don’t drink. I basically gave up drinking because alcohol makes me so belligerent.

3. Acknowledge the reality of other people’s feelings (usually this arises with my husband or daughters). Instead of snapping back answers like “I don’t want to hear a lot of whining” or “It’s not that big a deal,” I try to show that I understand what someone is saying.

4. Be realistic. For instance, I often get irritated when someone interrupts me when I’m reading—but I should know better than to try to read the newspaper during my daughters’ Saturday morning breakfast. Of course I’m going to get interrupted.

5. Don’t expect praise or appreciation. I often feel irritated when someone (usually my husband) doesn’t notice and praise some effort on my part. For example, when I went out of town last week, I got my older daughter completely organized for a field trip before I left. I snapped at my husband because he didn’t appreciate this Herculean accomplishment on my part.

6. Squelch my reaction. Not expressing anger often allows it to dissipate. I have trouble with this in person but often manage to do it if it involves e-mail; the deliberate effort of writing an irritated e-mail often gives me the opportunity to decide not to send it. I find it tougher to bite back an angry retort—but I’m working on it. When I can manage, acting the way I want to feel always helps me to change my feelings.

7. Make a joke. OK, some of these strategies are more fantasy than reality, but on the rare occasion when I do manage to make a joke during a moment of irritation, it works beautifully to lighten the mood.

8. Try not to be defensive. Many of my most harsh reactions are triggered by some kind of accusation—that I did something wrong, that I did something rude, that I screwed up in some way. If I can admit to fault or let it go, I can lighten my anger. My anger is tied to my pride, and pride is something I've been thinking a lot about lately.

In my case, as this list shows, anger stems from a tendency toward perfectionism. I want to control things, have events unfold exactly as I want, have people behave exactly as I direct, and get lots of credit for everything I do. Surprise! That’s not how the world works.

What strategies have I missed? What helps you defuse anger and irritability? I need more help!

* My friend and blogging mentor Jonathan Fields has two excellent blogs: Awake at the Wheel, which has a lot of great material of general interest, and Career Renegade, which is more focused on work and career. Jonathan's book, Career Renegade: How To Make a Great Living Doing What You Love, has gotten a lot of buzz.

* Considering doing your own happiness project or have some ideas to share? Join the discussions on the Facebook Page to swap insights, strategies, and experiences. Also, people who want to start happiness-project groups have started to post their cities, so if you're interested in joining or starting a group, look there.

karen carpenter weirdness

The lyrics of many Carpenters songs and the goody two shoes images they still can conjured up in the minds of anyone who remembers them are so at odds with the sadness behind the scenes...


I was always a fan of their music and more specifically Karen Carpenter's voice, but after a while I just couldn't listen anymore because instead of the music I was thinking about the anorexia...weird I know, but true...for me, at least. Many other pop singers have died from unusual causes, but somehow we don't think of their death immediately upon hearing their songs...








http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y9ii-Tquf4o


when i first heard this song years ago, i hated it, but later on i became a sonic youth fan (their version of "superstar" is amazing!)...i still don't like "tunic" that much, but find it an oddly touching tribute to a widely misunderstood singer...



the tribute album pictured below is also one of the weirdest things i ever heard, but a pretty good album with or without the carpenters influence....cracker's version of "rainy days and mondays" is so good i actually like it better than the original in some ways...



i think part of the reason the video and song are so disturbing is because they attempt to see life through karen carpenter's eyes...and can we ever really see things exactly as they happened to someone else, whether we know her or not? the skeletal images at first strike me almost as garish or "family guy" territory (where eating disorders used to be a running joke on the show), but i think kim gordon is being earnest, not mocking...she's mentioned in interviews how much she admired karen carpenter's voice...

out of print favorite

I remember reading this on a cozy Sunday afternoon back in the late 90s. There's so much to like about it...the old movie feel, the big band backdrop, the characters and their lives with and apart from each other, the emotions we share with each of the women we grow to care about...

It is somewhat similiar to another great and impossible-to-find novel called ALL GOOD WOMEN by Valerie Miner. Both books take place during the big band era, both give the reader endearing, fully fleshed-out characters and both wreck havoc with your heart. SWING SISTERS, though, focuses more specifically on an all-girl band and their adventures both on and off the stage.

This is what I found in my book journal, written right after I finished the book:

Every main character has serious emotional issues to work through...for some reason Roz's situation got to me the most...her story isn't just a story, but something going on inside of me. Lovey, the lead singer, leaps to the reader's reality so that you can practically hear her weave tapestries with her voice.

Various subplots come together in this amazingly touching book, but Roz's experience is what especially grabbed me.

Anyone who has ever loved someone who didn't feel the same way will feel Roz's sorrow as she tumbles into something she doesn't quite understand, but knows is all too real. Her feelings for fellow bandmate Sarah jumped off the page...Westin captures unrequited love like no other author I've read.

SWING SISTERS is the kind of thing you want to reread...the problem is I have yet to find it again. It's like an incredibly vivid, great dream you had once and want to recapture because while you loved having it, it's faded over the years.

bad zombie!

Maybe it's a sign of the times that my favorite movie is currently 2004's "Dawn of the Dead." Sometimes when I'm really sad or in a rotten mood I need something like "DOD"...so oddly comforting as to be the only thing I can really watch when I'm desperately down. Thank God I don't get down a lot!

There's so much to like about "Dawn of the Dead," though non-horror fans might not agree. There are some freakishly funny moments in the beginning...like right after the virus breaks out and the main character's zombie boyfriend is chasing her car down the street, only to be distracted by someone standing on the side of the road...a much easier, temporarily tastier target.

Other touches made this a keeper...like the fact that Sarah Polley's character is so so tired and ready to get finish her shift that she doesn't even notice the especially weird and bloody circumstances under which people are being brought into her hospital. Maybe she's just storing up energy 'cause as it turns out this is one of the hardest working and most appealing nurses in the history of film (take that, Nurse Ratchet!)

Or maybe it's the fact that Jake Weber appears as the very appealing and kind-hearted "Michael"...or that Ving Rhames is so kick ass or Ty Burrell so amazingly crass...take your pick...there's tons to like here and not just the zombies.

beauty is the beast

I have listened to Kate Havnevik so many times you'd think I'd grow tired of her, but I don't. Her music is so healing. Her voice is so different from other singers...it's a little breathy--which normally irritates me--but it's not "aren't I sexy?" breathy, it's more of an honest, "life has done this to me" kind of sound. I think that's why I put her cd "Melankton" (try saying that twice) on whenever I can't sleep. She sounds like she's seen a lot of sad things and that she'd sit down with you over a glass of wine (maybe beer, but she doesn't have a beer kind of voice) and translate your pain into something so gorgeous your heart would skip several beats.

One of the tracks, "Not Fair," could be straight out of a James Bond film, IF the women in James Bond's life wore their hearts on their sleeves and bared more than just skin. "Suckerlove" seeps into your bones right away with its exotic intro and goes straight to the punch with its message of love and loss.

"I Don't Know You" and "Timeless" are so delicately open that if I listen to them when I'm even the slightest bit sad, I completely lose it and have to find some tissues.

"Kaleidoscope" and "Nowhere Warm"...well, they are so lovely I can't find the right words.

The funny thing is the first time I put it on my stereo I didn't like it that much because I wanted every song to be like her "Grace" (from "Grey's Anatomy") Now, I can't remember the last time I fell so hard for an album.

a funny, underrated show on dvd

What a great DVD this is to have in your collection! "The Ellen Show" is fun, smart, sincere, sweet and often downright hysterical. Back in 2006 I bought this, but somehow didn't open it until recently and boy, am I glad I did...it helped me get through a bad cold...it was the perfect medicine!!

Sometimes all you need to see is that "I know something you don't" twinkle in Ellen's eyes and you just start to laugh. The woman has talent, there's no doubt about that and it can be seen in almost every episode found on two discs.

Some of the best ones include the pilot where Ellen returns to her hometown after her dot com business goes bust and finds a quirky bunch of people, both in her family and her co-workers. These folks have no concept there's a whole world to be found outside the small town of Clark. It's this mindset, of course, that helps fuel the humor of the show.

Other terrific titles on the first disc include: "Walden Pond" (Ellen becomes Clark's high school guidance counselor and bonds with a troubled student)..."Vanity Fair" (contains a cute mix-up involving beauty salons and animal hairstylists...gives new meaning to "best in show")..."Missing the Bus" (I'm a bit biased here since I love Betty White, but still it's a super episode AND with a young Dakota Fanning who steals your heart as a young Ellen in flashback).

A strong supporting cast carries "The Ellen Show" far above the bad treatment it received from its own network (how a tv program like this got cancelled when "Yes, Dear" went on to have four seasons is beyond me!)

The lovable, if terribly misguided set of co-workers are played to comedic charm by the ever-reliable Martin Mull ("Mr Munn"), the surprisingly gifted Kerri Kenney (as "Pam" the awkward, but ultimately kind home ec teacher), the adorable Jim Gaffigan (who is more than suited for the role of teacher-of-all-trades "Rusty") and the much-loved Cloris Leachman (who is just wonderful and endearingly daff as Ellen's mom.)

The second disc is not to be missed either. "Ellen's First Christmas" offers us the delightful Mary Tyler Moore (just as much an influence on Ellen DeGeneres as Lucille Ball, I imagine)..."Just the Duck" captures the dilemmas singles face living in a small town and serves up some very bright moments of humor when Ellen attempts to dine alone at a fancy restaurant and finds plenty of patronizing pity on her plate..."Shallow Gal" speaks to all of us who weren't quite right with in the "in" crowd back in high school and secretly want a second chance (guest star Maureen McCormick couldn't have been better cast...I mean, it's "Marcia" we're talking about)..."Where the Sun Doesn't Shine" gives us a strong Cloris Leachman performance and proof that she has never lost her timing or her shine when it comes to delivering a great line.

My only disappointment here is that there are no extras (can you imagine the interviews they could have done?) and that there isn't more to love. "The Ellen Show" is a reminder that we need to save the sitcom before it dies for good.

the okay girl

Maybe this is incredibly silly, even incredibly freaky, but I recently found out about someone I used to know, someone who ended up hating me because of a horrific misunderstanding which is the kind that can never really be undone or understood...and I know it would probably sound odd to her, maybe even alarming, but I'm so glad she seems to be having a happy life, to be healthy and surrounded by great friends, with a fun job.

I've always wondered if it's normal, even right, to care about someone who just doesn't like you...that's one of those life questions I hope to find an answer to do someday...not about Miss X, necessarily, but just in general...because I really do believe in at least one cliche and that's the one about the path of good intentions leading to Hell...or something like that...I'm so sleepy right now I can't remember how it goes...

This book is something I just started reading, but already it's speaking to me since I adored Judy Garland as a child and still do to some degree. Boyt's book isn't really about the wonderful Garland, though, even if it appears so on the surface and is full of lovely photos and interesting little tidbits about the singer's life.

It's more about the author and society and how some of us, especially those of us who get more lonely than others, can focus on one particular star and feel like we know them and somehow need them in our lives for comfort and joy...wacko as this may sound, it's true.

more on this later....