Day 640: Wacky Website of the Week – Spamgifts.com

Hmmm… there’s nothing better than curling up in your Spam blanket on a cold day exchanging your favorite Spam recipies with the rest of the Spam-o-philes out in the world.

http://www.spam.com/shop//

Day 639: TV Review – American Idol

I need to stop reading the news on Thursday’s. Serena and I are normally a day behind on our television watching, which means, we normally watch American Idol on Wednesday and Thursdays… and every week, the media has ruined everything! I had no idea American Idol was still so darn noteworthy.

Part of my daily routine is checking in on the various news agencies around the world… and every Thursday I forget to guard myself from the truth… and every Thursday these news agencies run front page headlines on the newest Idol castoff. Maddening! Have you no shame?!?

Listen… I admit it… I dig American Idol. However, when you know who’s going to be sent home it is an incredible boring show. Some weeks, when Serena and I are busy, we don’t get around to watching American Idol until Thursday night, so we watch the performances and the results back to back. This is about three hours worth of American Idol… now… imagine watching those three hours knowing who gets sent home… and pretending you don’t know because you don’t want to ruin the anticipation for the person sitting next to you. Every week!

ARG!

Okay, so I have this outlook task that reminds me to read the news every morning. Today, I tweaked it. It will no longer generate a “Read the news” task on Thursday… and just to be safe… I programmed another task that says, “DON’T READ THE NEWS TODAY” that only regenerates on Thursday’s. I think I am ready… next week will be different. I hope.

Day 638: London – Christmas Pantomimes

It seems that children’s theatres called pantomimes are all the rage over the holidays in London… Why they are called Pantomimes, I have no idea… because the actors talk… so, it’s not really a pantomime. Anyway, these, so called, pantomimes are very popular with families and many theatres shut down their normal production runs to mount a Christmas pantomime during the Christmas Holidays. In fact, these shows are so well received that theatre are able to attract celebrities to appear in them.

While we were in town, Pamela Anderson was featured playing the Genie in a Christmas Pantomime production of “Aladdin”. I know, right! Nothing sounds more like Christmas than Pamela Anderson handing out wishes to an impoverished ne’er-do-well!

Although I was unable to attend one of these “pantomimes” myself… most had closed around the time I arrived in London, it has left me with a very perplexing question… are Christmas Pantomimes British Theatre’s answer to Reality Television?

Hmmmm…

Day 637: Product Review – The Smokenator 1000

This thing rocks! For any of you charcoal addicted, hard core smokers… and by smokers I mean indirect grillers of meat… this is the ultimate product!

Essentially, The Smokenator 1000 turns your Weber Charcoal Grill into a water smoker. I’m still trying to figure out all of the nuances of the product, but so far I love it!

Check out the website (http://smokenator.com/) and youtube video embedded below:

Day 636: The Return of the Beer Crate Guys

Do you smell it? Spring is in the air. And after a long winters hibernation… the guys are rockin’ the beer crates once again! Man… I missed those guys!

Day 635: Friday Film Review – Mary Poppin’s & The Sound of Music

Two weeks ago Grayson and I watched “Mary Poppin’s” together. It was awesome. I had forgotten what a long movie it was… but Grayson muscled through… in two sittings. Being an Oscar buff, I must note that Mary Poppin’s is Grayson’s very first movie features an Oscar Winning Oscar performance. This is quite a big deal in my world.

This past weekend we made Grayson Movie History Again with “The Sound of Music” as Grayson’s first ever Oscar winning Best Picture. Again, it took two viewings to get through the film, but Grayson seemed to like it a lot. My little man even picked up on Julie Andrews. About fifteen minutes into the movie Gray looked at Serena and said, “Hey, that’s Mary Poppin’s!”… which seemed to give the movie even more clout.

He’s done this once before while in London watching the movie “Underdog” featuring Jason Lee as the voice of Underdog. Not long into the movie he started shouting, “Underdog is Dave! Underdog is Dave! They have the same voice!” Well, he was 100% correct. The Dave he was talking about was Dave Seville from the live action version of “Alvin and the Chipmucks” starring Jason Lee as Dave. I was pretty amazed by Gray’s connection on this one since there were no visual clues… Jason Lee never appeared on camera in “Underdog”.

Anyway, this is just another reason why Grayson is awesome.

Day 634: London Series – BBC Documentaries

One evening, after the rest of the family went to sleep I found myself channel surfing. I came across a very odd documentary airing on the BBC, titled, “The Influence of Latin Music in American Culture”. The documentary itself was pretty interesting… however; I thought it was very strange subject to watch on the BBC.

This is like PBS airing a special on the influence of French culinary techniques in British cuisine. Interesting sure… but a tad out of place.