Now Hear This!

Here's the first single (featuring Lou Reed. Lou Reed!) from The Killers' new album. What are the chances Brandon Flowers was raised on X96, KJQ, and KOHS (on cloudy days when the signal would make it all the way to Nephi)?




More Lou Reed tag team awesomeness, this time rocking out with Pavarotti:



And yet more...

I've grown tired of writing about the ways in which each week's episode of The Office was lame, so instead I'm going to list the Office characters who, like children at rich people's houses, should be seen and not heard.

1. Stanley. Rarely contributes anything to the show.
2. Meredith. Detracts from the show whenever she speaks. She should probably not even be seen.
3. Creed. This pains me somewhat because he's an interesting character and I used to like him. During Season 3 he just started to be a nasty person (stealing money, getting people fired, stealing Christmas presents from the kids. From the kids!)

So that we don't have four entirely negative posts in a row here, I'll note that I really like Toby and think he should have more lines. He wasn't in the third episode at all and he had only one line in the fourth. If I recall correctly, though, he didn't get the English grammar quite right: "whom" was the object of a preposition. (Professor Johnson, wherever you are and if you happen to be reading this blog, if I am wrong about this you can retroactively reduce my grade.)

I'm looking forward to when it's a half hour again.

I'd also like to point out that I'm also looking forward to a Cleveland/Colorado World Series. I'm hoping that Cleveland knocks the Red Sox out this weekend. I'm hearing a lot of people complaining that it will be the lowest rated WS in history, blah, blah, blah. Who cares? These are the same people who think ERA and RBIs are useful stats. These people and their opinions can be safely ignored.

I Think I've Pinpointed Why The Office Is No Longer Funny

The Office, Season 4, Episode 3

Everyone on the show acts like a complete unlikeable idiot doing things that no one in the real world does, except for Jim and Pam and frankly they're just not interesting anymore. And Toby. But I'm not even sure he's on the show anymore. My guess is that Paul Lieberstein recognized that this is a sinking ship and bailed.

Back to the point though. Whereas previously Michael Scott was oblivious to the rest of the world and was surrounded by normal people trying to deal with his insanity, through three episodes this season everyone is over the top and stupid. I can only assume that the writers thought, "Hey, if one person being a moron is good, ten people being morons is great." False! Ten people being morons is The Bachelor or the second season of The Apprentice or the New York Knicks and no one wants to see that.

Update: I know I said earlier that it might be a good idea to give Andy a love interest...I think I was wrong. Yeah, I was wrong.

The Office, Season 4, Episode 2

I don't even know where to begin with this episode. More drama, more outrageousness, less subtlety. What is wrong with B.J. Novak's character? I know he's supposed to be mean but isn't there a way to make him mean and likable and funny? And where is Ed Helms? It's been two episodes and he hasn't kicked anything yet. I'm also starting to wish that they had fired Creed instead of Devin in the Season 2 Halloween episode.

What happened to the subtle humor? I'm beginning to feel like I'm in an actual office with people I don't want to be around doing things I don't want to do and not getting paid for it.

The highlight of the show was when Jim and Pam went to Toby to see what they had to do about registering their relationship with HR and Toby told them wait and see how it goes before doing anything official.

Overall, it was funnier than the first episode, but I'm still not impressed. Maybe when the episodes go back to a half hour they'll trim it down and leave only the good stuff.