That 80s Show, Take Two

Oh, I missed Tunesday. Meh. It’s been a busy week.

Last night we caught The Goldbergs on ABC. It was sort of unintentional; I’d kind of wanted to see it not enough to actually know when it was on. The TV just happened to be on the right channel at the right time. Anyway, it was pretty good. With the narration, it brings to mind The Wonder Years set in the 80s. I think it’s kind of like what That 80s Show aspired (and failed) to be. Enough time has passed since That 70s Show ended that I think The Goldbergs might actually be able to work. As far as I can tell, 80s nostalgia is reaching a fever pitch, so the time is certainly right.

But what do I know? I’m so far from Hollywood I may as well be in Peoria. (Of course, Peoria is actually closer to Hollywood . . . so . . . .) I don’t know art, but I know what I like! On the other hand, I’m watching Airwolf* again, so I guess you should take my opinions about entertainment with a grain of salt.

 

*I mistyped this as “Airfowl,” which would be an entirely different program. Probably about geese.

Tunesday: I still don’t know what he’s saying

I’m diverging slightly from the normal Tunesday format tonight. You see, Husband watches football. A lot of football. And I’ve noticed that lately the NFL has not infrequently been playing Pearl Jam’s “Even Flow” during timeouts. I cannot hear that song without thinking of Opera Man.

You’re welcome.

Have mercy

I have an app on my phone called Mindsnacks Spanish.  It’s got a bunch of games and such to help you learn the language.  I had four years of Spanish in high school and a semester in college, but I’ve lost most of it since I never need to use it.  (Let me put it like this: I was watching Plaza Sésamo the other day, and I had no clue what was happening.)  Anyway, it’s a fun, useful little app.  When I first started with it, it used photographs instead of illustrations to show you the meaning of a word.  Very helpful for the visual learner, even though they were just stock photos — for the most part.

I want to shake the hand of the developer who used a photo of John Stamos as Jesse Katsopolis, aka Full House’s Uncle Jesse, to demonstrate el tío.  It still makes me laugh to think of it, and I encountered it months ago.

(Did you catch Jesse and the Rippers on Jimmy Fallon the other night?  That’s one reunion I never thought would happen!)

For want of a shoe, the horse was lost

Hello, blog.  It’s been a long time.  How’ve you been?  Sure is quiet around here.  I drifted away from updating because I couldn’t find a focus, and just having my own personal soapbox was not particularly motivating.  So here I am, recommitting to my original purpose: documenting the awesomeness of being a child of the 80s.

Yesterday I killed a few hours watching Ghostbusters and Ghostbusters II on one of the premium movie channels.  When I was a kid, we lived out in the country.  We couldn’t get cable, and my parents wouldn’t have been willing to pay for TV even if they HAD run it out that far, so everything we watched was via the UHF/VHF rabbit ears on top of the TV set.  My brother, on the other hand, was fresh out of college and living away from home — and with cable! — when Ghostbusters hit the premium channels for the first time.  He would periodically record movies (on Betamax, natch) and bring them when he came to visit.  And thus eight-year-old me was introduced to the Stay Puft Marshmallow Man.

I told you that to tell you this: that Betamax SL-2300 VCR was a glorious thing.  The silver remote control had three buttons (rewind, fast-forward, and pause) and was connected to the VCR via a long, thin cable.  The VCR opened up so many doors for us (not literally).  Suddenly we could record a show and NOT have to watch the commercials; imagine that!  I still remember so many shows I watched and re-watched over and  over: The Christmas Toy, A Family Circus Christmas, A Muppet Family Christmas, Cathy . . . the list goes on, but these are the ones that stand out in my mind.

My parents still have that old VCR, and those tapes.  I would love to watch all those shows again, although I don’t know that the VCR still works.  And I would love to see all those commercials that were such a novelty to skip.  The funny thing is — thanks to Amazon and the Internet, I can.  I own A Christmas Toy and Muppet Family Christmas on DVD (although they’re adulterated; because Disney owns Kermit now he was cut from the beginning and ending of the former, and they took “Sleigh Ride” out of the latter due to rights issues).  While writing this post, I found both the Cathy special and Family Circus Christmas posted online.  And there are dozens if not hundreds of commercials from the 80s on YouTube.

I get the impression there are a lot of folks out there like me — longing for the halcyon days of Muppets and Barbie and Voltron.  I often find myself trying to revisit my childhood, wishing I still had my My Little Ponies and all of my Barbies.  (I do still have a few Barbies, along with two Cabbage Patch Kids and some Strawberry Shortcake dolls.  Oh, and I do have my Voltron — lions, of course.  At least I haven’t divested myself of everything I loved as a kid.)  So that’s my niche.  Sit back and enjoy the ride through the 80s and early 90s, and please keep your hands inside the windows at all times.

A Very Special Episode

Fair warning: I’m recovering from the flu, so I’m kinda rambly tonight.  More so than usual, I mean.

My radio silence of late has been due mainly to NaNoWriMo.  I finished my novel yesterday — it was sort of a limp to the finish, because I was having trouble setting up the denouement I wanted, but hey, it’s done.  Now I’m going to set it aside until perhaps March (aka NaNoEdMo), at which point I may actually take a stab at working it into something decent enough to shop around for publishing.  This is the fourth or fifth novel I’ve written during NaNoWriMo, and the first one I’m actually still enamored with after finishing.

But that’s not why I’m here.  I’m currently watching a Very Special Episode of Mr. Belvedere on Rural TV.  Until last week when I discovered it’s in reruns up in the channels I rarely ever get up to before finding something to watch, I’d forgotten how much I loved this show.  It holds up surprisingly well and actually makes me laugh rather than cringe like a lot of today’s shows (I’m looking at you, Glee).  The episode I’m watching is the one where Wesley’s camp counselor puts the moves on him.  Do they even make Very Special Episodes of TV shows anymore?  I can’t remember the last time I saw one.  Maybe it’s just because I’m no longer watching shows aimed toward kids/teens/families?  It just seems as though there are no more sitcoms like Full House, Family Ties, Growing Pains, etc.  I can guarantee you that as a kid, I’d never have been allowed to watch something like Two and a Half Men or . . . you know, I’m having trouble coming up with names of sitcoms.  Maybe that’s the problem!  Seems as though all I watch anymore is reruns of The Big Bang Theory.  (Which I love, by the way, but I’ve yet to see a Very Special Episode of it.)

Aside: I added Brice Beckham (the actor who played Wesley) as a friend on ye olde book of faces, and he totally added me back.  Ten-year-old me is psyched!  ([Mumblety-mumble]-year-old me is also pretty thrilled, as embarrassing as that is to admit.  Squee!)

In other hey-I-seem-to-think-it’s-the-80s news, last night I discovered that Richard Marx is:
a) absolutely hilarious
b) on Twitter
c) while drunk
d) all of the above

(To tie that back into the name of this blog, I learned that because Wil Wheaton re-tweeted something he posted.  Woo, full circle!)