Pilots

Buzzfeed has a list, Here Are 35 First Episodes Of TV Shows That Will Hook You Instantly.

I agree with the ones I've watched (Barry, Schitt's Creek et al). Here's a few other pilots (that is, first episodes) that I consider to be particularly good/memorable.

TOP 10 (in no order):

The Cosby Show
Cheers
Fawlty Towers
Frasier
Friday Night Lights
The Sopranos
The Green Green Grass
The Mary Tyler Moore Show
Only Fools and Horses
The Vicar of Dibley

THE REST:

Blackadder
Black Books
Cuckoo
Fresh Prince of Bel-Air
Gavin and Stacey
The Wrong Man(s)
The Good Life
Green Acres
I'm Alan Partridge
The Inbetweeners
The IT Crowd
Lucky Louie
Malcolm in the Middle
All in the Family
Girls
The Office
WKRP in Cincinnati
Peep Show
Porridge
Roseanne
The Royle Family
Open All Hours
Veep
Wings
Yes, Minister

The Ringer Greatest 21st Character Tourney

Read all about it HERE. Here's my picks for the current bracket. Starting on the left side, and going down. + = toughest match-up for each region. * = my educated guess without having really watched either show

BOSSES

Tony Soprano
Don Draper
Coach Taylor+
Walter White*

MILLENIALS

Nathan Fielder*
Baby Yoda*
Bojack Horseman*
Tim Riggins+

It appears I don't watch a lot of shows with millennia characters? 🤔

SCENE STEALERS

Leon Black
Dwight Schrute+
Ron Swanson
Peggy Olson

Great region!

WILD CARDS

Michael Scott+
Rust Cohle
Larry David
Pete Campbell

Another great bracket. Having to cut Charlie Kelly was the toughest of the whole thing. I guess they all were great for me except for the millenial one.

WTF Mickey D's?

The folks (folk?) over at Brand Eating have a great question: why on Earth does a Double Big Mac have twice the number of patties but still only one slice of cheese? 🤔

One More Day

Nobody likes the quarantine but at least we do have a winner.

Another Reason to Love Charles Barkley

His graciousness after getting beat in a big upset in his final college game, against the University of Richmond:

Barkley was the first person to shake Tarrant’s hand after the game. Tarrant said Barkley complimented him for the way the Spiders played, and how Tarrant directed them.

After Barkley scored 23 with 17 rebounds in the upset that was his final college game, Barkley asked Richmond coach Dick Tarrant for permission to enter the Spiders’ dressing quarters in Charlotte, N.C., to offer congratulations.

And because YouTube is amazing you can WATCH THE WHOLE DAMN GAME HERE.

BUt of course the reason we all REALLY love Sir Charles is THE QUOTES!

How Great Songs are Written

Here’s John Lennon trying to figure out his classic Strawberry Fields Forever. 

Good Grief

I know everybody’s worried all the time now but if it makes you feel better you should know that on this day in 1993 this loser finally had some good news. 

Thoughts. I Have Them.

I’ll probably never start a band again but if I do I promise you the name will be Gordon Gartrelle. 

39 Years Ago Today

My first hero and all-time favorite college basketball player Jeff Lamp played his final game at Virginia, a win against LSU in what would be the final consolation game ever played. (Oh yeah, and President Reagan was shot earlier in the day because of Jodie Foster.)


Pretty much forgotten on the internet, grrrrrr, here's an article about him being a forgotten living legend.  Incredibly, Lamp was just one of four teammates at Ballard High that year who would be selected in the NBA draft (only one of whom I've ever heard of, Lee Raker, plus back then the NBA draft had like 200 rounds. I think I got picked once.)

"But Xmastime", you say in the voice of Craig “Ironhead” Heyward from those soap commercials (RIP), “didn't you actually meet Jeff Lamp once?"

Sigh. YES faithful readers, yes I did. You may read all 1,508 words about the historic meeting of hardwood legends HERE.

This Will Make Your Day

Here's to Biggens!

Hello Douglas Copeland

I generally roll my eyes at any "the new generation is a bunch of pussies!" but this article made me chuckle:

Generation X is generally accepted to have been born in that sliver of time between 1965 and 1980. What my teens didn’t know was that my entire generation has been dismissed from day one, and what’s more we don’t really care.

It seems that it has taken a global pandemic for anyone to sing our praises ― to even call us by name. All of the sudden folks are impressed by our remarkable resilience, our ability to entertain ourselves for hours on end and our willingness to shelter in place without whining.

Social isolation is not only tolerable for us, Gen X requires a regular dose of it to recharge our batteries. So while you might already be flipping out, we are basking in the down time.

We once focused all our attention on making mix tapes. Some of our best products took the entire weekend to create. Now that’s dedication.

Gen Xers have limited expectations too. We were completely satisfied to play with our Pet Rocks (which was literally just a rock), or the world’s first video game, Pong (literally a dot on the screen, moving between two cursors).  In other words, we are pretty easily entertained.

So when faced with the prospect of sheltering in place for an unspecified number of weeks, Generation X knows for sure that we got this. Heck, we’ve been training for a moment like this all our lives.

It might feel like “the end of the world as we know it” ― but Generation X feels fine. We have instantly become our nation’s unsung heroes. So watch and learn people, watch and learn.

RIP Roy Biggins

David Schramm, who played Roy Biggins on the criminally-overlooked Wings, just died. :(

Great character, and he totally nailed it. 

I’ll work up a “who had him outliving Faye?” joke when the appropriate amount of time has passed. 

The Incredibleness of Baseball-Reference

Great shout-out on The Ringer, with people pointing out some strangely fantastic bit they've found. A fave of mine, from the Cup of Coffee page:

I recently rewatched Field of Dreams, the movie that made Moonlight Graham a household name. Graham played an inning in the outfield on June 29, 1905, but he didn’t get to bat, and he never made it back to the big leagues. “Back then I thought, ‘Well, there’ll be other days,’” the movie version of Moonlight, played by Burt Lancaster, says. “I didn’t realize that that was the only day.”

Hundreds of players have had only one day in the big leagues, and Baseball-Reference’s cup of coffee player pages (one for hitters and one for pitchers) put them all in one place. Graham wasn’t the only hitter who never held a bat in the big leagues: A couple of players (Pedro Santana and Joe Hietpas) have had the same experience this century. Among the hitters who have batted, the results have varied widely, from Ron Wright, who infamously struck out and then grounded into a triple play and a double play in his lone game with the 2002 Mariners, to John Paciorek, who singled three times and walked twice in his only major league look as an 18-year-old with the Houston Colt .45s. Wright never got an opportunity to improve on his colossal dud of a debut, and Paciorek never got the chance to repeat his spectacular success. Somewhere, a seasoned sports veteran is intoning, “There are no guarantees in this game.”

WTF was John Paciorek never given another shot to play??????

Oh: injuries. And there's this:

Paciorek is rare among Major League Baseball players in having a perfect batting average of 1.000. He is the only player to achieve this distinction with more than two turns at-bat"

Gary Gulman 365

Gary Gulman is one of my favorite comedians and he spent last year Tweeting one piece of advice on joke writing every day. Today on Vulture he goes through & categorizes each one!

Tip No. 193: 25 years in, I’m having my most creative run ever. I’ve written 2+ hours in 18 months. There are several factors, but I think reading more than ever, 100+ books in that time, is important … or a complete coincidence. Either way it’s heaven.

Watch his brilliantly poignant special The Great Depresh on HBO NOW!!

Here's one of my favorite bits of his, his days in a Jewish basketball league.

41 Years Ago Today

The Bird-Magic NCAA Final happened:

When Indiana State erected a Bird statue on campus in Terre Haute in 2013 — making bloody well sure it was taller than the Magic statue in East Lansing — Bird was still brooding about a night 34 years before.
 
“You never get over that. It’s impossible to get over it when you have your heart broken. I knew going into that game that I was going to have to play the best game I’d ever played in my life, and I didn’t do it. I let us all down.”

That contest might be one of college basketball’s golden moments, but he has never watched a replay. He never will. “I know how it ended.”

Hold On, I'm (Not) Coming

I just now found out the amazing Stax Museum has digitized everything, including every page of their newsletter. 

Thank you amazing Stax Museum!

HOLD THE FUCK UP.

According to a new book out now, Steve Carell never intended to leave The Office when he did:

He didn’t want to leave the show. He had told the network that he was going to sign for another couple of years. He was willing to and his agent was willing to.

...And the deadline came for when they were supposed to give him an offer and it passed and they didn’t make him an offer. So his agent was like, "Well, I guess they don’t want to renew you for some reason." Which was insane to me. And to him, I think.

via GIPHY

OFAH du Jour

Uncle Albert's funniest scene!

“That’s What She Said” by Season

(Via this article)

KIP Record Release Party

20 years ago today (god I'm old) Marah held their Kids in Philly release party at the TLA in Philly. It was my very first Marah show, and still one of my favorites. Here's an outtake from the album they played that night that's remained a superslice of mine. Sorry, audio only. :(

My Top 12 Episodes of The Office

(In chronological order)

Diversity Day
Sexual Harassment
The Negotiation
The Deposition
Dinner Party
Stress Relief
Golden Ticket
Secret Santa
Threat Level Midnight
Goodbye Michael
Dwight Christmas
Finale

Also nominated:

The Dundies
The Injury
Performance Review
The Coup
The Convict
A Benihana Christmas
Product Recall
Fun Run
Money
Goodbye, Toby
Frame Toby
Dwight K. Shrute, ((Acting) Manager
The Target
Suit Warehouse
Livin’ the Dream
A.A.R.M.

More The Office!

The Ringer breaks down the iconic basketball game from the first season.Never picked up on "The Dirty Laettner"!!!!

15 Years Ago Today

The Office premiered! :)

I really don't have anything to say. The show has just brought me so much joy over the years. Here's the first time I ever referenced it on Xmastime. TBH I can't believe I didn't post about it until 2008 (of course I more than made up for the late start over the years).

The Office

The thing I don't get about The Office is isn't Jim way out of Pam's league? She does nothing for me. Mousy, dresses like a doily. And that mustache doesn't help things. Me, I'd plow over Pam with a Big Wheel to get up in Jan's tongety-tong. Bangin. AND her last name in real life starts with HARD!! :)

"Xmas, get in here...paper jam."

State du Moi

I haven’t panicked about there being no sports until I just tuned into Mad Dog and he was playing Jackson Brown. Wtf.

Your The Office of the Day

Michael’s first and last interactions with everybody. Enjoy!

UPDATE: is the David Wallace bit from a deleted scene???!!??

The Dead Boys

They should be much more famous, their debut album was awesome. 

My Mother Made This When I Was a Teenager

Happy St. Patrick’s Day everybody! 🤗🇮🇪

Brady du Jour

‪Anyone else make the “this is Tom Brady showing up in Tampa Bay” joke yet? ‬

Always Funny!

A bottle of Guinness was split on the floor

When the pub was shut for the night
Out crept a mouse from his little hole
And sat in the pale moonlight

He lapped at the frothy brew
Then back on his haunches he sat
And all night you could hear him roar
"Bring on the fucking cat!"

Happy St. Patrick’s Day!

(reprinted yearly)

When I was a kid my dad always tried to make a big deal out of us being Irish (the only ones in town), but who gives a shit what your dad says when you’re young? Certainly not me. When we got a little older my dad came up with the idea that on St. Patrick’s Day, he would administer a quiz to my brother and me on the history of Irish saints; the winner would get a pizza from TA-DA! Roma’s. A week or so before the 17th he’d give us some big, over-the-top dry book to read on the subject. My brother would actually read it; I’d get to page 3 and then start wondering if I’d rather be in Def Leppard or Duran Duran (trick question – I’d be better off being a dead Irish saint.) So guess who would win the “competition”? But the thing is, I’d still get the pizza – the pizza would come, and I’d hafta toast to Brothatime!!’s Irish brilliance, but I’d do it with a mouthful of cheese and grease on my face. To this day, I live by that creed: 

“I will not read for pizza.!”

Derry Girls

One great thing about any Irish sitcom I’ve seen is that it if came out anytime after 1978 then the odds of the classic Undertones hit Teenage Kicks popping up in an episode is somewhere around 100%. 🤗🇮🇪

Questions. I Have Them.

Why the fuck do they not allow cameras inside the Buddy Holly Museum in Lubbock? 😡‬

TV Watching Goals for Tonight!

Things Are Not Always as They Seem

This incredibly iconic photo, famously titled Burst of Joy,was taken on this day in 1973. It's become a photo we've all taken to one one of ecstatic joy, a US soldier coming back to his family from Vietnam. And not just a soldier - Lt. Col. Robert L. Stirm had just been released after 5 years as a POW. It's a photo that exudes happiness, hope, love, and everything.

Except.

I stumbled upon this little fact on Wikipedia:

Despite outward appearances, the reunion was an unhappy one for Stirm. Three days before he arrived in the United States, the same day he was released from captivity, Stirm received a Dear John letter from his wife Loretta informing him that their marriage was over. Stirm later learned that Loretta had been with other men throughout his captivity, receiving marriage proposals from three of them.

WTF!!  3 days before?? 3 marriage proposals? AND ACCORDING TO THE PHOTO SHE HAD THE ONIONS TO SHOW UP WITH A SMILE ON HER FACE?

Did things at least get better for Stirm, you ask?

Nope:

In 1974, the Stirms divorced and Loretta remarried, but Lt Col Stirm was still ordered by the courts to provide her with 43% of his military retirement pay once he retired from the Air Force.

The Brackets are Here!

Someone Tweeted this The Office tournament, so of course I had to give my 2 cents. (YES I see the typo in the first round but obviously Goodbye Michael won as it's in the next round now please stfu about it.)

Brutal First-round matchups:

Niagara vs. The Deopsition: of course the wedding episode was great and touching, but The Deposition was just flat-out one of the funniest of the entire run.
The Injury vs. Fun Run: both fantastic, The Injury maybe more iconic and features the first scene of omg, can Dwight and Pam be...friends?
Scott's Tots vs. Diversity Day: Scott's Tots is a brilliant premise with a massive plot hole (nobody checked in during the 10 years to see if the offer was still happening?) and Diversity Day was the first stone-cold classic, and definitely one of the all-time Top 5ish episodes.

Episodes I'm Surprised Made This List:

Drug Testing
Murder (except for Oscar's hilarious moment trying to speak Southern)
The Alliance
Pool Party (the only post-Michael episode until The Finale? There were some crappy Season 8 episodes but there's plenty better than this one.)

Episodes I'm Surprised Weren't on the List:

Performance Review
The Coup
The Convict
Back From Vacation
The Negotiation
Frame Toby
Golden Ticket
Secret Santa
St Patrick's Day

Post-Michael Episodes I Would've Been Okay With Here:

Garden Party
New Guys
Dwight Christmas
Suit Warehouse
Livin' the Dream

AND MY WINNER IS...

The Finale

Dinner Party is amazing but of course I'm a sap. :)

Wilson!

I didn’t know fuck-all about Woodrow Wilson but boy did this guy do a great job of selling me.

Not So Luvvly Jubbly!

Obviously everything turned out fine for him but Sir David Jason had thought he’d be joining Monty Python:

Speaking to The Telegraph, Sir David however admitted he was upset about not being asked to join at the time, saying: ‘Absolutely. At the time my nose was well out of joint.

Well, I come from a different background which maybe they didn’t want. They were all a bit cerebral. They’d all been to university. I was an actor, maybe they felt I couldn’t contribute much to the writing. 

Here they all are in the precursor to Python, Do Not Adjust Your Set. 

Some Advice

‪Use this all as an opportunity to binge-watch the brilliant, criminally overlooked sitcom The Grinder on Amazon right now. ‬

A Real Nightmare

Article about the comfort food that is the American version of Kitchen Nightmares:

Each episode plays out with almost identical beats: Ramsay is served the terrible food, interviews the highly deluded owners, investigates the kitchen for unhygienic horrors, observes a disastrous dinner service, and uses his expertise to repair the restaurant’s problems, all while doing a lot of yelling. The American version premiered in 2007 and is a product of the Extreme Makeover: Home Edition era of reality television, each episode ending with a surprise restaurant makeover and (usually) thankful owners, tied up with a nice bow.

What this article fails to mention is to not watch the terrible American version and binge the amazing original British one instead, which is always intoxicating.

I've said it before, there is an almost perfect symmetry to Gordan Ramsay's two Kitchen Nightmares series in that there's not a single moment in any of the original British ones that I couldn't watch over and over until the end of time, and yet there's hardly a second of the American version that's watchable.

And yes, I will remind you once again why the American version of the show suuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuucks. You're welcome, Earth.

Yogi Bear Movie

Its only flaw is the park’s desperate race to organically generate enough revenue in a week to stay open when probably all they really had to do is mention they had two bears that can talk?

Xmastime review from 2011:Xmastime review from 2011. Xmastime review from 2011. Xmastime review from 2011. 

Come the Fuck On, McDonalds

It’s remarkable to me that after 50 years McDonalds Big Mac is still so popular considering its total absence of structural integrity. Has anyone ever finished one before it started completely falling apart? 😡

Thoughts. I Have Them.

‪Now matter how old I am, Dumb and Dumber is never not funny. ‬

More Happy Birfday Big Bear

2 more classic bits. Enjoy!

Big Bear Already Understands How the World Works

Xmastime: you want some more chocolate milk?
Big Bear: yeah, but I wanna make it all by myself.
Xmastime: oh, okay.
Big Bear: you can be my assistant.
Xmastime: okay, cool.
Big Bear: now Mr. Assistant, would you please, open the milk (waves hand dramatically as if he were a magician)
Xmastime: Sure.
Big Bear: ....and, now would you please, pour the milk into the cup (waves hand dramatically as if he were a magician)
Xmastime: Yup.
Big Bear: Okay, and now Assistant would you please, take the top off of this (waves hand dramatically as if he were a magician, pushes can of Ovaltine to me)
Xmastime: Okay.
Big Bear: ...aaaaaaaaaaaand dump some of it in the milk (waves hand dramatically as if he were a magician)
Xmastime: You know, it seems like I'm the one doing all the work.
Big Bear: Well, that's because you're my assistant.
Xmastime: Ah. Gotcha.
Big Bear: And you'll tell my mom and dad I did it all myself, right?
Xmastime: Yes sir.

Conversations with a First Grader

Today was Big Bear's first day of first grade. He told me all they did all day was play, to which I replied "well, tomorrow they're gonna get serious about you learning stuff, you know", to wit:

Xmastime: They're gonna teach you how to read.
Big Bear: I already know how to read.
Xmastime: Oh. Well, they're gonna teach you how to write.
Big Bear: I already know how to write.
Xmastime: Oh. Well, they're gonna teach you math.
Big Bear: I already know math. 
Xmastime: Well. (long pause...) I guess there's no reason to go back, then.
Big Bear: Probably not.

Big Bear Memory du Jour

(walking with Big Bear to pick Cherry Bomb up from school and trying to gauge if we could make it home before it started raining, or if I needed to call for a car service)

Xmastime: how long does it take to get from Cherry Bomb's school to home?
Big Bear: same as it does from home to her school.

Boom!  :)

 Full Xmastime Big compendium HERE.

Happy Birday Big Bear!

Happy 14th Birthday to my godson Luke! About 11 years ago he delivered this gem to me:

Him: Can you get me some chocolate milk?
Me: You got it, buddy (getting up from couch)
Him: And when you get back, I'm gonna punch you in the stomach.
Me: Really?
Him: Yeah. hurry up.

Treat yourself in the search bar above with "Big Bear" for a rabbit hole of classics through the years.

Here he is about to get me dragged into a fistfight with some, and I quote, "friggin' loudmouths!"

State du Moi

I’m not saying it’s making lemonade outta lemons but Mad Dog just said that without sports happening he’s gonna be spending hours talking about All in the Family episodes and I’m a pig in shit about it.

OFAH du Jour

This list of Top 10 Only Fools and Horses episodes is pretty terrible. Only 3 would be in my Top 10, and 4 would actually be in my BOTTOM 10! Mange tout, people!

Andy vs. Dwight

The writers on The Office nearly ruined the show by trying to make Andy a replacement for Michael Scott, which was a huge mistake. And in a new book coming out, you can guess why it was Andy and not Dwight (until the very end of course):

Brent Forrester (Writer, Seasons 3-9): The writers and the cast, generally speaking, were really excited about Dwight becoming the boss. It just felt correct, and that was our creative thrust. Mostly it was pushback from the network saying, “Well. Is there someone more famous that we can put in here?” Of course, the creators always bristle at that and just want to do the right thing creatively. That was a big thing. But Ed Helms had this giant advantage because of course he was in The Hangover. Not to completely read the minds of the network, but that was my understanding of how that decision got made.

Owen Ellickson (Writer, Seasons 8-9): I think the Hangover calculus sort of shifted things toward Andy pretty quickly.

Let It Be

Let It Be is an unwatchable film that has the unfortunate agenda of trying to make it look like The Beatles hated each other, so I’m eagerly looking forward to Peter Jackson’s upcoming movie:

Get Back also aims to elaborate on the original Let It Be movie, released in 1970 and taken from the same recording sessions. That film amounted to a cinéma vérité document of the Beatles’ fragmentation. Ringo Starr is said to be pleased with the new movie, recently telling a friend that he appreciated that it didn’t make it seem as if the band was fighting all the time during that period. “He said, ‘It was just not true,'” says a source.

State du Moi

Just realized the song Gloria by Laura Branigan was not on the Flashdance soundtrack. I am stunned.

Urine? Is the Answer Urine?

Thoughts. I Have Them.

If Jon Hamm doesn't win an Emmy for his appearance on Curb Your Enthusiasm then I'm flipping the fuck out, people.

FINALLY!!!

OFAH du Jour

A stone-cold classic, one of my all-time favorites! :)

An all-time classic! :) https://t.co/nJ0xQBKYSY

— XMASTIME (@XMASTIMEblog) March 9, 2020

17 Years Ago Today

Grimace and Abe Lincoln met The Boss. 

Dipshit Me, In a Nushell

1. Watch video on Di Fara pizza 
2. Watch video on New Haven pizza 
3. Order Domino’s.

MIke and the Mad Dog!

Podcast plays a clip from 2006 when Doggie, the greatest Yankee hater of them all, fights in favor of Jeter should've been the damn MVP. Classic Dog! 😅

Thoughts. I Have Them.

‪Why is blowing your nose in public accepted but not farting? I mean, at least farts are funny. Blowing your nose is just gross. #XmastimeThoughts

OTD 1994

We lost an all-time great. 

Mars Bars

It's almost depressing how much we take for granted that we have access to something like this.

The Struggle Was Real, but Now it’s Over.

Hey Hey Hey!

In case you were wondering which episode of What's Happening! I will be watching tonight, it is Season Two's classic Give Me Odds. You're welcome!

How is this not an Onion article?

Via New York Daily News.

Boxcars are Turning

I wouldn't say I dug them as much as Soup, The Great Brain, McGurk, or The Three Investigators, but I read me the shit outta some Boxcar children books. - XMASTIME

In a total surprise to me, they're still cranking those fuckers out:

Without the continued prevalence of The Boxcar Children, kids these days might not even know what a boxcar actually is. Originally published in 1924, Gertrude Chandler Warner’s first novel about the four orphaned Aldens gained popularity when it was re-released in 1942, and she followed it up with another 18 stories about the children, who, thankfully, no longer lived in a boxcar. There are now more than 150 books in the series, known as The Boxcar Children Mysteries, and, although the characters have 21st-century privileges like internet access and middle school robotics teams, the books have managed to stay true to the old-timey, small-town spirit of Warner’s early editions.

Must Say...

...as someone who has met him (you know I don’t like to talk about it tho) No idea why it took me until today to watch this.

Yeah, But...

...I’m an American so I’ve been trained to idiotically think we’re all supposed to be John fucking Wayne.

Gunnison, CO

11 years ago I mentioned to Colorado town of Gunnison, a small town that avoided the plague like...well, the plague.

Today we're reminded of how they pulled off what they did:

Gunnison, a farming and mining town of about 1,300 people, had special reason to fear. Two railroads connected it to Denver and other population centers, many badly hit. “The flu is after us” the Gunnison News-Champion warned on 10 October. “It is circulating in almost every village and community around us.”

What happened next is instructive amid a new global health emergency a century later as the world struggles react to the emergence of a new coronavirus. Gunnison declared a “quarantine against all the world”. It erected barricades, sequestered visitors, arrested violators, closed schools and churches and banned parties and street gatherings, a de facto lockdown that lasted four months.

Instead of face masks and anti-bacterial hand gels, Gunnsion relied on the guidance and authority of local newspapers, doctors and police – a trust in institutions that may now seem quaint – and on people’s capacity for patience. 

 Well, no chance of us learning from this today, of course.

Happy Birthday Dr. Seuss...

...maybe the worst person ever?

(Originally posted in 2010)