Sesame Street classic moments

With Sesame Street celebrating its 40th anniversary, it was only appropriate to pay tribute to this wonderful show by highlighting some of its most memorable sketches and moments. Since every episode is, as you know, brought to you by a letter and number, I've decided to break things up alphabetically and numerically. Enjoy!


A is for the Aliens. Yip yip yipyipyipyipyipyip....



B is for the Beetles. Not pictured: the skit where they were split up by Maria Ono. B is also for BRRRUUUUUUUUUCE and for 'bonus,' so here's an added Springsteen spoof as well. You could say I was born to add it.





C is for Cookie! That's good enough for me!



D is for Don Music. Like any good musician, Don Music is totally ready to dick over Kermit over the publishing rights. This is basically what happened between Axl and Slash.



E is for Ernestine, Ernie's little niece. Wait, so this means Ernie had a brother or sister? Was that plotline ever explored? E might also be for exorcism, since Ernestine was clearly speaking in tongues.



F is for Feist. The enthusiastic head-bop along with the chickens kills me.



G is for Guy Smiley, everybody's favourite game show host. As we learn here, it's not his real name --- I've got to believe that Jim Henson had a friend named Bernie Liederkrantz and wanted to include a little in-joke on the show, since the whole concept of Jewish-Americans changing their names to fit in with WASPy culture is a bit advanced even for Sesame Street. btw, the Count should've taken the cash prize. He would've had loads of fun counting up to one million dollar bills.



H is for HERE, FISHY FISHY FISHY FISHY!



I is for 'I Love You.' Cutest thing in recorded human history? Quite possibly.



J is for Johnny Cash. He made quite a few appearances on Sesame Street, but this one is quite possibly the best since it's an actually an improvement on the original "Don't Take Your Guns To Town" song, which I've never been a big fan of. Also, there was a Lady Count who looked exactly like the real Count? Wow. That must've been one, ONE awkward wedding night. AH AH AH AH! Embedding is disabled on this clip, but here's the link.


K is for Kermit's news updates about nursery rhymes. These always killed me. I love Kermit's scrunched-up face of disgust and his bitching to his producer about his assignments. He's like Anderson Cooper.



L is for Lefty, the character who taught kids it was okay to buy things from shady guys in trenchcoats. Wait....



M is for Monologue, like the one delivered here by the great Patrick Stewart.



N is for Near And Far. Grover's cardio is awful.



O is for One, Two, Three Pigs! AH AH AH AH!



P is for Prairie Dawn. A long-forgotten character who inexplicably looked just like Shelley Long, she and Cookie Monster combined for tons of great skits. "You're always denying me!"



Q is for Quiet. Or, it's for Quite, as in 'Man, Kermit is being quite a dick to Elmo.' Geez, just let the kid help you describe what's loud and what's quiet. What's the big deal? Any clip with a patented Kermit scream is amazing.



R is for Robert De Niro. This clip is a great source of riboflavin! De Niro's Elmo laugh will haunt my nightmares.



S is for Snuffleupagus. Those are some quality reaction shots from the human cast.



T is for Telly, whose new shoes are sold to him by none other than Neil Patrick Harris. The girl muppet at the start of the skit even looks a bit like Alyson Hannigan. Maybe not the greatest skit, but hey, it's got NPH. That's enough to make it accept(wait for it)able.



U is for Unsettling, as in 'That giant anthromorphic U is really unsettling.' I remember seeing this skit as a kid but only just now realized that the guy is supposed to be a mountie. Paul Gross owes his whole acting career to this skit.



V is for Venice, the setting for arguably the best 'Monsterpiece Theatre' spoof of them all. Too bad Grover didn't call the Venetians on their obviously lame attempt to hide their anti-monsterism. "Anyway, me digress."



W is for Wonder, as in Stevie. One of the best live performances on any show, ever.



X is for X Marks The Spot. Sherlock Hemlock looks exactly like Cary Elwes' character in 'The Princess Bride.'



Y is for Y, Norah Jones' absentee friend.



Z is for ZZ Blues. What's up with the Count channeling Billy Crystal's old 'Fernando' character?



And now, the numbers. Since it would take a while to find more clips, we can take care of them in one fell swoop with....the Pinball Song!

Random Nonsense

I'm a week late to the party on this one, but if you happen to have not seen it in a million other places on the internet, here's Christopher Walken reciting the lyrics to 'Poker Face.' It. Is. Glorious.



Man, I'm usually on top of web memes like this one. Oh well....stay tuned for when I post videos of the Jingle Cats and Susan Boyle.

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FInally listened to Kanye West's "Graduation" recently and the only problem with the record (if you can call it a real problem) is that the samples are so catchy they overwhelm Kanye's raps. Now, again, much like the guy in the PlayStation commercials with the hot girlfriend that thinks his game is a movie....this one goes into the 'not an issue' file. Obviously Kanye chose these samples because they were so catchy in the first place, but it's just strange after listening to a hip-hop record that I was really jonesing for some Daft Punk and Steely Dan.

Anyway, good album overall. This is probably the best group of singles that Kanye has gathered together on one disc, and of the other album tracks, 'The Glory' is a very nice underrated number. It's always nice to remember that Kanye West is actually a tremendously talented musician, as opposed to just some douchebag interrupter at awards show. Not to be confused with THE Interrupter.

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We're getting closer and closer to the naming of the Canadian hockey team for the Olympics, so we're almost free of the comical sight of Steve Yzerman visiting various NHL arenas "scouting" the Team Canada prospects. Honestly, I think Stevie Y is just doing this for free meals in the press box --- he already has the entire scouting resources of the Detroit Red Wings at his disposal and, besides, it's not like he's trying to find any hidden gems here. He's basically picking the cream of nation's crop. Yzerman was at a Leafs-Lightning game last week allegedly "scouting" Vincent Lecavalier, and when Vinny opened the scoring, everyone was all "Oh, that's a big goal for Lecavalier, he really impressed Yzerman on that one." Yeah, I'm sure that goal against the friggin' Maple Leafs is what really convinced Yzerman that Lecavalier was a good hockey player. The 300 career goals and the Stanley Cup were nice, but putting one past Monster Gustavsson, that's the real breaking point.

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I've already blogged about the bad-ass promotional poster for LOST's final season, but now here's an added detail. As reported at DarkUFO (arguably the top LOST blog around), someone at Popular Mechanics had the hieroglyphics inside the 'The Final Season' header translated by an expert. Apparently they mean 'Who Is The Guide?' or 'Who Is The Leader?' Interesting. I'm going to go out on a limb can say that the answer to neither question is Boone....though, wait, I guess he did guide Locke during that weird hallucinogenic dream where Locke was pushed shirtless through the Sydney Airport. So basically, my prediction is that Ian Somerhalder will show up in the finale and be revealed as the mastermind villain behind the entire series. What a twist! [/Robot Chicken's M. Night Shyamalan]

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My roommate: "Hey, if the Blue Jays were in the World Series, would they still sing 'God Bless America' if they played games in Toronto?"
Me: "No way. We already have the 'OK Blue Jays' song."
MR: "That's true. That would be awesome. 'God Bless America' is all solemn and everything, and then up here it's just a lot of enthusiastic clapping and weak aerobics."
Me: "I guess it's a moot point since the Jays won't make the World Series again in our lifetimes."
MR: "True."

Then we both wept for 20 minutes.

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And, since self-deprecation has been part of this blog since day one, I'll leave on one of my most idiotic moments. Back in high school, I had a friend named Beth (note: not a real name) who, to be honest, I didn't find very physically attractive. Sweet girl, nice as anything, but she just didn't do anything for me looks-wise. It was no problem, she didn't have a thing for me either, so it just a nice, healthy, platonic friendship.

One night, we were talking on Messenger about some dating issues Beth was having. She was a bit down on herself and her looks, so I decided to cheer her up by saying "C'mon, sure you're good-looking! You're at least a six!" As in, a six out of ten. Now, since I didn't find her physically attractive anyway, I thought in my stupid, stupid mind that I was being generous. Mistake.

The next day I related this story to a mutual friend, who almost slapped me upside the head for being such a moron. In my defense, this was almost 10 years ago, when I was but a young and foolish lad who had about as much tact as a drunken Republican. The moral of the story is, never volunteer a number grade about a person's physical appearance unless they're a perfect ten, in which case go ahead and say it since they couldn't possibly be mad about that and good lord, you actually know a perfect ten? Well done!

And, Like That, He's Gone

BAM, I'm out of Toronto like a bolt and back in London before anyone even knew I was gone. (Unless they didn't notice I was there in the first place...hmm, I must learn to make more of an impression on people. Maybe more yelling?) My exit strategy was formed by about halftime of Toronto FC's crushingly disappointing loss to New York on the 24th, when it became apparent that I would be leaving town pretty soon in lieu of any possible MLS playoff games. With the last week filled with birthday events, sickness and Halloween parties, I barely had time to take stock in the fact that I was once again leaving ol' Toronto town for yet another winter. On the bright side, I highly doubt that a plow goes down the back alley behind my apartment, so at least I get to avoid having my car buried for upwards of three months. How do people in similar situations operate? Do they just wake up one morning in December, notice their car vanished under a massive mound of snow, and then just shrug and commit themselves to taking a bus until the first thaw? Man alive.

It's possible the city didn't want me to leave. I wanted to be on the road before 2 PM in order to avoid any semblance of rush hour in both Toronto or London, but didn't get out of there until after three due to some fantastic incompetence....and not on my part, for a change. I went to get my keys copied for the winter subletter, and popped down to the keycutter in the mall to get the job done. So the keys are cut with no issue, I pop back to the apartment...and neither key works. Fantastic. So then it was BACK to the mall to explain to the guy behind the counter that yes, in fact, there was 'some issue' with the keys in the sense that both were total and complete rubbish. So he re-cuts them, I head back to the apartment, and hey, success! The key to the building's front door opens properly! But...not the key to the actual apartment door. So it was back to the key-cutter for a third bloody time to get another key, and this time, it ended up working. Total time allotted on these back-and-forth trips: a good 45 minutes. Just incredible. Now, I admit to knowing exactly nothing about copying keys, but is it really that difficult a task? Each cut took five minutes, tops, so there clearly isn't an overt amount of craftsmanship needed. Was my apartment door key somehow really complex to duplicate, or was the cutter handling the job just wretchedly bad at his job? My car went in for a service a few weeks ago, thank goodness the garage doesn't operate the same way. "Ah, back again, sir? Oh, this time just two of the tires blew out while you were driving? Ok, that's better! We'll just replace those two blown-out ones, and this time, let's cross our fingers and hope for at least a 75 percent success rate, mmkay?"

When I do get back to TO, at the top of my to-do list is to visit this Commisso Brothers bakery. Rewind to last summer, when I'm at my cousin's place and noting that I don't know of any truly great Angelo's-style food market in Toronto. Rewind again to general London history --- Angelo's is a fantastic all-purpose bakery/market, with three locations in London, one of which is thankfully a five-minute drive from my house. Huzzah for easy access! Anyway, while obviously Toronto has loads of markets that would probably put Angelo's to shame, I've never been able to find one due to my overt laziness. However, my cousin informed me of the Commisso Brothers, which she described as "a Toronto Angelo's." This certainly piqued my attention....though apparently not enough to actually go find the place in the subsequent two months I was in the city. Again, overt laziness, folks. But next year, oh, that'll certainly be the time to commence with the Commissos. I can taste the high-class bologna sandwiches already. That's right, bologna sandwiches on proper panini bread and with proper bologna, not the store-brought stuff that's shaved off of a dead horse's carcass.

Man, this post is making me ravenously hungry for Angelo's. Five minutes, here I come!

Mitchell & Webb

My pal Aron did me a solid by introducing me to the work of Mitchell & Webb, the English comedy duo who star in both the hilarious 'Peep Show' sitcom and their own sketch show, 'That Mitchell & Webb Look' (plus an older show called 'That Mitchell & Webb Situation'). All are wonderful and I still have two more seasons of Peep Show to go.


Top 10 Mitchell & Webb Recurring Sketches/Characters
10. Robert Talks To The Horse
9. The Lazy Writers
8. David's Evil Supervillain
7. Numberwang
6. David and Robert conceiving and working out things that already exist
5. The Surprising Adventures of Sir Digby Chicken Caesar
4. Colin and Ray (the hostage negotiator and porn film writer who share an office)
3. Get Me Hennimore!
2. Drunken Snooker Commentators
1. 'Behind the scenes' with David and Robert


Here's a quartet of their sketches.....

Hiring Lindsay Davenport




Football, football, football!




The benefits of farming




Angel Summoner and BMX Bandit

Deleted Scenes

Haven't been posting much lately due to an oddly busy week. I was laid up with a nasty cold for a couple of days, in addition to all of my year-in-review TFC stuff (which, unfortunately, I'm writing now instead of two, three or four weeks from now in the midst of the MLS Cup playoffs). Even worse, what few posting ideas I did have were quickly made irrelevant by various events. For instance....

* Paul Beeston was hired as the Blue Jays' team president, thus big-footing my planned post wherein I'd write my cover letter for applying to said job. Now sure, I'm not technically qualified for this job, but that didn't stop them from hiring Paul Godfrey. My resume speaks for itself --- winner of a baseball fantasy league, former bar doorman ("My security background would help better control the rowdy Opening Day crowds!") and my sterling writing ability would've led to no shortage of scathing op-eds in response to local media who would dare question my moves. Trust me, had the Star's Morgan Campbell wondered why my first order of business as president was to have a giant bronze statue of myself erected in front of the Rogers Centre, my response would've been a masterpiece of wit. Or, just a 1000-word rant that could've been just summarized as 'sez you.' I would've been a great candidate, but I guess Paul Beeston is also good. I guess.


* I also had a post/poll ready asking what I should be for Halloween, with a number of increasingly bizarre options that ranged from "Pinhead from Hellraiser" to " 'The Battle of Milvian Bridge,' by 16th-Century Mannerist Artist Giulio Romano." But then, well, I had a Halloween party on Friday night, so time was of the essence. My eyes darted around the room, falling on my Roberto Clemente throwback Pirates jersey. Then, I looked down at my computer and noticed my USB cord. So, I simply wore the jersey and hung the cord around my neck and went as 'Pirating Cable.' There was a whole two minutes of thought put into that costume, but hey, at least it was cheap. The Halloween party was fun, by the way. The top costume of the bunch was probably my friend Noah, who came as struggling drywall salesman Steve Hawerchuck. The only downside is that Noah went around literally giving 5-10 minute sales pitches for drywall all night, so if you got stuck in a corner with him, you'd better have been prepared to keep up the improv until he was done.


So those were my two big post ideas for the week, and now they're both totally gone by the wayside. Blergh. What could possibly cheer me up?

Oh wait, THIS.

Birthday Bat Fight

Whenever your party is held the day before your actual birthday, you should remember that it means your actual b-day will involve a little bit of sufferin'. I've spent the day auditioning for the Bradley Cooper role in Hangover 2, except minus the tazing and stealing a tiger from Mike Tyson. Instead, I nicky-nicky-nine doored George Chuvalo. (btw, I'm in the Cooper role because nobody can replace Galifianakis, and I think the Ed Helms role was already filled by my pal Matt, who married a stripper. Wait, on second thought, he might have just bought her a drink. Wait, on third thought, it wasn't a stripper, but rather my friend James. Hmm, my apologies to all, especially James, who is a much better actor than Heather Graham.)

Discoveries from last night's festivities....

* I can remember the lyrics to the Spice Girls' "Stop" just as well drunk as I do sober. Either way, it's still strange.

* A surprisingly large number of my friends have been to Salt Lake City.

* Facebook needs to highlight their 'event invitations' block far more prominently on the main page.

* Leaving a prank-call voice message displaying mock outrage at a non-attendee is the kind of joke that seems a lot less funny the next day.

* If someone brings cupcakes to a birthday party, they will be devoured quicker than if you dump a pig into a piranha tank.

* The polar bear is my favourite shot, thus leading to the line "I've got more polar bears in me than the Dharma Initiative."

* If Toronto's pizza establishments say they're open until 3 AM, they really mean they're jerks who lock up at 2:45.


Thanks to all who attend l'affair d'Mark last evening, and your presence earned you a present. Please enjoy a bat fight.

BAT FIGHT with Will Ferrell from Will Ferrell

Yeah

As you all know, I really enjoy "discovering" established bands and then delving headlong into their discography. My latest 'find' are the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, which came about for a number of reasons. First off, 'Zero' is arguably my favourite song of the year. The YYYs rocked it out on SNL last spring, and hearing it again on the radio while driving down Queens Quay on a rainy August night really brought it alive for me. (If this was Twitter, the previous sentence would have a #lameattemptatsettingthemood tag on it.) Secondly, and this one is a bit stranger, 'Maps' has become my signature song on Rock Band. There are very few tunes that I can perform reasonably well given my Johnny Cash-meets-Eddie Vedder-meets-someone who can't sing voice, but for some reason, 'Maps' falls right in my ballpark. Maybe it's because MAP is also my initials, so I'm just presuming the song is about me on a subconscious level. If I'm ever asked to give a live show of every music video game song I know, it'll be Maps, followed by 'Song 2' and 'Feel Good Inc.' off of Singstar (apparently I sound like Damon Albarn?) and then a rocking rendition of Matthew Sweet's "Girlfriend" from Guitar Hero. And that'll be it. A four-song concert. Still less of a ripoff than a Guns n'Roses ticket.

But anyway, the Yeah Yeah Yeahs. All of those factors coalesced at the same time, thus causing me to buy their latest record "It's Blitz," which is my album of the year thus far. Let's face it, given how little new music I listen to anymore, it'll probably end up taking the prize for 2009 if Kyle, Misha and I decide to do another massive list of our annual favourite records. I's B is a terrific blend of guitar and synth rock, powered by Karen O's one-of-a-kind voice. The YYYs aren't going to blow anyone away with their lyrics, but their songs are almost like pop music's answer to tribal chants. They're repetitive, but good repetitive, and the songs have enough hooks to stay fresh and also know not to wear out their welcome. I's B is the Yeah Yeah Yeah's third record, and it's a great sign that their albums are becoming both better and more interesting over time, rather than staying within one style or (even worse) trying to change just for the sake of being different or weird, a.k.a. Radioheading.

Funny story: I bought It's Blitz, loved it, and then decided to check out Ticketmaster to see if the YYYs were coming to Toronto anytime soon. Turns out I missed them at the Warehouse by literally two days. Ouch. Instead I had to go see the Snipes. BOOOOO. (In all seriousness, yayyyy. My pal Aron is in the band and I didn't have to lie and say that they were good in an attempt to save his feelings since they really were good. Genuinely good, not just 'good for a band that my mate is in' good. My only criticism is their lack of songs about Wesley Snipes.)

Paranormal Activity

You know those few moments of darkness between the end of the movie and when the theatre turns on the house lights? When your horror movie has people in the audience yelling 'TURN ON THE LIGHTS!' since they can't bear those few moments, you know you've got a winner on your hands. Paranormal Activity is the best horror movie I've seen in ages. I beg of you, see it in a theatre, preferably a busy one. There are few film experiences better than seeing a genuinely great horror or suspense flick amidst a packed house that is really wrapped up in the story.

Ten years after the Blair Witch Project, Paranormal Activity uses a similar "real footage" shooting style to investigate a monster not in the woods, but in a young couple's suburban condo. Micah and Katie (the unknown actors' real names) decide to set up a camera and sound equipment to try and make sense of the mysterious occurrences that have been taking place in Katie's life since childhood. She seems to regard these things as more of a curiosity at first, whereas Micah sees the whole thing basically as an excuse to play around with his new camera. The movie is shot with as little artifice as possible and doesn't include opening or closing credits, but rather just a thank you to Micah and Katie's families and the San Diego Police Department. Yeah, that's not ominous....

Now, I mentioned 'Blair Witch' earlier since it's almost impossible to avoid a comparison, but I think I actually preferred Paranormal Activity since the story seems more streamlined (there's no scene here where someone throws a map in the river for no reason) and, whereas the scares in BWP came from never actually seeing the Witch, here you do see things, or perhaps more accurately the results of things. A whole lot is done within that one nicely-framed tableau of Micah and Katie's bedroom. I'm trying to be as oblique as possible since it would be unfair to reveal any of the surprises, but the 'events' of PA follow a gradual crescendo before peaking at the ending. If you didn't like Blair Witch because you didn't think anything happened, well, brother, do things ever happen in Paranormal Activity.

Bottom line is, the movie is creepy as hell. No matter how jaded you are about horror movies, you're going to jump and possibly shriek like a little girl at least once. I, myself, was responsible for at least one 'OH FUCK' that was probably said a few decibels too loud, but in my defense, I was drowned out by several straight-up screams from people around me. (It's the scene at the end of the movie. You'll know it when you see it.) In fact, I considered making this whole review just the running commentary that the teenagers behind me provided for the entire film. It was basically just, "Oh no....oh no....FUCK....what is this thing, bro?.....Ahhhhhh!!!!......Shit, man!.....I can't look anymore, holy fuck......" It was pretty much the same as how I sounded while watching Transformers 2, except in a different context.

Amateur Dream Analysis

DREAM: I'm in a church basement, helping stack tables and generally clean up after a buffet luncheon that morning. I go outside to find my car parked in front of the church, in the lane leading from the actual parking lot to the street. My emergency lights are on, so perhaps I didn't think I was going to be inside for as long as I apparently was. Anyway, there's a piece of paper stuck under my windshield wiper, and it's a parking ticket --- apparently my sitting in the lane for hours caught the attention of a local cop. The cost of the ticket? $4800. Eep.


ANALYSIS: The clearest connection is to the recent ticket I got in real life, as part of my never-ending attempt to figure out Toronto's baffling parking laws. Okay, so you know how when you park on a main street past 9 PM (in some areas midnight), it's free parking? This was my understanding for the previous three years, so last month I pulled into a spot at 10 PM literally right in front of a pay parking machine on a clearly-marked 'green P' area of Queen Street. I went on my way to see a friend's DJing set and left with friends when the club closed at 2:30. As we all got back to my car, I found a ticket had been issued to me 20 minutes earlier for 'parking in a permit-only area.' WTF? Where were the signs to this effect? I guessed it might've been because I was parked after 2 AM, but hell, I've been parked later than two in the morning a bunch of times and never been ticketed before. Something smelled.

Now, my ticket was only for thirty bucks, so it was a far cry from $4800. I'm not sure where that inflated number came from in my dream. Let's see, I was in a church...could it have been a Biblical reference? What is Mark 4:8?

"Still other seed fell on good soil. It came up, grew and produced a crop, multiplying thirty, sixty, or even a hundred times."

Oh, okay, that clears it up. Thanks God! That's not at all vague! Though, 4800 divided by 30 is 160, so that's a combination of 'sixty, or even a hundred times.' And really, what is a buffet but an ever-multiplying array of food? And clearly, since I only planned to park in front of that dream church for a few minutes since I had my cautions on, the amount of work I was called upon to do inside obviously multiplied while I was in there. Maybe others were meant to help clean up except they couldn't get their cars in because some jackass was blocking the laneway in to the parking lot. So in this dream, God was acting through the traffic cop to punish me for my sin of underestimating work, a.k.a. sloth. The dream is an overall parable from the Lord instructing me to not be so lazy. I dunno....I'm pretty lazy. But I did just put a lot of thought into a banal dream about a parking ticket, so there's my one non-lazy activity of the day. Now, back to watching football!

Out-Of-Context Texts In My Phone Inbox, Volume 3

As always, the identities of the original texters will remain a secret forever. FOREVER!!!!


"By fountain."

"Hey, this is Christine's friend Jen. :) When she has a sec, can she call me? Thanks!"

"I'm in the USA without any data. Any chance you can pass on the L.A.-Philadelphia score?"

"Wine!! Where are you?"

"Larkin just shouted hello from a car the other day."

"Oh! Would love to but I have a date! How are you?"

"Hey! I know it's late notice, but we're doing a bit of drinking for my birthday tonight. The plan is to have a few drinks."

"Watch out for signposts."

"Well...I guess we save a little money."

"Is that how you say hello where you're from?"

"Neggo. (y)"

"Ha ha, thanks! What?"

"Indoors, in Roots."

"Hmm, hmm?"

"Ugh."

"I put that football offer back up."

"Hey, you ever read Great Gatsby? I just started it. You around this aft for a video conference?"

"So what was the occasion the other night?"

"I hate the fucking Yankees."

"Louise wanted me to remind you of the Sens' victory."

"No worries, buddy. I'm going to hold you to that.....unless said shot is a prairie fire."

"5-5."

"Bene. You nap yesterday and sleep in today?"

"Yo, wino, what up?"

"Just landed in Charlotte on my way to Indianapolis. Ned Jarrett was in the seat behind me. Thought you might be passably interested."

"730 sounds good."

"What'd you think of her?"

"Awesome!! Congrats. Where at?"

"What the FUCK was Granderson doing there? For fuck's sakes...."

"Ah, chardonnay. So, I guess no Detroit now...."

"Hi! Not sure if you got my e-mail. Can we switch to Wednesday? Too busy at work today."