At Home: The Flight Patterns of a Young Boomerang

            This stretch of time at home has given me some unexpected opportunities such as becoming an expert at scaring the woodpeckers that mistake the house for a tree; cleaning obscure objects like a pellet stove; and experimenting with cooking.   Aside from those amusements, I have the time for introspection, which was something I hadn’t allotted quite enough time for during college.   Reflection has made me aware of the ways I have changed since living away from home.   A crucial part of that change began with gratitude.             Paradoxically, my path towards gratitude began by not noticing it at all.   A gratitude jar did not fit into the person I thought I was throughout most of my adolescence.   Hence, if you had told me at any point during this time that I would one day have a gratitude jar, I would given you the look that Wednesday Addams gave to her fellow “Kumbaya” singing summer campers. ( Here )   It was because the heart of my adolescent self-image was built

UPDATED: February 18, 2013  [Since I have more time to actually watch tv and think about it, I have re-written my review of Hello Ladies  even though it has been canceled.  Though I hope my review encourages you to watch it anyway.]    The intention behind this review is an effort to reframe the starkly negative remarks of its critics.  Hello Ladies is a new comedy created by Stephen Merchant (The Office and Extras) with Gene Stupnitsky and Lee Eisenberg (Bad Teacher and Year One).  The show centers on the dating misadventures of Stuart Pritchard (Stephen Merchant), a British web-designer who lives in L.A. and clings to the glamour of a bygone Hollywood.  It also captures the personal and relational difficulties facing Stuart’s friends: Jessica (Christine Woods) the struggling actress, who sublets Stuart’s guesthouse, and the unhappily separated Wade (Nate Torrence).  Much of the criticism leveled against Hello Ladies hinges on an overuse of 'cringe' comedy and St

Apologies for my brief hiatus. I've partially spent the time between my last post to visit some good friends in the city.  My visit also gave me the opportunity to use the commuter rail, bus, and subway.  Here are a few of the things I have learned thanks to public transportation: 1. Women dealing with packs of small children and sugar high pre-teens was the best form of birth control I've ever witnessed.  It was far better than the Flour Baby I had to cart around for a week in the sixth grade and much more exemplary of the flexibility of parental love. 2. Train selfies with friends were almost always accidentally photobombed by other passengers.  I felt less bad about taking a few selfies when I saw someone take one in a bar. 3. Dog strollers exist for small dogs and are as useful as their human counterpart.     4. It was best to be aggressive when boarding the train/bus but it was permissible to be polite once successfully boarded. 5. People making faces at young