Not much news since the plane landed. The deal is pretty much official, though.

I'd been thinking about watching Taxi Driver--for the one millionth time--for the last few nights. It's like a comfort movie for me. Isn't that insane? Frosty the Snowman and Taxi Driver. There could be no story at all, and I'd still sit there for hours, pausing and rewinding, trying to figure out which New York street each scene is shot on, and seeing how different things were back then. But the movie's awesome as a bonus. Anyway, with the death of Peter Boyle today, I figured tonight was the perfect night for it. I learned from the CBS Evening News that "holy crap" was Boyle's catch phrase on that Raymond show that Chan seems to enjoy. Apparently, after his role as "The Wizard," he went on to become some kind of irritable yet beloved grandpa. Terrible job by people who know him by anything but "The Wizard." "One guy lives in Brooklyn, another guy lives on Sutton Place..." I also learned that CBS isn't quite sure they like the word "crap." They cut the sound when he said it one time (despite that they actually had the phrase on the screen, during the teaser for the story before going to commercial), and kind of did a fade-out on it another time. Like they were trying to make us think there were just some random sound glitches...that happened to occur whenever "crap" was said. It's almost like they got complaints during the commercials, and came up with a quick fix. All for nothing more than a little crap.

Something that's been bothering me: The "voice" of the YES network is just some random dude. A pretty despicable voice if you ask me, only made worse that it's always heard proudly declaring upcoming "Yankeeographies"--"only on YES." Shudder. But it's avoidable, or at least it used to be. Now, "the voice"--will call its owner "John Dunbar," adding him to the Dunbar family--can be heard on the HBO On Demand channel. So, now, every time I'm searching through free movies or old Curb or Extras or Ali G episodes, I have to hear John Dunbar talking about HBO and other cable shows. It's sickening. But I'll take it one further. Apparently, John Dunbar has gone full-blown mainstream. You know how CNN is cashing in on the "people stuck in the woods" craze? Well, guess who's the voice of rural peril? John fuckin' Dunbar. I can't take it anymore. I got some bad thoughts in my head, man. I think I might buy some guns from Easy Andy and come up with elaborate ways of attatching them to my body and go down to where John Dunbar is no doubt pimping 12 year old girls and...

Moving on, my girlfriend has made her position quite clear on Ryan Howard: He should come to the Red Sox. Well, good news. He just "tried out" with this double-point:

Message received, Ryan. See you in a few years.