Hoʻomaikaʻi ʻana, ʻōlelo hoʻomaikaʻi, Hawaiʻi!*

Magnet #259 - Hawaii

So, today in 1950, the territory of Hawaii ratified a state constitution, and became a state nine years later.

Yay, Hawaii!

My sisters will remember, but I wonder if anyone else will - remember those I Can Read books? We owned a ton of those things. Freakin' loved those books!

The Toad and the Frog. Where they were having guests for dinner or something? Took forever before I realized that it wasn't Wind in the Willows that I'd read.

Danny and the Dinosaur. Where the dinosaur was running around town?

Sammy the Seal. Where the seal was running around town, something about getting out of the zoo?

That pig one, where the pig was looking for a home, and tried out a few houses or something, and then found a puddle of mud and he was really happy?

And, then, there was this one that was all white, with splashes of green trees, and the tiny people in Hawaii - the Menehunes? Which I totally looked up on that site I just linked to. And just now realized that they're supposedly fairy people. Dudes. Whoa. Now I understand why they traveled by leaves and pea pods!

Good gravy. It's like every time I remember something about my childhood, it gets turned on its axis.

Anyway...so congratulations, Hawaii!

*I'm SO hoping that this magnetpost title actually says, Congratulations, Hawaii! If it doesn't, blame this site. And, yes, I looked up Yay! in Hawaiian and it yielded no results.

Whewwww-whewwww, Whewwww-whewwww

Magnet #258 - Knight Rider

I watch Knight Rider.

There. I said it.

Hell, I even have a magnet for it. This magnet was part of a series of buttons that NBC Uni put out earlier this year, to help push their shows for Emmy *snerk* consideration.

I remember watching the original, but to my friends' consternation, not well enough to remember KARR...or Goliath, for that matter.

I'm not gonna lie. Knight Rider's not the best show on the air right now - I'm convinced it's still on only because NBC can't afford to dump anything right now. I also full-on admit (again) that I'm watching it, simply because there's a hot boy and a hot car. And, I suppose I should also admit that my head bops when I hear the souped-up version of the original opening theme.

The hot boy is played by Justin Bruening, who used to be on the soap All My Children, where oddly, his character Jamie is the son of Tad, played by Michael E. Knight, who in real life used to be married to Catherine Hickland, who used to be married to David Hasselhoff who played the original Michael Knight on Knight Rider. How's that for weird degrees of separation?

The new KITT is a product-placed Ford Mustang which morphs into a couple of other Ford vehicles as necessary, which is silly, but I actually kinda like the effects when he goes into his attack mode. Though, I could do without the Val Kilmer as the voice of KITT. Sorry, Val.

The writer/producers are the same guys who worked on Las Vegas, which I also watched (again, for the hot boys, who just happened to have hot cars). So automatically, we're guaranteed gratuitous T&A, silly, almost nonexistent plots, cheesy writing and acting, and sometimes superslick (and sometimes not) special effects, graphics, and camera work.

I don't care. I'm watching, and I like it. Because every so often, the show surprises me. Last night was one of those nights.

It was their Halloween episode, and they had dressed up a couple of the secondary characters in costume and the running gag of the first ten minutes of the show, was that the guy was dressed as Captain Jack Harkness. He sashayed around, expecting people to know who he was. And thus ensued at least three different interchanges discussing Captain Jack Harkness, the "time-traveling bisexual" ("or omnisexual, if you prefer") guy from Torchwood and Doctor Who.

I gotta admit, the kid really did resemble Jack - all he was missing was the hat.

While it totally tickled my funny bone and my BritShow fangurl sensibilities, I spent the next several minutes on pause, while my sister and I discussed if a BBC show reference to DW/TW was completely accessible on such a mainstream U.S. show. (We watch a ton of BBC shows, and the U.S. references are always apparent in them, so it's odd to see the reverse here.)

Our guess is that the showrunners have enough charismatic geek (/TM Rovan) credibility to be sending out a rather well-done shout-out to the DW/TW universe, and the audience has just enough charismatic geek credibility to get it. And those that don't, are hopefully curious enough to check out both shows on BBC-A.*

Loved it. Well played, boys.

*Commercial: If you don't know, the fourth season of Doctor Who starts on BBC-A this weekend. Yes, you've already watched it on SciFi. Yes, you already know what happens at the end. Who cares? Watch it.

So say we all

Magnet #257 - Preamble, by Mike Wilkins

Ok. You've got your shot, President-Elect Obama.

You've already made history.

Now let's make some more.

Many happy returns

Magnets #256a & b - Obama and McCain

I had toyed with writing a long diatribe about the election, the parties, the issues, my irritation at being pulled in multiple directions and made to feel like I'm smart or stupid for voting one way or another, and my extreme relief that it's finally election day and now everyone will hopefully STFU already.

But it's a magnetblog.

Here's Shepard Fairey's political art.

Go vote.

And I'll see ya'll on the other side.

They delivered for me

Magnet #255 - Glacier National Park

I talked about Montana before in this Wyoming magnetpost, plus I have a few magnets from Glacier National Park, with a few stories for those. This one sort of screams, America the Beautiful for me.

A roadtrip buddy and I went on a cross-country train trip, where we left from NY, stopped for lunch in Chicago, did an overnight in Minneapolis, then did two nights in Glacier, then an overnight to Portland. We spent a morning in Portland, then took another train up to Seattle, where we then rented a car and drove up to Vancouver for a couple of days, and then flew back out of Seattle.

Long trip. I could have used an extra suitcase just for the treasures I picked up a long the way.

Instead, I made use of the U.S. Postal Service - because they ROCK. They're everywhere. Heh. Which I knew, of course, but it was never so apparent than on this trip. I feel like every time we got off the train, I was off mailing a package back home to myself. And I'm not exaggerating that one - I seriously have USPS receipts from East Glacier and West Glacier.

Thanks, USPS!

Of course, all this mailing back and forth made it all the more ironic that when we got off the train in Portland, I inadvertently left a stack of stamped envelopes in our train car. We had to run back, only to find out that the wonderful guys at Amtrak mailed my bills for me.

Thanks, Amtrak guys!

A key from long ago

Magnet #254 - Key Biscayne, FL

Huh. I wondered how I got this magnet, cuz surely, I'd never been to Key Biscayne. It's a Key. With beaches. And sun.

I looked it up, and as it turns out, yeah, I have. I just didn't realize that that visit counted as Key Biscayne.

Stayed here at the Sonesta. Or, what used to be a Sonesta. Can't find it now on the actual Sonesta site. How odd.

Also odd. I remember being there now, I even went on the beach. But, I know for a fact that I didn't see any manatees.

Kinda makes me want to sing a Jimmy Buffet song or two, though.

Shopaholics in Jersey

Magnet #253 - Sense of Living is Joy Enough

Economists might say we're going into a recession and that the Middle Class is dying, but they should take a peek into the big box stores and malls of New Jersey.

Having now spent two Saturdays there straight, it becomes apparent that people aren't having as much trouble spending money as Washington or Wall Street think.

Based on these two shopping days, some random observations:

• The sales are insane.
• The lines are even worse.
• Sales people are being outnumbered almost everywhere.
• The higher-end and non-essentials stores aren't enjoying as much of the crowds.
• Ikea dinners are cheap and awesome. The meatballs even awesomer. But the Daim torte is awesomest.
  
• Christmas has come too early - in every store. I'm surprised Santa's not already hanging out in the center.
  
• Joy seems to have been extricated from Christmas, as evidenced by the lack of items with my name on it. (Mind you, that doesn't have a thing to do with the economy, but tragic, nonetheless.)

Anyway, fun days, shopping. Or rather, watching other people shop.