dustinnickerson

I like to talk and write about things. Some more important than others.


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Reflecting on The Office

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I haven’t watched the finale of the Office yet. I’ll watch it on Hulu sometime this weekend, because seriously, who has cable and watches TV anymore? Do they make calls on their home phones on the commercial breaks too?

But even so, I’ve been feeling plenty reflective on the show and it’s 9 seasons. Seemed worthy of a post. 

I didn’t buy into the Office hype early on. Plenty of my friends did, but me and my lady just never got around to watching it. This was a mistake. 

About the time season 3 was winning Emmy’s, someone loaned us the Season 1 and 2 DVD’s and we caught up fast. The Office quickly became my favorite comedy on TV, and as of now, will probably go down as my favorite of all time. Here’s why:

  • The Office challenged the way comedy sitcoms were supposed to work. The writers trusted their jokes enough to not use laugh tracks, and it worked. Enough so to pave the way for other comedy sitcoms to do the same.
  • The Office was about characters, and I love characters. It’s never been about riveting plot lines, action, slapstick jokes — it’s always been about the characters in the story, which is why it’s always been so compelling. 
  • It drew people together. Friends got together to watch this show. That’s cool and very important. 
  • It gave me hope in humanity that we liked it as much as people liked Friends, becuase man, I did not like Friends. 

Finally, the thing I hear most about the Office is “it’s not as good as it used to be.” I understand this sentiment, but it’s an unfair judgment of the show. Every new show gets a honeymoon stage, and the Office was no different. The Office is not my favorite comedy on TV right now, and it hasn’t been for a while. It was replaced by 30 Rock, which was replaced by Parks and Recreation, which has no been replaced by Modern Family. 

Why? Because those shows are new and shiny, and interesting to me in a way that a show I’ve already seen. The Office was funny every episode, even if it’s just for a few laughs. The Office was also funny every season, even if it wasn’t as funny as season 3. 

Much love to the Office. You’ll be missed. 


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Things I found while vacuuming my mini-van

I made the mistake of taking too long of a hiatus on vacuuming the ol’ faithful minivan. So when I got around to it, it was a bit of an adventure. Here’s the rundown of what I found in there. These were at least the things I could identify.

  • Enough Goldfish crackers and raisins to feed my family and probably another few families 3 square meals for 2-3 weeks
  • A Band-Aid
  • A Q-Tip (it was dirty, but why so, I can’t confidently say)
  • A single flip-flop
  • 6-8 different kinds of dry cereal
  • Magnets
  • Stickers
  • Acorns
  • More crayons were in that van than in my son’s Kindergarten classroom
  • Rocks (between the size of a marble and a baseball)
  • An actual marble
  • An actual baseball
  • A road Atlas…ha! That might of been the most useless thing in there
  • Several mysterious liquid puddles and stains
  • A sand bucket, and the sand that was once in it (now separated)
  • The lid of a Starbucks cup…sorry adults, kids aren’t the only guilty ones here
  • 2 umbrellas
  • Mixed nuts…by that I mean enough different types of nuts spread throughout the whole van to fill a mixed nuts container
  • Candy. Lots of candy. I recall specifically one Twizzler that gave me some trouble

And those were the things I grabbed. Plenty of other mysteries in the vacuum…

vaccum


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Just another regular season in Seattle sports

Down 20-0 yesterday, I looked at my San Diego friends and confidently told them my Seattle Seahawks would come back and take the lead of that game against the Falcons. I knew they would.

But I also told them not only would they take the lead, in true Seattle sports fashion, they would go on to still lose the game. Because that’s what happens in Seattle sports. It’s because of games and seasons like this that Seattle was named by Forbes as the Most Miserable Sports City in America. At least we won something, I guess.  

If we would have won that game, we would have matched the biggest deficit a team had ever overcome in a playoff game. On the road no less. But, that’s not good enough for Seattle sports. No, we like to do that, but still not win. Get the record for a second, but then get the loss instead. 

Call it a curse. Call it bad luck. Call it what you want. Seattle teams refuse to be average. The lose at historic rates, or they break records winning, yet don’t win the one that matters most. The last one. 

Seattle sports is full of weird anomalies, records, and stories. But not championships. I’m 28, so realistically have been cheering for these sports teams since about the mid 90’s. Here’s what I can remember:

  • A 1995 Mariner’s team that makes a historic August run to come back from something like 20 games back to win the AL West in a one game playoff against the Angels. Then, they make an incredible comeback in a series against the Yankees, ending with the iconic Griffey slide at home.

    And then? Well, they lost in an underwhelming series to the Indians in the ALCS. Naturally. 

  • The 1994 Sonics have the best record in the NBA, and then become the first 1 seed to lose to an 8 seed in playoff history. Need I remind you of this image, Seattle?

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  • Those same Sonics bounce back in 1996, win more games than ever in franchise history, and even make it to the finals. Who do they meet there? Some dude named Jordan in his first full season back. They lose in a forgettable series. 
     
  • 2005 Seahawks make it the Super Bowl, only to get a total hack referee job and a tight end with a case of the dropsies. Don’t buy the ref hack job? A few years later, the ref came to the Seahawks and apologized for the bad calls. That happens all the time, right?
     
  • The 1998 Seahawks are kept out the playoffs because of a phantom touchdown from Vinny Testaverde. A call that was so bad, many think it’s the reason we have instant replay now. This looks like a touchdown, right?

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  • 2001 Mariner’s win a regular season record 116 games. They lose in the 2nd round of the playoffs. 
     
  • 2010/11 Seahawks win the NFC West at 7-9. Worst record ever in the playoffs. And they get a home game against Saints, the defending Super Bowl Champions. and they WIN! OMGosh! How special is this team? Special enough to lose to an average Bears team the next week. 
     
  • Matt Hasselbeck says this in a playoff game:
  • In the last 20 years, all three teams have had ownership groups that threatened to take the franchise. And one of them actually did. They of course have the best young player in the NBA now, and have already been to the finals.

Just weird stuff. We don’t go 12-4 and win a Super Bowl. Ever. Doesn’t every city kind of take turns doing this?

Now, some may say, what about the 1979 Sonics? They won a championship, right?

Yes they did. Here are three other things about that:

  1. That was almost 35 years ago
  2. I was not alive then
  3. We don’t have that team anymore. Like, literally, they are gone. 

So forgive me, but that’s not really scratching the itch. 

Every year we say with most fans, “well, there’s always next year.” This is true. But Seattle fans, I’ll tell you now, if it’s anything like the years above, I’m not sure we want one. 

Who am I kidding? Bring on the misery. We’re taking it all next year. 


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Dustin’s 2013 Resolutions

Here they are people. Be inspired and such.

  • Listen to no more than an accumulated 2 minutes of Red Hot Chili Pepper’s songs on the radio. Sometimes when they come on the radio, I get distracted, and accidentally listen to like 20+ seconds of a song. Got to stay sharp
  • No car fights with the wife. Seriously, car fights are the worst
  • Call my mom on her birthday
  • Eat less than a dessert a day
  • Don’t break a bone in a way that has a lame story
  • See if I can get JNCO’s back in style
  • Convince one person who lives in SoCal that rollerblading was once a respectable extreme sport
  • Become a less embarrassing swimmer
  • Think about the Avengers a little bit less 
  • Write a 2013 resolutions post (check, we’re on way!)


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The Hobbit: An Expected Review

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There is a movie, it’s called the Hobbit. It’s a prequel to some movies called the “Lord of the Rings” trilogy, or something like that. I saw this movie, and here are my thoughts. 

**SPOILERS ABOUNDING**
(THE BIGGEST ONE: FRODO EVENTUALLY ACCIDENTALLY DESTROYS THE RING)
 
  • One thing about that ol’ Gandalf the Grey, he sure loves him some self a good fight on a bridge and/or high cliff. That and calling little people “fools.” Those are his two main shticks.
  • I found myself asking during this movie, “Will I get over dwarves?” They’re kind of the same bit over and over. It was funny when there was one of them in the LOTR trilogy. But another 6 hours of it seems burdensome. Especially without Aragorn to throw one of them. 
  • A lot of people say this movie isn’t as good as the LOTR flicks. I say it is (or at least not that much worse). The problem is you didn’t see it first, so it doesn’t feel as original or now sentimental. If the Hobbit was first, we’d all love it. Same goes for the newest Spiderman, by the way. 
  • Speaking of spiders, can we be done with big spiders in movies? 
  • There has been tons of weird stuff in Peter Jackson’s now four Tolkien movies. However, none of which are even close to as weird as that crazy brown wizard, Radagast. He’s up there with Catwoman’s weird friend in The Dark Knight Rises (which is eloquently reviewed here).
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  • Gesh, can’t Gandolf and that lady elf just make some wizard elf babies already? I can’t handle the romantic tension much longer. 
  • I guess Bane started the trend for bad guys that it’s OK if you can’t fully understand them. Gollum can be added to that list now. Gollum some how is more understandable in his older age and later films. “Riddles in the Dark” are especially hard when you can’t understand the words of said riddle.
  • Anybody else think that Bilbo was a little risky with the invisible ring experience?  He pretty much rubbed cheeks with Gollum.
  • The Eagles…a little fickle, right? Or is it that Gandalf sucks at knowing when to use them? All they do is always save the day. 
  • We get it, dwarves are stubborn. 
  • Perhaps the craziest thing about that ring of power is how it falls on people’s fingers when spinning through the air. I’m eight years into trying that with my wedding ring. Best case scenario, I usually jam the tip of my finger. 
  • There are three elements to a Jackson / Tolkien movie: walking, fighting, talking. This movie had all three elements in then some. 
  • This movie had about a 3 minute Frodo cameo. That was enough for me. 
  • This movie had a zero minute Legolos cameo. That was also enough for me. 
  • Am I kind of middle earth racist that I always want “man” to be the hero?
  • And finally, the bad guy was pretty much just Baraka from Mortal Kombat II, right?
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