HBO-Yeah

Around these parts (read: our apartment) HBO is King. We pretty much give every show they air a more than fighting chance. Look at this run and tell me they don’t deserve it: ‘The Sopranos,’ ‘The Wire,’ ‘Carnivale,’ ‘Oz,’ ‘Hung,’ ‘Bored to Death,’ ‘Curb Your Enthusiasm,’ ‘Da Ali G Show,’ ‘Generation Kill,’ ‘Summer Heights High,’ ‘True Blood‘ and on and on. Those are just the DVD box sets I would stuff down my pants at HMV. Why is there even another channel on the air? That list of shows is untouchable (try it: You fuck with ‘The Wire,’ I. will. cut. you.) The most recent HBO treasures we have added to our PVR’s Series Recording List are ‘How to Make it in America‘ (mentioned the great credits here – the show itself is a hearty B+) and ‘The Pacific‘ – the best thing I saw this week. It’s Tom Hanks and Steven Spielberg and war re-teaching me everything I forgot from Social Studies 10 (Fun fact – my Social Studies 10 teacher is the stick boy for the Vancouver Canucks. Mr. Shute FTW!) in an easier, more compact and tasty swallow. I think I’m a credits nerd, because here I go again:The Pacific’s credits with the charcoal pencil shattering into little black pieces as it’s drawing stuff? Striking and memorable: It’s the intersection of Beautiful Artsy Town and Graphic Design Boulevard. The show itself? Based on the one episode that has aired, we’re hooked. Really, with that pedigree, it HAS to be good. And it is. And I’m sure as the back stories are established, it will just get better and I will get more involved and cry when a character I believe to be real is killed by a Japanese soldier. It’s a harrowing road, but with HBO on my shoulder, I’ll walk it just the same.

The best thing I ate this week was the RIDICULOUS West Coast Prawn Salad at Earl’s. Read ‘em and weep/drool: chopped avocado, fresh strawberries, feta, quinoa, candied pecans, julienne carrots, organic greens and baby spinach, citrus honey vinaigrette and warm sauteed prawns. All together in your mouth = fantasia. The flavour combo is something I never would have devised myself – my home salads are either in a bag, or spinach + poppyseed dressing + fork. The candied pecans are beyond delicious just by themselves, and Mr. Quinoa’s presence amps the nutrition factor into the stratosphere, negating the sugar content in the accompanying strawberry margarita. I know Earl’s has the “waitress asses out for your Dad to flirt with” factor, but it feels like that has subsided a bit over the years. This was a solid filling and delicious meal that didn’t leave me needing a piggyback home. Try it. (Honourable Mention goes to the Santa Fe Chicken Salad. It has figs and it’s STILL DELICIOUS.)

The last comic of his pile that Nuv read this week, like leaving the best skittle flavour for last, was American Vampire. I glanced at the cover and saw Stephen King’s name and stopped dead. Then I touched it, hid in the corner and read it greedily in one go, when he wasn’t looking and it was GREAT. (Ok, factually, I asked permission to read it after he was done, because I value my life and marriage.) I haven’t picked up and read a comic in ages, and this was a super solid place to start. The story is split into two parts, the first part written by Scott Snyder, the second part by Stephen King. They each take one of the two main characters and introduce them to us, and both parts are equally compelling, with some very very good story-telling. It has made me ache even more to take a vacation where we just load up the car with blankets, fruit salad, tea bags, tootsie rolls and graphic novels and go read somewhere warm for a week. Or 52.

The most dangerous thing I heard all week was the thudding of my heart in my chest as I, for the first time at the age of 32, snuck into a movie that wasn’t the one I bought a ticket for. Danger zone, party of one! We went to see ‘Shutter Island‘ (finally) and after paying 8$ for the exact spot we parked in, finding out it was sold out was piss poor news. So, my renegade husband got us tickets for ‘The Runaways‘ ( something I would have watched, but I’m very scared to see Dakota Fanning as a sexy sexpot 80s rocker chick – AWKWARD) and we got our food and cooly slunk into ‘Shutter Island.’ I was basically cooler than ice for the entire time we walked down the wrong hallway. It helps that this theatre literally has one checkpoint on the ground floor, to ensure you’ve at least bought a ticket. Yeah, we had to sit down low where your eyes have to manually move side to side to watch the movie, but it was still extremely enjoyable, extremely illegal and made me want to give Nuv a handjob just to up the illict ante. When the employee came in to make the mid-movie sweep of the theatre, I didn’t even skip a beat and kept eating popcorn while dropping kernels down into my scarf for later. Basically, cucumbers and Vanilla Ice WISH they were as cool as me. (And as much as I fretted about the too-much trailer, there is so much more to the movie that isn’t shown or even alluded to in the trailer.) All told it was an evening of way too much Coca-Cola, another Scorsese win and completing one more thing off my ‘Scary Things to Do Before I Die’ list.

The best thing I smelled this week was the prep for homemade apple cinnamon oatmeal for the pioneer man in my log cabin me and Nuv. The sweet smell of cut up apples simmering in brown sugar and butter, stirred in with Only Oats oatmeal, while the sun streamed through the kitchen window, and I was still in pj’s after 1 pm = thanks life. You are so worth it right now.