Dear readers, I’m sorry I haven’t updated my web log (“blog”) in a while. Here are some thoughts/reflections I’ve had recently:

– The situation in Libya is crazy;

– The Oscars are coming up soon, let’s hope the best nominees win in each category;

– Social media is changing the way people interact with culture in ways we will never understand so don’t bother trying;

– “Yesterday is history and tomorrow is a mystery;”

– Abraham Lincoln is STILL my favorite president

Oh! One other thing is that WINE STORE LIVEBLOGGING will return on March 7. So get ready with all your wine-related questions!

Also, I think I will have an important announcement re: Artisanal Pencil Sharpening later this week.

Have a great day and I will “blog” with you soon!

Your pal,
David Rees

It’s been too long. New FFO drops tomorrow morning. Get ready.

Hello, internet friends.

Donald Rumsfeld’s memoir “I Am A War Criminal” (I think that’s the title) comes out today.

Join me and a bunch of other folks to celebrate tonight at Pianos on Ludlow Street. It will be a night of reflection and renewal!!!

Hello everybody.

I’m going to start hosting a monthly comedy show in New York City! The show is called LOLLYGAGGIN’ WITH DAVID REES. It will feature LOLs and gags aplenty. And also, plenty of David Rees aplenty … more than you ever thought possible in this lifetime!

The first show — THE DEBUT — is happening at HOUSING WORKS CAFE this Thursday, Feb. 3 at 7:00 PM (“A reasonable hour for reasonable people”).

Guests will include:

ANDREA ROSEN (one of my favorite comedians; you’ve seen her on Flight of the Conchords, Stella, VarietySHAC)

JOHN HODGMAN (a talented writer; you may have seen him on the Daily Show or the “Get A Mac” ad campaign)

SAM ANDERSON (a young fellow with a bright future, in spite of the fact that he wears corrective lenses)

Ladies and gentlemen, this show is FREE. “Free? Ya gotta be kiddin’ me.” No, I am not kidding you.

Please, if you live in the city, or work in the city, or enjoy traveling to the city, come to this show! It’ll be fun.

LOLLYGAGGIN’ WITH DAVID REES
Featuring ANDREA ROSEN, JOHN HODGMAN, and SAM ANDERSON
Thursday, Feb. 3 – 7:00 PM
Housing Works Cafe
126 Crosby St.
SoHo, NYC
***FREE***

Thanks for your interest,
David

I vote for Mohamed ElBaradei to run Egypt.

It’s exciting!

8:59 PM Oh. That’s the end of the show. But next week, there’s gonna be a team of ALL KIDS. A bunch of little kids, playing for a million bucks on a special two-hour Minute To Win It!!! Holy guacamole with extra nachos! See you later, I gotta eat dinner.

8:56 PM Not to be churlish, but I find Mark’s monologues vis a vis whether to continue on Minute To Win It a little condescending and exhausting. It feels soap-opera-ish to me, like the producers have fed him talking points. I feel weird all of a sudden. Maybe I’m just hungry. But I’m starting to have this creeping feeling … I do NOT like what’s happening on my television screen right now. “I have so much excitement” –Mark. But guess what? He’s walking away with the $125,000. Good for him; I think he made the right choice. Now he can start a college fund for his kids. Respect.

8:54 PM Is third time the charm with the racket challenge? OH SNAP, Mark nailed the challenge in, like, TWO SECONDS!!! They are going BUCK in the audience right now! That caught Guy Fieri completely by surprise: “This guy has been a warrior … he’s just won $125,000!” Hoo boy, I think Mark is about to walk away with his winnings. Oh wait a minute, now they’re doing something really crazy and unprecedented: They’re gonna show Mark what the next challenge is, before he decides whether to walk away! They’ve never done this before! And the challenge is a fiendish classic: NUT STACKER, remember that one? My we had some fun with it last summer(?).

8:53 PM (Assuming it’s okay to lump in Egypt with the Middle East. Can’t remember if people do that.)

8:52 PM So far, Guy Fieri hasn’t said anything about the protests in Cairo. Is that because the show is taped ahead of time, or do you think Minute To Win It just doesn’t weigh in on Middle Eastern politics, just as a general rule?

8:49 PM All right Mark, it’s time to win this gol-darned challenge or just go home and admit you’re a horrible father. (My prediction: Mark is gonna win a million dollars.)

8:48 PM Another LOL from Guy Fieri: “I feel myself twitching and moving!” (in reference to Mark’s tennis-racket gyrations). Mark fails again! That was his second attempt … and he just couldn’t get that gumball to cooperate. Now Mark is being extremely articulate in his desire to win more money rather than going home empty-handed. He really made his case well … sigh, if only someone in Washington would listen to him, maybe our country wouldn’t be in the shape it’s in, America where did we go wrong? (j/k)

8:47 PM They just showed a crowd reaction shot that featured an Asian guy with a really cool haircut.

8:46 PM Oh by the way, if Mark achieves his goal vis a vis the tennis racket and the gumball, he wins $125,000, which from where I sit is a lot of money.

8:44 PM Mark is struggling with the tennis racket. That little green gumball is just not cooperating. He’s out of time. The klaxon alarm sounds. The crowd heaves a collective sigh. Guy Fieri strokes his goatee with MAXIMUM pensiveness. Now they’re debating whether Mark should have used those extra ten seconds he won during his bonus round.

8:43:30 PM Guy Fieri isn’t wearing sunglasses on the back of his head. Perhaps that’s to reflect our new mood of national sobriety? ANYWAY, now Mark is ready for his next challenge: “What a Racquet.” He has one minute to explain why modern banking, with its reliance on esoteric financial instruments, is essentially a racket. Either that, or he has to put a tennis racket in his crotch and move a gumball with it.

8:43 PM Is it just me, or has every television program ever made in human history been absolutely horrible?

8:42 PM Heh, this Ford Focus ad is such an EPIC fail!!!

8:41 PM Loving that Dunkin’ Donuts is advertising ICE COFFEE right now. Man they must have made WAY too much ice coffee last summer and now they’re trying to get rid of it in the middle of a snow storm LOL EPIC FAIL.

8:40 PM According to this commercial, McDonald’s has a new kind of oatmeal. It has fruits in it.

8:38 PM (Just kidding Guy Fieri didn’t say that.)

8:35 PM Oh, I remember this challenge: Sticker Picker-Upper! You gotta use an egg to pick up some stickers on a pizza pan or something like that. Mark nails it! Level 6 complete! All this talk about levels reminds me of that movie called Inception, did you see it? People were having fights in their dreams. They were trying to find a suitcase with unused dreams in it or something. I think they went to a hotel where gravity didn’t work and they floated around fighting each other. In any event, it was a boring movie in many ways and I can’t believe it got nominated for best picture! (End editorial comment.) Dude, now Mark is getting really emotional about winning the money and what it means to him … he is acknowledging the broader economic context in which he is operating — money is tough for everyone right now, he doesn’t have a college fund for his daughters yet, etc — RADICAL ANALYSIS OF CAPITALISM TAKING PLACE RIGHT NOW ON MINUTE TO WIN IT, you heard it here first!!! Guy Fieri: “Let’s face it, Mark, those capitalist bloodsucking businessmen won’t stop until the working classes are completely decimated.” WTF

8:33 PM Guy Fieri is re-telling Mark’s redemption story. It’s a story about he came on the show last year and flamed out and didn’t win shit and now he’s back because everybody loves him. And now he’s burning up the money ladder, going all the way to the one million dollar prize at the top of the ladder. It’s like when, at the end of the Tractatus, Wittgenstein said something like, “Once you’ve climbed the ladder, just kick that motherfucker out from under you” or something like that. I can’t check the actual quote b/c I’m too busy liveblogging to get up and go to the other side of the room to the bookshelf, which is where I’ve decided to keep all my books..

8:28 PM This is the quietest I’ve ever heard the studio … giving Mark the blessed silence he needs, in order to listen — to really listen — to his oddly filled glasses. And now … he plays the glasses, and it sounds just like … ROW ROW ROW YOUR BOAT! The crowd bursts into applause and/or flames! Mark’s on a roll! Is tonight the night he vanquishes his demons???

8:27 PM This challenge is called “Spoon Tune.” You rearrange the ten “oddly filled glasses of water” (Guy’s description) so that they play Row Row Row Your Boat … and guess what? He only has a minute to win it! OKAY I’m crying FOUL on Mark’s super-intense, dire humming of the tune before he started arranging the glasses. That was too much.

8:25 PM Mark has another opportunity for another bonus: AN EXTRA LIFE. Goddamn, call me a paleoconservative, but when I first started watching MTWI, they weren’t throwing bonuses around willy-nilly. I feel like Pat Buchanan right now: “We need to take to the streets with our machine guns before we lose all that is essential to Minute To Win It!”

8:24 PM Oh shit, just had my first LOL of the night. Guy Fieri was looking at Mark and he said, “This is where we get into what I call RiDICulous amounts of money.” It sounded so awesome when he said it, I just plain ol’ chuckled. What can I say, I have a complicated relationship with Guy Fieri.

8:24 PM Well fuck a duck, Mark did it! He stacked the five apples! Whew! That was worth ten grands of money!!! (aka $10,000) He’s gotta be feeling good.

8:22 PM Okay, we’re back. Johnny Applestack … “it’s an old (challenge), but it’s a great one” (as per G. Fieri). “Steady hands and a good foundation …” I gotta tell you guys, I’m NOT liking these apples. I don’t think Mark can stack these goddamn fucking apples. These fucking cocksuckin’ no-good shit-hole butty apples!!! Come on, Mark, stack the apples!!!

8:18 PM Johnny Applestack, take 2: Mark tries again. He says to himself, “Come on, buddy.” That’s actually kinda cool. Oh, great: commercial break.

8:17 PM Great quote from Guy Fieri: “I’m not sure that I like that apple.” This apple stack ain’t looking like jack, if you ask me. Mark failed at the Johnny Applestack challenge. The audience is bummed. Mark’s daughters are crestfallen. Guy Fieri is mordant; that’s the only word for it. (“Mordant” is a word, right? A word that describes when a game show host feels sad on behalf of his favorite contestant?)

8:16 PM Turns out the challenge is called Johnny Applestack, which is a pretty cool name for what is (literally) just a guy attempting to stack apples on top of each other. It sounds like the name of a really good breakfast flapjack.

8:15 PM Mark has to stack some apples using a towel, or something(?). it’s hard to understand the challenges when you’re not really watching the TV. Most of the time, it sounds like this: “Challenge … must stack apples … a towel … a spoon in your toe … good luck.”

8:14 PM Pretty good commercials. Did you see that one about TurboTax? It looked interesting. I couldn’t tell what was happening because — OK WAIT A MINUTE: Guy Fieri just referred to Mark as a “living legend” because he’s the first-ever returning contestant. Not sure I approve of the use of “living legend,” there.

8:10 PM Mark did it! He just won five thousand bucks … and those sweet, precious extra ten seconds! We’ll be right back after these commercial breaks.

8:09 PM Guy: “You feel good?” Mark: “I feel great.” David Rees: “I feel great too. It’s been too long.” And here goes Mark with his yo-yo attached to his belt! he has to knock over some cans with the yo-yo. Guy Fieri: “This game is wild.” No argument here, this is one intense challenge on Minute To Win It.

8:07 PM Blueprint Bonus Game! That means he “not only gets the 5k, he also gets the bonus!” And the bonus is … extra time! A bonus that undermines the essence of Minute To Win It! Not sure how I feel about this. Mark is happy that the new challenge involves a yo-yo attached to his buttocks.

8:06 PM Gotta say Mark is dominating this pasta-related challenge. I wonder if he used to work at an Italian restaurant? Is Guy Fiere wearing a tuxedo jacket over his red shirt? “Level 2 complete!” Mark has completed the pasta challenge. The happy music is playing. How I’ve missed the happy music!

8:05 PM Guy Fieri is coaching Mark on how to get in the zone … not to be too anxious, too hungry. The poor guy has been haunted by his “Epic Fail” (my words) and now he’s back to avenge his past. So here he goes, about to put a piece of spaghetti in his mouth …

8:03:30 PM He did it! He emptied the kleenex box! (Computer is telling me to capitalize kleenex because it’s a brand name, but I’m so anti-corporate I’m not going to.) ON TO THE NEXT CHALLENGE: “Noodling around.” Using a piece of spaghetti in his mouth, Mark must lift other pieces of pasta. This feels like a weird dream.

8:03 PM First game is on: He has to empty a kleenex box of all hankies in ONE MINUTE.

8:02:30 PM Okay, here’s what’s up: Tonight they’re letting a former contestant who went home empty-handed try again. America is the land of second chances, and that’s why Minute To Win It is America’s show!

8:02 PM I hate to admit it, but Guy Fieri looks good tonight. I haven’t seen him in months, but he still looks good.

8:01 PM Let’s go!

I’m liveblogging Minute To Win It tonight! 8:00 PM EST only at http://www.mnftiu.cc!

Everyone please come to this fun show! We have Tom Shillue, Emily Flake, and David Cope! All for five dollars. “You gotta be kidding me, what a bargain.”

It’s okay if you live in Tennessee or wherever, you don’t have to come. But please tell your friends in New York state about the show; we’d love to have them.