Blog by Sumana Harihareswara, Changeset founder
Short Takes
Hi, reader. I wrote this in 2009 and it's now more than five years old. So it may be very out of date; the world, and I, have changed a lot since I wrote it! I'm keeping this up for historical archive purposes, but the me of today may 100% disagree with what I said then. I rarely edit posts after publishing them, but if I do, I usually leave a note in italics to mark the edit and the reason. If this post is particularly offensive or breaches someone's privacy, please contact me.
It is instructive and/or a buzzkill to watch the Psych episode "Gus Walks Into a Bank" and the Leverage episode "The Bank Shot Job" in close succession.
The most recent Muppets holiday special, Letters to Santa, features Jane Krakowski as a guest star and the US Postal Service as an uncredited guest star/sponsor. It is mercifully short at 44 minutes and makes more sense as an imaginary vehicle for Jenna Maroney than as a canon Muppet film. There are more things wrong with the film than right with it, including voices, dialogue, songs, plot, attitude, pedagogy, and geography. Just as Antitrust made me think, Couldn't you solve this problem with a post to Slashdot?, Letters to Santa made me think, Couldn't you solve this problem with a trip to the 24-hour post office near 34th and 8th? I suggest re-viewing the 2002 holiday special instead.
Leonard was quite excited that Hulu has Horse Feathers, one of the finest Marx Brothers films. Watching it led me to wonder: would it be harder to keep my bearings while conversing with Groucho Marx or with in-character Stephen Colbert? Or Muppets?
