Starbucks VIA Instant Coffee hits stores today all over the U.S. of A—and it’s YUMMY. 

My first memory of instant coffee dates waaaaaaaaay back to a little glass jar of Folgers Instant that my mom (and her mother before her) kept tucked away in the cupboard for when coffee-drinking guests came over…which, as I remember, never actually happened.  I’m pretty sure that freeze-dried stuff has a shelf like of about 1,000 years since it was always in that same place in the cupboard, nary to be used by my family.  My mom drank tea every day, several times a day, and I didn’t drink coffee until college.  I think I’ve spent the last ten years making up for the lost coffee-drinking years of my youth.

Starbucks, however, has been working on this brand of coffee for TWENTY whole years–and in my humble opinion, they got it right.  And you know what else is cool?  They made a 10 oz. travel cup that has a removable bottom where you can slide up to six packets of VIA to take with you wherever you go–IN THE MUG!!!  It looks a little bit like that thing that Newman used on Jurassic Park to smuggle those dinosaur DNA packets off the Island–which–JURASSIC PARK SPOILER ALERT–if you remember, got buried in the mud after those screeching, flappy-eared dinos ate him up in his jeep.  Mmmm.  That was an awesome movie.  But I digress…

Drop by your local Starbucks for a taste of VIA sometime over the next few days.  It’s really good stuff.

EDIT ADD:

The Jurassic Park mug (as I like to call it).

Shows that premiered last night that I watched last night with great anticipation:
-Cougartown
-Modern Family

Shows that I watched last night that normally aren’t on Wednesdays:
-Community, saved from last Thursday night.

Shows that I watched last night that Christy made me:
-The New Adventures of Old Christine
-That Jay Mohr show that I can’t remember the name of…

Shows that I am watching reluctantly and are about to give up on and that I yell obscene things at the TV in my head during most of:
-Glee

I know what you are thinking.  That is a LOT of TV. 

And you would be correct. 

It was a wonderfully relaxing Wednesday night.  I spent most of the week in my large, cave-like studio composing all kinds of tracks for kids music and walking home from Pep Boys carrying Noah on my shoulders for 2 miles and all sorts of other nonsense–so having a night off with Christy was a delight.  Staying up until 4:15am Monday night and being woken up by a darling, almost-6-year-old at 7AM the following morning gives Daniel only soooooooooo much patience until some form of recovery occurs–and that recovery was last night’s Ultimate Slack Down.  But enough excuses for my television extravaganza, let’s debrief, shall we:

Crap
crap
crap annnnnnd
crap

Oh wait, that was just Cougartown.

I mean, what WAS I expecting?  Was I expecting Courtney Cox to play a character funnier than Monica from Friends?  Was I expecting that it WASN’T going to be completely about sex?  Was I expecting it to be funny?   Was I expecting good writing?  Good actors?  Less botox??

I GUESS I WAS, OK??

But evidently my expectations were too high. 

Just stay away from Cougartown, it was terrible.

Modern Family…uuuummmm…slightly painful at times, and also slightly funny.  I’m not a huge fan, but it wasn’t as bad as Cougartown so it earns one or two more episodes before I shun it.  The dad of the “regular” family is pretty funny.  I’ve seen him at Starbucks twice now on Alameda (near Pavilions) and if I see him again I will give him a high five.  He did well…
This is a one-camera show, so we get spared the laugh-track and instead get some great dry humor and comedic timing.  It also looks like a documentary-style thing like The Office or Parks and Recreation, and I like that style.

Community was pretty funny.  It was my favorite from last night out of all that I watched–and that is not that high of a compliment given the rest of the bunch.  There were some hilarious moments, and one character, in particular that I instantly fell in love with.

The only reason I watched Jay Mohr and Julia Louis Dreyfuss is for Christy.  She likes these shows, but apparently she like EVERY comedy…from this decade or the past, no matter what it’s about, soooooooooo there you have it.

And Glee…ohh oh oh oh Glee…how you have let me down.  I shake my head at you in utter disappointment.  You reek.  You smell of marriage-hating and Anti-Prop 8 agenda (and that’s about as frank as I get on this blog).  Not that I’m going to bring up Prop 8, because, honestly,  I don’t wanna talk about it right now…but I just can’t decide whether this show is a comedy, a drama, or just a couple of producers’ and writers’ attempt to ruin our teenagers forever.  OOOoo, I have an idea,  let’s put in a line like this, “Dishonesty is like food for a marriage.  Without it, a marriage dies…”

REALLY?!?!

REALLY?!!?!?!?!!?!! (one thousand exclamation/question marks in random order)

LISTEN UP FOLKS—HONESTY is what makes a marriage work–NOT dishonesty.   You want to ruin your life? Go ahead, be DISHONEST.  Just be dishonest with yourself, your mate, your friends….and let’s just see how far you get? OK? How about THAT.  And I’m not some 12 year-old spewing this out, this comes from TEN years of real-life marriage–and not just a happy-go-lucky marriage–but a marriage that both spouses have had to WORK on constantly.  But it’s AWESOME.  And I wouldn’t trade it for anything.  So you want to tell the world that DISHONESTY is food for a marriage?? Really, Glee writers?

NUH-UH.

You people out there–be TRUTHFUL.  Even if it hurts.  Don’t lie to your friends, don’t lie to your mate, and don’t lie to yourself…cause that’s lame, and a sure-fire way to never grow past where you are right now. 

UGH.

GLEE–WHY DO YOU WANT ME TO HATE YOU?
IT’S LIKE YOU ARE TRYING TO BREAK UP WITH ME!

Here’s hoping Thursday night TV will not disappoint. 
Oh wait–it won’t.  Nothing can possibly disappoint me as much as last night’s TV.

Yay for THE OFFICE!!!!

Is it horrible that I’m so excited about Fall TV?

I REALLY HOPE NOT.

Christy and I are watching The Big Bang Theory (which was GREAT tonight), How I Met Your Mother, Survivor, The Office, 30 Rock, Fringe (also an AWESOME start), SNL, and trying a few new shows (like the Courtney Cox one, of course…).

We’re also going to try that new Sci-Fi show, FLASH FORWARD.  It has some great actors and looks like an interesting premise.

What are you watching this year?

Oh, oh, oh….there are so many other words and names that come to my mind when I think about what Kanye West did to Taylor Swift last night at the VMA awards.  Terrible, ungodly, names and words…but I am exercising self-control…discipline…and reSTRAINT!!!

I’m sure you’ve heard about all of this already (unless you weren’t on facebook or twitter at all last night) since with these new social networks we have via the interwebs the world has become smaller and news travels at the speed of thumb.  How quickly does one text, “Kanye is a (BLEEP)” and hit send on their smart-phone? About 5.5 seconds quick, that’s how…

Well, the news is saying that Kanye “stole her moment”–and while this is true–he did so much more than that.  He showed utter disrespect for a fellow artist publicly—NO—forget the artist thing—he showed utter disrespect and disregard for a fellow HUMAN being publicly; his actions are just detestable, absolutely detestable.  It makes me sick to my stomach to see someone so incredulously put down another.  Kanye, you really tick me off. 

And to Beyonce I say: well done, dude.  It takes someone that is incredibly confident in themselves to sacrifice their time in the spotlight for another.  Super, dooper, pooper classy, B-lady.  You have made a lifelong fan out of me with your display of kindness and love towards another.  Rock on, Beyonce–you are the world’s #1 diva, but you are also awesome-sauce. 

If you want to be shocked, watch this video of the MTV VMA awards last night.  That old quote, “This is your brain on drugs” is all I can think of when I try to figure this out…

If I ever meet Kanye face to face, I might punch him right in the kisser.

I’ve been waiting for this issue for a while…I am SO glad it is coming out this weekend…

Look for it in the grocery store when you’re checking out…

The highly anticipated new show was BACK last night with a new episode (the pilot aired last spring after the American Idol season finale), and I don’t know exactly what to think just yet.

I came across an article from ew.com that turned out to be more ambiguous about the show than the title led me to believe; it’s more of a feel-good read.  Let’s just say when I see a title like “Did Glee Push It Too Far?” I would think they would address the heightened level of sexual content in the show–but they didn’t.  And I only say “heightened” because it was more than was in the pilot, and more than I was expecting. 

As a self-proclaimed choir nerd and musician, it’s fun to watch music that is done with excellence.  Throw in some dancing and amazing vocalists and I don’t mind…mix it all up with some humor and great actors and you’ve got a WIN!  Then you blend in a sure-fire affair that’s going to happen with the lead character (hero-teacher Matthew Morrison) and pretty strong sexual message with the high schoolers annnnnnnd you pooped in my High School Musical Mocha Frappuccino.  Boo. 

But the jury is still out…I’ll give it a few more episodes before I completely disown it…

Thoughts?  Did you love it?  Hate it?  Do you get what I’m saying?

Why?

Because your kid might get to act in a film directed by Uncle Rico this Friday, that’s why.

I’m hoping he’ll tell me what happens next on LOST.

But come to think of it, that stuff is freakin’ top secret, so I doubt he will.  Unless of course after knowing me for 5 whole seconds he decides to tell me one of the worlds most protected secrets.

Hey, a guy can dream, can’t he?

I haven’t used the Wii Fit I borrowed from Kathy in about 3 months.  Oops.

I was using it steadily for quite a while, but there’s only so many times one can run in place, hula-hoop, and do low-impact aerobics before the wonder of the video game/exercise combo wears off.  Then you just find yourself skiing and snowboarding to make up your 20 minutes of exercise, and people…let’s be honest…Wii Fit snow boarding is NOT exercise.

Let’s just say that the Wii Fit has been staring at me from it’s box in the closet, taunting me…reminding me of my slothfulness.  So this morning I decided to break it out and get my heart pumping, you know, faster than the 7 beats per minute it takes to sit on my butt in the studio for 12 hours a day.  It was good…

But the real reason to use the Wii Fit is not to exercise, but so that it can tell you how fat you are, what a slob you are, and how poorly you’ve done at the activities.  And for me, it’s REALLLLY good at that. 

“Ooh, it looks like it’s been 121 days since I’ve last seen you.  That’s a long time!”

I know, Fit.  Shut your face.

“Are you ready for your training?”

yeah, yeah, yeah…(pressing A to pass all of this nonsense)…so it took me through it’s body exam to test BMI, balance, and weight.

And then it showed me something miraculous…since March… 

…turns out I lost 25 pounds.

I think I’m going to go to bed soon…it’s been a long, arduous day.  But one delightful moment came around lunch when I had a Pumpkin Spice Latte from the Bucks. MMMMmmmmmm…good.

Today is a gloomy day around here.  Sirens are going off everywhere, ash is falling from the sky, and a thick layer of smoke is covering the sun like a down comforter in the sky.

Living in Burbank, we are about 11 miles (by car) from the huge Station Fire.  Although I feel no imminent danger for my family or belongings, there are thousands out there that have been evacuated and many have lost their homes already to the blaze. 

Join me in prayer for those families and for the fire fighters and servicemen and women that are fighting this fire. 

God help us.

You can see Burbank on here–and the fire zone.

This video is terrifyingly amazing…