We interrupt these dog photos for Tracy Jordan

Here is everything Tracy Jordan (Tracy Morgan) said in season 3 of 30 Rock.

This is some kind of crazy funny list.

This is what we do to loaner dogs

I stepped out for coffee on Saturday morning and when I came back...well, you see the results. The second one is Buzz Lightyear, by the way. Please feel free to provide captions in the comments. I will publish every one, but I won't show the dog because, you know, that would be humiliating.

Some more flavors of awesome

1. Yesterday there was some down time before dinner was ready and we had somehow found the will to turn the TV off. The boys, still maniacs from the general lack of sun, pulled out new markers and poster paper. John, the 6 year-old, found his Star Wars Wii game and started to draw battleships and droids and whatnot. Kit, the 3 year-old, wanted me to draw his droid. I did and he marked on it, you know, just to contribute. Then Kit said something about wanting to give it to Kris Allen. American Idol Kris Allen. So I wrote on it "For Kris Allen from Kit" and then Kit took his Star Wars droid poster and left it outside on the front porch. I think he thinks that Kris Allen is going to pick up it. Sort of like Kris is the new tooth fairy or something.

2. We're going to stay on this Bobby Scales story. Scales is a 31 year-old rookie for the Chicago Cubs that was called up to the show about a week and a half ago. He spent 10 years (I thought it was 11) in the minors. Never got one at bat in the major leagues. Wasn't on anybody's hot prospect list. Was a substitute teacher. Since being called up to the Cubs, he's been hitting. Yesterday he had a very good day, 2 hits and 4 RBIs. How long will this story last? I don't imagine it will be forever, but still...one can hope.

3. I am going to review Saturday's Kenny Chesney/Miranda Lambert/Lady Antebellum concert...wait for it...for the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. Sigh.

4. We're getting a loaner dog, Buddy, while the in-laws are out of town for a week. Buddy is a great dog, a docile mutt/pug/something. Very easy to take care of. This, perhaps, will stall my puppy longing for the moment.

Return of the Son of Shameless Self-Quoting

NEW AGE WOMAN
The path to enlightenment has many winding paths and you could say that I am traveling on a holistic detour filled with daily meditation, trail mix and many other wonderful, life-affirming rituals.

BIKER
(To NEW AGE WOMAN)
Man I don’t know you, but I want to hurt you.

-- from The Absolute Most Cliched Elevator Play in the History of the Entire Universe

36 Flavors of Awesome

1. My essay in Babble.

2. A guy by the name of Bobby Scales spent 11 years in the minor leagues. 11 years! He got called up to the Show, to play for my favorite team the Chicago Cubs last week. Last night, he hit his first major league home run in the Cubs 6-2 win over the Padres. If that's not awesome, then nothing is.

3. Puppies. My three-year told me on the way to school that he had a dream about a puppy. I am afraid I won't be able to resist the urge to go out and get one for long. I have to keep reminding myself about vet bills. And that my three-year didn't have a dream about cleaning up puppy poop. No, he'd never have that dream.

4. Kris Allen's "Heartless" on American Idol. Yes, I watch that show. And yes, I'd rather have the Arkansas kid in the final than the guy who wears guyliner and screams and shows his tounge or the goofball with glasses. But you have to admit that doing Kayne West's "Heartless" solo acoustic was a brilliant stroke.

5. through 36. I'll get back to you.

A note from your fearful, bewildered leader

Follow me. I have virtual people "following me" on Twitter. I am sure if you are on Twitter, you have a ghostly hoard tracking your every move.

Of course the assumption is that I know where I am going and I am going somewhere. And that I know the best way there.

I haven't gone in a straight line my whole life. Or, maybe I have, but it's taken me forever to get there.

My wife and I are catching up on old episodes of Lost, which is just a heartbreaking and beautiful show. But you know one of the main things that happens in practically every episode that Jack or Sawyer or Hurley is out trekking somewhere in the jungle and they get turned around or shot or the smoke monster eats them. If I was a character on Lost, I am sure I would be worm food somewhere in the start of the first season.

All of this is to say that I am happy -- ecstatic, really -- for followers. But I hope you packed a lunch.

Man arrested for singing "Polyester Bride" at Panera Bread

I am sitting in Panera Bread writing this to Liz Phair's album you see there. Well, of course it isn't an album. It's been reduced to tiny Xs and Os or some such incomprehensible material. It's on my iTunes now and it's going in my headphones. It's much awesomeness.

I am selling my CD collection on eBay. It's a long process because I am impossible. I could sell them all in one big lump I guess, but I like pulling my CDs out one by one and posting them when I have time -- which means it is taking forever.

I haven't put this album up yet though I figure I might. But good gravy, it is wonderful. I have always loved whitechocolatespacegg (released way back there in 1998) anytime I have come back to it after a long layoff. I have been a big defender of Phair even when she was deemed a sellout because she worked with the same producers who tarted up the shrimpy Avril Lavigne for radio play.

Anyway, it's Friday and I have ginormous stack of stuff to do. But I wonder if Panera Bread would mind if I started dancing on the table? Or just shouted at the top of my lungs to "Uncle Alvarez."

What I am learning

No surprise, but now 2 months plus from being cut loose from the newspaper, I am still wandering through the wilderness of the internets. But I Twitter and I am writing theatre news for this place. I am still writing freelance for the old media newspaper that laid me off. What have I learned? I love Twitter. I could spend my life there -- and quickly go broke. I learned that I am not fast enough for the new media sprint -- yet. I've also learned I need a new, more powerful laptop.

There were more layoffs at the Democrat-Gazette yesterday. At the end of this article you will see the publisher says that after they scale back that they will hopefully build back up. I guess anything is possible. But it sure seems from my vantage point that new media has won the war.