Men vs. Women vs. Dishwashers

So very much to talk about this week, for instance: why can't women load dishwashers? My wife, the insultingly glamorous Mrs. Kelp, is an altogether more resourceful and vigorous housekeeper than I, thank god, and in fact way ahead of me in every other respect, but she has no understanding of how to load our dishwasher, and in fact openly rebels against the whole idea of there even being a proper way to do it in the first place.

She repeatedly -despite my protests -puts plates in spaces that have obviously been designated for glasses and insists on loading cutlery chaotically and including large pans that are obviously better dealt with elsewhere. A perfectly reasonable woman in most every other regard, she has absolutely no understanding of the need for orderliness in the dish washing sector as a means of cramming the damn things as full as they could possibly be.

Magically, Mrs. Kelp is not an isolated problem: I have at least one friend (well, truthfully, also at most pretty much one friend) who says his wife frequently does loads of up to forty or fifty percent under capacity, and it's slowly tearing their marriage apart. I have a feeling this is a lot more wide-spread than you might think, so don't be taken in by a pretty face, only to wake up one day and have your forks facing the wrong way.

Unfortunately, they don't have support groups for this yet (well, maybe in California, but not in the regular United States), but as soon as they start up, we're going.

In other scary news, they've discontinued the Spicy Baconator at Wendy's. Sure, they've still got the regular Baconator, and it's still as spectacular as ever, and you can have them throw a few jalapeño peppers on there, and that's not bad at all; but without the special sauce, it can never truly scale the heights of the Spicy Baconator. Still, it's hard to stay mad at them, granting that they were the first visionaries to realize that almost any sandwich benefits from twelve pieces of bacon.

I've heard two really interesting new local bands lately, namely Johnny & the Hellhounds, an extremely spirited little rockabilly quartet spearheaded by the slappin' string bass of Jared Souther and almost Hank Williams-like vocals of Johnny himself (didn't catch the young feller's last name, but you'll know him, he's the one with the Hellhounds); and Toast and Jam, an altogether more refined outfit helmed (perhaps) by Wellfleet maestro Tim Dickey featuring lovely, polished three part harmonies and generally impeccable musicianship.

Toast and Jam -and yes, I've talked to them about the name; I suggested calling it the Mormon Tabernacle Trio (band name courtesy of comedian George Carlin), but they didn't listen -play a relatively fresh and adventurous selection of rootsy song choices (I certainly wasn't expecting the New Pornographers song they covered), while Johnny and the Hellhounds write most of their stuff (and who wouldn't go for any song graced with the title, “Zombie Hooker”?)

The good news is, both bands are so new that they (delightfully) don't have websites yet! The bad news is, I can't get either of them to tell me where they'll be playing in the near future -I'm not sure if it's because they just don't have any jobs, or that they're worried that if they tell me where they're playing, I might show up again. No worries -I'll just keep stalking both of them until they crumble, and pass the savings on to you!

(Wait! Hold the presses! One of 'em already succumbed: Toast and Jam will be back at Joe's Beach Bar in Orleans on May 9^th.) (Wait, now the other one has a job, too: Johnny and the Hellhounds will be at the Land Ho with the East Coast Tremors -also led by the ubiquitous Mr. Souther -on Saturday, June 21^st!!! Make your reservations right now -this one's doing boffo box office, as they say in Variety.)

Meanwhile, my friend Julie who works at Blockbuster gave me my favorite movie review of the young year so far when, describing the recent Tim Burton – Johnny Depp version of “Sweeney Todd”, she opined “it's good, but they do sing.”

Myself and the radiant Mrs. K (who, despite her considerable intelligence and generally angelic demeanor, puts the forks in funny) are absolute devotees of the original musical, and though neither of us warmed much to the casting (the leads are altogether too young and nice-looking), I liked that it maintained a high level of nastiness and malevolence. Surely, this was a man who would've known how to load a dishwasher.

Busey Stands Tall at Oscar Time

You've caught me in quite a quandary this week: don't know whether to finally unleash the long overdue Kelp Kristmas '07 Wrap-up or go right to this year's Oscar Prognostications. Some would say, well, sometimes it's good to get your Oscar predictions in not too long after the winners have been announced -that's certainly the traditional way of looking at it. But here at the Kodder, we believe that haste makes waste. When you “predict” most of the award winners days in advance, you're relying on chance and witchcraft; doesn't it make sense that you've got a way better chance of making 100% accurate predictions in hindsight, once something has already happened? Of course it does!

2007 was actually a pretty good year for movies and all the people who won this year were basically the ones that should've won, and were rightfully honored. Nothing went wrong -no one swore or fell over, there was scarcely a whiff of politics, the show went off like clockwork -even the fashions seemed relatively understated. The capable and witty Jon Stewart, of the daily show, was adequate. Many deserving folk were given overdue recognition. It was SO BORING!

The ONLY GOOD MOMENT of the ENTIRE ORDEAL was provided by the legendary Gary Busey, during the Red Carpet segment preceding the Oscars capturing the arrival of the various luminaries. As “American Idol” host Ryan Seacrest interviewed Jennifer Garner, you could see that they were both reacting nervously to an unspecified disturbance happening off-camera; then Busey lumbers in, looking very much like he was on his way to the can and had just been thrown off a bit by the crowd, and plants a big kiss on Laura Linney, who had been standing at the edge of the fracas, adding how much he has enjoyed her work. He proffers a boisterous but incidental hello to interviewer Seacrest, who tries to deflect him by introducing him to Jennifer Garner, who obviously is shaken and mentally patting the intruder down for weapons.

Busey at first doesn't seem to know which member of the crowd Seacrest has sacrificed to him; when Seacrest repeats, “Jennifer Garner”, he grunts, “What?”, and then grabs her quickly for a perfunctory hug and a kiss on the neck -he obviously has no idea who she is, and his priority is still finding the john. Neither interviewer nor interviewee seems to have any idea who he is, either, but that's nothing: Busey not only doesn't know who they are, he also hasn't noticed that they're all on TV, trying to do an interview. Then he lunges away, as mysteriously as he came. Garner is in shock; Linney tactfully leads her away. Gary Busey's job is done here -god bless and keep you in your good work, Gary (we may have found our host for '09!)

Well, I'm obviously not going to have time for the Kristmas Roundup again, so we'll just have to postpone that until next time. Couple of random comments before we go:

Finally (and inadvertently, of course) happened to catch a bit of one of the debates between Hilary and Barack, and to me it felt more like Bill Clinton vs. Jimmy Stewart. Hilary has the Bill thing down -that smoothness, the effortless engagement, an unstoppable stream of instant, intelligent, constructive unflappableness -you'll never catch this one snoozin'. Barack is alternately stirringly idealistic and a tad ungainly; also smart, constructive, and energetic. Even McCain seems reasonable, compared to what we've been through lately. In fact, I can't remember a time when all of the candidates across the board were this much of an upgrade. This is gonna be great! Vote for anybody -you can't lose!

Which reminds me - to K. Lyle of Harwich: “Helpy” is not a proper name for a snake. Whether stuffed, imaginary, or normal, no one should be called “Helpy the Snake.” Even if he really is helpful, I can't believe that any self-respecting snake would ever want to be named “Helpy”, let alone the whole thing, “Helpy the Snake.” It is my understanding that snakes generally prefer names like “Lyle”, “Sid”. and “Lawrence” (though rarely Larry.) (Still, even Larry is a better name for a snake than “Helpy.”)

“Helpy” just does not work, snake-wise. Next time you need to name a snake, we hope you'll consult someone qualified to deal with such matters, because this is the kind of situation where youthful high spirits will only get you into trouble.

Until next time, keep your eyes open for a pop band called Vampire Weekend, who do a song called “Walcott” (“gotta get out of Cape Cod, outta Cape Cod tonight” -actually, a couple of the members, were brought up around here, I heard); the web-only TV show, “Penelope, Princess of Animals” starring Kristen Schaal, who played the groupie Mel in the ever supple Mrs. Kelp's favorite TV show, “Flight of the Conchords”; and the outtake albums from the vaults of Motown (you won't believe the hits they left in the can, though you sort of have to get in and root around to find the good ones -it's a great job for iTunes and their ilk, as 30 seconds is usually all the time you need to figure out whether it's a hit or a miss, and the hits are as good as it gets.)

Remember, no matter how bad it gets, spring is coming... come on, we can make it...