Besides my family, here are some of the things I’m thankful for this year.Barack Obama
Tina Fey
Vin Scully
James Bond
Lobster at The Lobster
Cutthroat Bitch (Ann Dudek not Sarah Palin)
Jon Stewart
Richbroradio.com
My daughter is not dating a vampire
Don Draper
Rebecca Hall
Opening Day
The iPhone (when it works)
Rachel Maddow
$2.50 gas
A one cent residual when MASH plays on the internet a thousand times.
Hulu.com
Hula dancers
Hawaiian sunsets
papayas
Bob’s Big Boy
Spam filters
DVD screeners
XM (before Sirius took over and will destroy it)
GPS
Manny Ramirez
Thongs
Fireworks
The Joker
Joe Torre
Louis Black
Hoffmania
Larry Gelbart
Talkradio 790 KABC
Peter Luger's steak sauce
Dave Niehaus
Manhattan Transfer
In Treatment
Dinah Washington
Denzel Washington
Disneyland
Dexter
Diablo Cody
Dick Cheney’s indictment
Patton Oswalt
The Bilko box set
Pixar
The Others
Coffee Bean Ice Blendeds
GreatBigRadio.com
Tallulah Moorehead
3 1/2 inning World Series games
Jon Miller
The Crab Cooker
Brian Wilson
Jenna Fischer
Wifi
Stephen Colbert
What’s My Line?
Ricky Gervais
Christina Applegate
Milk Duds
Amy Winehouse (when she’s out of jail/rehab/the hospital)
Cassell’s hamburgers
Red carpet shows
Amoeba Records
Baseball-Reference.com
Fellow bloggers
Our troops
YOU
Care to add your own?
The respite from the world's insanity I find when I read John Kennedy Toole's fine novel.
ReplyDeleteThe Apple Pan
ReplyDeleteFollow Your Heart Cafe
The Writer's Guild Library
Bea's Bakery
Brent's Deli
By Ken Levine
James L. Brooks
Teresa Strasser
Improv (any group will do)
MTM
Handmade Tortillas
Mom & Dad
Dogs
The Santa Monica Incline
Any used book store
ABE.com
Bob James
Pat Metheny
Topanga Canyon
Obama and all you who voted
Black & White cookies
A one cent residual when MASH plays on the internet a thousand times.
ReplyDeleteYou're welcome. ;)
The Statue of Liberty and
ReplyDeleteThe Statute of Limitations
Stealing a bit from yours, Mark:
ReplyDeleteDogs (especially their kisses)
Mom & Dad
dailylit.com
Twining's Lady Grey tea
Scrubs
The Shield
Pushing Daisies (hoping for the comic books and feature film)
The X-Files
The Valencia library in the Santa Clarita Valley (bitch all you want about all those books on hold, guys, but I appreciate it more than you might think)
NPR
Sleep
Las Vegas
The lobby of Mandalay Bay from the parking garage (I want to live there)
Quesadillas
Nachos
By Ken Levine
Bamboo Killers
The Erin O'Brien Owner's Manual for Human Beings
The Remains of the Day (book and movie)
itsyourturn.com
Facebook
Tivo
Clifford Brown (that trumpet is audial heaven)
KCRW's Strictly Jazz
Rain (tomorrow, and hopefully with that same steady, determined sound I like)
Amazon.com (for free shipping over $25 that gave me such a start today when I ordered the 2008 update disc for my Complete New Yorker hard drive off the New Yorker website, and had to pay $6.25 shipping)
The New Yorker
Nighttime (quiet, and full of more possibilities than during the day)
Movies
Netflix
Egg nog
I'll let it go at that for now.
Oh, and "soric," my verification word that puts this list on here.
Rory...
ReplyDeleteCome on up to Portland big fella. Why we've got every type of rain you can think of...
and some days - we get'em all! Fun.
Corey
Thankful I've got things I regret not doing enough of...
ReplyDeleteChris Lilley in Summer heights high
ReplyDeleteJasper Fforde's Thursday Next novels
This blog, for one
ReplyDeleteTurner Classic Movies
Wawa
Harry Kalas finally calling a Phillies World Series victory
WAMU's "Hot Jazz Saturday Night"
University of Maryland women's basketball
Louis Armstrong
Obama/Biden
The Library of Congress
Film Forum
Alexander Ovechkin
Cats and dogs (like 'em both)
Kristin Chenoweth (who, if talent translated into height, would have to duck under doorways)
Come on up to Portland big fella. Why we've got every type of rain you can think of...
ReplyDeleteand some days - we get'em all! Fun.
Figure out something you want from Southern California and I'll gladly trade it for that rain to last until February. Even after all we've been through, even after the rains that will come through, more Santa Ana winds are still expected in the coming months. I just hope it stays wet enough to make those a moot point.
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteThank you darling. And I'm thankful for you too. Not as thankful as I am for vodka, but close.
ReplyDeleteMy wife
ReplyDeleteAnton Chekhov
Vin Scully
Stephen Sondheim
Thomas "Fats" Waller
Bix Beiderbecke
Preston Sturges
"The Weenie King"
Dick Powell
Raymond Chandler
Billy Wilder
The George Burns and Gracie Allen Show
Jack Benny
Superman
Doc Savage
The theoretical Los Angeles Dodgers (not the real ones)
Two months of Manny Ramirez
The thought that Ned Colletti and Frank McCourt will one day be gone.
Ernie Kovacs
What's My Line?
The Marx Brothers
W.C. Fields's "It's a Gift"
Buster Keaton
Meatty Meat Burgers (gone but not forgotten)
TCM
Allan Sherman
The Amazing Race
Ellis Island
The Empire State Building
Molly Ivins
But, brother, are you right about Sirius screwing up XM. There's not one channel on there that's worth a damn any more.
Ahmanson Theater subscription
ReplyDeleteAmtrak from DC to NYC
Airplanes
Amoeba (ditto Ken!)
Bradbury Building
Cassette tape player in my car
Cellos
Dance
Dodger Stadium
DVR
Election Night in bars
Family & Friends
Farmers market flowers
Ford's Filling Station
Gossip Girl
itunes
Lost
Monday Night Football ads that said "Are You Ready for Monday?" and were made of turf
Pete Campbell / Vincent Kartheiser
Pollstar
Rental cars
Robert Downey, Jr.
Steel guitars
Topanga State Park hiking trails
Walking to work
Waterfalls in NYC
West WIng DVDs
Xenophilia
ReplyDeleteYams
Zebra?
(word verification 'lobbi' - concierge service for rich young LA girls?)
Cheers S10 on DVD (with 11 finally coming out soon!)
ReplyDeleteCC Sabathia
GOOD Brewer baseball
FrasierOnline
Dr. Gregory House
Mad Men
McSorley's Pub NYC
J.E.T.S Jets, Jets, Jets! (Keep wining Jets! The Packers need the higher round draft pick!)
The End of Bush's Reign of Error
Madam Secretary-Hillary Clinton
Barack Obama
Kelsey Grammer's doctors
Chez Jacques-Milwaukee
Guitar Hero
Java Cigars
Rockey Patel Autumn Blend
Jameson
New Glarus Spotted Cow
Sex and the City-The Movie
Packer football (even though they stunk up the Dome something fierce last night)
Bob Uecker
By Ken Levine
Coerper's Five 'O Clock Steak House
Diet Mountain Dew
New York City
HD-TV
Frasier reruns
The job I started in January. For the first time ever, I managed to find both a good work environment and a decent salary in the same place at the same time. I feel like a street cat that's found a home. (Except they didn't take me to the vet to get spayed and de-wormed.)
ReplyDeleteooh, i'll play!
ReplyDeleteBob Dylan
The Office/30 Rock
DVD Audio Commentaries
Midnight M*A*S*H Reruns on TV Land
Morningstar Veggie Foods
Aquaman
Blogs
Val Lewton
The Razor's Edge--book and films
My weekly gig at Time Out New York
Back Issue! magazine
TV Writers Who Have Blogs
Having A President I Can Watch On TV Without Wanting to Kick The F**king Screen In
Treasury-Sized Comics
Wii Fit
MST3K
My Girlfriend, Our Dog, and Our Cat
It's funny that you are thankful for Manny Ramirez, Ken, because (as a Red Sox fan) I am thankful His Poutiness is no longer polluting my favorite team.
ReplyDeleteI am also thankful for...
* By Ken Levine
* Cheers - the Diane Chambers years
* Hot biscuits and jam
* Lynn Miles - the best singer/songwriter to come out of Canada since Gordon Lightfoot
* The good news you posted yesterday about the decline in reality show ratings
* Netflix
* Cape Breton Island
* High speed Internet
* Wifi
* My new MacBook
* January 21 is less than two months away!
* Alan Shore
* Our cats, Henry and Angus
* My over-stuffed book shelves
* Dustin Pedroia
* Renee Zellweger
* Bonnie Hunt
* Cameron Crowe (I just rewatched Jerry Maguire)
* Joan Cusack
* John Cusack
* My boxed set of Firefly
* Yes, Tina Fey
Of course, all those run a distant second to my family and, especially, my new wife, Amy.
Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!
You hit a lot of the big ones already, like our troops, Vin Scully and Disneyland.
ReplyDeleteI'll add:
- my husband
- Five Guys Burgers (as close as it gets to In'N'Out on the east coast)
- a job that actually helps people in a practical way
- Tom Selleck
- peaceful changeover of government
- God (any form you prefer)
- Newhall Coffee
- pedicures
Oh, alright, fine.
ReplyDeletePJ O'Rourke
Food porn
Food
Living in a winter-free city
Citrus
My wife and kids
Beef
Kobe beef
Montepulciano d'Abruzzo
The stuff the BBC never sends over but I manage to find online anyway
The stuff that never gets syndicated but I manage to find online anyway
That my wife is a Tax Accountant
That my wife has not dismembered me with gardening implements
Karen Hall, particularly her dark side
Cooking Thanksgiving dinner for a small horde
Silence
Solitude
REALLY fresh seafood
Tailors
Used bookstores
eBay
Really good bourbon (Knob Creek, if you're shopping)
Really good scotch (Macallan 18, ditto)
WSJ
IBD
People who laugh at the things I say/write/do.
The college football season is almost over and my Hurricanes have been embarrassed relatively few times.
The other eleventy gazillion blessings God has given me -- and which I am blanking on -- that I clearly do not deserve but which I freely take anyway and about which I should be more vocally grateful than I am.
So there.
P.S. Disneyland AND Walt Disney World and Vin Scully! (And they say Americans from opposite ideologies can't reach common ground!)
ReplyDeleteIn no particular order. OK, in no particular order after the first one....
ReplyDeleteIndoor plumbing
Spell check
The TV remote (500 channels and still there's nothing to watch!)
My wife and children
What's left of my health
That I had no investments to lose when the stock market tanked this year (that's true spin, baby)
By Ken Levine
(Word verification: "psubeg."
Why, yes, I do. But how did it know?)
Jay Leno... counting down
ReplyDeletecamacho's place mexican food
ReplyDeletehank and crystal's truck stop in tuba city
emmylou harris
harps
the marx brothers
KXO radio
ellen green and swoozie kurtz together on the screen
the last election
the chop house in palm springs
two bunch palms
mission beach
the old globe theatre
pie
chocolate truffles
jeopardy! (watch on december 17th)
I'm thankful that nobody pointed out that I misspelled "winning" and "Rocky" in my earlier post!
ReplyDeleteI won't repeat your list, but here are some of my add-ons in no particular order of importance:
ReplyDeleteSpending time with family & friends
The Philadelphia Phillies won the World Series!
Sirius and XM merged so maybe now I can get the baseball games in addition to football
My dogs
My job
My health care plan
The view from my house
Springsteen & the E Street Band toured
Ever-falling gas prices (Less than $2.50 here, Ken.)
No hurricane damage this season
I'm thankful for the daily Ken Levine blog!
ReplyDeleteWord verification: "psubeg."
ReplyDeleteWhat's done in State College when Harrisburg cuts the university's budget.
My nuclear and extended families - including both two- and four-legged beings
ReplyDeleteBeing gainfully employed (and its corrollary: Not having to live in a refrigerator box)
Homemade soup
Fleece apparel- head to toes
Literacy and books
Living in a four-seasons region of the US
Cobalt blue
Obama's win
The impending resurgence of stem cell research
Starbucks salted caramel hot chocolate
Five working senses
Gerbera daisies
Amazon.com and the instant gratification of Kindle
Classic sitcoms (and classic writers of said sitcoms)
Spell check/cut-and-paste
Popcorn and Snowcaps at the movies
Imagination and creativity
Kids' laughter (especially my son's)
The freedom and ability to create endless, uncensored lists of thanks ...
etc etc etc
Ok, me too!
ReplyDeleteMy Schnauzer, Toby and my Yorkie, Murphy
My sisters
Barack Obama and all his Cabinet and staff
Best friends
By Ken Levine
Just Thinking - Earl Pomerantz blog
Furbaby Rescue and all small, hardworking animal rescue groups
The Big Bang Theory
West Wing reruns on BRAVO
My word verification is too funny and too appropriate: dogrativ
With our repeteing most of the submitted reasons, here is one
ReplyDelete$1.83 gasoline (Tusson AZ)
Can't believe I misspelled Tucson. Oh well, must be the cheap gas.
ReplyDeleteThe Philadelphia Phillies 2008 World Champions!!!!
ReplyDelete4 year term limits for Presidents
That I don't live in California
Conservatism
Guitar Hero
iPod
Blackberry
Blue Moon
My family
Mike D. wrote:
ReplyDelete4 year term limits for Presidents
___________________________________If this is true, Bush has been in office 4 years too long! Well, Bush has been in office 8 years too long but you know what I mean!
Bill Maher
ReplyDeleteGood friends in Rochester
ReplyDeleteGood friends in L.A.
CHEEERS Reruns
FRASIER reruns
The Buffalo Bills finally coming out of their slump (hopefully)
The Rochester International Jazz Festival
The Beatles (still, after all these years)
Eric Clapton CDs
Roger McGuinn/Byrds CDs
Prozac
Generic subsitutes for Prozac
Antidepressants in general
Lake Balboa in Encino
Cynicism (sometimes it's funny -- and yes, I can even be cynical about being thankful at times)
Turner Classic Movies (to echo an earlier post)
No more W in the White House (there goes a major amount of fodder for my comedy writing)
Sarah Palin (surprise! more fodder!)
Prilosec after a long day at my office
Pepto-Bismal when I can't afford Prilosec
Mylanta when I run out of Pepto-Bismal
All three of the above after Thanksgiving dinner
The fact that I now live down the street from the local JCC which is located right next to the Erie Canal, thereby giving me license to tell everyone the bad joke that I live right down the street from locks and bagels
Ken Levine's blog
A great weekend at the LA Airport Hilton
Mark: Teresa Strasser, yes! I knew her a few years ago when she was dating a friend and former bandmate of mine. She's the coolest. And don't get me started on Black & White cookies. I've been known to make a fool of myself at the sight of them.
ReplyDeleteMy list:
Family, friends, kitties
My writing partner
Bacon
Peaches
Pumpkin pie
Arclight Cinemas
Video on Demand
TCM
By Ken Levine (duh)
dave kehr's blog
The Soup, Mad Men, The Office, House, The Sarah Silverman Program, South Park, Lost, Top Chef, etc.
Dragnet, Dobie Gillis, Have Gun Will Travel, Columbo, The Dick Van Dyke Show, etc.
Judd Apatow and the entire Freaks and Geeks extended family
The British Invasion
The Motown Sound
Sinatra
Charlie Rich
Don Rickles
Amy Adams...
This could just go on and on... better stop now. My verification word is "cropt," which is what my list should be.
The Beatles
ReplyDeleteAnti-Scientologists
mystery novels
western novels
old TV westerns
my lovely daughters
Pepsi Gold
All the girls I've loved before
Hitlary losing the presidency
B-movies
Ken Levine's porn blog
The Internet
Chinese food
Mexican food
Italian food
Thanksgiving dinner with all the trimmings
Toy soldiers and Marx paysets
My family
ReplyDeleteCheese (but not Swiss cheese... Yuck)
The San Diego Padres
The NFL
The New York Times Sunday Edition
Peppermint tea
German beer
Berlin (the city not the band)
Netflix
The Internet
By Ken Levine
Lost
BBC America
BBC Radio
Beethoven
Malcolm Arnold
U2
William Shakespeare
Anthony Bourdain
Film Scores
Bob Newhart
Basset Hounds
Miles Davis
and...
Being employed!
The return of (finally) officially scripted TV--especially comedy.
ReplyDeleteMy Husband's Penis
ReplyDeleteThe Candle Cafe NYC
POM Tea
John Gregory Dunne
the film:THOSE WHO LOVE ME CAN TAKE THE TRAIN
the film:LAURA
Ken's Blog
New Balance Running Shoes
Chocolate
California
James Burrows
Joan Didion
Pine Cat Litter
Gardenia Soap
Aquaphor
Skiing Running Hiking Surfing
Neil Young
Kale
Freedom
Right To Vote
Food
Shelter
Kindness
Patience
LOVE
My nephew
Saarinen Arhcitecture
Paris
Sunshine
And the cool thing Wayne Gretzky said about the puck
M&M's
Hope
Sunshine (of course)
ReplyDeleteThe Beach
The other beach
And that other beach too
Waves, and the ocean
wild animals, particularly seals and fish
teenagers
people whose job it is to entertain us
people whose job it is to teach us
people whose job it is to heal us
and all the other people too
quiet freeways on Thanksgiving
too much turkey
the unreasoning devotion of dogs
word to verify: "nearthm" which is the sound of your partner's heartbeat during a slow dance.
P.P.S. Kosher-for-Passover Coke.
ReplyDeleteHaving a six year-old son who is thrilled to learn about kelp forests.
ReplyDeleteHaving a seven year-old daughter who can wear three dresses at once and look fantastic doing it.
Having a tolerant wife.
The limited slip differential.
My new Honda Civic Si.
My old Toyota Tundra.
My brother doing what he loves. Finally.
My mother going strong at 76.
Watching Jerry Maguire again this morning on Encore and being dumbstruck by how fantastic it really is.
Baja Fresh... because it's always good no matter which one I go to.
Friends who keep giving me work.
Friends who call me just because it's good to call.
Friends I wouldn't recognize in person, but I know their blogging style.
Living in a country where anyone can become President by earning their fellow citizens votes.
Living in a country that produces men like John McCain too.
The music on 30 Rock.
Alicia Keys
That it's only six more months until the new Star Trek movie is out.
That John Lasseter is running Disney Animation and Pixar now.
Finding old friends on Facebook.
Canada Dry Ginger Ale
Pedicures
The "Genius" feature on my iPhone.
The tennis court next to my office... so beautiful I might even take up tennis.
Holding the nut flush and having two people go all-in in front of me.
Throwdown with Bobby Flay
Esau's Cafe
Free WiFi anywhere
Trader Joe's pasta sauces
Our new kitten Twiggy.
Our old cats Gage and DeSoto
Lists
Sinatra
ReplyDeleteMy 85-year-old dad
John McCain, who gave more of himself to this country than most of us will ever be asked to give
"Frasier" (twice a day)
I'm thankful we have men like John McCain too. I'm thankful he survived his ordeal, and that he wears the honor he earned the extremely hard way with grace.
ReplyDeleteAnd I'm thankful he lost the election.
I'm very very thankful our horrible years of Republican rule are at an end.
And I'm thankful that Barry Humphries is doing another American tour.
Hi
ReplyDeleteYOur bolg is very nice. I have really learnt a lot from this blog thanks
Netflix
ReplyDeleteJanuary premieres (DOLLHOUSE, BREAKING BAD & FRIDAY NIGHT LIGHTS!)
Riding My Bike to Work for the time being
Final Draft