Besides my family, here are some of the things I’m thankful for this year.
Claire Danes
Apps
Twitter followers
Jenny Johnson
e-books
New Yorker cartoons
Mustangs
Crawfish
Carl Reiner
Vin Scully
Paul Rudnick
THE GOOD WIFE
Rachel McAdams
GRAVITY
gravity
Tina Fey
Louis C.K.
Doc Emrick
My USC students
Netflix
almond croissants
INSTANT MOM
Apple computers
Throwback Thursday
HOUSE OF CARDS
Grantland
Lobster at The Lobster
PARKS & RECREATION
Jon Stewart
Facebook groups
The yellow line in football
Flavored Tootsie Rolls
Richbroradio.com
My daughter is not dating a vampire
Don Draper
Rebecca Hall
Opening Day
The iPhone (when it works)
Rachel Maddow
A one cent residual when MASH plays a thousand times.
Hulu.com
Hula dancers
Hawaiian sunsets
papayas
Bob’s Big Boy
Spam filters
Frank McCourt sold the Dodgers
The Gigi salad
DVD screeners
Morena Baccarin
GPS
Clayton Kershaw
Aaron Sorkin
My KCRW card
The Johnny Mann Singers
Bob & Ray
Thongs
THE BOOK OF MORMON
Adele
ORANGE IS THE NEW BLACK
Joe Torre
Louis Black
Peter Luger's steak sauce
Manhattan Transfer
Dinah Washington
Denzel Washington
Disneyland
Improv
JUSTIFIED
Patton Oswalt
The Bilko box set
Pixar
iPad minis
Coffee Bean Ice Blendeds
GreatBigRadio.com
Tallulah Moorehead
7 game World Series
Jon Miller
The Crab Cooker
Brian Wilson (the one without the beard)
Julie Bowen
Neil Simon
Sam Simon
Wifi
Stephen Colbert
Antenna TV
Christina Applegate
Milk Duds
Linda Eder
THE COLBERT REPORT
THE MIDDLE
Red carpet shows
Nicole Atkins
Amoeba Records
Baseball-Reference.com
Fellow bloggers
On Demand
Our troops
YOU
Care to add your own?
As the unofficial master of shameless, but not yet overbearingly awkward, plugs, it's shocking you didn't mention any of your books. Perhaps that's for your readers to point out. Well done.
ReplyDeleteClaire Danes, Rebecca Hall, Morena Baccarin
ReplyDeleteHell yeah!
Even though we don't have Thanksgiving in the UK, here's mine, since you asked so nicely:
Susanna Reid - those outside UK won't know the name but she's a goddess who presents breakfast TV here - http://i3.mirror.co.uk/tv/tv-news/article2783940.ece/ALTERNATES/s615/Turnbull-Reid-BBC-Breakfast-2783940.png
Lizzy Caplan
True Blood
Homeland
South Park
Stanley Kubrick
Martin Scorsese
Woody Allen
Music
Pizza
80s movies
Cheers
Frasier
Kat Dennings
Rosamund Pike
Jeff Ross
Michael Keaton
The Honest Trailers guys
And too many more to mention.
Almost finished MUST KILL TV. Love the characterization of Muncie. From what I've read so far, I think it would make a terrific black comedy movie. By the way, you REALLY don't like Lena Dunham, do you?!
Ken Levine, among a long list. I enjoy having something worthwhile to read when I wake up every day.
ReplyDeleteI am grateful for you, and, among many others, music by:
ReplyDeleteJake Shimabukuro's ukulele
Mark Knopfler's guitar
Leonard Cohen's songs
Layla Hathaway's voice
Leon Russell's piano
and of course, the Tuvian throat singers...
W/out giving any plot points away, I'm in agreement w/Hamid: your book would be a good black comedy. It's one of the rare times when I think the movie would be better than the book. I read Forrest Gump when it was first published - around 1985 - and disliked it a lot. I was reluctant to see the movie but I gave in to domestic demands and went - what a difference. Unlike the book, Gump became humanized and very likeable. I think the same would hold true for MUST KILL TV. Not that your story doesn't have humanized characters, it certainly does. But to say more would probably get me censored - again! So I won't. Happy Holiday to all.
ReplyDeleteMost everything you said plus...
ReplyDeleteSCANDAL
Kyle Chandler
Lady Parts Justice
@UnfinishedS
FRUITVALE STATION
Corey Booker
THE SPECTACULAR NOW
Pharrell Williams
London
Netflix
THE NEWSROOM
HBO Documentaries
Scriptnotes Podcast
George Gershwin
NEBRASKA
Health insurance
Books
12 YEARS A SLAVE
Comedians
Hard cider
This article is a cry for help.
ReplyDeletePeople, post some topics for Ken to write about.
I'd like to hear more about that Bilko box set. I have a best-of and season 1. Maybe he box is Region 3 or something? Also, why doesn't Disney get on the stick and complete the Muppet Show series.
ReplyDeleteI'm thankful that Ken Levine writes such a great blog!
ReplyDeleteHere's a topic, or a Friday question, if you prefer: Ken, you didn't give the new Robin Williams show much of a chance when it first aired. I was wondering what you think since they added Brad Garrett.
@Todd Everett: A friend of mine bought a 3-volume set of Bilko episodes off of ebay. 147 episodes, but they turned out to be homemade product, recorded off of old Comedy Central broadcasts of the series.
ReplyDeleteI wouldn't be surprised if music rights weren't holding up the remaining seasons of the Muppet Show. That was a very music-heavy series.
Oh, so you like Linda Eder, too. Been listening to her a lot lately and have picked up several of her albums, most recently the one of Judy Garland songs.
ReplyDeleteOrphan Black and Tatiana Maslany, (who also has a background in improve) and the actor who plays Felix her stepbrother
ReplyDeleteand my health..
improv spell autocorrect did me in
ReplyDeleteFrench Fries at Kelly's Roast Beef (at Revere Beach, NOT Route 1)
ReplyDeleteTHE PRODUCERS (the original movie)
TCM (for every Preston Sturgess and Harold Lloyd movie they show)
Woody Herman, Dave Brubeck
Allison Janney
VEEP
Every episode of M*A*S*H (except the one in which Henry Blake dies)
your blog!
The Beatles
ReplyDeletefilm noir
plastic model kits
Marx playsets
paperback books, especially mystery and Westerns
my kids and granddaughter
retirement
my concealed weapon permit
the internet
Dragnet
Leave It to Beaver
my dogs
Tankon
I'm thankful that the FBI is not more competent and that I thus I remain a free man.
ReplyDeletePerhaps I've said too much . . .
Hey, thanks to you Ken, for the blogging and the books and for all of those scripts with David. Have a Happy Thanksgiving!
And in the spirit of the season, a Happy Thanksgiving to Lena Dunham, Zach Braff, Tim McCarver, and Roseanne. Why not? (Oh, I know why not - now I'm picturing them all together at the same holiday table.)
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ReplyDeleteVery cool that Amoeba Records made your list, Ken. Amoeba first opened in Berkeley back in the early '90s and I've been patronizing the store ever since...matter of fact I was just in there a couple of days ago.
ReplyDeleteI'm thankful for:
My 13 year old only child daughter, Naomi and her excellent health.
The Rolling Stones still together.
Keith Richards
British invasion music still enduring from The Beatles, Stones, Kinks, Who, Animals, DC5, Yardbirds, Small Faces, The Move.
Mad Men
House of Cards
Breaking Bad
Orange Is the New Black
The Good Wife
The Middle
Shark Tank
My good health
Living in Oakland
Very close to San Francisco
and let's not forget Berkeley
My giant 45's collection.
Still making mix tapes
Reading good books
That I met and had breakfast with Red Skelton.
Meeting ans shaking hands with Brian Wilson.
Tiger sneakers
Ralph Lauren button down shirts
Staying close friends with my high school friend Sheldon who transformed into Shelly.
Walking around the different San Francisco neighborhoods.
Staying away from LA
My large collection of very cool Japanese transistor radios that took me 23 years to acquire.
Punk rock music from 1976-1978
The Ramones
Listening to old Top 40 airchecks of KHJ.
Lots more too numerous to mention.
Aside from my family and friends I'm thankful for:
ReplyDelete-American Flyer, Lionel and Marx electric trains
-Pinball machines
-Steven Moffat
-Kenneth Johnson
-Tex Avery and Bob Clampett
-George Pal and Puppetoons
-SHERLOCK (BBC)
-Ed "Big Daddy" Roth
-This blog
-DOCTOR WHO
-Pizza
-30 second clips of free porn
-Steven Moffat (enough talent for two mentions)
Oh, and Nat Hiken.
ReplyDeleteThere ae so many things I for which I am grateful. I love modern recording technology. We can aurally record music!!! If only we had tapes of Bach or Mozart actually playing...
ReplyDeleteI am grateful I am able to listen to Chick Webb, who had a life and career long before I was born. That I was able to play the drum introduction to 'Liza' for a 15 year old student, show him the various techniques and explain that this music was the heavy metal of Chick's time, and how it connects all drummers. To see my student's eyes open in surprise, that makes me thankful.
Music and literature.... Hearing Bach for the first time and discovering Sophocles at 15.... Yeah, I'm thankful. :-)
The Clash
ReplyDeleteThe Police
The Ramones
The Replacements
R.E.M.
Old 97's
Alison Krauss
JD McPherson
80's alternative/college rock
Arby's Market Fresh sandwiches
Reese's Peanut Butter Cups
Patricia Heaton's acting
Eden Sher
Toks Olagundoye
Jami Gertz
Connie Britton
Nancy Travis
Lauren Cohan
The kid who plays "Dick Butkus" on The Neighbors
The ratings decline of 2 Broke Girls and 2 1/2 Men
MASH
Cheers
All in the Family
WKRP in Cincinnati
Google Maps
Google News Archive (sadly abandoned)
Spotify
Freecorder
Hulu
Me-TV
YouTube
Dutch apple pie
Ken Levine & David Isaacs
I'm thankful for "...by Ken Levine", of course!
ReplyDeleteThere's lot's more that I'm thankful for but I won't bore you with any of it. You can be thankful to me for that.
The Apple Pan in L.A.
ReplyDeleteMoody's & the Tourist Club in Truckee
I'm happy that the things I complain about are small and insignificant!
ReplyDeleteStu's Show
ReplyDeleteYou deserve at least one day off a year, posting a list of things you like might just qualify as taking a day off from writing.
ReplyDeleteHear, hear for Doc Emrick (the joy in his call) and the wonderful Carl Reiner.
ReplyDeleteAlso thankful for the greatest 17 second ever. (Chicago and hockey fans know)
And for Great Big Radio. Really sounds good.
Chris said...
ReplyDeleteI wouldn't be surprised if music rights weren't holding up the remaining seasons of the Muppet Show. That was a very music-heavy series.
true of some series I know -- WKRP and Crime Story, for instance, were both issued on DVD with what sounds like library music.
But Disney, who has a lot invested in the Muppets, issued three (of, I believe, five) seasons intact -- each season with fewer extras than its predecessor, BYW.
Even if they didn't do particularly well, which i find hard to believe, it would seem to be good pr and with the relationship with Henson productions to compete the series.
Particularly since they seem to be working the movie end of the franchise hard -- making new ones and reissuing old ones.
clearly they don't agree (sigh)
A Friday question for you, blogmeister:
ReplyDeleteAs a product of America's finest university--UCLA--who has gone rogue and now works at USC aka University of Second Choice, whose football team will you be rooting for this weekend?
"GreatBigRadio.com
ReplyDeleteTallulah Moorehead
7 game World Series"
Thank you, darling, and back at ya, as the kiddies say.
Turner Classic Movies
ReplyDeleteAnna Faris (and Allison Janney, and "Mom")
"Hot In Cleveland"
Bryce Harper
The new Beatles at the BBC box set (including a remastered Vol. 1, featuring John Lennon's brilliant take on "Soldier Of Love")
Elvis Costello
BBC news
Maryland being in the Big Ten one year from today
Amtrak
Carole Lombard movies
William Powell movies
Marshall Crenshaw
"Dragnet" and "Gunsmoke" on radio
When I was in 5th grade(probably 1980) our teacher made us all list our favorites. Favorite food, place, TV show, etc. For my favorite TV show, I wrote down M*A*S*H. I was the only one in my class to choose that show. I don't even think I knew what a martini was, but I guessed it must have been pretty darn good. I would like to thank Ken Levine for his contribution to that show. It was a show that really touched my heart, even in the 5th grade.
ReplyDeleteFriday Question:
Favorite and Least Favorite TV show theme songs and why.
Carl Reiner (Of Course!)
ReplyDeleteThe Beatles
The Criterion Collection
Some Like it Hot
Treme
Dick Cavett's blog in The Times
Act One by Moss Hart
Everything given to us by David Rakoff
The Phantom Tollbooth
Kind of Blue
Sweeney Todd
Crissy Field
Cold Brew Coffee
Larry Gelbart
Edward Hopper
The sublime documentary "Visions of Light"
Nat Hiken
Ernie Kovacs
Too much to mention, but including the Coverville Thanksgiving show - all Beatles covers.
ReplyDeleteI should make a list like this every day...
ReplyDeleteThis blog
Meditation
Good friends
Double Fine Adventure
Kickstarter
Arrested Development
Jay Stevens
My clients
Tim Shafer
A patient and kind-hearted ex
My oil heater (sure is getting cold)
Buffy
George RR Martin
Marc Maron
Netflix
Taxi
The Simpsons (first 10 seasons, natch)
Maggie
Joss Whedon
Improv4Humans
Meditation (yes, again).
Happy Thanksgiving!
Happy Thanksgiving, Ken! Enjoy your day off from your blog!
ReplyDeleteBrian O., there is a limited release on bluray of the Puppetoons Movie with extra cartoons and loads of bonus stuff. Just came out and mine just arrived. YUM!
ReplyDeleteSnow
ReplyDeleteNew job (and a good one to boot!)
Starbucks gold card
Tickets to the John Williams concert
The works of Jerry Goldsmith
These headphones I've had forever
Miklos Rozsa's Violin Concerto
The tackiness of our Christmas tree
People who DON'T pig-park
People who use turn signals
Jennifer Lawrence being from Louisville
My friends
The grad program at Asbury University
Peter Weir
Joe Dante
Both Graham Greenes (the author and the actor)
Kentucky
This blog
Joseph Campbell & the Hero's Journey
Cranberry sauce
My in-laws
My dog & cat
My wife
Thanks for the blog, Ken, and all the great work over the years. I watched the Turkey Day episode of Cheers earlier and was loving it. (Like I always do.)
ReplyDeleteThanks for all the great commenters here and great reading on a daily basis, as well. Some nice lists up there.
Happy Chanukah and Keep On Truckin'.
@Hamid: The ONLY thing I hated about my time in London was that it was The Year Without A Halloween and very nearly The Year Without A Thanksgiving, but a bunch of my mother's fellow American college students threw something together at the last minute, just to spite y'all. No turkeys to be found, so we had goose, which tastes kinda weird. All of our English friends were confused; "You mean it's a day when you just gorge yourself immobile? To show you're thankful? You lot are daft." Then I reminded them that a few weeks prior, they'd had a holiday where children begged in the street for money to buy fireworks, so who's daft, really?
ReplyDeleteEvery time I list the things I'm thankful for online, they seem to go to hell. So, I'll just say that I'm thankful for my wonderful vegan (allergy reasons) husband, for the awesome hippy-trippy food co-op that makes vegan pumpkin pies, and for my dear friend who brought one to dinner to please said vegan husband and take the weight of trying to figure out how to make one (along with the rest of his dinner AND a regular carnivore dinner as well!) off my head. Seriously, he took a bite, squeezed himself, jumped up in the air and floated back down, just like the dog on Quickdraw McGraw. It was amazing.
So full. So very, very full. I think I might urp.
Cheers to all,
Storm
A day late, but I'm adding my not-at-all-ordered list anyhow. Also made one a couple years ago, so it was fun to compare them.
ReplyDeletemy sons
dark chocolate
Stephen Colbert
Max Raabe and the Palast Orchester
David Rakoff
Joss Whedon
the Sherlock Holmes stories
Trader Joe's
Mozart
Prokofiev
tomatoes
peanut butter
Terry Pratchett
Castle
Randy Newman
Manhattan (and the Megabus that takes me there)
Allison Janney
Marin Alsop
macarons
Futurama
Leave my own? Is there anything left? I think the only things not on your list are John Boehner and that your daughter isn't dating John Boehner (though that might have been implied in the vampire item). However, I'll dig deep into the Mark bag: fireflies, the sound of a train whistle in the distance and Michael Gambon as The Singing Detective. Oh, and North by Northwest.
ReplyDeleteYou had space for a picture of Morena Baccarin! You had space!
ReplyDelete