It's hard to explain even to Baby Boomers how big the fear of nuclear war was for kids growing up in the 80s.  In retrospect we can see, and Boomers probably knew even at the time, that any realistic danger of it happening was all but gone by then and the fearmongering was blown way out of proportion, but of course no…

I remember wondering as a kid (and am still kind of wondering now) what are these dirty cartoons?  I mean, today we can all see Simpsons and Family Guy characters screwing each other in ads on porn sites whether we want to or not, but did they have actual pornographic cartoons back then?  Or was it supposed to be like…

It was a different time.

Man, Harry Anderson's "serious" voice was even worse than Saget's.  He always sounded like he was full of shit, like he was saying this heartfelt speech as a distraction before he pulls a live pigeon out of your ear or something (or in Saget's case, makes a joke about raping babies).

I'm pretty sure paparazzi would take that as a challenge. They're not just taking people's pictures, they're specifically trying to annoy, provoke, and anger them much of the time, certainly in this case.

I saw it. It was probably into reruns by the time I got to it, but I saw it. I think I had the standard "what in the fucking world" reaction you would expect, but at the same time I generally trusted tv to be the sane, wise guiding light, so I probably figured if it seemed nuts to me, it was just something I wasn't…

Do Americans venerate SNL?  Being in America, I mainly hear them complaining about it.

All extraneous words detract from clarity!  And from good writing. 

In ten years there will be people getting into this show who were babies when it originally aired. There will always be new people discovering any show or movie.  Let other people be considerate in peace.  If you'd prefer not to, that's fine, nobody's forcing you.

If the purpose is to communicate, shouldn't writing clearly be the priority?

Yeah, popcorn novels (and movies and music) don't get a pass for quality.  They need to be good just as much as anything else does.

Well, calling people ignorant is just rude, though.  It's not intrinsically rude to simply state an opinion directly. It actually kind of makes me uncomfortable that people feel that way now, though again I'm not exactly immune. I'm sure I have some fluffy-bunny writing on this very page.

One of the things I like best about Jim and Pam's relationship is that it was so not idealized. It wasn't a cut and dried fairytale love story; it was complicated.  Both of them handled it poorly in multiple instances over the course of years, due to cowardice, insecurity, and intermittent selfishness.  Not only did…

Yeah, rub one out over them too!

Hey buddy, this is a family place.  Put the mouse back in the house.

You should pretend there's a camera around and smirk at it.

For all the flaws of season 9, that bit from his wedding might be one of my favorite gags from the entire series. Several years of plot had to build up to that moment of him playing "She's Got a Way" (right?) at his wedding.  It's only funny if  you know what an unappreciative lout he was most of the time he was with…

Cool, thanks guys.  I remember it now but now I want to see it again.

Wow, it seems like I just had this conversation.  Sorry if I offended you by being considerate of people who haven't yet seen a show you've already seen.  :(

I was thinking more Strunk & White… but thanks, now I get to look into William Zinsser! I don't know of him, but a quick googling included on the first page of results a reference to Elmore Leonard's similar ideas about writing, which I've been reading about all day right here on this very site.  Kismet!