There was a clever moment in one of the middle seasons where the accountant (Brian I think?) wakes up on the dance floor after a wild party at the Bing, and groggily sits up—over his shoulder you see the Bing logo and realize that he's sitting in exactly the same position as the stripper (and right next to the…

http://www.theonion.com/art…

"When I Get to the Border" is phenomenal. If you have a crush on Zooey Deschanel, here is a cure: go to youtube and listen to the She & Him version of that song. For shame.

Here My Dear. My favorite Marvin Gaye album. Of course, one of the things that makes it so great is that the backstory is also all out in the open, in the songs' lyrics.

If by "the whole world" you mean "the Midwest." I'm from Ohio, and I've found that everyone from the Midwest knows the game and everyone from everywhere else has never heard of it.

Are you talking about "screw the dealer"? My family calls it 10-9 sometimes. You deal 10 cards the first hand, 9 the second, and so on down to 1 (which is a total crapshoot). You can only do well if you take exactly the number of tricks you bid. The bids can't add up to the number of tricks, and the dealer bids last,…

Noel: what was the first bridge book? I have an enormous bridge library, so they'll all be hand-me-downs once my kid gets old enough to indoctrinate. My wife swears by Watson but I have a soft spot for Bill Root.

I agree. Moving Pictures and Signals were the last hurrah. Although I have a soft spot for Presto.

Yes, point taken, although it's still hard to see how a correct understanding, even garbled or truncated by Hal, could lead to Pemulis's apparent belief that he can use the Mean Value Theorem for integrals (not the IVT, my mistake above) as a useful shortcut in his Eschaton calculations.

The Running Man was the last one. You're probably thinking of Roadwork, which is very…'70s. Still not bad, though. And the original Running Man is maybe the best thing he ever wrote.

To me, that is the funniest scene in the entire book. Especially toward the end when there is that involved stoned discussion about whether the physical characteristics of the playing field affect the regions they stand for, while people are just pegging tennis balls at that one annoying kid and Pemulis is getting…

Todd is worth 10 Rabins, at least when it comes to smart episode recaps. Really enjoying these, enough to go back and watch season 5 again.

Eh, Outland was pretty boring after hour 1 or so. I would not call it an amazing action-platformer in any world that had things like Psychonauts. And I got every single stupid collectible. It looks pretty, though, and it kills a few hours…B-.

Sir Duke. Should be #1.

Del Mccoury is great, but his version of the song always ends up sounding pale and mechanical next to the original.

I was hoping it was Christopher Cross, and I was finally going to find out if he had made it to the border of Mexico.

At one point or another in my life:

I like your avatar, your highness, but the "Ordinary Pain" outro is fucking awful. Repetitive, grating, not-Stevie-Wonder singing…ugh.  I skip it every time. Unless your comment was meant ironically, in which case well done.

Walking on Sunshine by Katrina and the Waves.

Yep. He always had problems ending his songs, but the meandering is very noticeable here. Luckily there is a CD "next track" button.