Two Vastly Different Varieties of Televisual Entertainment

1) So we tried to watch Inland Empire Saturday night, and people, we made it maybe 20 minutes into this three-hour epic. I can count the number of times I have abandoned a movie mid-viewing on one hand with a couple fingers missing (Reservoir Dogs, the truly loathsome and irredeeemable House of 1,000 Corpses), but we just couldn’t do it. Totally incomprehensible, and also, unbelieveably tense-making. My shoulders were up around my ears, I was filled with dread -- we got through the awesome-yet-scary-as-hell Grace Zabriskie’s first scene, and then had to call it. I think this is the final installment of a Lesson Learned: I love Lynch Lite (Twin Peaks, Mulholland Drive) and can’t really handle Lynch Dark Roast (Inland Empire, Wild at Heart). Good to know.

2) BASEBAAAALLLLLLLL! How bout them Yankees, folks? Opening Day proper got rained out, so we’ve only seen the one game (yesterday’s), but it was groovy. My beloved Paul O’Neill commentatin’, Melky and Jeets on the field, Giambi pulling actual baseball out of nowhere ... I gotta tellya, I have all kinds of good feelings about the Joe Girardi era. I loved me some Joe Torre, but it was time – it was past time, if you want to know the truth – and Girardi seems like exactly the right man for the job. Mariano Rivera’s smile just lit up the night, y’all – and that warms the cockles of my cold, dark heart. All’s right with the world.