The question: Which parent does Eli more closely resemble?

To judge this noodle-scratcher in a fair and equitable manner, I will present side-by-side pictures of Eli (who will always be on the left) and baby pictures of myself and Courtney (on the right). Then it is up to you, the blog visitor, to submit your vote in the comments.

Everybody clear? Great. Let’s get started.

Eli and Baby Courtney:

Eli and Baby Alan:

What do you think?  Is Eli a mirror of Mommy?  Or a dead ringer for Daddy?  Remember, every vote counts, and the polling is officially open!

If you happen to be having a rough day, I’m pretty sure this video should cheer you up pretty darn quickly.

n Thursday of last week, after I collected our mail, I noticed something on our front door.  It was a pamphlet saying that our house had been selected to participate in the Nielsen ratings system.  As TV junkies, Courtney and I were obviously excited.  If we had a Nielsen box in our living room, what we watched could have an impact on what shows stay on the air.  The power!  We were drunk on it almost immediately.

The next day, on Friday, I called the woman who left her card on our door. She asked me if we had cable, and if we had someone in our home under the age of 18. I answered yes, which were apparently the right answers, because she told me she would come by the next morning to go over all of the information in person.  It was all happening so fast!

Saturday morning, the nice woman from Nielsen came to our house to go over some of the details of the program.  They install some equipment in our TV, and when we sit down to watch television, Courtney and I (and Eli, if applicable) push a button that indicates how many of us are actually watching what’s on the tube.  Because the number of people who actually have these boxes is fairly low, we represent a large number of television viewers in the region, and so recording the data of what we watch is pretty important.  On top of that, for our “trouble,” we even get a small stipend of cash!

As the nice woman took down our information, I got a little anxious when she asked me what I do for a living.  But I answered the question honestly, there was no incident, and she left us saying that she would be in touch on Monday to schedule an appointment to do the installation.

We were ecstatic.

The following day – yesterday, to be exact – we got a call from the Nielsen woman.  It turns out that my career does in fact preclude me from participating in the Nielsen ratings system.

Bummer.

It’s a shame, but I can see that my job does make for a pretty obvious conflict of interest.  Now, I usually watch any show I work on as a general rule – mostly to show Courtney what I’ve been working on – but if my viewings were really being counted, I’d be sure to watch each of my show’s premieres and every subsequent repeat airing.  They tell you that you have to keep your participation in Nielsen a secret, because media people will try to influence what you watch to affect the ratings if they somehow find out that you have a box.  But what if a media person is living IN THE HOUSE WITH YOU?  <cue horror movie music>

So I get it.  Still, it would be nice to have some kind of impact on what shows get canceled and which ones don’t.  Of course, I don’t understand why, given current technology, Nielsen boxes are still necessary at all – shouldn’t there be a simple digital way to monitor what everyone with a cable box/satellite hook-up is watching?  You wouldn’t get how many people are there in the room, but at least that way there would be an accurate count of how many TV’s are tuned in to the Lost finale, or whatever.

Sour grapes?  Maybe a little.

At least this way I can tell people about it.

SPOILER ALERT FOR JAMES (or anyone else who hasn’t seen every episode of Lost and is planning to at some point in the future)

The final season and complete collections of Lost have arrived on DVD and Blu-Ray this week, and the special feature that is being dissected the most is the 12 minute epilogue mini-episode, “The New Man in Charge.”  The feature was teased as a way that the show could address some of the questions that weren’t answered in the final season in a fun, interesting, and canonical way.   I finally got a chance to watch this feature, and below are my thoughts.   Last chance to turn away if you don’t want to be spoiled.  And if you do want to see the video now, just click here – until the video is forced down, of course.

The New Man in Charge gives a glimpse of how Hurley and Ben run things in their time as stewards of the Island.  Unfortunately, we don’t actually get to see them on the Island at all, just taking care of some loose ends elsewhere in the world.  The first scene shows Ben shutting down the outpost that has been providing the DHARMA food drops.  So we pretty quickly learn how and why those drops kept occurring.  The show makes light of how fans were frustrated and demanding of answers by way of the DHARMA employees demanding answers from Ben.  A flurry of answers come by way of an old DHARMA training video.  The video provides a few answers about things that  took place on the Island, but also, in the grand tradition of the show, raises more questions as it answers old ones.  OK, so we know what the Hurley-bird was, and why there were polar bears on the Island, but the meatier reveals about the infertility issues and the purpose of Room 23 intrigued me, and I wanted to learn more.  If the electromagnetism caused the fertility problems, were they always there, or could women safely give birth before the Incident at the Orchid station?  And why was DHARMA experimenting on Hostiles and risking their wrath by violating the truth?  I mean, Chang explains why, but it just seems foolish.  Still, knowing that they were experimenting on humans does explain the psychological experiments going ion in the Pearl Station, and it just makes DHARMA that much creepier in general.

The second scene is all about the character that people were whining about throughout the final season – Walt.  I was interested in learning more about him, but I was OK without him playing a huge role in the series’ endgame, as his character did get some degree of closure, albeit not in the context of what he could do for the Island. Well now we see that his special-ness can be used to help his father, and possibly the other dead people whose spirits are trapped on the Island, to move on. Again, an answer that is intriguing and makes me wonder how exactly Walt would be able to do that. Is that the “job” Hurley was offering him? And how did Walt, who was living in New York, end up in an institution in LA? And why does he look older than me?

Overall, I enjoyed this epilogue, and it was nice to get a glimpse at what Hurley was up to when he was in charge of the Island.  I would have liked to have seen he and Ben actually on the Island, maybe checking in on Rose, Bernard, and Vincent, or cleaning up some of the wreckage of 815 or 316, or burying some bodies on Boone Hill, or something like that.  And while I choose to believe that Hurley got Desmond home to Penny and Charlie, a verbal confirmation of that would have been nice.  And yeah, I can see how people who were expecting a laundry list of answers might be disappointed by TNMIC.  But for people like me who are just happy to get more new Lost and get a few old mysteries resolved at the same time, it’s a pretty nice way to add a little more to the Lost universe.

Yesterday, as you no doubt have heard, there was a fire at a LIRR control tower that totally effed up the commutes of hundreds of thousands of people who travel to and from Long Island.  Today, the trains are still all kinds of messed up.  Sure, accidents can happen, so it’s hard to be angry at the MTA about a fire they clearly had no control over.  Until, that is, one finds out that the fire just so happened to hit equipment that dates back to 1913.

1913!  That is NINETY SEVEN years old.  Are you kidding me?  How has this not been replaced?  Before this fire hit, the technology was due for an upgrade in the fall, but really, why did the MTA wait until it was 97 years old before deciding to upgrade?  I’m pretty sure there were enough significant advancements in technology that would have modernized things significantly in, say, the 1940’s.  Or the 60’s.  Or 80’s.  Or, in fact, many times in between 1913 and now.

What exactly were you waiting for, MTA?  A massive fire wiping out all of your Woodrow Wilson-era tech?  Well, good planning!

Then, on top of that, news breaks that the MTA is looking to raise the cost of a monthly Metrocard to $130.   One hundred and thirty dollars!  That is a $41 increase from how much a monthly costs now!  And if it seems like fares were just raised, that’s because they were – on June 28, 2009 to be exact.  Just after a year since the last fare hike, and right after horrific service outages, comes new that the MTA could in the very near future raise commuting costs by a staggering amount.  This is insanity!

And who is going to stop the MTA?  A mass boycott would be nice, but what about the people who depend on mass transit to get to work?  You could drive, but then you’ll just be paying the same people your hard-earned money in tolls, which will also continue to go up and up and up.  The fact of the matter is that the MTA has essentially a monopoly on getting people in and around the city.  Bloomberg has talked tough to the MTA, but it clearly hasn’t done much good.  No, the sad reality is that the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (can you believe they get to call themselves the “authority?!”) will continue to raise fares year after year, all while subjecting their riders to delays, cancellations, outdated equipment, and noisy rides.

Sigh.  Perhaps someday we’ll be able to live hundreds of miles away from our workplaces and still be able to get to our city offices on time thanks to new super high speed railways, that maybe won’t be run by evil, inefficient, and corrupt agencies.  A boy can dream…

I’ve been called many things in my day, but “mature” is usually not one of them.  I mean, let’s be honest here: I watch a lot of cartoons and I am eager to spend any free time (a rare commodity, to be sure) playing video games.  So every now and again, I’ll realize that I am “too old” for something, and it genuinely surprises me.  I recently had such a moment reading over an issue of Maxim.

I have nothing against Maxim – I’ve been reading and enjoying the, um… articles for around a decade now.  It’s always struck me as a kind of “little brother” magazine to Playboy – more crass and less sophisticated, and more attuned to what someone in their 20’s would be interested in, as opposed to Playboy which skews a bit older.  When I was in my 20’s, I enjoyed reading both.

But now that I’m 30 (and approaching 31), Maxim just is no longer speaking my language.  I like the pictures of the pretty girls, and I enjoy their takes on movies and TV shows, but overall I just find myself too old for most of what’s in their pages – articles about how to pick up spring breakers or cheat on your girlfriend are just not applicable/interesting to me.  So sorry, Maxim, no matter how many more friendly reminder cards you send me, I will be letting my subscription run its course next month.  Like MAD Magazine and Nintendo Power before you, I will remember looking forward to your latest issues arriving in my mailbox, and I’m sure I will occasionally thumb through your latest issue on an airport newsstand and think back on the good times we shared.  But I’ll know deep down that it parting ways was the right thing to do, and that we’ll both be fine on our own.

This one is a no brainer.  I’ve heard that some people hated it, but Christopher Nolan’s got too good a track record to discount, and I’ve always been fascinated by the world of dreams.

A throwback to 80’s action-flicks?  And it puts the Planet Hollywood trio on screen together?   The kid in me is very excited for this one.

It’s got Michael Cera and plenty of geek cred.  Why wouldn’t I want to see it?

Courtney wants to see this one more than I do.  I mean, don’t get me wrong, I love Steve Carell and Paul Rudd as much as the next guy, but this movie just strikes me as one of those flicks where you’ve already seen the best parts from the commercials and the trailers.

Will Ferrell plus Adam McKay equals comedic genius like Anchorman, Talladega Nights, Step Brothers, and The Landlord.  Nuff said.

I like me a good animated movie, and this one got a surprisingly good amount of buzz.  Con: It’s not made by Pixar.  Pro: It’s not made by Dreamworks.

Of all of the movies on this list, this one is hands down stands to be the hokiest/cheesiest/biggest waste of a night out.  But it makes the cut for one key reason: The other movies I can watch on DVD at home and miss nothing.  But this one is meant to be seen on the big screen. In 3D!  And Elisabeth Shue is in it!  And, ya know, piranhas!  In 3D!

The movies will be beautiful, sound great, and they will feature some brand-new special features.  Like what, you ask?  Well, how about this never-before-seen opening sequence from return of the Jedi? (Watch it fast, before it gets yanked!)

Pretty cool, right?  I’m not big on re-buying movies and things in the latest format, but Star Wars is clearly the exception where I need to have it in the best and newest way possible.  I mean, it’s Star Wars!

PS The original trilogy will be on the discs as the Special Edition versions – apparently the original versions couldn’t stand up to the upgrade to Blu-Ray quality.  I’m quite fine with the changes made to the 2004 Special Editions, and though such a suggestion may be nerd blasphemy, I actually hope Lucas does a little more tinkering, and replaces the puppet Yoda from Episode I with a digital version.  Seriously, The Phantom Menace Yoda looked worse than the one in Empire, and that’s just not right.

Anyway, here’s a quick recap of things we all learned at the 2010 HOHHR BYOB BBQ:

• Eli and the Capobianco family get along GREAT
• Nate has gotten big, and he looks more and more like his Dad every time I see him
• Sausage and peppers can still be good even if the sausage is slightly charred (my bad!)
• Ladder ball should not be played in the vicinity of low-hanging wires
• Sherlock can impressively get his entire body under the shed and back out again, though he still can’t catch a rabbit

In all seriousness, Courtney, Eli, Sherlock and I were all extremely grateful that everyone could come over – it was great seeing the gang and catching up.  It’s funny that at last year’s get-together, there were no babies, and this year there were two.  Next year there will be three (if anyone wants to up that number, there’s still time!)  I don’t want to get overly philosophical about the circle of life or anything, I’m just saying that babies make everything better (what, me biased?), and I think they make these annual get-togethers that much more fun for everyone.

Looking forward to next year’s BBQ – we just might still have enough burgers and hot dogs to cover it!

That’s right – Sonic Drive In – the company that has advertised locally for years even though there are no local restaurants – is set to open its first Long Island location in Spring 2011 in North Babylon!  Not convenient enough for you?  Well they are also apparently scouting locations in Massapequa, Smithtown and East Meadow!  There has not been any announcement of exact location for any Sonic, but someone wrote in the comments of the first article that it would be on Deer Park Avenue – just a short drive south from the Noah’s!  I can’t imagine we’d go there any more than we’d go to Five Guys, which would still be closer, but just knowing that a Sonic is nearby is oddly comforting.

In all honesty, I’ve only had Sonic once on a visit to Atlanta, and I think it was good, but I don’t remember being totally blown away by it.  If memory serves, we had it not long after another meal, so we may have been too full to really appreciate it.   But it definitely deserves another shot.

Come to think of it, I just like having things locally that other places have.  It bugs me when people from other parts of the country can act all high and mighty because we don’t have such-and-such’s here.  (Who needs you anyway, In-N-Out?)  Well, suck it, other regions of the United States – Long Island’s getting Sonic!