Writer's Strike Blues?

I'm sure you've all been wondering "How has Ronson been dealing with this writer's strike?" I know, I hear you loud and clear and, believe me, it's been tough. The last show I had in my DVR, (why?) E.R. (which I suspect has long been without writers anyway) finally crapped out it's last new episode. But here are a few things that have been keeping me occupied in the meantime:

Reality TV
It's true, I've dabbled in some reality TV, though I still hate most of it. Project Runway is still obviously on my TV rotation, but I also found myself intrigued by Survivorman (above), after watching a marathon with my dad over the Christmas holiday. I think we both agree that the appeal of the show is actually that Les Stroud (aka Survivorman) is not always all that good at surviving, which we feel adds more of an authenticity to the show. I've never seen the guy catch a fish (after hours and hours and hours of trying), he's always complaining about how he has to film himself climbing rocks and, by the end of the seven days, he's pretty crabby, irritable and even a little stir crazy, which always makes for great TV.

Books
Currently, I've almost polished off the latest volume of my favorite anthology, the Da Capo Best Music Writing series. I've read nearly every year (I discovered it in 2003, went back and read 2000-2002, and have only since skipped the tumultuous 2005 edition "edited" by J.T. LeRoy). You might think, "Oh sure, big music snob likes to read about his favorite albums/artists of the year," but it's not like that at all. Most of the appeal is its variation. One minute you might be reading about an in-depth profile on James Brown, the next, rappers in Israel, then a profile on Joanna Newsom, which is infinitely more interesting than listening to a Joanna Newsom CD. Even if I'm not familiar with the subject (and a lot of times it's for the best), it makes for an interesting read and is highly worth checking out...



Music
Now that I've loaded a whole lotta of my old CDs onto my iTunes hard drive (see my a couple posts below for that) I've been able to focus on some new stuff, like Cat Power's new covers album Jukebox (above), and the critically-loved Person Pitch from Panda Bear, which is actually pretty good, especially if you like loop-crazy, Pet Sounds-style pop. As for older stuff, I'd suggest checking out former Temptations lead singer Eddie Kendricks' solo stuff. At this point, I'd probably prefer listening to a few hours of music and reading instead of enduring American Idol all week...

Movies
Well, it's Oscar season, so I suppose it's time to see a few of those. After checking out Kelly's list, I realized I'm pretty behind at this point too (though I can check Juno off my list. Whew!).

If the strike goes on much longer, I figure I'll grow a strike beard and braid it or something. See? There's always plenty to do!