[Actually, typing the headline out, I have a hard time seeing how that can possibly be a bad thing. Nonetheless, onward with this week’s column…]
My wife and I are devotees of the show Arrested Development. The kind of devotees who like to come up with something more nautically-themed than “hot cops,” if you know what I’m saying. We’ve got a big ol’ nerd-out planned for when the new episodes of the show hit Netflix this May—including signing up for a Netflix account—and in the meantime, I have my trusty DVDs from when the show was still on the air to give us our fix. We’ve burned through a number of cheapo DVD players over the last couple years, mostly just watching the show, or Star Trek, or The Big Lebowski, etc.
As we stood at Best Buy the other night in Little Falls, we decided that instead of another just-above-disposable DVD unit, we’d upgrade to something a little better. We wound up with a Samsung Blu-ray dealie. Yes, it plays DVDs too, and just because I think we’ve also worn out the Arrested Development discs as well as the old, crappy players, we got new versions of seasons one, two and three. Had to be done.
The editorial department at Buzzfeed recently said of Bill Murray, “His life is full of breathless win.” I felt pretty much the same way when I took the thing out of the box and plugged it into the HDMI. My excitement only increased when I discovered that the unit also had Wi-Fi, could get on our home network and upon doing so, access YouTube videos and partake in other, much-less-free services, like Netflix and a number or lesser entities in the same vein.
I very quickly realized this was the starting point for the beginning of a new era in my life. I’ve had internet since there was internet to have, and I’ve been watching television since before the doctors knew children so young shouldn’t be watching it, but I’ve never combined the two in more than just illegally downloading shows. Until this weekend. Breathless win.
First up, a live Wino set from Pittsburgh, in full. Later, some acoustic Queens Of The Stone Age. Still after that, a short film called The Delicious that I highly recommend to anyone with eyeballs and an appreciation of the absurd. On and on into the reaches of the night. I’d search for things on my laptop (which is faster), then find the specific clips with the remote and watch them, in HD, on my television.
I may never read another book, may never play another video game, or have a productive late-night email session. I might have to end this column after starting it I don’t even know how many years ago. I’ll have to quit my jobs, shut down my blog, call it a day on pretty much my entire existence. Because now I can watch YouTube clips on my tv. Can you imagine what it’ll be like when I finally sign up for Netflix? I’ll let you know when the time comes—or maybe I won’t because I’ll be a hermit who hisses and scuttles away anytime someone opens the bedroom door and lets in the tiniest sliver of natural light. A shattered Gollum of the robust creative-type I used to be, but screw it, I’ve seen the top of the mountain, and it’s being able to launch into any full-length album I can think of and some I can’t at any time I want just by telling my best Blu-ray buddy to make it so.
So uh, yeah man. If you need me, I’ll be knee-deep in another round of The Satanic Rites Of Dracula or a full, commercial-free episode of Mystery Science Theater 3000, splicing in live clips from Unida and Clutch and living a dream that my constantly-five-years-behind-the-times ass couldn’t have imagined even one week ago.
See you on the other side.
JJ Koczan
jj@theaquarian.com
