Awesome!

Protect your awesome stuff

If you've been paying close attention to Awesome, you probably have a house full of awesome things by now. And of course you don't want some stupid burglar to break in and help himself to all your awesome stuff.

If you don't have a pack of loudmouth dogs like me, consider picking up one of these nifty gadgets. You just plug it into any outlet and it emits random light patterns that simulate a television, thus fooling potential stealers of stuff into thinking you're at home.

It also has a timer so you can set it to turn on and off while you're away, and it uses much less electricity than simply putting your TV on a timer.

Also, it might make for some fun party lighting when you are home.

Martinis and Medicine

When I was six, there were several women I would have been more than happy to grow up and become:

• Wonder Woman
• Any one of Charlie's Angels
• Hot Lips Houlihan, whose hair was so effortlessly bouncy and beautiful even during a war!

Needless to say, I grew up to be just me, like the world needed another whiny woman with bad hair days and no special powers except the ability to eat an entire batch of Duncan Hines brownies in one sitting right before her period.

Luckily, we've got a whole M*A*S*H DVD box set to remind us of Hot Lips and a time in our lives when anything seemed possible. Even good hair.

You got what I need!

The greatest show on TV just started it's 3rd awesome season, and nowlife just got better: It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia Season 1 & 2 on DVD.

If you watched the new season and thought, "WTF is going on with these horrible, awful people!?" then you should pick this up and get yourself oriented. There really is no way to explain what's going on except for just diving in and watching.

Flight of the Conchords

I love visiting my long distance boyfriend in NYC for a bunch of reasons, including:

• He's funny
• He makes strong drinks
• He pays for a taxi if it's 3 am and we have to get back to Manhattan from Brooklyn and I don't feel like waiting a goddamn hour for the f*%$ing subway
• He has a huge HDTV, DVR and CABLE!!

When you live with an antenna on your small tv like I do and keep your fingers crossed that on any given night you'll maybe get PBS and NBC, having cable is like moving from McDonalds to Lobster with the Queen. Or something!

Anyway, there's this show on cable? On HBO? Flight of the Conchords? And it's awesome!! Do you know about this show? OMG!! It's just....I don't even know how to describe it! Just--if you have cable...watch it! Watch it with strong drinks!! And also watch this.

Get out the Kleenex...

This American Signed Poster

  Signed by Ira Glass 
  Originally uploaded by sarahhatter.

A few weeks ago Wendy told you guys about the new tv for This American Life that debuts on Showtime March 22. Well have we got a surprise for you!

Thanks to our friends at This American Life we have a few posters for their new show signed by Ira Glass to give away to our readers! Yay signed stuff! If you'd like to have a chance to get one, all you have to do is sign up for our quarterly gift guide between today and April 1.

(If you're already signed up, send us an email letting us know you'd like to be considered for the drawing and we'll make sure your name is included.)

Don't forget to tune in to Showtime on March 22!

The sign was turned the wrong way

Cable, Why do You Taunt Me So??

As if 'Pimp My Ride,' weren't already enough temptation to break down and get cable, now 'This American Life,' a 15-year-old award-winning Chicago Public Radio show that tells first-person stories of American life, is going to be a tv show on Showtime.

The TV show debuts March 22, but if you're in Chicago Thursday night, you can catch a preview at the Chicago Theatre at 8 PM with guests Dan Savage, Sarah Vowell, and Mates of State. And you don't even have to get cable...but  you really probably should.

Adventure Time

Talk about Awesome!

Hi, I'm An iTunes Personality.

Oh, yes. Oh yes yes yes. That is quite right: iTunes now carries the entire first season of The State.

Gah!HH!!!!!! This is like telling me...something that happened when I was in high school is now on dvd. Uhm. Or, something that was on TV when I was 14 is back on TV cause we're remembering the past...or something.

I don't really know what this is like, but it's pretty sweet. If you haven't seen the show, at least do yourself a favor and find out where all those people from Reno 911 actually came from.

Hint: NOT RENO.

Kirsten's Favorite!

Here's another reader favorite from Kirsten:

"So I thought you should know about Stylus, which is like Pitchfork without the hipper-than-thou attitude. Very refreshing.

Also, Reefer Madness: The Movie Musical, is not just for Veronica Mars addicts like me, but is really entertaining on its own. It satirizes not only the fear machine and sensationalist newsmaking, but the conventions of musical theater themselves. Good stuff. "

Editor's Note: So, what's this Veronica Mars show all about?  This isn't the first time I've heard someone give it a glowing remark.  Should I be watching??

Favorites from Emily!

Another awesome reader, Emily, sends her favorites!

Schick intuition razor: 100% worth the extra cost because you don't have to do the stupid lathering thing EVER AGAIN.

This table from Crate and Barrel that I can't afford but looks like it was just hewed by Norsemen. (check out the Room View and look at the awesome bench that matches it).

Pretty much everything here, except for the stuff that's all eileen fisher's skanky little sister.

Veronica Mars, which is hands-down the best show ever (watch the first season and you'll see).

Sunny Side Up

I've recently fallen in love with It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia. It's one of the funniest shows I've seen on TV in a long time, which means they're gong to cancel it pretty soon. O! Arrested Development! How I miss you!

Anyway, this show is pretty much exactly how I am when I'm with my friends, except I've never gotten drunk and taken a high schooler to prom after being blackmailed by his classmates to show up or have my liquor license taken away because I served minors since they overpay after two rounds. And I've also never had Danny De Vito for a dad who high jacks the basketball team I have to coach to fulfill my community service hours while his Vietnamese friends smoke ganja and gamble on the bleachers.

And I've never even been to Philadephia. But I like beer, and I'd love to own a bar one day that just *barely* broke even each month. Big dreams.

By The Power of Grayskull!

Only twenty-three years after its debut, He-Man returns to us on DVD. If there's a small child in your life who's never seen the masters of the universe, or a grown up kid who still thinks he's one of them, you must buy them the Season 1 DVD.

I don't know how many countless hours I spent as a child waiting for this show to end while my brother was watching it, just so I could put on something else. Usually, it was some show on Nickelodeon about a family of koalas that lived in trees and went to school and had a friend that was a flying squirrel. I have no idea what the name of it was but I was riveted with it, and every time He-Man came on I knew it was just a short time until my koala family would be on too.

But that show is never going to be on DVD. He-Man is, and in a message from the gods above, I hear Today's Special might be soon...

oh! mikey

Thanks to Ross, over at Hypocritcal Mass, I've found a new way of fucking around -- with the Fuccon Family from the bizzare Japanese show 'Oh! Mikey.'  According to the official site, 'Oh! Mikey' is the story of the "fashionably hip and gut-splitting funny" American-bred Fuccon family who has recently moved to Japan.

I can tell you from personal experience, American families living in Japan are pretty hilarious.  (I wouldn't know about the fashionably hip part, though --my mother dressed me in Rainbow Brite velcro shoes and denim stir-up pants when we lived there).

Check out a bit of the show here, and if you like it, go here to find out how to purchase the whole series (with English Subtitles) on DVD!

And, oh yeah -- they're mannequins!  So Fuccon awesome.

Making history

The History Channel is on a roll these days with their new series 10 Days That Unexpectedly Changed America. From the Puritans and the Pequots to The Battle at Antietam to Elvis to the California Gold Rush in my very own hometown, the series spends 10 hours examining some huge leaps in our nation's history. They're each narrated by different actors and directed by various award winning filmmakers. It's truly and awesome series that I can't wait to finish.

Check your local listings and don't miss it while it airs! And if you've got a history buff in your family with a summer birthday, pre-orders for the series are on sale and will ship in late June!

Christmas in hollis

I just finished a big round of bawling my eyes out because of Run DMC. Not their music, no no no, but because of Darrel McDaniels' heart-wrenching quest to find his biological mother. I have no idea how I stumbled upon it given the repetition of that disgusting Flava Flav show, but somehow I ended up watching slack-jawed as DMC spent a year of his life tracking down his mother.

The story is beautiful, aching, and full of insight into the life of an adoptee- the pain, the struggle, and the ultimate reward in discovering your roots. VH1 is on the course to redeeming itself if they keep up this kind of programming, and I urge everyone - adoptee or not - to check out this show, even if it's sandwiched between ridiculous F-list celebrities running around naked.