My Life and Code

When I was a kid, I loved whenever I would happen across Siskel and Ebert’s TV show. I think it was shown at 7pm on Saturdays in my area, but I don’t remember ever setting out intentionally to watch it — I’d just happen to catch it. I always enjoyed getting to watch clips from the new movies they’d be reviewing, and hearing them give their thoughts — and often debate — about the films. It was one of two movie review shows I was aware of, the other being Sneak Previews  (which I learned only relatively recently had originally been their  show). But I preferred Siskel and Ebert’s At The Movies  (and later Siskel and Ebert and The Movies ). It wasn’t just the format of the show, but its hosts. And thanks to YouTube, I’ve been able to revisit a lot of their reviews, including a lot I’d never seen before. I’ve had a blast watching these clips and checking out their reviews of movies I like. We didn’t always agree, but I always enjoyed hearing their thoughts. Sometimes, they wo...

I didn’t have a very happy childhood, but some of my fondest memories from when I was young, memories which I cherish, are of baking Christmas cookies with my mother. I was in my early school days, starting around kindergarten or maybe before. I remember rolling out the dough on a round table in our kitchen and using cutouts to make the cookies we would then decorate. Thinking about it now, these are probably my happiest childhood memories. While we’d be making the cookies, my mother would play Christmas music from some old records. They were compilation albums from the 1960s featuring artists of the day performing traditional Christmas songs. To this day it remains my favorite kind of Christmas music. In the years since then, I remembered two album covers specifically: one was a white cover featuring round Christmas tree ornaments with pictures of contemporary stars like Jim Nabors and Johnny Mathis, who appeared on the album, inside the ornaments; the other, which I was sure was ...

The classic television sitcom Cheers  tells us that "Sometimes you want to go where everybody knows your name." And when I was in my late teens and earlier twenties, there was a place like that where I spent a lot of my time. Only it wasn't a bar, it was a pool hall. The Rack Room was located on Route 1 in Langhorne, Pennsylvania. It was located behind a Denny's with which it shared a parking lot. It was a pool hall (and a parking lot for that matter) in which I spent a lot of my free time. I'd been introduced to the place when I was 16. I'd been working part-time at a grocery store and one of my friends/co-workers from there was a regular. I hadn't spent much time in pool halls up until that point, and truth be told I still can't shoot a very good game. I spent just as much time in the Rack Room's arcade playing the latest Mortal Kombat  game as I did shooting pool But it wasn't as much about the pool as it was about having a place to ha...

One of the staples of my youth was the I-95 Marketplace, an indoor fleamarket which was located in Langhorne, Pennsylvania. It was only open Friday through Sunday (adding Thursdays and eventually the other weekdays during the holidays), and the interior was a large, open space comprised of small shops separated by poles and canvas. You could find all sorts of products there, from clothing, electronics, toys, furniture, books -- pretty much anything. I would typically go there Friday evenings after school. I'd walk through the woods behind my house, cross two sections of creek, walk under two sections of I-95 itself (the northbound and  the southbound), before finally emerging from the woods and arriving at the back of the marketplace building. I have many vivid memories of making the trek in dark, rainy weather, often arriving with wet (or drenched!) sneakers and cuffs, sometimes muddy, but always ready to head inside and spend my allowance on comic books or music or whatever els...

Among the things I enjoy in life are retro/nostalgia, autumn, and Halloween, so when I saw the following at Target today I couldn't help but smile.