Marketing Shill

It's been a while since I did one on those weird posts where I go on and on about things I'm currently addicted to, right? I feel like doing one today.

Current Musical Obsession: The Hush Sound - Like Vines

Y'all, I have no explanation for my love of this CD. Normally my music reviews are unintelligible as a rule, but this time I don't even have a genre to reference. It's definitely not rock, it's doesn't even really feel like traditional pop. Maybe pop-rock, but even lighter, or punk-pop with a softer edge.

Frankly, the closest thing I can think of is a cross between Ben Folds and the Dresden Dolls, only totally different.

Whatever, why do I even try? It's a great CD, super short (like 35 minutes) and I have listened to it approximately 25 times in the last week.

Current Video Game Obsession - Picross DS

Take a square grid - 10x10, 15x15, or 20x20 - and delimit along the edge of each row and column of the grid the order and length of its filled-in squares. When you have followed those rules for every row and column, a picture will be formed.

Everyone has played Picross before, right?

This game combines everything great about that game, only it's easier than ever because you can use the stylus pen to fill in all the information, and there are tons and tons of themes for how each grid is filled in. Also, the game is only $20 and has so many puzzles that I've been working through them every day for more than two months and still haven't finished them all.

Easily the most game for my money since I bought that used copy of Smash Brothers for the Gamecube like 5 years ago.

Current TV Obsession(s), Ranked in Increasing Order of Enthusiasm

• How I Met Your Mother - My fervor continues unabated
• Pushing Daisies - Yeah, we've gone over it, but also add on They Might Be Giants to that list of my button-pushing issues. God, I love this show.
• Ugly Betty - Still good but mostly forgettable. Except! Gay dating so cute that I grew reflexively bitter just watching it, considering my current travails. Still, so nice, and organic, and *swoon*.
• Dirty Sexy Money - Donald Sutherland gave the best line reading I've ever heard in my entire life this week, and the only thing he said was "Justin Timberlake?" You had better be watching this show. (Oh, and did I mention that the resident heartthrob on show sang a drunken karaoke version of All By Myself, wearing nothing but a pair of boxer-briefs, while standing on the Brooklyn Bridge? Because he did.)
• The Office - Absolutely the best returning show this fall. Less painfully awkward than we've come to expect, and I think it's better for it. Also, I think I have a literal emotional investment in the Jim/Pam relationship. That's not healthy, y'all.

Current Personal Obsession - Turning 26

Twenty-six, you guys. Otherwise known as The Downslope to Thirty. The depression, it is like a deep, deep well. You've got a little over nine days to prepare yourselves for birthday week, when I will more than likely offer up my very own rendition of the above-mentioned scene from Dirty Sexy Money - better than half naked, smashed, and belting out All By Myself to a crowd mostly unconcerned well-wishers. Although probably not on the Brooklyn Bridge.