goodbye flashforward

You were supposed to be the next "Lost." Instead you got canceled before "Lost" completed a triumphant sprint to its end (an ending on its own terms, I might add).

There's a storytelling lesson here: don't be boring. "Flashforward" had a great premise and the story arc moved along swiftly, but it was not a good sign when I realized the characters were so bland I could not remember any of their names. The central character in "Flashforward" is a recovering alcoholic who tends to become obsessed with his FBI work at the expense of his family. I'm sure someone thought this was a interesting backstory/personality for a character, but it honestly feels a bit lazy in a show that was supposed to be about the fantastic. It's hard to imagine that and only that being the basis for a character in "Lost," in which backstories are not only integral to the fabric of the show but also tend to be extraordinary (usually in a sad way). As TV, alcoholism just can't compete with getting pushed out of a skyscraper by one's con man father.

our old mattress

Yesterday we (or more accurately, the delivery guys from Raymour and Flanagan) got rid of our old mattress. After we stripped the sheets off of it, I looked at the manufacture date on its label:

06/07/1994

Yikes. Consumer Reports seems to feel your standard innerspring mattress will last you around 10 years, so I guess it was indeed time to get rid of this one. Just for fun, I did a little research to see what was going on when our mattress was made...

• The #1 song on Billboard's Hot 100 was...

This is pretty much how I remember 1994. It was sepia-toned, we all belonged to melting-pot R&B harmony groups, and we all hung out on rooftops.

• Ace of Base's "The Sign" was the #1 album in America.
• The Flintstones was the #1 movie in America.
• A Grace Under Fire rerun was the top-rated show for the week of June 6-12 (though technically the highest-rated program on the evening of June 7 was Roseanne... also, holy shit, Google News Timeline is awesome).
• A gallon of gas averaged $1.06.
• O.J. Simpson was still a respected former athlete and TV/film personality.
• The Rangers were still cursed.
• I was in eighth grade.

It's funny, we think of the 90s as sort of the anti-80s - the end-of-history Clintonian response to the Age of Reagan, the stripped-down grunge revolt against the new wave. Yet today the 90s seem just as dated. People still had big hair, jackets with humongous shoulder pads and innerspring mattresses. Progress marches on.

david's 4/30 power rankings

1. Grandpa
2. Handy Manny
3. Daddy
4. Mommy

baseball doubleheader fun fact of the day

When Ernie Banks said "let's play two," he didn't actually mean it. He knew the umpire would say no.

hunt for red october (UPDATED)

Capt. Vasili Borodin: I will live in Montana. And I will marry a round American woman and raise rabbits, and she will cook them for me. And I will have a pickup truck... maybe even a "recreational vehicle." And drive from state to state. Do they let you do that?

Captain Ramius: I suppose.

Capt. Vasili Borodin: No papers?

Captain Ramius: No papers, state to state.

Capt. Vasili Borodin: Well then, in winter I will live in... Arizona.

Captain Ramius: Ooh, uh, about that "no papers" thing I just said...