If you’ve been reading Earn This, you’ve known from the start that I have a minor obsession with this trio from La Crescenta-Montrose. The second article I ever wrote for Earn This was a (poorly written) review of It’s All In Your Head, which is still one of my ten or fifteen favorite albums in…
Some shows, like Parks and Recreation and Game of Thrones, remind me of summer storms. You know exactly what you’re in for as soon as you see the first gray clouds: First it’ll become overcast, then rainy, then windy, then you’ll get a few minutes of heavy thunder and lightning, then a pleasant post-precipitation humidity…
Parks and Recreation had all sorts of warning signs around it when it debuted in 2009. It was pitched as a spinoff of The Office, which was currently at the end of its peak in Season 5. This was an idea that seemed like a really bad one at the time (and seemed even worse…
When it came time to come up with a third and final thing to suffer the wrath of my quarterly “BOTTOM Everything” post, I tried to single out the thing that most DISAPPOINTED me. And the one that hurt me the most, I think, was Dragon Age II. It’s not that DA2 is strictly a BAD game.…
This past April, I participated in Camp NaNoWriMo, an online writing challenge to set and meet a monthly writing word count goal with the support and encouragement of some fellow “campers.” My group — or “cabin” — of writers included several fascinating people and talented writers I’m now happy to call my friends. One of my…
Prelude to a Dream This is the story of my best birthday present ever. One of the hallmarks of adulthood is realizing that paychecks allow you to buy yourself gifts; and who knows you better than you? Armed with a modest but steady income, on the eve of my quarter-century day, I made an investment…
In Colton’s post about the time Dave Elkins performed in his living room, I wrote a little bit about Marilyn Auza, Dave’s opening act, who sings and plays acoustic guitar. In the article, I praised her guitarwork, but I wanted to take a chance to expand a little bit on her charming performance. Beyond her…
I could have included this in my Disney Renaissance post, but I chose to give A Goofy Movie it’s own post — ranked directly ahead of the other Disney Renaissance movies. It’s not because A Goofy Movie is BETTER than the other Disney movies. I can objectively accept that Beauty and the Beast has more…
Ah, “Disney Movies” — a staple of the childhood of pretty much any American child from the 1990s. These animated films — mostly Broadway-inspired musicals — produced by Walt Disney Animation Studios (née Walt Disney Feature Animation) became one of the most trusted brands in all of cinema thanks to a fantastic run of films…
The first Kanye song I heard was back in 2005, several months after the release of The College Dropout. “Through the Wire” on a compilation of Grammy nominees. Shortly afterwards, I read an article about Kanye’s mercurial personality. I became intrigued and checked out the rest of the album. I enjoyed it, but not enough to…