2011 YearEnder

The New Year presents us all with the opportunity to look back before plunging into what's next. I've been putting together the following - my Annual YearEnder - since 2003. And even though I'm not posting regularly on this beloved ol' blog, I plan to come back at least every year around this time to put up what I send out to friends (minus the personal bits). If you like what you see, there are links that follow for my earlier YearEnders. I hope you enjoy whatever you manage to get through - there's plenty here to consume, but I believe you'll agree it was time well spent.
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2011 As a Series of Snapshots

• Atlantis flew the last Space Shuttle mission (in place of the intended Endeavour). Ending a thirty year program of 135 missions, which held aloft the dreams of millions like me who couldn't even pull together the grades to get into Space Camp.
• Our military's most adept soldiers and commanders found Osama Bin Laden in Pakistan, did what they do under the cover of night, and then plunked him somewhere in the Indian Ocean. I'm still awestruck by the almost utter lack of triumphalism that followed that adventure.
• Kate & William done got hitched. Pippa ascended to the throne of "World's Hot Lit'l Sis" while Harry retained his title of "World's Skeeziest Bro."
• Europe got all wobbly amidst a debt crisis seemingly caused by antiquated, carefree countries like Greece and Italy not acting more like their stodgy, persnickety peers in Germany and England.
• Japan suffered through a massive earthquake and overwhelming tsunami, resulting in the meltdown of a nuclear power plant. I'd bet that somewhere out there is a screenwriter who pitched this same cataclysmic set-up to Jerry Bruckheimer and got the reply "nah, too over the top".
• Rupert Murdoch's UK tabloid - "News Of The World" - folded after a massive and repugnant phone hacking scandal. If I was an editor in charge of writing the obit for that rag, I'd have used: "Rupe Duped, James Blames, Hacks Whacked". Good riddance, to the bloody lot of them.
• Anthony Weiner wins the 2011 Brett Favre "No Good Can Possibly Come From Taking A Picture Of Your Junk, Much Less Texting It To Someone" Award. My bet is next year's winner will use Instagram.
• North Korea's leader, Kim Jong-il, died. We were told that our intelligence services didn't see it coming. While, yes, I realize he was a short man, is it too much to ask that we step up efforts to track the leader of the (second?) most insane country on the planet with nukes?
• Along with its "Arab Spring" predecessors, Libya came largely unhinged and morphed into a form of leaderless chaos. In so many ways, this seems like merely a placeholder for whatever description of this transition comes next.
• A series of repeated standoffs and a continued game of talking points brinksmanship cratered the U.S. Congress's approval ratings. In fact, more Americans currently favor a shift to Communism than the Congress we've empowered. Inexplicably, re-election for around 90% of them should still be a breeze.
• The Iraq War ended. I feel like the Nation should have at least baked a cake or put up a banner. Is this how people acted in 1975 after seeing those helicopters pull the last people off the Embassy roof in Hanoi? Different circumstances, to be certain. Regardless, I hope I'm not alone in asking to see plans respectfully proffered ASAP for a memorial to the fallen soldiers from this shared and shaded era.

Comeback of the Year
It's been tried before, but I noticed a mass exhumation of 1980s nostalgia and revisionism in 2011. Not just at Sarah's Dance Party, although our collective pink collar was truly popped for that one. I'm also talking about the throwback sound of bands like Cut Copy and M83 who released some of the best music of the year, the neon-infused look of super-cool movies like "Drive", the wall-to-wall fun sub-referencing in a book like Ernest Cline's Ready Player One, the Steve Jobs-inspired memory lane strolling, even the early signs of a possible collapse for the current Russian system of government - it all adds up to some serious deja vu.
Lexicon Addition(s) of the Year
"Occupy" anything and/or everywhere. The Vancouver-based magazine "Adbusters" should be given origin story cred for coining the phrase. But this is one of the most striking examples I've ever seen of a new usage being taken to a truly transcendent level.
Trend of the Year
Protesting in public proved to have an actual impact on the course of governing. Sometimes. Nonetheless, the simple act of marching in the street evolved all around the world in 2011. And now that this Genie has wafted out of the bottle...


A Few Picks for the Best of 2011

• TV - No show took more chances and offered more random, hilarious rewards than "Louie" on FX. Creator/writer/director/editor and namesake comedian Louis C.K. is just getting better. Even while the creative landscape in TV fills to bursting with quality shows.
• Movies - There are always movies still on my "must see" list when the time comes to hork up the YearEnder. That cop-out excuse should not detract from my appreciation of the surprising and delightful "Crazy, Stupid, Love." If I could bottle up the essence of the entire cast, I'd drizzle them over my oatmeal and in my coffee each morning. I've been waiting for Steve Carrell to find a role like this since the last time he played Produce Pete on "The Daily Show". If you possess the capacity to love, test its vitality with a viewing of this movie.
• Sports - The ForeverSconnie side of me wants to say that the Green Bay Packers ruled supreme over All in the Land of Sportiness this year. Because they've had one helluva year, starting with a stunning run to the last Super Bowl and continuing through the entirety of this NFL Season. Yet however much it pains me to say so, the World Series Champs from St. Louis earned this particular YearEnder nod after their epic end of season and post-season run. The Cards were pure sporty goodness. Now never do that again, mm'kay?
• Music - Bon Iver's second full-length, eponymous album is a thing of richly-layered beauty. So many acts put out great stuff this year (including Seattle's Fleet Foxes and Shabazz Palaces, just to name two worthy competitors for this heralded honor). Regardless, Bon Iver always floated back up to the top of my playlist. Call me out for my obvious bias (much of what Justin Vernon creates for his band is done in a converted vet clinic in tiny Fall Creek, Wisconsin). But give it a chance if you've not yet done so.
• Books - "The Art of Fielding" by Chad Harbach fills the roster spot of a very popular novel that then might not garner the literary plaudits it should. Here again, the Wisconsin connection played a small part in raising its position on my radar. Still the beauty and ease shown in the storytelling made me really take notice. All those hard slog years of writing for Harbach must now feel like time well spent.
• Journalism - For those who care to notice, "long form journalism" emerged as a category in 2011. It was packaged as Kindle Singles or served up by new platform players like "The Atavist" (for iPad or other devices). Not long ago, this was just called magazine journalism, by my estimation. Nonetheless, the "Vanity Fair" piece by Keith Gessen about Chad Harbach and the future of publishing was a trend setter in this category of journalism. No matter what it's called.
• Killer App - Siri. That one time when I asked my new phone for "record stores" near my location and Siri made a joke about asking HAL for help? Oh sure, I'd been hooked already. But it was then that I knew voice recognition was WAY cooler than I'd realized.
• Radio/podcast - I run way too many miles, all the while listening to podcasts and, more recently, books on tape. Of all the shows in my regular rotation, "Studio 360" is the most consistently creative and almost always proves itself worth the time. Kurt Andersen retains a lifetime pass from me for "SPY" magazine. He's still prone to some big swings and misses (his most recent "Vanity Fair" piece on how our culture has been stuck in neutral since 1992 is the most glaring example of one of those). But the dood is an interviewer with a serious twinkle in his Dadaist eye. Subscribe now, if you've not already done so.
• Celebrity flameout - Maybe an omnipotent power took a peek at the spreadsheet listing in-no-way-deserved salaries of this planet's celebrities in 2011, then decided to give Charlie Sheen a much needed karmic haircut. If that were so (and PLEASE let it be) I'd bet the house on who's due next - anyone even vaguely connected to a Kardashian.
• Person of the Year - Mohamed Bouazizi was the Tunisian fruit vendor who died last January 4th after setting himself on fire. This unthinkable act launched a movement that toppled governments. I can think of no more influential person on the planet in 2011.

TwentyTwelve's Largely Baseless Predictions

• Donald Trump publicly proposes to Sarah Palin. I'll paraphrase - "If you do me this honor, it'll be huge." Never one to avoid flirtation, The Sarah joins The Donald for pizza, leads him on for months, and still rides off toward the horizon with Todd on a brand-new, solid-gold snowmobile. Cut to commercial.
• The Denver Bronco's quarterback Tim Tebow retires from football before next season after being moved to a back-up role. He's immediately drafted to run for President on the Teaparty ticket (renamed the Tebow Party). No one on his campaign bothers to read the Constitution until two weeks before the election, missing that whole age requirement part. Unbowed, Tebow vows to proved the doubters wrong at his first debate. At which he assumes his now famous "Tebowing" position on the stage for ninety minutes and refuses to answer questions. In the end, the doubters win. Again.
• China's crackdown on artists finally causes the ground the shift in unprecedented ways. Recently jailed writers (such as Chen Xi and Chen Wei) along with the genre-bending master Ai Weiwei (currently fighting trumped up tax charges) manage to spark something cloaked deep inside an ancient culture disguised as a young nation of 1.3 Billion people. No jokes here - just a ballsy prediction. With the acknowledgement that upheaval there will eventually wash up on the shores of every nation across the globe.
• Afghanistan maintains its position as the most soul-draining and intractable foreign policy entanglement in American history. An open-ended base of operations in Central Asia? No empire can sustain that for long. This coming year opens a road to bring 'em all home. Now wouldn't that be a stimulus package?
• President Obama's glide path to re-election weathers newly minted allegations of drug abuse when he's seen sporting a nicotine patch while playing a game of H-O-R-S-E with reporters. The manufactured buzz passes quickly.
• The ongoing pop culture love affair with the undead shifts again. Zombies (who had replaced vampires) make way for the embrace of these renewed, terrifying, lifeless vessels. Ventriloquist dummies. It's Howdy Doody Time, 2.0. The taglines almost write themselves. "The hand goes in. The gloves come off." Bada bing, bada boom. You're welcome, Hollywood. 
• The massive success of "The Book of Mormon" inspires a slew of lesser knock-offs bound for Broadway. "Battlefield Earth: The Musical" ruins the party for religion-fueled, theatrical comedy for years to come.

GOP Candidates Nomination Odds
As a quadrennial YearEnder bonus heading into a Presidential Election year, I feel as though I should update the line on the various candidates. This should not be seen as an endorsement or encouragement to gamble on politics. A split of all winnings, however, will not be refused.

• Mitt Romney (3 to 2) If you believe the polls, Mitt's always had the inside track. He's also always been this cycle's Dukakis. His over/under percentage for the general election is 30% (translation: we're bound to see a third party materialize).
• Jon Huntsman (8 to 1) From the family that brought us the Styrofoam hamburger clamshell (seriously - look it up), this Huntsman is as clean as an Amish laundry basket on Sunday morning. He speaks Mandarin fluently, he has an attractive & articulate trio of daughters, he's the best retail politician in the field and an endless quote goldmine. In other words, he's too modern for most. And Huntsman once mentioned lyrics by Nirvana during a GOP debate (again, seriously). Ready to peak at 11% in New Hampshire.
• Ron Paul (1000 to 1) He'll start off strong by tying for the lead in Iowa. Then his previously unclaimed son - Rand Paul's twin brother (RuPaul) - will expose the family secrets on Valentine's Day. By year's end, Ron resigns from the House and moves to a bomb shelter just outside of Waco.
• Newt Gingrich (10,000 to 1) Over the next year, Newt struggles through more peaks and valleys than a 100-year-old sherpa. Eventually, his Tiffany's credit line gets revoked - crushing his credit rating. For a short while, Newt and Calista show up periodically on QVC, hawking commemorative plates featuring history's greatest debates. One day they wake up broke, friendless and with a garage full of plates absolutely no one would buy. Then an odd little thing happens - their marriage somehow grows stronger. The happiness they find by focusing all that love they have to give upon one another would never ever have been possible in that stuffy old White House. Newt learns, at long last, that sometimes you have to lose it all in order to win at something truly important. So maybe that was the reason Newt ran the way he did, after all.
• Rick Perry (A million to 3. No, maybe 2. Wait...3.) Contrary to everything I've said about him since he became Governor when Dubya resigned to run for President, his timing isn't always great. In this cycle, he begins to peak again in late November. Which prompts him to claim, "I'll be back in 2014." Perry's next campaign never materializes.
• Michelle Bachman (14 bazillion to 1) Really? Do I need to justify this? OK - let's just say she's a longshot.
• Rick Santorum (Infinity to negative infinity) Dan Savage still gets credit from me for the single most cleverly planted political timebomb in history. This man-on-dog just won't ever hunt, no matter when he peaks.
• Herman Cain (suspended campaign) He's currently only in the running for spokesperson jobs held by ex-NFL Coach Jimmy Johnson (for ExtenZe) and that couple still sitting in (separate!) clawtooth bathtubs.

With all that said, let me offer up a favorite toast in the immortal words of Colonel Henry Blake - here's looking up your ol' address. May you be grand in all gestures, as the New Year unfolds.
Ever -
E.
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As promised, the following links will take you back to my prior YearEnder work.

2010 YearEnder
2009 YearEnder
2008 YearEnder
2007 YearEnder
2006 YearEnder
2005 YearEnder
2004 YearEnder
2003 YearEnder

For my recent stuff, you can always follow me over on my new "book in progress" blog. The work I'm doing there is quite different, but still comes only from me. Thanks for reading. Rock on.

2010 YearEnder

It's been a few months since I posted anything here.  In the past, I've always put up my YearEnder for public consumption.  It just seems appropriate to still do so.  All the family stuff has been taken out.  This is the meat in the sandwich.  I hope a few things ring true for you.  Or at least that the points I scatter somewhat all over the map hit the occasional mark.  Rock on, 2011-style. 

2010 As a Series of Snapshots

• BP unleashed an underwater oil volcano that erupted for months, yet has already been mostly forgotten.  Proving that with a few ads and some rudimentary misinformation, 50 million barrels of the crudest oil can be miraculously turned into fish food and corral fertilizer.
• Sandra Bullock managed to win an undeserved Oscar and a nation's misplaced sympathy almost simultaneously.  While Jesse James' inexcusable infidelity managed to at long last give Nazi-friendly, goth tattoo models/strippers a bad name.
• Sarah Palin’s achieved what for some was a stunningly irksome degree of financial success.  Which was only dwarfed by every single person working on Wall Street.
• Tiger Woods spent a whole lot of solo time working on his swing, while Elin Nordegren finally got around to reading Stieg Larsson's Millenium trilogy in the original Swedish.  In so doing, they each found their bliss.
• Afghanistan became the Larry King of redundant, soul-draining foreign entanglements.  And even Larry knew this year was the time to say that enough's enough.
• A plucky bunch of Chilean miners came up with a unique but ultimately unsuccessful way to avoid the Great Recession.
• The political fulcrum story of the year was the "big C" conservative shellacking of the "shrinking L" left.  And the most vocal part of that Teabagging, pendulum-swinging movement is only going to demand more attention in the next political cycle.  Be careful what you wish for, America.  Check back in a handful of months from now and we'll see how this latest hopey, changey thing is working out.
  
• Conan O'Brien was forced to trade in a barely drivable talk show vehicle with three former owners for the equivalent of a 1992 Ford Taurus SHO with 212,000 miles - a late-night gig on TNT. 
• Elena Kagan joined Sonia Sotomayor as the two Obama appointees on the U.S. Supreme Court.  They both bat left, throw down the middle, and impress the scouts entirely.  Although their lackluster contributions to this year's Supremes Secret Santa gift exchange left plenty of room for creativity and studiousness.
• Glenn Beck, Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert held rallies in our Nation's most storied public park. Beck claimed to gather like a billion people on the anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr.'s "I Have a Dream" speech to tell them something unintelligible about George Soros. Subsequently, Stewart and Colbert proved little more than it's still too early for a Father Guido Sarducci comeback. 
• Haiti, the poorest nation in the hemisphere, suffered an earthquake that severely damaged well over half of the nation's structures and left over 200,000 people dead out of a population of 9,000,000.  Followed by the usual aftershock of our collective brief attention span and a distinctly human inability to know what to do about such tragedies.   
• Spain won their first ever World Cup, held in South Africa (the first African host nation).  The biggest stars of the event turned out to be a (murdered!) octopus in Germany and a cheap plastic horn with an pornographic sounding name.  Oddly enough, precisely matching one of the predictions from my last YearEnder.
• Barack Obama got popped in the kisser while playing basketball, requiring an array of stitches.  The other elbows he took all year long left no such visible marks.  But they'll prove much harder to repair.
• Our troops began to leave the active theatre in Iraq, moving toward the expected full withdrawal date of 2011.  Aside from the tens of thousands of military trainers, supporting personnel and diplomatic staff required to operate our fancy new Embassy - the largest maintained by any nation in any other nation on the planet.  Not that anyone's counting anymore. 
• Blogging ended.  For me, anyway.  Been there, overdone that.
  
• George W. Bush's memoir fell a bit flat.  He even included that ol' "miscarried fetus kept in a jar to scare the kids as they struggled with adolescence" chestnut.  Please give a curious public something they haven't read in every other Presidential autobiography next time, won't you?

Comeback of the Year

Brett Favre's shamelessly returned in the worst shape of his career for his final NFL season.  Controversy ensued when poorly staged and not at all flattering self-portraits of his, um, Little Quarterback emerged.  Forever replacing jokes about his wavering retirement decisions with ones that pivot upon sexting pictures of his junk.  In other words, not all comebacks are good ones.

Lexicon Addition of the Year

LeBron James' NBA free agency decision was boiled down to his proclamation of “I’m taking my talents to South Beach”.  Unsurprisingly, whenever a derivation of that phrase is now used, LeBron gets a cut.  So think carefully before you tell your manager at Cinnabon that you're "taking my talents to the Verizon kiosk".

Trend of the Year

The troubling reality behind mining “rare earth” elements.  These gnarly bits are essential to manufacturing everything from cell phones to green energy technologies and have names that sound straight out of a James Cameron movie (dysprosium, terbium, neodymium, europium, yttrium). Add in that they're crazy toxic, much of the mining is done illegally by criminal gangs and the fact that China has the market locked up like a hooker in Charlie Sheen's hotel suite.

A Few Picks for the Best of 2010

This year with an added honorable mention in each category, hereafter tagged "the UnderDoggie".

• TV – I'm left standing behind “Mad Men” as still the best show on TV.  This season’s effort by Jon Hamm as Don Draper was the most twisted, beguiling yet.  The episode ("The Suitcase" - regarding a Samsonite campaign) where Don got drunk with a fearlessly ambitious Peggy (the amazing Elizabeth Moss) equaled the best hour of filmed entertainment offered this whole dang year.  And the UnderDoggie goes to “Louie" on FX, orbiting closely around the actual life of my favorite comedian, Louis C.K.  The series started very small.  Then grew a massive pair and went far out beyond the margins of what's been seen before in a sitcom format.  Find it.  You're welcome.
• Movies – “Black Swan” was the very best I've seen thus far. The director, Darren Aronofsky, is the scariest and most surprising thing to come out of Dallas since Jerry Jones’ last three facelifts.  That pesky voice in my head desperately wants Natalie Portman’s fabulous scarves collection. She's also destined in the very near term to become the biggest female movie star on the planet.  UnderDoggie – “Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World” - the most underappreciated movie of the Year by miles.
• Sports – The San Francisco Giants and/or the New Orleans Saints.  Hard to bitch about sports with stories like these around.  UnderDoggie - Canada's impressive job hosting the Winter Olympics when Vancouver appeared to be hovering somewhere in the mid-60s.  Fahrenheit.  I haven't the foggiest idea what that would be in celsius, eh?
• Music – Kanye West’s new album "My Beautiful Dark Twisted Fantasy" was far and away the best, most album-y, album of the year.  The arrangements, the beats, the featured performers, the flow.  This one’s for the brilliant douchebag.  UnderDoggie - the adorably dour, Dylanesque Swede stage-named The Tallest Man On Earth (Kristian Matsson) stayed in our CD changer more than anyone or anything else this year.  His full album, "The Wild Hunt" is the best of his stuff you'll find out there.
• Books – “Super Sad True Love Story” by Gary Shteyngart was the freshest thing I read all year.  A near future dystopian novel hardly stands alone these days.  But Shteyngart's unique timing and playful humor lightens and lifts the set-up perfectly.  His was also the best reading of the year I saw (at the Tractor Tavern in Seattle's increasingly posh yet still hilariously Scandinavian-dominated neighborhood, Ballard).  Rest assured, there were plenty of others that would have been brightened considerably by a drunken crowd and at least one accordian.  My UnderDoggie goes to Tom Rachman's "The Imperfectionists".  His darkly drawn characters working to stay afloat in a sinking, stinking newspaper stuck with me like no others encountered this year.
• Killer App – Wikileaks.  After only 4 years old, they're already on the brink of taking down governments. Let's see Google try that.  Or, please, let's not.  UnderDoggie - Groupon.  If your city doesn't offer them yet, those days are coming soon. 
• Radio/podcast – After years of not paying much attention to them, the rock 'n roll culture program "Sound Opinions" became a podcast that I absolutely never miss at least part of.  Jim and Greg's recent interview with James Murphy from LCD Soundsystem was the best chat about music I've heard all year, and they never fail to pick great stuff out of the bins I'd otherwise pass by.  The UnderDoggie goes to "The Moth" - the inconsistent storytelling podcast that is more hit than miss.  And sometimes a total homerun (Michaela Murphy's "All Star Game" being the best example that comes to mind from this year). 
• Journalism - General Stanley McChrystal lost his job as our top commander in Afghanistan for, as best I can tell, not knowing that "Rolling Stone" magazine was in the business of writing down the stupid things he said.  The other game changer scoop offered was McChrystal's affinity for Bud Light Lime.  Talk about a case of "don't ask, don't tell".  UnderDoggie - Ken Auletta's piece ("Publish or Perish?") in "The New Yorker" about the arrival of the iPad and what the competitive differences between it and Amazon's Kindle might mean for the future of publishing.
• Celebrity flameout – It seems almost unfair to pile onto the keeled over mess that is Lindsay Lohan.  But she's absolutely in a class by herself.  Aside from spending half the year in rehab and jail, her gig appears to now only be method acting prep (heavy on the "meth", but pretty equallly focused upon the "odd") for a starring role in her own autobiography.  She makes Joaquin Phoenix and Christian Bale look like they're mailing it in.  Sadly, Lindsay's also my dead pool pick for 2011.  In spite of all that, if she had a Farrah Fawcett-equivalent poster, it would be hanging above my bunk bed.  Right next to Lee Majors in his red track suit.  The UnderDoggie is awarded to Miley Cyrus.  In advance for 2011.  And 2013.
• Person of the Year – Dan Savage for initiating the inspired public service campaign for young gay people that served up proof that “It Gets Better” in the face of daunting, classless idiocy.  And the UnderDoggie goes to former JetBlue flight attendant, Steven Slater, for offering proof that in those cases where it won't we should all consider options that typically say "don't go there".

 TwentyEleven’s Largely Baseless Predictions

• The next Presidential election is already boiled down to two remaining Republican challengers before the first Primary vote is cast in early 2012.  A robotic re-election campaign for President Obama prepares to face either the Former Governor/Current Curmudgeon George Pataki or the Current Senator/Former Skull Model John Thune.  My money's on the skull guy.
• Taylor Swift steps up her ravenous trophy hunting by bagging a Timberlake, a Clooney, a Nicholson and a Bridges (Lloyd, which is all the more creepy given that he’s been dead since 1998).
• A new form of creative American austerity becomes all the rage, driven in part by Lady Gaga’s game-changing meat dress worn at 2010's "MTV Video Awards" show.  Consumers hungry for deals will eschew designer labels, choosing instead to make their own clothes with whatever they find lying around the house. 
• Kate Middleton and Prince William's royal wedding becomes the most watched televised event in history, surpassing the Apollo 11 moon landing and the finale of "M*A*S*H*".  Even during Prince Harry's 20-minute best man toast where he jokes about William's hair loss and some of Kate's "experimentation" in college.  The world feels a bit icky for like a week.
• A retro mania for the Muppets sweeps the Nation.  Once more, characters with vivid, unnatural skin tones and exaggerated, childlike emotions warms the hearts of kids young and old.  Until people begin to realize how similar they are to the new Speaker of the House John Boehner (R-OH). 
• The trendy embrace by kids of SillyBandz is replaced by the new gotta-have-them craze – HamHandcuffs. 
• Facebook fails in its broad assault meant to combine all our disparate forms of messaging.  If I'm to believe their current plan, my next YearEnder might be automatically pulled from all my emails and texts, along with possibly all the long forgotten notes scribbled on cocktail napkins stuffed in the pockets of old coats dating way back to the elder Bush's Administration.  I may not have rowed crew at Harvard, but I think I also have a case for why Facebook might lose on this one.  Too much, too soon.
• The cast of “Jersey Shore” is kidnapped by North Korea's new leader, Kim Jong-Un, to feed their tasteless, limitless cheese output to a hungry nation.
• Justin Bieber defies expectations and records a polka album.  You get it as a joke birthday present, but end up really liking it.  Then you hear it playing at a Starbucks while you're waiting on a caramel latte.  You cry just a skoch.  Then walk out, totally forgetting your drink order.  And the rest of the day pretty much goes like that.
• And the anniversary of 9/11 becomes a moment for all of us to pause and consider just how much - or how little - can be accomplished in a decade.

Whew.  So let's just call that my spin on 2010.  I wish y'all the best in the year ahead.  Be most excellent.

Ever -
E.

2009 YearEnder

The New Year is in full swing.  Which shouldn't worry me, although events of the last few days have made me waver.  This morning, someone clipped the driver's side mirror off our car that was parked out front of the house.  This past weekend, I did a faceplant and busted up my ski helmet on only my 3rd day on the slopes this season.  So time to shake some dust off the ol' karma.  Besides, my helmet is under warranty from my local ski shop (shop evo online, they rock).  And a rearview mirror is just a way to keep from looking forward.  Speaking of which, some of you have already seen the following - the business end of my annual YearEnder.  With this, I begin my 6th Year of this blog and hope y'all keep coming back for more kindly in TwentyTen.
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First, a few thoughts in lieu of a DecadeEnder
I don’t do DecadeEnders. Too much to likely leave out. Besides, we can’t even agree on what to call the Decade that we just kicked to the curb. The “Aughts”? An anachronistic, lame retread. And if we go with anything as incomplete as The Zeroes or as bleak as The Bush Decade, I’ll just put away my snark pen and go back to writing dirty limericks. If an adequately clever decamoniker comes up, maybe I’ll get back to you. But for now I will offer up only one pick. The Person of the Decade. Al Gore. Think about it – dude got more votes yet saw the Presidency slip away, then he got all fat and reclusive, eventually he went back to his first love shtick which allowed him to become an Oscar winner, a Nobel Peace Prize winner, and a wealthy, svelte, smooth operator. He even started a cable network. He’s the white Oprah.

2009 as a Series of Snapshots

• Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger successfully braced 155 passengers for impact. Crash landing an 80-ton glider on the Hudson River was the easy part. But even the fame that came next he handled like a hero.
• George W. Bush and Dick Cheney left office. But not before losing nearly $600 from each of their security deposits.
• Brett Favre was secretly enlisted to launch an undeclared guerrilla war along the borders of Wisconsin, Minnesota, and some of the more confused parts of Iowa.
• Michael Jackson died, at long last proving that general anesthesia administered daily just before bedtime is not good for you.
• Sarah Palin and Carrie Prejean each “wrote” books. And they looked fabulous doing so.
• Obama held a Beer Summit at The White House for no reason whatsoever. The world learned that Joe Biden doesn’t drink. So all that crazy stuff that comes out of his mouth? That’s the pills talking.
• Iran’s ruthless, theocratic regime morphed into a fully-loaded turd cannon aimed at a broadening protest movement. Since June, many thousands have died or simply disappeared into a Kafkaesque nightmare. Kinda makes worrying about whether Jon Gosselin’s apartment was really robbed recently or if Kate Plus 8 will get their reality show back seem a smidge, oh I don’t know…criminal, don’t you think?
• Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich was removed from office for crimes against, um, humanity? If you listened to him, all Blago said was “the fix is in.” I think he was talking about hair products.
• Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize. And he didn’t even train for it or warm up beforehand – he just went out and did it.

Comeback of the Year
Afghanistan – An aimless war that is now over 8-years-old got a renewed jolt of attention this Year. But with twice as many casualties in 2009 as in 2008 and a forecast of increased bleakness, this is a comeback that sapped a nation’s spirit. Kinda like Lindsay Lohan’s.

Lexicon Addition of the Year
“Hiking the Appalachian Trail” – This new euphenism manages to be both dirty and ironically exotic at the same time. Although a part of me wishes that Mark Sanford had instead used the alibi of heading off to “hike the Ice Age Trail” in northern Wisconsin. It’s actually quite sexy there, too.

Trend of the Year
Discombobulated Hopetards – Depending on who you listen to, Barack Obama’s first 11 months as President were either pretty disappointing or an utter disappointment. Even his most fervent supporters spent much of ’09 lamenting something or other about Obama. Please put down the naive indignation, pick back up those pom-pons and get to work. Nobody should’ve believed the Augean Stables would clean themselves.

A Few Picks for the Best of 2009

• Movies – Having not yet seen a handful of noteworthy new films, I’m nonetheless confident that “Up in the Air” is the best of the Year. Cunningly smart, genuinely affecting, and willing to ease back the curtain to show a cool-as-Freon George Clooney as a regretful, sad character.  Subtly stunning.
  
• Music – I’ll go with the sharp, crafty, French pop of “Wolfgang Amadeus Phoenix” by the band Phoenix. It’s the best in a class of winners from all over the map.
• Books – No book made me laugh like “This Is Where I Leave You” by Jonathan Tropper. If that isn’t reason enough, call me shallow.
• TV – “The Rachel Maddow Show” is far and away the best thing on MSNBC. I think that somewhere hidden down inside even the deepest, darkest parts of the Rushs and Becks of the World, there’s a little love flickering for her consistently sharp wit and smack-upside-the-noggin interview style.
• Radio/Podcasts – I now run at an ungodly hour most mornings, always taking with me a least a few podcasts. The one I most despise but absolutely never miss is the “Culture Gabfest” from Slate. Host Stephen Metcalf takes insufferable pretentiousness to an unjustifiably new extreme. I highly recommend it.
• Sports – Elin Woods’s early morning tee off on Tiger reverberated ‘round the world. She managed to overpower his entire career of low scores on the course and redirected everyone’s attention to how he scored just about everywhere else. You can’t call it a victory for her. But what an epic game-changer for Tiger.
• Killer App(lication) – TMZ.com’s ubiquitous clearinghouse for greasy tabloid newsiness. TMZ is now essentially a verb. As in, go TMZ yourself.

TwentyTen’s Largely Baseless Predictions

• The cabal of Birthers and Teabaggers are joined by new, equally-relevant grassroots movements – the NoLeftTesticles and the HotKarls.
• Health Care reform trips across the finish line like an 8-hour-marathon finisher who stopped along the way for a lite lunch, but still demands a medal and who thereafter repeatedly updates his or her Facebook status to bloviate about the life-changing nature of the race. Thanks for showing up, folks. But next time you should strive to actually DO something worth celebrating.
• Joe Lieberman manages to piss off Democrats anew when he introduces a strangely vindictive bill seeking to outlaw the practice of steaming milk (especially soy) for lattes on the Sabbath.
• The improbable success of the Cash for Clunkers program is followed by Obama’s decidedly less catchy home foreclosure program – (De)Clunkers for Defaulters.
• Apple’s new iSlate tablet computer proves to be a bust when trendy, early-adopters realize it is merely a $700 college-lined Mead notepad with a glowstick taped inside the back cover. Only 20 million are sold in the first month.
• The Octomom meets a sweet guy (Paul) who really likes kids. Paul works for the Postal Service, and plays fiddle in a bluegrass trio. They discover a shared love for collecting kitschy ceramic ashtrays. They take some line-dancing classes, but quit after a few weeks when the instructor they really like switches from Tuesdays to Wednesdays.
• Kanye West’s entourage gets stranded in Nashville during a freak snowstorm. Each morning thereafter Kanye wakes up in the same hotel room where only he remembers what happened yesterday, forcing him to relive the same day in different ways to infinity.
• Swine Flu vaccine shot recipients develop a curious side effect – lifelong, uncontrollable flatulence paired with x-ray vision.
• The DC Party Crashers – the Salahis – do whatever they can on repeated occasions to make the TwentyTen YearEnder. Alas, their 15 minutes have long since passed.

With that said, I’m off to line up for airport security to get my full body cavity search for a flight I’m taking in mid-March. I hope TwentyTen has nothing but the most elegant answers and countless simple pleasures in store for you and your entire brood. Be well.