Imported from another board

"And no one is allowed to lie. And everyone has to answer this thread at least once.

Please name your 3 favorite Television shows, your 3 favorite pieces of music, and your 3 favorite books that you ever saw, heard, and read. Explain how you would recommend them to someone else."

I spent so much time answering this question that I wanted to use it again.

I'd be interested in how you'd answer. That means you, Sass, and you too, Zvon. I'd include Baldar because I'd also like to see what he has to say, but apparently I'm ignoring him.

My answer:

These favorite questions are some of the most difficult for me. I don't really HAVE favorites, so how can I possibly answer (a requirement) and not lie (also a requirement)? So, with the qualification that these are shows, songs, books that I enjoy, and which are the first to come into my mind at this moment, but may or may not be my favorites, I will try to answer. These are not in any particular order.
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Television: American Gothic - I really liked it. A lot. Because of that it was doomed and cancelled after one season (95-96); Buffy the Vampire Slayer - I have to clarify that every season was not equal. It didn't start out so great and it seemed to "jump the shark" towards the end, but I got so many laughs watching this, and it was a show that all four of us enjoyed, which made it all the more enjoyable for me. (97-03); Fringe - New this season, it was recommended to me just a couple of weeks ago. (Thanks, Z) After watching the pilot, I felt compelled to watch the following episodes immediately. http://www.fox.com/fod/play.php?sh=fringe
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Music: Muzio Clementi's Sonatina, Op. 36, No. 3 - It's my favorite to play, though I've never mastered the entire piece. I remembered it well enough for 20 years of not playing piano at all to pick it back up with a minimal amount of practice. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VE8pxV5eplA&feature=related; Kansas' Icarus - Kansas is one of my favorite bands. I think they're considered progressive rock (not sure what that means exactly), but I think there's a classical feel to a lot of their songs and classical is the root of all music, imho. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rBRj7AF8YjQ; Jeff Healey's I Think I Love You Too Much - It's a great song with some excellent guitar playing, and a nice example of the blues genre that I love and a musician that will be missed. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=odGmr9nyazM&feature=related
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Books: Brian Lumley's Necroscope Series - Classified in bookstores as sci-fi, I don't think it's as easily pigeonholed as that. It's espionage, horror and adventure as well, with a little comic relief. As an added bonus (to me) these books are voluminous. http://www.brianlumley.com/books/necroscope; Stephen King's The Stand - Stephen King is a good storyteller and this may be his best, although I have to mention The Talisman, a King collaboration with Peter Straub, because that's also a good read. http://www.stephenking.com/library/novel/stand:_the_complete__uncut_edition_the.html; Rex Stout's Nero Wolfe series - I read one of my father's Nero Wolfe books way back when and got hooked. There's a fair amount of humor in these mysteries so it's doubly enjoyable for me. http://www.gazetteofthearts.com/bookpg2c.htm
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As you can see, my tastes are not very sophisticated. I usually go for the passionate or humorous, though I often find humor in dark and strange places.

If you ask me the same question tomorrow, I may have entirely different answers, but since it took me over three hours to comtemplate and compile this, I would lie and give you the same list.

Mucho impressive answer! I need some time to think about this...

but I recently watched all of the Buffy shows online never having watched while it was on and I thought it was very cute. Of course I loved Firefly, another Joss Whedon show which steered me to Buffy. I'm looking forward to his new show, Dollhouse, with the chick that played Faith on Buffy.

I was attracted to the new show Fringe and even set up a series recording. When it was time for the 4th show to record and I hadn't worked up interest in watching any of the 3 sitting in my DVR I knew I would never get there so I just deleted it all.

Well, if you follow my link there, you can watch any of the first six at your leisure.

I enjoyed the Nero Wolfe show on A&E with Timothy Hutton. I liked that they used the same cast as different characters in different shows - like community theater. I decided to start looking for the books at used book stores. They were very hard to find and when I did find one the price was high. Hold on to the ones you have - they might be worth something.

So anyway, I have one which I haven't read. I should do that!

You should! I think you'll enjoy Archie's wit.

Television:
I think the best thing I've ever seen on TV was a BBC miniseries called The Singing Detective (a movie was based on this but it pretty much sucked). I saw it in the late 80's on PBS. The reason the miniseries was fantastic and the movie sucked is because it was a very complicated story that could not be told in a few hours ( I believe the miniseries was 6 hours long. If not, longer) and didn't have Michael Gambon. He played the lead character and gave one of the best acting performances I have ever witnessed.

Battlestar Galactica: Not my younger brothers Battlestar, lol. Fantastic writing, performances by all, especially Mary McDonnell.

The X-Files: Simply the best TV series ever made imo. It could go from alien take-over one week, to a comedy episode the next. It changed the format of what an episodic television show could be. It was a mix of The Twilght Zone, The Night Stalker, The Invaders and a few more shows that I loved as a kid.

Books:
Like you Bam, The Stand is one of my all time favorites. I'll never forget how creeped out I was when reading about Larry trying to get out of NYC thru the Lincoln Tunnel.

Another of King's works makes the cut : The Dark Tower series. Funny, I read book two first (called The Drawing Of The Three) and I'm glad I did. I went back and read book one, The Gunslinger and if I had started there I might not have continued on with the story. Book one was rather blah. Does provide a nice base for the story, which just takes off and opens doors that could take you anywhere. Favorite book of the series: The Drawing Of The Three.

Anne Rice's The Vampire Chronicles. Read Interview With A Vampire and I was hooked. I do believe she has yet to wrap up that epic tale. I also may not have read the last few books, if there are more after MERRICK.
Favorite book of the series: Memnoch The Devil

Music:
It was hard to only list three of each above, but this topic is going to be especially hard for me.
Because there is so much music I love I will take you literally and list 3 of my favorite pieces.
This definitly changes day by day,week by week, year by year, decade by decade....I can keep going......okay,

I'll stop.

Scheherazade - Rimsky/Korsakov
The Door - Spocks Beard
The Wall - Pink Floyd.
I consider the entire Wall double album/CD as one piece of music, especially my special 30th anniversary edition mix/version which I made myself, which is mine, which is what it is.

And that is mine.


btw, why would anyone lie about this?,lol.

I really should check out The Vampire Chronicles. They are easy to find cheap, too, because they were/are so popular.

Netflex has both versions of The Singing Detective - the one you like from 1986:

Quote :

Mystery writer Philip E. Marlow (Michael Gambon) is suffering a debilitating bout of arthritis in a British hospital. Unable to move without pain, he escapes into his imagination, plotting out a murder tale in which he's both a big-band singer and a super-sleuth. Mix in flashbacks of Marlow's youth and his unhappy marriage, and you have a gripping murder mystery and a lavish musical rolled into one.

I'm adding it to my queue.

I also wish I'd started on Battlestar Galactica (I was a fan of the original, lol) because (I've heard) it's everything I love in a series. But I feel I'm too far behind to start now. That said, if I'm ever laid up in the hospital or bedridden that is so the entertainment I'm asking for to keep me occupied while I heal, lol.

Sassenach wrote:

I really should check out The Vampire Chronicles. They are easy to find cheap, too, because they were/are so popular.

Netflex has both versions of The Singing Detective - the one you like from 1986:

Quote :

Mystery writer Philip E. Marlow (Michael Gambon) is suffering a debilitating bout of arthritis in a British hospital. Unable to move without pain, he escapes into his imagination, plotting out a murder tale in which he's both a big-band singer and a super-sleuth. Mix in flashbacks of Marlow's youth and his unhappy marriage, and you have a gripping murder mystery and a lavish musical rolled into one.

I'm adding it to my queue.

I also wish I'd started on Battlestar Galactica (I was a fan of the original, lol) because (I've heard) it's everything I love in a series. But I feel I'm too far behind to start now. That said, if I'm ever laid up in the hospital or bedridden that is so the entertainment I'm asking for to keep me occupied while I heal, lol.

I do want to see The Singing Dick again.


One of my brothers said the same thing about Battlestar so I got him the 2003 miniseries through a torrent download.
Just gave it to him the other day as a matter of fact.
This is definitly one series you really have to see it all, preferably in order.

They even have webisodes and off season movies (might only be available on DVD).
I always skipped that shit figuring it must be overkill and not on the par of the series itself.
But I went and got one recently, Battlestar Galactica:Razor and it was just fantastic.
It was between seasons 3 and 4, and done in flashback focusing on another ship, not the Galactica.
I was really blown away by how much I enjoyed that.

You said "Singing Dick." *insert Beavis snickering*

I just had a terrible visual of a dick with lipstick, eyes and eyebrows.....kinda like a sock puppet......singing "I got a Crush On Obama".

The dick with lipstick was singing "I got a Crush on McCain".


Sorry, I couldn't help myself!!! Lipstick has gotten a bad rap.

Sassenach wrote:

The dick with lipstick was singing "I got a Crush on McCain".


Sorry, I couldn't help myself!!! Lipstick has gotten a bad rap.

heyyyyy.....I don't wear lipstick.

And you aren't a dick!

Sassenach wrote:

And you aren't a dick!

There's a lot of people who would disagree with you.......but I'd rather them think me a dick then a pussy!

Singing dick made me think of this guy: , though technically I guess he's a dancing dick.

Mine used to dance like that.....now, he barely likes to waltz.

That little fellow is doing more than singing and dancing...

He's happy to see ya back.......

VERY happy.

shhhhhhhh........he fell asleep.

Bam wrote:

Singing dick made me think of this guy: , though technically I guess he's a dancing dick.

That's The Springing Dick.


(could have went with The Spewing Dick but the one that rhymes gets the nod)

Zvon wrote:

Bam wrote:

Singing dick made me think of this guy: , though technically I guess he's a dancing dick.

That's The Springing Dick.


(could have went with The Spewing Dick but the one that rhymes gets the nod)

Now he just needs a top hat and a cane. Well, maybe not a top hat.

You can't wear a tophat on top of a helmet.

I think that helmet has a leak.

I got the entire Singing Detective miniseries.

Didn't wanna spend for it so I downloaded it thru a torrent.
Burned the first 2 episodes and I'm looking forward to re watching it.

I'm even making kool DVD labels for it cuz I'm nutz like that.