Brad Bird, of The Incredibles fame, once directed an animated episode of Amazing Stories (a 30-minute sci-fi/fantasy anthology TV series produced by Spielberg in the ’80s) called Family Dog. I haven’t seen it in years, but I remember it being pretty damn funny, which, judging from his subsequent career, seems just as it should be.
Anyhoo, there’s a scene in that episode where the cartoon family is sitting around watching home movies, and the toddler girl sees herself on screen. “That’s me!” the girl starts repeating over and over, excitedly. “That’s me in there . . . in the movie!” “I know, honey,” the mom patronizes, getting increasingly annoyed with her daughter’s endless sense of surprise at something so mundane from an adult perspective. (This reminds me of the time we took my two-year-old nephew to see The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, and during the entire train sequence from London to the English countryside, he kept exclaiming, “Choo choo!” And looking around at each one of us, to make sure none of us had missed the train, pointing at the screen, repeating, “Choo choo!” over and over and over. Even for a minute or two after the train was gone, he still had choo-choos on his mind, and made sure we all knew about it. I suppose it was hypocritical of me not to insist my sister take him out of the theater until he quieted down — no doubt I would have been steaming mad if I were an unrelated audient in that same theater. Maybe there’s a fine line between “entirely annoying” and “amusing and adorable.” Oh well . . .)
Where was I? Oh yeah, Family Dog. Whenever I see my name in print somewhere, I always think of that toddler in Family Dog. I’ll walk up to a Border’s magazine rack with Justin, say, grab a copy of Liberty, point to the contributing editors section, and say, “That’s me! That’s me in there . . . in the magazine!” Yes, I’m the kind of guy who makes lame jokes referencing pop culture moments nobody else knows, that aren’t funny to anybody but me. Actually, I’ve probably never explained to Justin that was a paraphrased quote from an old TV show, which is probably why he always looks as annoyed as the patronizing cartoon mom when I say it (although I’m sure at least a couple of my siblings would get it). Come to think of it, he’d probably look just annoyed even if he knew. Yet I’m still compelled, as if by Zeus himself, to say that kinda stuff out loud.
So what inspired this digression in the first place, one might ask? My pal David M. Brown wrote to me the other day, calling my attention to a recent LFB Blog entry about Cato’s new blog. David quoted my March 18 entry here, the second time he’s quoted me over there. If he keeps this up, I might get the idea that I should update this site with actual interesting, incisive commentary from time to time. Maybe I should write something about the meta nature of blogging — a blog quoting a blog about yet another blog. Or does the fact that this subject has already filled digital reams of blogspace add yet another tasty layer of meta? Mmmm, meta . . .
In the meantime, I just think, “That’s me! That’s me in there . . . in the LFB Blog!”
