Prettyyyy, Prettyyyyy, Prettyyyyyy funny.

Curb Your Enthusiasm returned for a 7th season tonight on HBO. This year is highly anticipated because of the two year hiatus since the last new episode and because of the "reunion" of the Seinfeld cast that will take place during the season.

Impressions from episode 1:

LD still has it. Not even Frazier could make me cringe from so much anticipated foot-in-the-mouthery and yet laugh time after time (with Frazier it was just cringing). It's not annoying when Larry David questions (and ultimately violates) the social norms of handicapped bathroom-use-etiquette, or what's up for grabs in other people's refrigerators. It's funny. In fact, these are practical issues I'm glad he's bringing to the forefront of watercooler discussions.

Also crucial to episode one's levity was a typical Curb play: the reappearance of "lesser" characters, such as Leon "Get in That Ass" Black. LD, as Leon prefers to call him, does a good job with this -- surrounding himself with other funny characters and spreading the laughs around. In fact, the jokes aren't usually Larry's; rather he's the punchline. Just like with Seinfeld, a good team makes this show continually funny. And the first episode had some of my favorite plays: A profanity- and racially-laden rant from the Blacks (re: how black people like higher temperatures than white people), a Susy freakout towards Larry (re: dinner party guestlist conjecturing), and LD getting screwed in the end, a victim of his own schemes.

The season's only heating up as Big Sein prepares for his return.

Jewish Neuroticism

Who's a funny neurotic Jew from NY? Well, just about every comedian, worth his weight in matzo, of course. But it's tough to not think of Woody Allen when Jewish, NY, and neurotic all are tossed about in the same sentence. Who's another maybe even better one? Larry David.

There are a lot of similarities between the two actually. While everyone knows that George was based on good ol' LD, Jason Alexander originally played the character as an interpretation of Woody Allen. It's pretty obvious, in fact, if you go back and watch some early episodes.

Opening tomorrow in NY is a new Woody Allen movie, "Whatever Works," starring Larry David. We can only presume that this synergy will establish a new level of comedic and pathologic neuroticism that most of us can only dream of. Can't wait till it filters northward.

13 is the new 18

As a recovering touch-me-not, germaphobe, xenophobe, and NJ-aphobe, I found this NYTs article about high school kids in, you guessed it, NJ, particularly interesting. Apparently mothers and teachers alike are seriously concerned about teenagers' proclivity for physical touch, specifically the hug.

From the article:

Comforting as the hug may be, principals across the country have clamped down. “Touching and physical contact is very dangerous territory,” said Noreen Hajinlian, the principal of George G. White School, a junior high school in Hillsdale, N.J., who banned hugging two years ago.

That sounds about right. Hugging is dangerous. Lest our daughters become too attached to their BFFs and our sons become.... well you know... So, of course, the logical, Vulcan response, if you will, of banning hugging all together is certainly the appropriate one.

Maybe society does mirror television and video games too much. Kids who grew up watching Full House and playing Nintendo as the Princess formerly known as Daisy, couldn't stand themselves anymore and went on to become more violent school-shooting pre-teens. On the other hand, today's kids were witness to 8 seasons of Emmy-Award winning Sopranos programming on HBO, and like Tony and his Italian-American pals, can't enter a room without hugging five other dudes.

It all reminds me, and Neil I'm sure, of The Kiss Hello. In this classic episode of Seinfeld, Kramer decides the building would be more friendly if there were pictures of every tenant in the entryway. This of course leads to an invasive, hyperoral society neither Jerry nor myself could possibly tolerate. Eventually tensions build, and in this famous scene they reach a climax...