Dear Philadelphia: I have lived here now for nearly six years. I made it through four and a half without buying pepper spray, and only acquired one from a friend when a string of sexual assaults last fall were a little too close to home. It remains attached to my keychain, except for when it isn't: before shows at the Electric Factory or TLA, I make sure to detach it and leave it somewhere......

I like Jason Statham. I think he's a really talented guy. But let's face it, besides Snatch and Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels, he hasn't been in very many decent movies. Just look at his filmography: Transporter 2, that Uwe Boll Dungeon Siege thing, The One. Ugh. For that reason, I went into my screening of The Bank Job with pretty low expectations. And I came out pretty impressed. It's actually a really solid......

Penelope is explicitly a modern fairy tale—even to the point of opening with "Once upon a time..." and ending with "...and they lived happily ever after"—about a young woman named Penelope (Christina Ricci), who is cursed. Her family is very old and very rich, and many years ago, a male of their number thought he'd fallen in love with a washerwoman, but ultimately broke his promise to marry her. When the woman subsequently committed suicide,......

I'm a bit of an Anglophile. I love British just-about-everything, except for the food. But I especially love British humor. And after attending and enjoying a staged reading of Roy Smiles' Ying Tong last spring, I figured I'd really love the fully-mounted production at The Wilma Theater. I never thought I'd say this about any production, ever, but I think I liked the staged reading better. There was something charming about the bare-bones production......

Three weeks ago the Super Bowl heralded the end of another football season. At least, I think it did. See I don’t really “get” sports. Trust me, I am all man (except for my partially formed superfluous vagina), but sports has never been “my bag.” I mean I get the point of the game: two teams of guys try to get the ball either into some end-like sector or over some big pointy poles,......

Bon Iver is the lyrics and music of Justin Vernon. As last night's opening act for Black Mountain, Vernon and his band set an introspective tone. The first thing I thought of when they started playing was, Dude meditates or spends a lot of time alone and quiet, or he could never write such insightful, unembellished lyrics, or create exquisite music stripped down to its barest, most natural, yet beautiful state. It's like he was......

Dear La Petite Mort, I think my game is broken. I haven't been out on multiple dates in years. I'll admit, I'm sort of a particular guy. If I want to see There Will Be Blood and she wants to see 27 Dresses, done. If I want to talk about Obama and all she can say is, Oh Britney! she's finished. It might seem picky, but I never want to settle. If she's too short,......

UPDATE: Digg this, please! “Thanks for coming out to the movie tonight. If we catch you filming anything, we will pull you out of here and prosecute you to the fullest extent of the law, so (Jack Benny-esque comedic pause) enjoy the movie.” With these words spoken by a suited, security officer before the screening of Sylvester Stallone’s new Rambo film, perhaps I should have been tipped off to the aggressive nature of the film......

I don't have kids, so I may not be the most qualified person to write about today's topic. But I have a mom and a dad, and I'm young enough to remember living under their parentage, so I'm not completely unqualified. Especially because I'm not writing this column on where to change diapers, whether breastfeeding in public is okay, or how to generally raise your kids. Instead, I'm only going to mention that, when......

Hey There Philly: Politics aside, I'm a proud Texan. But I've just returned from a two-week visit to my folks' house and I discovered that... I really missed you. It wasn't the kind of missing you I've had in the past, where I was just kind of bored with sitting on my ass at my parents' place and wanted to get back to work or to school – although boredom did play a small factor.......

It's that time of year folks, when we all lay down plans for the new year before promptly "forgetting" about them a month later. I'm hoping that making mine public will force me to stick to them... but check back with me in February. Get more active: I know, I know, isn’t this everyone’s resolution, even if it is most often tacked with the perennial favorite, “lose weight?” But I already have the daily gym......

The Phillyist Staff had so many ways to countdown to 2008 that we found ourselves with quite a few leftovers on this, the final day of 2007. So enjoy this afternoon's glut of lists from your friendly neighborhood bloggers, and we'll see you next year! At this point, I guess most of you readers out there know that I don't eat to live – I live to eat. So it stands to reason that I've......

Every weekday of December (except for December 25, that is), Phillyist will be counting down to 2008 with our highlights from the past year and our predictions for the next. If you have a list you'd like to submit, let us know! Y'all have a Merry Christmas? Good. I'm glad. Mine was nice, too. But I'm kind of glad it's over – just like I am every year. Because, you see, while I like Christmas......

Every weekday of December (except for December 25, that is), Phillyist will be counting down to 2008 with our highlights from the past year and our predictions for the next. If you have a list you'd like to submit, let us know! Raise your hand if you don't love YouTube/Viddler/Google Video/etc. Okay, that one guy raising your hand? You probably just want to scroll past this post, because it probably won't interest you in the......

Every weekday of December (except for December 25, that is), Phillyist will be counting down to 2008 with our highlights from the past year and our predictions for the next. If you have a list you'd like to submit, let us know! With apologies to those readers who don't celebrate Christmas, I'm going to indulge myself a bit here. I love just about everything about Christmas. I actually enjoy Christmas shopping, stressful though it may......

Every weekday of December (except for December 25, that is), Phillyist will be counting down to 2008 with our highlights from the past year and our predictions for the next. If you have a list you'd like to submit, let us know! Keep in mind that despite the "top ten" designation, these are in no particular order. Also, most of these bands have been around for a few years, but I only discovered them this......

You wouldn't know it from looking at me, or from looking at Ross, but this Phillyist has always had a thing for bad boys. Somewhere near the top of my list of dirty, sexy, hunky sits Anthony Bourdain. Sure, he's got a history of substance abuse, smokes like a chimney, is far too fond of fried foods, and, oh yeah, is old enough to be my father. But I'd run off on a culinary adventure......

Dear Philadelphia Winter: The fact that I've started putting on a scarf for my walk to work means you're right around the corner, and there's no stopping you. For a significant portion of my life, I considered you a necessary evil. After all, without you, there would be no Thanksgiving, no Christmannakkanzaa, no New Year, right? But about three years ago, I decided that was a ridiculous idea. After all, people in, say, San Diego......

Sorry there was no Eagles Diary last week. I turned on the channel the game was supposed to be on, saw a team in a blue-and-yellow get up that a Division Nine college football team wouldn’t wear and assumed that the game got canceled. But anyway, I was wrong. The game took place and the Eagles actually scored 56 points and obliterated the Detroit Lions. So I had high hopes for the Eagles latest square-off......

When Ross and I walked into St. Stephens Green (17th and Green Streets; no website available) on Sunday, Jason, our more-or-less regular server, gave us a big smile and said hello. It was the first time that we felt he remembered us from our previous visits. I'm always met with a combination of pride and panic when I'm recognized by the staff at a bar. Pride because, hey, it means I'm becoming a regular! I'm......

Performances: Debbie Does Dallas: The Musical (To The Wall Productions) (Future Showtimes) I got a late start on the PLAF, and I do feel sad and sorry about it. I was out of town, and arrived in the middle of last week to a job tornado, the start of new classes, and some large plumbing problems at home. But all that is marginally under control, and I'm ready to see some shows involving sex, nudity,......

3:10 to Yuma is another entry in Hollywood's current favorite genre: the remake. Unfortunately (or perhaps fortunately, depending on how you look at such things), I can't compare it to the original, as I've never seen it. But I have seen this film, and it's about a down-on-his-luck fellow named Dan Evans (Christian Bale) who's trying to hold onto his ranch, even though a powerful local businessman is trying to drive him off the land......

That is not a hyperbole. Last week, I was really jonesin' for some raw fish. But I'd already been at the place across the street so many times. I wanted to try something new. And I didn't have a whole lot of time. A quick Google search reminded me that there's a sushi place, Tokyo Sushi Bar, at Reading Terminal Market. As my office is just around the corner from there, it seemed worth a......

It said here that Silverchair had a devoted, thriving fan base, despite limited touring and declining radio play in America. But I had no idea that Saturday night’s Fillmore at the TLA crowd would be that into it. Several minutes before the band took the stage, chants of “Sil-Ver-Chair, Sil-Ver-Chair” drowned out the house music, and the sold-out crowd roared when the Australian trio took the stage. It didn’t take the band long to match......

Those who routinely fly in and out of Philadelphia International may have noticed some recent changes in both the arrival and departure flight paths. An exhaustive list of documents on the motivations and effects of possible flight path changes, part of a redesign of the larger NY/NJ/PHL airspace, is given on the FAA website. Basically, the FAA is trying to reduce noise impacts on the region while improving arrival and departure capacity of the......

Dear Radio 104.5: I don't know where you came from, but I think I love you. With Y-Rock exclusively 24/7 on the internet and in HD, the Philadelphia airwaves had been severely lacking in the modern rock department of late. And then one day, while my boyfriend was surfing the radio in his car, "Bullet with Butterfly Wings" came on. I assumed that we were still listening to one of his pre-programmed XM stations until......

I love movies, but I'm generally a pretty passive movie viewer. By that, I mean that I don't usually get lost in the world of the film. I enjoy what I'm seeing, and I like to think I appreciate it on a pretty high artistic level. But I'm always very aware of the fact that what I'm watching is a movie. So I don't usually feel compelled to stand up and cheer at the end......

This one comes straight from Ma Phillyist (aka Mamaist, aka Mommy, aka Mom, aka Mother, but only when I'm mad at her), who's been visiting the past few days. She's the one who always stressed the importance of manners to me. She also thinks that, in spite of my weekly manners column, five years of living on the East Coast has taught me a few manners that she wishes I hadn't picked up. Oh, it's......

A Quirky Column about Dog Walking Adventures in the City of Dog-Owning Love Chill Dogs "I like your dog," she said. "She isn't like most Chihuahua’s. She's chill. That's cool." This laid back artsy girl with a flapper-like hair cut, piercing blue eyes and a blue, cotton dress was standing behind the counter at an extremely chill cafe that serves iced coffee and various cafe accoutrements while paying my friend and his dog, Hannah, the......

A Quirky Column about Dog Walking Adventures in the City of Dog-Owning Love Dog Custody Friday night in Fishtown, I met a friend of a friend who joked about losing two dogs in two previously unsuccessful relationships. “And I didn’t do anything wrong,” he said. “I didn’t cheat on my girlfriends, treat them like shit or anything and they wind up with the dogs.” He’s over it, but hasn’t wanted to get a new dog......