Because I have the day off, which is nice, since I ended up going out on Saturday and Sunday. My friends are like that; nobody sees anyone for a month or so, and then everyone decides to have six parties in two weeks. But I think we are going to make an effort to start up our weekly TV viewing group again, so that's nice.

Lots of big changes over the holidays: Crazy Tree is going to Spain for a few months (probably not unrelated to the fact that J2 and J3, his roommates, are currently feuding). Minnesota J finally found an apartment -- in the East Village, no less -- and got promoted to supervisor at work. Zan and BA are engaged, and getting married in the fall. When they announced this on Saturday, I think we were a little stunned, as we tend to think of them as married (at least I do). It was much funnier when they told Crazy Tree on Sunday, which I can't really explain, unless you know Crazy Tree and the way he acts when he's on his third beer.

I apologize for all the new psuedonyms, but I feel like protecting people's privacy these days. Not that any of those people won't recognize themselves should they stumble across this site, but now that most of us have jobs and coworkers and supervisors, it seems like a good idea. Especially after the story they were telling me last night about the party I was too sick to go to. A word of advice: do not bang snare drums and shout loudly from rooftops as a way of venting your political frustrations. Your neighbors will think it's something else. (And just in case anyone in OK wonders, that is not something that normally happens at the parties I go to, okay? It was right after the election and people were very depressed.) Anyway, thus the psuedonyms, which I will try to be more consistent with from now on.

TV Notes: MI-5 is back!!!!! After the first "season" (actually the first 2, but I guess TV seasons are shorter in Britain and A&E showed the first two BBC series consecutively) ended in a cliffhanger in August 2003 (!) I signed up on the A&E website to be emailed when it started again, but it had been so long I gave up hope. Then two weeks ago, I got an email saying it was back on! Of course, now I don't have cable, so I'm hoping my parents got my emails asking them to tape it for me. It is SOOOO good. It makes "Alias" look like a soap opera (oh, wait, "Alias" is a soap opera. just about spies).

Speaking of which, Alias is back too, and I'm still watching, even though last season was pretty maddening. So far, the new season is pretty good, as long as you can stand to watch a show about spies where it really doesn't matter what the mission is, as much as how many disguises/accents/gadgets they can use carrying it out. Like I said, it's really a soap opera. I mean, they've already had an "evil twin" plot, an "amnesia" plot, weird distortions of the timeline, and people who die amid lots of pyrotechnics only to return the next season perfectly fine. Michael Vartan is still gorgeous, so I'll keep watching.

Saving the best for last, Veronica Mars may be the best show on network television right now. Seriously. The writing is snappy, the storylines are intriguing, the actors are great. If it wasn't on UPN it would be getting a lot more buzz (and it's a lot better than the other critically acclaimed high school drama on right now "Life As We Know It"). It's on Tuesdays at 9/8 central. They're even re-airing the pilot this week, so you can get the whole backstory (trust me, in this series, backstory is important). Definitely worth taking a look.

The critic will retire now to go find some lunch.