WHAT A PISSER: NYMag presents an abbreviated history of fourth-wall breaking:

ALL THAT AND AN IKEA JOKE: I love David Fincher. I loved Fight Club, liked Panic Room, loved Social Network, know I will love Zodiac once I see it (Adam, why didn't you tell me this was any good?), love his signature touches (the dim taupe palette, the heroic credit sequences), and love his furtive sense of humor. Example: In Fight Club, Tyler Durden tells a possibly fabricated story about how he used to work in a theater and splice single frames of male anatomy into the movies so that the audience would receive them subliminally, and then, as Fight Club reaches its climax, Fincher does the same thing. It's just about a frame, barely enough to notice; not enough to interrupt the narrative; plenty enough to insinuate himself, and maybe you, into Durden's japery.

Spacewoman and I have decided, therefore, that Fincher was sharing a little in-joke with readers of his source material when, in The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, the first thing Mikael Blomkvist does is order a sandwich. The sandwiches! This is an exceedingly violent movie, but there probably are more sandwiches than guns. Well played, David Fincher.

WELCOME TO IMMORTALITY, WHICH REMAINS A SCHLEP FROM THE MAJOR HIGHWAYS: Congratulation to Barry Larkin, elected today to the National Baseball Hall of Fame with 86.4% of the vote. (Our vote tally is here.) He will be inducted along with the late Ron Santo this July.

Jack Morris (66.7%), Jeff Bagwell (56%), Tim Raines (48.7%), and Alan Trammell (36.8%) each gained more than 10% this time around; Mark McGwire remains stable (19.5%); Bernie Williams (9.6%) remains under consideration for another year, while two-time AL MVP Juan Gonzalez (4.0%) falls off the ballot after his second year of eligibility.

I HATE GREEK DRAMA, YOU KNOW, WHEN EVERYTHING HAPPENS OFFSTAGE: I only started watching Downton Abbey about two weeks ago (that's a lot of Edwardian drama to shovel into just a few days), but am now firmly in the (side)saddle and eager to discuss the season 2 premiere. Just a few thoughts on my end to kick things off (noting, however, that if you have never watched Downton but have the intention to do so at some point in your lifetime, you shouldn't read this post any further lest there be spoilers) :

• I am a big suspender of disbelief, but there is something bothering me. I can buy the fact that Matthew Crawley is sufficiently dense not to realize that Mary is sending "Dude I Still Love You, You Nitwit" smoke signals from her tormented eyes, but is there really any universe in which Mary wouldn't have told Cora -- at some point during the two years that have elapsed since Season 1's conclusion -- that Edith was the one who spilled The Secret to Pamuk's father?
• I was glad to see from the pre-show interview with Elizabeth McGovern that her odd Americo-Brit accent on the show is in fact Elizabeth McGovern's own odd Americo-Brit accent, stemming from years of living in London and picking up that weird British intonation thing that all Americans living in London for more than 15 minutes seem to be affilicted with, rather than a studied dialect decision.
• Lady Sybil is to-die-for gorgeous.
• This show has an odd habit of making all of its characters reasonably well-rounded except for those who we are intended to roundly dislike, who are one-dimensionally awful. Thomas, O'Brien, Edith . . . not a redeeming characteristic among them. The good news, however, is that Bates's surprise visitor would seem to make the usual suspects seem nuanced and three-dimensional.
• Lack of Verisimilitude Department: After also having watched Jude Law in Contagion this weekend, I am struck by the fact that Downton Abbey apparently employs the best dentist in all of England.

Who's watching?

GREEN FOURTEEN COSMOPOLITAN: Originally, I wasn't going to post anything about Beyonce and Jay-Z's baby naming decision, but then I overheard a heated discussion among several checkout ladies at my supermarket on the subject, and it was clear that this was Major News. So, yes, Blue Ivy Carter it is, and if you believe the chatterati, she's named for her daddy's favorite color and her mama's favorite number. Deep. (And do people actually have favorite numbers once their age hits double digits?)

(I personally have no particular affection for the initial, incorrectly reported variation of Ivy Blue Carter, as it sounds a bit too much like the girl whose eyes were as blue as the Bonnie Blue flag.)

AS ONE OBSERVER TWEETED, IT TOOK LONGER TO EXPLAIN OVERTIME THAN TO PLAY IT: Yes, that was something. Pure coincidence that the Denver quarterback finished with 316 yards in the shortest overtime in NFL history.

JUST FOR ONE DAY:  In honor of David Bowie's 65th birthday today, The Mirror (UK) recounts 65 facts and myths regarding the Thin White Duke, runs 65 pictures, and explores his present mostly-retirement in New York.