Operation Pink Herring

How the baby ruined our TV

A few months ago, Joel declared that we should cancel cable once the baby arrived to save money.

My first reaction was hell to the N-O. Fresh off reading this post, I was fairly terrified about feeling lonely, bored, and isolated during those first few months and I saw the suggestion as a personal affront. Sure, let's cancel cable! That sounds like a fantastic idea! While you're off at work with your fancy fast internet and your people to talk to and important work-things to do, I'll just sit at home with an infant attached to my boob, staring at the wall in silence! And while you're blissfully sleeping through the night I'll just wake up every two hours and quietly hold the baby with one arm while I hold up a copy of War and Peace in the other arm at 3am. Who needs TV when I can be educating myself AND feeding a baby in the middle of the night? And then I believe I cried. Have I mentioned that pregnancy hormones are fun?

Still, I was not pleased with the suggestion, even after I recovered my wits and peeled myself off the tear-stained floor.

BUT. Then we decided to actually do something about turning our second living room into the baby's room.  Previously, we had a big couch downstairs with a flat-screen TV connected to the main cable box and Xbox with surround sound and all that crap. We used this for Netflix Instant and occasionally one of those old-fashioned "DVD" thingies. On the second floor, we had a loveseat and a smaller TV connected to the Tivo. This is where we watched most of our TV (and coincidentally, where we ate dinner, since the coffee table up there doubled as our dining room table). So our first step in Preparing for Baby was to take the Tivo and coffee table downstairs and set them up in the Big TV Room. We then promptly (meaning five weeks later) put all the second floor room furniture on Craigslist. We weren't exactly following the What to Expect When You're Expecting Official Timetable to the letter, but whatever. Progress! We were making it! 

There was just one teensy little problem. When we connected the Tivo to the main cable box downstairs, it started recording every show with this little red flag icon instead of the happy green circle icon we have known and loved for many years. We ignored this at first. But then when I went to watch a rerun of Law and Order I'd recorded, I got this strange little warning telling me that "due to copyright settings," once I started the program, I'd have 24 hours to finish it before it was automatically deleted. Pardon moi? Upon further investigation, we learned that the little red flag also meant that we had only seven days to watch a recording before it was also automatically deleted.

As far as first world problems go, this was a pretty huge one. I came home one day to find Joel frantically watching an episode of Eureka. "I can't talk right now!" he said as he triple-beeped his way through the commercials, "I only have 36 minutes to finish 42 minutes of this show!" A week later, I stayed up way later than I wanted to in order to finish watching Project Runway after forgetting that it went to a 90-minute format last season. Normally I would have just stopped it whenever I felt like and resumed watching it when I was good and ready, whether that was the next day or two months later. BECAUSE THAT IS HOW TIVO IS SUPPOSED TO WORK. But no, I stayed up until the late, late hour of 11pm (shut up) and finished the goddamn show because I wasn't going to have time to watch it the next day. The whole time, I bitterly remembered the night I became utterly convinced that we needed to pony up for a Tivo. We were coming home from the grocery store and it was 7:57pm and Prison Break was about to come on. Joel slowed down while we passed the house and I jumped out of the still-moving car (possibly I have dramatized this evening in my mind a wee bit) and raced inside to set the VCR while he looked for a parking space. I struggled with getting the VCR properly set up and we missed the first ten minutes. This was back before all shows were available online, and also back when Prison Break was a good show. It was a tragedy of minor proportions and I decided I was sick of it. We got a Tivo a few weeks later and the Tivo set us free. The end. Until now.

This little copyright debacle has been going on for about a month, and friends: it sucks. We went on a babymoon vacation to South Carolina (and met the lovely Angela!) and while we were gone, all our shows were deleted. We can no longer bank up three or four episodes of a show and watch them back to back on the weekends. The Tivo is basically useless, and without the Tivo... TV is basically useless. And these two now-useless commodities are costing us $75 a month.

I tried contacting Tivo's customer service, and they were helpful enough, but ultimately concluded that it was a Comcast problem. I tried contacting Comcast and they were... not helpful. At all. The first person I spoke to on the phone said she'd never heard of such a thing and it must be a Tivo issue. The person I talked to on via their online chat help suggested that all our problems would be solved if we switched to a Comcast DVR for a low introductory price. As a last ditch effort, I tried contacting Comcast Bill on Twitter. I've seen other people have great success solving customer service problems via Twitter, and I figured it was worth a try. And what do you know -- it worked!

Well, sort of. It worked in that Comcast Bill put us on some kind of VIP Customer Service list and I got a call from a very nice gentleman who was very concerned about our problem that same afternoon. He agreed that we had a serious (SERIOUS) problem on our hands and set us up with a service appointment that same weekend.

It didn't so much work in that the service tech was unable to actually, you know, fix the problem. He tried switching out the cable box and spewed out a lot of mumbo jumbo about "cable cards" and our elderly Series 2 Tivo "not having one" (and he also had some helpful advice about how we should find out the sex of the baby so that we can know if we're "in for trouble" or not), but the bottom line is this: we either replace our perfectly fine Tivo with a newer model and pray that fixes the problem, or we suffer with the faulty copyright setting forever.

Strangely enough, I have almost stopped caring. It's the summer and there's not much on. I'm totally over Covert Affairs and Pretty Little Liars. So all my shows are getting deleted? Whatever. I'm just pissed that we're now paying $75 a month for, basically, nothing.

Friends, I think we are going to cancel cable. Hold me.

Adios, 2010

Annual New Year's quiz thing time!  I love reading other people's responses to this quiz every year, and here's to hoping that you do too. 2007, 2008, and 2009 versions, should you care to look.

1. What did you do in 2010 that you’d never done before? Got a job that I did not hate. Started a (*cough*prize-winning) garden. Celebrated a year of marriage.  Started composting. Crafted a homemade Christmas wreath. Learned how to (sort of) knit.

2. Did you keep your new year’s resolutions, and will you make more for next year?I have fallen out of the habit of making real resolutions because I didn't really like the pressure I put on myself to achieve each and every one of them.  Since one of my resolutions several years running was to be less hard on myself, I'd say that means yes, yes I did keep my resolutions.

I did informally resolve to go to yoga more this year, meaning I wanted to clock at least 53 classes during 2010.  Going once a week has been my norm for several years and it's pretty easy to fit in one class on the weekends, but it gets tricky when we go out of town or have company and I then have to try to "make up" the missed class.  In 2009 I just barely squeaked out 52 classes, thanks to the month I took off for the wedding/honeymoon, the three weeks I was incapacitated after my knee surgery, and the ridiculous amount of traveling I did for work, my brother's wedding and related activities, my wedding shower/bachelorette party, friends' weddings... etc. Anyway, this year was much calmer on the travel and wedding side, and I clocked in 64 classes. I'm quite proud! I am signed up for a teacher training course that starts in February, and the course requires that I go to three classes per week (OMG) so next year's tally will be even higher.

I also kind of resolved to lose some of the extra weight I'd been carrying and get into better shape, and I'd say I did fairly well at that. The last time I weighed in at the gym I'd lost a total of about 6-7 lbs. Sadly, that weigh-in was almost a month ago and I haven't been to the gym since then. I have no good reason other than I just never feel like going, even though the damn gym is right in my office building now.

3. Did anyone close to you give birth? Yes, the newly pregnant friend mentioned in last year's survey gave birth to an adorable baby boy! 

4. Did anyone close to you die? Thankfully, no, but I am a little afraid that Madison's name will be in this space next year. The old badger is not looking so good lately, and by that I mean he is looking even worse than usual. He's due for his annual vet visit this month which should be a rocking good time, as always.

5. What countries did you visit?This is the first year in a good long while that has not seen a stamp on the old passport.  We did go to Colorado for our anniversary in July, and we made a visit to Vermont in October... but other than that and several weekend/daytrips to New Jersey, we pretty much stayed put.

6. What would you like to have in 2011 that you lacked in 2010? A new job for Joel, complete with a new location for us.

7. What dates from 2010 will remain etched upon your memory, and why? April 2nd, my last day at my old job, and April 12, my start date at my new job.

8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?  Getting a new job; realizing that it is possible to not only not hate your job, but to actually like it.

9. What was your biggest failure? I'm really not sure.

10. Did you suffer illness or injury? I am getting really sick of listing my knee for this question. Guess who's back in physical therapy? THIS GIRL. My settlement had better be very large is all I'm saying.

11. What was the best thing you bought? I'm having trouble coming up with something for this question, possibly because we tried really, really hard to put as much money into savings as possible this year. I did buy this pursein August and I love it, like, a lot. The Groupon for 5 Bikram yoga classes for $20 was an excellent purchase, and we've been getting a lot of mileage out of our Netflix via Xbox live acount as well.

12. Whose behavior merited celebration? Same answer as last year: Joel's. I would be lost without him.  

13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed?  Appalled: People who cannot shut the hell up in the movies.  Depressed: Apostrophe abusers.

14. Where did most of your money go? The mortgage was far and away our biggest expense this year.

15. What did you get really, really, really excited about? Quitting my old job. I miss certain things, most notably my old coworkers, but on the whole I am so, so, SO happy to be free of that place.

16. What song will always remind you of 2010? Zero, by the Yeah Yeah Yeahs. Help I'm Alive and Stadium Love by Metric.

17. Compared to this time last year, are you:
(a) Happier or Sadder? Happier.
(b) Thinner or Fatter? Thinner.
(c) Richer or Poorer? Richer. 

18. What do you wish you’d done more of? Hiking. Writing.

19. What do you wish you’d done less of?  Sitting around wondering what we should do on the weekends.

20. How did you spend Christmas in 2010?  Christmas kind of blended in with the rest of my week-long vacation this year, which is just fine with me. We stayed home, slept in, watched Scrooged (which I'd never seen before) and then I screwed up our Christmas Ham (which was actually a shoulder roast, but whatever) but it turned out delicious anyway. Christmas was lovely.

21. Did you fall in love in 2010? With Raylan Givens, yes.

22. What was your favorite TV program? Justified. Walking Dead is a close second.

23. Do you hate anyone now that you didn’t hate this time last year?  Every single one of the stupid hooligans that ruined a movie for me this year by yelling through the whole damn thing. 

24. What was the best book you read? I didn't have a standout best book this year, but here are the books I really enjoyed:

Her Fearful Symmetry by Audrey Niffenegger

Watership Down by Richard Adams (This was a re-read, and I think I loved it even more than I did in high school.)

Peace Like a River by Leif Enger

The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand 

Island Beneath the Sea by Isabel Allende

The Help by Kathryn Stockett

Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins

The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet by David Mitchell

Shiver and Linger by Maggie Stiefvater

Hey, speaking of books, are you on Goodreads? Me too! Want to be my friend?

25. What was your greatest musical discovery?  Metric. My god, they are good. Also, the Yeah Yeah Yeahs.

26. What did you want and get?  A new job!  

27. What did you want and not get?  A new job for Joel. And a new house.

28. What was your favorite film of this year?  I always have to ask Joel for help with this question, so here are our combined favorites:

How to Train Your Dragon. You guys, this is the cutest movie ever.

Inception. Lived up to the hype!

True Grit. As discussed.

The Town. Even though this movie was totally ruined for me, once again, by loud punk-ass kids in the theater. At the 2pm showing. IS NOTHING SACRED. 

29. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?  I turned 29, and I cannot remember for the life of me what I did.

30. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?  Having more than one closet and a dedicated parking space.

31. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2010? Jeans, Jcrew tshirt, hoodie and Privos.

32. What kept you sane?  Quitting my old job. This is getting a little repetitive, but I don't know how much longer I was going to survive in that basement dungeon. 

33. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most? Tie, between Timothy Olyphant and Georges St-Pierre. Did I mention that not only did I get totally into Ultimate Fighter this past season, but we went to watch the pay-per-view finale? At a sports bar? I never thought I would care about a sporting event -- let alone a fighting sport -- in my life. But between my love for polite, Canadian Georges and my burning hatred for Josh Koscheck, I was no-shit nervous about the outcome of that fight. (Georges won!)
 
34. What political issue stirred you the most? Ugh, I don't know. I hate politics. I am pretty psyched about the repeal of Don't Ask Don't Tell, though. I hope one day my kids will be unable to believe that such a stupid policy was ever real.

35. Who did you miss? My two best friends, who live way too far away.

36. Who was the best new person you met?  Raylan Givens.

37. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2010. If the other person pulls first, it's justified.

************************

2010 was a great year for us, and I hope it was for you all too. And if it wasn't, well, hooray! It's over! Here's to a happy and healthy 2011. Happy freaking new year, internet.

The most wonderful time of the year

Reasons number seventy-eight you should not have two margaritas on an empty stomach while surrounded by coworkers:

"Isn't is marvelous," I swooned.  To my boss.  She'd just asked what we all thought of Fall TV. 

But I'm not ashamed!  I'm in love, I'm in love and I don't care who knows it.  Last night Joel asked what my favorite new fall show was, and WELL, SINCE YOU ASKED.

There's The Event.  I'm digging it so far, even though it is treading a little too close to Lost's territory, what with the disappearing magic plane in the very first episode. They've got some aliens in there to change things up -- at least I'm pretty sure that chick from ER is an alien -- and a little government conspiracy to boot.  I'll give it a try, even though I was extremely disappointed by the casting of Luke Danes as a terrorist.  It turns out he wasn't a terrorist after all, he was acting under duress!  And now he's dead, so he can go back to being Luke Danes. 

Besides, Luke Danes being made to wear an awful pilot outfit instead of his eternal flannel shirt is the least of my problems as far as character defamation (har, get it?) goes this TV season. Let's talk about Hawaii 5-0, shall we?

Now, I am too young to have ever seen the original show, so I don't care at all if they ruin its "legacy" or whatever.  But again with the ripping off of the Lost -- here's Jin! And he's speaking English!  I realize that he was just pretending not to speak English in Lost -- that's what actors do, after all, they act -- but hearing someone who will always be Jin to me speak perfect English is extremely disconcerting.  It's too soon. Take a vacation for a year or twenty, Jin.  Or just never work again.  The latter is my preference.  That also goes for Mohinder, and I don't care if he was actually faking the British accent in Heroes and the new American accent in Covert Affairs is real.  No. Just... no.

However, this is my biggest issue: Boomer.  When you've been immortalized as Cylon Number Eight, you should just retire from acting. I don't want to see you playing some police academy newbie.  I am actually enjoying Hawaii 5-0 enough, but are there no other actors in the world?  Besides Jin and Boomer, we've got Mick St. John from the short-lived and admittedly terrible vamp series, Moonlight, playing the lead.  I'm actually OK with that, because his acting was so godawful in Moonlight that I never fully identified him as his character.

What else, what else... I'm OK with that Dark Blue show, as long as we're assuming that there is room in this world for yet another law enforcement drama.  NCIS LA continues to make me angry with its ridiculous plot lines and complete refusal to put LL Cool J in anything other than a solid-colored, tight-fitting long sleeved shirt.  The Vampire Diaries makes my life complete, but why do all the good shows have to be on Thursday night?  I mean, we've got Vamp Diaries, Nikita (LOVE), Jersey Shore and Project Runway on the same night?  And then on Wednesdays I'm forced to watch yet another drama-filled season of Ultimate Fighter because there is nothing else on?  Is this really necessary, TV schedulers of the world?

Supernatural continues to kick ass, proving that beloved characters CAN continue their careers when they are written off a long-running show like Gilmore Girls, provided that 1) there is a suitable gap between roles, and 2) they can actually, you know, ACT.  

Smallville is finally, FINALLY, coming to an end -- but not before introducing an army of Lex Luthor clones.  Yawn. This show, it kills me. WHEN IS HE GOING TO FLY, GODDAMNIT?  We've been waiting ten years.  It is time.

Am I missing anything wonderful this fall TV season?  It truly is marvelous, isn't it?

 

At this rate I'll never get around to Jersey Shore

2. Project Runway.

Otherwise known as another TV discussion post that was supposed to be a paragraph long, but instead is a full recap because I tried to write my paragraph while watching the show and I'm not deleting this now because it took me three hours to write. Even though the show is only an hour long. 

Hey, so Project Runway is back!  Even though the last season just ended like two weeks ago.

Anyway, new designers, pregnant Heidi, same Tim Gunn (thank god).  We're back in New York.  Double thank god.

I'll confess that I always hate the first episode of the season.  It's hard work trying to learn new names and figure out who I love and who I hate all over again.  There are just too many people at the beginning.

This guy is an actor, and by "actor", he means he walks around Disney World dressed as Captain Jack Sparrow.

This girl says she is Iranian and that makes her different.  Yay!  We've never had an overly made up Iranian girl who thinks she's better than everyone on the show before.

This lady's name is Ping and she has a panic attack, complete with frantic shrieking, over the two-minute editing time limit in Central Park.  Apparently she has a problem with deadlines and unwrapping fabrics, which bodes well for all the future visits to Mood.

Christiane says that her first thought is "go for the color" and I am guessing that maybe Nina Garcia, hater of the all-black collection, might have given this girl's application the stamp of approval.

During Tim's check-in, Tim tells Jesus that he finds his dress "disturbing", and Jesus replies that it doesn't bother him at all and he's not changing it.  Good call, kid! What does Tim Gunn know, anyway?

A dude whose no-shit name is Seth Aaron Henderson wears a ripped up tuxedo with a movie usher's red jacket for runway day.  And a bandana around his head during the confessionals.  Just in case the three names weren't getting the point across: he's totally rock and roll. 

And ooooh what have we here? The formerly-Bluefly-now-Macy's Accessory Wall is now the formerly-Bluefly-then-Macy's-now-Bluefly-again Accessory Wall! Do I sense some dramaz? 

RUNWAY DAY!  We learn that the winner of Project Runway will receive blah blah blah we all know this right now.  The only thing I'm more sick of hearing is, "as you know in fashion, one day you're in and they next day you're booted to Lifetime out.

Everyone's designs come down the runway, and everyone thinks their garments are truly amazing.  They all nailed it. Every one of them has showed how much skill they have as a designer.  They would not make a single change. Oh, you kids are so cute.

Despite Anthony's attempt to woo Michael Kors by wearing pants the same color as his skin, Michael says that this model looks like she could go to a garden party and steal champagne bottles with that appendage on her hip. 

Seth Aaron Henderson calls his look "Little Tokyo" and before I can even finish laughing, guest judge Nicole Richie tells him he made everything work, Heidi says it's fun and shows a point of view and Nina "appreciates the back".  Michael thinks it's totally commercial and lots of women would love to own it.  No one says anything about his outfit.

Ping also gets high marks from everyone. Despite her breakdown during the fabric selection, everyone loves her look.  Also, she is not dressed like a crazed magician. 

Jesus's specialty is "evening gown" (how original!) but Heidi isn't sure how fashionable it is and Michael thinks his model looks like a crocodile trunk exploded on an evening gown. Oh, noes!  They don't like it!  Who ever could have guessed OH WAIT TIM DID.

Nina gives Christiane mixed reviews, as does Michael.  Good try, but too much going on.  I have the same complaint about her name, which is very hard to type.

Emilio's dress is deceptively simple, which is code for "you're staying".  I don't necessarily NOT like it, but I'm not quite sure which of the three different sewn-together patterns is the simple one.

The judges have their little chat and dear god, it looks like Seth Aaron Henderson is going to win.  I find myself rooting wholeheartedly for poor panicking Ping, whose look "transported" Michael when the model walked on the stage.  GO PING GO!  I am not ready for an entire season of Sir Seth Aaron Henderson, punk rock movie usher.

DUN DUN DUN.

Ping is safe. Which means she is not the winner. Goddammit.  Seth Aaron is going to win.

BUT WAIT NO, EMILIO IS THE WINNER!  Hooray!  Take that and shove it in your popcorn machine, Seth Aaron, who is also in.  Of course.

Anthony is in and tries to give an acceptance speech.  Heidi tells him to get his himself and his red pants off the runway before she changes her mind to Auf Wiedersehen. 

Heidi totally jerks Jesus around, making it sound like she's going to give him the double-cheek kiss of death before saying "someone has to go... but it's not you".  Heidi!  You're cruel!

Christiane is out, and she says being eliminated means nothing at all.  Riiight.  But I'm actually sorry to see her go, she was non-offensive and not that annoying, except for the fact that her name gave my spellchecker a seizure.

This paragraph-turned-recap would simply not be complete without mention of the most exciting thing to happen during this premier: the commercial for Pregnancy Pact.  PREGNANCY PACT!  Based on a true story!  WORLD PREMIERE!  And perhaps especially fitting, since two of the four judges were pregnant this week. Nina, do you have something to tell us?

Nip/Tuck finally getting sliced (ZING) from FX, people with ridiculous TV loyalty complexes rejoice

I feel like talking about TV.  Let's do, shall we?

1. Nip/Tuck

I am thinking that I am the sole person in the universe still watching this show because I never see it mentioned anywhere, ever.  And there's a good reason for this: it totally and completely sucks.  And not even in an it's-so-terrible-it's-amazing way, because lord knows I love a good ridiculous-yet-fantastic television fantasy. I vaguely remember being really into Nip/Tuck at some point in the distant past, which probably had something to do with the fact that I had a super-crush on Julian McMahon, otherwise known as Cole Turner, the demon who fell in love with a witch on Charmed. 

That relationship is probably #4 on my all-time best Forbidden Loves list (#1, obviously, being Bella/Edward) (#2, also obviously, Buffy/Angel) (#3, less obviously, is a tie between Rory/Dean (after he's married) and Rory/Jess (when she's with Logan)).  So Nip/Tuck arrives and it's not only got Cole, but we get to see his bare ass several times an episode!

Well. Somewhere in the past seven years (SEVEN YEARS HOLY GOD I AM GETTING OLD) Nip/Tuck took Cole, the lovable demon, and turned him into Christian, the nymphomaniac jackhole.  I don't even care to see his ass anymore.  Sean's, either. I wish everyone would keep their goddamn clothes on and that's never a good sigh.  I don't know what sealed the deal for me: Sean accidentally-on-purpose letting his lesbian ex-wife's girlfriend die on the table during a routine face lift?  The fact that Christian has three kids, is supposedly a reputable surgeon, and yet has time to screw at least three women in every episode?  Or perhaps the fact that Christian is both grandfather and stepfather to a fourth kid?  Oh, yes, dear, crazy Kimber has been married to both Christian AND HIS SON.  Jesus, PLEASE, someone cancel the show and bring back Passions already.

It almost redeemed itself last season when Rose McGowan briefly joined the show as the new anesthesiologist, who quickly also become Sean's girlfriend and then even more quickly became Sean's new wife.  Because... that's what normal people do when a new person starts at the office.  You want them to feel included, you know?  So you have sex with them, but then you don't' want them to feel like you're just using them to get back at your partner for having sex with your now-lesbian ex-wife, so you marry them. Obviously.  But then she got killed off by a serial axe murderer (seriously) while the new Sean-family was out camping in the woods -- which, by the way, they were only doing so that she could fill the luxury camper with carbon monoxide and collect on Sean's life insurance policy -- and my dreams of a Charmed reunion were dashed. 

Oh, god, and before HER, Starbuck was on the show for five seconds!  But then.... something happened. To her.  I think.  I had to watch all those episodes on mute so I could pretend her character's name wasn't "Teddy".

Thank goodness this is the last season.  It hurts my heart when I see shows like this carrying on for SEVEN FREAKING YEARS when shows like The 4400 and The Unit are being unfairly canceled.  Yes, I am still bitter about The 4400 and YES, I realize it's time to let go.

Wow, see how I put that little number one up there?  That's because this was meant to be the beginning paragraph.  I was going to talk about other shows but now I'm feeling depressed and angry and I have to go find some online clips of Gilmore Girls or something.

The year of the wedding

I know that 2009 was pretty terrible for a lot of people.  Layoffs, infertility, breakups, unemployment, divorce, you name it: 2009 seemed to have it.  And in filling out this little annual survey doohickey I'm remembering that there were some pretty hugely sucktastic events in there for me, as well.  But, overall, I think 2009 the happiest year of my life.  Am I crazy?  Was our wedding just THAT awesome (be forewarned: this post unintentionally became a bit wedding-heavy)?  Or did the good just outweigh the bad in my little heart of coal?  I'm not sure, but I can't bring myself to say that 2009 was anything but good to me.  Even if we did spend the last few minutes of it chasing our dumb-as-bricks cat across the neighbor's snowy roof. 

Without further adieu, here's the annual New Year's quiz thing! I really enjoy reading the responses people post to this all over the internet.  (2007 and 2008 versions, should you care to look.)

1. What did you do in 2009 that you’d never done before? Rode in an ambulance. Got married. Bought a non-Volkswagen.  Bought a bike of my own.  Made the decision to put a pet to sleep.  Had surgery.  Baked a pumkin pie from scratch.

2. Did you keep your new year’s resolutions, and will you make more for next year? I never quite got around to making any concrete resolutions this year.  I felt like if I made it through the year without going totally broke or insane and came out married on the other end, then I would have accomplished everything necessary.  And I did, so... I win!

3. Did anyone close to you give birth? No, but I did just learn that the very first of my friends is pregnant. 

4. Did anyone close to you die? My grandmother died, and that was sad even though we weren't particularly close.  And there was also Max, if animals count.  The first week after that was pretty horrific.  I am an old pro at making myself feel bad about things, but I have never felt so completely crushed by guilt as I did in the first few weeks after putting him to sleep. It was... not good.  Honestly, I still don't feel great about it.

5. What countries did you visit? Canada, for our honeymoon.  I was supposed to go to Argentina for work in November, but then I realized that a 14-hour flight three weeks after having knee surgery was probably not a super idea.

6. What would you like to have in 2010 that you lacked in 2009? A new house and new jobs for both of us.  (Dream big, right?) 

7. What dates from 2009 will remain etched upon your memory, and why? July 25th. No special reason. 

8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?  I don't want to say "getting married" because that sounds like one of those people who has been sleeping with a pink, glittery wedding binder under her pillow since age six, just waiting to fill in the blanks with a groom's name... but I think that planning and coordinating all the details that went into that day without losing focus of why we were doing it was my biggest achievement.

9. What was your biggest failure? I'm really not sure. Maybe getting so anxious in the final run-up to the wedding.

10. Did you suffer illness or injury? Ugh. Almost a year later, and I still think about that stupid car accidentmultiple times a day.  I spent countless hours (and by "countless" I mean that I have a detailed list I'll be sending to my lawyer) going to a chiropractor, an orthopedic surgeon and a physical therapist and I've managed to get everything back to normal except my stupid, stupid knee.  In case you couldn't tell how I feel about the whole situation: it's stupid.  I still vacillate daily between feeling so lucky that things weren't worse and being really, really angry that I'm still dealing with knee problems (and very well might be for the rest of my life) while that kid who hit us has probably forgotten the whole thing ever happened.   

11. What was the best thing you bought?  Again, it's a tie. Between my wedding ring and my Motorola Droid. My god, I love them both.

12. Whose behavior merited celebration? Joel's. I would be lost without him.  

13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed?  Kristen Stewart's.

14. Where did most of your money go? The wedding, the mortgage, and our new car.

15. What did you get really, really, really excited about? The wedding.

16. What song will always remind you of 2009? Daylight, by Matt and Kim.  And Your Song, by Ewan McGregor, which was our first dance song.

17. Compared to this time last year, are you:
(a) Happier or Sadder? Happier.
(b) Thinner or Fatter? About the same, again.
(c) Richer or Poorer? Definitely poorer, but we're steadily repairing the wedding-sized hole in our savings. 

18. What do you wish you’d done more of? Sleeping. Reading.

19. What do you wish you’d done less of?  Fretting.  This is the same answer I gave last year, and I'd be willing to bet it will be my answer next year too.

20. How did you spend Christmas in 2009?  We slept in and opened a few gifts from Joel's family in the morning.  Later, we went out for dinner and saw Sherlock Holmes in a sold-out theater.  When we got home around midnight there were parking spaces aplenty, which was a true Christmas miracle.

21. Did you fall in love in 2008?I stayed in love? This question is weird.

22. What was your favorite TV program? Tie, between True Blood and The Vampire Diaries.  Man, I wish I could love the Sookie Stackhouse books, but they are so very awful.

23. Do you hate anyone now that you didn’t hate this time last year?  I hate lots of people.

24. What was the best book you read? I read a lot of really great books this year and I really can't pick a single favorite.  It's a tie between the Harry Potter series, Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins, Graceling by Kristin Cashore, and The Golden Compass, The Subtle Knife and The Amber Spyglass by Philip Pullman.  However, worst book I read is easy: any one of the Sookie Stackhouse books.  I was totally expecting to LOVE those books, since 1. I bordered on obsession over the first season of True Blood, 2. I like vampire shit, in general.  But oh my god.  They are so godawful that I haven't even been able to finish the last three books yet.  Nine.  There are NINE of these books.  I can't leave the last three unread because the unfinished task light will continue blinking in my brain until the day I die, but I'm not sure when I'll muster up the patience to power through. 

25. What was your greatest musical discovery?  Shazam.

26. What did you want and get?  Married.  

27. What did you want and not get?  A winning lotto ticket.

28. What was your favorite film of this year?  Out of loyalty, I'll say New Moon.  But coming in at a very, very close second: Avatar. 

29. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?  I spent my 28th birthday on the couch, feeling pretty miserable (and being smothered by a sympathetic cat).

30. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?  Winning the lottery.

31. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2009? Illegal jeans, Threadless t-shirts, sweater dresses.

32. What kept you sane?  My mom, Joel and my seven thousand excel spreadsheets. 

33. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?  Edward Cullen, as portrayed by Robert Pattinson.  (This is different from Robert Pattinson himself, mind you.) (This answer is exactly copied from last year.  Sigh.  Still true.)
 
34. What political issue stirred you the most? Legalizing gay marriage.

35. Who did you miss? This wasn't for the whole year, but Max.

36. Who was the best new person you met?  Uhhh... I'm drawing a blank.  Did I meet anyone new this year?

37. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2009. Biting your nails doesn't help.

Happy new year, internet.  I already know that 2010 is going to be great, if only because doing math this year is going to be SO much easier.

From the What Could Have Been files

Ok, 'fess up, people.  I KNOW I am not the only person watching the Vampire Diaries.  Right?

Am I the only person who is now bordering on completely obsessed with the show?  I look forward to Thursday nights (the fact that Supernatural is on right after is a pretty huge bonus).  I chant KISS KISS KISS at the TV.  I laugh out load and squeal at least once per episode.  OK, clearly I have crossed the border into Obsessedville.  Please, tell me I am not alone here.

But the show also makes me a little bit sad because I can't help thinking this is what the Twilight movie could have been with better acting, writing and casting. Here's to hoping that Chris Weitz is watching and taking notes?  (And see, that's how we can pretend that my still talking about Twilight is even a little bit relevant: New Moon comes out in six weeks!  But there's a tragic side to this story: I will not be able to attend a midnight showing, or even see it the weekend it comes out.  I have to go to a meeting for work.  In... Argentina.  And yes, I am a little bit sad.) 

In other disappointing pop-culture vampire news, I am officially declaring myself done with the Sookie Stackhouse books after #4.  I really thought I'd at least like these books, but I don't.  I hate book-Sookie  and book-Bill.  I'll be the first to admit that Twilight had its own problems, but these books are just SO bad and I can't find a single redeeming factor.  I mean, Edward may have been a tad controlling, yes, but at least he didn't cheat on Sookie and then rape her in a car trunk after she saved him from the Volturi.

But, hey, at least True Blood is awesome.  And we have Thursday nights to look forward to all fall.

*********************************

Updated to add:

Right after I published this, Joel emailed me to say:

I saw your post about the show.  Just as an FYI, according to Nielsen ratings, 3.8 million people watch Vamp Diaries compared to 17.4 Million for NCIS: LA, so yes you could be the only one watching the show.

 

Really?  Really?  Now, I like NCIS.  A lot.  I've written before about how I think it's the best police drama this side of Law and Order and should totally bump CSI off the air.  HOWEVER, I am having trouble getting on board with the LA spinoff.  Chris O'Donnell, I like.  LLCool J, I think I like.  The ridiculous "headquarters", the mysterious Gibbs counterpart who supposedly dated Frank Sinatra, the criminal psychologist on staff... a little bit much, guys.  Plus, as Joel points out, there is not even a Naval base in LA. 

So a telepath and a vampire walk into a bar

I was recently introduced to a little-known show -- maybe you've heard of it? -- called True Blood. We borrowed the first season on DVD from my brother and his wife and quickly devolved into watching four or five episodes in a sitting. Love Sookie, love Bill, love the trashy Louisiana setting.

But did anyone else notice the similarities to another popular vampire series?

For instance, Edward Cullen is a vampire who lives among humans in secret. Bill Compton is a vampire who, until recently, lived among humans in secret.

Edward and the Cullens live on animal blood because they are good vamps who don’t kill humans… most of the time. Bill subsists mostly on synthetic True Blood because he's a good vamp who doesn't like killing humans. Most of the time.

Edward is a telepath who can hear everyone’s thoughts... until he meets Bella. Sookie is a telepath who can hear everyone’s thoughts...until she meets Bill.

Edward is irresistibly drawn to Bella because he can’t hear her thoughts, even though she smells so good that he can hardly resist killing her. Sookie is irresistibly drawn to Bill because she can’t hear thoughts, even though he is very, very dangerous.

The Cullens are monitored by Jacob’s pack of werewolves. Bill is monitored by Sookie’s boss, Sam. Who is a werewolf.

The wolves hate all vampires, but Jacob especially hates Edward because he’s in love with Bella. Sam hates all vampires, but he especially resents Bill because he’s in love with Sookie.

Jacob and his pack turn out not to be werewolves after all. They’re just shapeshifters who happen to turn into wolves. Sam turns out to not be a werewolf after all. He's just a shapeshifter who prefers taking the shape of a dog.

Is this all a mighty coincidence? The Sookie Stackhouse books were published before Twilight, but I can't fathom a good Mormon girl like Stephenie Meyer reading them (I'm almost done with Dead Until Dark, and some of the sex scenes would make Emmett Cullen blush.) I mean, I'm not complaining. I love Twilight. I love True Blood (I'm not 100% sold on the books yet). But man, there are a lot of similarities.

***************

Related: So who else is watching The Vampire Diaries? I heartily approve, both because there was a snippet of a song by MGMT that I love in one scene and because they have my long-lost LOST boyfriend playing a major role. Oh, Boone, how I've missed you ever since that damned plane fell on you in Season One! Plus, they've got a great Wolverine vibe going on with the whole good-brother-just-wants-to-live-life-in-peace-but-bad-brother-won't-have-it-thing.

Times a-changing

I don't know about you guys, but when I was a whiny little brat who refused to eat the nutritious dinner my hard-working mother had lovingly prepared, I got to eat a bowl of Frosted Flakes instead.  Maybe some graham crackers with a little sugar sprinkled on top or some cinnamon pop tarts if I was feeling really crazy. What I did NOT get was a pizza delivered because I refused to eat real food.

This commercial crams everything that is wrong with America into a 30-second spot. OK, well that may be a slight exaggeration, but do you know how hard paella is to make? Actually, I have no idea how hard it is to make, but I DO know that paella is delicious. And therefore probably hard to make. And I am pretty sure saffron is expensive. And also reasonably sure that saffron is an ingredient in paella. VERIZON: Consider yourself ADDED to my official list of terrible commercials that are ruining the world.

Sargeant Pepper

At a quarter past six on Saturday morning I dropped Joel off at the steps to the Athletic Center and he boarded a coach bus bound for South Carolina, leaving me as a bachelorette for a full week.  He's been doing this every spring since we first started dating, and it's a week I've come to both look forward to and dread in equal measure.  We are pretty good about spending time apart, I usually enjoy having entire days to myself: days where I can go to yoga and sit around in my sweaty clothes all afternoon, watching whatever I want on TV with the volume up to supersonic levels.  But I was caught unpleasantly off-guard the first few times he went away for entire weekends; caught by a crushing sense of loneliness that I really had no excuse to feel.   I've learned over the years that the key is to make plans, and lots of them -- even if it's just running the same errands I run every week, having a schedule in place makes all the difference.  But sometimes, despite my best precautions, I find myself feeling distraught and abandoned by Sunday night.  

Happily, I made it through this past weekend without once feeling like the sobbing little lady left behind at home.  It seems I've finally gotten the hang of this week-alone thing, and it's about damned time, right?  And ironically enough, this is the last spring break I'll spend on my own since Joel's team has been cut from the University's budget thanks to the tanking economy.  So... good thing I've got that figured out.

Anyway, now my biggest dilemma is that I am DYING to watch the last three episodes of Battlestar Gallactica sitting in my Tivo... but I can't because I need to wait until Joel gets home.  Not because I'm nice, but because I need someone around to answer all my dumb questions so I'll have at least a 50/50 chance of knowing what the hell is going on.  In my defense, I didn't watch the show until last year so I never got some of the foundational background.  In, uh, not my defense, I have a lot of questions about shows that I've every single episode of, so... yeah.  Don't ever go to the movies with me, is what I'm saying.  And don't ANYONE say anything about the last three episodes of BSG or I'll have to kill you.  That goes for the entire internet.  I already had Harry Potter ruined for me by THIS stupid video, [DON'T WATCH IT IF YOU HAVEN'T READ THROUGH BOOK 6, SERIOUSLY] and I really just can't take another blow like that.  I'm fragile right now.  Twilight is over, Kristen Stewart is giving interviews that make it look like she's even more braindead than I already suspected, and my brother is taking so goddamn long to finish Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows that I'm left discussing it with myself on Twitter.   Seriously, K: if I hear that you've been sleeping this week, I'm going to be very disappointed.

***************

In completely unrelated news, I fear that my car might be heaving its last exhaust-laden breaths.  I've been thinking that it's been a bit noisy lately, and last night the brakes really didn't seem to be braking all that well.  I was just resolving to take it in to be looked at - it's due for an oil change anyway - when my radio crapped out.  Again.  Maybe it will be as simple as disconnecting and re-connecting the battery (that's how we fixed the radio last time).  Maybe this is nothing, maybe it's just another attack of Volkswagen Gremlin-itis... but I just have a feeling that this is the beginning of the end.  I hope I'm wrong, I'd love to drag another few thousand miles out of this old girl.

***************

And to end on happy note: ladies and gentlemen, we officially have a minister to perform our wedding ceremony.  Can I get a hallelujah?  We ended up going with the first guy we met with - the one that was perfect except for the fact that he had another wedding an hour and a half after ours - and I'm really happy with the decision.  He's the right fit for the style of wedding we want and we both felt really comfortable with him... the only issue was our fear that the two ceremonies were just too close together, timewise.  But after we met with another wedding dude who regaled us with a tale of the time he performed FOUR weddings on the same day, we realized that booking with someone else didn't guarantee us exclusive rights to that date and there was a good possibility that another officiant might not even tell us if they were rushing off to another ceremony an hour after ours.  I emailed Dude #1 and told him the situation - that we really felt he was the best fit and were just concerned about the timing - and he assured us that he would not book two ceremonies if he were'nt completely sure he could give both the same level of service.  I mailed a check that same day and put a huge happy checkmark on my spreadsheet.  YAY.  And also: PHEW. 

 

In other news...

Hi guys.  I am not quite sure how to come back from such a gloomy post, but I'll try.  First off, I am OK.  Thank you all, SO MUCH, for your comments, emails, texts and phone calls.   And if I said anything nonsensical to you in response to those messages, um... sorry.   I didn't think that the muscle relaxers were having any effect other than making me pass out in slack-jawed coma for a few hours every afternoon, but I don't exactly remember posting some of the thing I did on facebook or sending some of the texts in my phone's sent folder (not that I said anything outrageous, I just don't remember saying it at all)... so I guess they were working after all?   I'm still pissed off because my coworkers both got sent home with some grade-A quality painkillers and I got stuck with some bullshit muscle relaxers that my doctor-friend told me are pretty much placebos but WHATEVER.   We're all OK, and that is what matters.

I felt pretty much like hell on Thursday and Friday, but I think I'm steadily getting better.  I am back at work today, woohoo.  Life goes on, and I am very, VERY grateful for that.

Moving on...

After the return of Jack Baur on Sunday night, I found myself at Sam's Club yesterday purchasing, among (many) other things, a 15-lb bag of rice and a 5-liter bottle of olive oil.  Then I went through the pantry and pulled out things like peanut butter and told Joel "we need to get some more of this shit.  This never goes bad."  

And then I told him I thought we should get a gun and he spent the rest of the evening on the computer looking at tactical rifles.  

The thing is, I love shows like 24 and Jericho... but they scare the living shit out of me, to put it mildly.   And I can't even tell you how terrified I was after reading The Road.   I used to have nightmares that revolved around there being some sort of natural disaster and my being unable to wrangle all three cats into a carrier before being evacuated.  Now I'm afraid of riots and survival in a post-apocalyptic breakdown of society.  

(After we decided we need to get a gun, I also realized we also need to get a goat, at least two sheep, and some chickens as well.  And a fallout bunker.  Joel will commence looking at real estate in  Wyoming as soon as he finds the perfect gun.)

I'm either the smartest person I've ever met or the craziest.  If it's the latter, I'd like to blame everything on "the amnesia", which is what I have taken to calling the drop in IQ I've experienced after the accident.  Don't get mad when I can't remember what happened last season on Battlestar Gallactica!  It's the amnesia.  I think I may have over-inflated my front car tire, but I can't be sure.  It's the amnesia!  You know how it is. 

Yesterday was my last day home before returning to work and I was very excited about the prospect of being home at 5pm to watch the entire hour of Gilmore Girls on ABC Family (instead of the last half hour, which I usually catch at the gym).  No missing the first half of the episode, no laughing too loud because I have headphones on while I"m on the treadmill... just  me, my couch, and Luke Danes.  And then I turned on the TV to find Kyle XY on instead!   If that's not a sign of the upcoming apocalypse I don't know what is. 

Good thing we have enough soup to last us through the nuclear winter.

Viewer discretion advised

WARNING

The following video contains disturbing images and is intended for mature audiences only.  You may have nightmares after watching this video.  You may want to break things.  If you are pregnant, nursing, or plan to become pregnant, please talk with your doctor before watching. 

Comcast commercial from Pink Herring on Vimeo.

And just for fun, here's another lovely little bit from our friends at Comcast.  Too bad they're not showing the one where Katie shops for a house via the magical channel 888 anymore.  Yes, TOO BAD INDEED. 

Katie Comcast from Pink Herring on Vimeo.

Ten bucks says "Katie" considers jumping off a tall building every time this commercial airs.  

This and that, here and there

My new camera, let me show you it.

So, I bought myself a new camera.  It's a Nikon D80 and I am in love with it.   Our cute little point-and-shoot is still quite useful for carrying around in my purse and taking self-portraits in hotel mirrors, but my Nikon, it is my baby.  And now, just imagine!  Instead of seeing crappy pictures of my cats, now you'll be seeing crappy pictures of my cats in 3872x2593 pixels.  Like this!

Plus, the in-camera processing is pretty much The Shit.

Oh, yes.  I foresee many good times ahead.

Oh, crap.  I have to go to class tonight.

The impetus to finally up and buy this new camera, which I've been salivating over for months (ever since I realized that our cute little point-and-shoot did not have the ability to adjust f-stops manually) was that I'm taking another photography class.  It's noncredit and not a big deal at all, but it's already 100 times better than the last class because the teacher is not insane.  One week down, and so far that hasn't been a single picture of a stuffed pig dressed up in an Attila the Hun costume! 

Hey, guess what!  I went to Utah!

I got to try out my new camera in Utah this weekend.  I had a meeting in Salt Lake City on Friday, and I got to meet the fabulous Heidikins on Saturday.  I am on a roll with meeting up with bloggers lately!  Heidi took me on a whirlwind tour of the SLC area, and dudes.  It's pretty out there.   We went up to Snowbird (where my little brother worked for approximately one week earlier this year) and on the way down we saw a storm passing through the canyon below.   It was awesome and scary and beautiful.  We also saw a sphinx with the face of Joseph Smith and the famous Temple Square and topped it all off with lunch at Cafe Rio.  Now, I've carefully considered the statement I'm about to make, and I want you to know that I take food very seriously.  The burrito I had at Cafe Rio was the best I've ever had.  It was better than Chipotle.  As I said to Heidi while we were eating (at 11:30am, after we'd already made trips to both a Starbucks AND an Einstein Brother's Bagel shop earlier in the morning), the only thing that could have made that meal better is if I had been really, really hungry.  Is there anything better than eating something truly delicious when you're really, really hungry?  I think not. 

Boob tube

I think I'll need to dedicate an entire post to my thoughts on the return of TV, because my thoughts.  They are many.  But it's nice to actually have new shows to watch!  I sort of forgot what that was like.  Now I'm back to bemoaning the terrible decision to get the Tivo that only records one show at a time.  But still!  New stories to watch! Also: Wild card, bitches!  YEEEEHAW!

I don't know if I'm becoming even more cranky now that I'm nearing twenty-eight or if commercials are really stepping out on a limb nowadays, but there are three commercials on right now that not only annoy me, they offend me.   The first one might only be a regional commercial, and in that case you should feel very lucky if you don't live in the Baltimore metro area.  If you do, though, have you seen that Comcast commercial that's on EVERY FIVE SECONDS singing Get what you want!  Get what you need! while a series of attractive, hip-looking people (mostly women) jump on a trampoline in the background, whipping their head around like they're having the time of their lives at a rave?  Does it make you want to kill something, too?  Because I hate that commercial so much that I can't even fast forward and ignore it.  I have to watch it, every time, and every time I come to hate it that much more. 

The other two shit-list commercials are the two variations of the High Fructose Corn Syrup is Actually Quite Good For You Campaign. 

I think that these commercials are personally offensive to me because they are so well done.  If they were just filmed in someone's basement with a camcorder, they wouldn't be so goddamned convincing.  And the thing is, I consume my fair share of High Fructose Corn Syrup.  But at least I KNOW I'm making a Poor Food Choice when I do so, and I sort of feel bad about it for a second or two before enjoying that delicious cinnamon frosted Pop Tart!  Now I'm all kinds of confused.  I should go on a high fructose corn syrup boycott, just to protest this ridiculous campaign, I think to myself whenever they come on.   But how is that fair?  I don't WANT to give up cinnamon frosted Pop Tarts!  NOW I AM CONFUSED ABOUT POP TARTS, THAT'S WHAT THESE COMMERCIALS HAVE DONE TO ME.   I hope those bastards burn in hell, that's all I'm saying.

And on that note, I think I'll get back to work.

Or break something.  WILD CARD, BITCHES!

Clearing things up

So, blah blah, out of town sooo many weekends blabbity blah, so behind on stuff at home, blah.   You don't care about that.  I don't care about that.

What I DO care about is the fact that I've had The Secret Life of the American Teenager up in my "In My Tivo" sidebar for weeks now, although I hadn't actually seen any of the episodes.  I set up a Season Pass the minute I heard that it was by the makers of Seventh Heaven and that Molly Ringwald was in it, but I didn't actually have time to watch the pilot until this weekend (blah, busy busy, blah).  I am extremely concerned that if any of you actually look at the sidebar, you might have been thinking all this time that I liked the show.  Let me clear that up right now:  Holy fucking disappointment, Batman.  It sure is by the makers of Seventh Heaven, THAT'S for sure.  They've even got the same soundtrack and everything.   But instead of Ashlee Simpson, we've got Molly Ringwald... which is just embarrassing for dear Molly and now half as fun as being able to watch Ashlee Simpson "act".   Instead of Haylie Duff, we have John Schneider, which... ditto.  Sad for John Schneider, not even half as entertaining as Haylie freaking Duff playing a knocked up teenager turned reverend/minister/whatever.   Joel came in when I was halfway through the pilot and he almost started crying when he realized our beloved Johnathan Kent from Smallville was on this show.   And that about sums it up.  I finished the pilot, it was terrible: preachier than Seventh Heaven (I didn't think it was possible either!) and not half as entertaining, plus some rookie casting director made the mistake of casting actors that look like identical twins as the Good Guy and the Bad Guy, and that confused the hell out of me.  In summary, shame on you, Molly and John, the show sucks completely and totally, I deleted the remaining four episodes in my cache without even watching them and I threw up in my mouth when I saw a preview for this week's episode alluding to the fact that Good Guy was apparently going to propose to Knocked Up Protagonist.  So, that's that.  I just needed to clear that up.

Secondly, I started reading Twilight, and I'm in a bit of a quandary.  You see, I somehow managed to completely miss out on the whole Harry Potter craze, and I'm still kicking myself for that, but what's done is done.  However, when I heard about this newfangled "Breaking Dawn" book coming out, fourth in some series that all the kids were raving about, I thought to myself hmmm... maybe I should see what that's all about.  I ordered the first book from the library, about six months later I finally got it, and HOLY HELL, NO ONE TOLD ME THESE BOOKS WERE ABOUT VAMPIRES.  I liked Buffy before liking Buffy was cool (what do you mean, liking Buffy was never cool?), I carried around The Historian for weeks so I could read it during every spare minute, and I am still pissed that they canceled Moonlight, because WTF TV producer dudes, can't you give a show a chance?  IT WAS GETTING BETTER.  I'm a sucker (HAHA) for all things vampire.  I don't know why... I just am.  So basically, this lady writes four books that are the Next Coming of Harry Potter and they're ALSO about vampires, and NO ONE TOLD ME.  Well, that's not true, Isabel told me, and I should have known she was right.  Because Isabel is always right.

So now for the dilemma: I have been staying up all night, talking to my coworkers about it all day, and BRINGING THE BOOK TO WORK so I can read it on my lunch break.  I started it on Sunday, and I'll probably be finished by Thursday, but the library still has New Moon backordered for weeks.  I'm on a tight budget (more blah blah) and I set an Absolutely No Buying Books That's What Libraries Are For rule, but if i don't get a copy of New Moon STAT, I think I might die.   Also, did you realize that the movie does not come out until December?!  What the hell am I supposed to do until then?

Also, I kind of hate these "team" terms, but Edward all the way, dudes.  ALLL the way, if you know what I mean, and I think you do.

Tivo update

A few weeks ago Laurie commented about the fact that my little "In my Tivo" sidebar item was still proclaiming that I had an "impossible backlog" of shows to watch.  Yeah, that's a lie.  So I figured it might be time for an In my Tivo update.

For the time being (until all the writers catch up and start putting new shows back on NOW PLEASE), this is our paltry TV lineup:

Monday: One Tree Hill (I'm not even ashamed to admit that I CANNOT GET ENOUGH OF MAH PRIMETIME SOAPS); New Amsterdam (Joel likes it, I love the concept but find the show sort of meh)

Tuesday: NCIS (I still don't understand how the whole world thinks CSI is soooo awesome and this show gets ignored!)

Wednesday: Girlicious.  Enough said.

Thursday: Lost (although we are currently three episodes behind, because I forgot to record it the week that Joel was away on Spring break, and uh... watching it on the internet is hard when you have dial up.  Halp!); Smallville (for the record, I am so over Lana that I almost can't watch this anymore, and if the CW cancels Supernatural (LOVE) and keeps Smallville for a billionth season...well, I am going to be pissed.  And I know the CW doesn't want that.  RIGHT?)

Friday: BATTLESTAR GALLACTICA.

I feel that this last item deserves a whole entry of its own, because OMG.  Did you know that BSG is like, the best show ever?   I can't believe I just typed that either, but there it is.  I am officially and completely converted.  I still find "frack" annoying, but I'm willing to look past it because OMG STARBUCK IS BACK.   Or is she really a Cylon?   THE SUSPENSE.

And while we're on the topic of sidebar items, maybe you've noticed that I now have a big spankin' BlogHer Ads section.  I'm not really expecting to make any money off this here blog, but I figured that if someone is willing to pay me any amount for doing something I'm already doing for free... well, why not give it a try?  So, if you're philosophically and morally opposed to blog advertising... just pretend that's not there.  I switched to a three-column design to accommodate the adspace without pushing the rest of my sidebar down too far, but I've already gotten one complaint (from Joel) that the new format is "too skinny".   I am assuming that, like me, most of you use a feed reader and probably don't even notice when a blog's design changes.  But let me know what you think of the format or if you  have any suggestions.  I am wondering if any of you more savvy web people know if it's possible to modify the template so that there's not so much unused space on both sides of the page -- and if so, can you tell me how?    Do you just not care at all, since you never leave your feed reader (again, like me)?  Speak now or forever hold your peace.

(Except, not really, because forever = until whenever I next change the template)

That's 35 episodes of L&O. I counted.

We did the second dose of roundworm medicine on Wednesday night (Christmas is over, time for torture!) and it went better than the first time, if only slightly.   Although the vet assured me that this medicine doesn't taste bad, Max and Henry begged to differ, spitting all over the place and running off after I shot it in their mouths.  Maybe they just don't like being force-fed yellow goop, or maybe it really does taste awful.  We'll never know.  I am confident that enough got down their little throats to be effective, and that's all that matters.  Max grudgingly accepted the treats that I placed in front of his post-medicine hiding spot and Henry spent the night sleeping on my bladder, so I think they both forgive me.

We had a new strategy to try with Madison this time: quick and dirty.  The plan was for Joel to throw a blanket over Mads, hoist him onto the counter, I'd pry open his mouth and squirt the medicine in, and then we'd both run for cover.  I wanted the entire operation to last no more than fifteen seconds, therefore keeping the element of surprise on our side.

It worked, mostly.  Blankets were thrown, medicine was squirted, but much of it was spit back out by one angry and surprised fluffy-cat. I grabbed the back-up syringe, and most of that seemed to actually go down his throat.   I think that in the end he consumed at least a full dose of the medicine, with about the same amount being spit all over the floor, the blanket, and Madison's face.  Mission: Accomplished.   And on top of that, Madison had no problem with my thoroughly scrubbing his face with a washcloth afterward to remove all the spit out goop before it crusted into his fur.   Taking flavorless medicine = HELLZ NO, but having his face wiped again and again with a wet washcloth until he resembled a drowned rat = NO PROBLEMO.   Go figure.  At least this means that he won't have to step into my Little Barbershop of Horrors again.  Mission: Double Accomplished.  Phew. 

Now we just need to wait a week and re-test to  make sure that everyone is truly worm-free.   Cross all your fingers and toes, please. 

Speaking of worms and other disgusting things, is anyone else still watching Man vs. Wild?  I used to love, love, LUUUURVE this show.  I subscribed to Bear's blog, I eagerly awaited each new episode, and I felt inspired after watching Mr. Grylls brave new and treacherous climates.   But then that whole scandal happened, and my heart was sort of broken.  I mean, I know it's TV and TV isn't real, and there was undoubtedly some serious editing going on to put together the polished hour-long journeys, but planting tame horses and pretending they're wild mustangs?   Having rafts pre-assembled by experts and then pretending that Bear constructed them with his bare hands?   "Chancing upon" poisonous snakes that had been trapped and released directly in Bear's path?  That is too much.  I felt deceived, cheated on, and hurt.   That's right, Bear Grylls.  You hurt me. Personally.  And I'm not sure I can forgive you.

The new format of the show that they've adopted in response to this scandal is just, what's the word I'm looking for here?  BORING.  Bear jaunts from task to task with no coherent segue in between.  With the old format he had a purpose: to either find a way out of the wilderness or to simply survive for a set amount of time if getting out was truly impossible.  Now, there's no point.  When he's done showing us how to climb out of a crevasse (which he jumped into on purpose), he just goes off puma hunting with a native (and then suddenly gives up the moment they're "really close").  After he show us how to kill a poisonous snake (which they are now careful to note has been placed there specifically for the show), we go straight to cutting open a camel carcass.   There's no flow, and it's painfully obvious that any continuity seen in the previous seasons was totally fabricated through creative editing and staged situations.

Instead of being an impressive show about surviving under dire circumstances, it seems that Man vs. Wild has morphed into Fear Factor starring Bear Grylls.  The "special episode" that Joel and I watched last night, titled "Bear Eats" confirmed the transition for me: an entire hour dedicated to Bear eating sheep eyeballs and drinking the water from elephant poop is hardly something I'm interested in.  I didn't mind those parts of the show when eating unpleasant things was simply a means to survival, but more and more it seems to be the focus of the show.  And if we're admitting that this is all planned, staged, and supported by an entire film crew, then why is it necessary for the star to actually eat live snakes on camera?  If that's what the show is going to revolve around from now on, then I'm simply not interested.

Unfortunately, with the writer's strike still in fully swing, THERE IS NOTHING ELSE TO WATCH.  Can't we all just reach a settlement so I can go back to enjoying the shows that didn't pretend to be real?  Moonlight, how I miss you.  A poorly scripted, terribly acted show with plot holes the size of the Grand Canyon would be so much better than watching Bear Grylls eat another beetle.   

But at least we have this to look forward to: A Law and Order marathon on TNT beginning at noon on New Year's Eve and ending at 10pm New Years Day.  Maybe there is a Santa Claus after all.   

 

Long Live and Prosper

When I first heard about the TV strike, I was all "whatever.  How long can that last?  We peoples need love our TV, they will find a way to work it out."  I was even a bit relieved, because dudes.  The fall lineup was killing me. 

So, the strike happened.  We caught up on everything in the Tivo cache.  The strike continued.  I watched all of Seasons 1 and 2 of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia on DVD.  The strike continued.  I cleaned my house, did all the laundry, made a new lasagna recipe, organized the litterbox room office, cleaned the house again, SCRUBBED THE OVEN.  The strike continued.

And so when Joel set the Tivo to record Tin Man, a SciFi Channel miniseries about the Wizard of Oz, I did not even protest.  I mean, what else am I going to do?   I've already cleaned out the fridge and sanitized the carpets.  Bring it on.  Sigh.

Here's the surprising part: I am sort of in love with it.  I think that this officially makes me a sci-fi geek, if you also take into account that a few months ago Joel started watching this strange movie called Highlander, which apparently everyone in the world (except for me!) heard about in 1991.  I made fun of him, made fun of the Highlander's very badass coat, made fun of science fiction in general... and then Joel went to bed and I said, "um.... I'll be up soon. I just have to finish this, uh, very important thing I am doing here on the computer.  It might take awhile.  Oh, no, leave the TV on...you know, just for background noise."  Also, I am still watching Moonlight, GOD KNOWS WHY, since it is painfully, horribly bad.  I just can't quit you, Mick St. John.

Also, I might sorta kinda love like Battlestar Galactica now.  "Frack" still annoys the living shit out of me, but the show... it is sort of awesome good.

So, Tin Man.  Anyone else watching?  I haven't seen Episode Three yet, so no spoilers.  We have to ration this last part out for at least three nights, otherwise we might actually have to turn off the TV and, like, talk to each other or something.

Just for the record, I still think Star Trek is boring.

Warning: Do not troll IMDB.com after drinking

I have a Very Important Question for all of you out there who watched Gilmore Girls from the beginning.  As opposed to me, who got addicted to reruns at the gym, and although I think I've seen every single episode, I did miss some of the more subtle nuances.

So, I know that Jess was the son of Luke's flaky sister.  IMDB says he is the son of Luke's sister "Liz".

Isn't Liz the Renaissance Festival hippie weirdo?  Married to wannabe-contractor-knocked-a-hole-in-Lorelei's-bedroom-TJ? 

I have a hard time reconciling the Liz I know (happy hippie, who has a baby in the later seasons, right??) with someone capable of raising Jess to be such an angsty teenager.  Plus, I thought Jess' mom lived in Florida, although I always thought that was weird, since Jess seemed to "be from" NYC.

I am going crazy over this.

(PS - Yes, it is Friday night again, and I'm a little tipsy, again, in Chicago, again, and I have to get up tomorrow morning at 5am, again.  It's like fucking Groundhog Day over here.)

Don't judge me because I watch a lot of TV

So, Fall TV.  Where to even begin?

We had several old favorites from last year in the Tivo Season Pass Manager, and I proposed that we adopt a "No New Shows" policy for the fall.  Read my lips, no new shows!  Yeah, that didn't work any better than "no new taxes".  Joel added a bunch of shows "just to see if they're any good" and somehow we have now added hours of extra TV to the weekly schedule. 

And we are woefully behind.  The fact that Joel goes to bed at 10 (or shortly thereafter) and that I have been gone almost every weekend this past month hasn't helped.  Anyway, here's what we'll be watching when we find the time to devote to worshiping the DVR gods:

Monday

Prison Break: I'll be the first to admit that Prison Break is getting a little ridiculous.  Season 1, break out of prison.  Season 2: On the lam.  Season 3: Break out of a different prison!  But, hey, it's TV.  Whatever.  Michael Schofield is still smokin' hot, and I'm still finding it entertaining.

Heroes: I know a lot of people have lost interest, but I am still hooked on Heroes.  I am a mainstream sci-fi geek at heart.  You won't exactly catch me watching Star Trek, but almost all of my favorite books and TV shows have some magical or sci-fi element to them, and Heroes is no exception.  I really thought that it was going to turn out that Hiro actually WAS Takezo Kinsei, and honestly, would it not been a lot cooler than him just helping the real Kinsei find his inner hero?   Peter Petrelli's identity-in-a-box annoys me (but I'll always love you, Jess Mariano), Clare's toe-chopping grossed me out, but I'm still hooked.  This is one of the only shows we're all caught up on.

Journeyman: OK, so I broke my own rule and added this show myself.  I couldn't help it!  The Time Traveler's Wife is one of my all-time favorite books, so how could I pass up a show based on it?  Ok, you got me again.  The show is not technically based on the book.  But it practically is!  I was both terribly excited and a little bit afraid to watch the pilot, because I thought it would either be the bestest show evah, or else I would hate it for not being as great at the book.  I was pleased with the pilot, although I did find myself saying things like "Hey! He's not supposed to be able to take anything with him when he time travels!  How come he has all his clothes and his blackberry?" a lot, but I'm going to keep watching.  So far I've only seen the pilot.  I know, I know... I'm so behind!

Tuesday

NCIS: I don't know why more people don't watch this show.  All you people watching CSI out there, ditch that bimbo Calleigh Duquesne (even her name is annoyingly hard to spell) and watch NCIS instead.  I heart Tony, I adore Goth Abbie, and I've even warmed up to Ziva. .

The Unit: I shouldn't like this show.  But I LOVE. THIS. SHOW.  Again, why don't more people watch it?  You've got "Bob Brown", who I still call Noel, but instead of being a dorky R.A. following Felicity around, he's a terrorist-killing black ops soldier.  HOTT.

Wednesday

Bionic Woman: This was 100% Joel's pick, but it didn't suck as much as I thought it was going to.  In fact, much to my own chagrin, I liked it.  Shoot me now, I've officially become a fan of comic book adaptations (this was a comic book... right?).  Add that to the quasi sci-fi geekdom, and I think I'm in trouble.  I can't make a true judgment call on this, though, because I've only seen the pilot so far.

Thursday

Smallville and Supernatural: I am irrationally attached to both of these shows.  They're symbolic to me.  I started watching Smallville at The Boys' House in college, before Joel and I started dating.  I watched our box set of Season 1 DVDs in our first apartment, when we'd just started working and Joel was working 16 hours a day and I was home alone with no cable, no cats, and waay too much time on my hands.  It's gotten kind of ridiculous over the past few seasons: I was PISSED when it turned out that Lana wasn't really dead because I cannot stand another pouty word out of Ms. Lang, and seriously? These kids are supposed to be in college? When to they go to school?  How does Chloe zip back and forth from Metropolis to Smallville several times a day when they're supposed to be, like, two hours apart?  And why does Supergirl have to look like a Barbie doll?  But alas, I still love it.  And I always will.   Supernatural has not been on nearly as long, but I love it just as much.  I've always loved ghost stories (Poltergeist was one of my favorite movies when I was a kid, we used to rent them for every birthday sleepover).   I really wish that they didn't have to name the brothers Dean and Sam, with Sam being Dean from Gilmore Girls, but that's a small matter. 

It's Always Sunny In Philadelphia: Love, love, love, love it.  Do you watch this?  Why not?  Who doesn't love a good comedy about a group of really stupid friends?  Every episode I try to decide whether I love Mack or Charlie more.  I can't make up my mind.  At the moment I'd say Mack, but if Charlie draws another map of the ventilation system he'll move back into first place.

Friday

Moonlight: This was another of Joel's adds, but I love me a good vampire show.  Buffy, anyone?   So far I've only watched the pilot, and I'm teetering over whether or not we'll keep it.  Like the concept, didn't so much like the reporter chick.  She looks too much like ex-ADA Serena Southerland, and it freaks my shiz out.

And it goes without saying that I'm watching all three Law and Order franchises, right?  I don't associate them with a particular day of the week because I just save them to watch when Joel isn't around.  He doesn't appreciate a fine crime drama when he sees one, which is a real shame since I have apparently turned into a sci-fi/comic book fan under his influence.

I am fully aware that some of the staples of modern American television are missing from my list.  Desperate Housewives, Grey's Anatomy, The Office... I don't know what to say.  I've never seen the former two and I really don't have any desire to get into them.  I've seen Office re-runs and I thought they were absolutely hysterical, but... it overlaps with Supernatural.  And we have the Tivo that can only record one thing at a time.  Don't tell me to watch one show live, because I just can't do that anymore.  Tivo has set me free, and I can't go back to commercials and start times. I'll just wait til it's over, order all the season DVDs from Netflix, and then lament the fact that I have no one to talk to about how awesome it is.   That's exactly what I plan to do with the Harry Potter books, too.

Shows that we tried out and ditched: K-Ville and Life.  K-Ville was OK, but there is only so much time in the day and only so much space in the cache, and it just didn't make the cut.  The guy on Life reminded me far too much of Horatio Caine, one of the most annoying TV characters to ever grace the small screen (in my book, he comes in right after Ms. Duquesne), so that got the axe after the pilot as well.

Jeebus, does that ever look like a lot of shows.  Ten hours a week.  That's like a part time job. And Nip/Tuck hasn't even started yet!  (Not to mention 24 and Lost, both of which I'm so over but I'll still totally be watching)  Well, it's a tough job, this being a TV addict, but someone's gotta do it.

Tivo tears

I watched the Gilmore Girls finale last night.   I realize I'm a day late here.  That's what Tivo does to you.  It lets you be lazy about watching TV.

Anyway, I just thought you all should know that I cried.  Joel was off at a team function, and I took advantage of my evening alone to watch some of the shows that Joel can't stand to listen to -- you know, Seventh Heaven, One Tree Hill, America's Next Top Model, that sort of thing.  Oh, SHUT UP.  I know they're bad shows.  That's why I love them.

It's been awhile since I had a good cry over a book or movie.  Well, I did shed a few isolated tears while reading 1776, but it's wasn't a good, cathartic cry.  I think the last time I had a great cry over something totally fictional was when I watched The Notebook over MLK Day weekend.  That's a long time, people! 

So, Gilmore Girls broke my dry spell.  I'm not ashamed to admit it.  I am not overly sad that the show is going off the air; I think it's time and there will always be reruns on ABC Family (which I watch every day at the gym).  But man, when Luke started planning the surprise party?  I just couldn't help it.  And then when Richard apologized to Lorelei for their past relationship?  I lost it.  By the time it became clear that Emily was trying to loan money to Lorelei so she wouldn't lose touch with her, I was sobbing.

I'm also not ashamed to admit that I am 110% in love with Luke Danes.  I defy anyone to tell me that they don't feel the same way.

24 and Prison Break: you could learn a lot from each other

Is it just me, or is prime time TV gearing up for the summer a little early this year.  We still have a few episodes left, but the plot has completely gone to hell on both Prison Break AND 24.  And according to Tivo, Heroes ain't comin' back anytime soon.

So, Prison Break.  What we still have going for us is that Michael Schofield is still smokin hot.  I am glad that during this long run from the law, he's managed to keep up with shaving his head, because last week on the Unit?  NOEL HAD HAIR.  And now I can't watch that show any more.  But other than Michael's HOTTness, Prison Break is fading fast.  First of all, where are we now?  I thought we were in Mexico, or at least Sucre and Teabag and Mr. Ex-Guard were, all chasing each other.  Now we're all in Panama.  I may just be confused about all that, because I do remember Teabag wearing a Panama hat a few weeks back.  Hmm. My real problem is Sucre is just going to die in the street from a measly stabwound, after everything he's gone through in this show?   I also have a problem with Sketchy Ex-FBI guy calling the cops to report that "two american men just shot a well-dressed Asian man" BEFORE THE ASIAN DUDE EVEN SHOWS UP. Muwahahahahaha, yes, now we know your evil plan to double cross Asian Dude.  But did you consider that now the police are on their way, and if something goes wrong, you're totally screwed?  Of course not.  This is the small screen equivalent of leaving the hero to die by locking him in a room filling with water with a bunch of angry carp with lasers attached to their heads.   Last but not least, are they really setting us up for Prison Break: Panama next season?   Well.... as long as they keep shaving Michael's head on a regular basis, I'm OK with that, I guess.

Moving on to 24, I just have one thing to say:  "At least you have your faith.  I'm still looking for mine."  I thought there could be no worse line than "I tripped over your ineptitude", but I stand corrected.  Poor douchbag guy from Division.  He tortures people at the drop of a hat, but it's just because he hasn't found God yet.  LAME.

Also lame?  A supersmart terrorist thinking he could survive by chopping off his arm with an axe and running.  Apparently, this nuclear scientist did not take biology.  Heck, neither did I, and I still realize that 1. That would hurt like a bitch, and 2. You'd bleed to death in about 35 seconds.  Unless, of course, your terrorist friends did a half-assed job of bandaging you up with a shirt.  You'd be fine then.

I'm also not really down with the "We're nuking Mysterious No-Name Middle Eastern Country", no, wait we'll wake up Palmer, we're not nuking anyone!  Wait, Palmer has lost is marbles, we're nuking them again.  Obviously we're going to nuke them, because that is just the worst idea in the history of ideas, and that's what Presidents do. On the show, I mean.

Last but not least, I think the Vice President's blond henchwoman is a Fembot.  Don't ask me why, I just know these things.

*************

In other news, I went for my W-word test yesterday and it was the most humiliating experience of my life.  Now I have to wait THREE DAYS for the results. 

What, you thought I could go a whole day without mentioning it? 

Home Sweet Tivo

Well, I made it home from New Orleans on Saturday night.  The meeting was just as much of a disaster as I thought it would be (although in ways I never could have imagined -- I'll give them points for originality), but now I'm home.  Phew.  The best part is that I think that things went SO badly that I have enough ammo to convince my boss never to work with this company again. 

Here's to hoping.

On Sunday, Joel and I spent a few hours cleaning the house.  WE are working on a new plan to share the housework more equitably, and so far it's working very nicely.  I didn't spend my entire day off on Monday scrubbing the house, and that was nice.  Instead, I ran some errands in the morning and met up with Joel at home for lunch.  Then I caught up on last week's Tivo cache, went to yoga, and took Max to his annual vet appointment.  Don't worry I'm not going to talk about that last one.  We'll just say that it was not pleasant for me, Max, or my credit card, and I have decided that these preventative visits are HIGHLY overrated.  Until they go out and get jobs with health coverage, I am hereby issuing a moratorium on vet visits.  Amen.

You know what's great about never keeping up with your Tivo cache?  You find yourself watching last week's show just in time for the new episode.   So we watched last week's Lost last night, and now instead of ruminating for a week about how in the HELL John's father ended up hog-tied in The Others' basement, we get to find out tonight!  Yet another benefit of the great and wonderful Tivo.

Oh, and, yes, Lost has sucked me back in.  I will give them another chance, since they appear to finally be tying up some loose ends and plot holes (we get to know how John became paralyzed!  And it's only season, what, 29?) and for getting some better dialog.  When "Ben" was spouting off about the magical box that can give you anything you imagine, anything your heart desires, as long as you want it badly enough?  I was gagging.  I can swallow a lot more mystical mumbo jumbo than your average girl; I am a tree-hugging, karma-embracing hippie, after all.  I'll see your island with healing powers and raise you one dinosaur that hasn't been heard from since season one.  But I don't try to pull an ace out of your sleeve by throwing in some mystical box-thing.  Oh, no, buddy.  There is a limit to my suspension of disbelief, and it's reserved for daytime soaps.  Luckily, I can continue to watch the show in good conscience, because John agreed with me.  You'd better hope that box is big enough to imagine yourself up a new submarine.

LOVE IT.

That little one-liner was only topped by the spat between Tom Lennox (possibly the worst politician in the world, lacking the ability to pull off a simple double-cross) and Karen Hayes. When Karen asked snippily if Tom got that bruise on his face by falling down a flight of stairs, instead of replying "Oh, this old thing?  st got pistol whipped by a couple of insider terrorists, that's all", he says: "I tripped over your ineptitude".

OH SNAPS!  I'm not even sure what that means, since Karen was resigned at the time, but you get points for trying, Tom. 

Note to 24 producers: I don't think I was supposed to be laughing.  But keep 'em coming, it's better than this crap about waking presidents up from comas so they can stop WWIII from starting.  Days of Our Lives called, and they want their storyline back.

OOOOOH!  SNAPS! 

I'll be here all week, people, making jokes that only I find funny about last week's television episodes.  Stay tuned.

Let's talk about TV because my brain is dead

Work is kicking my ass lately, but I just have to discuss last night's episode of 24.

Well, not so much discuss.  What I want to know is, when Jack's father was finally revealed, was I the only one who couldn't stop thinking "That'll do, pig.  That'll do."?

Seriously, HOW AWESOME WOULD IT HAVE BEEN if Phillip Bauer had said that to Graem, instead of all that lame "How could you double cross your own father" bullcrap?  "That'll do, Graem, you goddamn government conspiracy pig.  That'll do.  Seriously, you'd better shut up before your brother kills you with his teeth like he did to that other terrorist."

And what is up with the weird spelling of Graem's name?  Just in case we couldn't tell that he was a douchebag from the way he constantly wears that bluetooth headset, oh, and the fact that HE SHIPPED HIS OWN BROTHER OFF TO A CHINESE PRISON, they also had to get all hippie and spell his name all crazy-like?  I don't like it.  I don't like it at all.

Um, also... for all you Prison Break watchers (I know you all watch it, Michael Schofield has you all hypnotized too, don't lie to me), how did you like the way Fox threw their own news program in the show like that?  I thought it was totally LAME (but not unexpected from Fox); Joel thought it was better than making up a fake news program like 24 does. 

I have to go home now and drink a few glasses bottles of wine while I watch Heroes on the Tivo.

A philosophical discussion of the Gilmore Girls

I started watching 7th Heaven and Gilmore Girls at some point during college, and I hated them both so much that I actually loved watching every episode.  For me, there is a fine line between a show that just plain sucks, and a show that is so awful, whose plot line, dialog and characters are just so ridiculously unbelievable, that it's awesome.  I believe it has to do with the writers saying to themselves, "You know what?  This is TV.  It's not real.  Everyone knows it's not real.  So let's have some fun with it." 

Like, for example, soap operas. 

(Dear Lord, I am about to admit that I sometimes watch soap operas).

So I used to watch Days of Our Lives with my mom.  My mother got hooked on the show when she was pregnant with me, and we used to watch it together whenever I had a day off from school over a lunch of tuna sandwiches.  So I feel sort of a special connection with the town of Salem and all it's voluptuous, cunning inhabitants.  That being said, I got to see an episode a few weeks ago when I had the day of of work and I was at the gym at 1pm.  All I could think was, wait.... didn't they have this EXACT plot line two years ago?  LAME.  And then I changed the channel and watched My Super Sweet Sixteen instead.

As much love as I have in my heart for DOOL and that crazy Stephano, I just don't care anymore.  It doesn't matter who's got amnesia, because Marlena will hypnotize them and help them get their memory back, and it doesn't matter who's dead, because for goodness sake, PATCH just waltzed back from the dead.  The problem is, they try to make it seem real, and then they go bringing people back from the dead.  Not gonna happen, people.

I might be the first person in the history of television to make this statement, but I think Passions got it right.  If you've stumbled onto Passions during your channel surfing, you've probably wondered who slipped LSD into your Diet Coke, because holy crap, is that a monkey dressed as a baby?  Is his name precious?  And is that a MERMAID?  Why, yes.  Yes it is. 

Passions embraces the fact that it's a soap opera, and goes above and beyond the usual recycling plot line.  So Marlena was once possessed by the devil and had to be exorcised on Days?  Passions will see your exorcism and raise you one Rosemary's baby.  So you say Stephano faked his own death for the umpteenth time?  Well, Timmy, Tabitha's talking, walking doll (rest his soul) used to take breaks to make mar-timmies for everyone.  Everyone except for Teresa, of course because she was pregnant after she got knocked up by Ethan's father, and then she drugged and date-raped Ethan and pretended the baby was his, and then when she was found out, she locked Ethan in a garage and refused to let him out until he had sex with her.   Top that.

A quote for the wonderful IMDB sums it up pretty well: 

How is it that I hate this show so much, yet, at the same time, know all of the characters' names? Simply, once you're hooked, you're just like those dead fish that got dumped on Ethan. You can't stop watching this show. You keep watching because you can't understand how it can get worse and worse, every day.

Easily the most insulting, sexist, and horrible shows on TV today (and that, dear friends, is a big, bold statement.) It's all those things and, just incidentally, totally entertaining.

If you're going to make a soap opera, make it a soap opera.  Don't insult us by pretending it's "real".

All that was a buildup to my recap of Gilmore Girls, if you can believe it.

I once heard someone say "I used to be friends with her, but I really don't like the person she's become", and I thought that was pretty much the meanest thing you could say about a person.  It's worse than hating someone because they made out with your boyfriend or stole your favorite CD or crashed your car.   Think about it: I don't like the person you've become.  If someone said that to me, I would be crushed. 

I don't like the person Rory Gilmore has become.

I used to hate her for being boring, and for being so freaking smart, and for having those impossibly witty and fast dialogs with her annoying mother.  And then she went to high school, and had some real problems, and I started to like her.  And then she met Dean.  I loved Dean.  I still love Dean, now that he's on Supernatural.  I loved Jess, and I loved that Rory left Dean for Jess, because that's the kind of stuff that teenagers do.  It was real.  As real as TV can be.

And then she went to college.  I thought that Rory getting sucked into Logan's circle, stealing the boat, dropping out of Yale, not speaking to her mom for months, living with her grandparents and working for the DAR was BRILLIANT.  Brilliant.  Because that's the kind of stuff that happens in real life.  Mothers and daughters fight.  The smartest, brightest private-schooled kids sometimes drop of college.  Life gets crazy.

So, Gilmore Girls went from being one of my love-to-hate shows, along with Seventh Heaven and passions and Law and Order: Criminal Intent, and slowly it grew on me until it became a pure love-to-love show, on the level of Smallville and Supernatural, and God save me, Sex and the City. And now it seems that it has come full circle.  I watch it because I want to see how much more it can suck.  I want Lorelei to be married to Luke, not Christopher, or at the very least for the measly fight scene to have landed Christopher in the hospital or something.  I want Rory to dump Logan and stop acting like a member of the Young Aristocrats Who Are Friends With Annoying Twiggy Girls Club.  I want Jess and Dean back on the show, but only if it would not interfere with the brilliant new shows they're moved on to, because Gilmore Girls best not be messin' with my Heroes and Supernatural.  Hell, no.  GG, you can't even go there any more.

The only one I still like is Emily Gilmore, who has always been my favorite character on the show.  If she starts going soft on me, it's all over.  I'm going to have to break up with this show just like I did with Lost.

(Which means I'll still totally watch, but I won't be proud of myself).

Really, really, really, really, really, really ridiculously good-looking news

Joel and I have just completed the most productive weekend ever.  Really, who would have imagined all the things you can get done when you don't sleep until 11am every Saturday and Sunday?

On Saturday, I went to morning yoga, and Joel went to morning practice.  We then spent the afternoon moving bookcases and taping the living room, preparing to paint the other half of it.  Then Joel went to his team's annual Turkey Roast dinner, and I went off the Home Depot to buy more paint.   The evening was spent taping, and watching all the TV that Joel taped for me on Thursday when I was out taking care of babies and such.

On Sunday, we woke up bright and early and went to pick up a new couch that we'd bought.   On the way home, we stopped at Circuit City and bought a Tivo.  Then we came home, unloaded all of our purchases, set up the couch and the Tivo, and painted the living room.  Somewhere in between, I also did three loads of laundry.

Did you catch the really, really ridiculously good news? 

OMG WE GOT A TIVO!!!!!!!!!!!!!11!!1

I am still sort of in shock.  I have been dropping not-so-subtle hints about how our lives would be enriched if only we had a Tivo for the past few months.  Like, when Joel would miss 10 minutes of Prison Break because he didn't hear me yelling "It's back on!" when he was in the kitchen?  Never would have happened if we had a Tivo.  When I set the VCR incorrectly and accidentally didn't tape Battlestar Gallactica for him?  Never would have happened if we had a Tivo.  When we missed the beginning of Lost because we were driving around this god-forsaken neighborhood looking for a parking spot all night?  Never would have happened if we had a Tivo.  When we got into a fight on Saturday night because I wanted to do SOMETHING, ANYTHING BUT WATCH CARTOONS, and Joel really, really wanted to watch Naruto?  Never would have happ.... well, you get the idea.

The other day, Joel was looking at some site that lists really good internet deals (this is apparently a hobby of his, which I will now fully and unconditionally support, even if he is planning to buy an Xbox 360 on Thanksgiving Day) and he found out that Tivo was offering a rebate that allowed you to get the box for free at Circuit City.   I was skeptical, but it turned out to be for real.  You still have to pay for the monthly service, but whatever.  It's less than we pay for Netflix.  Plus, we don't pay for interenet.  I use the fact that we don't pay for internet to justify just about every purchase I really shouldn't make.  Thank you, neighbors with an unsecured wireless network, for enabling my spending.  I will send you my credit card bills.

I REALLY wanted a Tivo.  Joel REALLY loves getting a good deal.  So, there was really nothing we could do to stop ourselves from getting a REALLY good deal on a TIVO.  Come on, it was FREE!

I really think this is going to change our lives.  I am so very excited, it's almost obscene.  I can start watching Gilmore Girls again!  I don't have to stay up until 11 on Tuesdays to see Nip Tuck!  Most importantly, I can pause Heroes tonight while I'm cooking, and not miss one single second of SAVE THE CHEERLEADER goodness. 

How did we live before this again?  I really don't know.

Going on the record

I'm just going to come out and say it.  I think Lost has jumped the shark.  When it's canceled at the end of the season, you can say you heard it here first.

I have been a Lost fan from the very beginning, which is somewhat unusual for me, since I tend to jump on bandwagons that are already careening around the information superhighway at full speed.  I've seen every episode of Lost, from the very first day that poor Oceanic Air flight crashed on The Island.

And yet, I am so confused.  I have so many questions.  And because it's Friday, I'm going to go ahead and give myself permission to do the rest of this in list format. 

1. If Kate was married to that cop guy and that was after she was arrested and robbed the bank and killed her dad and became a fugitive, who is the guy who gave her the little plane toy?  Has she been married more than once?  I seem to remember her screwing over her one true love in the bank robbery.  She did rob a bank, right?  And then she was in love with Jack.  And now she is in love with Sawyer?
2. The Others are supersmart, and have all this great technology, and yet Kate can climb out of her cage in under 15 seconds -- in a dress?
3. I won't even get started on the creepy porn implications of the cameras everywhere, and Kate and Sawyer having sex IN A CAGE.
4. Are we now supposed to believe that the whole motivation behind all of The Others' actions for the past 3 seasons was getting Jack to do the spinal surgery on Ben/Henry Gale?   It didn't occur to them that 1) Jack might try to kill Henry/Ben on the operating table 2) THEY COULD HAVE JUST ASKED HIM, and avoided two seasons of kidnappings and intrigue?
5. Who is the new blond chick?  Does she have a name?
6. How many people can they kill before there is no one left on this island?  Boone (crushed by plane), Shannon (shot by Ana Lucia), the guy Ana Lucia put in the hole because she thought he was An Other, the teacher dude who got blown up, Ana Lucia and Libby (shot by Michael), Ecko (beaten to death by smoke)... All they need is to bring back Boone, and make up a story about how he wasn't really dead, he just faked his own death to go and search for Shannon, and they'll officially be stealing from Days of Our Lives.
7. Please bring back Boone.  I miss him.
8. Hell, I even miss Shannon.
9. Their semi-incestuous love affair was more believable to me than magic black smoke killing Ecko, who has previously survived a plane crash and an attack by a polar bear.
10. I don't miss Ana Lucia or Libby one bit.
11. Are they really dead?  Did Ana Lucia really kill Shannon?  Maybe it was just an illusion created by the magic black smoke.
12. MAGIC SMOKE?
13. Hey, remember Walt and Michael?  I hope that rinky dinky boat it had a really big gas tank, because this island is supposedly 1000s of miles from anything.
14. What happened to Walt's dog? 
15. How is Hurley STILL fat?
16. Let's get back to Sawyer for a minute.  He has "given up hope" because The Others revealed to him that they're on a different island.  The original island, where all his friends live, is visible, and it's not even far away.  And this causes Sawyer to give up hope of ever escaping?  He's a professional con artist.  He survived a plane crash.  He GOT SHOT IN SHARK INFESTED WATERS.  He was tortured by an ex-Iraqi soldier.  He's been workin' on the chain gang all day long, but he can't even try to swim a mile or two back to the old island?
17. What has Sayid been up to this entire season?
18. What happened to Jin and Sun?
19. Hey, wasn't that Desmond guy supposed to be clairvoyant or something? 
20. Who's the dude with the eyepatch?

What is going on? Do I even care anymore? 

All I know for sure is, if they kill off Sawyer, I am going to stop watching. I mean it.   And if they kill off Kate, I just might forgive them for all of the plot holes and red herrings.  Or maybe Sayid could just torture her or something.  Or they could brainwash her and make her less annoying.  Hey, it worked on Days.

Is this Lukah guy supposed to be the new George Clooney? NOT EVEN CLOSE.

You know, I like to think of myself as a television connoisseur.   I will admit, I watch way too much TV.  But I have a very discriminating eye.

HAHAHAHAHA!!!1!!1, you're thinking.  Because I have previously admitted to watching Seventh Heaven.  But I watch Seventh Heaven for a reason:  It's a great way to build up rage, scream at the television, and then the anger is gone.  And thus, you don't have to choke the nice man, the one who ogles you on the way to work every single goddamned day and makes disgusting comments after you've walked by, to death.*  As Dr. Phil would say, it's a constructive outlet for my anger.  At least, that's what I think he would say, but I wouldn't know because I would rather stick my entire head into the cats' litterbox -- after a weekend when I've been away somewhere and Joel has "forgotten to clean it out" for 3 days -- than actually listen to anything that Phil McGraw, PhD, has to say.  Maybe it's the fact that his surname is the same as that horrific country singer's.  Maybe it's the fact that I was once forced to watch a Dr Phil episode in my family's living room, with my mother and both of my brothers, and that the topic of this particular segment was fellatio.   Whatever.  The point is, I actually do have a modicum of taste.  Or so I like to tell myself.

So, here I am, sitting in my hotel room, watching ER.  I'm watching ER because for some reason, this very swanky hotel which gets HBO and Showtime, only gets 4 other channels and they're all playing sports.   Now, I haven't watched ER in quite awhile.  Probably not since high school.  Because in college, I discovered Law and Order, which is playing on at least two channels between the hours of 5-10pm.  And then, along came Netflix.  And also... I am more than a little bit queasy at the sight of blood.  I suck it up for Nip/Tuck, but that's totally different because Nip/Tuck more than makes up for it by frequently showcasing Julian McMahon's naked butt. 

The point is, I used to like ER.  I used to think it was a "good show." So I am struggling to explain why, in the 15 minutes I've been watching, there has been a completely idiotic "heartwrenching" scene with an old guy who refuses to take his heart medication, but then gets chauffeured into a helicopter for a heart transplant at the "Mayo clinic", followed by a helicopter crash.  Which was caused by terrorists?  I am not sure.  But it seems a little overly dramatic.  Please keep in mind that I admitted earlier that I love the soap opera called Passions.  And still, this episode was inciting the "oh, COME ON!" reflex.

And then, wait, is that UNCLE JESSIE?  Oh my god, yes it is.  Uncle Jessie, what are you doing on ER??  Did "Jake in Progress" get canceled already?  Were you unhinged over the fact that your ex wife is appearing in another blockbuster film covered in nothing but a thin layer of blue paint? 

I'm sorry.  But there are limits to how far I can stretch my imagination, and seeing Uncle Jessie in a paramedics outfit, hitting on the Indian/British chick (and didn't she use to be a DOCTOR?) is far beyond them.

I'm going to sleep.

*And also, it cracks me up every single time I see Ashlie Simpson trying to act.  And now!  Haylie Duff!!! I LOVE Hilary Duff!! But that will not stop me from mocking her older, less pretty, sister!

You just can't keep them Camdens down

You know what I don't like?  Being tricked.  Especially when the trickster is an overweight cat who I JUST HEARD SCRATCHING THE RUG, SO STOP ACTING LIKE YOU WERE JUST SITTING ON THE COUCH THE WHOLE TIME BECUASE I TOTALLY HEARD YOU.  Or, a preachy douchebag who reproduces irresponsibly and lets his son screw various D-list Hollywood siblings.

That's right.  They're back.  The Camdens. Even though they had the SERIES FINALE two weeks ago and I not only watched it when it aired the first time, but also again when it replayed the week after, just to catch all the subtle things I missed.  Was that really supposed to be Simon's baby?  And OMG the baby-mama really IS Haylie Duff!  Six more Camden children on the way?? Thank goodness it's over.

Only it's not.  They've created a new channel that is the spawn of the WB and UPN, a channel specifically for shows like 7th Heaven, America's Next Top Model, Girlfriends, Everwood, and One Tree Hill.

ABC Family, I think you have officially been replaced.  CW, here I come.

A fond farewell to the worst show on television

I don't usually watch the new episodes of 7th Heaven.  In fact, since I haven't been to the gym in the past oh, 10 or 11 weeks, I haven't even been watching the reruns that air on ABC Family at 6pm lately.  It's a sad state of affairs when you turn on the television, and see Simon getting married and think "who the hell is this Rose chick?"

Thankfully the universe had good timing, and I happened to be looking for something cheesy, yet infuriating, to watch last night at 8pm.  The series finale of 7th Heaven just happened to be on. 

The finale was pretty much everything I would have expected from a show that has been spewing  preachy sentimentalism for the past TEN YEARS.  That show was on the air for a decade.  Putting it in the same category as Friends and Seinfeld.  And Stargate SG1, as Joel is always quick to point out. 

The going back and forth and back and forth and back and forth and back and forth about whether of not the wedding was actually going to happen was enough to make a person dizzy.  The montage at the end that included that awful shot of the happy and loving Reverend and Mrs. Camden holding up their large, full wine glasses while looking lustily into each others eyes made me nauseous.  The fact that the winner of the "7th Heaven Smile Moment" was when The Grinning Idiot proposed to Lucy made me want to throw the TV out the window.  I would have expected nothing less.

I think the show would have been much enhanced if the wedding featured live music by Cecilia, who is still played by Ashlee Simpson, of course.  Could she not dye her hair back blond and put on the sweet, chaste facade for one more night?  Is she so famous now that she has forgotten where she came from?  You were getting busted buying condoms at the local drugstore with Simon before you were lip synching on Saturday Night Live, Ashlee.  Don't you forget it.

And if they couldn't get Ashlee to perform at the wedding, would it be too much to ask for a plot twist involving Jessica Biel that wasn't a dream sequence?   I'm envisioning something like this: Mary is planning to surprise everyone by showing up to the wedding (because that's the cool thing to do in the Camden family, according to Matt and his preggo wife with very curly, very shiny hair.  Even if it means not telling your family about your pregnancy until the 7th month.  And flying during the third trimester. The day before your graduation from medical school.) She's running late, so she's speeding down the pristine roads of suburban California to make it to the church on time.  And of course, she's drunk and the car is loaded up with memorabilia that she stole from a diner as a part of a hazing prank.  Just as Simon is about to reluctantly say "I do", Mary crashes her car into the front of the church, and runs over Rose.  Problem solved!  No wedding!  Better yet, maybe she could borrow one of those fighter jets from her breakout movie about the airplane that gains self-awareness and tries to destroy the world, and drive THAT to the wedding and crash it through the church.  I don't think that would be asking too much.  But apparently Jessica Biel has also forgotten her humble beginnings as the renegade daughter of the Camden family.

At the very least, the twins could have drawn something a little more inventive on their faces than mustaches.  I'm just saying.

Other gripes: Why did Ruthie's boyfriend have to look like a cross between and hippie and a child molester?  Ruthie was the only one in the whole town of Glenoak that had an ounce of sense.  When did she start DATING?  I thought that slow dancing was only appropriate for the married Camden offspring.  And "Umberto"?  Are you serious?  They couldn't come up with any other Hispanic name for their token ethnic character?  And was that baby that showed up at the end supposed to be Simon's illegitimate kid?  So it was a happy ending, because he didn't marry Rose when he in fact has a child with some OTHER random girl?  Is that what is passing for wholesome television these days? And yet they couldn't have just one Ashlee Simpson performance, and Mary got kicked off the show for posing semi-nude in Gear magazine at 17 years of age?

That sort of reasoning is akin to when the Reverend was so upset because Matt and curly shiny Sarah were having premarital sex, or at least sleeping in the same bed from time to time.  But not really, because it turned out that they had secretly married on their first date, and then staged another fake wedding so that the honorable Reverand could officiate.  Because getting married and lying to your family about it is better than having premarital sex. 

I'm almost sad that this show is off the air. How are the children of tomorrow going to learn about the wholesome values of going to church and procreating like rabbits?  What other show would dare to have a hot vixen homewrecker who is also a police officer and just happens to be named named Roxanne who seduces the Associate Pastor into commiting the deadly sin of lust (but who is really just confused and upset about her alcoholic father)?  And I'm even willing to admit, although The Grinning Idiot is the most annoying character on television, he was still pretty damn hot.   I'll miss you, Kevin Kinkirk.  I will not miss your television wife.  Goodbye and good riddance to Lucy Camden's reign of drama, poutiness, and cute pregnancy outfits. 

The Day in Numbers

Times I hit the snooze button this morning: 4

Times Max vomited before I left for work: 2

Catcalls received on way to work: 0

Hours worked at work: 8.5

Hours worked on papers: .5

Catcalls received on my way home from work: 2

Pounds of cat food purchased: 10

Quantity of feline antidepressants purchased: 30

Flowers planted: 5

Gardening accidents: 0

Piles of cat vomit stepped in: 1

Additional piles of cat vomit found throughout the house: 4

Times Max decided not to use the litterbox: 1

Value of that rubber-backed mat: its weight in gold

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And because 24 is a number, and so totally fits in with this theme (and I didn't even plan it!):

I'm saying this here as my time-stamped record -- I'm beginning to think that Audrey Raines is involved in this terrorist business.  I can't say how just yet, but there's something fishy going on Ms. Raines... how many times is she going to say "MAKE SURE YOU GET THAT RECORDING, JACK"??  She's in on it.  And I'd be willing to bet she's sleeping with Logan too.  She looks like that kind of girl.

And yet, I still have no answer to my question from last week: WHERE IS AARON PIERCE?  I don't feel all too reassured with the unstable Martha Logan on the case. 

It's unanimous -- Jack Bauer is the most desired man on the planet

I saw this on Post Secret today.  Rock on, Jack.  If only you were real.

And I'd like to retract what I said about Audrey Raines a few days ago.  Audrey, you GO GIRL.  You took that slash to the brachial artery like a champ.  I actually hope that you survive. 

On that note, WHAT HAPPENED TO MY DEAR, SWEET AGENT PIERCE?? WHAT HAVE YOU DONE WITH HIM, EVIL TERRORIST PRESIDENT?? 

God Bless America!

You didn't type in the wrong web addess and accidentally find some incredibly patriotic person who looks just like me.  Nor did I undergo a lobotomy last night -- yet still, I said it: God Bless America!   Yup, I'm the same person who doesn't believe in God and who, in the not-so-distant past has been known to say that I hate America and all the McDonald's loving, SUV-driving, "America is the best because that's what the propaganda told me to think", war-mongering people in it.  That hasn't changed.

I still hate politicians, Democrats and Republicans alike (although I probably do hate Republicans a little teensy bit more).  I still think that Team America: World Police should have won at least 12 Oscars.  But anyone who's not feeling a tad bit patriotic after last night's episode of 24 is clearly a terrorist.

Forget G.I. Joe -- Jack Bauer is like the lovechild of a drunken, one night stand between James Bond, MacGyver, and Chuck Norris.   He picks locks, commandeers police vehicles, shoots bad guys (but not to kill), programs cell-phones to self-destruct, AND he's popular with the ladies.  He's not afraid to shoot your wife in the leg to get the information he needs.  He doesn't work for CTU, heck, officially he's not even alive... and he doesn't follow anyone's rules but his own. 

It's true, I am a little bit obsessed with Jack Bauer.  But even more than Kiefer's sexy lead man, with his backstory of possibly being a deadbeat dad to his incredibly hot daughter (who is now sleeping with her pedophile psychotherapist as a result) and his home-wrecking with the Secretary of Defense's daughter, I think I am in love with Aaron Pierce.  Talk about your all-around good guy.  He may not have a trendy man-bag of tricks like Jack, but he also doesn't need Chloe to re-adjust 19 different satellites and upload the schematics for every building in the Los Angeles metro area to his PDA in order to get anything done.  When you can't trust anyone, who can you call? Aaron Pierce.  When you're driving damning evidence to the White House and you're ambushed by a van full of commandos, who will save your ass? Aaron Pierce. When President Logan issues a bogus warrant for your arrest, who will warn you? Aaron Pierce.  And to top it all off, he can keep his mouth shut about all the intrigue in order to remain close to that backstabbing President and spy on him some more.  And he's sort of hot, in that mature, pattern baldness, forehead sweat kind of way. 

I salute you, Agent Pierce, for your selfless, heroic contributions to American entertainment, in your understated, yet still kick-ass sort of way.  If things don't work out with that romantic chemistry they've been not-so-subtley writing in between you and First Lady Logan, I would be delighted to bear your children.  Call me.

*****************************************************************************************************************

UPDATE: I have just been informed by my news-hungry significant other that Kiefer has just signed a contract commiting to THREE MORE SEASONS of 24.  Maybe there is a God after all!