Maybe There Is Such a Thing as Too Much TV

This freaky news item reminded me that at one point in my life I was so afraid of being buried (not even alive, just plain old buried) that my wishes were to put my body in some cabin in the middle of nowhere with all of my stuff. Just in case, you know, when you die, you actually do remain sentient.

Yeah. I know. Crazy! But apparently I wasn't the only one with such thoughts.

You're Looking at Country

This week's SFist post is now up.

Read it. It's good for you!

I Miss Those Early Days When Drooling Was Socially Acceptable

Some good friends of mine had a baby last year. In the interest of privacy I won't name them or the baby, but I just needed to post this picture.

Thank god they didn't have an ugly kid.

His Own Personal Jesus

"The Book of Daniel" premieres tonight on NBC. It stars Aidan Quinn as an Episcopalian priest who talks to Jesus. (And Jesus talks back.) I'm sure there's much more to the series than that (and I believe it falls into the realm of "dramedy"--or is that "dramady"?) but it's already causing controversy, and some stations are refusing to air it.

That's reason enough to watch the pilot, methinks. (Although that whole Jesus-as-a-character thing was done pretty well on "Rescue Me" already.)

Love Him

Jon Stewart has been named Oscar host for this year's ceremony.

Gotta say, I love him, but just as I had qualms about Chris Rock, (and I think they proved to be valid) I have some qualms about Stewart. I still think an Oscar host should have some ties to the movie industry (even though Carson was a great host, granted). I also think the Oscar host should be kind of bland, which Steve Martin has always been good at (and I mean that in the best possible way.)

A lot of right-wingers are getting their panties in a twist over the choice, but come on. Did they think Rush Limbaugh was gonna be asked to host or something?

Honest to Christ

David Letterman's confrontation with Bill O'Reilly really rocked last night. Everyone's talking about their discussion of Iraq and Cindy Sheehan, but I thought the earlier bit about O'Reilly's ridiculous obsession with the so-called "War on Christmas" was much better. Letterman summed up my feelings about all that baloney perfectly with his complete boredom with the whole topic, and his opinion that O'Reilly is taking incidents that have occurred here and there, and is turning them into a National Crisis.

Here's a link to the entire interview.

Edited to add: Looks like that link isn't working right now. Maybe it's getting too much traffic. All the other clips I've found are only of the last part of the interview, but I'm sure it'll pop up on YouTube at some point today.

Sharing

This week's SFist post is now up. And if you do go and read it, could you please post a comment on it? There's nothing sadder than posting something that's basically a request for comments, and getting absolutely nothing...

Please, Tell Your Friends About This Show

One of the best things about being unemployed is being able to watch an episode of "Arrested Development" at 11pm (thanks to TiVo) while eating a late dinner of Fruit Loops (because of the lack of money. Cereal is cheap!) and then watch it again three times in a row (because you don't need to go to bed early. And because it's an absolutely hilarious episode.)

Even though I knew this episode was coming, and I had read about the "HBO" and "Showtime" jokes already, I was not suspecting the 3D, celebrity appearances, and "live" ending.

It was a completely brilliant episode and a fitting end to the series, if that is indeed the case. I know it's not on next week, but I thought there was at least one more episode in the can...guest starring Justine Bateman as Michael Bluth's previously unknown sister.

The Events of This Blog Occur in Real Time

Except when they don't.

I did end up spending the 31st (and part of the 1st) watching the 24-hour season one marathon of "24" on A&E. I'm not sure why I never watched the show back when it premiered, but I imagine it must have interfered with some other program that aired at the same time or something, so I missed the first season, and then the second, and the third, etc. The fifth season is premiering in two weeks but I don't think I have it in me to rent two more seasons, and also watch marathons of season four on A&E. Instead, I'll just slowly catch up with re-runs every Sunday night. I'm two-hours into Day Two already...

I can't say I LOVE the show, but I appreciate its gimmick. At least it's doing something different. It doesn't always succeed (the whole "events occur in real time" thing was a real stretch in season one, and I think they drop that notion by the second episode of season two, although I could be wrong about that) but I like that the gimmick, for the most part, keeps the show focused. When you need to have a story tied up in 24 episodes, and can only spend one hour a week propelling the story forward, there's no room for tangents. "Lost" is kind of the anti-"24". That show is all about tangents and flashbacks, but with "24" what you're allowed to learn about the characters can only be presented within the context of one day in their lives.

Because this is a TV show, that often means that characters will have conversations that no one would ever have in real life (especially if one were dealing with an national emergency). This is, in my opinion, the biggest problem with the show. On the one hand, it's hard to feel true compassion for a character you know nothing about yet, and on the other hand, the show's attempts to tell us about those characters often sound too much like Exposition and nothing more.

This might change with further seasons, and I am curious to see how they manage to keep Jack Bauer within the show without having the audience constantly thinking, "Jeeze! What's up with this guy? Why does he always have to get everything done in 24 hours? And after the second 24 hour emergency, why would he ever, EVER, volunteer to deal with one again?"

And I'd really like to see one season that was just an hour of him sleeping for three episodes, then an hour of him showering, eating breakfast, walking the dog. And then a couple of hours of him watching a football game or something. If only Andy Warhol were alive and directing TV...

Le Poisson, Il est Mort

My fish died on New Year's Eve. As I was taking to my bed around 3am that night, I saw that while he was indeed still floating upside down, he wasn't breathing anymore. A sad way to begin the new year, that's for sure.

Dealing with a dead pet of any kind is tough. And I'm not just talking about the emotional aspects of it. I'm talking the practical parts, too. Like, what do I do with his body? Sure, most would say "Flush him!" but he was kind of a big fish, and the last thing I want to deal with is a dead fish clogging up my toilet. The other obvious choice would be tossing him in the trash. But that just seemed so needlessly callous an option.

So, I placed him in a zip-lock bag and put him in the freezer.

Now, before you start to worry that I've gone all Jeffrey Dalmer or something, calm down. I'm not going to eat him or take him out occasionally for midnight chats. I'm just thinking about perhaps giving him a burial at sea. There's something kind of wrong about burying a fish (ashes to ashes doesn't seem appropriate when you're dealing with a creature that lived in water) hence the whole tossing him into the sea idea.

The other fish is (knock on wood) doing fine, so I don't think this one died of anything contagious. So maybe he'll make a good meal for some seal or seagull or something. That would complete the cycle of life a little better than tossing him down the garbage shoot, methinks...