Nothing's changed, but the surrounding bullshit - that has grown.
= These have been two of the most stressful weeks at work. And it wasn't because of one or two big disasters or anything, it just felt like I couldn't breathe. It was as though no matter where I turned, there was a new problem to solve, and those problems never stopped coming. I'm sure we've all had those weeks, but that's the main reason I haven't updated. I really wish I had a better reason, but my brain almost literally goes offline the minute I leave the office. Self preservation, yo. I would like nothing more than to just run away for a week or two, but I'm not that lucky. In less than 24 hours, a new week begins. The boss is on vacation, which I would normally love (because yay! nobody looking over my shoulder!). But when so much stuff is happening, it's nice to have that support, you know?
= Apparently, today is Easter. Who knew? I haven't celebrated this holiday since Mom passed, it just means nothing to me. Pops is over at his girlfriend's place where she and her whole family are having Easter Brunch. I declined the invitation. Not really in the mood to be an incredibly sore thumb.
= Oh, Amazon. You would.
= The Obama's new dog, Bo, is made of total preciousness. And it was a gift from Senator Kennedy! It's BObama!!
eee! They gave it a lei!
= Hey, even Google's ignoring Easter. Solidarity, man. But this was posted March 20th, to mark the first day of Spring:
= If you're not sure about when your favorite TV shows end, or when other shows will be starting, CliqueClack has a great rundown here.
= So let's talk about my boyfriend, the television. It's been busy, and I feel the need to discuss it. First, some good/bad news. ABC is going to be airing the remaining episodes of Pushing Daisies (May 30), Dirty Sexy Money (July 18), and my favorite, Eli Stone (June 20)! More TV thoughts (short and long) about Dollhouse, Smallville, The Office, Life, Gossip Girl, etc.
-- I'm really looking forward to Glee (May 19) over on Fox. I think they're smart for airing it over the summer, to reel in the whole HSM tween crowd. But it looks kindof hilarious for adults. This promo is what totally sucked me in.
-- Still watching Dollhouse. Still not caring about Dollhouse. The whole fake-out "uprising" of the dolls two weeks ago? ARGH. So annoyed with that. I can appreciate that finally stuff is happening (I liked November revealing that she's a doll to Ballard), but if they're going to do episodes like that again, no thank you. And the whole Dominic is the NSA spy story.. it didn't make sense. The way I heard it, he was trying to protect the Dollhouse, so... they essentially kill him? This is fucked up on so many levels. And the real inside spy is still there? I'm assuming it's that NCIS chick programmer, but I think everyone does. The only part of the show I actually really like is Sierra/Victor and the theme song. So, yay. I don't know if even Alpha can save this. It seems like Joss is resigned to Dollhouse being over, too.
-- Smallville comes back on the 23rd, which gives me plenty of time to stew. That's never good. Hex hit me the wrong way because of the whole Chloe/Lois thing. And I don't want to be the fan that only finds the bad in the show. I can be perfectly happy with Chloe as a non-reporter and changing as she grows up, and giving up her entire life to Lois (uh oh, stewing! Lois resentment coming!), and essentially continually being a plotline punching bag... did I say I can be happy with it? Okay, well, maybe not happy. But I can accept it, as long as they don't completely ruin her. The rest of the characters? Eh, I don't care about them. They're all mythology whatever the crap. I care about Chloe, the only one whose future I don't know about. I worry about her. I worry that she'll be eaten up by the eventual LOIS AND CLARK 4EVA crap that I'm supposed to believe.
But that's "Hex" and I'm trying to move on, which the following episode helped me with tremendously. See, here's the thing about this show. I could sit here and name 5 things that were SO wrong with "Eternal," and yet all I can remember was how freakin' beautiful and painful it was. For some reason, this show has the ability to make me forget all the gaping plotholes and blatant character inconsistancies and forces me to remember the pretty, the omgz!drama! and the whole "ends justify the means" way of storytelling that they're so good at (not a compliment!). Because really, I have been known to have short-term memories about such things.
Example: When Chloe locks the basement door (from the inside? who HAS that!?), I tend to forget "HEY, CHLOE. THAT'S DUMB. GO GET CLARK. MKAY? THX." in favor of "OMG THAT'S SO AWESOME." It kicked me in the gut for a split second, which makes me forget all the logical stuff. It was just such a WOW moment for me. But I'll bring on those five (four) things...
[1] Davis. Sam Witwer is really impressive. I guess he was over at Battlestar Galactica for a bit? I never watched the show, but he's got a new fan in me. But oh, what lost opportunities! If this show were run by competent writers, can you think of how good this could've been?
First, the whole Chloe/Davis relationship could've been written to be deeper and more meaningful all season long, from the very beginning, so that the emotional punch in the gut that I *did* get when she was killing him would've hurt 100x more.
To wit, even without all that development, they still managed to make the whole Chloe/Jimmy relationship pale in comparison. Let's be honest, they should NEVER have married them off so quickly. If they had to keep Jimmy and Davis around, they could've built a truly hard-to-choose triangle between them, all while throwing her never-ending love for Clark into the mix just to make me happy. :D
[2] Because they couldn't dig deeper with the Chloe/Davis relationship, in the end, it only makes Chloe look bad. This is something I've learned to get over in watching the last 8 seasons, because character inconsistancies is just part of the Smallville package at this point. Removing her from the Daily Planet sent Chloe into this weird place where she had to find out what she wanted, and I can easily justify the Jimmy marriage by saying that she was looking for something to define her once she was stripped of her Intrepid Reporter Status, and clung to Mrs. Jimmy Olsen Status as a result. See? I can justify almost anything! It's a gift.
All of that would've been fine, if they had stuck with it. But they decide to bring Davis in, who is SO much more interesting than Jimmy and it really undermined anything and everything that Chloe seemed to want with Jimmy. Again, I say, this is where a legitimate love triangle would've been interesting. So instead of great character movement for Chloe (imo, their most valuable female character), we get Davis disappearing for episodes at a time (I understand actor contracts are the reason for these), but then they magically make Jimmy look crazy for suspecting Davis of being a murderer. Which then made it hard to believe why Chloe would believe Davis more than Jimmy. Oh, the head, it hurts. Because as a result of all of that, all we got was the big Chloe Humiliation Game in the hospital corridor. W.T.F. I swear, it makes me cry just thinking about it. It was all so wrong. And could've been done much better. That's what kills me the most about this show. The potential is there, and it just keeps underachieving.
So here we are, 2 episodes after she's kicked to the curb by her husband, and she's already having a dinner date with Davis. It just feels so very un-Chloe-like.
But again, WHATEVS. I can almost forgive ALL of that, because I get sucked into "Hey, ends? You rock. Means? Totally justified. Next?!"
[3] Oh, Clark. I love how much of a jerky, douchey, dickhead you can be. Seriously. For as much as I love your friendship with Chloe, you sure seem to rip into her on a fairly consistent basis. And for that, you are assigned a multitude of negative RAD points. Yeah, we know you're perfect in your own mind. We know you are appalled that Chloe believed the best in someone (hey, didn't that used to be your trait?! Oh yeah! Character inconsistancies! Check.). We know that you like to run Chloe's life as long as it doesn't directly get in your way, but cut her a little slack, would ya?
And yet, I can't hate him. He loves Chloe a lot, and he apologizes (sometimes) when he's been a jerk, as long as Chloe stands up for herself. But one of these days, presuming Chloe survives this season, I need him to kiss her ass, for real. Not just one of those half-hearted little apologies he does, where his "Kent Charm" gets him the rest of the way, but a real apology, a real effort, a real gesture that doesn't include getting her mind wiped for her own good. I need him to know that he takes Chloe for granted a LOT, and that if he was a better friend to her (hint, Clark, when she said she turned to Davis because he was a strong shoulder to lean on, it was a direct blast on you!), she wouldn't be having to protect someone like Davis.
[4] And that's a whole other thing. Chloe choosing to stay in the basement with Davis. I will turn this into a positive. I will turn this into... she's doing it more to protect Clark than to protect Davis. Because my head likes that better.
But seriously, she had such a hard time dumping the Kryptonite on Davis before Clark arrived. But in the split second it took for her to realize that Clark was in danger, she ran back and dumped that crap all over him, no hesitation. Of course, not knowing it would only make him stronger, but still, the decision was clear. Clark above all else. I hope that continues over the last four episodes we have coming up. There's big spoilers abound, but it's hard to piece it all together, so I'm going to shut my eyes and try and swallow the episodes we've got left.
At this point, all I care about is if Chloe and Clark end up okay, and that they're both back next season. Everyone else can DIAF for all I care. :)
And OMG, I can't believe I wrote so much about Smallville. UGH.
-- Gossip Girl. Oh, show. If you keep teasing the Chuck and Blair fan in me, I will give you up for good! As it stands, I only barely skim through the episodes while I'm doing other things, but you've tested my patience. I realize that you know that C/B are the golden goose and you don't want people to have what they want so soon. And I'm going to assume that you'll build all this crap up for the season finale, then hang that C/B carrot out there for me to nibble on, just before you throw it in the garbage disposal again. But you're on notice, GG! No more shenanigans! After this season is over, you'll be on a very short leash, and I'll have no problem kicking you out in the cold if you act up again!
-- Life. The show fell a little flat for me in season 2, they improved some stuff, but really screwed up with other things, and I wasn't really anxious to watch it lately. But someone had posted a picspam of the final scenes, and it made me want to see it, so I did just that. Watched the last ten minutes and fell in love again. GUH. When this show is good, it's AMAZING. And who doesn't just fall in love with Damian Lewis the first time you see him? Let's get that baby out of Sarah Shahi and get this show renewed so I can get my quirky little Crews/Reese team back.
-- The Office. Two new episodes this past Thursday! Wheeeee! After the longest day ever, it was so nice to come home and watch them. Kudos to the show for not wrapping up the whole Michael Scott Paper Company storyline quickly, because it was pure gold for me. So much to love! I have to do a more extensive LOVEFEST post for the two episodes some time before Thursday. "It's Britney, bitch!" But for now, a few fun things:
- MichaelScottPaperCompany.com (oh dear, I want a mug!)
- I hope you all caught the new/fake opening credits for "Michael Scott Paper Company." If not:
- And lastly, because it's awesome:
= My latest favorite LJ thing is picspams. I don't know why, I just found that I love them a lot. I like that they expose me to a lot of different shows or movies that I maybe never have given a shot without the right picspam. This month's challenge over at picspammy is Scenes and Sequences. So I've been futzing around and will be posting three scenes from various shows (Smallville, Greek, Big Bang Theory) tonight. They're my first picspams ever, so I'm nervous. But I think they turned out pretty well. I just needed something really simple to vacate mentally from my horrible week, and these fit the bill perfectly.
= I'm really excited about my two day trip to North Carolina, it'll be so nice to be in a whole different space in the world for 48 hours. I upgraded my flight to business class, because I didn't want to be shoved into the plane last. heh. I'm not much of a seasoned traveler, so any bit of mental ease is worth the money.
= I didn't mention it here, but back on April 1st, we lost another cat. Death sucks.
For the last 20 years, my family had 4 cats - Pooky, the old, cranky bitch, who died a few years back. Max, the sweet little baby boy of the bunch, who died last year. Nakomi, the pudgy little sweetheart, who died on the 1st. And Chinook, Nakomi's sister, who's still hanging in there.
That's Nakomi. She was about 16, and simply died of old age. I just happened to be upstairs at my dad's place, moving some furniture, when I heard some wheezing. I just mentioned it in passing, and asked my dad to go see what Nakomi was doing. Then all I heard was, 'oh no.' He told me to go back downstairs. He knew I'd lose it. I stopped on my way down, gave her a kiss, told her I loved her, and left. He stayed with her until she died an hour later.
I loved all the cats, I had them for most of my adult life. But as I mentioned back when both Pooky and Max died, they all belonged to my Mom. She loved them more than any of us could. So when one of them passes, yet another connection to my Mom does. And yeah, it's been 7 years, and time does heal all wounds eventually, but the stinging pain still kicks me in the ass sometimes, too.
Chinook misses her sister. And I just find myself missing my family.
= And with that ray of sunshine, I'm off to post picspams, battle the treadmill and do my laundry. Have a good week! :)
= Apparently, today is Easter. Who knew? I haven't celebrated this holiday since Mom passed, it just means nothing to me. Pops is over at his girlfriend's place where she and her whole family are having Easter Brunch. I declined the invitation. Not really in the mood to be an incredibly sore thumb.
= Oh, Amazon. You would.
= The Obama's new dog, Bo, is made of total preciousness. And it was a gift from Senator Kennedy! It's BObama!!
eee! They gave it a lei!
= Hey, even Google's ignoring Easter. Solidarity, man. But this was posted March 20th, to mark the first day of Spring:
= If you're not sure about when your favorite TV shows end, or when other shows will be starting, CliqueClack has a great rundown here.
= So let's talk about my boyfriend, the television. It's been busy, and I feel the need to discuss it. First, some good/bad news. ABC is going to be airing the remaining episodes of Pushing Daisies (May 30), Dirty Sexy Money (July 18), and my favorite, Eli Stone (June 20)! More TV thoughts (short and long) about Dollhouse, Smallville, The Office, Life, Gossip Girl, etc.
-- I'm really looking forward to Glee (May 19) over on Fox. I think they're smart for airing it over the summer, to reel in the whole HSM tween crowd. But it looks kindof hilarious for adults. This promo is what totally sucked me in.
Click to view-- Still watching Dollhouse. Still not caring about Dollhouse. The whole fake-out "uprising" of the dolls two weeks ago? ARGH. So annoyed with that. I can appreciate that finally stuff is happening (I liked November revealing that she's a doll to Ballard), but if they're going to do episodes like that again, no thank you. And the whole Dominic is the NSA spy story.. it didn't make sense. The way I heard it, he was trying to protect the Dollhouse, so... they essentially kill him? This is fucked up on so many levels. And the real inside spy is still there? I'm assuming it's that NCIS chick programmer, but I think everyone does. The only part of the show I actually really like is Sierra/Victor and the theme song. So, yay. I don't know if even Alpha can save this. It seems like Joss is resigned to Dollhouse being over, too.
-- Smallville comes back on the 23rd, which gives me plenty of time to stew. That's never good. Hex hit me the wrong way because of the whole Chloe/Lois thing. And I don't want to be the fan that only finds the bad in the show. I can be perfectly happy with Chloe as a non-reporter and changing as she grows up, and giving up her entire life to Lois (uh oh, stewing! Lois resentment coming!), and essentially continually being a plotline punching bag... did I say I can be happy with it? Okay, well, maybe not happy. But I can accept it, as long as they don't completely ruin her. The rest of the characters? Eh, I don't care about them. They're all mythology whatever the crap. I care about Chloe, the only one whose future I don't know about. I worry about her. I worry that she'll be eaten up by the eventual LOIS AND CLARK 4EVA crap that I'm supposed to believe.
But that's "Hex" and I'm trying to move on, which the following episode helped me with tremendously. See, here's the thing about this show. I could sit here and name 5 things that were SO wrong with "Eternal," and yet all I can remember was how freakin' beautiful and painful it was. For some reason, this show has the ability to make me forget all the gaping plotholes and blatant character inconsistancies and forces me to remember the pretty, the omgz!drama! and the whole "ends justify the means" way of storytelling that they're so good at (not a compliment!). Because really, I have been known to have short-term memories about such things.
Example: When Chloe locks the basement door (from the inside? who HAS that!?), I tend to forget "HEY, CHLOE. THAT'S DUMB. GO GET CLARK. MKAY? THX." in favor of "OMG THAT'S SO AWESOME." It kicked me in the gut for a split second, which makes me forget all the logical stuff. It was just such a WOW moment for me. But I'll bring on those five (four) things...
[1] Davis. Sam Witwer is really impressive. I guess he was over at Battlestar Galactica for a bit? I never watched the show, but he's got a new fan in me. But oh, what lost opportunities! If this show were run by competent writers, can you think of how good this could've been?
First, the whole Chloe/Davis relationship could've been written to be deeper and more meaningful all season long, from the very beginning, so that the emotional punch in the gut that I *did* get when she was killing him would've hurt 100x more.
To wit, even without all that development, they still managed to make the whole Chloe/Jimmy relationship pale in comparison. Let's be honest, they should NEVER have married them off so quickly. If they had to keep Jimmy and Davis around, they could've built a truly hard-to-choose triangle between them, all while throwing her never-ending love for Clark into the mix just to make me happy. :D
[2] Because they couldn't dig deeper with the Chloe/Davis relationship, in the end, it only makes Chloe look bad. This is something I've learned to get over in watching the last 8 seasons, because character inconsistancies is just part of the Smallville package at this point. Removing her from the Daily Planet sent Chloe into this weird place where she had to find out what she wanted, and I can easily justify the Jimmy marriage by saying that she was looking for something to define her once she was stripped of her Intrepid Reporter Status, and clung to Mrs. Jimmy Olsen Status as a result. See? I can justify almost anything! It's a gift.
All of that would've been fine, if they had stuck with it. But they decide to bring Davis in, who is SO much more interesting than Jimmy and it really undermined anything and everything that Chloe seemed to want with Jimmy. Again, I say, this is where a legitimate love triangle would've been interesting. So instead of great character movement for Chloe (imo, their most valuable female character), we get Davis disappearing for episodes at a time (I understand actor contracts are the reason for these), but then they magically make Jimmy look crazy for suspecting Davis of being a murderer. Which then made it hard to believe why Chloe would believe Davis more than Jimmy. Oh, the head, it hurts. Because as a result of all of that, all we got was the big Chloe Humiliation Game in the hospital corridor. W.T.F. I swear, it makes me cry just thinking about it. It was all so wrong. And could've been done much better. That's what kills me the most about this show. The potential is there, and it just keeps underachieving.
So here we are, 2 episodes after she's kicked to the curb by her husband, and she's already having a dinner date with Davis. It just feels so very un-Chloe-like.
But again, WHATEVS. I can almost forgive ALL of that, because I get sucked into "Hey, ends? You rock. Means? Totally justified. Next?!"
[3] Oh, Clark. I love how much of a jerky, douchey, dickhead you can be. Seriously. For as much as I love your friendship with Chloe, you sure seem to rip into her on a fairly consistent basis. And for that, you are assigned a multitude of negative RAD points. Yeah, we know you're perfect in your own mind. We know you are appalled that Chloe believed the best in someone (hey, didn't that used to be your trait?! Oh yeah! Character inconsistancies! Check.). We know that you like to run Chloe's life as long as it doesn't directly get in your way, but cut her a little slack, would ya?
And yet, I can't hate him. He loves Chloe a lot, and he apologizes (sometimes) when he's been a jerk, as long as Chloe stands up for herself. But one of these days, presuming Chloe survives this season, I need him to kiss her ass, for real. Not just one of those half-hearted little apologies he does, where his "Kent Charm" gets him the rest of the way, but a real apology, a real effort, a real gesture that doesn't include getting her mind wiped for her own good. I need him to know that he takes Chloe for granted a LOT, and that if he was a better friend to her (hint, Clark, when she said she turned to Davis because he was a strong shoulder to lean on, it was a direct blast on you!), she wouldn't be having to protect someone like Davis.
[4] And that's a whole other thing. Chloe choosing to stay in the basement with Davis. I will turn this into a positive. I will turn this into... she's doing it more to protect Clark than to protect Davis. Because my head likes that better.
But seriously, she had such a hard time dumping the Kryptonite on Davis before Clark arrived. But in the split second it took for her to realize that Clark was in danger, she ran back and dumped that crap all over him, no hesitation. Of course, not knowing it would only make him stronger, but still, the decision was clear. Clark above all else. I hope that continues over the last four episodes we have coming up. There's big spoilers abound, but it's hard to piece it all together, so I'm going to shut my eyes and try and swallow the episodes we've got left.
At this point, all I care about is if Chloe and Clark end up okay, and that they're both back next season. Everyone else can DIAF for all I care. :)
And OMG, I can't believe I wrote so much about Smallville. UGH.
-- Gossip Girl. Oh, show. If you keep teasing the Chuck and Blair fan in me, I will give you up for good! As it stands, I only barely skim through the episodes while I'm doing other things, but you've tested my patience. I realize that you know that C/B are the golden goose and you don't want people to have what they want so soon. And I'm going to assume that you'll build all this crap up for the season finale, then hang that C/B carrot out there for me to nibble on, just before you throw it in the garbage disposal again. But you're on notice, GG! No more shenanigans! After this season is over, you'll be on a very short leash, and I'll have no problem kicking you out in the cold if you act up again!
-- Life. The show fell a little flat for me in season 2, they improved some stuff, but really screwed up with other things, and I wasn't really anxious to watch it lately. But someone had posted a picspam of the final scenes, and it made me want to see it, so I did just that. Watched the last ten minutes and fell in love again. GUH. When this show is good, it's AMAZING. And who doesn't just fall in love with Damian Lewis the first time you see him? Let's get that baby out of Sarah Shahi and get this show renewed so I can get my quirky little Crews/Reese team back.
-- The Office. Two new episodes this past Thursday! Wheeeee! After the longest day ever, it was so nice to come home and watch them. Kudos to the show for not wrapping up the whole Michael Scott Paper Company storyline quickly, because it was pure gold for me. So much to love! I have to do a more extensive LOVEFEST post for the two episodes some time before Thursday. "It's Britney, bitch!" But for now, a few fun things:
- MichaelScottPaperCompany.com (oh dear, I want a mug!)
- I hope you all caught the new/fake opening credits for "Michael Scott Paper Company." If not:
- And lastly, because it's awesome:
= My latest favorite LJ thing is picspams. I don't know why, I just found that I love them a lot. I like that they expose me to a lot of different shows or movies that I maybe never have given a shot without the right picspam. This month's challenge over at picspammy is Scenes and Sequences. So I've been futzing around and will be posting three scenes from various shows (Smallville, Greek, Big Bang Theory) tonight. They're my first picspams ever, so I'm nervous. But I think they turned out pretty well. I just needed something really simple to vacate mentally from my horrible week, and these fit the bill perfectly.
= I'm really excited about my two day trip to North Carolina, it'll be so nice to be in a whole different space in the world for 48 hours. I upgraded my flight to business class, because I didn't want to be shoved into the plane last. heh. I'm not much of a seasoned traveler, so any bit of mental ease is worth the money.
= I didn't mention it here, but back on April 1st, we lost another cat. Death sucks.
For the last 20 years, my family had 4 cats - Pooky, the old, cranky bitch, who died a few years back. Max, the sweet little baby boy of the bunch, who died last year. Nakomi, the pudgy little sweetheart, who died on the 1st. And Chinook, Nakomi's sister, who's still hanging in there.
That's Nakomi. She was about 16, and simply died of old age. I just happened to be upstairs at my dad's place, moving some furniture, when I heard some wheezing. I just mentioned it in passing, and asked my dad to go see what Nakomi was doing. Then all I heard was, 'oh no.' He told me to go back downstairs. He knew I'd lose it. I stopped on my way down, gave her a kiss, told her I loved her, and left. He stayed with her until she died an hour later.
I loved all the cats, I had them for most of my adult life. But as I mentioned back when both Pooky and Max died, they all belonged to my Mom. She loved them more than any of us could. So when one of them passes, yet another connection to my Mom does. And yeah, it's been 7 years, and time does heal all wounds eventually, but the stinging pain still kicks me in the ass sometimes, too.
Chinook misses her sister. And I just find myself missing my family.
= And with that ray of sunshine, I'm off to post picspams, battle the treadmill and do my laundry. Have a good week! :)