Zella

Choosing where they'll go with a dart. LMAO

I definitely understand! I've also wondered about their travel. I have friends who travel a lot--and I live vicariously through them--but it involves a lot of saving and strategic planning. I can't see these jackasses having an itinerary or any intelligent planning on what they want to see and do abroad.

They're not sheltered country boys. I mean, they may be sheltered, but they don't live in the sticks. They live on the outskirts of one of the largest metro areas in Arkansas, alongside over half a million other people. As someone who actually does live in a rural part of the same state, it really irritates me when they act like "golly gee shucks I live in Mayberry." I know it's not the same as living in a huge city, but it's also not like they're living in a town where you can count all the stoplights on one hand and are guaranteed to run into people you know every time you're at Walmart and have a long drive to get to anything.

I love your cat's name!

Dirty Diaper

That was my breaking point too. At a certain point, I just refused to believe that anyone would willingly spend time with Sheldon.

Yeah this is what I did for years, on the off-chance something I wanted to see was on there. I finally cancelled it at the beginning of the year. I've not missed it.

Carl Weathers dying has bothered me more than any celebrity death in quite a while. I first saw him in Predator. He was great at drama and action, but his comedy stuff in Happy Gilmore and Arrested Development is what I always default to with him. I think his run on Arrested Development playing a cheapskate version of himself is one of my all-time favorite guests bits on a show. I quote him from there all the time. 😂 And per the showrunner, that direction for the "character" was all Weathers' idea!

I love Julian's reaction to being scolded for that. "Well, you know, hindsight is a wonderful thing, isn't it?" LOLOL

That is one of my absolute favorites too! The chaos is superb. I also love what a criminal turn of mind Fanny has. 😂😂😂😂😂 I don't think 3 aired on CBS. Because one of my favorite episodes is in that season, and I was looking forward to hearing people's thoughts, which never happened. (Unless I missed something.) It seems like CBS dumped it after season 2, which is just dumb to me. They could have easily fit in all 5 seasons before they start showing the American version's newest season, IMO.

I've watched a lot of SVU over the years--though not anything recent--and I always was mystified at how both Stabler and Benson still had jobs.

I had that experience with Little House on the Prairie on whatever I watched it on a couple of years ago. It was very annoying and distracting.

Yes I agree he's great sycophant inner circle material. LOLOL

I don't think Jeremy has the wherewithal to emerge as a MacArthur replacement, though I don't doubt he fancies that for himself. Jeremy strikes me as someone who's very desperate to be liked, which I doubt is a great personality trait for playing MacArthur version of Game of Thrones, and he also lacks the charisma or gravitas that you'd need for that. A bit of a diversion, but I think the same principle applies. I once read an insightful interview with an author who's written about a lot of cult figures, and he was asked about the difference between Charles Manson and Jim Jones. He basically said Manson was too much of an overtly off-putting weirdo to appeal to anyone but a couple of dozen disaffected outcasts. Jones at the height of his power could and did manipulate very affluent, intelligent, well-educated people and maintained a sizeable congregation. I think Jeremy is likewise too much of an off-putting weirdo to ever appeal to enough people to achieve replacing MacArthur. That's not to say MacArthur himself isn't an off-putting weirdo himself. I coined the term Hateful Old Fuck for him a few years ago for a reason. 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣 But he does seem to have enough people believing he's not an off-putting weirdo to be successful at his purpose. Jeremy just radiates desperation and off-putting weirdo, and in the past, pastoring one church seemed like too much work for him. I don't see him growing enough to suddenly be able to rule MacArthur's empire.

I never get the impression Jeremy actually is interested in the things he bandies around. He would actually probably be more interesting as a person (even as a pretentious one) if he had hobbies he genuinely liked, but the vibe I've always gotten from him is he wants the attention from the persona rather than any sincere interest. He also reminds me a lot of this:

I'm pretty sure that there is an intentional fire set on the prairie for him to collect insurance money in the book. I personally thought there was some dark humor in the scene as the agent posing as an insurance guy realized during the conversation that the fire they're watching is an act of fraud against the very policy he sold Hale. It basically underscores how greedy Hale is and how bold he is in undertaking his schemes. He'll acquire a policy and turn around and commit fraud on it within weeks of purchase because he assumes he can get away with it. Insurance fraud is also a recurring issue in the story, from the harebrained car theft scheme to the very sinister manner in which Hale acquired insurance on Henry Roan Horse before killing him. It's basically part of a pattern to the family's crimes.

I think it makes sense within the context of the real Pa apparently making a lot of poor financial decisions, to the point he wasn't above fleeing in the middle of the night to avoid paying debts. It would have been an interesting facet to explore of Pa being a beloved husband and father by his family but, as to quote my Granny, "unable to manage a setting hen." I don't think Landon was interested in depicting that, though, because it would have made him less of an idol. So, we get the consequences of his bad decisions while skirting around the causes.

I thought this was an interesting interview with Jason Isbell, who played Ernest and Mollie's brother-in-law Bill, and some of the behind-the-scenes stuff is interesting. https://www.gq.com/story/jason-isbell-just-another-actor-with-a-night-job I found it especially amusing that the dialect coach told him that because of his naturally heavy Alabama accent, he didn't have any notes for Isbell and he could just talk the way he normally did. But then de Niro was apparently standoffish with Isbell for a few days because he thought he was method-speaking to get into character until he realized Isbell really does just sound like that. LOL

And within context of the entire post, that parallel is clearly not the case.

It's actually just a nickname for him. They did call him that, but his name was James, per the book.

I'm not following your interpretation. It's a book club system administered by the state's library system that libraries can opt-in to. It's not mandatory to participate, and it's hardly the only access to reading these people have. If you are part of it, you get to rank your preferences for future books, but you are the mercy of them handling logistics of or dozens of other library-affiliated book clubs. They're not censoring what people are reading, but you're warned up front that new books in high demand are not guaranteed until they have some age on them and that you are at the mercy of other people returning their books to the system in time for them to come to your group. It can be amusingly inconvenient at times, as my anecdote illustrated, but it's hardly Orwellian or sinister. In fact, it actually is a wonderful resource for small, poor libraries that may not be able to regularly afford buying a dozen copies of relatively new literary-ish fiction a month for their book club.

I have such a hard time seeing him agreeing to the dancing lessons to begin with, given how sullen he's been over over things. Sadly, I could see this reasoning checking out.

I think they're more strategic with what they select now to ensure it's a wider variety that's coming, regardless of how the state schedules it. They've not complained about it in a while. I wondered if the state had multiple book clubs ready to revolt. 🤣🤣🤣🤣

The book club at my library is ultimately administered by the state library system, so the book club attendees get to select titles they find interesting, but the actual decision on what is read and the order they come in is controlled by the state. I don't attend, but I work when they meet and I always like eavesdropping on their meetings. They had one run where it was months of the world's most depressing WWII novels on end. They were all ready to crack. LOL

I've never gotten over her shouting at the old guy in Gold Country while she is trespassing on HIS property. I never could like her after that, though several other later episodes considerably lowered my opinion. What an insufferable brat.