Bastet

Oh, weird, everything I've ever read said it's set in Napa, including some Napa publication that published an article in the first season saying so far, there's nothing distinctively Napa about it. Are you sure it's Santa Rosa?

Yeah, I think Geena fits right in with the others, especially the other women, on this show in terms of general attitude. Now we just need to learn more about her personality than she's really into her religion. We got a little bit this episode with her saying as a mother, she had to go to Afghanistan to get some rest. Even just one line per episode like that will help flesh her out. And we apparently learned that Geena and D.J. intend on having only one child (because, re. Becky being pregnant, he said Mary thought she had it locked up as the baby of the family).

When time Major Crimes ended, early this year, Gus (Rene Rosado's character) was mid/late 20s (his age was never stated, but when you factor in his history and know he's about five years older than Rusty, you come up with a ballpark). I suspect Rosado is around 30, but I can't find anything that lists is age. And, of course, the actor's age only gives a clue to the character's, so we still wouldn't know. Maybe Darlene will make a joke about it.

Yeah, in terms of "Yo, you probably don't want to eat that!" notification, it's a distinction without a difference. But the nuance of which government agency is sounding the alarm (the CDC issuing an alert versus the FDA, USDA, or a company issuing a recall) and why is good supplemental information. Many media outlets are not including that, although the USA Today article linked to at least touched on it, which was kind of a pleasant surprise, since its reporting tends to gloss over details.

I'll sit in my corner alone, because this was my least-favorite episode of the season. I don't like Becky's pregnancy any more tonight than I did upon learning about it (it could be salvaged if she has an open adoption with her friends, I guess), I don't like Darlene's boss* (or job, really, but it's better than the one she has), and I wanted a lot more snark from Darlene about Becky getting knocked up. There were some funny lines, mostly from Jackie, I continue to love the Dan/Becky relationship - and I LOVE the milkshake callback - and I don't dislike the episode, but I was far less excited by it than any previous one. And at least I didn't see Gus (his role on Major Crimes) when Rene Rosado was on screen, and start reflexively yelling at my TV; maybe the fact he's speaking Spanish helps. (I wonder when/how/why Jackie learned Spanish.) *I did love, however, when he told her he was a grown-ass person and could eat what he wanted, because Darlene pissed me off in the opening scene -- Don’t tell your date what to eat. Ethical considerations with food are a fair topic of conversation, of course, but “don’t eat that, eat this” when the person is now making an informed choice is a bad look. As is firing someone for being pregnant, but I can't expect this show to get into the nuance of essential functions and accommodations.

As the article notes, no recall has been issued. But the CDC issued a food safety alert advising that no one eat romaine lettuce until they learn more about the outbreak, because so far they have not identified the common cause, so there's no way of saying, "Don't eat romaine lettuce from this farm/this region/whatever."

Allison Janney is one of those rare people who likes/is liked by most people she works with, and she also becomes - and stays - friends with a number of them. Her enduring friendship with Melissa Fitzgerald - who worked almost exclusively with her, yet for usually just one shooting day per episode - particularly warms me.

That was crazy, and the announcers commented on it -- you don't often hear two defenses given praise in a game with that score, but that really was a great defensive performance on both sides of the ball on top of the obvious offensive prowess. I'm obviously extra pleased with the outcome, but that was just a damn fine game.

That's what is tough about doing a Thanksgiving episode for a show that airs on Thursdays - you don't want to air it after, but a full week before can feel too early (especially this year, when Thanksgiving is already so early and people aren't yet in the mood). With tweaks in air dates, this episode could have originally been slated for this previous Thursday with this week a skip (airing either the first episode or the strongest episode as a repeat), or it could have been slated to air here all along if the 13-episode order was all the network ever cared about (meaning they don't care about low Thanksgiving-night ratings for a new episode affecting the overall season ratings, because they're not looking to sell a second limited-run season to advertisers in the first place). There's nothing definitive about CBS airing a new episode of this when it's airing reruns of everything else -- it could be the usual burn-off scenario, or it could be what was always planned. They're obviously producing this show more cheaply than in the original run (music licensing costs have nearly disappeared, and there are fewer sets), so a new order is still possible with the ratings, but it could also easily be done after these thirteen. I'm happy either way, as this has been really fun.

This is one hell of a game, but I cannot believe the strip for a TD that just happened - the sack was going to be one thing, but holy crap. Edited to say: Quite an answer by the Rams. This is a great game. And I have had A Day (and missed the entire first half on TV, although I did get to hear some of it on the radio), so this is just what the doctor ordered. Now I need it to end in a Rams victory.

I just got home and the game is pre-empted by football anyway - I was already annoyed by missing the first half of the game, and forgot it would air on my local channel as well as ESPN, so that I'd be missing J! too. I'll have to check for a late-night airing, but decided to go ahead and check here to see who'd done well. Claire's my number three of the group, but I'll still be perfectly happy if she wins.

It's kind of the nature of soaps; even if they don't play a character that long, you see them multiple days a week for at least a year, usually. Anyone I knew from Guiding Light is forever their GL character to me, no matter what they've gone on to do. In that same repeated exposure vein, and anyone who guest starred on a show I re-watch repeatedly is permanently that character to me (in terms of immediate and primary association, not that I actually can't watch them in another role without thinking of them as that one role) no matter how many things I'd seen them in before that role.

I normally don't mind - or, in the case of "sprinkles are for winners," outright like - the Jamie commercials, but that one with the a capella group is awful; Jamie manages to be even more annoying than the singers.

I'd only seen a few of the ones with athletes, so I had to go look that up -- textile dysfunction. It's a great parody, and, yep, I love the bathtub shot best:

Same here. And, I'd listen to it on an hour-long loop before I'd watch that "Johnsonville brats are made in the U.S.A." woman's commercial a single time. None of this is to say I like the new Honey Bunches of Oats commercial with the singing, just that the Progressive one is even more annoying and that Johnsonville one will be Exhibit A in my affirmative defense if I ever happen across that woman and punch her square in the mouth.

That was my favorite, too; that's Bandit with sacks - he eats them from inside, and then sleeps in his pile of confetti. I don't have a picture of that, but I do of my favorite thing about cats and boxes - how they squish themselves into ones smaller than they are. Here's Bandit sleeping in a shoebox lid:

Big cats like boxes too (you may want to mute; it has annoying music):

Neither is Riley, and I always tell her she's going to get kicked out of the cat club for that -- a lifetime of cat ownership, and this is the first time I've had that happen. Like @Jaded, I periodically leave a box or sack out to see if she has changed her mind.

Because networks generally don't "waste" a new episode on a night when most people either aren't watching TV or, if they are, are watching football. They usually counter-program with specials they are fine with getting lower ratings than normal for that timeslot (which is what ABC is doing) or just show re-runs of their usual Thursday programming, which is what CBS is doing with everything other than Murphy; that it's the one exception does suggest they're burning off episodes. But, at least we get the novelty of a Thanksgiving episode airing on Thanksgiving, and in my time zone the football game will be over by the time the episode airs, so I can watch it in real time.

So not only do I have to root for Washington, I have to root for an offense led by Colt McCoy. Oh, well; a Cowboys loss is always something to be thankful for, so root I shall, but that's going to be a tough one for Washington. At least the other two Thanksgiving games I can truly get into - I like the Bears and the Saints. The Giants are either going to eke out a third win in a row next week in a close, ugly game, or the Eagles are going to get so fired up about recovering from today's embarrassing loss in New Orleans that the G-Men will go back to losing in a bloodbath.

Lawrence Taylor's reaction to Theismann's injury is one of the most memorable images in football to me.

I have a realistically-functional family and a great group of friends, but Christmas is just one day in late December -- I do not want to see/hear Christmas shit when we haven't even reached our ridiculously-early Thanksgiving yet. The Christmas "season" gets longer and longer every year, and all that does is make me more bah humbug by the time we actually get to it.

So in the numerous countries without Halloween, is it Christmas season year-round? Come to think of it, I have never been out of the country in November or December. So I indeed have not experienced how early this stuff starts elsewhere, but I know it's too damn early here.

It's a two-way street; a lot of workers put in the extra effort, only to get absolutely no "reward" other than continually having extra work piled on them. Women, especially, are vulnerable to being labeled as someone it's perfectly acceptable to pile extra work on without any recognition, because her work ethic means she'll get it done despite being used in that way. Situations like this should be more common, where a good employee is respected as such, and thus motivated to go that extra mile when it's needed and she can because she's treated like a person, appreciated for her abilities, and specifically thanked (and remembered come bonus time) when she chips in elsewhere. @GHScorpiosRule, I remain glad this is such a good fit for you; yay for making it through the probationary period, and I think you'll be there as long as you want to be.

The Sainsbury's ads with Mog will always be my favorite British Christmas commercial entries, but I love that one, too; definitely my favorite from John Lewis. I am a little put off, though, by how they all react to Buster with a bit of dismay -- the kid should rush in there and join him, and the parents should be extra happy that this great surprise turns out to be an even better one than they thought, because another member of the family is just as stoked by it.