Bastet

Same here, for the same reason.

I am so happy for Mouse, and so enamored of her owners. They lost their daughter, saw their grandsons incarcerated, lost their dog earlier than they'd have ever expected, are dealing with health problems ... and responded to all this by driving across the country to adopt a 12-year-old pit bull who survived Katrina and spent 10 years in a kennel. People like that give me hope for humanity. Almonaster in his toddler pjs is just adorable, but his ordeal is heartbreaking. His road to recovery will be a long one, with the mental taking longer than the physical. Jay Glazer tends to bug me, but now that I know he learned the truth about pit bulls by watching this show and then adopted one of his own, I have to tip my hat to him. I never tire of hearing the story of Tatanka, because I can just picture the whole thing. Tia and all the other adults terrified these girls are about to get mauled, the girls just giggling their heads off, and the dog thrilled to have a receptive audience.

I don't think opting not to marry automatically indicates a lack of commitment (that may be it, of course, but there are also several fundamental and completely unrelated reasons a couple might choose not to marry, so without knowing anything about them, my mind doesn't jump there). Naming one's child "Chosen," however ... I have no problem judging that choice.

I needed to clear some space on my disc for tonight's episodes*, so I just watched the "Christmas" episode. I wish producers would quit making them do that shit. The timing being so obviously staged makes me hyper-focused on what else may be staged/recreated and it's very distracting. Which, admittedly, is my problem, but I really do think it's rather dumb. Have Christmas decorations as the backdrop for the talking heads and play the "from our family to yours" message at the end, and you have yourself a Christmas episode without forcing people to let production come through and string up lights, tell them they have to reference Christmas, etc. I hope Sui got to have dinner with his mom again for Christmas. *There are apparently two "looking back on memorable moments" episodes prior to tonight's new episode (the 100th episode and special after-show). It starts at 7:00 EST, but there's a Dr. Dee episode in between. So it's the recap part one at 7:00, recap part two at 9:00, new episode at 10:00, followed by a half-hour special. Anyway, yay for Gentilly! He's adorable, and the difference between his behavior in the kennel and out and about just makes you feel for all of them. I'm really glad they have that large property in the country now, and it will be great if they can eventually (if they don't already; I don't follow them in real time) have just the two facilities -- that one in the country, and the warehouse in the city. I know their adoption rates skyrocketed after the move to New Orleans since they were now a public facility in a central location rather than out in the boonies by appointment only as they'd been in Agua Dulce. And I know that for the overwhelming majority of the dogs they were happier in the warehouse than they'd been in Agua Dulce because they now have regular attention from a lot more people. But I've remained a little sad that the Tehachapi idea fell through, because it would have given them so much space when out of their kennels. So this two-location setup would seem to give them the best of both worlds, especially with how many more dogs they have in New Orleans than they did in Los Angeles.

Like both Dan and Roseanne told Jackie, at different times, that fantasy is fun for about two weeks. I think they're both really funny playing their roles, and it's nice to see the affectionate aspect of their relationship on display occasionally, like in this episode. Dan and Roseanne have been together from such a young age that Jackie is more than just his sister-in-law; she's something of a little sister to him, too (whom he finds pesky, but will protect to the death). It's interesting that Jackie is a lot more palatable playing her happy homemaker role here than she is when she tries to mold herself into the "perfect" partner for Gary (who thankfully tells her he doesn't want someone like that, and to just be herself). She knows it's fake, and temporary, so she's just having fun. When she's trying to do all this stuff she's only seen on TV after working all day, and in a real relationship, it's different.

Because they find it relaxing. I don't have any "adult coloring books," but I've been occasionally pulling out a garden variety coloring book and an old 64-pack of Crayons for about 20 years now.

That's exactly why the commercial fails for me -- his "it's what you do" scenario is being Peter Pan and thus staying young forever. But he's acting like an asshole, not a kid. Sure, a kid can be an asshole, but so can an adult; nothing about what he's doing is particularly evocative of his age versus any other age. There's too tenuous a connection between what he's doing and that the fact he's Peter Pan is making him do it to make the commercial funny to me. If he was being annoying in a way more suggestive of the age-specific ways young teenagers can be annoying, it might work, as most of the "It's what you do" commercials amuse me.

I think, "How sad, she was only 65" -- and then realize her dad was only 45 when he died and get even more bummed.

Yeah, it seems virtually guaranteed that Libeled Lady would be even better with Clark Gable, as he worked so well with all three of the other stars. But the film is so close to perfect as is, it's a little difficult for me to imagine it differently. But I do think its weak link is the Gladys/Haggerty relationship - I've no idea why she wants to be with him - so it would be interesting to see if I was invested in them with Gable in the role.

It used to mean that here, too, but I haven't heard it since the '70s.

Absolutely -- unless it's UCLA. But I'm rooting for Stanford tomorrow. Which may be the kiss of death, since I'm 0-2 in "my" bowl games so far. USC lost, OU lost ... come on Stanford, and come on Oklahoma State. My hat's off to Clemson, though, because they just outplayed OU and turned in a great game. I don't know if they're always such a physical team, but they were certainly impressive today. But now I'm stuck with a national championship I don't particularly care about. If Alabama wins, I'll root for Clemson because I don't like the SEC and I hate Nick Saban. But if Michigan St. wins, it will be two teams I don't care about one way or the other. I'll probably still root for Clemson, on the theory you want the one who beat you to win the whole thing. I'm skipping the Alabama/Michigan St. game in favor of TCM's Thin Man marathon, however. (I have them all on DVD and could just start after the game, but the marathon is my New Year's Eve tradition and it's oddly cool for it to back on TV for the first time in years. Besides, if I didn't start until after the game, I'd never make it.)

I feel about that one the same as I do about the original planned cast for Libeled Lady (with Clark Gable in Spencer Tracy's role): I love the existing casting, so would never want those movies to not have been made as-is, but I'd love some parallel universe where I can also see how they'd have come out with the alternate casts. I recently watched A League of Their Own again for the first time in some years, and did a little reading on it -- the number of actors considered (or, in at least one case, cast) for Dottie before Geena Davis ultimately won the role is a little mind boggling.

I'm sure there have been others, but I've never seen a kicker built like that before. I did a bit of a double take when he first took the field.

What the hell, Trojans? That interception was just stupid, and then a short pass on fourth and the game? I'm going to bed with a headache.

Ugh, my dad - who is from Oklahoma - must have black-eyed peas for dinner on New Year's Day. My mom and I would both rather eat our shoes. (She likes most other beans, while I have never met a bean I didn't hate.) I always spend the afternoon and evening with my parents, watching the bowl games, so we snack all day and thus my mom and I can happily skip dinner (I do have a piece of the jalapeño cornbread I make for my dad - his mom's [non-sweet, because bread is not cake] cornbread recipe plus the peppers). But those damn black-eyed peas are in the crock pot all day, stinking up the joint. I remember in the last year or two I learned via discussion around these parts that some people believe these must be consumed on the first of the year for luck, and I phoned my dad to ask if that was the basis of his family's tradition. He said no, he'd never heard that, it was just something everybody did. Then he said, "I guess you and your mom are screwed." Heh.

I'm schizophrenic with my Oxford comma use; I probably use it more often than not, but I don't always use it. I also type two spaces after a period, and will probably die without ever having made the adjustment to one. It's just too ingrained.

This has probably been mentioned in 62 pages (we're an oft-peeved bunch here, aren't we?), but: "For all intensive purposes ..." Come on.

Yes, I'd have been respectful so as to not have my ass thrown in some TSA brig, but I absolutely would be asking the flight attendants to do their job. You haven't left the gate yet -- if some entitled jackass won't obey the rules after multiple requests, they get escorted off the plane. If you don't enforce that, and ruin my flight, the company is going to hear about it. And auntlada's story illustrates my issue with taking very young children (who can't yet be reasonably expected to understand and control their behavior) on airplanes unless unavoidable -- here is a couple rightly worried about their child's ability to behave in the cinema, where they can just get up and leave if the kid starts melting down. Well, that's not an option on the plane. We're all stuck. It's not fair to do to people. And, yeah, WTF with not wanting to buckle your child into a seat. How 'bout you listen to the flight attendant who survived a plane crash, and watch her haunted face as she talks about the seated kids surviving and the lap children she, per procedure, instructed the parents to brace on the floor dying. As she talks about the shell-shocked mother saying, "You told me to put him on the floor, and now he's dead." Get that kid off your lap and buckle him/her into the seat.

We've talked here (and elsewhere) before about the awful Kit in A League of Their Own, and now I want to complain about her some more. Last night I watched the movie from the beginning for the first time in many years -- I generally catch it when it's already at least half an hour underway. They're playing some little cross-town game for their dairy's team, and Dottie tells Kit the other team's pitcher is throwing high ones no one can hit, so since Kit has a problem with those to begin with, she shouldn't swing at them. So, of course, Kit promptly ignores this and strikes out. But their team wins off of Dotty's subsequent hit. What does Kit do? Celebrate with her team? No, of course not. She whines and pouts because it was Dotty, instead of her, with the winning hit. And, of course, she only turns into more of a crybaby once they're playing professionally. I hate her. I wish she'd crawled back under a cow like Jon Lovitz suggested, because the movie would be terrific without her.

Not that I'd be any less annoyed by a disruptive child if I was in coach, but, yeah, when I'm sitting there in a seat for which I paid a lot of money or miles and you plop down with something that runs a high risk of being a noise machine you cannot shut off ... I mentally brace myself and request that my pre-takeoff drink be made a double. I understand that sometimes you have to get someplace with your child via airplane, but under optional circumstances I just don't think it's appropriate to take a child who will not/cannot behave on a plane.

I thought the eyebrow thing was involuntary, like a nervous tic or something. If he's doing that on purpose as part of his "ladies' man" persona ... yuck.

Again with the archive rather than seeing the show ... No one knowing where Good Times or The Good Wife was set surprised me (I knew Chicago for the former, and even though I've never seen the latter I had the sense it backed me up). Washington D.C. was even more surprising, given Murphy Brown. That was a top 10 hit for how long? Was this a "before your time" moment from Alex? Same with Frank Capra as the director of It Happened One Night. (Edward Albee, I knew, but wasn't surprised none of the contestants did.) No one knowing platinum as a "silvery" precious metal?! "Fend" was also surprising as a TS, but less so. "Destroyer" also surprised me. Louis XV = Orleans as a TS didn't blow me away, but I'd have thought one of them would come up with it. I blew it on the Cossacks, too, though. I came up with Wal-Mart, but might have joined the rest in not knowing it under game conditions, as the "numerically" part of the clue initially threw me off to thinking about a number in the company's name/stock symbol; just me not paying attention to the wording, but maybe their minds tripped them up in the same way. I failed on McDonald's, though. And I didn't get "convoy," associating that with trucks, not ships (damn you, C.W. McCall and Smokey & The Bandit). I also knew very little about animated movie characters (no surprise, as I've never been much into them as a whole), coming up with only Jessica Rabbit and Thumper. As for FJ, I'm a space program nut, so I instantly knew Eileen Collins as the first female pilot (and shuttle commander), but the wording of the clue did give me pause since I also knew Michael Collins did not land on the moon during that historic voyage.

Those conversations about boundaries Sean's dad claims to be having with him? Need to happen more often. Rachel is just as desperate for a partner, but she manages to speak of men as people, rather than objects, and asks their permission before touching them. Sean is just seven kinds of inappropriate. I really felt for Megan's mom at the group meeting, because right before she said she's the only one sitting there alone I had mentally noted she was the only one without a partner (and marveled that it was so -- most marriages don't last, and I would think those that result in a special needs child would have worse odds than the average, not better). Her emotion that Megan's support would come from the system rather than family was moving. I also felt for John's sisters. It's great that they regard it as a given they'll take care of John after their parents die, but I'm also really glad there are two of them to split that between. I'm always amazed how many people, especially people with kids, leave estate planning until later in life, so I shouldn't be so skeptical that these parents don't already have plans in place, but still ... I really hope this was for the show and they were talking about specifics in that meeting, not the general concept of "Gee, I should figure out who's going to care for my child and how." And with someone talking about having a trust already established, I think that was the case -- more about specific documents to guide and instruct those who'll be helping these people manage their lives when the parents are gone than the need to provide, period.

The Hillsborough one was quite interesting. I only knew the most basic details, and while I did know it resulted from improper procedures (rather than spectator activity), I had no idea all the shenanigans that went on with trying to cover that up and shift the blame. Taking - and publishing - the blood alcohol levels of the victims? Like someone interviewed in the film said, sure, you do that with a pilot, conductor, or driver in the event of an accident, but with a bunch of sports fans crushed to death? And then doing criminal background checks on everyone (or at least those whose blood alcohol levels were elevated, I can't recall)? It's disgusting, and that's before we get to altering the police officers' statements and telling reporters blatant lies about robbing victims, desecrating bodies, battering the police, etc. I'm disappointed Duck-whatever (the police "captain" [not his title, but the guy in charge]) was never punished. But at least, at long last, all the facts came out and the deaths were rightly attributed to negligence rather than classified as accidental. That coroner is a real asshole, too. What's most horrifying to me - and I'm not sure if this was in the film or just something I read - is how many people died standing up. Because I initially pictured people falling down and being trampled. But, no -- they were packed in so tightly, with literally nowhere to go, that they were crushed in between the people in front of and in back of them (or between the fences and the people behind them) and asphyxiated right where they stood.

I didn't see the show, but just checked the archive. I'm a bit surprised no one knew what's in a salty dog. I'm even more surprised busybody and septic shock were TS, and that no one could come up with arterial. I didn't know the Cannonball Express, either, though. I also started to say Oakland (for the Athletics), before my brain finally registered the barbecue part of the clue and made me actually look at the date to realize I'd skipped ahead in the team's history. So I was sympathetically embarrassed on the contestant's behalf. I've never seen Star Trek, but I knew Gene Roddenberry was the creator and I guessed Khan from the way the clue was written since that's been parodied so many times. I guessed Christopher Lloyd based on "back to the future" in the clue, but I think I'd have kept quiet if I was really playing. John Denver was an instaget for me.