Bastet

I didn't find them wary, I found them rude. If they ignored her and walked away, I'd take no issue, since she's a stranger. But once they opted to engage in conversation with her, I think they had an obligation to speak in a respectful tone. I spent the entire conversation imagining what would have happened to me had I spoken to an adult like that at their age.

I hate that this show - which stays away from several other gender stereotypes - engages in the idea that intellectual women don't have a variety of interests just like anyone else, and are in fact so out of touch they don't know the first thing about pop culture. Because Maura loves science and is knowledgeable about cultural history, she has never even heard of Lady Gaga? I couldn't stand the way those snots spoke to Maura, either. She's not hip, so the rules of common decency don't apply? Jane's rant about first-apartment decorating gave me a laugh, since the Starry Night print in my home office does, in fact, date back to my first place.

Tomorrow when it's time to vote for our favorite of whichever three episodes remain, my head might explode.

Season two is difficult, but three is impossible! This is how my thought process went, too: S2: The Host One Breath S3: Syzygy Wetwired

With three errors in a nine-word sentence, that little snippet of dialogue - "Me, her and Bobby were in the same class" - reminds me of something found in an elementary school workbook in one of those "Correct the following sentences" exercises ("She, Bobby and I were in the same class"). The TV was at the other end of the room and I was listening to the conversation around me more than the dialogue, but it was jarring enough to cut through.

Until now, I wasn't even sure if the sub-woofer of my computer speakers worked. Cool.

Isn't "black and long" a parody?

I have to drink a fifth of vodka to endure Brandon ... Oh, you meant the characters' substance abuse. I quit watching before anyone really got started, but I did see the "turbo toilet" episode where Dylan counsels David on ditching his stash. And a few of the episodes leading up to that, with David drugging himself into managing his crazy schedule. Which could have been a nuanced storyline about expectations gone out of control but, being this show, wasn't.

Although Angela was inappropriate again, at least it was in the small dose of yesteryear. Way to stereotype every teenage girl as a vapid twit with a narrow set of interests, Ma Rizzoli. Because as you know from your own daughter and her best-friend, your like-a-daughter, they're universally like that. Oh, wait ... I figured the daughter would turn out to be the opposite, and she was as precocious as she was predictable, but it beat the alternative. I like the boyfriend and wouldn't mind him sticking around casually. But, really, Maura? "My mom doesn't allow me to wear lipstick." "Well then, here, girl I've just met and have absolutely no say over -- have some lip gloss." Are they implying that crack on the lid of the toilet tank is because the person changing the handle - which attaches to the tank itself and exerts no pressure on the lid (which is removed at the time of installation) - tightened too hard? That's not how this works. That's not how any of this works. Or was there also a crack on the tank my bad eyes didn't see? I'm assuming the brass handle came from the snazzy, old-school hotel. So who's framing him? I assumed the wife, until the "he's going to kill himself" scene - if it is her, she's a good actor. But who else have we met? I need to stop having this on as background noise to which I pay only sporadic attention. I'd catch the late airing, but TNT in its infinite wisdom has decided not to provide one for its summer season finale. Good thing I got home early. Setting side Maura's contrived presence on suicide bridge (which is, apparently, the one place in Boston that has no traffic) to begin with, why did she not spend her time calling for back-up instead of standing around looking worried? And Jane jumping in after him? Come on. Summon the nearest EMT or cop on the ground, and they can help a lot more than someone who has also just done a high dive.

I'm not taken by that one, either. When I listen to anyone read Dash's work, instead of sitting there captivated, I shrug and think, "No wonder his writing career is floundering."

As Dave Zirin said, the NFL has about as much of a commitment to do something about violence against women as BP has to cleaning up the environment. The article from which I stole that quote is a good analysis of the new DV policy.

I found Charlene and Bill treacly, so I went into the "Charlene goes to meet Bill's family" storyline figuring I'd be suffering through those scenes while waiting for the show to get back to the others, but I wound up getting a huge kick out of it. I love Charlene in that episode. I also love Charlene buried up to her elbows in thousand island dressing.

I'm now finding it physically painful to choose for season three. S2: Ascension Duane Barry S3: Quagmire Syzygy

That commercial sounds awful. I can remember my mom asking my dad and me, "What do you guys want for dinner?" But it didn't mean "Each of you pick any meal under the sun and I'll make both of them." (As she liked to remind me when I didn't like what we were having for dinner, she wasn't running a restaurant.) It meant she hadn't planned anything specific yet and wanted general suggestions to spark an idea -- our answers were along the lines of "something with chicken" (actually, we'd say "chicken à la some way," because we're dorks) or "pasta of some sort." And then we'd wind up with one or the other.

I was at my parents' house last night and my mom had some crime show on in the background. A student at a well-to-do private high school said: "Me, her and Bobby were in the same class." Unfortunately, I should probably congratulate the writer for the verisimilitude.

Only on TV can carrying one candle illuminate an entire room, while scattering a hundred candles (all matching, of course) across the room causes only a moody glow.

I remember muttering at the TV during the Dan and Melissa argument, when he had his eye-popping reaction to being called a ... now I'm blanking on which slur she used -- "flamer"? ... after having found it totally appropriate to call her a "stupid bitch." She was completely out of line, of course, but having a "I can't believe she just did that!" reaction when he'd already done the same thing to her irked me.

Different songs have different costs to license, so you can assume the ones replaced when they had to re-license everything for the DVD release were expensive and the ones kept were budget-friendly. There are a lot of things one must get over in the pilot, but that's something that has really stood out to me all this time. In what school would such a broadcast not result in some administrator marching down to the booth?!

I say we just boot them both; it's the middle of the pack and thus not terribly important which order they go in.

SoapNet was willing to pony up more money than TVGN. Given how much more time TVGN cuts from syndicated programming for commercials than average, that's pretty sad. But this is supposed to be the non-show thread, so I guess this should go in the General Discussion/All Episodes thread (if we have one) or a new Music thread.

Got it -- I forgot about the weighting system. What a doof. :-)

I know it's extra work, but joelene, if you feel like doing it ... when you announce which episodes were eliminated, I'd love to see a partial voting breakdown from that round. For example, I went back and looked at the round that knocked out Humbug, because I was stunned so many people would vote for it. But, really, only three people did - Dod Kalm got four votes, Humbug three, Colony and Little Green Men two each and then a few episodes got one vote each. With so few people voting, I find the breakdown interesting. So, since you're tallying anyway, maybe you could note how many votes each eliminated episode got (and any close runners-up)? In case I'm not the only one interested, here's how the last round broke down: Colony went out with four votes and Little Green Men with two (although it looks like End Game also got two, so I may have miscounted). The Blessing Way and Apocrypha each had four votes take them out, while Piper Maru went out on three votes. 731 was a runner up with two votes.

I wouldn't be surprised if market research indicated Bayer had done such a good job of promoting its aspirin as a means of reducing one's heart attack risk that many consumers today thought of it only in that sense and largely forgot about it when considering pain relievers. But, yes, the commercial is awful for the way that idiotic passenger speaks to the flight attendant as if she's wholly unfamiliar with the English language.

September is a good month on TCM this year. "Friday Night Spotlight" features pre-Code films (including several of Myrna Loy's, so I'm doubly happy) and includes two airings of the Thou Shalt Not documentary my satellite decided to crap out 10 minutes into last time. Melvyn Douglas is Star of the Month for the first time. (Which leads to another airing of The Americanization of Emily, for those who missed it during the James Garner memorial marathon.) As previously noted, the Lauren Bacall tribute planned for her 90th birthday has been expanded to a 24-hour memorial marathon. The "Projected Image" series focuses on the Jewish experience on film. "Essentials" includes several musician biopics, and there is also some Hitchcock, a mini-marathon of '40s crime dramas, a Richard Linklater introduction, a tribute to the Telluride film festival, and quite a few more goodies in this month's mix.

Add Gilmore Girls and this is me. All are shows I skipped the first time around, thinking, "No thanks; maybe if I was fifteen." All are shows other discerning adults have recommended to me in the intervening years. And all are shows I tried and thought, "Not even if I was fifteen."