Sunday, July 31, 2011

A bit behind the times

So...Boehner says that we need to reduce the national debt by spending a lot less and not making any more money. Isn't that a bit like deciding to fix your family budget by cutting out food and not asking for a pay raise at work?

Furthermore, if the Republican plan is to fix the debt problem just long enough to get a new president, aren't they just setting up THEIR president. I mean, isn't the goal to make sure that we have a Republican as president in 2012? In which case, why would you want to make sure that they're going to have to be the bad guy when they have to raise taxes? Wouldn't it make more sense to let the current president raise taxes so that it can be used against him during the gubernatorial election?

I'm just saying that congress is making less and less sense. But then politics is made up of two words - poly meaning 'many' and ticks meaning 'blood sucking parasites'...Or, even better, if con is the opposite of pro, what's the opposite of progress?

Tuesday, July 26, 2011

Cleaning

I'm having a contingent of garden bloggers over to the house on Saturday. Most people spend their time leading up to the party prepping the yard (these people, after all, are gardeners). Not me. Other than watering, I'm not doing anything new to the yard, or doing anything special. Shawn will probably have an 11th hour clean up the yard frenzy (raking and mowing is my guess). But not me. Nope. Instead, I am prepping the house. Because you just know those wily garden bloggers will find a way to sneak into my extra bedroom closet and tsk about how it's not organized. Yep. That's totally going to happen.

Monday, July 11, 2011

Expedition: Watch TV

You can tell it's the summer hiatus for most of the TV shows we watch. This is mostly because we've started watching totally random shit on Hulu.com.

So far we've watched My Own Worst Enemy, Wilfred, Misfits, Love Bites and Expedition: Impossible. This, of course, is in addition to our normal summer viewing of So You Think You Can Dance, Master Chef, Burn Notice (via Hulu), Royal Pains (via Hulu) and White Collar (via Hulu). And I can't wait for Eureka and Warehouse 13 to start again (both via Hulu).

So, the summaries:
My Own Worst Enemy: A man signs up to give himself a split personality where one personality is a 'normal' guy while the other is a government trained operative (along the lines of Ethan in Mission: Impossible). But what happens when switching between the two personalities becomes uncontrollable? A decent concept, but I can also see why it was cancelled - Henry (the normal) was getting a bit whiny and Edward (the operative) was a cad. I mean I liked the show, but I ended up more interested in one of the other operatives, Tom/Raymond. (1st and only season available via Hulu)

Wilfred: A man sees his next door neighbor's dog as a man in a dog suit. It's not like Son of Sam (though the dog does egg on said man to do things - like take a dump in the jackass's boot), but it's more like the fact that we all have conversations with our animals and tend to anthropormorphise them. In this case, the dog just talks back. Oddly, if they went with a real dog and did CGI to get it to talk, it probably wouldn't work. The show is HIGH LARIOUS. The first episode is a little weak, but the second and third are capital. (via Hulu)

Misfits: A British dramedy that is similar to Heroes, but with a lot more cussing, comedy and sex. 5 delinquents are doing community service when they're caught in a freak electrical storm that gives them special powers. As they all find out what powers they have, they find that they weren't the only ones given special powers during the storm. Hijinks ensue. I like this show and find it quite entertaining - even if I can't understand what some of the characters are saying (attributed to their accents and British slang). So far there are only 4 episodes available, but I think the show is currently still on air so that means there are at least 2 more seasons of it. So it's lasted at least as long as Heroes. Available via Hulu.

Love Bites: When I first saw this title, I thought it was like Bites as in "this sucks", but no, it's Bites as in little bits. Each episode usually has 3 stories that are sometimes inter-related, sometimes not, sometimes using the same characters, sometimes not. Admittedly, the reason why I even watched the first episode was because of the title, but I actually like the show. I don't think Shawn really likes it very much (it's my new Glee, if you will). My favorite episode was the one with Kurtwood Smith as a father coming to terms with the fact that his son is gay (Episode 2: How To...). Of course, since the stories aren't necessarily told in any chronological order, nor do stories continue over multiple episodes, I could see how it would drive some people nuts...but at the same time, it also means that you don't have to watch all the episodes to know what is going on - oh sure there are recurring characters, but generally you don't have to know the whole back story on them for the little vignettes to make sense. Only downside is that it is unlikely to continue into a second season based on how much trouble it was to get the first 9 episodes aired. Currently airing on NBC Thursdays 10/9c. Also can be found on Hulu and NBC.com

Expedition Impossible: A Mark Burnet production that is like the Amazing Race on steroids. Where the Amazing Race would have the teams drive 7 miles through the Sahara, Expedition makes them walk it. Where the Amazing Race has teams wait 5 minutes before making a second guess at the clue, Expedition doesn't tell them they're wrong and lets them hike 30 minutes in the wrong direction before telling them they chose the wrong option. We only started watching this because the "Gypsies" team trained for the show by doing CrossFit. It's stronger than TAR in some aspects - makes the teams work harder to complete the leg, but it's also weak - the clue challenges are set up in a way that allows teams to piggy back on the earlier teams. Something to think about if you did the Tough Mudder... Currently Airing on ABC Thursdays at 9/8c. Also available on Hulu and ABC.com