Archive for May, 2010
Oh how the stars have aligned..
Oh, what a terrible position we, the die-hard Pittsburgh Penguins fans are in. We find ourselves in a position of who do I personally hate more. Specifically, I am talking about the Stanley Cup Finals between the Chicago Blackhawks, and the Philadelphia Flyers.
Rule number one of being a Penguins fan, you must hate with every fiber of your being the Philadelphia Flyers, and let me just say the Flyers do not make it hard for us to do that. I mean biting, Hartnell? Really? But anyway, the Flyers have made it to the Stanley Cup finals, how they made it I don’t know, but they did, and I must not root for them. But..
Rule number one of being a Pittsburgher, is if someone talks shit on the Burgh, or slights the Burgh, you must hate them for ever and ever and ever, and I mean really hate. Hate like really having to think about hitting the brakes if you are barreling down the road and Sienna Miller is standing in your path.
So you hate the Flyers as a team, not necessarily hating any one member of the team (although,..Hartnell) and not wishing particular harm on them, but as a whole.. hate them. Persons who have wronged THE BURGH, real personalized hate, got it?
Okay, so here is the problem. While I have no hatred for the Chicago Blackhawks, and actually love the city of Chicago, they have one person on their team that makes it IMPOSSIBLE for me to root for them, MARIAN HOSSA. As we all know Marian Hossa has personally wronged, and talked shit on the Burgh, and this is of course completely unforgivable. So now I find myself in a quandary, I have to root for one, so whom shall it be? How can I justify as a Pittsburgher, and a Penguins fan rooting for either of these teams? And why must the universe put me in such a position?
Well, I feel like some one who has personally wronged the Burgh trumps a team rivalry, so I have opted to root for the Philadelphia Flyers. With the understanding that I want Marian Hossa destroyed personally. So far Hossa has pulled the following shit: 2 years ago, he played with the Penguins to win a cup, they didn’t win, so he went to Detroit to play with the Red Wings to win the cup. Last year the Penguins won the cup, so Hossa did not win a cup with Detroit, so in order to try to win the cup this year he has gone to Chicago to play with the Blackhawks. If he doesn’t win with them this year, I am hoping he will become a curse. So please Philly, I never ask you for anything, please destroy this douche bag fool, and make him a curse. That would make me so happy that I feel like we could be friends for a minute, probably during the off-season.
Let me tell you another person who is walking down the path to eternal hatred by all Pittsburghers, Ben Roethlisberger. He’s definitely got a front row ticket on my bus to the sun, but that’s a whole different story. We’ll crack that open in another post.
So, even though it pains me to my soul to say it,
Go Flyers! Beat Hossa!
What I saw in my FlashForward…
Well damn, another one of my shows has been officially cancelled. FlashForward has been shit canned, which sucks for me cause I was pretty into the show. This is not the first time one of the tv shows I watch has been cancelled, sometimes it is understandable, and sometimes you can see it coming a mile away. FlashForward specifically, I kind of saw coming. Mainly because ABC screwed with the show from the get-go, and it was destined to fail because of it. But the networks have burned me before I tell you. Let me tell you the story of a little show called “Vanished”.
Vanished, was a Drama/Mystery/Thriller on Fox back in 2006. It was an interesting little kidnapping show, in that people are trying to find out who kidnapped a lady and get her back, and catch the kidnappers. So everything was cool until episode 9 when they killed the main character for some bat shit crazy reason. Episode 10 airs people realize that they really did kill him off and it wasn’t a dream, nor is he coming back. Then, Fox yanks it, mid-season, episode 11, 12, and 13 never aired. After much bitching on the part of the fans, Fox agrees to for a short period of time put the last 3 episodes on their website for fans to watch. Mid season, 3 episodes left, never going to air them, that’s BRUTAL.
What sucks the most about FlashForward getting cancelled is that this is yet another show that for me will have no ending. I hate it so much when Networks do this, you get all into the story, characters and the show, you hang on with the plot try to figure out whats happening and whats going on, and then BAM, cancelled. Now you are never going to know how it ends, or the answers to all the questions. Not being a fan of the show Lost, I can only imagine how those folks feel. But at least they got some answers over the years, FlashForward lasted one season. Which really felt like two because it took like a 6 month hiatus in the middle of the first season, brilliant planning on that one ABC.
The show had a pretty cool premise, and it was nice to not see another Medical Drama, Crime Drama, or Reality Show. Because let me tell you, (to all the tv exec’s that are totally reading my blog daily) Medical Dramas are way too plentiful, and I for one have been ruined for Medical Dramas because of ER. I watched ER for all 15 years it was on. Now let me polarize that statement by telling you I am 30 years old. I watched ER for HALF MY LIFE, and it was a great show. So you’re not going to replace that show for me, I am over Hospital Dramas. Now I know other people love them and all that, so keep making them, but make them good and make them in fewer numbers. Though truth be told, I love me some Nurse Jackie but the description of that is a Dramedy, so I am still technically telling the truth.
Crime Dramas.. Meh. You know what used to be cool about Crime Dramas? They used to have characters that you would care about, and the show would be more about the characters than what crime they were solving. Somehow, somewhere this got switched to the show being almost all about the crime part of the story, and the actors story is superfluous to the show. So that if you miss an entire season, or a few weeks or what have you it doesn’t matter at all, you’re really not missing a beat. That sucks and that is not what I am looking for. If all I care about is the crime aspect of the story, then I will go watch anything Bill Curtis is narrating or something on the ID channel.
Reality Shows make me cringe. I mean its funny to me that they are as popular as they are. When the Writer’s strike happened a few years back, we knew it was coming. I read something funny at one point a few years back, saying something to the effect of, you better like game shows and reality shows or go ahead and sell your tv now. I mean it was no secret that game shows and reality shows are cheap and easy to produce, and no one writes them so get ready to see shit tons of them. But whats surprising to me is that people love them still. I mean what Reality Show can they put on tv that you haven’t already seen at this point? So why are we still entertained by this? I don’t know, I guess some of them are okay, but as a whole I am not a fan.
Ok, here’s my point, network television sucks, as I scroll through my DVR settings I realize more and more I am getting away from network television. Mainly because their programming isn’t competing for my attention the way it used to. Cable networks and Premium channels have way better content, and can afford to pay more for the programming they produce. Plus, it is really starting to seem like actors and actresses are beginning to gravitate more to Cable and Premium channel programing, probably for a million different reasons, but I think because overall the shows are better.
The networks just keep shooting themselves in the foot. The whole Conan/Leno thing this year, the news affiliates screaming their heads off about it, but their worst problem is that they are training the public to wait out the shows at this point. What I mean by that is, it looks more and more like it’s not worth getting into a show until it has a season or two under its belt. You can actually afford to do that these days with Netflix, On Demand, and Hulu, it’s not terribly hard to watch a few seasons of a show so that you can get into a show well after it started.
So now it’s not worth investing the time in getting into a show in its first season. How are the networks going to change this public perception? I don’t see it happening, all I see is crappy programming in a revolving door getting regurgitated over and over again. In the spirit of the show I will tell you what I saw in my FlashForward… More reality shows that make me want to shove crayons into my brain to make myself stupid, a la Homer Simpson.
Think twice my friends, think twice before you offer to be the nice friend who accompanies someone to the Doctors office. Maybe it was always this way, but I don’t remember it always being this bad. I mean everyone has had a bad experience at the Doc’s Office or two, and I myself have had many. But my trip yesterday with my good friend has taught me another lesson I will not soon forget. So severe the lesson, I made a mental note at one point of my more than FIVE HOURS in the waiting room, to move far away before my parents start to require these kinds of long ass Doctors Visits. Because I do not want to get sucked into this kind of time suck vortex again.
I mean shit, I even came prepared, I brought a text-book for a class I am working on and thought, there’s no way I will even get done what I am supposed to, so I won’t need anything else. PFFT! I must’ve been smoking crack to even think that. Now, in no way was this visit to the Doctor supposed to be a quick in and out thing, I knew that going in. But hot damn! Seriously more than 5 hours was completely unnecessary, and at one point the place was freaking packed, every seat was taken, and people were standing. Now, also you should know, this was not some strip mall Doctors Office, this was at the HOSPITAL. One of the UPMC hospitals to be more specific. And I am not even knocking UPMC, that is so not the point, I am not even knocking the Doctors Office. I am telling you this as a cautionary tale my friends.
If you feel compelled to be nice, then please be prepared for the life sucking vacuum you are walking into. If you do not feel compelled to be the nice friend, then you are better off! Go with plan B.
I hate you cell phone Voicemail.
I am convinced that Voicemail (on a cell phone) was sent here only to enrage me. I hate it, and I promise you that if there was a way I could turn the damned thing off, I so would, and my life would improve greatly. I think that I have learned to hate Voicemail mainly because so many people are too stupid to use it correctly.
Stupid person misuse number one: “Hi this is (insert name here), call me back”.
Ok, so you called me on my cell phone. My cell phone has caller ID. I know you called me. Now, you have forced me to call my voice mail and waste seconds of my life to hear you say that you called me, which I already know. And, you ask me to call you back. Well, I presumed that you wanted to speak to me regarding something, which is why you called, so one would only think since there is something you wanted to discuss, I should call you back.
Stupid person misuse example number 2: Hey, blah blah blah for 5 minutes, never get to the point, just pointless rambling, blah blah blah. Call me back.
So now you want me to call you back after you blathered on and on about nothing on my Godforsaken Voicemail because you either have nothing better to do with your time, or you are physically unable to get to your point. Fantastic, I totally look forward to our upcoming conversation. P.S. thanks for wasting 5 minutes of my life.
Stupid Person Misuse Number 3: Waiting until after the voicemail message until it is in the recording phase to hang up. So now you have just left me a message of you hanging up. Brilliant. Now I get to call my voicemail to hear your phone click. If you’re going to not leave a message (which I prefer by the way) hang up before it starts recording. How about that?
Now let me say, if you are going to use the Voicemail for its intended purposes, to leave me a poignant message that requires no return call because now I have all the pertinent information. Then by all means please feel free to leave me a voice mail. If that is not what’s going to happen, don’t even think about it. Because I am not ashamed to tell you, Voicemails have absolutely lead to the dissolution of some personal friendships. So, if you can not handle this Voicemail responsibility, hang up quickly before it starts recording, it may save our friendship. Rest assured, I will somehow psychically know to call you back.
