Things to Do in Denver When You're On a Lunch Break, Part 2.

After a weekend of 80 degree warmth, the weather gods have dictated that the Denver area should start the week with rain and snow. This makes the lunch time walk a bit short. Today it consisted of a block. I brought a Turkey Burger from home and wanted to get an ice tea to go with it. This means a walk to the the local Rite-Aid. (I could go to the kitty-corner Walgreens, but during the lunch hours, the check-out lines get too long.)

Anyway, I went to the back of the store to get a diet Snapple when I heard a hub-bub of activity. It seems that the store security guard caught a shop-lifter. The police were on their way. The shop-lifter was giving the guard a hard time, but was not going anywhere. Listening to the store staff, I discovered that the shop-liftter was caught lifting mouthwash.

It reminded me of the guy I saw being carted out of the Market Street Station with an empty bottle of mouthwash in his hands. That idea is to extreme for me. I could not even imagine swallowing that stuff.

TeeVee Question #2

I know Lorelai on Gilmore Girls is a student of popular culture, but is she a Battlestar Galactica fan? She actually used "fracking" in a sentence.

I "heart" Lorelai.

"Why Don't You Put Her In Charge?"

We don't really celebrate Easter in the Buchanan household. The kids are older, so they don't need all the Easter Bunny trapping. A few chocolate bunnies and Cadbury Mini-Eggs do right by them. We are not every religious. We were Unitarian for a while until we moved. My in-laws became Born Again, and are always asking us to go to their church. (We went once at Christmas. It fulfilled an old obligation, and we don't plan on going back.) So how did we celebrate the start of spring?

We had a "Bill Paxton" Easter.

It started when The Wife and I sat to read the paper. For some, odd reason, The Wife picked up the lastest issue of Entertainment Weekly. Inside was a one-pager about the immortal actor. It gave a brief synopsis of his career; from director of the video "Fish-Heads" (Eat them up, yum!) to his defining role as Corporal Hicks in Aliens to his lead in the new HBO series, Big Love. Tis got The Wife to thinking. We had watched Big Love when we had a free HBO weekend. She wanted to see some more. Through some unnamed sources, I actually had the latest episodes. We sat down and watch two. (The one where Second Wife Chloe Sevigny throws a nightmarish birthday party, and the one where Bill takes his son hunting.) We both actually like the show; we find it kinda funny. I also think that lifestyle is way too exhausting. So instead of huntng for Easter Eggs, we watched Bill Paxton as a polygamist.

After a very early (2:00 PM) Easter dinner at the in-laws, we came home to wind-down. The Wife suggested going to McDonalds to rent a movie. Something the whole family could watch. After searching the DVD kiosk, I came home with The Greatest Game Ever Played. It's a Disney sports movie about golf; in particular the 1913 U.S. Open. Shia LeBeouf plays Francis Ouimet, a caddy who can really play, who takes on the top British player. Although on one level, it is a typical underdog sports movie, in actuality it's about how through perserverance one can actually rise above one's station. Since he was a caddy, Francis Ouimet was looked down upon by all the Upper-Crust who claimed golf as their sport. On the other side of the ocean, the top British Player, Harry Vardon (played by Stephen Dillane) is greeted with fame and fortune, but is denied membership into the Elite due to his family background. The movie is very good. Everyone liked and found it very entertaining. So what has it have to do with Bill Paxton?

He directed it.

That's how you have a "Bill Paxton" Easter.

Sleepytime Tee Vee, Part Deux

I must have needed to write about falling asleep watching the tube, to stop doing it. Ever since I posted about my condition, I've been awake through everything.

Strange. Maybe if I write about not having any money, Dame Fortune might come to visit. That's something to ponder.

Blue Flu

While sitting at my desk, trying to get some semblance of work done, The Wife called. She was hanging out at Peaberry's with Laurita and my mon-in-law. Anyway, The Wife called and asked if I knew the name of the "Sleeping Smurf." I drew a blank. I rushed to Google and Wikipedia, but it ended up that she figured out the answer herself. (Lazy Smurf)

I realized that I know a lot of geeky things. I have a ton of junk information in my head. That area could be used to come up with a cure for cancer or something. Instead I can name members of the "Legion of Super-Heroes." I discovered that I do have a deficiency. I know nothing about the Smurfs. I never watched them. I know they are blue and that there is some wizard called Gargamel. Otherwise, nothing. So if I ever get on Jeopardy, you know I'll never pick the Smurf category.

The CW: The Early Years.

Next year, the WB and UP will converge into a new uber-network called CW. There is a lot of debate on what shows from each netlet will carry over into the sleeping giant. One bit of rumor-mongering is that one night on the CW schedule will consist of Gilmore Girls, followed by Veronica Mars. When that happens you will see a veritable estrogen-fest full of snappy dialogue, snarky quips, and sullen mood swings. That will be a great night of TeeVee.

So, UPN must see the writing on the wall, and moved Veronica Mars to Tuesday nights. So a viewer can catch GG on WB and then switch over to VM on UPN. (Also Veronica was getting clobbered by Lost on Wednesdays.)

I only have one complaint. Gilmore Girls seemed like it had more commercials and less show. I could swear one break was 10 minutes long. (It had a two airings of the "First Bank, the Colorado Bank for you," in one such block.) Veronica Mars, on the other hand, was so densely packed with information, I think even the commercials had clues to the bus crash mystery. ( I have developed a theory, and other people seem to concur, but more on that later.)

I do hope that next year, there is a CW night of GG and VM. I could do with a double dose of Lauren Graham and Kristin Bell.

Sleepytime Tee Vee

First of all, let me qualify this by saying I love watching television. I think I've said before, I believe we are in a quality time for TV. I have a Dish DVR with 100 hours of recording space, and half of hard drive is filled. (Or is it half empty?) I like the shows I watch. What I don't understand is this.

I fall asleep watching most of them. At some point, while watching television, I will nod off. It tends to happen around the 9:00 PM MST hour. It can happen any time. I get all comfortable on the couch. The Wife is by my side. I watch any show, Bones, Veronica Mars, Battlestar Galactica, Gilmore Girls, whatever. At some point I will nod off. Sometimes The Wife will notice. She'll tap my arm. She'll yell my name. Other times she won't catch it unless I am sleeping through the commercials. (We usually watch shows on the DVR, so we can usually skip commercials.) I pop awake and act like I was paying attention the whole time. The Wife usually laughs at this. I end up watching the show the next day, fast-forwarding to the parts I missed. I can usually stay awake during Sit-Coms. Usually. Of course, The Wife has her own TV Ambien. All I need to do is put on Saturday Night Live or Real Time with Bill Maher and she is dead to the world.

One way to help with this issue is that I watch shows on Sunday Morning, especially shows that I have to pay attention: Lost, Veronica Mars, 24. Another way is that I will watch the shows on my lunch hour at work. Tuesdays and Thursday I can telecommute, so I can plant my butt with laptop and play TV catchup on shows I slept through the night before. Finally, I just play catch-up on the web. There are plenty of ways to do so.

Oh well, I better get going. I got two hours of Doctor Who to sleep through.

A Free Night of the Creeps

Late last year, Lawrence Jr. got a job at on the local movieplexes. He works about 20-some hours a week. He likes the job fine. Of course, the benefit is that the Buchanan family gets to get into movies free. Last week, while I was at work, he took The Wife and Laurita to see Failure to Launch. (Which was fine by me, cuz I had no interest in seeing another lame rom-com.) Me, I got my free movie tonight. Lawrence Jr and I went to see Slither. (The Wife and Laurita sayed home and rented a movie on the Dish. I think they saw Just Like Heaven. Lame Rom-Com.)

Slither is a horror-comedy directed by Kirk on Gilmore Girls brother. It stars that guy from Firefly, Betty Brant from Spiderman 1 and 2, Henry the Serial Killer and that annoying doofus that Mel Gibson needed to kill in Payback. (With special guest appearance by Pam from The Office, and voice cameo by Rob Zombie.) It's basically a 80's horror movie, the type I would see with my college room-mates at the local cineplex in Barb City.

It's a pretty simple story.

Man meets Woman. Man marries Woman. Man gets infected by meteor-riding-alien-needle-worm, and turns into a raw-meat-dog-cat-possum-devouring squid monster while still carrying a torch for the Woman. Man gets another Woman to become a breeding womb for a butt-load of red squirmies, which the red squirmies infected townspeople by going down their gullet. Other Man who likes the first Woman battles zombie-hive-mind-townspeople to save the Woman from the raw-meat-dog-cat-possum-human-devouring squid Man.

See. It's that simple.

Slither is a fun movie. The characters have some good lines. Only one is a teenager. The rest of the cast are actually actors who have personality. There are pleny of in-jokes and winks to to the horror fan. (I won't spoil them, but for me, I love the name of the Lodge in the movie.) It does remind me of the Fred Dekker classic, Night of the Creeps. Slither's director, James Gunn, said he did not know of Creeps until after his movie was done. I just chalk it up to the sub-genre of films where slimy creatures crawl into people's orifices and take them over. (The Hidden, Star Trek 2: Wrath of Khan, Fahrenheit 911)

For a free movie, Slither was pretty good. I heard that it is not doing real great at the box office. I think it will be one of those films that will have quite the life on DVD. It's the Tremors for the 21st century. People will always watch it.

TeeVee Question #1

So...

Would the Bones team be able to figure out what happened to Thumper on Veronica Mars?

A Lost Prison Break

It was all flashbacks on last night's Prison Break as we saw where everyone's background. Let see. Lincoln was a loser. Michael got his tattoo idea from a delivery person. Sucre only wanted money for an engagement ring, but was set-up by his cousin. C-Note actually is a guy with integrity. Dr. Sara was a morphine addict. Everyone's favorite T-Bag may have been turning a new leaf before getting busted by John Walsh. (I don't believe it. Theodore is just evil, which is why he is such a great, slimy character.) Most interesting is the fact every Prison Break fan knew; that the Veep's brother was still alive, and looking to be a toothless wonder.

I am not sure how they can sustain the show over a few seasons, but I'll keep watching it.

Arrested on Mars

It was great seeing George Michael and his cousin Maebe on the latest episode of Veronica Mars. It also made me a little sad. I was not a fervent follower of Arrested Development, but every episode I did catch, I would laugh out loud.

Actual, this Veronica Mars episode made me laugh out loud, too. It was during the party scene, when Veronica finally dealt with the score-keeping frat boy. The Wife and I both hooted at that.

Though not as funny as Tobias's business card.

The Light At The End...

Seems like the more you try to solve your problems, the more obstacles step in your way. We're in some dire straits in the Buchanan household. It's the type of straits where we can lose everything we worked for. We put ourselves into the situation. We will work out hardest to get out of it. I don't know why I am putting this up here, but I guess if I see the words, I can believe it