Nicked

As much as I wanted to call this post chopped I equally wanted to avoid a second Cooking Channel show reference within a week despite the topic being all about related to cooking. Upon reflection, the event leading to my whine did not live up to the billing of being “chopped.”

After picking nearly a peck of unpickled fresh peppers from my garden on Saturday, I set about chopping some for the dishes I was making - chicken soup and Mexican rice. I am much the same way with peppers as the rest of the world is with bacon - everything’s better with peppers (Yes, even chocolate cake and fruit cobblers.) I can be a bit of a heat freak, but mostly, I enjoy the flavor of peppers. When you get past the idea of “oh, it burns!” the flavors in pepper make the dishes as distinct as they are.

Typical for my time cooking, I had a sports show on in the living room television that I watch from my prep station (kitchen counter). I quickly looked up to watch a purported “spectacular highlight” and I swiftly brought the knife down across the end of my fingertip, cleanly removing a chunk of nail and flesh.

I love sharp knives; the cut itself did not hurt. But in the days since, EVERYTHING that makes contact with the exposed nailless tip of my finger reminds me just how vulnerable we are when our defenses are down. Even typing - maybe especially typing - proves painful because it is my middle finger with the most popular letter on the left hand its responsibility (at least 21 poundings in this last sentence alone).

I know from experience that one must pay close attention when dealing with sharp or hot objects in the kitchen. I earned every scar on my hands and arms. Now that the surface has mostly healed and can possibly survive the flood of capsaicin from the fresh hot peppers, I need to finish preparing them for a vacuum seal that will allow me to continue using them throughout the winter months when my peppers slow production

This time I am thankful that I was only nicked as I chopped the peppers.  

And I never found the nail or the finger tip so you may want to avoid this batch of Mexican rice.

Brain Lapse

         A night after staying up well past my bedtime to watch the election coverage to its finale with the speeches of the presidential candidates, I came home from work ready for and early bedtime. As I finished my dinner and contemplated bedtime, a calendar alert went off on my phone and computer simultaneously reminding me that it was Nature, Nova, and Nova: Science Now – my favorite night of television.

         I stayed awake long enough to find out what each show was about.

         And then I went to sleep for the remainder of each one.

         This normally only happens with mindless sitcoms. But after a night being up four hours beyond my normal time, I did not have the energy to get too educated tonight.

         My brain is full from the elections.

         Maybe that is why I stayed awake for most of TMZ.

Football Confession

         I talk – too much perhaps – about how much I watch sports and enjoy them. But it is time for me to come clean. Time for me to be brutally honest with myself and everyone who knows me.

         I have the television on the games every weekend.

         I barely pay attention to it.

         I listen for unusually loud noise and then I look up for the replay.

         While I do genuinely enjoy sports, I find myself too busy doing something else – cooking, cleaning, reading, writing, Facebooking, and tweeting. I think I have lost the ability to focus on any one thing for an extended period of time. It is not that I do not want to , I just have become so used to doing many things simultaneously that my brain flits from task to task.

         When I try to slow my mind down, I go to sleep. I need to work on correcting this. Just ask my roommate. He wears headphones so he does not have to hear me snoring in my recliner. I do like sports and enjoy seeing athleticism at work on the field. I need to find some way to become better focused at it without sleep overcoming me.

 

New Season Blues

         In an effort to separate life from work – at least a little bit – I have tried to watch some of the new season of television. Since I do not have cable I have been limited to broadcast television: and once again, PBS has the only shows for which I stay awake through most of the broadcast. Perhaps it is the television snob in me. Perhaps it is because I actually enjoy learning something more than sitting for gimmie punch-lines.

         Twenty-five years ago my degree in radio-television production made me highly critical of television as an entertainment medium as I could spot every microphone shadow and continuity failure. Good writing saved some of the television shows at the time. Either shows have become much better at hiding those pesky microphones (they have become comparatively microscopic) or I have lost my eye for such things (aging does that). Sadly I have yet to find any good writing this season.

         The shows I have enjoyed most consistently have had good writing and good characters. A conversation Facebook chat with a friend of mine recently explained why I do not watch some of the shows. He was anxiously awaiting the premier of one of the popular reality shows – which I confessed to watching one time. He could not believe that I was not hooked. I summed it up with one statement, “I would not be friends with any of the people on the show.” You want reality; that’s it. The reality producers effectively craft characters from all the people participating in the show by selectively choosing which bits to air: mostly drama without the writers creating a story. Reality does not need production.

         I work with people all day long. I do not need to come home to more “real” drama. The created drama on PBS, though takes up little of the programming time and creates stories and characters I look forward to watching. Downton Abbey, Dr. Who, Call the Midwife, all have stories that captivate and characters who fascinate. Dr. Who has finally captured my attention even though it has been around, off and on, longer than I have been (continuously). The other documentary and educational programming engage my brain enough that I do a better job of staying awake than any of the laugh tracks.

         I find it fascinating that the laugh track was supposed to make it easier to laugh because the view was laughing along with others. It also helped the ignorant viewer know when a joke had been made. Despite the laugh track, I can make it through entire episodes of some of the shows I have seen this season without even breaking a smile.

         Now that I have given them a few weeks to grow on me (though I mostly slept through them – seriously they could not even keep me awake), I have reached the point of giving up on television for another season and the cable company will futilely attempt to get me back.

Reality Bites

Reality bites. But it is so addictive. For years I swore off reality television as brain numbing but then I started watching Top Chef, and because I love to cook, it was engaging and I personally was fascinated by the challenges. And then there were those few unfortunate episodes of Real Housewives New Jersey. So many people I know were talking about it, I checked it out just to see and found myself so disgusted by the entire premise of the show that I could only tolerate a couple episodes.

But as I was looking around the dial, I realized so many of the shows I watched were reality of some kind or another. The various travel channel shows - Man Vs Food, Anthony Bourdain’s No Reservations. They were all truly more reality than anything else.

I had become a fan of reality television without really realizing it. I was actually looking forward to Friday nights and Ghost Adventures. While the show is incredibly fake, the host (lead investigator) can get frightened and jump into my arms anytime.

And then along came the A-List. A couple of friends watched it and described it as a train wreck that your just couldn’t help but stare at. I made the mistake of catching a glimpse. All I can say about that is, “Bless their hearts. None of them got the sense God gave a mule.”

But coming in January is the highlight of the reality show season...

...RuPaul’s Drag Race. (Belated Happy Birthday RuPaul.)

ADRAGTED

I am almost a little embarrassed to admit this, but I am totally hooked on RuPaul’s Drag Race. As the season finale drew close last night, my cable started freezing up every fifteen seconds. Every channel had the same problem, so I know it was not something specific to Logo.

I turned off the cable box.

I rebooted the cable box.

The picture and audio still kept freezing every fifteen seconds.

Logo does not put the shows online until the next day. I was going to have to live a life of isolation, not texting or taking texts from certain friends. There would be no blogging. There would be no Facebook.

Someone might tell me who won before I had the chance to get home and watch it for myself on Logo Online.

How is it possible that a television show has done this to me? I’m not a TV person unless it is a nature special. Then again - RuPaul’s drag race is kind of a nature special. Plumage. Disguise. Relationship. Drama. It’s all right there.

Fortunately, I tried unplugging the cable box and when it came back, it finally connected to the network and everything worked correctly. The show did not disappoint - it was drag drama all the way.

My gurl Raven did not win, but I can say that I’m ready for season 3!

It's a LIGHT BULB

I rarely watch television - mostly because I find most shows to be absolutely dreadful. Still, I almost always have it on as background noise when I am home in the evening - usually Travel Channel or Discovery Channel - something that at least sounds educational (though Man Versus Food and America's Worst Driver on Travel Channel have dumbed it down significantly).

Tonight I was just settling down to Travel Channel and a beautiful nature show on Alaska and started eating a nicely grilled steak when, "snap" the picture goes out but the sound continues. The bulb burnt out (I have a rear-projection television). It was not really a stressor because I knew the bulb had a limited life-span and there is a panel that pops off the back of the set for easy bulb replacement.

I called the local big box chain appliance store where I purchased the television. They don't carry the bulbs, but there is a convenient link on the website for ordering.

Easy enough.

I know my set model and type it in.

With shipping - $219.

It's a LIGHT BULB.

Granted - it is a fancy light bulb, but it's a LIGHT BULB!

Still - it is cheaper than a new television and I almost have this one figured out after three years, so I pulled out the card.

But I keep thinking: It's a LIGHT BULB!

"Glee"ful

I have to confess that as much as I generally despise television, I have become hooked on Glee. It is one of the funniest shows with bursts of the best writing I have seen since West Wing. Most of the show is hokey, but when the writers do come up with a gem, they are at the peak of artistic creativity.

I can even suspend my disbelief that the actors are really high school students and not the twenty-somethings most of them are. To date the plot lines are weak and the character development is superficial at best, but that is all overcome when track-suited Sue Sheridan enters a scene.

While I beg the writers to improve the storylines and make all the characters as fun as Sue, I appreciate the forty-something minutes (thanks to HULU) of mindlessness the show gives me every week.

Soundly Confused

Last spring I bought the new television and have gradually experienced some of the features that come with a HDTV.

Since I'm too cheap to pay for the cable package that includes high definition broadcasts, I bought a basic hd antenna and get my high definition for free. Since I have the sound being fed from the television, I've discovered that hd broadcasts are in surround sound.

You may wonder why I am just discovering this six months later.

I rearranged the living room this weekend and am now sitting in a location.

Twice today during football games I got up to go out and check to see the rain.

It was not raining - it was crowd sounds from the broadcast.

And someone to the back right of the microphone has a REALLY annoying noisemaker. There is nothing that resembles rain there, more like some kid playing a toy trumpet outside my window.

I finally like my living room, but the new arrangement is going to take some getting used to. I'm especially going to have to get used to the sound and stop looking out the window or running to the door to see the rain.

Me and the Simpson Me

I've lost track of all the times I've said, "I never do this, but..."

This morning when I found out you can personalize your own Simpsons character, I had to do it. The movie website has an avatar creator and you can make your own Simpsons You.

I almost posed in a black tee and jeans, but was having hair issues, so went with what I already had on. I never can tell if my hair is messy enough or too messy. Whatever did combs do to become such unwelcome items in styling?

Below is the Simpsons Rusty and the Real Rusty. Can you tell which is which?

Rosie's Price

Barker’s Beauties beware.

Bob Barker endorsed Rosie O’Donnell as his replacement on The Price is Right.

Hmmm…an 83 year old lecherous man replaced by a 40-something year old lesbian. The Beauties can’t catch a break.

And since the former “Queen of Nice” left her namesake talk show, she has worked hard to lose that sobriquet. She’s done battle with publishers, The Donald, Kelli, and her co-host. Can you imagine what she would be like with some of the contestants who make the show?

I can just see it now – the announcer invites someone to “Come on Down,” and the camera pans the audience to find the person cowering down in his seat.

“Do I have to?” he asks.

“You’re the next contestant on The Price is Right!” the announcer intones.

And he does come on down for fear that Rosie will come out and bring him on down. I imagine the ratings will stay about the same, but the demographics will change.

Good Pets Gone Bad

Recently I saw a “documentary” on Animal Planet or some such channel titled: Good Pets Gone Bad! I was expecting some bad cases of cat-scratch-fever, bird flu, and dogs that wouldn’t stop going poo (my new favorite word) in the neighbor’s yard (my neighbor, I know who you are!). Instead we were treated to the rage of a bison in Yellowstone Park which didn’t want to be petted, horses in Asia fighting over a mare, a boa which ate Fifi (as Fifi’s distraught owner TOOK PICTURES to record the demise of her beloved – I don’t even want to know what she did when her husband died!), and trained fighting dogs in the ring.

Dear Mr. Producer:

I hate to be the first to tell you that bison are not pets. Neither are wild stallions, uncaged boa constrictors, or fighting dogs. Instead of Good Pets Gone Bad I suggest you do two shows and title them Stupid People Who Get Too Close to Big Hairy Beasts and Blatant Animal Cruelty.

Sincerely,

A Loyal* Viewer

*you have to say that or they think you are some nut-job.

The show had to be a documentary: you can’t write fiction like that (though you can make it a musical).

Some of the captured footage simply consisted of people defying every particle of common sense given to humanity since the Stone Age: when a big animal looks agitated, move away!

The remainder of the footage only demonstrated the cruelty man can deceive animals into doing upon one another. Dogs and cocks trained to fight to the death has no real social, cultural, or moral value; it merely exploits an animal’s natural instincts beyond nature. One of the most graphic consisted of horse fighting. Two stallions were introduced into an arena with a mare in estrus (or sprayed to smell as if she was in estrus). The two stallions would fight to the death to mate with her.

I, on the other hand – not being a horse person – could have had much more fun with the stallions and caused much less physical trauma (though they may need counseling at a later time).

For starters, I would have introduced a single stallion into the arena after spraying his butt with the estrus scent. We could have had hours of fun as he spun himself in circles trying to catch that wily mare who stayed just behind him.

Then…

…just before he was completely exhausted, I would let in a second stallion.

“Hey, baby!”

I’m guessing stallion one gets a second wind or they both get a big surprise.

And then you win a ratings bonanza with Good Pets Gone Gay.