Television Man

It appears that I'll need to work Friday and Saturday nights this week. Alas. One of my co-workers called this afternoon to ask if I could fill in for her while she attends a Polish lecture. I'm happy to do it, but this means I'll lose another evening-at-home with Kendra this week, and both of us need as many of those as we can get to remain even-keeled. Hrmph.

But Kendra and I did have a proper sweetie-night tonight. I attempted a pot roast for the first time, thereby earning a Donna Reed Good Housewife Point (redeemable for delicious Tupperware muffin cozies). It was a four-pound brick of partially frozen cow this morning, but by dinnertime it was fork-tender and moist and smothered in vegetables. Afterward, we watched Angel together, cuddled obnoxiously cutely on the couch with our koalas. (I feel somewhat justified now that it is clear that they are not in fact repeating the Cordy plot from last year. Ha.)

Smallville, on the other hand, is becoming steadily less interesting to me. I was intrigued earlier this season, when I thought Adam Knight was Bruce Wayne incognito, but now they're amply demonstrating that they're not at all interested in having any sort of continuity with the cooler aspects of the Superman mythos. And, gosh, is there anything Kryptonite can't do? It's become a crutch for the writers; in three successive weeks, it's been a nitro substitute for drag racers, an explosive, and now a time warp. Bleah.

In other minor annoyances, I sat down to watch the episode of Enterprise I taped tonight, and discovered that a college basketball game had run long. I now have the first 45 minutes of the exciting sweeps cliffhanger on tape. Stupid sports.

But there was some good entertainment news today. The Firefly movie is officially a go. This was one of the hands-down best SF shows on TV, just hitting its stride after eight episodes, and its early cancellation was a televisual tragedy. Now we get to see more of the story, at least. (Gotta buy those DVDs.) Also, I caught the trailer for Hellboy tonight during Smallville, and I must admit it looks awfully purty.

Hm. Now that I'm on about TV, here are the shows I actually look forward to each week:

Sunday: King of the Hill, Alias, Mythbusters, Home Movies
Monday: (nothing)
Tuesday: 24, Scrubs, Junkyard Wars
Wednesday: Angel
Thursday: Survivor
Friday: Monk
Saturday: (nothing)

That works out to about an hour a day, assuming no reruns. Perfect! However, due to inertia, I'm still watching a number of shows I don't particularly look forward to: The Simpsons, West Wing, Enterprise, Smallville, Friends, and ER. (Although The Simpsons is undergoing a surprise Renaissance this season.)

Tim Minear's Wonderfalls premieres next Friday; it's getting very good early reviews, and it's produced by a Buffy alum, so I'm hoping it will actually be good. Then again, it's on Fox, so if it's good it will be cancelled. (See also The Ben Stiller Show, My So-Called Life, Freaks and Geeks, Firefly, Futurama.)

Whine, whine, kvetch, kvetch, whine.

Swarthmore in review

One of our Scottish dance friends (the cellist in our band, and a high school junior) visited Swarthmore last week. It was initially quite low on her list, and her mom thought it was "dingy" the last time she was there; now, Cello-Gal is thinking of applying early decision, and her mom actually visited Kendra at school today to expound on how beautiful the campus was. Go Swarthmore! It'll be excellent if we can continue to see them from time to time after we leave Ann Arbor.

Now, let's hope she gets in....

Hard Sun

I update too much, don't I?

Guy Gavriel Kay is on a book tour across Canadia for his new book, The Last Light of the Sun, and is posting day-to-day anecdotes here. A sample:

Another line of thought, triggered by someone else’s art. On Tuesday, Laura and I saw Ronnie Burkett’s new show, “Provenance.” Burkett is close to royalty among modern puppeteers on this continent (google him, you’ll see what I mean). He works with life size puppetts, classic puppets-on-a-string, very small face puppets (attached by wires in front of his own head) and others. He’s mischievous, confrontatioinal (this one has its share of that), inventive, lyric. The theme of “Provenance” is a search for beauty, conducted in a Viennese brothel by a drably unbeautiful Canadian art historian named, wonderfully, Pity Beane, who chases down a painting she’s always loved in that unlikely setting. The skill, at times, is exhilarating.