Thursday, February 28, 2008

Ax Men, Really?

Okay,

I FELL for the crab fisherman show.
I was intrigued by Ice Road Truckers.

But....

Ax Men?

As in.... Loggers? Lumberjacks? Tree choppers?

I mean, it's an honest craft. I'm not saying it's easy, or safe.

But...

Ax Men?

Thursday, February 21, 2008

Top 20, Bottom 10

I totally stole this from More Gravy.

More Gravy has been blogging more because she just had another baby, and finds herself frequently trapped under her laptop, baby, and baby-mauling toddler.

But hey, I stole it, yes, what can I say, when it comes to blogs, I have no creativity. Strange, considering I'm a writer.

Top 20: in no real order

1. My kids, yeah blah blah.
2. Fitting into my one pair of size 8 jeans because it's a 'skinny' day.
3. Dr. Who, Torchwood and BSG.
4. Clean laundry room with actual clean laundry
5. Long bubbly baths
6. Early bed time for the pre-schoolers
7. Coffee and chocolate biscotti
8. Tea and tea cookies
9. Shopping by myself
10. Buffy Nostalgia (followed by Angel Nosalgia which reawakens Buffy nostalgia, it's a cycle)
11. British Comedy
12. Being home with the boys the first four (probably five) years
13. Running around the track with the boys.
14. Reading quietly while Drama Girl reads quietly
15. Waking up early enough to have coffee without interuption
16. Library trip without the kids
17. Spring weather in February
18. A good book
19. Realizing your friend across the country is on Aim at midnight and you can chat
20. Sleeping

Bottom twelve, in no particular order-- it would have been ten, but the cat required more than one slot

1. Cellulite and 'jelly belly"
2. Looking for a job after not working for five years
3. The eternal last semester of school
4. Fighting children
5. Realizing Drama Girl hasn't done her homework in a week
6. Stategically placed cat throw up
7. Cat throw up used as a Statement by the Cat
8. Knowing the cat secretly likes Hubby McRed better
9. The fake tree in my living room
10. Doing work that I may never actually get any income from
11. Lack of good television on Thursday nights
12. How fast my eyebrows grow in

Saturday, February 16, 2008

Torchwood

Right, I get why I love watching Dr. Who.

But someone please, PLEASE tell me why I can't stop watching Torchwood.

It's such an unlikely show to like, and the 'in the commercial break' explanatory interviews drive me nuts. Do they NEED to explain each plot, or character development technique? ARGH.

Yet, here I sit, watching Torchwood, and heaven forbid, if I miss it, I watch the repeat.

Friday, February 15, 2008

What, I'm not compatible with Wolverine? WTF?

So,

This is my comic hero match?

I mean, not Wolverine? Or, like, Batman?
I get a half cyborg?
I mean, he's got potent, def, but not Wolverine?

Now go find yours!

Saturday, February 09, 2008

Elizabeth the Golden Age

The one thing about On-Demand is occasionally, there's actually a move on it that I want to see.

I thought Elizabeth, the Golden Age, was one of them.
Queen Elizabeth is one of my favorite, strong female role models.

Oh I don't buy into the 'Virgin' Queen bit, I like to think she managed to sneak a guy into the sack every now and again, but that's just a minor thing, over the course of her life and accomplishments, I always admired her place in history, her politcal savvy, her smarts, etc etc etc.

So what does Elizabeth the Golden Age portray?

A love-struck woman who goes half mad over Sir Walter Raleigh, screeching in despair and loves lornless (is that even a word) throes while Spain is getting ready to attack. She cries, she whines, she pouts, and she needs a strong man to set her straight. WHAT! WHAT! Sir Walter Raleigh is the man that sets her straight? WHAT?

Oh what a nice way to take a strong woman and turn her into a wretched whiny bitter loveless hag of a shrew.

I despised that movie.

Oh, and on TOP of that, to make it worse, they put her on horseback looking like an elfin queen from the Tolkien films rather than an actual Queen.

So my review for Elizabeth the Golden Age is..... bleeeaahhhh

Thursday, February 07, 2008

Have you Checked Your Kids Math

So,

tonight, lets talk about fuzzy math. Math for people who hate math. Math that involves lots of 'in the ballparks, guesstimates, and concepts' rather tahn 2 + 2 is 4 and 2 * 2 is 4.

My Drama Girl is ADHD, with some unidentified learning disorder in math, which I'm beginning to suspect may be Fuzzy Mathitis. For years, she's been doing awful in math, and has been part of special math groups of other students who do horrible.

She came home the other day.
"How is school."
"Fine," she says, with the excitement of a canned sardine.

"How is Math?"
"Oh math? Math is good. It's easy now."
pause
Check Pulse
"It is?"
"Yeah, we are doing it a new way now."
"Really?"
"Yeah."

She then proceeds to pull out a math sheet, and perform.... MULTIPLICATION problems... the OLD WAY, the computational way, that we all learned when we were younger.

Same with division.

I am an anti new math person. I admit it.
Save the conceptualization, concepts, abstractions of math for the kids who are older. That stuff will come, but it won't come if they don't know their basic facts!

Just a thought.

Saturday, February 02, 2008

Before 19-0

Okay so

The Big Game is here, and now, we take a break from the beloved sport for... politics.

Senate looking into Spygate
Posted: Friday February 01, 2008 06:05AM ET
The ranking Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee wants NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell to explain why the league destroyed evidence related to spying by the Patriots. Senator Arlen Specter, Republican of Pennsylvania and ranking member of the committee, said that Goodell would eventually be called before the committee to address two issues: the league's antitrust exemption in relation to its television contract and the destruction of the tapes that revealed spying by the Patriots.

Now, which is the bigger issue here? And what did they not say? Oh, that the Senator is heavily backed by Comcast? No wait, the REAL issue is the league's antitrust exemption. Isn't the destruction of the tapes an internal matter within the NFL, especially since the team, and the coach, has already been fined?

Don't get me wrong, I think the spygate thing was a shame, however, I don't believe it did anything except piss the Patriots off enough to go 18-0, possibly 19-0. I don't believe it gave them an unbelievable advantage, and I'm not convinced they were the only team to do it. But, saying that, why, WHY did he destroy the tapes? I don't know. Frankly, I don't even care. It wasn't the Patriots that destroyed the tapes, it was the NFL Commissioner. I just hope it doesn't come back on the Pats heads.

Because really, I just want to watch football. And really, I'm tired of everyone hating the Patriots just because they won too much. It's not that they won too much, really, though, it's that it's not YOUR team that won that much. To which everyone yells OOOH SPYGATE, but, that doesn't explain 18-0. I read an article that says Spygate made the Pats 18-0 because of all the crap they got for doing something that, I dont think, significantly made a difference in their game.

Regardless, I just want to watch the last game of the season, and potentially the biggest game in NFL history with a potential 19-0 undefeated team, without hearing people talk about how nice it would be if Brady got hurt. Now, that there's real sportsmanship. OH MY, a team is WINNING and FABULOUS, lets hurt them? Ugh.