fox

Television – Someone Shoot Me

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Someone shoot me – there is a handful of TV shows that are just too stupid to keep watching, and they keep getting dumber and worse… but I cannot stop watching them.

The worst of the bunch is The Following. I cannot even describe how this descends into ever-greater stupidity. I never liked Kevin Bacon much, and this does not help. The FBI in the show is made up of bumbling idiots who are always about ten steps behind the criminal mastermind of the show. But the criminal mastermind/cult leader is actually just as stupid. Everyone is stupid. And totally unlikeable. And the only remotely interesting part (but not enough to keep watching) is questioning how it is that all these people are brainwashed (or something?) enough to follow along with this cult leader. The words that signal stupidity, more than anything else, are some variation of, “Let’s not do anything stupid.” Or “We need to be smart here.” This always signals that they are already knee-deep in the boiling shit of stupidity. No show is better at sending this signal than The Following.

But right up there on the list – Helix. I wanted to like it and kept trying to – but I hate the show. Nothing changes that.

Likewise, I am none too impressed with the repetitive crap inflicted by shows like Grimm but I keep watching.

I did at least finally cross The Crazy Ones off my list of weekly viewing, but I need to force myself to mark these other crappy shows off the list, too. I need to refer to the “Fuck, yes” rule when watching tv as much as I do about every other aspect of life. Lukewarm reception – don’t waste any more damn time!

Meanwhile I have been enjoying the crass and mullet-filled nonsense that is Eastbound & Down. It is rather funny in this politically incorrect, some other section of society way. But then I realize I have actually known people who are not too terribly different from Kenny Powers, the dubious anti-hero of the show. The show has a varied and quite stunning soundtrack.

Not including or to be confused with the Jerry Reed song that shares the same name as the show.

Loads of other TV viewing but don’t really feel like chronicling the stuff that was actually decent.

Seahawks + Dodging Deer = Another Commute

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This morning/middle of the night made for an awful commute. During the first third of the drive, the roads were clear, but every kilometer or so, I encountered big groups of deer playing in the road. I must have seen 100 deer in about 100 kilometers. I also saw a rabbit, which I have never seen around here, and two foxes. This winter, strangely, has been mostly devoid of moose. It occurred to me that my driving amounted to little more than dodging deer, which would not be a bad name for a video game. I got to use the whole road, just as the Seattle-based 1990s comedy sketch show, Almost Live encouraged Ballard drivers to do. You pay taxes on the whole thing – randomly weave all over the road!

On the second third of the road, most of it was covered with ice that had been covered over by snow. So many cars were off the road and so many tow trucks were pulling the cars out. The whole thing made me not only not want to drive but made me think seriously about the merits of living somewhere warmer – Hawai’i once more? Australia (perhaps much too warm)? Uruguay?

Thanks to the middle-of-night driving, I did not get to see my Seattle Seahawks win against the San Francisco 49s in their playoff game. It sounds like the Seahawks did not play at their best in the first half, so I know I would just have been getting angry and sick watching it anyway. By the time I was done driving the first two-thirds of the seemingly interminable three-hour commute and stopped off at a petrol station in Uddevalla, the Seahawks had claimed their place in the Super Bowl (versus the Denver Broncos). All kinds of mentions of it are going around the internet already – but it seems funny that the two places in the entire US to pass laws making recreational marijuana legal are the two places that send their football teams to the Super Bowl.