The Amazng Jay

So, I just came back from the store…

This afternoon, in an effort to assist my lovely wife in the hectic baking frenzy in the T minus countdown to “Celebration Sydney ‘07,” I took the task of baking the cakes that would be decorated to suit the theme tomorrow. Today the cakes bake and then have overnight to cool before the icing artistic extravaganza begins. I am no stranger to baking, or cooking really, although I rarely do either while at home. Being unfamiliar with some of the fancier tools of the trade found in our cabinets, my first mistake was adding flour to the greased pans. I had no idea that the special magical cake grease already contained flour, so I washed the pans and began again.

I also made the mistake of reading on in the instructions until the second cake was already mixed, prompting the question, “How important is it that the cake goes immediately into the oven after it is done mixing?” Turns out, that is important, and having only one oven and 25 minutes to go, I should have read on.

This evening, before we retired for the evening, Liz picked up the yellow cake, which she had strategically stacked on top of the chocolate cake pan to find that the chocolate cake had risen more than she thought, leaving a small oval of chocolate cake stuck to the body of the first pan. This is not a big deal, because to level the cakes, the top rounded part is cut off anyway. Liz was showing me the chocolate on the bottom of the pan, when I cautioned, “Careful not to turn that over too far.” And I put my hand up to indicate that I didn’t want the yellow cake to fall out of the cake pan. Her reply, “Oh, you really think you greased the pan that well?” To which I replied that I did indeed feel that my second attempt at greasing the pan was more than sufficient.

A few minutes later, I stepped around the corner of our kitchen back towards Liz where she offered me a fingerful of chocolate cake scraped from the bottom of the pan. Then she had one, and then offered me another, and then had another for herself, and then the yellow cake slipped from the well greased pan, and landed on the kitchen floor.

And I laughed.

Published in: Random Rants | on January 22nd, 2007 | No Comments »

2006-2007 Television recap

At the urging of my fans, I mean reader, I am returning to my roots of television prediction/recap. Of course, just in time for the end of the season. I did do my predictions last week for the finales, and my batting average has dropped dramatically, but this week I have decided to look back to the beginning of the season and see how my initial impressions played out. The following is copied from September’s post, and I have added new commentary in italics.

Monday

8:00 CBS The Class starts 9/18 - It’ll be cancelled soon, but I’m going to watch if I can stand it until HIMYM starts. If its really bad, I’ll watch the beginning of Deal or No Deal on NBC.I did watch all season, and it was not cancelled until it finished its run. We’ll never know if she left Yonk or not.

8:30 CBS How I met your mother returns 9/18 - still looks like the best comedy on television. Obviously Ted and Robin get together, but that won’t last long, Robin is just the yardstick against which his future wife will be measured. Marshall and Lily are separated, but I still think she’s pregnant, but thats not really how I want them to get back together. I want them to get back together and then find out that she’s pregnant. Another year later, and I’m still wrong about Lily’s pregnancy, and Ted and Robin lasted a whole season. I liked the way they handled Robin and Ted breaking up, doing it as a flashback, kind of forces the fans to get past it. Plus, they have the summer to get over it, because it was renewed for the fall.

9:00 NBC Heroes starts 9/25 - the advertising did it for me on this one, I just hope it lives up to the hype. They are claiming that the superpowers are an evolutionary thing, but they also play up the, “Something’s coming” aspect where they will need these powers to combat an evil. We’ll see how it goes. Should be some good character work. Loved it, and it stuck around!
10:00 NBC Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip begins 9/18 - Aaron Sorkin brings some lesser used characters from the West Wing to LA for a behind the scenes look at SNL. Probably the wittier of the two shows with this premise. It may have been wittier, I found 30 Rock unwatchable, but I was apparently alone there. 30 Rock is still going strong, and Studio 60 didn’t even make it to February. Maybe if they burn off the old episodes this summer and they do well, NBC will 7th Heaven it back onto the schedule.

Tuesday

8:00 CW Gilmore Girls returns 9/26 - Lets see if Stars Hollow makes any more sense this year. It didn’t and it was cancelled.

9:00 CW Veronica Mars returns 10/3 - the best sleuth of Neptune High goes to college and solves new crimes and mysteries. So far this show has only been picked up for half the season, so after Gilmore Girls, watch it! It made it the whole season, despite a creative reworking half way through resulting in standalone episodes instead of extended arcs, but even that didn’t save it from the axe. It’s gone too.

10:00 CBS Smith premieres 9/19 - I saw a new comercial for it and I’m tuning in just because I love shows told from the bad guys point of veiw. It didn’t work out to well for Heist, but this one has Ray Liotta, so it might last. It didn’t. I won’t miss it as much as heist though.

10:00 NBC Law and Order:SVU returns 9/19 - Liz will probably be watching this while I watch Smith.

Wednesday

8:00 NBC 30 Rock begins 10/11 - intially this one was scheduled for 8:30, but then they realized no one would willing watch “20 Good Years” so they moved it to 8, to force people to watch it instead of tuning in at 8:30 to start their veiwing. Back to 30 Rock, Probably the goofier of the two shows with this premise. Ahh, remember 20 good years? No one else does either.

9:00 ABC Lost returns 10/4 - First season was about the survivors, second about the tailies, this year about the Others. I’m addicted, although I never really tried to follow the whole online, “Lost: Experience” They are just over halfway through the series. This summer, get the DVDs, or download them from ABC.com and get caught up. You aren’t going to want to get behind.

9:00 FOX Justice you only missed two episodes so far, catch it now Cancelled too early.

10:00 ABC The Nine begins 10/4 - looks like Lost without the island, showing how nine people involved in a back robbery are connected by a whole lot more than that through flashbacks, etc. I’ll watch right up until they cancel it, probably. I didn’t even watch it that long. Bad timeslot for me, and probably everyone else.
Thursday, dreaded Thursday

8:00 CW Smallville returns 9/28 - This year they form the Justice League, I’m there. When do we get the epsidoe with the Wonder Twins? I’ll be watching this while Liz watches “Ugly Betty” (no interest) So, no wonder twins, but we did get plenty of green arrow, and the season finished with Bizzaro Clark, so I am anticipating this one more than usual.

8:00 CBS Survivor - now with segregation! recommences 9/14 - I always say that I won’t watch because I’m not invested in any of the characters yet, but I always end up watching because it premieres first. Despite the controversy around the make up of the tribes, if anyone remembers last year and they started with four tribes of five people, they were disolved by the third episode and formed two tribes again. This year, it’ll be nice to see more than just annoying greedy white people, we get annoying greedy people from other ethinicities too! This is the first time I picked the winner, I picked Yul for the fall, and Yeo-man for the spring. If Dreamz had integrity, I would have gotten two in a row right.
8:30 NBC The Office returns 9/21 - I got hooked on this one over the summer. Jim is my hero. I’ll catch up again over the summer, Thursday nights were too busy.

9:00 ABC Grey’s Anatomy returns 9/21 - I’m not a Meredith Fan, I’m coming back for George. I actually left this show for the middle of the season, because George wasn’t getting any story lines. I heard that he was again, so I tuned in for the end of the season, starting with the ferry disaster. I actually became a bigger Alex fan than George. George cheating and then concealing it from Callie, who I love, lost it for me. Alex and Ava are the best couple on the show, and Alex handled her having a husband with more respect than any other man on the show would have, I can’t remember why I called him McScuzzy.

9:00 CBS CSI returns 9/21 - It’s not a show where you have to watch every episode in order, so I’m more likely to catch repeats, but it’s important enough to warrant a listing. I blasted CSI for getting gimmicky in the beginning with their cliffhanger ending setting up the miniature killer, but I really got into it, and liked the story arc holding it all together this year.

10:00 CBS Shark premieres 9/21 - Despite the congestion on Thursday’s, there’s nothing on at 10, so I’m going to try another Lawyer show. This one has James Woods swicthing sides from defense to prosecutor. I decided early on that the show was too predictable and decided to cut my losses and quit it before it was cancelled, and it stuck around all season and was renewed, although shifting to Sundays.
Friday

10:00 CBS Numbers returns 9/22 - This all star cast is back to solve more cases with math. Still a great show, not a whole lot to say really, nothing stands out notably as a season defining moment to me.

Saturday

there’s nothing on on Saturdays again this year.

Sunday

Fox’s animated lineup returned this past weekend, I didn’t even bother watching American Dad or War at Home. The Simpsons was good, and Family Guy was disturbingly funny as always. 400 episodes in 17 years. I remember laughing about the show being older than Bart, I guess were aiming for Marge next.
Desperate Housewives returns to ABC on 9/24, Liz will be watching. She stopped.

And over the course of the year, we added several shows including House, 24 and American Idol.

Published in: Television Tales | on January 21st, 2007 | No Comments »

My Fall Preview Guide

So, the only thing I apparently use this blog for is TV, so I probably shouldn’t be surprised that my last entry was the recap of last season’s shows. This summer has been lackluster at best, but with the lack of time available for television viewing, it is better that way. Not that current living and working conditions have been ideal for catching up on TV either. I did manage to keep up with Hell’s Kitchen, Top Chef, Last Comic Standing and Psych. Of those, Psych was worth keeping up with, truly excellent writing. Top Chef hasn’t ended yet, so I can’t fully grade it, but the other two ended wrong, and I didn’t care by the time they got there. Some of you may have realized that LCS hasn’t ended yet, but it emphasizes my point. I don’t care how it ends. Shoulda been Amy. Or the hobbit guy.

This brings us to this season, kicking off this week with the exception of Biggest Loser which added a third team when it debuted last Tuesday. Unfortunately, the previous hour-long format was not enough to contain the 18 contestants, so each episode for the foreseeable future will be a super sized 90 minutes with a crappy sitcom thrown in to hold our eyes over until something good comes on at 10, since all of the other 9 o’clock shows are hour long dramas you can’t exactly join already in progress.

This Wednesday the first four shows of interest premiere the same night that Last Comic Standing concludes its run. This would be the season for them to burn off the results show on Bravo since no one cares and it caused a clog on my DVR when I tried to record the three new shows. I am going to try Fox’s Back to You 8/7c starring Frasier and Ray’s Wife as TV anchors/ex-lovers. It may turn out to be the first sitcom to go “on hiatus” but I’ve bought into the advertising and I have decided to give more sitcoms a chance since they seem to be a dying art form. At 8:30 Fox brought back Ray’s brother doing well on his own on ‘Till Death, which I didn’t watch last year but I’ve caught a few episodes this summer and, as a married man, found I could relate more than I expected to. Nine o’clock Fox shifts gears, and probably loses its audience, but I expect to enjoy Kitchen Nightmares with Gordon Ramsey. Apparently the British version shows a kinder, gentler, helpful GR, but the Americanization still has him playing the ass, but I assume he is still effective in turning the floundering restaurants around. I am interested in seeing how he does this and whether he can do it with simpler menus that don’t include risotto. Also at nine, over on the CW, they replaced the OC with Gossip Girls. It is by the same creator and described as The OC in New York with realer problems and more money. This is what Liz will be watching while I watch Kitchen Nightmares because she’s about sick of reality kitchen shows featuring angry Brits calling people donkeys for fun.

Thursday at 8 CBS brings us to China for a new season of Survivor that takes us back to the basics a little bit, with no exile island and they’ve scrapped some of the shark jumping twists they’ve tried lately, although they’ve altered some, and added more. The immunity island is unspoken and hiding in plain sight at camp, and each week the losing tribe loses one member to the winning tribe for interrogation for a day to uncover strategy and form alliances.

Next week gets really busy. Sunday Fox brings back the animation block, of which I’ll be watching Simpsons and Family Guy. This Simpsons episode was finished before they started the movie, but the opening credits will showcase Bart skateboarding through a scene from the movie that anyone who saw the movie will appreciate. Family Guy is an hour-long Star Wars spoof, don’t miss that, because the cartoon network never does well with putting together two part episodes, so you want to see this one right.

Monday the 24th is NBC’s to lose. Chuck, in my opinion, would have made a better movie than series, but one could say that about a lot of the shows I’ve recommended, so this may surprise us. I have on reliable authority that the geek squad is excited to be represented. If this show is done right, it could borrow some plot lines from Alias, and keep itself alive that way. At 9, NBC brings us back for Heroes which picks up four months after Peter “exploded” and they will drag it out for 8 episodes until we really know what happened after Nathan went up, up and away. In between actual episodes, they will be airing Heroes: Origins, which will be stand alone episodes about one character not in the original series that is getting their power for the first time. Each episode will introduce a new character that we, as viewers will get to vote for our favorite who we would like to see introduced as a series regular for season three. It’s a great idea of eliminating repeats and adding to the story and viewer involvement, I’d like to see that trend continue, although I don’t know how you could do it for other shows really. Don’t touch that dial at 10 o’clock because the Early Edition/Quantum Leap series Journeyman debuts. This one I really hope sticks around, because I love time travel shows and this one looks good. He inexplicably leaps through time making small improvements as he pieces together the mystery of an old girlfriend who went missing, causing an obvious strain on his present day marriage with questionable fidelity and unexplained absences. I mention NBCs power hold on the night, but CBS returned How I Met Your Mother to us, and this year we will actually see the Mother mentioned in the title. Not that Ted actually meets her before having a few hookups with some guest stars. Robin will stick around and have relationships of her own (I’m rooting for her to break Barney’s commitmentphobia) and Marshall and Lily will be married with comedic married issues. I will be watching Chuck live and HIMYM delayed because of the pathetic 8:30-9 options presented by CBS and CW. Big Bang Theory has been done better before (Weird Science) and Aliens in America is probably a good concept (immigration/exchange students, not little green men) but I don’t trust the CW to do it well enough to bother getting into it.

Tuesday we have the debuts of House and Reaper going head to head on Fox and CW respectively at 9. I’m watching Reaper because of the guy playing Satan looks cool enough to pull it off. I don’t expect it to last long, but I expect it to be fun to watch anyway. House is going to be auditioning his new team in the style of every current reality competition he can think of from giving them roses to the next round, to snuffing out their torches when they’ve been eliminated. Law and Order: SVU returns its most reliable installment this night as well.

Wednesday the 26th adds a third competitor to the 9 o’clock hour with ABCs Private Practice. My prediction? Addison will be back in Seattle by November sweeps. Sure they dropped the talking elevator and recast her best friend, but this series should call it a success if they outlast Cavemen.

The 27th of September is a day that will take me a long while before all these shows finally get cleared off my DVR. 7 hours of TV tonight! First up at 8, Ugly Betty returns with an Emmy under her belt, and this season the celebrities were fighting for a guest spot on this show of shows. Smallville is also going to be full of guest stars this season, and tonight we find out who lives, who dies and how they will explain Ma Kents absence this season. At 9, ABC brings Grey’s Anatomy back without Addison and Burke but they’ve added Ava and Mer’s sister. Starting off with everyone a little bit single this season won’t last, but should be better to watch. Not that I’ve ever respected Derek and Meredith together, I watch for everyone else. Although to be honest, I don’t have a lot of respect for George because I really liked him with Callie, and he screwed that up, I hope she lets him win her back, but she has not come across as big on the second chances, especially as she almost gave up on him before he took the first chance. Also at nine, CSI finally tells us that Sara is dead and Grissom can get along with the rest of his life. He’s going back to insects this season and the rest of the characters get personal lives again. Most anticipated in this family is The Office. The first four episodes are hour long episodes that play out more as an abbreviated comedy movie than TV with filler. They tell us that the Jim/Pam storyline will not go as the fans hope but that they will not be disappointed or riot the DM warehouse. At ten I have decided to give Big Shots a shot. It is the story of four CEOs who have everything they want in the business world but have plenty to complain about from their personal lives. It’s an interesting concept, because Sex and the City for guys is not an easy sell. The all star cast of this is what will make it work. You’ve got Bobby Donnell from the Practice, Michael Vaughn from Alias, Joshua Malina, who was Jeremy on Sportsnight, and Will Bailey on West Wing. The fourth is Titus. I don’t have the same admiration for him, having never seen his show, but I will credit him for his company, as long as he respects the fourth wall.

Numbers returns on Friday concluding premiere week. Next week Pushing Daisies starts on October 3rd and Scrubs has been pushed back to October 25th, after The Office finishes its hour long episodes/miniseries/movies of the week. Pushing Daisies seems like an absurd concept and the plot description reads like an acid trip, but it is a critic favorite and they can’t all be high. I’ll give it a try. Stay tuned for my midseason edition when 24, American Idol and Lost returns in January with fresh episodes of Psych.

Published in: Television Tales | on January 17th, 2007 | No Comments »

The Amazng Jay

So, I just came back from the store…

2006-2007 Television recap

My Fall Preview Guide

Family

Places I Go

Categories

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