Live and Let Di

Scrubs and Monk

Scrubs and Monk are two of my favorite TV shows. I think we record every syndicated episode of Scrubs on the TV in the family room and every episode of Monk on the TV in my bedroom. Scrubs. Monk. If you know these two shows, you will see the conflation of their titles. (I love my new word...even if I don't use it quite right!)

The premiere of Scrubs, which just moved to ABC from NBC, reminded me of why I love it so much. The funniest line was when J.D. was trying to pump up his interns and says,

"Now, I know we never do great come medical awards season, except for Dr. Shalhoub. He wins everything."

Monk, starring Tony Shalhoub, is an Emmy favorite, despite the show's off-network (USA) status and under-the-radar popularity.

Smart, funny TV. Love it.

Di

Cue Twilight Zone Music

I'm just a little delayed downloading my pictures and letting them inspire my blog. On Thanksgiving morning, I turned on the TV and started watching a parade. Before I realized that it wasn't the Macy's parade (and before I remembered that I don't really like watching parades anyway) I saw a crowd scene that made me grab the remote and rewind.

Yes, it seems that while my husband was pretending to be hanging out with the family on Thanksgiving morning, he was also at the IKEA parade with his hot young mistress.

Di

Who are you?

This quote has been shuffling around my brain since my daughter and I excitedly consumed the first episode of Grey's Anatomy. ***Spoiler alert***

Three society-type women who have been friends since they were little girls end up in the ER when their limo crashes. Coincidentally, their husbands, who were in a different limo because they wanted to smoke cigars, were in an even more serious accident.

The women are played to perfection with a balance between hysteria, sadness and incredulity. I predict an Emmy nod for Bernadette Peters (Sarabeth) and probably Kathy Baker (Anna). And anyone who watched the show might be shocked to realize that the women who lost her memory was played by Mariette Hartley (Betty). Yes, Mariette Hartley, perky substitute co-host of the Today show.

As it turns out, Anna has been having an affair with Sarabeth's husband for several months. As Anna is feeling judged by Meredith and the staff, she tells Meredith the following:

When you spend your life with someone and you have kids together, you think it'll always be this amazing, and this wonderful. You think that you'll always feel that kind of love and I do, I do love Phil. I just... well little pieces of you get chipped away by another person and then you shave little pieces of yourself away so you'll fit together and then one day you look up and you don't even know who you are.

Wow...how incredibly insightful and yes (attention, overused blog word approaching), poignant. I don't really want to say how I interpreted it or how it made me feel, I want to open up a discussion to do that. So please comment.

Oh...and guess what? I got to send a CORRECTION TO IMDB!!!! This is how the quote appeared in the IMDB entry for this episode:

No, no, no. It was not Betty who said it. Betty's major quotes were "What am I doing here?" "Am I in the hospital?" and "What happened?" since she was the one who lost her memory. I think they should send me an IMDB coffee cup or something!

Di

 

Ubermoms Gone Wild!

Julia Louis-Dreyfus is a comic master and is willing to do anything, including doing a scene clad only in a bra and pants and putting ice pops in her armpits. The "peri-menopause episode" was so funny that I saved it on our DVR and re-watched it with my husband last night.

But does anyone else just LOVE the mean Moms on The New Adventures of Old Christine and think they steal every show?

They are every parent's dream/nightmare. We WANT them to handle Cotillion, PTA, being the Room Mom, etc. But we don't want them to judge us slacker Moms for being, um, slackers!

Marly: Oh, yeah, my nanny just went through the change, too.
Lindsay: Wait, I thought your nanny had a heart attack.
Marly: Well, she was sweaty and missed two days of work—I don't know.

And the "peri-menopause episode" gave a sweaty, hormone-driven Christine the opportunity to tell these women off:

Christine: (to Marly and Lindsay) Listen, I have taken your crap for the last three years, and I'm gonna tell you something. If you ever make Ritchie feel unwelcome, or embarrass him, again, I would be thrilled for the opportunity to kick your sorry, tanned, bleach blond, Botox asses back to your tacky McMansions and your loveless marriages. You got that?

Christine and 30 Rock are the only two TV shows that have held my interest since the writers' strike.

Di

         

30 Rock rocks (what a lame title for this post!)

My son and I like to watch 30 Rock together, so when he told me a NEW episode was on tonight, we just had to watch.

So there we sat, on my bed, both on our laptops while we watched. The plot included a send-up of reality shows called MILF Island...try to explain THAT to your 12 year old. Another plot involved someone bad-mouthing Jack to a reporter, calling him a "class A moron." The piece ended up in the newspaper and appropriate hilarity ensued.

At one point, Jack says to Liz, "When you Google 'class A moron,' my name comes up...so long Randy Quaid." So, of course Rory couldn't resist. So he Googled it...and guess what?

Class A Moron

I wonder if they had to pay Google for that?

Di

P.S. I'm all for freedom of speech, but no lectures about letting my 12 year old watch 30 Rock. My mother (inadvertently) let me read The Other Side of Midnight when I was 13 and I turned out OK. Hmmm....okay....go ahead with the lectures.

How could I forget???

How could I have forgotten cute, perky, bubbly, naive Karen Valentine, Miss Johnson of Room 222 fame? I did this whole Thursday Thirteen about Famous People I Have Seen/Met Up Close and I forgot to mention the ultimate celebrity encounter. Imagine the elevator door opening and seeing one of the cast of EVERY FRIDAY NIGHT OF YOUR ADOLESCENCE (Brady Bunch, Partridge Family, Room 222, Odd Couple, Love American Style...a classic line up that will never be equaled) walk on. No, it's not "Marcia, Marcia, Marcia" or even David Cassidy...it's Karen Valentine.

The setting, the St. Regis Hotel in Detroit. In addition to being the hotel of choice for actors performing at the adjacent Fisher Theater, is the home of my ALL-TIME FAVORITE TYPO!!! Yes, I am innately incapable of reading ANYTHING without editing. As I snuggled up in my jammies and contemplated the delights of room service breakfast the following morning, I couldn't help but notice this offering:

Fruit Composte

This burned on my brain the now inextricably intertwined images of this delightful fruit treat:

and this disgusting (but great for the environment) technique of recycling food and making mulch or fertilizer:                                                

But I digress. Yes, there I was in the elevator going to my room at the St. Regis on one of my rare business trips. I was toting a piece of luggage that was WAY too expensive for the minimal business travel I did...so I think I justified it by getting it for my road warrier husband. It looked kind of like this one:

So, onto the elevator steps the Karen Valentine. On Room 222, we all thought Liz (Denise Nicholas) was so cool with her unflappable style and subtle sexual chemistry with Mr. Dixon (Lloyd Haynes) but we all wanted to BE Alice Johnson (Karen Valentine) with her wide-eyed naivete and her tendency to be kind of goofy.

I digress AGAIN!!! OK, so she looks at me, looks at my bag and says, "Wow. I love your luggage."  Yeah...that was it. My exciting celebrity encounter. For one brief moment in time, a TV star (OK, former TV star) was admiring ME (or me by extension...my luggage).

Di

 

Back from the Beach

Wow...five days without blogging. That may be a record for me. Not only that, but from Saturday evening until I got home at noon on Monday, I was not on the internet, and didn't even have any withdrawal symptoms! And when I got home on Monday, I didn't immediately get on line. So I guess this is my way of saying that I'm NOT addicted. I CAN quit anytime I want. But I hope someone out there missed me!!!

So, today you get to be the recipient of my "junk in the trunk"...stuff that has been accumulating in my brain since we left Boca for Merritt Island Friday afternoon. (If anyone from either of my children's schools is reading this, of course this was AFTER their doctor's appointments for which I needed to remove them from school early!)

1. Less than two weeks until Buy A Friend A Book Week. I must think of a new unique contest. In the two contests I have done so far I have asked entrants to 1) give me the title of the best book they have read in 2006 (I got such a great turnout for this one that I had both adult and junior divisions); 2) list the top three books they have read. If you have any suggestions for a theme, e-mail them to me privately and guess what? I'll buy a book for the first person to come up with the theme I eventually use!

2. Andrea finally made a decision on her book won in my last BAFAB contest. For those who worry that there is any unfairness to this contest, I will remind you that her favorite book of 2006 was The Stolen Child by Keith Donohue, which I kind of disliked and I think Andrea may have selected just to be contrary. Since Andrea is a local winner, we had a Sunday morning rendez vous at Barnes & Noble where my 13 year old entertained her 4 year old so that we could have coffee and delightful adult conversation. Before Andrea's arrival, I walked around collecting a large pile of books from which I thought she might like to make her selection. We used the pile to save our table, went and ordered our coffees and came back to find that an overzealous bookseller had picked them up and reshelved them! Ugh!!!!

Anyway, after reading unanimously positive critical reviews (or after weighing all of them and going with the heaviest), Andrea selected Heydey by Kurt Andersen, and after her last report, is loving it!

Taylor, who won the junior division selected That Was Then, This is Now by S. E. Hinton, but when it came from Amazon and I foolishly left it on the counter, my son Rory started reading it leaving pages dog-eared and the spine broken, so I couldn't give it to Taylor. Besides, it is such a tiny little book, I want to get her that and something more. Any suggestions? Taylor is in 5th grade and about to enter middle school.

3. I am reading Jodi Picoult's latest, Nineteen Minutes, and all the while blogging in my head. I am about 2/3 through it, so we will see what the final outcome is, but right now it is running a distant second to Lionel Shriver's We Need to Talk About Kevin.

4. Speaking of Ms. Shriver, her latest book The Post-Birthday World has received some positive buzz. For those fortunate to live in the vicinity of Quail Ridge Books, the greatest independent bookstore ever, Ms. Shriver is going to be appearing at QRB in Raleigh on April 10. For those who are not fortunate enough to be with a couple of hours of Raleigh so you can take the occasional field trip, I would strongly encourage you to subscribe to QuailMail, the consistently informative newsletter sent weekly by QRB's incomparable owner, Nancy Olson (shown here with John and Elizabeth Edwards). In addition to the great book selection, wonderfully comfortable children's section, articulate staff reviews and unrivaled service, one of my favorite things about QRB is the eclectic collection of blank note cards. I just got a very cool Frida Kahlo card from my friend Shirley from my book club in NC who got it at QRB. Shirley, I think we should plan a field trip and lunch around visiting QRB when I'm up there in the beginning of April.

5. We just had a great weekend with friends Steve, Nicole and McLane who stopped in Merritt Island before heading on to a week at Disney. I love having friends who do not need "entertaining", but enjoy the simple things...a windy day at the beach, a fabulous dinner at Danny & Sonia's, kicking a soccer ball around, playing cards, working maniacally on a jigsaw puzzle and even taking the occasional spontaneous nap while watching March Madness. McLane (age 8) summed it up for me when she plopped herself down in the backseat of my car and announced, "I'm having fun! Are you having fun?"

6. Today it's back to the "real world"...I was hesitant to even open up my calendar and check my schedule for today because I didn't want to lose the overwhelming sense of relaxation I had from the weekend.

Di

McToast

I recently tossed over Kevin Costner as my man for whom I would leave my husband, replacing him with Patrick Dempsey, but tonight he pissed me off. As Anne Hathaway was delightfully praising the illustrious Julie Andrews, Patrick Dempsey, AKA McDreamy, was McBored. He could not have possibly looked less interested in the goings-on. Now, we can't blame it on age...he was born just four years after me and therefore more have been touched by Mary Poppins, The Sound of Music and the Carol Burnett combinations. But he just looked like he wanted to pick up his ensemble SAG award, listen to another person stand up for Isaiah Washington and get on to the after-hours party.

So, McDreamy, you are so tossed aside. And I now designate Kyle Chandler as the man for whom I would leave my husband. (Although, Michael knows that was it not for it my friendship with Stacy, it would TOTALLY be him!) Patrick Dempsey, Julie Andrews is the woman who was making it happen before you were born. You have no business McDayDreaming while she is being honored. She has earned every honor she has won. And while you have bedroom eyes and an all-day five o'clock shadow, you need to sit up and take notice that she has been awarded the status of Dame and you are nothing but the man of the moment. Do a tenth of what she's done and you can look as McBored as you want. And as painful as this may be...you've lost this 40-something soccer mom!

McDi