Breaking Up with the Hills

She did it. She actually did it. After threatening during every episode of five straight seasons, Traci has officially cut The Hills out of her life. I am now a lone man, watching it all on my own.

Of course, I had my doubts about the post-Lauren Conrad Hills. But I've been pleasantly surprised.

Less Lauren = more Audrina, Lo, and Stephanie Pratt, which is bad. There is also some intense boringness with Heidi and Spencer (though his cowboy hat could have its own show, costarring Charlie's mustache).

Kristin Cavallari is a million times more entertaining than LC, there's more room for Brody to start girl fights and conveniently walk away, and Justin Bobby gets to have lots of different hairdos. I'm content.

But Traci has moved on. One can only hope that our television paths will cross again.

Traci's Best Dance Crew

There are things that Traci watches on TV that annoy me (what's that TLC show called? Whoops, I Had a Baby But Didn't Know I Was Pregnant?). But every once in a while she has favorites that just catch me off guard. America's Best Dance Crew? Curious. I think it's because she's still got the hots for AC Slater.

Keep My Puffy Pants in Storage

No need to worry about losing me to Hollywood...yet. Last week's episode of Hammertime on A&E was in fact about The MC Hammer/Vanilla Ice show in Provo. However, I was not featured on the show. (I watched it twice to make sure.)

It was weird, but cool to watch a filmed version of a show I saw in real life. (I don't remember it being as spectacular as the TV edits made it out to be.) Watch the full episode here. It's episode #3.

The Rest is Still Unwritten

In just a minute here, I will watch one of the last two episodes with Lauren "LC" Conrad still on The Hills. I haven't felt this sad since Traci and I said goodbye to The OC a few years back. Luckily, I've got Josie & The Pussycats on the DVR to cheer me up.

Bye, Bye Doug. We Hardly Knew Ye.

Lamest. Breakup. Ever.

Why are all of Lauren's new L.A. boyfriends just boyfriends that she had when she was in high school--Jason, Stephen, Doug? I'm guessing that it is probably hard to meet someone who wants to date you and have that relationship scripted and taped. But then again, it is L.A., where everyone wants to be an actor. So I guess the real problem is that guys just don't want to date Lauren because she's boring.

Say It Ain't Lo

The Hills is back and I couldn't be happier. Unfortunately, with the premier episode of Season 4, I had to face an inconvenient truth. I hate Lo.

Lo, you can't get your feelings hurt when Audrina says you'll never be friends. You don't like her. You're not nice to her. Oh, Lo, what's happened to you?

TV: Spencer vs. Traci

Shows that Spencer likes that Traci doesn't:

-Prison Break
-Football
-Gossip Girl

Shows Traci likes that Spencer doesn't:

-Scrubs (I even hate the theme song)
-Girls Next Door
-America's Top Model (Urge to kill Tyra Banks. Growing. Growing.)

Lame things currently on our DVR:

Legally Blonde the Musical (Traci)
High School Musical 2 (Traci)
Mad Hot Ballroom (Traci)
Gridiron Gang (Spencer)*
Step Up (Spencer)*

*I haven't watched either of these yet and I know Traci won't watch them with me. If anyone wants to come over, let me know.

Happy Halloweeeeeen!

The best part about Halloween is that you get Simpsons Halloween re-run episodes all week long. Last night was the episode where Kang and Kudos kidnap Bill Clin-ton and Bob Dole and run for president. My favorite line:

Kang [running for President]: Abortions for all! [crowd boos]
Very well, Abortions for none! [crowd boos]
Abortions for some, miniature American flags for the others! [crowd cheers]

Couldn't find that clip on YouTube, so this one will have to do.

Kanye Channels Daft Punk?

Roger Meyers Jr. once said, “You take away our right to steal ideas, where are they going to come from?” That's pretty much how I feel about most hip hop. One of my favorite musical plagiarists is Chicago's own Kanye West.

Kanye has crossed over into sacred ground, sampling one of the best songs of all time, Daft Punk's "Harder, Better, Faster, Stronger." I feel slightly violated just listening to it. Kanye's version is adequate, but mostly just makes me want to listen to Daft Punk.

Take a listen here [via Cause=Time]: Kanye West - Stronger
--
Other favorite Roger Meyers Junior Quote: "You kids don't know what you want. That's why you're kids, because you're stupid!"

Television Raising our Child

Months ago, Paige mastered waving goodbye. The wave is now accompanied by her only recognizable word, “da-die.” (It’s not bye-bye, exactly, but we were still pretty excited about it.) Paige only waves when she thinks someone is leaving – or when she thinks someone should be leaving – but she never waves hello. Well, she never waved hello. About a week ago Traci let her watch The Wiggles for the first time. She was hooked instantly. By day two she was waving to The Wiggles the second they came on the TV – with both hands. Did this translate into her waving to real human beings? No. She only waves to The Wiggles. The other night we were at my sister’s house. Surrounded by millions of toys, Paige spent the whole time clipping and unclipping a booster chair safety belt. Nothing could distract her from this task. She would stop periodically, however, to wave at The Wiggles on the TV.

No Way of Knowing

One of my favorite Creed moments...

Shut Up You Face

Though the Simpsons has been rather disappointing for the past few seasons, the classics are still classics. Linguo, the grammar robot, is hi-larious!

A Mole Problem

Every once in a while, when I'm feeling a bit blue about my job in the insurance biz, I turn to YouTube for a few laughs. Oh Arrested Development, please come back to us!

DV-R U Okay?

We had our first DVR mishap this week. The contraption holds 100 hours of TV, which seems like more TV than you'd ever record. Well, I guess I didn't take into consideration that when you tape three hours of MTV music videos every night (MTV only shows videos in the middle of the night, so I DVR 'em. Three hours of MTV only equates to six or seven videos and they're all Gwen Stefani.) it adds up quickly. When you surpass the 100-hour limit, it starts deleting your shows. Traci had taped all of the episodes of Extras, only to have them all deleted. She was not happy with me. Not happy. I lost a bunch of episodes of The Office and Ratt Behind the Music. But we're dealing. We cleaned out the DVR, canceled all of the stupid videos, and life begins again.

More Mormon Embarrassment

When Traci saw there was going to be a new show on MTV called "Engaged & Underage," about kids who are getting married who are under 21, she immediately said 'Oh, I'm sure there will be an episode about Mormons.' Sure enough, episode 8 featured a couple of Utah kids.

Chris and Amanda are both 19 and Mormon; Chris is a convert to the church. The plot of the story revolves around Chris's out of town family not understanding why they can't come to his temple marriage and Amanda being completely inconsiderate of their feelings.

Amanda spent most of the episode crying because she had to have a ring ceremony in addition to the temple ceremony. "As a little girl, I never dreamed of having a ring ceremony." Yeah, I never dreamed of being considerate of my in-laws when I was little, either.

Watch the whole episode here.

Dunzo...The Day After

How I am supposed to feel? I'm just so confused and conflicted. Here it is, the day after the Series Finale of The OC and I'm still trying to wrap my head around it all. It all just happened so fast. Everything was going along and then, boom, Josh Schwartz and the boys had to find away to a wrap up the whole show right in the middle of an abbreviated season.

I was kind of hoping for a Seinfeldish bring-every-character-ever-back episode, but I guess they couldn’t figure out a way to fit Anna, Alex, Luke’s gay dad, nutso Oliver, Lindsay, and Volchek into one episode. (I was a mildly surprised that Marissa wasn’t resurrected for the final episode, if we’re being perfectly honest.)

It just seemed like any other episode – babies being delivered by a gay midwife, marriages happening/then not happening, etc. – and with five minutes left I thought the show was going to end with no real ending at all. That thought made me very upset.

And then came the epilogue clips. Seth marrying Summer, fine. Julie going to college, being supported by both Hercules and the Bullit, whatev. Sandy teaching school, hoorah. Ryan taking in a mini-me, lame. As cheesy as it was, this offered me some much-needed closure. I don’t have to spend the rest of my wondering what happened to my favorite fictional friends. Phew.

But I’m not ready to give it all just yet. Anyone want to join me for an OC DVD marathon next week? Paige’ll be there…

Fare thee well, Orange County

There's only one episode of The OC left, and then it's dunzo. I'm just trying to keep it together up in here. I know this season was going to be disappointing the very first episode, when Ryan decided to deal with Marissa's death by joining a fight club, but I've hung in there. (That's more than I can say for my eternal companion, who keeps saying "This is why this show is being canceled...because it's stupid!)



I've stuck with The OC for four seasons. Heck, I was just 23 years old when Ryan first moved next door the Coopers. I've lived through Luke's gay dad, Marissa's drug-abusing psychopath boyfriend Oliver, the exit and return of cute Anna, Marissa's lesbian girlfriend Alex, Summer's boyfriend Zach and Seth's boyfriend Che. What am I going to do now? What am I going to do?

The Hills just isn't the same, and I think there's only a few episodes of The White Rapper Show left. First Arrested Development, now The OC? Fox Network, what have I done to deserve this?

Television: Wanna Bask in Your Golden Light

The Sutherlands have entered the 20th Century! We now have cable TV (well, satellite tv anyway). As I suspected, there really isn't ever anything actually on TV, even if you have more stations. But I have found a few new shows to watch. Oh, and the DVR is truly the best invention in the history of the world.

Currently watching:

• The Hills (hooray for not having to download it off the internet. And with the OC being canceled, how else am I going to get my fix of California living?)
• The White Rapper Show (I'm white, I have always wanted to be a rapper. And it's a lot better than you'd think.)
• Anything to do with Metal on VH1 (Traci and I watched three hours of Heavy: The History of Metal. Three hours.)
• Journey to the Center of the Rock/World's Best Videos on IMF (IMF rocks. Unfortunately, we only have a trial version of it. I don't know at what point it's going to go away, but I don't want it leave! There are even less videos on MTV, MTV2 and VH1 than I could have possibly imagined. Like no videos.)
• I'm from Rolling Stone on MTV (I have always wanted to write for Rolling Stone. Plus I'm white and I want to be a rapper.)

I haven't really gotten into The Daily Show or the Colbert Report like I thought I would, but hey, we'll see how it goes. I also haven't ventured out into the world of Adult Swim yet. Traci is addicted to The Girls Next Door and Dr. 90210.

Oh, the Chicken Dance

Many thanks to RB for sending me this collage of chicken dances from my favorite canceled show, Arrested Development. As you watch this, picture me huddled over my computer in my little cubicle, trying so hard not to laugh out loud - with my face turning all red, and my shoulders bobbing up and down in silent laughter.

Longest Week Ever...

One of my favorite moments from MTV’s reality soap, The Hills, was when Heidi, the spoiled, ditzy friend gets a full-time job, which she’s so sad about. Right before they cut to commercial the camera zooms in over her shoulder to her computer. It shows her Outlook email calendar and everyday she’s filled in 8 a.m. – 5 p.m. with just one word, “work.” Poor Heidi. I looked at my Outlook Calendar this morning and thought the exact same thing.