There are three flowers in a vase....

I am often frustrated by the shows I like that don't make it to a second season, or even get to finish their first. In the past year my list has included Dirty Sexy Money, Journeyman, Moonlight (though it took almost the whole season to get REALLY interesting, it was Angel for chicks with some really great potential) and My Own Worst Enemy. There are more, but these are the ones that come to mind that really didn't get their opportunity to grow.Anyone that knows me even just a teense knows I am a big Joss Whedon fan. Indeed, the only time I ever went fullgoose gaga over meeting someone was when I happened to pass Joss Whedon a few years ago on the street as he was enjoying a late night meal in Broadway in NYC. And I've met Charlton Heston.
Seriously, Joss Whedon made me gaga, but Moses I could handle.
From Buffy the Vampire Slayer, through Angel, Firefly, Dr. Horrible's Singalong Blog and Toy Story, I have loved Whedon's use of language, his truthful explorations of the human condition and brilliant sense of humor and irony. The Buffy Season 5 episode dealing with death is (as far as I'm concerned), the best episode of any show in the history of Television. Nothing I have read or watched or talked about has ever covered the process of surviving the death of a loved one as brilliantly as it. And that's just a single example of Whedon's genius.

Dollhouse is the latest in his ouvre. I will let the video speak to what the show covers because this blog is about the suckiness of the FOX network.



It looks as though Joss Whedon's Dollhouse is going to be added to that list. FOX has announced that it will not be airing Episode 13 of the 13 episodes shot for this mid season replacement.

The reasoning given is lame. The 12th episode is really the season finale with the 13th as an added ep extra. Joss' people confirm this but it feels like they are just kissing FOX's ass in hopes of not being screwed over.....AGAIN.

The writing, as they say, is on the wall.

If 12 is the finale and 13 presumably sets up Season 2 and FOX isn't airing it?... They clearly aren't planning on giving a go to Season 2. A show they barely promoted except a few lame internet ads and a plentiful lack of current ads, aired on Friday, when NO ONE watches Television and those numb-ball fuckbrains at FOX wonder why the show isn't getting the ratings they "expect".

Not to mention the pre-airing meddling that they did with the show before hand. It's Firefly all over again.

Whedon has a contract with FOX, which I guess includes a clause requiring him to come up with a great idea and then get fucked royally once it airs.

We fans knew it was coming. Save Dollhouse sites started almost a year before the show even aired. FOX tried to placate us, but we knew better. We could see already that they were simply giving lip service.

Dollhouse is not Joss' greatest show...not yet. That place is held for Firefly which really would have been his greatest show ever had FOX not tampered endlessly with showing episodes out of order and barely promoting it, as well as airing it on a Friday.

FOX decided to pair Dollhouse with The Sarah Conner Chronicles, a fairly lame but not terrible retelling of the Terminator story. The better choice would have been J.J. Abrams' Fringe, which is rather brilliant, has a following, and airs on Tuesdays, a much better night for T.V. viewing. But you only do something like that with a show you actually intend to be successful. FOX, to my mind, never had any intention of doing so. By the way, I'm not convinced that FOX is all that hyped about FRINGE either. They seem more excited by the series finale for JailBreak, a monumentally stupid show that should never have been green lighted in the first place.

Their news networks suck, their programming (with one or two possible exceptions) sucks, and they suck. The Simpsons while still somewhat entertaining is a pale reflection of what it once was; subversive, thoughtful and unpredictable. I'm not a big fan of Family Guy though it does have a following. They did put some effort into Arrested Development but eventually gave up. They kept it going but also didn't really promote it the way they should. I guess FOX only advertises its "reality shows" and sensalitionalistic fake news reporting.

Meanwhile NBC has renewed that insulting piece of shit, Heroes, for a fourth season. Seriously, that show makes me want to fly to Los Angeles find where Tim Kringe lives and punch him in the face, then go to the execs and NBC and punch them as well.

Back in the 80s a guy named Brandon Tartikoff was running programming on NBC and Steve Bochco created a show called Hill Street Blues which Tartikoff aired mid season.

Hill Street reinvented the cop show and hour long drama entertainment by giving us stories that ran over more than one episode, great characters that weren't cookie cutter Dragnet cops. They had flaws, and desires and dissapointments. It was a cop show that America wasn't used to and its ratings were lackluster.

Brandon Tartikoff loved the show, he believed in it and he ordered a second season. Ratings improved and the critics joined suit. By the third season, Hill Street Blues was a hit and it changed T.V. forever. Without it there would be no E.R., no L.A. Law, no Grey's Anatomy, etc. There might not even be a Buffy The Vampire Slayer, another show that needed a season and a half to really catch on.

The critics didn't fall all over Dollhouse at first, but many have changed their tune in the last few weeks and written glowingly of the show.

FOX should change its tune too. But I doubt it will. Fringe is FOX's last chance for me. If that goes too, I'm done with them.

Here is where you can sign an online petition to save Dollhouse if you are a fan, or if you just want to spare yourself my ugly rantings. The numbers on this one are low. Spread the word.

Ground Zero

So...I'm re arranging my thoughts and am going to stop tipping in advance of what I'm going to write about because, well. I'd rather be able to change my mind. But I'm keeping the context of New York.

For the last few days and the next week I have been and will be working across the street from Ground Zero here.

I don't come down there much. I never really did before except when I had visitors or a temp job necessitated it. I've never really liked the area very much except for by the water where, if you have a view of the harbor it is quite beautiful. But since the attack I've been there twice. It's just too hard. Make that 4 times. I was down here a couple of times during the immediate aftermath. The stench of smoking steel, wood, asbestos and, well...human was intense, humbling and there are no words more for it.

This assignment has me here for the first time since 2002. I pass the construction site every day, twice a day. There are small monuments to our victimhood here which is just more incentive for me to never be down here.

There's been a lot of talk lately about the renaming of One WTC, from Freedom Tower to the current iteration. But as far as I'm concerned, what we call the building is totally fucking meaningless. That we are building again at all is the important part. The building is not something I'm crazy about, but I'm very pleased that the actual site of the old towers will be a park and waterfall markings of the tower footprints. I think its fitting and beautiful and frankly if any area needed some green space, its the Financial District.

Here's what gets me though. I do not need to see continual pictures of what happened. I don't need to see photographs on onlookers crying, holding eachother and otherwise appearing devastated and I suspect that those who traverse the streets and overpasses here, who have done for years before I have and for years afterwards don't have to either. We/They were there. We lived it, ate it and literally breathed it for a long time. We all here lost someone either 1st or 2nd person.

September 11, 2001 lives in us every day, ever hour and every minute we walk any street in this city, especially the streets below West 4th.

We do not need continual pick up truck reminders to 'never forget'. Fuck you asshole, I lived it, don't tell me what to remember and what not to remember. And we don't need to be scraping the wound open every morning we get off the Subway or PATH train to come to work here to see our faces plastered before us, tear-filled and horrified.

Some of us wake up in the middle of the night screaming still. Some of us still roll over in bed to the spot once occupied by a lover or spouse who was working that day, (be it in an office, a police car or a fire-suit) and try to caress them in the empty spot. Some of us see the flying bodies when we close our eyes for an afternoon nap.

Now admittedly that's not precisely my experience. My September 11th story is a somewhat twisted tale of a grandmother's death and being near one of the other sites and coming home to an immediate bomb scare. That's for another blog entry.

But the aftermath for me was clear. Though I lived on the opposite end of Manhattan then, the sky was still dark and the fear and anger and grief was still palpable. And I still live with friends whose losses were far deeper and more painful than my own.

We remember. For God's sake, We Remember.

My Home Town

New York is famous for being a city of reinvention. It is the embodiment of constant change. There is something about its inner core that abhors steadiness.

It's a magical thing about this town, but it is also its curse. From New Amsterdam to now, its been a city never settled.

About 20 years ago they tried to make a TV series out of the movie "The Four Seasons". In the opening sequence, the character is leaving the city. He looks around and we hear construction everywhere. He says

"Ahh New York...I love it......Call me when it's finished"

Of course he never gets that phone call.

Sooo....as I begin my series of lamentations on the loss of what makes New York New York, bear all that in mind.

Still, New York has more of what you find everywhere else; Kmart, Target, Disney etc., all swallowing up Sal & Carmine's, Schimmel and Sons, etc. So that's what I'm ranting on in the coming days and I invite you all to comment on the changes you see in your hometown that you don't care for.

It's Curmudgeon Time.

I'm baaaaaack.

March approaches its end and with it comes my birthday.

I'm one of those people that thinks of birthdays as just that. A chance every year to renew. And after this last month, I'd really like that.

So here's what's happened...

After months of struggle with catching up on rent from my long stretch of unemployment I reached an agreement with the landlord on a payment plan. The most recent payment being a few days late, the landlord used this as a perfectly legal, if scumbaggy reason to send an eviction notice.

After some thinking I decided it was better to keep the money, move and be rid of the apartment that had been driving me crazy for the last several years...BUT...it meant I had to move within 5 days before the Marshall came and cleared out my stuff. CRAZY time. But it also gave me the chance to do some purging. In some cases too much and others not enough.I know I left some things behind that were of significance to me. But I've decided to chalk it to fate.

All this was followed by two weeks of sleeping in my daughter's room by the patient kindness of my ex wife and her fiancee while I found a new place to live. Which I did.

Tonight I moved in just about fully with my real bed, desk and clothing. More remains in storage but that's to be dealt with over the next few months.

In the last two weeks I lost an old HS acquaintance to cancer which was very sad. It also made me realize that in a way I am now of that age where this sort of thing becomes more common. She was a good woman, talented and spirited and the world is a lesser place for it.

A few days after her passing, an old boss of mine, one of the few I truly liked and still think fondly of, smashed the window of his 17th floor office and jumped. It was a great shock because he never seemed that kind of person. He leaves behind his wife and two children. A good man who must have suddenly been terribly overwhelmed.

In pace requiescate, Scott.

Add to this some other situations that people close to me are experiencing and it was just impossible for me to wrap my head around writing anything that wasn't going to sound completely insane.

But renewal is coming. I'm back now dear reader(s?). I hope you missed me as much as I missed you.

Breaking through

I'm almost ready to start blogging again.

I know all 2 (if that many) of you have really missed me.

:-)

Pissant Whining Children

So yesterday the House Republicans decided "No We Can't" and voted unanimously against the bail out bill.

Poor babies, too much money for jobs and not enough for Corporate Tax Cuts.

"We have the second highest Corporate Taxes in the World...the CBO says..."

Oh I am all broken up about your fucking Corporate Taxes.

"Everyone knows that when you cut taxes, it creates jobs"

Hmmmm. Lets see....


Bill Clinton raises taxes on the wealthiest Americans, creates 26 million jobs in 8 years.
GW Bushbrain cuts taxes, we go into recession (no he did not inherit a recession, the recession started into his first year. Up until then it was just a slowdown, no job loss until...)Over 5 years he creates 3 million jobs. Then in the last year, loses half a million.

That's 26 million to 2.5 million.

Cutting taxes cuts taxes. That's it. It has no overall benefit except to those whose taxes are cut.

You creeps never mention taxes for the middle class getting cut. You never mention cutting or eliminating taxes on unemployment benefits (a tax that was started by RONALD REAGAN I feel compelled to remind you) Ohhh, but poor poor Exxon Mobil, poor poor AIG.

There are people losing jobs right and left out here you fatuous fucktards! People with children and mortgages and who also need to eat on occasion.

I know back in college you all read Ayn Rand and got all excited about Objectivism. But guess what, The Fountainhead is a fantasy novel. The world doesn't work that way.

When private industry collapses on their "Virtue of Selfishness", the Government has to go in and push for new jobs (like you know, sodding and fixing the National Mall, fixing highways). Get the money out there and make those jobs happen. People get paid, they pay their bills, money circulates, banks start lending again because there's folks who can pay loans off. Cause and Effect, not some dumbassed theory written by a certifiably insane woman who had serious emotional problems.

You're all old men now. Grow up. You lost your majority, and you're not getting it back anytime soon. Work for your country, not your bassackwards theoretical and unproven bullshit.

People are starving and panicking here. FUCK your alleged principals and stop fucking the people!

I'm Gifts of Thought and I approved this message.

Unapologetic Gushing for my Country

By the time I was six years old, John F. Kennedy, Malcolm X, Martin Luther King and Robert F. Kennedy had met violent assassinations, the Vietnam War and its graphic casualties were on the news everyday, black kids getting hosed in the streets of southern cities and towns, the Watts riots in Los Angeles, Kent State and probably a few others that memory fails to recall.

And then Richard Nixon came along.

This will strike some of you as odd (that is if there is anyone reading this) but even at that age I knew something was wrong with that guy. Call it child’s intuition, but something about him bugged me in a large way. My mother tells me that in 1972 I was making my own anti-Nixon flyers and passing them in the street. I have no memory of this, but I have to say it sounds right.

I remember watching Nixon’s resignation speech on that warm summer night. I was 11 by that time.

Then there was Ford who said that our long national nightmare was over, and then he pardoned the criminal ex-president. And then he tripped a lot.

After Ford came Carter. I remember the slogan “Trust me” and not liking it at all. But he wasn’t Ford, so I figured he’d be a step up. I wasn’t too right. Now my dislike of Carter’s presidency had less to do with the hostage situation or the economy. What irked me about Carter was his way too militant stance on the Soviet Union and his decision to boycott the Olympics.

November of 1980. My first election. On election day I asked my theater professor to allow me to tag a ride from college back into the city so I could vote. That night I sat in a bar called Hanratty’s on the Upper West Side of Manhattan with my father and wept into my beer. I wept because Ronald Reagan was clearly going to win. I wept because Jimmy Carter was the only alternative to Ronald Reagan. I wept because by that time, the experience I was having of my country was one of astounding arrogance, violence and egotism. I wept because I was fully understanding that so rarely does one get to vote FOR someone so much as vote against.

I wept, because I felt that the country I lived in was a country of great promise that acted as if it had already delivered on that promise and was far far far from it.

Believe it or not, growing up I still loved The United States and what it stands for that entire time. Few who knew me in those days would believe that because I ranted continually on how this country sucked. But it was because of the lies and violence I grew up watching.

Reagan, well…that’s a disaster we are still paying for. Then GHW Bush. My brother said it best when he won the election. “There is no such thing as an ex-head of the CIA” Too much conflict of interest. Too much lack of care. One day I’ll put down a rant on the entire Bush family, from Nazi Sympathizer Prescott down to Jeb’s crack addicted children, but that’s another night.

Then Bill Clinton. A man of promise, great promise and good words. I flipped the lever for him with some reluctance, only because while I liked his words, something about him seemed off. Turned out it was his dick and a lack of ability to truly consolidate his political genius in a way that truly turned the tide on the previous 12 years.

A lot of blame is laid at Clinton’s feet for W’s mistakes...ways of diverting responsibility, but we do have to admit that Clinton did have something to do with our current financial situation and the failure of true Welfare Reform. Blaming Clinton for 9/11 however is wishful thinking on W apologists’ parts.

What followed Bill is the unspeakable anti-American, anti-Constitutional activities of the W. Administration.

Can you wonder that my world view is often bitter and angry? But that bitterness and anger rises out of a love of this country, its heart and soul and the genius of the flawed men that founded it.

This year, slowly but surely I came for the first time to vote FOR someone. I watched as the kind of philosopher leader I had longed for for my whole life steadily, surely and calmly won the election for President of the United States.

I watched proudly along with 35 million other people on our televisions and 2 million braved ridiculous cold to watch him somewhat clumsily inaugurated. I feel inspired.

I am now not only proud of America’s promise, but its behavior.

I said a few days ago that perhaps we needed the last 8 years to sink so low that we had to long for sunlight so much that we drank it like starving artists for lunch.

Today I watched President Obama begin to demonstrate what it means to have good government. He spoke about the sacrifices that employees of the state department offer just by showing up.

I am proud of where we seem to be going.

I’m mindful that we’re at the start. But I’ve never seen so much heart and soul poured into national service by our political leaders.

We are moving to our promise again, we are moving forward at last. We are going to try the impossible again. We are going to lead with confidence and without fear.

We are taking patriotism back from jingoistic, ignorant buffoons and being what we stand for.

We are Americans again.

Well, just when I thought it was safe to watch the news I see that Sarah Palebrain is back in the news. The main stream media has decided to legitimise her once more because...well...she's amusing.

She's been interviewed by a guy named John Ziegler, a right wing talk radio blabbermouth who is promoting the new conservative meme that it was the media coverage of Barack Obama that got him elected and also the "assassination" of Sarah Palin.

Ziegler also interviews people whom he says were Obama supporters. All of the interviewees that he shows don't seem to know which party was currently "in control" of congress.

He also asks them several questions about which candidate said what. Good questions and the answers do support his claim. For instance everyone knew that Sarah had spent $150,000 on clothing, but no one knew that it was Obama who claimed he had been to 57 states and had one more to visit. This apparently proves how badly informed liberals are.

He didn't question anyone on whether Obama was a muslim or not. Or an Arab, for that matter. We might remember there were hordes of people in this country who still think Obama is both of those things despite numerous statements and proofs to the contrary. There's still a large number of people out there who think Obama was born somewhere other than Hawaii, despite the certification from the state of Hawaii.

I have no doubt that a great number of uninformed people voted for Obama. Same for McCain.

Hell, there are students in public colleges who were campaigning for Ron Paul. These kids clearly didnt realize that Ron Paul would eradicate the very schools where they were pursuing their degrees.

There's no shortage for stupidity.

Any one can easily make a documentary about stupid people, featuring stupid people.

John Zeigler's ex girlfriend looks a lot like Sarah Palin by the way. I find that interesting. She's sued him for harrassment because he was speaking about her pornographically on his radio show (a show he later had to leave).

I'm done rambling. See you tomorrow.