Disconnected

I didn’t have to be Amish for long. The power came back on, and thus far no elderly zombies have risen from their earthy graves, stumbling forth in search of brains or grains.

So I guess I dodged that bullet. But of late I’ve been faced with another nearly insurmountable challenge in this 21st century world—for the past few weeks—nay, months—our internet has worked sporadically, at best.

Sure, you could argue that it’s in fact our neighbor’s internet that has worked so sporadically, but potato, potato, I say to you. The truth of the matter is, there have been nights and days I’ve been left with nary a connection to the outside world.

(Except, you know, my cell phone with its internet, and the ability to go outside, and stuff.)

What do you do when that connection is cut, however briefly? I do occasionally get internet fatigue—I spend all day at my job in front of a pair of computer screens, flitting between the internet and a bevy of Microsoft Word documents, after all. There are nights I come home and the last thing I want to do is stare at a screen any longer. But truthfully, I spend much of my home life with my Macbook on my lap or at least within typing distance. Our stubborn connectedness is the curse of my generation, constant information the albatross around our collective necks.

So what happens when the cord is cut? How do you handle it?

For the sake of argument, let’s say leaving the house isn’t possible. I’m not talking about those evenings when you’ve got errands to run and friends to see; I’m talking about those times when you’re flat broke or feel gross or just plain don’t feel like going anywhere.

I know what I usually do. After cycling through a few stages of grief, and repeatedly checking the wireless connection like an insane junkie in need of a fix, I may relent for a bit. I’ve been reading more lately, which would be better if I were reading Crime & Punishment rather than my recent diet of YA Lit and Anthony Bourdain, but it still feels productive to me. Bourdain is pretty badass, after all.

Then what? Well, without real internet, I’ll admit I spend a fair bit of time checking Twitter and Facebook on my phone. What can I say? I get antsy without constant updates by the likes of @drunkhulk and @docpemberton.

Oh, and there’s always TV, isn’t there? Well, there’s not Netflix, not without internet. But without the novelty of streaming, there are still DVDs to be watched, entire seasons of TV shows to be viewed and reviewed. A Buffy marathon is never out of the question.

The paradox, of course, is that whenever you can’t have something, you want it even more. So whenever that sweet stolen internet connection is cut, however briefly, I’m sure to want to stream a specific TV show or pen an epic blog. I can crave the company of a book all day long, but as soon as I’m home and I can’t get online, it’s all I want to do.

Maybe one of these days I’ll really learn to rough it. Turn off all my glowing screens and fill my time with activities that people did just a few short years ago, when all these connections weren’t yet available.

Maybe one day. For now I’m going to go check Twitter and see if anything good’s been posted to reddit. Maybe do an online crossword or download a new podcast to listen to. Roughing it can't be all it's cracked up to be. Can it?

Sugar & Spice

I may not be the girliest girl there is. I love beer and football, but I also love going shopping and girl talk. I think I strike a nice balance.

But there are some girly things that are just ridiculous. Absurd things. And you know what? We girls know this. I know this. But I participate in them, anyway.

Take GOOP, for instance. GOOP, for the uninitiated and unfamiliar, is potential worst person ever Gwyneth Paltrow’s e-newsletter in which she attempts to foster her image as the Martha Stewart of the new generation, only, like, prettier. Week after week I open this vapid monstrosity to find recipes for searing whitefish, or tummy-toning workout routines from Gwynnie’s personal trainer, or instructions on how to make a cheery holiday wreath from stray socks plucked from the dryer. Week after week my eyes roll back into my head as I hover my cursor over the “Unsubscribe” link, vacillating. And week after week, my subscription to GOOP lives to see another day. What if next week is the week she (or, more likely, her minions) writes about something useful to me? What if I miss it? It’s a thought I cannot bear.

Which brings me, of course, to another girly trait that I recognize as ridiculous but cannot seem to shake—the art of over-thinking. My mind is a mess of worst-case-scenarios, including the fresh hell in which Gwyneth Paltrow writes about the key to existence and I miss out on enlightenment. The normal part of my brain can identify my faulty reasoning but does nothing to stop the girly lizard-brain part from picking apart every worry, every scenario, every text message, every “We need to talk about something,” every “Can you come into my office for a second?” It’s truly exhausting. And yet it persists.

But not every girlish absurdity I embrace, whether intentionally or not, is a fatal flaw. When I turn on the TV, there’s a 33.3% chance that whatever I flip to will be near embarrassing. My DVR knows better than to miss a week of Gossip Girl or Grey’s Anatomy, and woe be the work that needed to get done before I stumbled upon a marathon of ANTM. I may be rotting my brain but I simply can’t help myself.

And then there’s the girly-girl things I could help, but why bother? Like getting dressed up in cute party dresses even when the occasion and the weather don't warrant it. Sometimes a girl just wants to look pretty, okay? And freezing toes and chattering teeth aren't standing in my way.

For the most part, I’m not complaining. We all have our guilty pleasures and peccadilloes. I think that one of these days I’m going to need to do something about GOOP, though. I just don’t think I’m buying what Gwynnie’s selling.

That's My Jam

The other day in the car during my long, lonely commute home, a pop song came on the radio. What song it was is unimportant; use your imagination. As the opening chords drifted through my car's admittedly mediocre speaker system, I said out loud to no one, "This is my jam!"

Instantly I was taken aback. When did I become this person who constantly refers to things she enjoys as her "jam"? Every now and then, one must carefully examine one's life, and this was one of those moments. I say this phrase far too often, I deduced, and must be stopped.

As a matter of full disclosure, here is an abridged list of things I have, of late, referred to as "my jam":

Neon Trees, "Animal"

Ke$ha, "Your Love Is My Drug"

Ke$ha, "Tik Tok," only to rescind my declaration upon the realization that the song was not, in fact, "Your Love Is My Drug"

Strawberry preserves purchased by me

Communication

Neon Trees, "Animal" again-- it really is my jam

I need a new expression of appreciation. I can only assume that "That's what I'm talking about" would be every bit as absurd and out of place as "That's my jam." I'm far too ridiculous to ever simply utter, "I enjoy this particular thing, person or song." So I'm out of ideas. If you come up with any replacement catchphrases for me, do let me know.

In the meantime I'll be rocking out to the new Taylor Swift. It's my jam.

Gone Too Soon

I think you may have figured out that I'm a bit of a television fan. I prefer to watch series in order, never missing a single episode. It's the plight of the purist, but it's made much easier by TV on DVD, the internet and my BFF, Netflix.

My latest Netflix conquest has been Sports Night, a half-hour comedy/drama by Aaron Sorkin (The West Wing, the new film The Social Network) that ran on ABC for two pitch-perfect seasons before being canned for low ratings. It marries two of my favorite things-- sports and TV-- and features stellar writing and a killer cast.

So what happened? Why did this show only tough it out for two seasons, while other more mediocre ones last for years? Well, I'm not a television executive, just a nerdy viewer, so hell if I know. I do know that I have a tendency to fall for shows just like this.

Take a sitcom called Kitchen Confidential. You've never seen this show. How do I know this? Because Fox ran a mere four of its thirteen ordered episodes before pulling it off the air. Fox has a violent, bloody history with good TV, favoring instead reality programming about sharks finding love or something. Kitchen Confidential (based on Anthony Bourdain's fantastic book by the same name) got off to a slow start, but by the fourth aired episode, I was laughing out loud, as were my college roommates. It never had the chance to find its audience. Maybe it never would have-- this is no Arrested Development: don't get me wrong, there's a reason why it's not a cult favorite all these years later-- but viewers never had the chance to discover it.

A fledgling series should certainly be given time to come into its own, find its niche, find its audience-- but how much time? If a show hasn't established itself as a ratings-getter within five episodes, should it be canceled? Thirteen episodes? A whole season? There are rumblings right now that Fox (oh Fox, you cut-throat bastard of broadcast networks) is planning to pull Lone Star off the air after only one episode. (Ed. note: Lone Star wound up being canceled after two episodes.) That certainly seems unfair, but what is? TV is a business, after all.

Another issue at hand-- let's say a show is allowed more than four episodes to find an audience, and it does, albeit a small one. How do you determine if a show was truly taken before its time? My perennial favorite Veronica Mars had gone significantly downhill by its third season, which turned out to be its last. Should it have stayed on the air on the promise that creator Rob Thomas could deliver a better fourth, which was set to jump forward in time and feature Veronica in the FBI Academy? Likewise, Arrested Development's run consisted of three solid seasons. Sure, it was never recognized or acclaimed like it is today, never got its due, but is it better that the show ended while it was still near its peak?

Both of the aforementioned series had stumbled in varying degrees before their cancellations, but there are plenty of examples of shows that were going strong, at least creatively, and yet never made it out alive. One doesn't have to scour the internet to find anger and righteous indignation over the tragically short run of Joss Whedon's space western, Firefly. The fans carried on so much that he was able to make a movie tying up loose ends (Serenity)-- thankfully, since the original series was treated like a ginger stepchild. Ten of the fourteen episodes were aired, not in the intended order, with unexplained gaps in between. Time slots were shifted without notice. Advertising was practically non-existent. Is it any surprise that Firefly's home was with Fox?

And what about Freaks & Geeks? Possibly the most egregious example I can think of, as it was pulled after only 12 of 18 ordered episodes had aired despite being a truly incredible show in all aspects. Entertainment Weekly named it the 13th best series of the past 25 years in spite of its short run, and I can't disagree. It's television tragedy that shows like this never seem to last, while others are rewarded for their lowest-common-denominator humor and writing.

Take the WB/CW's Seventh Heaven, for instance. It ran for a whopping 10 seasons and was cancelled with plenty of notice for showrunner Brenda Hampton (Secret Life of the American Teenager) to wrap up whatever endings she needed to. Then the finale, which the network advertised as a series finale, welcomed good ratings. So they brought the damn thing back! In fact, its eleventh-hour, eleventh-season renewal was directly responsible for the cancellation of a show I enjoyed and found to be much better in all ways, Everwood. Where is the justice in this world?

It's fortunate that in this age of archival, these shows aren't lost or forgotten. On the one hand, websites like Hulu and the proliferation of TV on DVD make it easy to discover such cancelled gems. On the other hand, what a pain it is to find a show that's really quality, only to find out there exist a mere 14 episodes, or 22 or even 64-- it never feels like enough. You'll always feel cheated out of the plotlines that never were.

This unfairness, it's really just a fact of life. There are more movie blockbusters cobbled together with explosions and boobs than there are incredibly-crafted indies. Dan Brown books are best-sellers. Some of the best things will always fly under the radar, and you don't have to be a skinny-jean-clad hipster to appreciate that maybe that's for the best. I know I have more of an attachment to some of these shows that really never got any credit. They're the ones I pimp out to friends, recommend to strangers and watch over and over. I think I'm to blame for no less than 15 different cases of Veronica Mars fever, for which the prescription isn't cowbell, but instead hours and hours of trying to figure out who killed Lilly Kane before our intrepid protagonist. If these excellent shows had run for eight seasons apiece, would the desire to get them whatever accolades I can still be there? Maybe. But at Dragon*Con this year, the line for the Firefly panel (featuring four of the lead actors) was the longest I saw all weekend, and was full of over-excited fans wearing Jayne hats. Not too shabby for a 14-episode series that went off the air seven years back. Fans of these kinds of things are enduring.

It's tempting in this TV climate to refuse to start watching a show until it has a proven record of not being canceled. I wouldn't fault anyone who waited until a series came out on DVD or on Netflix InstantWatch before giving it a shot. But I'm willing to start out a promising show even if I know it'll be ripped away from me before I'm ready. Sometimes that's the price you have to pay for true quality.