Thank God for Comedy Central

The Original Kings of Comedy followed by Jamie Foxx's Laffapalooza--just what I need to stop this crying jag. Guess I'll go soak in the tub and listen to stupid jokes about how black folks are different from white folks.

Perhaps I just need to cry

I've avoided the movie Lackawanna Blues for a while because I knew it would make me cry. So why on earth would I watch it on a weekend when I am already in a fragile state of mind? The sense of community portrayed in the film just doesn't exist anymore and it makes me sad. I guess I'm in mourning this weekend for everything I've missed, whether it be through my poor decision-making or just being born at the wrong time.

525,600 Minutes

This was not the weekend for me to watch "Rent". I've seen it on stage before so I knew what to expect, but I still cried through the whole third act. Watching a movie where all the characters are talking about living their lives to the fullest and not stifling their dreams was not the best choice for me today. I feel like I've wasted half of my minutes and I don't know how to make the best of the other half. I'm too old to blame my mistakes on being young but I don't know how to be a grown-up. I don't have a choice, though, because I've got kids to raise and I don't want to screw that up.

Health Update

Despite the fact that my ticker says .5 gained, I actually lost half a pound this week (the ticker is showing the change from my original starting weight). The only change I made this week was to cut out the sweet iced tea on Wednesday and Friday. Next week, I will try to stick with that and cut out the French fries. Tea and French fries were not daily menu items for me before so I'm sure they contributed to the last 10 pounds I gained. Giving up the fries will be a real challenge for me because there are many days that I don't like the soup or vegetable that is being served in the caf.

Exercise is going well. I'm still using videos but I've given myself permission to march in place if I can't do one of the moves and then jump back in when they get to something I can do. That may sound strange, but I am usually an all-or-nothing person; if I can't do every single move in the video or keep up with the presenter's speed, then I give up. This time, I am trying to remind myself that the amount of time I stay in motion is the focus.

As you can see, I'm not much of a geek

I identify myself as a geek, but I apparently I haven't completed the required reading :-). To clarify, the ones that don't have some sort of highlighting are the ones I haven't read.

What have I read?
These are the 25 most popular scifi books at What Should I Read Next?

I liked it!

I didn't like it!

I want to read it!

The Hitchhiker's Guide To The Galaxy - Douglas Adams

The Hobbit - J. R. R. Tolkien

Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix - J.K. Rowling

Ender's Game - Orson Scott Card

The Lord of the Rings - J. R. R. Tolkien

Neuromancer - William Gibson

American Gods - Neil Gaiman

Snow Crash - Neal Stephenson

The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe - C.S. Lewis

Dune - Frank Herbert

Good Omens - Terry Pratchett, Neil Gaiman

Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell

The Handmaid's Tale - Margaret Atwood

The Princess Bride - William Goldman

Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell - Susanna Clarke

Fahrenheit 451 - Ray Bradbury

Neverwhere - Neil Gaiman

The Eyre Affair - Jasper Fforde

Pattern Recognition - William Gibson

A Game of Thrones - George R.R. Martin

The Diamond Age - Neal Stephenson

Cat's Cradle - Kurt Vonnegut

The Stand - Stephen King

Stranger in a Strange Land - Robert Heinlein

The Colour of Magic - Terry Pratchett

Take the 'What have I read?' test now!
Eight different categories to try!
Buy your books at Amazon US or Amazon UK

Water Cooler Talk: Project Runway

"Reunion"

This is the show where they bring back all the contestants that were voted off previously, hence the title. I guess they do this before the fashion week episode to heighten the suspense. Whatever. Here are the highlights as I saw them:

--John Wade lost so much weight he is almost unrecognizable. It looks good on him.

--Kirsten Ehrig is seven months' pregnant.

--Santino, in his arrogance, still thinks that he is a compassionate person. He is a jerk whose only redeeming feature is his hilarious impression of Tim Gunn.

--A lot of the talk-back clips contained conversations that I didn't remember from the episodes. This must be the stuff that was left on the cutting room floor the first time around.

--Guadalupe sounded like she was smashed. She wasn't making any sense.

--Oh, my God! If they had shown the whole 9:53 minutes of Andrae's outburst on TV, I would have thrown a shoe at my TV. The man needs help.

Overall, the reunion was only mildly interesting. I think these scenes would have been put to better use if they had been used to spice up some of the more boring episodes.

This Diamond Ring

There are days when I wonder what is happening to my brain. ABM bought me a lovely wedding ring set for Christmas. It was nothing extravagant, just CZ and sterling silver which is exactly what I wanted. (Why should he spend a ton of money on a diamond when CZ looks just as good to my eye?) He bought the right size but the rings wouldn't fit. I can get them on but they are just tight enough to be uncomfortable after an hour. They have been sitting in a drawer since Christmas. Every day I look at my hands, trying to find some sign that the weight I've gained has made my hands fatter; I just don't see it. Yesterday, while watching a wedding on TV, I figured out the problem. I've been trying to put the rings on my right hand. It has been so long since I've worn a wedding ring that I forgot that it goes on my left hand. My left ring finger is smaller than my right, so the rings fit fine on that finger. Sometimes I think all my useful knowledge is seeping out of my ears at night, leaving me with nothing but trivia.




Today's exercise: Pseudo-kickboxing video

Avoiding my responsibilities

Checking DJ's homework is such a trial that I avoid doing it. I know that is bad, but it is the truth. His main problem is his atrocious handwriting. It isn't just a little sloppy; his letters don't have the proper proportions and he ignores lines on the paper altogether. He thinks that as long as his teacher doesn't say anything to him, then his homework is fine. She may not say anything, but his grades are going down because she marks off for bad handwriting (unlike the teacher he had for the first quarter).

Today I had to deal with another crying jag when I asked DJ to rewrite his spelling words. He says that he hates for me to check his homework because I am always going to tell him that it is wrong. I waver between feeling sorry for him and being angry with him. I know that when he slows down he can write the letters properly, but he is hellbent on finishing his homework as quickly as possible. No matter how gentle I am when I tell him to do the rewrites, he cries. Sometimes I try to show him how to do it properly next time without making him rewrite it this time, but he still cries. What's worse is that he just sits and cries. I know this sounds crass, but I wish he would write while he was crying so he could get it over with.




Today's Exercise: Belly dance video

This workout doesn't hurt my back but I had to quit early because my left ankle hurts. It has been hurting since yesterday. Although Monday's workout didn't seem difficult at the time, I suspect that the jumping jacks were a bad idea. I have a ballet/pilates workout I can try tomorrow if it still hurts.

Oprah Special Report: Katrina Stories No One is Telling

Although I take in lots of information daily, none of it is really news. I purposely avoid news because I can't take it. Today, however, when I saw the Oprah special come on I felt that I had to watch it. I have been more wrapped up in my own petty problems than usual and I thought that as a good Christian I should focus on someone else's problems for a while.

Thank God for TiVo. If I had to watch this show straight through, I think my heart would have burst out of my chest. The fact that part of our citizenry is still living in squalor months after the hurricane is appalling. The fact that people are being kicked out of temporary housing because FEMA will no longer pay for it is appalling. The fact that kids are being kicked out of school because they can't meet the uniform dress code is appalling. I don't know much about what is being done and what has bogged down the system, but stories like this need to be on TV every day until the people with power get mad and fix this.

Just as I feared

None of M's friends showed up on Saturday. It is understandable. As I said before, most of her classmates live in the same city as the school while we live about 30 minutes away. I think I erred by not calling each girl's parents and emphasizing that while this was not a party, it was her birthday present.

I'm not sure that it would have made much of a difference, though. People around here are weird about gatherings. I don't know if it is a black thing or a southern thing, but people rarely have parties and they don't RSVP when they are invited to one. I wasn't surprised to find out that all the girls invited to the twins' birthday party came from non-Southern families (they were all white, too, but we aren't going to dwell on that). They all showed up on time and brought a gift even though I was trying to play down the fact that it was their birthday. I marvel at people who get together with friends once a week to play games because ABM and I can't manage to get our friends together more than two or three times a year.




Today's Exercise: Tae Bo Kicks

I've gotten off to a good start this week. Tae Bo Kicks is a Billy Blanks exercise video for kids. He doesn't exactly have the fun, bouncy presence that you expect in a kids' exercise instructor but the workout was easy enough for me to make it through the whole 35 minutes. I feel like I got a good workout and (so far) my back isn't bothering me. He doesn't work evenly on both sides of the body but that isn't much of a problem; I just stopped when he instructed them to do an extra rep on one side. The other benefit besides it being a workout I can do all the way through is that he kept all that "communicating with your body" stuff to a minimum. All the exercise philosophy between reps is what turned me off when I tried the basic Tae Bo video years ago. Although in most things I want to know the reason why I am doing it, with exercise I just want the routine.

Thank you, Google!

Our laptop came loaded with Windows Media Player 10. A few weeks' ago the sound stopped playing for no reason. We hadn't made any changes to the settings or anything. The sound worked fine in all other applications except for WMP. Since this isn't our main machine and we have Real Player and Quicktime installed on it, I didn't devote too much time to fixing the problem. Tonight I finally got around to doing a Google search on the situation and a posting on the Hardware Analysis site yielded the answer. Apparently, next to the volume slider in WMP 10 there is a teeny tiny mute button. This button looks almost the same when it is on "mute" as it does when it is on "play". I never would have paid attention to it if several people on this site hadn't found the problem. As Mur Lafferty said in her most recent podcast, Google's greatest accomplishment has been to allow people to get their stupid questions answered without having to look stupid in front of someone.

Growing My Own Gamers #3

Yes, it has been a while since I've posted about our game playing. The main reason is that I have been suffering from a bit of game envy. I listen to almost all of the boardgaming podcasts out there and I hear about all these games that I can't afford to get right now. Knowing that all these cool games exist makes another round of Pit almost unbearable.

My cheap solution to escaping game ennui is to explore all the different games that the kids and I can play with a standard deck of cards. When I was a kid, the only card games I knew how to play with regular cards were War, Speed, Spoons, and Go Fish. As an adult, I added Spades and various patience games to the list. With the help of the library, the kids and I have tried out the following games over the past month:

Crazy Eights
Stealing Bundles
Lose Your Shirt
Anchors Away
Snip-Snap-Snorem
Newmarket
Knockout Whist
Tressette

Snip-Snap-Snorem and Lose Your Shirt were the favorites among the kids, probably because they are easy. Lose Your Shirt is similar to War in that it can go on forever and I want to avoid games like that. Newmarket was just introduced yesterday and was a big hit with DJ and C2, who both like games with chips that you can win. C2 also liked Tressette and keeps asking to play again, which surprised me. She is my kid who struggles in school but she is attracted to the games with complicated rules. I may try some more two-player games with her, since the other kids prefer easier games.

Yesterday I got a pleasant surprise. The game I ordered on eBay, Reiner Knizia's Poison, arrived in the post. Since I just paid for it on Wednesday, I wasn't expecting to see it until the end of next week. Although the kids seem to enjoy anything we play, I like cards that are dedicated to a certain game. Good artwork and fun bits enhance my playing experience immensely. I played it with M, C2, and DJ; we couldn't convince C1 to play. The whole game is mathematical, so it is a good way to get my young ones to practice doing math in their head. DJ enjoyed playing but was resistant to doing the addition himself. He would always point to a cauldron and say "How much is that?" He consistently gets high marks in math so I know that he can figure it out for himself. Like M, I think he is good at math on paper but needs more practice applying it in the real world.

I'm glad that the kids enjoy being used as game guinea pigs for their mami, but I must admit that it is a little boring for me at times. I know that in the long run I will appreciate starting them out early. For instance, playing Knockout Whist gave them an introduction to trick-taking and the concept of a trump suit. This is laying the foundation for us to be able to play Spades or Hearts with them later. However, I am craving some adult competition. ABM avoids playing games with us the way I avoided Candyland when the kids were little. Honestly, I can't blame him. A quick root beer-and-pretzels game like Poison can be excruciating with kids who take much longer to make decisions. Unfortunately, it is difficult to get our friends together to do anything so I will just have to wait patiently for the kids to get older.

Health Update

As you can see from my weight gain, I didn't give up the cappucino or the iced tea. Instead, I added potato chips and chocolate. Healthy eating just seemed like a useless pursuit and exercise was painful. It is difficult for my goals to feel relevant when they are so far away. Even my short-term goal of increasing my exercise time from 10 to 15 minutes a day seems like it will take forever. I plan to keep plugging away at the exercise, but my heart's not in it.

Today is M's birthday; she is now 13. I am officially the mother of a teenager and it is hitting me hard. Yes, I am self-centered enough to think it is all about me on my kid's birthday :-). Saturday she is having friends over (it is NOT a party) , so it can be all about her then. Today I am trying to come to grips with the fact that I am the mother of a teenager with breasts and hips and beautiful long hair and lips "full enough for kissing" (her words--YIKES!). For the most part, she still acts like a kid so it is a bit unsettling when teenage things like that pop out.

I was a bit down today, but I still forced myself to exercise. This lifted my spirits but not in the way you may think. Today I tried out a belly dancing workout and all the girls decided to jump in. C1 stood in front of me with a silly grin and a body built like Olive Oyl's and shouted, "I can't get my hips to stop shaking!" It was the funniest thing I've seen all week and definitely worth the trouble of keeping the rugrats around.




Yesterday's exercise: Walk Away the Pounds
Today's exercise: Belly dancing video

Happy Valentine's Day

As you can see on the sidebar, my avatar is all ready for a hot date . Unfortunately, she will probably get more action than I will tonight. ABM won't be home until about 10p and since his job is stressful, he won't be in a good mood when I see him. Even if he was off today, I would be foolish to expect anything special. He is one of those men who think that Valentine's Day is a holiday created by advertising companies to make women believe that they aren't loved if they don't get flowers/diamonds/candy today. The last time he bought me flowers was when a co-worker pressured him to do it.

As for me doing something for him, his idea of a romantic gesture is me finding something cool and free for him on the internet. That doesn't take much effort on my part but to him it is great because he hates doing research. So I guess I will see if I can find a new game for his Zire 72.

Water Cooler Talk: Grey's Anatomy

ABM and I spent some quality time with our Tivo and watched the last three episodes of Grey's Anatomy. We love this show! As usual for us, however, it is the secondary story lines that hold our attention. We couldn't care less about the love triangle between Meredith, McDreamy, and his wife. I am all about more screen time for Yang (Sandra Oh) and Burke (Isaiah Washington). Sandra Oh is one actress who keeps my eyes glued to the screen, no matter how small her role is. Proof of my Oh devotion? I watched a sappy Lifetime movie yesterday because she was in it. ABM's favorite character is Bailey (Chandra Wilson). My husband, who in the past hasn't gotten emotional over TV shows, was yelling at the screen last night that the writers better not let Bailey's husband die :-).

Last night's episode provided a few minor surprises. Christina Ricci is more of an indie movie chick so I didn't expect to see her doing a guest spot. Kyle Chandler, who I haven't seen in much of anything since Early Edition, was a sight for sore eyes. I was hoping that he might end up as a love interest for Meredith, not as pink mist in the hospital corridor. The explosion was a surprise to me because the musical score was lulling me into that "this is the end of the episode" frame of mind. I actually jumped when the bomb went off.




Today's Exercise: Bhangra dance video

Health Update

Yes, I am starting back at ground zero. I know what the problem is, though. The MIL bought a giant container of French vanilla cappucino mix and I have been drinking two or three huge mugs of it every day. High-calorie drinks pack on the pounds for me more than anything else and I can see the difference almost immediately. If I start cutting them out now, I can guarantee that I will see a loss of at least two pounds next week. Whether I will cut them out is the question 'cause I loves me some coffee.

My exercise program is going about as well as expected. I've been using a show called All-Star Workouts on FitTV that has a different workout every day by a well-known fitness instructor. I can only do about 10-12 minutes of the workout, which basically covers the warmup. Still, I am really feeling it in my thighs and calves so that's good enough for me.

Water Cooler Talk: Project Runway

"Makeover"

This week, the designers had to give each other makeovers.

--This has absolutely nothing to do with the show, but I loathe the way Daniel was holding his cell phone. My husband and everyone I know has developed that weird hold when they use the speaker phone. It's like the phone is contaminated so they only want to hold it with their fingertips. I prefer the cyborg look of the Bluetooth headset over that any day.

--Again, nothing to do with the show: why must today's pregnant women wear the tightest clothing possible over their bellies? I understand being proud of your little bump; I was definitely proud of mine. However, the black t-shirt Heidi was wearing looked like it could barely take the strain of being stretched over her stomach and the jacket stuck out at an odd angle because it wasn't long enough to accommodate her girth. That was not youthful or attractive; it just made her look like she was in denial.

--After a few episodes of showing his endearing side, Santino returned to being a jerk. He especially got on Nick's nerves. I'm still wondering if he has a crush on Santino. The one you love is often the one who gets on your nerves the most.

--A little hair and makeup assistance can do wonders! Kara, Chloe, and Daniel all had full, sexy heads of hair that just needed a little attention.

--Santino lied through his teeth about the outfit he designed for Kara! I'm glad that she didn't feel the need to defend him and his glued-together jumpsuit, even though she loses points with me for crying about it backstage.

--The dubbing of Heidi's comments on the runway was so obvious that it makes me wonder what the designers were actually hearing in the studio.

Nick was the ultimate loser this time. How did Santino skate by again? His outfit was falling apart. I know that Nick's suit for Daniel was puckering at the seams, but that can't be as bad as a sleeve falling off. The producers have got to be pushing to keep Santino so that there will be a strong personality in the final three.

Water Cooler Talk: Gilmore Girls

"You've Been Gilmored"

There's not much to say about this week's episode because it was rather predictable. Rory gets named editor of the Yale Daily News? Check. Paris gets pissed and kicks her out? Check. Rory is forced to move in with Logan? Check. Christopher telling Lorelei about Rory's new living arrangement was a slight surprise. Overall, though, Rory moving in with Logan seems to be a bit of a non-event. I like that the writers of this show don't drag out the story lines (Rory was barely in Logan's apartment for one day when she told Lorelei and Christopher) but sometimes the show could benefit from a little tension.





Today's Exercise: Hip-hop dance video

Trying out another ticker

Today's exercise: Bhangra dance video

Generally, I don't put much stock in writing down my progress. For instance, a food diary doesn't work for me because I stop writing in it as soon as I eat junk food. I know that it is stupid to cheat because I am only shortchanging myself, but that's what I do. However, exercise charts have the oppostite effect on me. I tend to exercise more just so I can have something to put on the chart. Again, I'm the only one who knows if I am telling the truth so I could cheat but I don't.

Anyway, I found a ticker site that I like so I am going to start tracking my exercise on my blog again. I am not going to talk about it much because discussing my measly 10-minute exercise session isn't going to be too interesting. My plan is to just put the ticker at the top of whatever post I am making that day instead of making a special exercise post.

My weekly goal is 150 minutes, which is 30 minutes a day/5 days a week. I know that I am only going to be able to meet 1/3 of my goal for a while because I can only handle the movements in the aerobics videos for about 10 minutes at a time. We are considering the possibility of replacing our treadmill in a few months if we get a decent tax return and one of the cars doesn't break down. If that happens, then I stand a chance of meeting my goal sooner because I have more endurance on a treadmill. Of course, our cars can smell tax returns and bonus checks and choose the day before their arrival to go into a coma, so I am not getting my hopes up.

Super Bowl Commercials

This is one of ABM's favorites:





I thought the kids would like that one, as well, but this is the one that cracks them up:

Health Update

Here we go again! By the time New Year's Day rolled around, I had gained back the few pounds I lost last year. That means that I started 2006 at 265, which makes me 100 pounds overweight. As you can see by the ticker, I've lost a few pounds since that day. The only change I've made is drinking more water. Some would say what I lost is water weight, but I know the truth. Drinking water causes me to have more bowel movements, so I've pooped away three pounds. I wonder how much more weight I would lose if I went for a fancy colon cleanse. (Say it with me: Ewwww, gross!)

Since this is my first health update of the year, let me give you a snapshot of where I stand now. Besides being overweight, my body has become its own barrier to exercise. I have a myriad of strange symptoms that pop up now when I attempt to move. My lower back starts to hurt if I do housework for more than 10 minutes. The soles of my feet hurt when I try to walk for exercise. My knees buckle under me more frequently. I have numbness in my legs that comes and goes at the oddest times. Recently I started having a strange burning in my thighs that feels like I am standing too close to a heating element. (Don't say it: I'm not going to a doctor because I don't have any health insurance.) These symptoms frustrate me because I feel that most of them would go away if I wasn't carrying all this extra weight.

Finding a balance with food is still a struggle. Today I am in the proper frame of mind to eat nutritious food. I just ate two vegetables with dinner, which is unusual for me. After a period of healthy eating, though, I find myself wanting to rebel. So I go through cycles of eating healthy for three weeks, then throwing it all out the window by eating anything that can't run away from me for months. If I could somehow make the healthy eating cycle longer and the crazy eating cycle shorter, then I might have some success in improving my health.

What does all this mean for where I'm going, healthwise? I don't know. I do know that I don't want to try another diet or another plan. I don't want to think about carbs, calories, fat grams, points, etc. Want to know a secret about this fat gal? I don't think about food all day. That may be hard to believe considering how much I weigh, but it's true. The only time my mind is consumed with thoughts of food is when I am trying to stick to a plan. Trying to stick to my prescribed amount of calories/points/whatever makes me think about all the foods I can't eat. Even if I say that I am going to allow myself to eat XYZ today and go back to my plan tomorrow, I feel guilty for not sticking to the plan. I don't ever want some numbers on a piece of paper to make me feel guilty about what I put in my mouth again.

Exercise seems to be the only answer. As much as it hurts, I am going to make myself move. I can't let myself spend another weekend in bed from sunup to sundown. If I continue to do that, then I know that one day I won't be able to get up. Last year's mantra was "I want to have sex until I'm 80". This year I am adding one I stole from author Haven Kimmel: "She got up off the couch." I don't know how much I will be able to do once I leave the couch, but I'm getting up anyway.

Water Cooler Chat: Project Runway

"Flower Power"

This week's challenge was to make a dress out of plants and flowers. I think this was the equivalent of the supermarket challenge from the first season. In a way I think it is smarter to bring out this type of challenge toward the end. Theoretically, the worst designers have already been eliminated by this point so the remaining people should be able to handle such a difficult task. The twist is that the winner this week is exempt from being eliminated in the next challenge.

--Nick was still taking the loss of his original model hard. Daniel decided to keep his model, so Nick's original model is completely out of the competition. I didn't realize until recently that Nick is a teacher at a design school. That may explain his attachment; he probably works with the same models a lot in his real job.

--This is the first challenge where Chloe looked like she was not going to make it. All the other challenges seemed effortless for her, but I think she became overconfident with the leaf dress. Still, her dress didn't look as unfinished as she claimed it was.

--Santino's impression of Tim Gunn is the only thing he has done on this show so far that makes him likeable. The little story about Andrae and Tim at Red Lobster had me laughing out loud.

--Where did Heidi Klum get that hideous maternity dress? I'll be the first to admit that I am old-fashioned when it comes to maternity clothes. If I could have gotten away with it, I would have dressed like Laura Petrie while I was pregnant. I'm not a big fan of the idea that you should dress as if you weren't pregnant. That dress Heidi wore was too busy with the asymmetrical ruffles and the weird hemline; the belly made it look even more jacked-up.

--Andrae was doing so well, but he disappointed me this week with his dress. There wasn't enough color to offset all that green. I happen to love green, but the model looked like she had wrapped herself in an Astroturf sample. The model walked like her boobs itched.

--Nick also let me down. His dress looked like it was made from duct tape.

--Kara and Daniel both made good use of flowers, but I like Kara's better than his. She redeemed herself with this dress. The bodice fit so well that it gave the model the appearance of a woodland sprite. I'm glad that she didn't cave to Tim's suggestions. She focused on the bodice and kept the skirt simple, despite him prodding her to move on to the skirt. I think that listening to Tim during the creative process has made her back off of her more daring ideas, which has hurt her.

Daniel has immunity next week, and Andrae got the boot. I'm glad that he was able to stay long enough to show the world that beneath all the histrionics is a decent designer.

Water Cooler Talk: Gilmore Girls

"Friday Night's Alright for Fighting"

--The fans who say that Luke and Lorelei have chemistry must be wearing better glasses than mine. Luke went to hug her and he couldn't even do that right. Some may find the bumbling endearing, but there is nothing that makes my heart go pitter-pat when I see them together. It makes me wonder id the actors even like each other off-screen.

--Does Lorelei have to have everything center around her? I'm starting to think she is an attention hog. The way she pouted because she couldn't meet Luke's daughter right away was childish. He has only had three meeting with her himself! She needs to give them some space. He has been understanding about all of Lorelei's issues, but for some reason she can't see that.

--I never expected Lorelei to be the one showing signs of maturity. As much as she enjoyed torturing her mom in earlier episodes, I was surprised when she advised Rory to make it up with them.

--Was Logan being sweet when he helped Rory with the newspaper crisis or was he throwing his weight around? Rory proved in the DAR fundraiser episodes that she can be a great last-minute general so I don't think she really needed him to take command. Tell me if I am seeing this the wrong way.

--The family fight at the end of the episode reminded me of some 1970s movie that I saw but can't remember the title. Was the show paying homage to some famous director and I missed it in the credits?

--The previews for next week have me worried. If Logan and Rory get married, I'll be fine. If Rory turns out to be pregnant, I will emit the scream heard 'round the world.