Mostly Off-Topic Ramblings!
Soap Talk Below!
I hope everybody had a great holiday, however you celebrated it! I was greeted this morning with two children who were quite obviously suffering from a candy hangover. They marched into my room at 8 A.M. with the hangover already in full swing if the sparkly sunglasses straight from their baskets were any indication. I made the mistake of thinking kiddie hangovers are anything like adult hangovers…they’re not. Trust me. Instead of lying around and holding their heads or something, they had already managed to destroy half the house with just a pile of packages (from which new toys had already been liberated), lots of Easter grass, a pound of stickers and two plastic eggs filled with Silly Putty. Bright blue and pink silly putty. My house has a lot of earth tones, so I spent a good part of today thinking that whoever invented the original color of Silly Putty was a genius and whoever thought Easter colors were a good idea should be shot. You would think the stuff would peel right off (since that is kind of the point of it to begin with) but my girls found that if you work with small enough pieces of it, you can indeed grind it into furniture and carpeting to the extent that it is very difficult to remove. My husband suspects that maybe they tried the “hair of the dog” routine and had already regenerated their candy quota by the time I got up, and I suppose he could be right. Holiday’s are hectic but I’ve found that for us, the day after is sometimes worse. We spend most holidays running around from one family gathering to the next so they don’t get to actually look at all their new loot for very long in the morning before it’s put aside and we move on, so to speak. By the time we get back home, they’ve usually been indulged beyond recognition and we can’t wait to get them in bed, so it isn’t until the next morning that they get the chance to check things out in depth…and that’s exactly what they spent this morning doing apparently. It was rather impressive really in its scope and destruction, in its own way of course, lol. I wish I had a digital camera, because I’d love to show you what I saw when I came out of my bedroom. I was still finding silly putty stuck in the oddest places hours later…the creativity never ceases to amaze me.
My oldest lost her second tooth Easter morning, so we spent the day trying to persuade my youngest that “that lady” (her pet name for the Tooth Fairy) wouldn’t bother her when she came to leave a surprise under her sister’s pillow. When the first tooth came out a few weeks ago, it dawned on the little one that all this Tooth Fairy talk really meant that “that lady” was going to come in her room. She informed us in no uncertain terms that she didn’t want “that lady” in her room…and “what if she messes with all my animals (stuffed) or decides to take something of mine when she takes the tooth??” It’s funny how you never know what is going to set someone off. One kid is perfectly fine with fairies, jolly old men, and bunnies coming in and out of the house at night…and the other thinks it’s a bit intrusive, lol. I suppose it’s the same for adults though, everybody has a different trigger and you really can’t predict what it will be unless you really, really know a person. Apparently we start that pretty young :)
A few of you have asked
about my GH watching status. Sage told me a week and a half or so ago that it
might be time to poke my head out and take a look. I checked with Katrina (not
that I don’t trust my Sage, but he’s more able to see the good in things than
most of us so I wanted to be sure that even critical ole me might be interested
in looking at it again, lol!) and she concurred, along with several other
trusted columnist friends and board friends. So, I taped a few episodes last
week (I wanted to see Tracy anyway, so the timing was great). I’ve watched last
Wednesday and Thursday so far and quite enjoyed what I saw for the most part.
Not perfection or anything, but I can feel how much the break I’ve taken has
helped because I don’t feel all that invested. It’s SO much easier to ignore
the sucky parts if there is something you really want to see (Tracy, for
instance) interspersed among it. There was very little mob action going on for
those two days so that helped as well. The other thing that helps is the
knowledge that I can shut it off anytime I feel like it – that’s priceless! So,
for now, I’m watching when I feel like it. If it holds my interest, I’ll
watch. If it doesn’t, I can fill the time in other ways. I’ll probably catch
most of Tracy’s stuff and whatever else someone tells me is worth seeing, but I
won’t be writing a column or anything at this point. To do that (even though I
do miss it a LOT) I need to watch most of the time and I’m not interested in
putting myself in that position as of yet. I see improvement, but I need
consistent improvement before I’m ready to invest time into it again. Here’s
hoping we get the consistency though, because I’d love to be back dishing GH
again sometime soon! Thanks so much for all your queries, and for your support
– EOS truly has the best fans around!
I’d also love to hear your feedback on the new column. Let me know what you like and what you don’t and I’ll take it under advisement. I’ll probably be doing a variety of things, sometimes off topic, sometimes not so let me know how you feel about the format if you get the chance! And as always, thank you for reading.
Seriously, maybe it’s just me (?) but I swear that PC is twenty times more interesting for the first few weeks of an arc than it ever is for the wrap up of an arc. I’m really enjoying things again right now. What really stood out for me over the past week or so were the scenes with Rafe and Livvie in one cell and Caleb and Alison in the next one. That was great stuff! Livvie writhing in pain, Caleb visibly upset and willing to start sacrificing things for her, Alison in a red satin dress and matching lipstick…looking confused and unsure of what’s next, and Rafe sort of torn between helping and letting things take a natural course that will really only further his agenda anyway. Best of all was the moment when it dawned on all of them that Rafe and Livvie could have sex and Livvie would feel better! The look Livvie gave Rafe was saying she wasn’t completely opposed, and who can blame her really? It’s not like they haven’t done it before and the girl was obviously in pain. I had a moment, I admit, where I was picturing Rafe “healing” Livvie while Caleb and Alison held each other, covered their eyes and cried in the opposite corner of their cell. The mere suggestion of it was creepy and compelling all at once and I thought the scenes were appropriately tense and riveting! They are utilizing more characters, things seem less centralized and there has been a bit more levity in the last few weeks.
On the other hand, here’s a direct quote from my husband who doesn’t watch PC but sees enough of it to have a general idea of the story since I often watch on tape in the evenings or on weekends. He walked in the room on Thursday night while I was catching up on a few of last week’s episodes and he said: “This is still going on with the vampire thing? I thought it was supposed to change every once in awhile!” Word, dear husband, WORD!! Oh, but he also saw one of the ladies in a turtleneck (Lucy maybe?) and said that she must be a vampire since everyone knows they wear turtlenecks to cover the bite marks…sometimes he just thinks he’s smart, lol. But seriously, I really am hoping that we can see some other stories develop throughout this arc and not have everything be about the vampires. Karen and Frank’s appearance is a good sign. Maybe we’ll be allowed to catch up on what they’ve been doing (sorry for their fans though that we didn’t get to enjoy the “happy times”, if there were any). Jack and Reese are now technically out of the vampire sphere so that could be a good thing as well. It’s great that Caleb is human now and I am really looking forward to watching him cope with that. Kevin seems to be getting a purpose and that’s very positive (hopefully the purpose won’t be solely about the vamps, but I guess it’s something, right?) Most of all, it’s absolutely wonderful to see characters interacting with different characters. The last two arcs in particular have so isolated certain characters to interacting ONLY with certain other characters that it was becoming almost laughable. To almost never see Karen, Ian and Chris – all doctors at the same hospital – have any kind of conversation? To rarely see Kevin interact with Victor, or see Frank with Mary? It was all becoming a bit too much, so the pacing and integration excite me so far. More Chris and I’ll be in Heaven!
I’m thoroughly enjoying Lucy and Elizabeth together, who would have thought that? They have a good comedic timing between them, and I enjoyed that neither one is being overly dumb. They both noticed something up with Frank (not so for poor innocent Ali) and they were fairly smart in their attempts to get info on Alison’s whereabouts. We have very few female friendships on PC anymore, so I could get into at least an uneasy one between them. Elizabeth is correct; they are very much alike when you think about it.
I had to laugh at Livvie’s indignation about Rafe’s lie of omission. True, he didn’t tell her that Caleb was alive, but I don’t really recall her asking him straight out or anything. I’m not sure how Rafe kept a straight face but I commend him on his restraint in the face of her outrage. This from the woman who led him to believe he was in love with her instead of her “best friend” for weeks, and then led him to believe her baby was his as well. Livvie, your hypocrisy precedes you! It would have been a bit of fun if Rafe had just asked her what she thought SHE was doing for all those months if not telling lie after lie?
Do you suppose Joshua had a department store makeup counter chick pick out that matching lipstick to go with the red dress of seduction, or did Alison just happen to have that in her purse and decide to put it on in order to look her very, very best for her kidnapper? I don’t know about you, but if some guy has me prisoner and makes me put on a sexy dress, he’s gonna have to supply armed makeup artists and hairdressers to make me get all primped up like Ali was. Somebody should tell her that the idea is NOT to get all prettied up for the bad guys.
I’m still mildly interested in the musical side of things, so I’m not completely opposed to the “band” trying to get things working again. The kids can use a place to hang out I suppose, and I’d rather have the focus be music than blood sucking, so all is good there. Mostly, I’m happy with the progress so far and if this arc can just keep moving toward diversity and a dash of the human story now and then while moving away from vampires…I’ll be watching with as much interest as my kids have when they eye their chocolate bunnies! Minus the desire to take a bite, of course…that was really a very bad example when dealing with a show that features lots of biting, now wasn’t it?
PS – I forgot to tell you all last week that several readers wrote me about those bricking scenes and I was not imagining that I had seen something similar before! In 1999 Greg Cooper and Julie put Eve in a straight jacket and proceeded to brick her into a little room in an abandoned mansion. Lucy arrived to save the day but they tricked her into joining Eve and bricked them both in. Chris and Scott had to save them eventually. Thanks to everybody who helped jog my memory…I can use that from time to time, lol!
Let’s talk about
Gabrielle! I used to have little to no use for the character. She basically
annoyed me on every level possible. Now? Now I find that I think I LOVE
Gabrielle! I really liked how the Matthew reveal played out this time around.
I love that Gabrielle reverted to her old ways and swiped the envelope from
Nora’s desk, and that she completely overstepped any semblance of a boundary by
reading Sam’s letter to Matthew. I was thrilled that she fessed up, and I
really liked the way in which she did it and the way in which she didn’t try to
talk Bo into forgiving her. Gabrielle has come a loooonng way, baby! I can see
where we’re probably heading, of course, and I know that the Matthew love fest
will undoubtedly lead to trouble for Bo and Gaby, but what’s a romance without a
little trouble anyway?
That Matthew is quite an accomplished little artist though because that picture he drew for Sam (apparently some time back) was like nothing my kids ever came up with at such a young age. Not so much the content but the obvious confidence and bold delivery (not to mention that the people didn’t have blue faces and hats three sizes bigger than their heads or anything either, lol). Christian better watch his back! Or better yet, maybe Nora better since once Lindsay is sane again she will be in a perfect position to foster some new young talent. Can’t you just see it? Little Matthew is enamored of the art world…he starts drawing pictures and begging to take them to the art gallery to show the nice “art lady”. Then he’s SORAS’ed to eighteen and he becomes enamored of the “art lady” herself…plus, he’s a bit of a conniver and he knows what it takes to get ahead. You think Carlotta’s bad? Imagine Nora dealing with Lindsay as a possible daughter-in-law! It’ll be great, I tell ya, just great. :)
Reason #986 why I love Roxie: What are ya, “a special kind of stupid or something?”!!
How great is it that RJ finally resurfaced after proving that he is the most diabolical man in Llanview by being bad enough to save Keri so she can come back and bore us for another day. They don’t get any more ruthless than that. I was a little disappointed that he was so easily thwarted on his plan to ruin Flash’s band by taking all the masses of money they seem to think they’re gonna make, but now that Dorian’s around I’m sure we’ll see him get back to his cunning self!
Flash’s illness is very strange. Either she takes more cough medicine sometimes than others or it’s a very intermittent (yet extremely annoying) cough. Sometimes she coughs so hard you can see her lungs peeking up from the back of her throat and yet other times she sings like an angel with nary a throat clearing in sight. I’d like to say I care, but I’ve lost interest. I think there is potential for the character, but she’s not someone Joey should be mooning over and so far she hasn’t developed into anything much. The “Placenta Song” (which would’ve been a great title, by the way, lol) actually didn’t suffer a fate worse than death by coming from her lips…so I guess that’s progress. I really like the music they’ve been using lately overall though. They’ve had some good montage type things and also some really good background music that fits the mood and tone well.
Why did Mitch get custody of a car that Clint gave to Jessica? I thought Mitch was awarded the Lord estate, I wouldn’t think Buchanan spoils should apply.
I wish I lived in Llanview if for nothing else than that marvelous hospital they have! Mitch and Dorian managed to get to the hospital and be seen by a physician all before Blair could get from the club to Llanfair’s front door (and she was supposed to be hurrying even). You can’t beat having no wait at the ER, that’s my kinda town!
I have a confession. I love secret tunnels, puzzle boxes, buried treasure and just about anything else that falls under the “only on soaps” category. I was in bliss watching Dorian and Blair tiptoe around in their high heels down there, reading ancient (photocopied, of course) instructions and deciphering the puzzle. It cracked me up and fully entertained me. I loved the spikes, I loved that the diamond opened the door (and closed the spikes, lol)…. oh, it was great! The Cramer women are a great source of amusement to me anyway though, so that could explain some of it. How can you not appreciate someone who can’t keep a straight face while telling of her blind husband’s plight?
Something I don’t appreciate though, is Jessica’s decision. I was invested in her guilt and sympathy right up until she stood up next to Mitch and told her Mom that she was staying with her father. She lost me there. The least she could have done would be to take Viki aside and explain her decision in private. To stand up and basically take a stand against her mother in front of both Mitch and Dorian, no less, was just mean. Mitch’s scenes in the garage were enough to make most people feel a pang of sympathy, so I can buy that she feels badly, but I think they took it a step past where Jessica would go. We’ll see how it plays out I guess. Maybe since she made that decision right after her mother dropped the news that the judge was bought it means that she’s thinking she can get more dirt on him if she lives in the same house, that I might buy!
Roxy and Nigel are the best! I love that Roxie actually shows some concern for her kids on occasion (like when Renee told her what Rex has been up to) and yet she always manages to say something that hurts without her even realizing it. She’s one of those people that really couldn’t be a good parent if she wanted to, but that doesn’t stop her from the occasional good day. I particularly loved those scenes though because Nigel was looking on and feeling concern over Roxy’s concern…it’s all so sweet in a dysfunctionally ridiculous way.
Marcie and Al are almost as good. That story has real potential and I hope they run with it. The Marcie/Jen dynamic is fabulous too when you think about it, so there are many avenues to explore. Al the drug addict was not something I saw much potential in, but Marcie has changed my mind – I wanna see him have to beg her to give him a shot. I’m planning to savor the moment! :)
Jen the cat burglar? Eh…whatever I guess. She’s more palatable when she’s just outright bad rather than when she’s faking niceness, so that’s a plus I suppose. I think maybe she’s better than she used to be though because I do feel moments of sympathy (then she goes and does something even dumber than the last thing, lol).
Catherine Hickland has been great lately! I actually feel bad for poor Lindsay, and that’s tough to pull off. In fact, I’m fairly certain that her performances have a lot to do with my occasional sporadic sympathy toward Jen. Nobody should have to see her mother like that! Dorian was superb with Lindsay (it should probably scare Dorian when she considers how well she relates to crazy people, lol) and it’s almost like you can feel that this story is all going to come together in some great way. What’s really cool about it is that in the meantime, the many threads of the story are all interesting unto themselves. I consider that a sign of excellent storytelling and it absolutely makes my day to see it!
I miss Starr! She and Aunt Dorian should be a treat to watch. Speaking of treat to watch, we did get a bit of eye candy this week when Joey decided to be very un-priest-like and show his dislike of Rex. But hey, when it’s all done shirtless it sort of negates the need to judge the content, if you know what I mean. Troy almost never takes it off anymore and I was feeling decidedly unsatisfied with the ratio of shirted to shirtless men, so a special thank you to the boys…next time though, they shouldn’t tease me with all those voices in the background! Just bring out the shirtless extras and be done with it already.
Want More of Sherry's Work?
Sherry's Taste of PC - 4/13/03
Confessions of a Soap Opera Drop Out - 4/2/03
Sherry Takes on OLTL - 4/2/03
Sherry's Port
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