Did anyone else see the premiere of Kid Nation last night? I actually really enjoyed it. In case you're not aware of it, Kid Nation is a reality show where forty kids live together in an abandoned frontier town for forty days and try to make their society work. Nobody is voted off at the end of each episode. Kid's leave whenever they feel like they've had enough and can't take it anymore.

The littlest kids in the show are ADORABLE. And I'm not much of a kid person. There's this one scene where Jimmy, the youngest of the children, is missing so his team leader goes off to find him, only to discover him all by himself, sitting against a building crying. When his team leader asks him what's wrong, Jimmy (who looks very similar to Danny from The Shining) blurts out through sobs in the cutest way, "I'm only eight years old. I'm only in the third grade. I'm too young for this stuff. I wish I was older, but I'm too young." (or something to that effect). I think it broke my heart in like eleven different places.

I really liked the show up until when all the kids were separated into teams and had to compete with each other because then it started to feel too much like every other reality TV show out there. I really wish they would have just left the kids to figure everything out for themselves with just a little bit of guidance and not have had to deal with stupid competitions. Hopefully going into future episodes, the creators will have realized this, although I doubt that.

It'll be interesting to see what happens in the season. Obviously there will be some romances and some confrontations. I'm really liking Sophia (the older girl who bought the bike) so I hope they don't try painting her into The Bitch character they have in every reality show. That would be a disservice.

Anyway, enough about Kid Nation. The premiere I'm really looking forward to is next week's Bionic Woman! Here's hoping it lives up to the hype!

FALLing in Love
September 17, 2007

It's finally starting to feel like Fall. The days are getting shorter, the kids who sell crack in my neighborhood are off the streets and back in school selling crack where they belong, and I haven't had to run my air conditioner in well over a week. I'm in Heaven.

Fall is definitely my favorite season hands down. I don't care for the heat and humidity of Summer and, while Winter can be beautiful to look at from your comfy apartment every so often, for the most part it kind of sucks. So that leaves only Spring and Fall left.

Now, I'm a fan of Spring. Everybody loves Spring. But that's kind of my problem with it. Spring is like the Homecoming Queen of the seasons. It's popular, and light, and airy, and everyone looks forward to it because they either love it or because it means they're getting closer to summer, which they also love. It makes people happy. But just like the Homecoming Queen, it's devoid of substance. It will go on to lead a bland life in a bland town with a bland husband and a bland 2.5 kids. Sure, it'll look pretty enough, but looks can only take you so far. And besides, I challenge anyone to say that Fall isn't beautiful.

Fall is like the Ugly Duckling of the seasons who blooms into a gorgeous bohemian. She is shy in class and never really has any boyfriends, and draws weird pictures of melted toasters in the margins of her notebooks, and every once in a while comes to school wearing men's dress shirts. Her eyes are maybe just a little too close together or her nose is slightly crooked. She's always just a little underweight. She doesn't have the generic girl-next-door beauty of goody-goody Spring, nor the sexed-up hotness of bad girl Summer, yet neither is she ugly like Winter who's Goth and plays lead Tuba in the marching band. She is beautiful in that way that only someone truly unique and interesting can be. And that beauty will ripen with age and maturity, far surpassing her sister seasons once grown out of adolescence. Fall is a woman unto herself--deep, and intense, and earthy, yet slightly morbid, carrying around a certain bit of mystery and complexity underneath the cool veneer.

Though not as easy to like as Spring or Summer from the initial first meeting because Fall is not as flashy and eager to please and is infinitely more complicated, if you're lucky enough to really get to know this season, the rewards are much greater. Many people think of Fall as symbolizing death because of all the leaves turning and the animals taking off for warmer climates, but I like to think of it as a return to inner life. Spring and Summer are escapist. Fall represents reality. Not the wicked harshness of Winter reality, but the pleasantness of a cool autumn evening reality. And reality can be a great thing. Because with that reality, Fall encompasses the pursuit of knowledge, truth, and the reclamation of life goals. It's the time to focus on self-betterment and actualization. It's a time that we grow as human beings. And I think that's a pretty good thing.

So let the meathead hornballs have Summer, and the Joe Averages of Anytown, USA have Spring, and, by all means, whoever the hell wants Winter can go crazy. Me? I'll take Fall any day.

Boobs
September 13, 2007

Boobs. I love 'em. They look great, they feel great, and they're pretty fun to play with. All that, and they can even sustain human life. What else can you say that about? Call it a primal urge, aesthetic taste, or a confirmation of my heterosexuality, but I love being around them. Big boobs, small boobs, round boobs, pointy boobs—they're all pretty awesome. So, with that in mind, I'm all for helping them out and keeping them in existence. My friend, Laurie, is participating in the Avon Walk for Breast Cancer in October. She's trying to raise as much money as possible. If you'd like to support her and keep evil cancer away from our lovely, noble boobs, then please make a donation. And if you do this, I promise I won't ask you to donate anything to my Bike Ride for Priapism campaign later in the year. Seriously, it's a really good cause and breast cancer kills a lot of women so if you've got a little extra to spear, then please donate to help for research.