- Joined
- May 11, 2010
- Messages
- 20,703
- Location
- Charlotte, NC
- Display Name
Display name:
Snorting his way across the USA
The birds are still snoring, crickets are purring, and frogs are chirping as I'm standing in front of the gym at 4:56 a.m. hoping that the front desk person won't wait until the very last minute to unlock the door and let a small assemblage of die hard fitness enthusiasts through the door to begin their daily regimine. Why do minutes count? For most of the people, a 5:00 a.m. opening time is getting a late start for an earlier than standard work shift to begin with. For me, it's because the hour long television show I want to watch during my hour of cardio, starts on the hour. Usually. Barring the network's decision to f***** with me and start an hour long show on the half hour. It doesn't happen often, but it has happened.
There isn't a whole lot of things to watch early in the morning. I've watched every single episode of NCIS (original, LA and NOLA) there is to watch, some several times over. Scott Bakula needs to ace that phony Louisiana accent. Same thing with Chicago PD unless they have new stuff out, but in the end, unrealistic shows portraying pencil pushing federal bureaucrats as Delta Force operatives, and city detective sergeants that should (and probably would) be fired and jailed in a real LEO setting wears on you.
There is news. National news networks make me angry and want to break things, so I tend to avoid them. Local news is all over the board, plus the temptation to stalk the traffic girl is too great. Besides, if you've seen fifteen minutes, you've seen it all and after that it just repeats. Or, I should more appropriately state, that they "say again." The anchor dude really needs some of that Just For Men. He can't pull off the grey look these days without coming off as an aging perv.
Sports? I can't STAND watching recycled sports. It doesn't interest me. I'm sorry. Pull my bro card if you must. I'll watch the NFL playoffs and the Super Bowl live, and not religiously. Even women's tennis has no place for me now that they wear shorts under their outfits. Baseball? Ho hum, I turned off of it after the baseball strikes. Basketball? Repetitious. Soccer? That is a sport where, if you removed the ball from the game, it would only affect the average score by 2.
That leaves true crime shows.
Ideal:
The crime happens right up front. Or at least within the first 5-10 minutes of the show, not because I like seeing crime happen to people (I don't) but the whole investigative process is fascinating to me, despite having been dramatized for television. Often times, one can figure out who did it within the first few minutes by seeing who they are NOT interviewing during the course of the program. The husband and/or boyfriend they are not talking to, probably is who did it. I doesn't always work that way, but it often does.
Marginally acceptable:
Take the ideal scenario, but don't conclude it. We're talking unsolved crimes here. If you have some really strong suspects identified during the course of the investigation but you just can't prove it, well, okay. But no suspects at all and you leave it open? Come on, man. There have been a handful of shows where they pull it off, but my inner sleuth needs some validation.
Unacceptable:
They have done it to me twice so far, the second time was this morning. That is where they spend the first forty five minutes developing the backdrop, and in the last fifteen minutes the crime happens and they wrap it up. You kind of already know who the bad guy (or girl) is going to be and not through keen detective analysis. No. That is no with a capital 'F.' They could have condensed the first 45 minutes in to 5 minutes and it would have served equally well. I don't NEED to watch 45 minutes of petty bickering and dysfunctional family life. If I did, I'd watch a soap opera instead. (Technically, I don't 'need' to watch the program to being with but let's make the presumptive assumption I do for the sake of argument.) Okay I get it. You need to fill an hour with a twenty minute show. The Dangerous Women series works well, because they put three twenty minute segments in to fill an hour show. It also reminds me why I don't want to stalk the traffic girl that badly.
There isn't a whole lot of things to watch early in the morning. I've watched every single episode of NCIS (original, LA and NOLA) there is to watch, some several times over. Scott Bakula needs to ace that phony Louisiana accent. Same thing with Chicago PD unless they have new stuff out, but in the end, unrealistic shows portraying pencil pushing federal bureaucrats as Delta Force operatives, and city detective sergeants that should (and probably would) be fired and jailed in a real LEO setting wears on you.
There is news. National news networks make me angry and want to break things, so I tend to avoid them. Local news is all over the board, plus the temptation to stalk the traffic girl is too great. Besides, if you've seen fifteen minutes, you've seen it all and after that it just repeats. Or, I should more appropriately state, that they "say again." The anchor dude really needs some of that Just For Men. He can't pull off the grey look these days without coming off as an aging perv.
Sports? I can't STAND watching recycled sports. It doesn't interest me. I'm sorry. Pull my bro card if you must. I'll watch the NFL playoffs and the Super Bowl live, and not religiously. Even women's tennis has no place for me now that they wear shorts under their outfits. Baseball? Ho hum, I turned off of it after the baseball strikes. Basketball? Repetitious. Soccer? That is a sport where, if you removed the ball from the game, it would only affect the average score by 2.
That leaves true crime shows.
Ideal:
The crime happens right up front. Or at least within the first 5-10 minutes of the show, not because I like seeing crime happen to people (I don't) but the whole investigative process is fascinating to me, despite having been dramatized for television. Often times, one can figure out who did it within the first few minutes by seeing who they are NOT interviewing during the course of the program. The husband and/or boyfriend they are not talking to, probably is who did it. I doesn't always work that way, but it often does.
Marginally acceptable:
Take the ideal scenario, but don't conclude it. We're talking unsolved crimes here. If you have some really strong suspects identified during the course of the investigation but you just can't prove it, well, okay. But no suspects at all and you leave it open? Come on, man. There have been a handful of shows where they pull it off, but my inner sleuth needs some validation.
Unacceptable:
They have done it to me twice so far, the second time was this morning. That is where they spend the first forty five minutes developing the backdrop, and in the last fifteen minutes the crime happens and they wrap it up. You kind of already know who the bad guy (or girl) is going to be and not through keen detective analysis. No. That is no with a capital 'F.' They could have condensed the first 45 minutes in to 5 minutes and it would have served equally well. I don't NEED to watch 45 minutes of petty bickering and dysfunctional family life. If I did, I'd watch a soap opera instead. (Technically, I don't 'need' to watch the program to being with but let's make the presumptive assumption I do for the sake of argument.) Okay I get it. You need to fill an hour with a twenty minute show. The Dangerous Women series works well, because they put three twenty minute segments in to fill an hour show. It also reminds me why I don't want to stalk the traffic girl that badly.
