How Many Days Until July 25th?

After seeing these pictures and reading this, I am now officially excited about The X-Files movie. (Although a new agent named Dakota Whitney? That is one silly name!) I have seen maybe one episode in the last 3 or 4 years, but I am now looking forward to a new adventure. I'm only hoping it is good. I can't wait to see the trailer!

Oh, and new episode of Saturday Night Live tonight with Tina Fey hosting. It should be good.

I've been reading The Lucifer Effect by Philip Zimbardo tonight, which I just received in my Amazon package today. Very interesting read so far. :) I'll have to write more about it once I'm done reading it.

TV, Why Do You Make Me Sad?

I watch very few dramas and comedies on TV, and I now remember why. Dear God, I can't take the angst! On last night's episode of The Office, the Scranton and Stamford branches merged, and Michael is now in charge of them all so that means more friends for him, which makes him so happy! Ha! He even made a welcoming video called Lazy Scranton, based on the SNL clip Lazy Sunday. Hilarious. One of the new employees, Andy, played by Ed Helms of The Daily Show, is the ultimate suck-up, which gets oh so much under Dwight's skin. That was all great.

They are trying to kill me with the Pam and Jim relationship though. Pam was so happy to have Jim back in Scranton, because she finally broke up her engagement and seemed ready to start something with Jim. He was being distant most of the day (he got rejected by her before so it was understandable to be on his guard.) At the end of the episode, Jim announced to Pam he was dating someone else! Kill me. This is like the Mulder & Scully dynamic but at least 10 times worst. LOL The new girl in Jim's life, another employee from Stamford who got transferred with him, has no idea what went down with Pam so it should be fun when that blows out in the open.

Anyway, this made me so sad because:

1) A comedy shouldn't be bumming me out.
2) I can't believe I care enough about fictional characters to be feeling sad about their fate (they are NOT REAL!)
3) Seriously, I don't want them to hate each other. It is not fun to watch.
4) I don't think I can tolerate another Mulder/Scully or Ross/Rachel type of relationship again. Because, by the end, I didn't really care what happened to those 2 couples. It had dragged on so long that I wasn't too fond of them anymore.

Let's hope Jim and Pam make up sooner than later. Otherwise, I'll be weeping in my corner. LOL

This Is A Post Without A Title Because It Is Full of Random Stuff...

My writing muse struck again: Wild Horses. There is something about certain songs that just inspires me. Incidentally, I wasn't listening to the original version of Wild Horses when I wrote this, but to the cover by Alicia Keys and Adam Levine (of Maroon 5). I highly recommend it. Anyway, it is just a beautiful song.

A fellow Office fan compiled the colours of Jim's shirts and Pam's cardigans across episodes just because I dared her to.(She had compiled Jim's tie patterns last week, and I was kind of joking around...) First of all, what better use of Excel is there? ;) Second, I am amazed there are some people as geeky as I, who think stats can be fun. Finally, I think I may have discovered myself some powers of persuasion that I can use for evil. LOL (Yeah, I wish.)

Rented a documentary called Stupidity last night. Eh. It felt full of filler, and for a documentary deploring the pervasiveness of stupidity, I didn't exactly it offered a lot of insight into anything.

I made some fresh salsa, and mint & shredded chicken noodles last night. So, so good.

Because YouTube is awesome as always, I found a clip of an old SNL episode with Justin Timberlake as host. I remember being surprised how good he was. It had a skit where he played Jessica Simpson. It still cracks me up...

TV-Related Comments...

- I had Seinfeld playing in the background, and it was the sponge episode. I heard a familiar voice in the background talking with Elaine... Turns out that Elaine's sponge-worthy guy? Is Scott Patterson from The Gilmore Girls. How about that. He is really hard to recognize though. I don't know what it is, maybe the hair.

- Tina Fey announced she is leaving SNL. I used to like her a lot of SNL, but Weekend Update has not been so good lately so maybe a shake-up will be good. I'm sad though to see Rachel Dratch leaving as well.

- I finally got courage to post online some Office fanfiction I wrote. It had been kicking around for a while on my hard drive, and I finally finished editing it and got the courage to post it. Ah yes, my friends, that is my dirty little secret. I can't help writing fiction. I'm not a great writer by any mean, but I love it. I used to write X-Files fanfic (without posting it) and now, I write Office fanfic. Anyway, if you are curious, they live here: A Walk in The Rain and To Make You Feel My Love.

Live From New York, It's Saturday Night!

Disappointing show tonight. Kevin Spacey was the host, which has been a good thing in the past. Tonight, not so much. Sure, there was the best installment ever of The Falconer, and there was a very funny parody of The Usual Suspects, which I didn't see coming. The opening monologue of Kevin Spacey on American Idol was funny but the rest was take it or leave it. Last week's episode with Julia Louis-Dreyfus was so much better; actually, it was probably the best installment all year.

And what is up with Nelly Furtado? Her two previous albums were wonderful, so this change in style is a little disconcerting. She had such a style of her own before; this just felt like she was copying what is out there these days. It didn't even sound good. For shame, Nelly.

After the new SNL, there was an old show from 2000, with Britney Spears as host and musical guest. Surprisingly, it was a very strong show. There was a Chris Parnell rap about Britney (his raps are always so funny), an installment of the Ambiguously Gay Duo, and a lot of well-paced skits. However, many things about it felt like I was in the Twilight Zone. Britney was looking good, funny jokes about McCain endorsing Bush for President (hahaha), about Clinton philandering, about Angelina Jolie and her recent marriage to Billy Bob Thornton. Strange. By the way, watching this old episode explained something from the new Update tonight. At the end of Update tonight, there was a tribute to Tina Fey with her favourite characters singing to her, and one of them was Rachel Dratch as a creepy baby with an arm sprouting from her head. This was supposed to be the child Angelina had with her brother. It made it funnier to know that.

Yay! New Episodes of The Colbert Report and The Daily Show Tonight!

Both shows were on holiday last week so yay for that.

On a less joyous topic, I was watching the news at dinner time, and they were reporting that the biggest food bank in Toronto did not have enough food to feed 170,000 people who use food banks every month (which is such a high number for a city of 5 million people, by the way). Anyway, it prompted me to get off my butt, which is a good thing. Went to the grocery store, filled a bag with food, and dropped it in the donation bin. I feel ashamed that I need to be prompted to remember to give to those in need.

Okay, I must got back to marking papers...

One more thing, if you missed SNL this weekend, you missed the awesome Laser Cats short film. So so funny. Go watch it.

My New...

Passion isn't exactly the right term. At this point, it would be more like "something I recently discovered that makes me happy", "my new thing to bring a bit of sunshine in my life", "something light and delightful I can indulge in occasionally". Actually, it is something old made new again. Ah yes, fanfic. Since I know a number of my readers know about my dirty little fanfic-reading secret because they shared it too (LOL), I don't feel too ashamed. Yes, I am a little fangirl trapped inside of a body of a grown woman... who still goes to school... who has a roommate... who owns a lot of mismatched furniture and no car. Anyway, technically, I'm a grown woman. ;)

My undergrad years, particularly in the summer, were prime time X-Files fanfic reading. Since then, I lost a lot of my XF interest so I have read very few (none really in 3 years at least). But I have now started watching The Office, which has plenty of UST (Unresolved Sexual Tension for those uninitiated), which is the ultimate trap for me to read fanfic it seems. LOL Mulder and Scully got me the first time, and now, it's Pam and Jim. I stumbled upon a board where people made fic recommendations, and oh. I have only read 3 or 4 short stories but I have fallen in love with it a bit again. Of course, I sadly don't have much time to read this stuff but that's all the more motivation to graduate. ;) LOL

By the way, there is a Saturday Night Live TV Funhouse retrospective airing on April 29. Saturday TV Funhouse was often the best part of SNL. The Ambiguously Gay Duo and The Ex-Presidents were always my favourite cartoons on SNL so I'm hoping to see plenty of both. Steve Carell and Stephen Colbert, who were the voices of Ace and Gary, aka The Ambiguously Gay Duo, recorded new material for this special. I can't wait to hear that!

I Was Stress-Free For a Full 48 Hours!

Incredible! Amazing! Out of this world! I had a pretty relaxing weekend. Watched a lot of TV, more than I wanted to but these things happen. I watched Live 8 yesterday, and then "Gone With The Wind" was on TV, and I had never seen it so I watched. It was a very good movie, and although it was long, I wouldn't have cut out much of it at all. Scarlett was annoying in her fickleness, and always longing for the things she couldn't have, but that was the point. The single most annoying character, however, was Prissy with her ridiculously high pitched voice, which would make Victoria Jackson (Alert: dated SNL reference!) sound like a bass. Oh, and Clark Gable was very charming as Rhett Butler.

Today, I rented "Shake Hands With The Devil", the documentary on Romeo Dallaire, the Canadian General who conducted the UN Mission in Rwanda in 1994. Such a tragic and disturbing story. Gave me shivers.

Well, we now come to the fact that I'm up at 3:30 am, all wired and stressed out. So what happened? Well, my roommate announced today she was moving out. This means I have the option of taking over the lease, which I think I will exercise because I am not moving for a third year in a row (!), but this means finding a new roommate. Thus, stress alert. Plus, it means reorganizing and readapting yet again to living with someone else. I mean, in some regards, I'm happy my roommate and I are parting ways but at the same time, it's such a pain in the butt. I thought I might have one year free from living-arrangement stress but clearly, it was not meant to be. I need to up use of relaxation techniques.