Erica Irlbeck, Ed.D.

NBC Fall Lineup

2011-09-14T08:37:00.000-05:00

I give NBC lots of credit for a good job of promoting its new shows during its regular programming. However, NBC is a giant failure for promotions on its website. Go to www.nbc.com and as of two days of one of its newest shows’ premiers, you still get s a re-hash of its already-existing shows. Not what you want to do when you’re number four and need to gain viewers. Also, it’s pretty stupid to inject commercials (not one, but multiple commercials) into your online fall preview show. Seriously, who does your marketing?? I have a group of students that could use a project, or jobs, I think they could help.

After two Google searches, I finally found the fall previews. Here are my picks and pans by night and time.

The Sing Off (Monday at 7)—OK, NBC, it’s time to catch the hint that there is only so much room for reality star-maker shows. America’s Got Talent, The Voice, Last Comic Standing….shall I go on? You’re still the number four network, and these shows haven’t catapulted you forward, so maybe it’s time for something different…but I see nothing different about this show. It’s America’s Got Talent, The Voice, American Idol and The X Factor all rolled into one with a new title and different judges. Fail.

Playboy Club (Monday at 9)—Ever since The Girls Next Door, I have been strangely interested in the Playboy brand in general. No, I don’t read the magazine, even for the articles, but I am fascinated by Hugh Hefner and his climb from a simple idea to a huge empire and brand. Seriously, a naked girl magazine inspired a night club, and then an entire occupation (Playboy Bunny), a chain of hotels and casinos (but they shut down), a television channel, clothing line, and several spin-off t.v. shows (Girls Next Door, Kendra, Holly’s World, etc), and now a t.v. show about the club and the bunny. I’m not totally positive this show will work out, but I want to see what it’s all about. Three episode trial run.

Up All Night (Wednesday at 7)—Were the writers of this show bugging our living room?? Less than 30 seconds into the preview, there were two conversations that Scott and I have had—cleaning up our language around the baby, and who got more sleep. And we haven’t even had our baby yet. I love Christina Applegate, and this show is about exactly what we are about to experience in our life. I’m sold. One caveat: this show may freak us out pre-baby and we may decide that we don't want to watch it.

Free Agents (Wednesday at 7:30 )—It’s a little show about a public relations agency. It stars Hank Azaria and Katheryn Hahn, and I like both of them. I used to work in PR, and we teach PR to our students…I think I should watch it. It’s for educational purposes.

Whitney (Thursday at 8:30)—I’ve been watching Whitney Cummings for a while now on Chelsea Lately. I’ve never been much of a fan of hers. I don’t think she’s all that funny. However, after watching her show previews, I think her prime time show might actually be funny. Maybe. She gets a three episode trial period.

Prime Suspect (Thursday at )—Anyone remember Chase on NBC from last season? Probably not, because it got cancelled. This show looks like the same thing, different characters, different city. It does have a Law & Order feel to it, which has been successful since I was in high school, so maybe it will work out. I doubt it.

Grimm (Friday at 8)—What in the world??? Detective sees zombies? NBC spent all of 30 seconds on this preview; therefore, I have no idea what this show is about. I like weird, supernatural shows and all, but not this one. Maybe if the network would have spent a little more time on the preview to entice me I would pick it, but as it stands, no.

Smash (Midseason)—Deborah Messing is back! It’s musical, it’s inspirational, it’s about Broadway, it’s getting a prominent place in the DVR. I’m excited about this one. It co-stars Anjeica Houston and Jack Davenport (remember him from FlashForward before ABC cancelled it right in the middle of a story line?) and American Idol’s Katherine McPhee.

Four shows make the cut with one more coming after the first of the year. For such a horrible job of promotions, I must say NBC could be on the upswing. Here are our NBC shows:

Monday—Playboy Club

Tuesday—Nothing

Wednesday—Up All Night, Free Agents

Thursday—The Office, Whitney

Friday—Nothing

FOX Fall Lineup

2011-09-12T12:10:00.000-05:00

I have never been much of a Fox fan. Ever since they killed off Marissa on The OC, I just haven’t found the room in my heart to forgive them. American Idol lost its luster for me once Carrie Underwood won, and though The Simpsons continue to amuse me, it’s one of those shows that I’ll watch if it’s on, but it doesn’t make the DVR cut. Had DVRs been invented in high school, maybe, but it’s a good thing we didn’t have DVRs when I was in high school, otherwise I would not have made it into college….or out of college for that matter.

OK, back to the point....

With my personal bias in mind, here are my reviews for Fox’s new shows. Since they only have two hours of programming a night, they only have four new options. However, they have some mid-season shows on the horizon that might be of interest. I’ll follow up on those in a future blog (maybe. I still haven’t finished blogging about our Belize trip, and that was back in March. Blogging doesn’t get me tenure, so it’s kind of low on my priority list).

Allen Gregory (Sunday at 7:30)—Although The Simpsons and King of the Hill hold a special place in my heart, I’m really not a big fan of animated series. With that said, this one looks like it could be funny, but I don’t picture it being successful. The show is about a seven-year-old that acts like an adult, drinks wine with his school lunch, and calls his teacher by her first name. For those that like animated series, give this one a chance, but it’s just not for me.

Terra Nova (Monday at 8)—An ordinary family finds a portal to go back in time and try to restore civilization. I think this one might appeal to Lost fans, but I’m not feeling it. In addition, the previews are super lame and don’t give me much insight into what the series is really about. I had to read the reviews to be able to describe a show. READING—about t.v.!! The nerve. Not the right thing to do when you’re trying to attract TELEVISION viewers, Fox.

New Girl (Tuesday at 8)—We have a winner! This show looks freaking hilarious. Zooey Deschanel gets dumped and has to find a new place to live. She moves in with three guys who attempt to help her back on her feet. Zooey seems a little clumsy, both physically and socially, and I can relate. Plus, I used to live with two guys, so some of the situations remind me of that time in my life. Give it a shot. It comes on right after Glee, which makes me a little disappointed that Raising Hope is getting pushed back half an hour.

I Hate my Teenage Daughter (Wednesday at 8:30)—Jamie Pressly stars as one of two moms that are dealing with very spoiled teenage daughters. I don’t have a teenage daughter, and I’m not a teenager anymore (although I can picture myself acting like the girls in this show years ago), so this show doesn’t appeal to me.

We’re just not big FOX watchers, but it has our hearts on Tuesday night!

Monday—Nothing

Tuesday—Glee, New Girl, Raising Hope. All shows premier September 20.

Wednesday—Nothing

Thursday—Nothing

Friday—Nothing

Saturday—Nothing

Fox has always bragged that it appeals to a younger audience, so what does this list say about us??

CBS Fall Lineup

2011-09-08T12:28:00.000-05:00

Once again, CBS’s lineup is so solid that only six new shows are offered for the fall. This is a testament to the programming geniuses at CBS. Case and point—three shows survived last year: Mike & Molly, Hawaii Five-0, and Blue Bloods. This is really good, considering they didn’t offer very many new shows last year, either.

So here are my pics from CBS. Only one doesn’t make the cut.

2 Broke Girls (Monday at 7:30)—Hmmm. Not terribly excited about this one. It seems to have its mildly funny moments, but I kind of think it’s a little over-acted. Not feeling it.

Unforgettable (Tuesday at 9)—I’m in. This looks really different and really good. The main character remembers everything. She can recall every day, every conversation, and nearly every detail. As someone who is frequently accused of having a freakish memory, I can’t wait to see this show. PLUS the male lead is none other than Dr. Shawn McNamara from Nip/Tuck (Dylan Walsh). I missed the good doctor.

How to be a Gentleman (Thursday at 8:30)—This show seems kind of silly, but the previews cracked me up. Something about it is endearing. It’s not really my kind of show, but I’m giving it a three episode trial period to see. Essentially, the show is about a nerdy guy that needs help being cool, so he enlists the help of a former high school classmate that is now a personal trainer. We shall see about this one…

Person of Interest (Thursday at 8)—I must admit, I can’t really figure out what this show is about. CBS didn’t offer very detailed previews for this one. But, it’s just creepy and mysterious enough to pique my interest. Michael Emerson plays a super nerd that invented software that can identify people that are about to be involved in violent crimes; Jim Caviezel plays an ex-CIA agent that has to find and prevent these crimes. So it’s kind of like a non-cape, non-Batmobile, super power-free, modern day Batman and Robin.

A Gifted Man (Friday at 10)—A driven doctor is visited by his recently deceased ex-wife, who needs him to carry on her work. It may sound strange to some, but I’m the girl that never missed an episode of The Ghost Whisperer. Paranormal shows really appeal to me. It stars Patrick Wilson, and I’m not really a big fan of his. Something about him creeps me out and I can’t figure out why.

So here’s a look at our CBS shows, listed by night and time:

Sunday: The Good Wife. (New night and time). Scott still watches The Amazing Race, but I grew tired of it.

Monday: How I met Your Mother and Hawaii Five-0. (Although it was good, I wasn’t crazy enough about Mike & Molly to keep it in the que. All the fat jokes made the pregnant lady self conscious.)

Tuesday: Unforgettable

Wednesday: Nothing for me, but Scott is a Survivor loyal.

Thursday: The Big Bang Theory, How to Be a Gentleman, Person of Interest

Friday: A Gifted Man

ABC Fall Lineup 2011

2011-08-19T22:15:00.000-05:00

It’s that time of year when I procrastinate writing my syllabi and long for the cooler days that offer cooler stuff to watch on television. Yet again, here are my picks and pans for the new season of t.v. shows.

By tradition, I go in alphabetical order of network. ABC is up first. I must say, this is the most disappointed I have been in quite some time about ABC’s lineup of shows. I am only deeming a handful of shows DVR-worthy, but I’m not terribly excited about any of them.

Two new shows sandwich in my Sunday night staple, Desperate Housewives, they are Once Upon a Time and Pan Am.

Once Upon a Time (Sunday at 7). Huh? Fairy tales transported to now. What? I don’t get it. It’s a no.

Pan Am (Sunday at 9). This one makes the cut, mostly because I’m curious. I really like Christina Ricci and I’m excited to see how she does in this role. I’m not completely sure about this show, but I’ll give it a four week trial period.

Nothing new on Mondays.

Last Man Standing (Tuesday at 7). If I were a middle aged dad of teenage girls, this show might be funny to me. Honestly, the previews that ABC posted to its website were pretty funny, but I’m just not the target audience. Tim Allen returns to ABC for this new comedy. Best wishes, Buzz Lightyear.

Man Up (Tuesday at 7:30). Although I did give a laugh or two at the previews, I am really not excited about another show about three guys that hate their lives because their wives are so uncool. They wonder why they aren’t as awesome as they once were simply because they’re married with kids. This has been done before. Not my type of show.

Suburgatory (Wednesday at 7:30). This one looks pretty funny. It’s about a family that moves from Manhattan to the suburbs. They’re in a major culture shock at the soccer moms and cougars prowling about town. This comes right between The Middle and Modern Family, so it works well into my Wednesday evening. I’ll give it a shot.

Revenge (Wednesday at 9). I’m kind of interested in this one. It’s dark and errie, kind of creepy…looks like a show I would like.

Charlie’s Angels (Thursday at 7). I know that I was excited about Hawaii 5-0 making a comeback, and it’s one of my favorite shows, AND I usually like a good chick show, but this one is just not going to make the cut. I don’t know why. I watched two different previews, and neither appealed to me.

And that’s it. ABC does have some new mid-season shows. I’ll try to review them at another time. I will say that two of the info pages on the mid season shows were not working—not good for business, ABC! I might have gotten really excited about something if only your links were working.

By night and time, here are my ABC shows:

Sunday: Desperate Housewives and Pan Am

Monday: Nothing

Tuesday: Nothing

Wednesday: The Middle, Suburgatory, Modern Family, Revenge

Thursday: Grey’s Anatomy

Friday: 20/20

Belize Day 3--Placenciaaaaaahhhhhh

2011-03-23T23:10:00.001-05:00

Our third day in Belize was all about enjoying the beach at Placencia. As soon as I caught a glimpse of the beach and these chairs, I wanted to move here.

Placencia is on a peninsula and is absolutely gorgeous! Evin and Tony live a short 10 minute boat ride from here, and Tony's brother owns the best bar on the beach, the Tipsy Tuna.

We had seen a lot of really cool stuff in the previous days, so we wanted to take this day to just chill out and enjoy the beach.

First thing's first. Breakfast. Tony and Evin took us to eat at Da Thach. It was a great little beach restaurant that served the best breakfast burrito I had ever tasted. Instead of a tortilla, they used flat bread. And as a side item, fry jacks, which are essentially sopapillas served with jelly or beans. Who would have thought...jelly on a sopapilla. Well let me tell ya, I've been missing out!

Next on the agenda...sit around and do nothing. And that's all we did all the live long day.

The beach and sand are beautiful, and it was totally cool to sit there and enjoy the view, Tipsy Tuna food an beverages and the sound of the ocean. To read my review of the Tipsy Tuna on Trip Advisor, click here.

I paid enough for the pedicure, so I had to show it off.

Tony sliced us up a lovely bunch of coconuts.
We drank the coconut milk.

Reading on the beach

Awake from my nap.

Following a day on the beach, we had to go experience the town. We enjoyed a great crab dinner with Tony's brother and sister in law, had some wonderful gellato, and then went to the Purple Space Monkey for karaoke. Evin and I paid homage to our motherland with a performance of Oklahoma. More importantly, Scott sang! He did a lovely "Amarillo by Morning." Evin and Tony sang "Summer Lovin." How fitting.

Belize Day 2--Cave Tubing & Ruins

2011-03-20T19:27:00.000-05:00

We woke up to a woodpecker beating on our shutters. I thought it was Evin, so I yelled at it.

We had breakfast in the hotel's restaurant. It’s been a while since I’ve had pancakes, and although these were not as good as Scott’s or McDonalds’, these were still mighty tasty.

Next we went to the Mayan ruin, Xunantunich. According to the Internet, which is always reliable, it’s the second tallest Mayan structure in Belize and was used by the ancient Mayans as a ceremonial center. It was allegedly abandoned after an earthquake.

To get to the ruin, we had to take a hand cranked ferry across the Mopan River. The man in charge of the ferry was more than happy to let a couple of dorky tourists run the ship.

Over the river and through the woods, followed by a pretty good uphill hike to get to the ruins, we saw an impressive ancient city. It was absolutely incredible. To think the ancient Mayans built that temple is so hard to belive! No cranes or bulldozers. Just man power.

We climbed to the top of the Castillo, which was where archaeologists say was where the Mayan priests lived. There are replicas of reliefs on the sides of the building. The complex also included residences and a sports field.

The reliefs on the side of the Castillo are replicas.

The actual artwork is on display in a museum.

Looking straight down. Yikes!

Historians think these may have been the
residences within the Castillo.

The rest of the complex from the Castillo.

We climbed to the top of the ruin and could see the Guatemala border from there.

Guatemala in the distance

It was quite a hike up to the top and we were amused to find no guardrails near the top. Scott and Evin were a bit more daring than me.

For someone that is as accident-prone as me, I stayed as far away from the edge as possible. I have to admit, it made me a bit nervous.

But I got a little more brave. After all, we were on a mission to find our 2011 Christmas card.

This one won't make it. I'm holding my head funny.

Probably won't use this one either.
It might make it into a frame.

In an attempt for a funny picture, I got a little more brave. I always wondered...if you climb on the ruin, does it ruin it?

Next on the agenda—cave tubing! I LOVED it! Sadly we don’t have pictures. I made the mistake one time of taking a camera on a tubing trip down the Guadalupe River and was not about to sacrifice another camera to the river. I took a waterproof camera, but the pictures were too dark to post. Although we had to hike a long way with our tubes, we got to see some rainforest. The caves had stalactites, stalagmites, waterfalls, and other very interesting rock formations. Our guide took us back into some secret parts of the cave to see some ancient Mayan pottery. I highly recommend doing this.

On our way to Placencia, we drove through Belmopan, the capitol city of Belize. The capitol was in Belize City, but after a hurricane wiped out the city years ago, they decided it would be safer to have the capitol further inland. The photo below is of the Beliziean president's office. He doesn't live there, but does all of his work there.

Belieze's version of the White House.

Next we drove to Placencia and enjoyed a night at the Tipsy Tuna, Tony’s brother’s bar. It is right on the beach and is awesome. The place includes an indoor sports bar complete with sand floors; an outdoor beach bar with an outdoor dance floor; beach chairs, and a yummy grill. The place was so awesome that we returned the next day and sat by the beach all day long.

Belizean Adventure Day 1

2011-03-19T22:44:00.001-05:00

For those of you that don’t know, my baby sister, Evin, now lives in Belize. She lives in a small village about two hours from Belize City and 10 minutes from the beach. Her boyfriend, Tony, is a banana and citrus farmer. Since we now have a free place to vacation, and we have never gone anywhere for spring break, we decided to pay her a visit.

Evin and Tony met us at the airport and promptly whisked us to a hole-in-the-wall that allegedly had the best banana shakes in Belize. I think they could have given Braum’s a run for their money. So delicious!! We drove around Belize City for a while. It's very much a Central American, developing city. Some parts were pretty sketchy while others, particularly the oceanfront, were nice.

We then drove to Cayo, which is a region of the country. We stayed at a very nice cabin in San Ignacio called the Windy Hill Resort. It was just beautiful there. We had dinner in the hotel's restaurant, which was very good. Good service, and good menu, especially for the price.

Plants and landscaping at the Windy Hill Resort.

That night we went into San Ignacio to the Stork Club (funny name, I know). We were the only people there when we arrived; so to liven the joint, Evin and I did a stirring rendition of “Does he Love You” by Reba McEntire and Linda Davis.

Since I'm the big sister, I got to be Reba.

I later sang “Walkin after Midnight” and “Vogue.” Evin sang “Stand By Your Man.”

Sometimes it's hard to be a woman.

Since the crowd was small, Scott considered singing, but alas, he backed out. But his bashfulness did not last long. More details to come in a future post!

Remember Scotty, I'm the star, you're the manager.

Exactly two other patrons entered the bar and they attempted karaoke, but they were really just stealing our thunder. One of they guys started singing “I Will Always Love You” by Whitney Houston and insisted that we sing it with him. He was shoving the microphone in our faces and was rather obnoxious.

What part of "I don't want to sing with you"
does he not understand???

Other than Captain Creepy, we had a great time! And I discovered that my relatives are sweetening up this little country. Go Goss Chocolate!

See my review of the Windy Hill Resort by clicking here.

Corpus Christi

2011-02-28T22:51:00.000-06:00

Downtown beach in
Corpus Christi

I love water. I’m sort of obsessed with it. I love oceans, lakes, rivers, streams, heck, I’ll even stare at a mud puddle for a good 10 minutes. I don’t know why I’m so captivated by water. Maybe it’s because I grew up in a land-locked state, and the only water I regularly saw was Eagle Chief Creek, the Great Salt Plains Lake, and yes, the occasional mud puddle.

So when I learned that the Southern Association of Agricultural Scientists research conference was in Corpus Christi, I was excited to see the sea. Corpus Christi, in my opinion, is not a very pretty city. It has some nice things to do, and the Omni Hotel where we stayed was very nice. And we had a balcony that allowed me to see Corpus Christi Bay.

Yes, I am wearing a pink t-shirt,
a red sweatshirt, and black running
shorts with white legs. Don't judge

It was so nice to take a walk on the sea wall and look at the water and all the boats. So you can imagine my giddiness when I learned that part of our program included a three hour tour (a three hour tour) aboard the Texas Floating Classroom (it wasn’t really a three hour tour, but I couldn’t resist the Gilligan reference).

Usually, the boat hosts school-age kids, but on this day, it was a pack of professors. We got to see the microscopic creatures floating around in the seawater, and even got to hold a baby jelly fish.

We got to see a shrimp net in action. It caught all sorts of sea creatures—stingrays, squid, shrimp, puffer fish, and several other little fishies. We got to play with all of them. I had so much fun and learned so much on that little cruise.

The tours are available for anyone, you just have to call ahead to make sure there isn’t a conflict with a school group.

My Thoughts…

2010-11-04T13:40:00.000-05:00

If anyone cares to read my thoughts…

The best show on t.v. is…..your favorite! Who am I to say that Grey’s Anatomy or Glee is the best on the tube this year? I’m not. I’m just a huge fan of television shows, and I probably need to find another hobby. But I love television shows and love to talk about them. So for the 10 readers of this blog, I want to share my thoughts of the new television shows that occupy my DVR.

Back in September (and yes, it has been more than a MONTH since my last post. Apologies to all 10 of you), I made my picks and predictions for new shows that I would bring into my life. I have FINALLY made it through all of them and have made my decisions. Here they are by night and time (all times Central).

Monday

The Event (8 p.m. on NBC). As much as I had hoped for Dr. Carrie Weaver (Laura Innes) to come back to my television, I really didn’t like this show. It has a great cast, and the concept is interesting, but in the first two episodes, there wasn’t a big enough hook to keep me. Plus, everything was so confusing. It would have been more helpful to have a great revelation to clue us in on what was happening, and then feed us little tidbits each week to help us figure it out. I know it has something to do with aliens and a plane that mysteriously disappears from the sky and crashes in the desert, but that’s about all I could figure out.

Mike & Molly (8:30 p.m. on CBS). It’s adorable. It’s funny. It’s cute. It’s sweet. It’s going to have to significantly decrease the fat jokes, or it’s going to lose me. I am cheering for this little show, because it has the potential to be good, but it is starting to seem like vast majority of the jokes are making fun of Mike because he is a large dude; the rest of the jokes are Molly making fun of herself and her size. I don’t get offended by fat jokes, but there really should be some more humor other than that…otherwise I think this show may get cancelled. For now I still like it, but I have let several episodes linger on the DVR, which sometimes isn’t a good sign.

Hawaii Five-O (9 p.m. on CBS). Yes! Love it!! Great show, great actors (and attractive, I might add), great story line, great action, and GREAT shots of Hawaii. The only thing I don’t like about this show is that it really makes me want to take another vacation to Hawaii, which is not in the budget. I did not have high expectations for this show, but I must say, it by far exceeded what I thought I would see.

Chase (9 p.m. on NBC). This is a good show. I liked the show, but it wasn’t a show for me. As stated in previous posts, I’m not a big cop show person. A few shows had to give, so I “chased” it off my DVR (hahaha!). If you like cop shows, however, this one might interest you.

Tuesday

Raising Hope is the funniest show on television.

Raising Hope (8 p.m. on FOX). Oh how I LOVE LOVE LOVE this show. In one week, it catapulted into the coveted Number 3 place in my top five shows. This show is hysterical!!

The story is about Jimmy. A sweet 20-something that lives with his parents and works for his dad’s landscaping company. His family is white trash and I love it! One night on a trip out for ice cream, Jimmy meets a lovely young lady, yada yada yada, and she’s pregnant. Come to find out, she’s a serial killer. She gets caught, goes to prison and is executed. Jimmy gets the baby, Princess Beyonce.

With the help of his mom (played by Martha Plimpton), dad (don’t know who he is) and senile MaMaw (played by Cloris Leachman), the entire family raises the baby, whose name was changed to Hope.

I belly laugh at least once a minute while watching this show, and Scott even LOLs at it too. Go back and watch the old episodes on Hulu, and add this one to your list of favorite shows!

Wednesday

Better With You (7:30 on ABC). Very funny show. Very well done. It’s a keeper. The story is about two sisters and their parents. The younger sister, Mia, is recently engaged after only a few weeks of dating. The older sister has been with her boyfriend for nine years. The parents have been together for more than 30 years. The show takes us through the differences in relationships when they’re at different stages. Add it. You’ll LOL.

The Whole Truth (9 p.m. on ABC). Like Dr. Weaver, I really wanted Dr. Abbie Lockhart to return to my television set. Alas, that is not going to happen. Although interesting, this show just didn’t resonate with me. It’s very similar to Law & Order. Plus, I already have one lawyer show in my life (The Good Wife) and there just isn’t room for another.

Thursday

My Generation—CANCELLED. We were actually getting into the show, but ABC killed that idea for us.

Friday

Blue Bloods (9 p.m. on CBS). I like the show a lot. I don’t love it yet. However, Tom Selleck and Donny Wahlberg give plenty of reasons to love it. It’s a nice show about a New York, Catholic family whose family business is law enforcement. It has a good crime/detective story each week, and there is also a mysterious twist. For now it stays, but there are four episodes in the DVR collecting dust.

Farewell, Event, Chase, The Whole Truth and My Generation. You made a nice effort. And best wishes to Mike & Molly. I’m rootin’ for ya, but you need to step it up!

These Are a Few of My Favorite Things

2010-10-01T14:03:00.000-05:00

Actually, I meant to say favorite shows, but Rogers and Hammerstein did not write a song about favorite television programming, so let’s improvise! There are a handful of shows that I insist upon watching the night they air. I look forward to the show every week, and love to talk about them with my friends.

Drum roll, please.

Although I love the housewives, I just don't love
it enough to put it in the top five

Honorable mention: Desperate Housewives, The Middle, Cougar Town, and The Big Bang Theory. I absolutely love each of these shows, but I’m just not as obsessed with them as the top five. Don’t get me wrong, I would be devastated if any of these shows were to be cancelled (and I fear Housewives may soon be on ABC’s chopping block), but I’m just not as dedicated to them as I am to the top shows, and I may let them stack up for two or three weeks in the DVR before I get to them.

5^th favorite show: The Good Wife (Tuesday at 9 on CBS)—I am so happy that some of my favorite ER actors are finding work these days. Carrie Weaver has a gig on NBC, Abbie Lockhart is now a lawyer on ABC, Clooney is…well, he’s still hot, and Julianna Margulies (a.k.a. Carol Hathaway) plays Alicia Florreck, The Good Wife. The show began with Alicia standing by her man, played by Chris Noth (a.k.a. Mr. Big), as he fesses up to embezzlement and an affair. He goes to jail, she goes to work. The show is basically about life and how people deal with the big issues that life throws our way. It’s a really good show. There is always an interesting lawyer case, and Alicia, who had been a stay-at-home mom for more than a decade, is showing off her mad lawyer skillzzz. Highly recommend it.

4^th favorite show: How I Met Your Mother (Monday at 7 on CBS)—This show is legen-wait for it-dary! I truly feel like I am friends with Ted, Robin, Marshall, Lilly and Barney. I want to hang out with them, and knowing that I will see them at the end of the day makes Mondays bearable. I must say, I’m anxious to see how Ted actually does meet the mother, but I’m content to hang out with the gang for now. Suit up!

3^rd favorite show: Modern Family (Wednesday at 8 on ABC)—This show is absolutely hysterical. I love every character, even the kids. I love the story line. I love everything about this show!!! I find myself belly-laughing several times in every show. In its second season, the show is off to a great start, snagging several Primetime Emmys just before Premier Week. If you don’t watch this show, you’re missing out.

2nd and 1st favorite shows: Call me spineless, a wimp, a pushover, whatever you want to say, but I just cannot pick a favorite between these two. I love the drama, but I love the music, I love the story, but I love the comedy, I love the medicine, but I love the high school drama. It’s comparing apples to oranges, and I simply will not choose a favorite between these two shows. The winner of my favorite show is a tie between Glee and Grey’s Anatomy. They both get first place!

Sue Sylvester is my favorite character.

Glee (Tuesday at 7 on FOX)—In a word, brilliant. This show is so well done, and so well thought out. Glee combines a perfect mix of great music, dancing, story line, and high school angst. The characters are well developed, we like the people, and we are cheering for the glee club kids to gain acceptance into high school life. Like most of America, Sue Sylvester ("I'm gonna make it a habit to not stop and talk to students because this has been a colossal waste of my time") is my favorite character, followed closely by Kurt ("I'm so depressed I've worn the same outfit twice this week"), followed by Brittany ("I don't brush my teeth. I rinse my mouth out with soda after I eat. I was pretty sure Dr Pepper was a dentist").

This season, the show debuts a new football coach…a lady football coach, which should add another level of comedy ("Female football coach, like a male nurse? Sin against nature"—Sue Sylvester). After all the hype, I had high expectations for the Brittany Spears episode, but was a little disappointed. I wanted to see more Brittany! But maybe there was a reason for this, as Sue Sylvester so wisely pointed out, “Don't let your own recklessness blind you to the fact that Britney Spears is a genius pop culture provocateur and a gateway drug to every out of control impulse ever created.”

Glee is my favorite show and I can’t wait for Tuesday to get here!

Although I miss Dr. George O'Malley, Grey's is still my fave!

Grey’s Anatomy (Thursday at 8 on ABC)—Wait a second, Grey’s is my favorite show! Again, I can’t decide.

For those of you fair weather wimps who couldn’t stick it out through the Grey’s dry spell, Grey’s is back and it’s awesome! I must admit, I was growing a bit frustrated in the last seasons. The stories seemed to drag a bit, and I may have let an episode or two slide, waiting until Friday to watch. I’m still a little blue about the death of Dr. George O’Malley.

HOWEVER, last season’s finale was two hours of edge-of-your-seat drama and creativity. I’m sure everyone knows by now—and if I’m telling you something before the show, then you need to keep up better—but several of the Mercy West folks were shot on last season’s finale. Derrick and Alex both got shot, but they’re okay now. For about two hours, I really thought we had seen the end of Alex. The show is brilliant, and the seventh season is off to a great start so far. I am, however, disgusted at ABC for not allowing the season premier to be two hours long. What's up with that, ABC??

If you have drifted away from Grey’s it’s time to drift back. Do it for George.

So those are my favorite shows. I also like rain drops on roses, whiskers on kittens, brown paper packages tied up with string...

And now you will be singing show tunes for the rest of the day.

My DVR List

2010-09-19T12:50:00.001-05:00

On the eve of Premier Week, we found it both appropriate and exciting to review the shows that are about to be recorded. If I do not answer e-mails or telephone calls in a timely manner, please forgive me. This is the most exciting week of the year for us.

Monday

Barney, Robin, Ted, Lily
& Marshall, I have
missed you!

7 p.m. How I Met Your Mother (CBS)

8 p.m. The Event (NBC)*

8:30 p.m. Mike & Molly (CBS)*

9 p.m. Hawaii Five-0 (CBS)*

9 p.m. Chase (NBC)*

Tuesday

7 p.m. Glee (FOX)

8 p.m. Raising Hope (FOX)*

9 p.m. The Good Wife (CBS)—does not premier until next week.

Wednesday

7 p.m. The Middle (ABC)

7 p.m. Survivor (CBS)+ - This is Scotty’s deal, not mine.

7:30 p.m. Better With You (ABC)*

8 p.m. Modern Family (ABC)

8:30 p.m. Cougar Town (ABC)

9 p.m. The Whole Truth (ABC)*

Thursday

For three months, I
have worried about
Dr. Shepherd's gunshot
wound recovery.

7 p.m. Big Bang Theory (CBS)+

7 p.m. My Generation (ABC)*

8 p.m. Grey’s Anatomy (ABC)

8 p.m. The Office (NBC)

9 p.m. Jersey Shore (MTV)

Friday

8 p.m. Body of Proof (ABC)*
9 p.m. 20/20 (ABC)

9 p.m. Blue Bloods (CBS)*

Sunday

8 a.m. CBS Sunday Morning (CBS)

7 p.m. Amazing Race (CBS)—I have kind of given up on this one, but Scott still likes it.

7 p.m. The Simpsons (FOX)—Mostly for Scotty, but every now and then, Bart and Homer are hard to beat.

8 p.m. Desperate Housewives (ABC)

9 p.m. Over the Limit (TRU)—This show is funny! It’s about cops that arrest drunk people.

9 p.m. Undercover Boss (CBS)—Again, a Scotty show.

* Denotes new show

+ Denotes new time or night

We also record all episodes of Chelsea Lately, Kendra, Deadliest Catch, and The Closer. And people think we need a kid.

NBC Fall Lineup

2010-09-14T19:45:00.000-05:00

We are exactly one week away from Premier Week! I am so excited for quality television! No offense to Snookie, JWoww and The Situation, but I have had enough reality television for one summer (even though I secretly love The Jersey Shore and can’t get enough of it!)

My last installment of new show picks brings us to NBC. The Peacock Network has been a slump lately, and I’m not so sure that 2010 is its comeback year. A sidenote to NBC’s web masters: Thank you for organizing your shows by night and time instead of alphabetically. It’s like you read my mind.

Here are my picks and pans by night and time:

The Event (Monday at 8)—Although I can’t tell you exactly what the show is about, I am picking it. There’s some sort of government cover up and an attempt to assassinate the president. And Blair Underwood is the president. I think its mysteriousness is why I’m interested. It almost has a Lost feel to it…you’ll have to watch every week to figure it out. Also, Dr. Carrie Weaver (Laura Innes) from ER is in this show, and I have missed her, and I want to support her career. During her time off from ER, her leg must have miraculously healed.

Chase (Monday at 9)—I’m interested for several reasons: 1) it’s set in Texas and I enjoy to see how Hollywood will stereotype us; 2) Jesse Metcalf is in it, and if you will remember, he played John the high school gardener that Gabby was, um, seeing, in Desperate Housewives; and 3) and most important, that creepy dude from Nip/Tuck that has all the tattoos was in the preview.

Jerry Bruckheimer is the producer of Chase, and usually his shows do very well. Kelli Giddish, a relative newcomer, is the main character, and from the previews, it appears that she over-acts a bit. This show makes the cut, but only on a trial basis. Three weeks to hook me, otherwise, DELETE!

Undercovers (Wednesday at 7)—Meh.

Law and Order: Los Angeles (Wednesday at 9)—I’m not even going to watch the preview, because it won’t matter. All Law and Orders are successful. I don’t watch any of them, but I know that they’re good, so I expect this one will be too.

Outsourced (Thursday at 8:30)—Fun idea, but I’m not feeling it. An American call center outsources its employees to India, and sends their one remaining American employee overseas to manage it. You might give it a chance, but my Thursdays are full already, and I have enough comedies in my life.

School Pride (Friday at 7, doesn’t premier until October 15)—Think Extreme Makeover: Home Edition, but for schools. Communities come together to renovate run-down schools. It’s a nice idea and will probably be a really good show, but it’s not my kind of show. Give it a shot if you’re looking for something that’s positive and family-oriented.

Outlaw (Friday at 9)—Every time I tried to watch the preview for this show, the internet crashed or some other issue arose, so automatically I had a bad attitude. I’m not a big lawyer show person, but this one looks really good, and so does Jimmy Smits, although he has some huge bags under his eyes in some shots.. Smits plays a Supreme Court justice that steps down to go into private practice. I’m interested in this one, so I’m going to watch it online a few times before I’ll give it a full DVR commitment.

So here is my NBC lineup, including existing shows:

Sunday—Nothin’

Monday—The Event at 8 and The Chase at 9

Tuesday—Nothin’. Although I am now a Jillian Michaels fan (her e-mail fitness tips are great!), I just can't watch two whole hours of her yelling at people.

Wednesday—Nothin’

Thursday—The Office at 8. That's it. Wow. And to think that my Thursdays were once completely dedicated to NBC. I miss Friends. And ER. And Seinfeld. And Just Shoot Me...anyone remember that show? I liked it.

Friday—If Outlaw pans out, I may add it, but at the moment, my Fridays are free. Maybe Scotty will take me to the movies. I think adding another show to the DVR is more likely.

FOX Fall Lineup

2010-09-09T20:51:00.001-05:00

Dear FOX Network:

Like CBS, your website is difficult to navigate. Additionally, when you’re trying to create buzz around the shows that you invested money in and need to garner ratings so that you can gain and keep advertisers, you should have those glaring on the homepage, instead of placing a two-color link to “2010-11 FOX Schedule” at the bottom of the page. Please see what ABC does.

Love,

Dr. Irlbeck

Putting all annoyances aside, FOX has some interesting new shows in the fall lineup. Here are my picks and pans for the new shows by night and time:

Lone Star is the new Dallas.
And I still want Lucy's hair.

Lone Star (Monday at 8)—Anyone remember Dallas? I sure do. Oh, how I longed to be Pamela Ewing and have my own swimming pool and work at a cool department store in downtown Dallas, all while having my own horses out back that I could ride when I got off work! I also wanted to be just like Lucy Ewing and have long blond hair and get to invite my friends over for pool parties. Well, Lone Star is the new Dallas, only sleazier. The show is about big oil in Texas and follows a father and son who are ruthless.

The show has some heavy hitters in the cast…starting with Jon Voight. Brangelina’s baby granddaddy isn’t the main character, but as in all of his movies, he has that “I’m gonna kill ya just by lookin at ya” look in his eyes. David Keith plays the mean dad. You have seen him before, but it’s hard to pinpoint where. His list of guest-starring roles is extensive on IMDB.

The difference between this show and Dallas is that the dad is mean and tries to get his son to be mean. Jock Ewing would never be mean; Miss Ellie would have left him. He left that up to his ruthless son, J.R., who many people think looks like my dad. I never thought so.

Anyhoo, I’m interested in this show, but I already have five seasons of Dallas DVDs sitting on a shelf collecting dust. I think with this one, I’m going to watch it online during my lunch break before I make a full DVR commitment. I’ll let you know what I think.

This show looks hilarious.
Add it to your DVR.

Raising Hope (Tuesday at 8)—This show follows my new favorite show, Glee, so FOX better bring their A game if a brand new show is going to follow the television genius of Glee. From what I can tell, FOX brung it.

Raising Hope looks hysterical. I was laughing out loud during the preview. The show is the story of a single dad trying to raise a newborn and he has no idea what he’s doing. He doesn’t have a stroller yet, so he wheels the baby around in a used shopping cart. He pukes on the baby when she has her first dirty diaper. It’s funny! Martha Plimpton plays the mom/new grandma and I have been a fan of hers since The Goonies. Cloris Leachman plays the grandma/great grandma and appears to be senile. Looks great! Give it a shot.

Rumning Wilde (Tuesday at 8:30)—FOX’s website won’t play this video. Bad move, FOX! Your failure just created an automatic NO!

The Good Guys (Friday at 8)—This show started airing this summer, but FOX is trying to pawn it off as a new show. Nice try. I’m not adding it.

So that’s it. Fox has some other shows listed on its website that will start in January: Bob’s Burgers, Masterchef, Mixed Signals, Ride-Along, and Terra Nova. They’re available to preview, but I’m not a huge FOX fan, and really don’t care. I’ll get around to it in January.

CBS Fall Lineup

2010-08-23T20:27:00.002-05:00

This fall, I was planning to make a lifestyle change. I had been thinking and praying about it for some time, and was at peace with my decision.

Goodbye, Melinda Gordon

I had decided to delete The Ghost Whisperer from my DVR. This was a very difficult decision, but after having a collection of eight episodes from the spring backlogged in my DVR in JULY, I think it was clear that we were both moving in different directions.

HOWEVER, CBS jumped the gun and cancelled the show before I could make this lifestyle change. I guess I am just as perceptive as the network’s execs. They should totally hire me.

Melinda Gordon was an important part of my life from the moment she convinced that lost Vietnam vet’s soul to cross over that fateful day in 2005. I shall miss her, Jim, Delia, Ned, Ely and Aiden, along with those that haunted her—the shineys, the shadows, the weepies, the creepies, the crawlies…I couldn’t keep up with all of them.

Now on to the new stuff!! First, let me publicly state that I do not care for CBS’s website. I find it difficult to navigate, and it takes me three clicks to get to the preview I would like to see. I recommend the CBS website brass find a copy of Nielsen (1993) for web usability guidelines and suggestions. Or maybe just look at ABC and do what they do. It’s not hard, really. I do like the fact that CBS gives you the option to embed previews into another website, which I am doing here so each of you can decide (in one click, mind you) for yourselves which shows will make your DVR list. (If the shows don't appear in your web browser, click on the You Tube link about halfway down. For whatever reason, it makes the others work. And my apologies, CBS insists upon playing their commercials.)

CBS only has five new shows, a testament to Les Moonves and the CBS geniuses that are able to pick and place such great shows. Here are my picks and pans by night and time:

Mike and Molly (Monday at 8:30)—I think this show will become near and dear to my heart. I like the title because I have a cousin named Mike and he has a dog named Molly. How cute! But really, this show is about Mike and Molly, two nice people with struggles to lose weight. I totally relate. They want to date. Dang, I was on a roll with the rhymes, now I’m stuck.

ANYWAY…Mike develops a little crush on Molly and he asks her out. I have not been disappointed by CBS’s comedies, and I think this one will rank right up there with How I Met Your Mother and Big Bang Theory. The show stars Melissa McCarthy—she was on Samantha Who? and has been in several other movies and shows. She’s super cute and a good actress.

Hawaii Five-O (Monday at 9)—Let’s first get this out of the way:

Ok, that was fun, now wasn't it? I cannot speak the word “Hawaii” without this song popping into my head. One of the greatest t.v. theme songs of all time.

CBS has decided that they need to re-make the 1970s hit show. I never watched the show the first time around, but I am very aware of the fact that it is a classic.

I don’t know about this one. I just don’t know. The previews look really good. It looks like a fun cop show. I want to like it. But the child of the 70s inside me wants to hate it. I’m stuck. I love Hawaii with all my heart, so that makes me excited to see the show, simply so that I can see more Hawaiian scenery. On the other hand, I’m just not much of a cop show person. But Scott Caan (who is having a birthday today! Happy birthday, Scott!) plays Danno, and I have liked him since he was Tweeder in Varsity Blues, and then I loved him when he was in Ocean’s 11. Then in Ocean’s 12. And then again in Ocean’s 13.

Ok, here’s my plan. Hawaii Five-O makes the cut, but it has three episodes to make me love it, otherwise, it’s getting blown off the list like an angry volcano.

Book ‘em Danno.

The Defenders (Wednesday at 9)—Based on the preview, Jerry O’Connell and Jim Belushi work really well together. They’re funny together. I think this could be a good show, but for some reason, I’m not feeling it. It’s set in Vegas, which I love, and I get to look at Jerry. I can’t pinpoint why I won’t be adding this to my lineup, but I just won’t. If you’re into legal dramas, give this one a chance, and if Hawaii Five-O doesn’t work out (and I don't think it will, despite what Entertainment Tonight says), then The Defenders may get added in its place...or maybe I'll take up another hobby, because I clearly watch too much t.v.

S#*! My Dad Says (Thursday at 7:30)—William Shatner is the dad that says stuff. He’s the best part of this show. But I’m thinking no. First of all, I hate it when people try to force something in to a t.v. show. Does anyone remember Dirty Dancing the t.v. show? Probably not, because it was a bad idea! But CBS tried to make a t.v. show out of something that clearly should have stayed a movie. Same thing goes for this show. S#*! My Dad Says is a Twitter site. It should stay that way. In the preview, the acting looked strained, unnatural and poorly timed. I could be wrong, but this one doesn’t make my cut.

Blue Bloods (Friday at 9)—Tom Selleck. Donny Wahlberg. Oh yes. The 12-year-old New Kids on the Block fan inside of me is squealing right now. I’ll be loving you forever, Donny!!!

CBS has some really great shows, and we are fans of many of them. Here are the CBS shows on my DVR:

Sunday: The Amazing Race. I used to love this show, but lately, I’m growing tired of it. The American people must be tired of it too, as it has been shortened to 30 minutes.

Monday: 7 p.m.: How I Met Your Mother; 8:30 p.m.: Mike & Molly; 9 p.m.: Hawaii Five-O.

Note: CBS has moved Big Bang Theory to Thursday. This better not mess with my recordings of other shows!!!

Tuesday: 9 p.m.: The Good Wife. I LOVE this show!!! Nurse Carol Hathaway. Mr. Big. Great cast, great story line, great show altogether!

Wednesday: 7 p.m.: Survivor. That’s all Scott.

Thursday: 7 p.m.: The Big Bang Theory. So funny!!!!!

Friday: 9 p.m.: Blue Bloods. This appears to be the Brothers and Sisters of the law enforcement world, and since I missed the boat on Brothers and Sisters, this show will make up for it.

Saturday: Nothin. I’m at the football game.

Nice work, CBS. I think you have pulled together an excellent lineup, and I can’t wait for September 20!!

ABC Fall Lineup

2010-08-16T22:34:00.000-05:00

Although I have thoroughly enjoyed Boston Medical, Scott has loved laughing at the antics on Wipe Out, and I am disgusted at what has become of Chris Harrison on Bachelor Pad (he was so good on Channel 9 in Oklahoma City), ABC’s summer programming is wearing on me. I understand why they keep the A-list programming in the back pocket until the fall, but dang it, I watch t.v. in the summer, and I’m getting tired of the sub-par reality "programming."

Oh, Derrick and Meredith, how I miss thee and your beautiful hair. Will the handsome Dr. Shepherd recover fully from his gunshot wound? Will Owenstina’s love survive despite Owen’s feelings for Teddie? Will Callie and Arizona…oh wait, I don’t care so much for that one. But I am just chomping at the bit for some good television!

In addition to my longing for Grey’s Anatomy, I am also anxious for the new season of Cougar Town, Modern Family, The Middle, and Desperate Housewives. But this year, as in past years, I am just itching for the new television shows! So here are my picks and pans for ABC’s fall lineup by order of night and time:

No Ordinary Family (Tuesday at 7)—Blah. I think it would be a fun movie, but for a t.v. show, no. Moving on now, because I want to spend no more time on this…

Detroit 187 (Tuesday at 9)—If I were really into cop shows, this would make the DVR list. I watch The Closer, so I just really don’t have room in my life for another crime drama. But, this show does look really good. SOOOOO, depending on how well some of the other shows pan out, this one may get a mid-season add. If you like crime dramas, check this one out.

Better With You (Wednesday at 7:30)—Yes, this one looks good! The actors are great! I really liked Jennifer Finnigan when she was on Close to Home (before CBS cancelled it). I loved Debra Jo Rupp when she played Alice (Pheobe’s sister in law) on Friends, and then as the mom in That 70s Show. Josh Cooke looks familiar, but I didn’t see anything that rings a bell for me on IMDB. Finally, Kurt Fuller plays the dad in this show. He has been in everything, but my favorite was when he played Russell in Wayne’s World. This show definitely makes the cut.

Isn't the former Dr. Lockhart looking
poorly these days?

The Whole Truth (Wednesday at 9)—I’m not a huge lawyer show person, but I will record this one simply because Maura Tierney is in it. I loved her as Dr. Abbie Lockhart in ER, so I am happy to see that she is employed, so I will do my best to make sure she stays employed. However, she looks AWFUL. Oh yeah, and the show looks good too. However, this show has three weeks to ensnare me, otherwise it gets deleted. Cut throat. That’s how I roll in t.v. land.

My Generation (Thursday at 7)—Makes the list, no questions asked. The show is set up like a documentary that introduces us to the characters when they were seniors in high school in 2000, then we catch up with them 10 years later. It looks very creative, very different from anything else, so I’m excited to see how this one turns out. I didn’t really recognize many, if any, of the actors, but that’s okay.

Secret Millionaire (Friday at 7)—No. Dumb. Don’t care.

Quincy was a favorite for a
young Dr. Irlbeck and
her grandparents

Body of Proof (Friday at 9)—This looks good. Dana Delany stars in this cool show. I really liked Quincy when I was a kid (yeah, Grandma and Grandpa let me watch whatever I wanted), and this looks like the 2010 version of Quincy. Delany’s character was a big time neurosurgeon, but a tragic accident forces her out of surgery. To stay employed, she becomes a medical examiner. This will take the place of Ghost Whisperer in my Friday night lineup. Jeri Ryan is also in this show and I think she’s cool.

There are several other shows that will hit mid-season, especially Mr. Sunshine, starring none other than Matthew Perry (a.k.a. Chandler Bing), but I’ll get to those in a post in a few months.

I have become pretty loyal to ABC, as evidenced by my DVR:

Sunday—Desperate Housewives

Monday—Well, nothing. Dancing with the Stars doesn’t make the cut. Sorry.

Tuesday—Neither does the DWTS awards show.

Wednesday—Basically, Wednesday belongs to ABC. The Middle, Better with You, Modern Family, Cougar Town, The Whole Truth.

Thursday—My Generation & Grey’s Anatomy

Friday—Body of Proof & 20/20.

So there you have it. Please do not disturb me the week of September 19. Clearly, I’m busy.

Well, excuse me, but I think you've got my chair...

2010-08-06T19:15:00.000-05:00

We scored these great metal yard chairs from some of Scott's grandma's old stuff. As you can see, the years had been cruel to these little cuties. So, I gave them a spa treatment, and they now look like brand new chairs that are worthy of the Ruby Tequila's patio.

The first step was to clean them off (the birds really liked them). I had to use a scrub brush and the "jet" setting on our spray gun to get all the rust and "bird impurities" off. Then I spray painted the arms with a new coat of white.

The next step was taping. And that was an extremely tedious job. It took about 30 minutes per chair to wrap the arms and legs, and there were three chairs. Mind you, I was trying to get all this done when it was raining every other day in June, so what should have taken two evenings ended up taking a week-and-a-half.

We made good use of our old shower curtains (as seen in the picture to the left). I felt like a genius when I realized the old, musty shower could double as a paint drop cloth. Of course, I often feel like a genius.

After painting the first chair an awesome lime green, Scott and I really liked the color combination of "painters' tape blue" with the lime green. Lucky for me, Rustoleum makes and Home Depot sells painters' tape blue in the vast selection of spray paints. (Note: Painters' tape blue is not the actual name of the paint color, but I like the name that I came up with. It's cute, don't you think?)

I also bought a lovely shade of lemon yellow to round out the trio.

And here is the finished product! I love the way they turned out and I am so pleased with the outcome of our patio. I did all of the painting and landscaping. Scott watched.

After I came up with the catchy title (thanks, George Strait), and as I was writing this post, I couldn't get George's 1980s mega-hit The Chair out of my head. The song was on my iPod, because I have the entire Strait out of the Box set stored there, but I couldn't figure out how to pull the song off my iPod and embed it into my blog. So after two minutes of frustration, I went to YouTube, and oh...my...goodness. I found excellence in 1980s video making. I couldn't bear to keep this gem of a video to myself, and I had to share it with you, all eight readers of my blog. Enjoy.

Ag Media Summit

2010-08-01T22:24:00.001-05:00

Mickey's Diner in downtown St. Paul

As summer starts to draw to a close, my favorite way to wind down this wonderful time of year is to attend the Ag Media Summit. This year's meeting was in St. Paul, Minnesota. Upon arrival, we were starving, so we went to Mickey's Diner. The place was one of those old dining cars, and it reminded me of Shortcakes in Stillwater. It's always open and has served a wide variety of fried stuff to Minnesotans and lots of famous people. There was seriously nothing healthy on the menu, but you can get breakfast 24 hours a day! I had a hamburger and fries. It was tasty, but I smelled like a hamburger for the rest of the day.

Back at the hotel (Crowne Plaza), somehow, someway I got a poolside room. I never get the good room, so you can understand my excitement. The first night we were there, we hung outside my room and watched people swim.

However, I was rather confused at the bathroom configuration. It was as if the contractors completed the bathroom and thought "hmmm....something's missing. Oh yeah! The toilet! Let's just cram it under the counter and no one will ever notice." Weird.

Before all the conference festivities began, we deemed it essential to go shopping at the Mall of America. It was way bigger than I could have imagined. It has an amusement park inside! We were there only two hours, so we barely got to have the full experience, but I found a wonderful scrapbooking store there. We ate lunch at Bubba Gump Shrimp Company. They had fried shrimp, grilled shrimp, boiled shrimp, shrimp gumbo, shrimp cocktail, shrimp salad, coconut shrimp.....that's about it.

For the Ag Media Summit Welcome Party, we took a riverboat cruise up the Mississippi River. It was really fun, and the views were great. As usual, Boelte Hall had their props set up for pictures and we had to see who could be the funniest.

The Texas Tech crew.

Defending myself from Viking attackers

The OSU alumni who are now faculty members. Nerds.

All the OSU alumni and students who attended AMS.

During the conference, I won a Flip Cam from Alpharma and Charleston Orwig. I was so excited about this, and couldn't wait to shoot my first video. And here it is. Special thanks to Lindsay Kennedy for starring in this video and for coming up with the material.

The final night was a little dressier for the cocktail reception and banquet. My students looked so cute! The banquet was followed by a dance, but since I tend to embarrass myself when dancing, I opted to go back to the room and pack.

I slept most of the trip back--little did I know, I was getting sick. Every time I travel, I get sick! But as we were approaching Lubbock, I got so excited to see how green and pretty everything looks this year.

So here's to another great Ag Media Summit, and as I close this entry, I get a bit of a panicked feeling because I know summer is almost over and I am so not prepared for the fall semester.

Next year is in New Orleans. Woohoo!!!

Make Like a Tree and Leave

2010-07-24T19:05:00.000-05:00

When we bought our house, one of the selling points was the pre-existing landscaping and trees. Our yard had a peach and two plum trees, and for several years, we enjoyed wonderful fruit from all three trees.

But all good things must come to an end. Fruit trees don’t have a long life expectancy to begin with, plus we had bores (sp?) and several freezes did a number to all three of them. We haven’t had fruit in several years, and finally, the trees gave up. Shortly thereafter, my ivy and grapevines decided the trees would make an excellent habitat, so they took over. It looked like the trees were alive, but alas, they were covered in vines.

In an attempt to up the resale value of our house, we enlisted the help of Dr. Alyx “Chain Saw” Shultz to chop ‘em down. Alyx loves her chainsaw. She gets great pleasure from sawing, trimming, logging….generally anything that involves the chainsaw. You can see by the look on her face that she is completely enjoying the project. Alyx is so awesome! She has an infinite knowledge of chainsaws, veterinary medicine, marathons, equine science, and statistics.

While Alyx was annihilating our yard, I, on the other hand, stood back and acted like a girl. I checked on the cookies, moved limbs, asked her if she was wearing proper eye protection, and made dinner. It’s as if we were married in the 1950s. Scott and I did, however, manage to make an impressive brush pile, and if we weren't in city limits and if our shed weren't five feet from the pile, we would have a bon fire worthy of our college days.

Alyx is about to move to Kentucky to be on faculty at Murray State University, and she is just giddy about the vast amount of trees that she will get to saw down once she moves.

Another endearing quality about Alyx is that Patsy likes her. For those of you that know my dog, she likes my mom and dad, Erin, maybe Scott’s mom and dad, and now Alyx. That speaks volumes to Alyx’s character and we will miss her and her chain saw.

Note: Patsy approached Alyx on her own accord.
I did not force this behavior as I typically do.

Our yard now looks naked. We were going to put a garden in along the fence, but it’s so bare. We need a little protection from the alley as any creeper could stand back there and look right into the yard. Any suggestions for filler in this area are needed and welcomed.

We Saw Marfains!

2010-07-19T22:05:00.000-05:00

Here in Lubbock, we say that we live in West Texas. Although that statement is not un-true, there is a place that is even further west than what we consider “West Texas,” and we went there this weekend.

We went to Marfa, Texas. As Meterologist Matt Laubhan stated, think Mexico, then up a little. It was only a five hour drive to get there from Lubbock, which surprised me, I thought it would be way longer. Marfa is centrally located 180 miles from El Paso and 180 miles (approximately) from Midland. This Google Earth picture isn't as clear as I had hoped, but yeah, find Mexico, then up a little...Marfa is marked on this map. Lubbock is where the little I-27 marker is.

Marfa is an odd little place, but we really liked it. It is frequently featured in Texas Monthly and I’ve seen it a time or two in Southern Living, so we have wanted to see this mysterious little place for a while. It’s known for several things: the Marfa lights, art, movies, beautiful scenery and our friend Eric Pierce.

The Marfa lights are a mystery. No one really knows what they are. They’re just lights that appear on the horizon east of Marfa at random times of night. My mom told me about them when I was little and it scared the dickens out of me. Unsolved Mysteries was even intrigued by the lights and did a segment on them. In order to face my childhood fears and in hopes of getting to dial 1-800-876-5353 to help solve a mystery, we went out to see if we could see the Marfa lights. No such luck. Eric grew up in Marfa and had seen the lights several times. I looked them up on the Internet, and there aren’t many good pictures of them, but you’re welcome to Google them yourself.

Marfa is also on the map because it’s an art community. In the 70s, an artist named Donald Judd (I guess he was famous, but I hadn’t heard of him, but I’m not as cultured as most) moved there and started using many of the building in town for his art. He acquired an old fort and renovated the fort’s building and grounds into art spaces. One piece of “art” is a bunch of cement blocks. Here’s a picture from Google Earth. I just don’t get it. The blocks are the dots on the right side of the picture in a straight line.

We went into a gallery and found a photo of Judd’s art on sale for $15,000. We passed on that in search for something a little less. This “Prada store” is actually "art." It’s a little box of a structure outside of Valentine. You can’t go in. It’s just an exhibit of Prada stuff, but the shoes and purses were from the 2005 line, so I wouldn’t want them anyway.

So now, artists flock to Marfa to set up shop. Many have a studio in New York and one in Marfa, like this Evan Hughes guy that makes furniture. Makes total sense.

Marfa was the setting for Giant, starring Elizabeth Taylor, James Dean, Rock Hudson and Dennis Hopper (God rest their souls). The cast and crew took over The Paisano Hotel in the 1950s, which has recently been renovated. We ate there Friday night. Yummy food! Can you imagine being a teenager in Marfa in the 50s and having that many movie stars in your hometown? I would have been in movie heaven! I still hold out hope the same thing will happen to Carmen, OK. Hey, it happened to Wakita. Anyway, No Country for Old Men was also shot there. It was an odd little movie, but I kind of liked it. I couldn’t get past the bad guy’s haircut. Finally, There Will Be Blood was shot there. That was the most horrible movie I have ever seen. What a waste of two hours of my life.

The area around Marfa, Ft. Davis and Alpine is just beautiful. They usually don’t get much rain, but after all the rain this year (thanks, Hurricane Alex), everything was so green and pretty. Very cool rock formations, mountains, old buildings and yes, even some art decorated the landscape. We really liked it there and hope to return at some point to see more sites.

Our friends, Eric & Melissa Pierce hosted us for the weekend. Eric’s family has a ranch south of town. The house is awesome!

The pond in the photo above is stocked with gigantic catfish and they love mealtime!

There was other wildlife (I only saw rabbits, but I kept my eye out for rattlesnakes, wild hogs and mountain lions). This jackrabbit couldn't figure out why I was walking in circles around the pond. I tried to explain to him that I was trying to get in shape for a wedding, but he just didn't get it. He's the tiny speck next to that plant. Squint your eyes, if needed.

Although we didn't see the Marfa lights, we saw some very pretty stars. The photo below is of the moon, but it didn't quite look like that in person.

Eric also took us to an old Indian camp. I don’t know what the holes in the ground were for, but it’s pretty cool. They found several arrowheads in the area of the camp. I didn't try to pick up arrowheads because I just knew if I put my hand on the ground a rattlesnake would jump out from underneath a bush and bite me. I'm petrified of snakes, if you can't tell.

Although Marfa is an odd little place, it was really nice and very enjoyable with great friends!

Cancelled.

2010-07-13T14:14:00.001-05:00

Yet again, another television network broke my heart.

I was just getting my life back together after NBC cancelled ER (and yes, I know it was time, but I still miss Dr. Kovach!), when ABC cancelled Ugly Betty. Rip my heart out and stomp on it!!! And now, TNT cancelled Saving Grace. Just kick me while I'm down, Hollywood!

I really liked this show! And according to a straw poll of my students, one in seven liked the show too. So, did it really need to be cancelled? I think not. However, I do not run a television network (but maybe I could do a better job) and do not know what types of budget constraints they face, and I really have no idea what the ratings for the show were.

The main reason I loved the show so much was that it was set in my motherland of Oklahoma. They go places in The City (Oklahoma City for you backward, non-Okies) that I'm familiar with, they eat at Johnnie's Grill all the time (for you non-Okies, this restaurant is a must-try), and it was simply a really great story. I don't get back to Oklahoma as often as I would like, so this show made me feel a little closer to home. My biggest complaint about the show was that they made everyone out to be an ou fan. NOT EVERY OKLAHOMAN IS A SOONER FAN.

The show is about the life of Grace Hanadarko (which is spelled wrong, it should be Anadarko) and her quest to find God again through the help of her angel, Earl. Grace was raised in a strong Catholic family--her brother is even a priest. But Grace has issues with God. Her sister was killed in the Murrow Building bombing, and she spent most of the last 15 years being mad at God, and sometimes doubting God's presence at all. In the final episode, Grace finally accepts God, but then TNT ruined what could have been a happy ending by canceling the show. I did not like the way the show ended. You can see the final episode here. I won't tell you how it ends, but I really, really want to. It's really bothering me to not tell.

I do want to point out the character names and why this show makes me laugh...and probably in a way that the writers of the show did not intend:

Grace Anadarko--Anadarko is a small town in west-central Oklahoma. So small, it's a Class B school, although they used to be good in basketball, circa 1994
Kate Perry--Perry is in northern Oklahoma on I-35 near Stillwater. It's where the authorities caught Timothy McVeigh. It is also the world headquarters of Ditch Witch
Butch Ada--Ada is in southeast Oklahoma and is home to East Central University, Bob's Barbecue and Polo's Mexican Grill--yum!
Ham Dewey--Dewey is a very small town in northeast Oklahoma. There is also a Dewey County in western Oklahoma. Taloga is its county seat. We would occasionally play Taloga in basketball. They, of course, beat us. My friend Jill grew up there
Bobby Stillwater--really? I think the show's writers were stretching for names. Bobby Stillwater is the lone OSU fan on the show. The show did not do a good job of representing my alma mater, but I'll look past that

So farewell, Saving Grace. I'm going to go sulk a while, or at least until Glee comes back in the fall. If TNT cancels The Closer, I think I might eat an entire half gallon of Braum's chocolate ice cream and sob.

My Part Time Job

2010-07-07T13:52:00.000-05:00

Although I am fully and happily employed by the Department of Agricultural Education and Communications at Texas Tech University, I have another job that I get a kick out of.

A long time ago, 10 years to be exact, in a state far, far away, Indiana if you're curious, I worked for AgDay Television. I loved that job! I got to travel and cover agricultural news from coast to coast...but I never went to the east coast, so coast to coast is not really an accurate statement...more like Midwest to west coast. Anyway...

When I worked there, I was dating the man that would eventually become my husband. He lived in Lubbock, I missed him, I wanted to be closer to my family, so I eventually decided to move.

When I started grad school in 2006, AgDay called wanting some freelance reports from God's country. Anxious to practice what I teach (video production), I happily agreed to send them one story a month. In reality, it's one story every two months, but who's counting? (Probably the head honchos at AgDay.)

Last month, I did a story in Tulia, Texas on wheat harvest. Prices are terribly low this year, due to an oversupply of wheat in the world. As down as the farmers were on prices, I still couldn't help but get a lift to my spirit by the beauty of it all. I just love the colors during harvest. The blues, golds and greens are always so pretty. I took this picture with my iPhone and it didn't do the colors justice, but it's still nice to look at.

Without further adieu, here is the story, as reported by Erica Goss--that's my showbiz name.. Special thanks to Tommy Womack of Tulia and Jay Yates of Shallowater for allowing me to interview them for this. And a huge thanks to the fabulous Scott Irlbeck...the handsome young devil that charmed me away from AgDay. He shot the video for this and did a marvelous job.

My Students Part II

2010-07-01T15:27:00.000-05:00

For ACOM 5308, Utilizing Online Media, Dr. Courtney Meyers taught our students how to create portfolio websites, and I must say, I am so proud of their work. So if any of the four readers of this blog are looking for talented and bright young minds, take a look at these people!

Brian Holladay's Portfolio Site

Brittni Drennan's Portfolio Site

Christy Witt's Portfolio Site

Kelsey Hall's Portfolio Site

Mica Graybill's Portfolio Site

Way to go, students. This summer class has been one of my favorites to teach. I learned so much teaching this class, and I hope my students did as well.

My Students

2010-06-30T13:13:00.000-05:00

I am just swelling with pride right now. This summer, Dr. Courtney Meyers and I taught ACOM 5308, Utilizing Online Media. We have studied blogs (and thus the recent activity on this site), Twitter, YouTube, Facebook, Flicker, and several other online tools to communicate the message of agriculture.

This class has been a blast to teach, and I have learned so much in the process. Our students were required to Tweet daily, watch and reflect on AgChat, review a social media book, create a video resume, build a portfolio website, and create an online marketing plan. I will post links to their websites in a few days, but I wanted to show off their video resumes. All these students did the work themselves, and they are all available for work in the near future! Take a look! I am just so proud of all of them!

Brittni Drennan's Video Resume

Mica Graybill's Video Resume

Kelsey Hall's Video Resume

Brian Holladay's Video Resume

Christy Witt's Video Resume

Italy Day 14--Final Thoughts

2010-06-29T21:01:00.000-05:00

All we did today was eat breakfast at the B&B, which consisted of yogurt and cookies, then we took a train to the airport, which is not interesting at all, but we wanted to share our Jerry Springer final thoughts on Italy.

Italy is beautiful, and there are a few places that I would love to see again. A trip to Italy was my dream vacation, and I am so very happy we were able to see this wonderful country.

The scenery is so diverse--ocean, mountains, rolling hills, and wonderful greenery. It really is a beautiful country with wonderful people and I hope to re-visit certain areas someday.

As much as I loved our trip and had high expectations for Italy, I must say I was a little let down on a few fronts. First, many parts of it were very dirty. We saw lots of trash--water bottles, cigarette butts, and just general junk lying around on the sidewalks and street. This was especially obvious in Rome, but Milan, Venice, Florence and Sorrento all could have used a good scrubbin'. Graffiti was everywhere. EVERYWHERE!

All over train stations, the trains including the seats, on buildings, highway signs, construction sites, historic monuments, and the worst--churches, even St. Peter's. Basically, if something had a surface, some jerk was going to write or paint on it. Some places tried to control the graffiti, but with the sheer amount of it, you could tell many cities gave up. It was really angering to see that Italians, and even some idiot Americans, Texans even, have such little respect for public property and historic relics.

Another disheartening experience was the beggars. They were everywhere. All colors, all ages, always wanting money. Some of them would carry a baby around and tell you the money was to feed the kid. They would approach everyone they saw. Seriously, you could not go anywhere without getting hit up for money. The only time I was tempted to give money was to an old man on the street with two cute little dogs. It broke my cold, cold heart! I was a little torn, because I know we are supposed to be sympathetic and helpful to the poor, but if I would have given money to every person that asked, I don't know that we would have had the money to feed ourselves on our trip. I'm sure some of those people legitimately needed some help, but I know there were others that were scamming on the sympathies of tourists. One lady in particular was begging in the square of the Duomo in Florence. Every time we walked through the square, there she was, asking us for money. She probably walked that square 20 times in one day. Granted, I don't know her situation, and it's not right for me to judge, and I hope she's able to get away from that life someday soon.

Eva, our innkeeper in Tuscany, told us that Italy has a huge problem with immigrants from all over the world. She said the immigrants usually end up on the street begging or picking pockets. When they get caught, they don't usually have a passport, so the Italian government doesn't know where

to deport these people to, so they let them stay. It's sad, and I hope the Italian government does something about it.

Another drawback of Italy is the traffic. You hear stories about Italian drivers...they're all true. They drive like psychopaths. They pass on curves, pull out in front of people, cut people off, speed, and honk...oh, those Italians love to honk the horn. Then there are the motorcycles and scooters. If I lived in Italy, I would drive a scooter. They're cheap to operate in a country where gas is very expensive, and apparently the rules of the road do not apply to them. They weave in and out of cars, which worked very well for them when there is a lot of traffic. They make up their own lanes and drive in between cars. The photo above is the only one I got of this mess, and it doesn't clearly demonstrate how awful the traffic really was.

We really didn't see much law enforcement on the road while we were there, so it seemed to us that we could go as fast as we wanted, weave in an out of traffic, bump into other cars, pull out in front of others...just as long as we didn't kill anyone.

To avoid driving, Italy has a pretty good public transportation system. It's very dirty as evidenced by me gagging on the train in the photo to the left, but we were able to get everywhere we needed via trains, trams, buses, subways, ferries, and an occasional cab. As long as we were in the water or on some sort of rail, we also didn't have to worry about freaky Italian drivers, either.

Driving aside, the Italian culture was very interesting to us. We really liked most of the people we encountered. They were very friendly and hospitable. The culture, from what we saw, was strongly rooted in family. It was not uncommon for grown kids to still live with their parents, and working for the family business was very common. At our B&B in Rome, the owner's daughters worked for her, and they seemed perfectly happy hanging out at home with their family.

Italians didn't seem to be into their careers as Americans, although I'm told that in Milan, the residents are very career centered and the culture there seemed similar to New York or DC. Italians also don't seem to be in as much of a hurry as Americans. This is really nice, until you’re famished and need a piece of pizza ASAP. They rest for an hour or two every day and they take long vacations. Tell me again why Americans don't do this??

Europeans in general--not necessarily Italians, and not all Italians--are well travelled. They have seen all or most of their continent, but when you can cover three countries in the amount of time it takes to get from Lubbock to Dallas, it isn't hard. A vast amount have spent a significant amount of time in the US, and many other parts of the world. They keep up with US news and they're very interested in our politics. Nearly all of them speak English, possibly Spanish, sometimes German, and maybe French. We felt really ignorant. The Italian language is really pretty. Instead of saying Rome, it's Roma. Instead of Naples, Napoli (NAP-o-LEE).

Italians are very dramatic. They talk with their hands a lot and get really loud in a conversation. Sometimes that pretty language doesn’t sound so pretty. At the B&B in Rome, the owner and her daughter were engaged in what appeared to be a very heated argument. We asked the daughter what was going on, and she said they were discussing how to sell their puppies. They weren't mad, just dramatic about their conversation.

In Europe, many, many people smoke and it's not a big deal. However, all those smokers throw their cigarette butts on the ground, littering the streets. If an area is posted non-smoking, you won't see anyone violating the rule. But if it's not marked, you'll be standing in a blue cloud for a long time. The owners of the B&B in Rome smoked, so all the bedding had a stale smoke-mixed-with-detergent smell. It wasn't horrible, but noticeable.

Mealtime is very important to the Italian culture. It’s not uncommon for dinner to last three hours. We had a typical Italian dinner at our agritourismo and it was four courses. It really was a great way to enjoy a meal, albeit expensive.

Many restaurants expect you to order the full four courses, and some people do, but that was a little out of our price range. Appetizers were $5-8 (Euros, not dollars), pasta was $8-12, main dishes were $15-20 and did not include a veggie or potato, and dessert was $5-8. This did not include drinks.

Several times we asked for tap water, but they told us they didn’t have it. Really?? Funny? They want you to order bottled water which was about $2 for a large bottle, which doesn’t sound bad, but you’re looking at U.S. $2.60 for water. Ripoff! The wine was fairly reasonable. We found bottles as cheap as $5, yes for a bottle, but most places had more expensive wines. We always asked for the house wine and were never disappointed.

One of the wonderful things about Italian restaurants is that they always bring you a basket of bread. I fell in love with Italy with that first basket-o-bread in Venice. I think I could survive on bread, wine and cheese, but that’s a conversation for another day. The drawback of the bread is that restaurants charge about $2 per person, but that also covered the tip.

Italians, and in general, Europeans, have coffee after dinner. In fact, they look at you like you have two heads if you don’t order coffee after your meal. Cappuccino is a breakfast drink, and if you ask for coffee, you get espresso. I don’t understand why those Italians couldn’t grasp the fact that I really didn’t care for coffee and didn’t want any.

I focused on a lot of negatives in this post, but the trip was awesome…a dream come true, really. I hope to return there someday, but only to Tuscany and maybe Sorrento. I would really like to see the Italian Alps, called the Dolomites and possibly the Lake Cuomo area…home of the original Bellagio.

Italy is a wonderful country, and I highly recommend it for a vacation. Ciao!

Italy Day Tredici

2010-06-22T21:30:00.001-05:00

Our last day in Rome. We slept in and took our time getting ready. We were really tired because of all the walking we did. We walked to the neighborhood train station and then had to wait about 30 minutes for the next train into town.

We really wanted to see the Necropolis. It's a crypt below St. Peter’s Basilica—Peter (as in Simon Peter....as in Jesus' disciple) is buried there. We heard about this through a woman we sat next to on a train that was a historian for the Vatican. Little did we know, you have to have reservations several weeks, maybe even months in advance. So we go be-bopping into the tour office and asked for a tour for today, and they looked at us like we were devil worshippers or something. Fine. Whatever.

So we stood in line for a really long time to see St. Peter's Basilica. It was totally worth the wait.

Completely beautiful and gigantic.

I was in awe at how huge it was, yet it was very well decorated.

I was also in awe at the symbolism of the church. Jesus told Peter, "You are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it”—Matthew 16:18—and literally, the church, the mother Catholic church, is built upon Peter's remains. His bones are directly below the altar, which is pictured below.

That Bible verse is inscribed around the dome, but I couldn’t tell if it’s in Italian or Latin.

The Basilica was so incredible with the ornamentation. Michelangelo’s famous Pieta is in the Basilica as well, and it was really cool to see that.

Next, we went below the crypt, many former popes are buried there. Some of them had elaborate tombs, some with a marble carving of themselves on top. Pope John Paul is buried down there. I was pleased to see he had a very simple, white headstone that said Pope John Paul, 1920-2005. No photos allowed. Some visitors got a little emotional at his grave—he really was loved by masses of Catholics. Five years after his death, there were still photos and other John Paul trinkets for sale at the Vatican.

Next we went to the top of the cupola.

Thank you Jesus for an elevator. We were so tired, and it was so hot that day, that the million stairs would have been the death of me. The elevator got us a little more than halfway up, and at that point, we were able to get up close and personal with the artwork in the dome.

It was beautiful at that level, and it's all mosaic, not paint. This prevents fading from sunlight and flash photography, plus it's so pretty!

We lingered around the dome long enough to catch our breath, and then it was up...up....up.....toooooooo heaven (shameless reference to early 80s Reba hit).

Those stairs were horrible!

I don't usually have problems with tight spaces, but they bothered both of us. Plus they were tilted, going along with the shape of the dome.

I think Michelangelo created that stairway for idiot tourists to prove their faith, because I was praying the entire trip up. (Quick prayer: thank you God for preventing my heart attack at the top of the dome and for saving me the embarrassment of being carted down those stairs on a stretcher. Amen.)

Miley Cyrus was wrong--it's not the climb, it's the view when you get there.

We (mostly me) were dripping with sweat. Look closely and you can see me glistening.

It was totally worth the agony. The view was breathtaking (even though we didn't have much breath to take). We could see all of Rome and got a great view of it's beautiful monuments and ruins.

It was also great to get a bird's eye view of Vatican City. We had wonderful, unobstructed views of St. Peter's Square, the papal apartment, the Sistine Chapel,

the museum (holy moly that thing is huge),

the gardens, and the train stop. The gardens are available to tour by advance booking only, so we were thrilled to see them from the sky--so pretty!

The pope and/or his peeps can catch a train right in the back yard, and the Vatican has it's own radio station.

Following the dome climb, it was close to 4 p.m. and we were starving. We ate a piece of pizza (must say, Pizza Hut was better) and took the Metro to the Spanish Steps. It was raining, so we didn't really get to see them in all their glory, but we were really let down. They were just steps with pretty buildings at the top and expensive stores at the bottom.

Then we walked to the Trevi Fountain...now that was worth the walk! We had no idea how huge it would be! It was beautiful!

But then it started to pour, so we and a hundred other tourists took refuge in a tiny little church next to the fountain. We would have never given this church a thought, but we are so glad we went in. For such a small church, it really was beautiful. It was covered in Biblical artwork from floor to ceiling, and the walls and beams had a nice blue/grey color on them. It was lit with candles and the altar was covered with lilies, so it smelled wonderful in there. Music was playing, and it sounded like there was a choir of nuns and monks hidden somewhere singing just for us. It was very peaceful, and we just sat and stared at the ceiling and altar for 30 minutes or so.

Then we got hungry.

Everything that we found near the fountain was completely touristy, and we wanted our last Italian meal to be a good one, so we decided to go with what we knew. We took a very long, meandering bus ride and inadvertantly saw some beautiful parts of Rome, then changed buses, then walked several blocks back to Ponte Sisto--the restaurant Kate recommended. We ate there two days previously and knew it would be good. It was. All their pastas are homemade and so yummy! Scott had homemade spaghetti with shrimp, mussels and clams. I had homemade rigatoni with bacon and fava beans and a bit of Chianti. We had panna cotta with caramel for dessert. It was yummy, but Scotty said my panna cotta was better. Sweet, but I think he was lying.

We went back to the room a little early so that we could pack for our trip home :(

Italy Day Dodici

2010-06-17T22:07:00.000-05:00

First item on the agenda--see the Pope. We took the Metro to the Vatican, then we bought a few rosaries to give as gifts. The Pope addresses the masses in St. Peter's Square every Sunday at noon.

And by masses, I mean people by the THOUSANDS...and they all had cameras. So did we.

When we arrived, mass was still in progress in the Basilica. We could see a simulcast of the service on Jumbotrons in the square. Even though the service was in Italian, the music was really nice and it was cool to see a service in the "mother church."

About 10 minutes after church let out, the windows opened in the papal apartment, the maroon cloth was rolled out,

and then the Pope stepped out.

Obviously, we didn't get a good view of him. It could have been a cardboard cutout for all we know. He gave a message in Italian, and then he gave short blessings in English, German, and Spanish.

He welcomed us to the Vatican on Pentecost Sunday (and we still don't know what Pentecost is) and blessed us with wisdom, joy and peace. It was a really awesome experience. He blessed my rosaries...although he probably does not realize that.

Next we did lunch...mmmmm, McDonalds. But did you know McDonalds charges for ketchup in Italy? That’s un-American! Beggars in the McDonalds hit us up for money. They were everywhere and use their kids to make people feel sorry for them. They were also picking up used cups and drinking from them, so they were obviously hungry enough to eat others’ leftovers. It was really sad.

Our next activity was the Coliseum.

It was huge and an awesome site to see. It would have been so cool to go to an event there.

We both decided to watch Gladiator when we got home.

Did you know they had luxury boxes in ancient Rome? Seriously. The photo below is of antique stadium boxes where the emperor and other rich folk would sit.

Graffitti is all over Rome, but we were rather disappointed to see that Americans...TEXANS for that matter...participated. Of course, this adds fuel to all of our aggie jokes.

It was kind of hot in the Coliseum, so we sat in the shade and gawked at the architectural wonder, but then our attention turned to people's feet. We could not believe some of shoes people would wear. Heels, wedges, flip flops, tall boots...all to tromp around the cobblestone streets of ancient Rome. How very intelligent.

We learned, however, of a new fashion craze--boy capris. Scotty can't wait to get a pair.

Constantine's Arch is right next to the Coliseum. Constantine legalized Christianity in Rome around 300...or maybe 500 A.D. So, we can attribute him for our religion spreading across Europe and eventually to the United States.

We took a tour of Palatine Hill, the hilltop overlooking Rome where all the ancient emperors lived. Palatine means palace in Italian.

As you walk through the area, you can see why the emperors chose that location for their homes, it was really beautiful. When a new emperor took over, he would build a new palace.

There are lots and lots of ruined buildings...and then Mussolini built his palace up there too. I found that just a bit pretentious. His palace is now some sort of museum.

Mussolini's digs were not all that pretty, but nice view. We saw what was left of the Circus Maximus, the old chariot race track. It doesn't look like much now, but I guess it once was really something to see.

Palatine Hill was where Rome began, and then the civilization flourished in the Forum. The Forum is at the bottom of Palatine Hill, and you can see how this once was a busy city with lots of residents, visitors and monuments.

Abandoned single pillars were all over the place, and piles of old columns, capitols and marble lay around like scrap metal. Kind of sad (tear, sniff).

Now here's a little story about a town named Rome. A long, long time ago...like waaaayyyy before Christ when mythology ruled, the area had an honorary group called the Vestal Virgins. I can't really remember what they did, but it was an honor to be one. Well, one of the lovely ladies turned up pregnant. Oops. So she told everyone that Zeus or someone like that was the baby daddy, so no one was going to mess with his kid. So she had the babies, and oh no...twins! She named the boys Romulus and Remus. She was still ashamed of having kids out of wedlock, so she dumped the babies. A she-wolf (and every time I tell the story, Shakira's She-Wolf plays in my head) took the babies and raised them as her own. All over Rome, there are carvings and pictures of a she-wolf and two babies.

When the boys were older, they wanted to establish a settlement. They had some sort of fight, and ROMulus won, and hence, ROMe was born. If I understood the guide correctly, archaeologists think this little area protected by the tin roof was possibly Romulus's settlement.

When Rome fell, the buildings and monuments were abandoned, so the churches used the old Roman buildings as their scrap yards, and they took whatever marble and other materials they wanted to use to build cathedrals. Good one Rome.

Just outside the ruins is the jail that held Peter and allegedly, Paul. We really wanted to see this, but it was closed for reconstruction :(

So, we ate! Our friend Kate, who lived in Rome for a semester, recommended Isodoro near the Coliseum. On her suggestion, we did the pasta sampler.

We ate like high school football players at the Pizza Hut lunch buffet. Then we got the bill. The food was reasonably priced, but they charged a 12% service charge AND a $2/person cover. (Note from Scott - hmmmm, it appears my thriftiness has really rubbed off on Erica! Just a few short years ago she never even looked at prices. Good for you E! I'm proud of you!! Now back to Erica).

We got some great nighttime photos of the Coliseum, then called it a night. (Note: Scott's pictures were way better than mine, so I only posted his photos).

When we returned to the B&B we visited with Francesca and family. Their yellow lab had just had puppies, and they decided to crash right in front of the door. They were not moving for us or anyone...they didn't care that we paid money to be there. They were really cute and I wanted to keep one.

Francesca force-fed us apricots soaked in brandy. Holy moly! They were something else! This was a very fun, very nice Italian experience.

Italy Day Undici

2010-06-12T18:14:00.000-05:00

Francesca and Frederica at the B&B stuffed us full this morning. Sweet pastries, yoghurt (that’s Italian for yogurt), cappuccino, and waffles with Nutella. I'm ashamed that I did not think of waffles with Nutella myself.

Francesca's husband took us to the metro stop. He doesn't speak a lick of English and we know four Italian words, so we said two words total: "ciao" and "grazie" for the entire 10 minute trip.

Our first stop was the Trastevere neighborhood.

Our friend Kate lived in that neighborhood during her semester in Rome and said it was a must-see. We spent about an hour being lost and wandering the streets, then Scott got his bearings and we found the church we were looking for.

Santa Maria de Tresteverre was a nice cathedral in the middle of a very old, very cool little neighborhood. The plaza in front of the church was really pretty. The interior of the church was awesome.

We didn't expect to see such amazing artwork in such a small church. The frescoes were gold; it looked similar to St. Mark's in Venice. The best part of the church was the wedding that we watched.

If I were that bride, I would have been very angry if a bunch of goofy tourists were barging into the church and gawking at my wedding, but everyone else was doing it and when in Rome....

We ate lunch at a cute little restaurant that Kate recommended. Super yummy!

One of the best meals of the trip. Ponte Sisto was the name of it. Homemade pasta and bread!

Next we took the train to the Pantheon neighborhood. En route to the Pantheon we stopped by a set of ruins in the middle of the city.

They have an official name, but everyone calls them the cat sanctuary because a bunch of feral cats roam all over the place. Someone makes sure they're vaccinated and taken care of.

Next was the Pantheon, a church built by the ancient Romans and continually used for 1,400 years.

Those Romans knew how to build a building! The dome was the inspiration for the Vatican, the Duomo in Florence, and the U.S. Capitol.

In fact, Michelangelo and Brunessci studied the Pantheon before they designed their domes. The Pantheon truly is one of the wonders of the world and it was so cool to see it.

We found Santini's tomb, but this was not the right tomb (again, if you don't know what I'm talking about you really need to see Angels and Demons).

Next we went to Piazza Novona to look at local artists peddling their wares. It was fun to look at, but we didn't buy anything. Some of those artists stuuuuuunk!

The next few hours were kind of a bust. We wanted to rent bikes and do a tour like we did in Munich. We walked and walked only to learn the tour we wanted to do was $60. EACH. So then we decided to see the Coliseum. We got all the way over there only to learn it closed in 30 minutes...it was starting to rain anyway, but we took some good pictures.

We kind of wanted a change of pace and taste, and we had some really great Italian food in Germany, so we decided to have German food in Italy. The food was good, not as good as it was in Germany of course, and actually, Hoffbrau Haus in Vegas is better, but this was still mighty tasty.

We took a short Metro ride to the Vatican because we wanted to get some good pictures while it was lit up at night. In the movies, it's so pretty at night. Well, Angels & Demons greatly misled us. It was just not as spectacular as we expected and hoped for.

To avoid the traveling pitfalls of the night before, Francesca very sweetly told us she would pick us up at the Metro stop nearest her house. When we got there, we hung out with her family. We didn’t understand much of what they said, but it was fun anyway.

Italy Day Dieci

2010-06-07T22:00:00.001-05:00

Caio bella Sorrento! I would have loved to have swam in your beautiful waters, but your weather just didn't cooperate.

Off we go to Rome!

Unfortunately we had to take the filthy train again. I'm surprised we didn't share a seat with a mouse or a cockroach.

We rode the cheap train from Naples to Rome. It took 40 minutes longer but was €40 cheaper for the two of us. Everyone else in Europe saw the value of this train ride also. There were no seats left, so we had to stand in the aisles and sit in a little jump seat. Not a fun ride.

We arrived at the central train station in Rome and had to meet our hotel owner at a Metro (subway) stop. Although quick, the metro is really gross.

Our hotel, actually a b&b, was in the middle of nowhere. We found it with good recommendations from Trip Advisor, but no one told us it would be in the middle of a neighborhood in suburban Rome.

Francesca and her four kids run the place and live on the bottom floor. Her son, Giovanni, walked us to the train station to get to town. We had to walk several blocks to the station and it was a little shady--the neighborhood, station, AND the train.

After a train ride and two metro trains, we arrived at the Vatican stop.

St. Peter's Square was HUGE and all that I expected. I was really impressed with it. We booked tickets to the Vatican Museum, and to our surprise, they had availability for that evening. And I noted a major misspelling in the Vatican Museums brochure. I’m pretty sure Sistine is not spelled “Sixtene.” Oops! The Vatican should hire me to be a proofreader. I would be glad to do my work in person.

First order of business was to find the four churches of the Illuminati. (If you haven't seen Angels & Demons (1) you're missing out and (2) this paragraph and photo will have no meaning for you.) We ended up finding the second clue first...but not to worry. We found Santini's tomb the next day.

We decided to sit, eat and re-group, so chose La Caravella, a restaurant that offered a $10 set menu--a main dish, salad, beer, and gellato. Sounded great! Well, I ordered spaghetti and the Kraft spaghetti kit that I make at home was way better than that. The "salad" was lettuce and tomato with olive oil, the beer wasn't even Italian, and the "gellato" was Nestles in a cup like you get with school lunch. La Caravella will not get a good Trip Advisor review!

The highlight of the day was the Vatican Museum. It was filled with rooms and rooms of artifacts, and not just relating to Christianity or the Catholic churh. There was an Egyptian exhibit and lots of Greek statues.

The former papal apartments were highly decorated, one of them with some famous Raphael works.

The best part was the Sistine Chapel. We sat in there for at least 30 minutes staring at the ceiling. It was so awesome to see in person! Michelangelo’s work definitely made up for the bad day we were having. Photos were forbidden. They had people walking around that would yell at you if you tried to take a picture. I speak from experience. I still don't know what it would hurt. I didn't have the flash on.

But then the bad day returned. We took the subway to the ghetto train station, only to learn there were no more trains going to our stop. I cried. Really, I did—real tears and everything. Fortunately we found a nice cab driver that only charged $20 to take us to the b&b. He got a little lost, but thank goodness cabbies now have GPS, even in Italy.

Italy Part Nove

2010-06-06T13:32:00.001-05:00

Today we got up early (early for us anyway) and took the filthy train to Pompei.

Pompei was a city built around 600 or 700 B. C. In 79 A. D., nearby Mount Vesuvious erupted, suffocating all the residents and burying the civilization in volcanic ash.

The residents didn't understand what was happening, so instead of evacuating, they went into their homes, which ultimately killed all of them. Vesuvius is the mountain in the photo below. It's still active. The last eruption was right after WWII.

The city remained buried until the 1700s. Modern city planners were digging water wells when they discovered the buried city.

Excavation began, and even in 2010, one-fourth of the city remains un-excavated.

We used a private guide that pointed out a lot of interesting things. He was pretty funny and really loved to talk about Pompei. We were glad we used him because we were able to ask questions and get lots of detail that the audio guide wouldn't give. Pompei appeared to be a fairly sophisticated city.

They had running water, sewage system, cobblestone streets,

businesses and homes. Some of the homes were pretty extravagant, with mosaic floors, multiple stories, dozens of rooms, and frescoes on the wall, which are still there today. The volcanic ash helped preserve a lot of what we see today.

In the mosaic above, there was writing that said "beware of dog" in Italian. Pompei was a port city, and catered to sailors with hotels and restaurants. You just never think about a restaurant in ancient times, but the photo below is an ancient buffet. The cook would drop the pot of food into the little circles below, a fire kept it warm, and patrons would choose what they wanted to eat. Cool!

Back in Sorrento, we ate leftover pizza and had gellato at Gellatiria David. Yum! Very nice owner, too.

We took a two-hour bus ride along the Amalfi Coast to Amalfi town. The drive was absolutely beautiful!

However, the road was essentially one lane; we were in a large city bus; I tend to get car sick; and the road was filled with hairpin turns, often with a three foot curb between the bus and a 1,000 foot cliff.

Plus Italian drivers drive like psychopaths, and our bus driver was no different. In many places the bus was hugging the curb, and when we looked down, all we could see was the ocean below. It was very scary! If that bus would have rocked to the right, the photo below is where we would have landed. That's the curb at the bottom of the picture.

As we got off the bus, we both agreed there was absolutely no way we would take the bus back. Our guidebook told us there was a ferry service that would take us back to Sorrento, but it would cost more. We were fine with that--anything to avoid the bus. Plus we were excited to see all these villages built into the sides of cliffs from the water. Well, for no reason at all, the ferry didn't run that day. We could get to the next town by boat, but not Sorrento, and no reason offered. So we were stuck on the stupid bus to go back.

We were afraid of getting left in Amalfi Town, so we booked our bus tickets, and we were in Amalfi for a grand total of 45 minutes.

Amalfi is built into the side of a cliff, so it's possible to own a home that's several hundred feet in the air. Many homes had impressive gardens, lemon trees and nice sun decks. We don't know how they were able to get stuff to grow in such small yards, but it was really pretty.

The bus driver on the return trip was a little better, but the bus made me carsick nonetheless.

We had dinner at St. Antonios. We had a caprice salad (being so near to Capri, we must have the salad!) and I eat tomatoes now. Of course, when they're covered with olive oil and accompanied by fresh mozzarella, they're pretty easy to stomach.

I had homemade pasta with shrimp. The noodles reminded me of mom's noodles and Scotty ate fresh fish that was looking at him when they brought the plate out.

This was our last night in Sorrento, so with dread, we packed and mentally prepared ourselves for the train ride to Rome.

Italy Day Otto

2010-06-05T14:21:00.000-05:00

Breakfast was at the hotel--packaged pastries, but they tasted okay. We really liked the cappuccino. There was a small grocery store outside of our hotel, and every day we got to look at these lemons. They were about the size of a football.

We did a little more browsing through the streets of beautiful Sorrento and found a tour bus to ride. It was really fun.

The driver knew his audience and played a bunch of Dean Martin and other cliche Italian songs that he knew the Americans and Brits would like...he even sang along and was very entertaining.

We went to a cliff above Sorrento, sampled lemoncello and lemon granitas, then cruised back to the town square. They claimed they would show us everything and if they did, there wasn't much to Sorrento. But we really liked the tour and the views anyway.

We got to see a big lemon grove. They cover the trees with a net to keep birds off the fruit. I would like to have one of these to cover my entire back yard to keep the grackles out!

For lunch we had street vendor food--hot dogs, sandwiches and fried cheese. Then we caught the ferry to Capri (pronounced KAP-re, not KUH-pree as in the pants, although I wore capri pants that day), a beautiful island off Sorrento.

The scenery for the entire ferry ride was beautiful and the water was a shade of blue we had never seen before. It was crystal clear although the beaches were very gravely.

We took a boat ride around the island and we loved it. For some reason, I really like to ride boats. Maybe it's because I've been landlocked all my life. Anyhoo....

We saw huge cliffs with awesome rock formations,

the white grotto,

the green grotto that had the most beautiful color of water I have ever seen,

and the Faraglioni Rocks. I have no idea how to pronounce Faraglioni, so I called them Fraggle Rock.

Let the music play, worries for another day, let the music play, down at Fraggle Rock!

Our boat guides convinced us that the famous blue grotto was closed, and we believed it. We shouldn't have listened. There were several tour companies taking people into the blue grotto...and ours was not one of them. The blue grotto is a sea cave that small rowboats can go into. Inside the color is supposed to be an incredible blue. We wouldn't know, though. The entrance is only a meter tall, so boats can't go in during choppy seas or high tide. I found this picture on the Internet, so it will have to do.

We wanted to rent a scooter and cruise the island, but the scooter rental guy told Scotty that he didn't have enough balance. We ate gellato and rode a huge ferry back to Sorrento.

We took a well-deserved nap, and then had pizza for dinner and walked around the town a little more.

Italy Day Sette

2010-06-05T14:06:00.000-05:00

We didn't like this day very much. It was filled with grueling traveling. We left our beautiful agritourismo at 8 a.m. Because it was early, we didn't get breakfast and didn't get to say goodbye to Eva, sweet little Olivia and Mossimo.

Once again we had to drive through Florence which just as awful as before, and it was worse because we were afraid of missing our train. To save money, we took the slow train to Naples, and slow train is an understatement. We departed from the small (and dirty!) train station in Florence, but fortunately had time to grab a sandwich before we left, otherwise we would have been crazy hungry (I become rather horrific if I miss breakfast).

The train was running 40 minutes behind and it seemed like we stopped in every single small town between Florence and Naples. Our source of entertainment on the train was an old Italian couple that really wanted to talk to us and didn't want to accept the fact that we didn't speak Italian. They would bicker at each other, then try to tell us about it, then the wife would tell her husband that we "no conprende." To the very end of the ride, he tried to talk to us.

Scott started talking to the other person in out compartment, and she told us she was a historian for the Vatican archives. She told us she was writing a book about spies in the Vatican during World War II. We told her the story should be made into a movie. We can't wait to read this book!

The Naples train station was very dirty and from there we had to catch another train to Sorrento. We got a good look at the Italy no one tells you about--very dirty and covered with graffiti. It was almost third world. The train was rickety and did not feel very safe.

The Sorrento train station was not much better. The town around the train station is busy and unclean, and with dread, we found our hotel. The gate was locked, no one answered the buzzer, and so I called the innkeeper's cell number. I had trouble understanding him and he kind of hung up on me, and then out of nowhere, here comes this Italian guy on a bike, "did you just call me?" He was very nice and carried my very heavy suitcase.

Hotel La Magnolia far exceeded our expectations. It was small, but well decorated, very clean, big rooms, more amenities than most European hotels, and a veranda. We loved it! And within a few minutes, we loved Sorrento!

We went to dinner at a restaurant on the water called Ristaurante Delfino. We shared calamari (best I've ever had), I had gnocchi with shrimp and Scott had lobster ravoili. Yum! A little pricy, and the hike to the restaurant was quite a workout, but so worth it!

We strolled along the narrow streets of Sorrento, tried lemoncello, came back to the room and said goodnight to a long day.

For our review of Hotel La Magnolia on Trip Advisor, click here.

For our review of Ristaurante Delfino on Trip Advisor, click here.