My Current Interest

               When I am trying to find something to watch on TV, I have a selected list of channels that I check.   I know which ones I am most likely to find something I like and I go to those first.   Over the past couple of months this list has grown a little and it now includes the two PBS channels in my area.   I do not know how many times I came across these channels and found something interesting to watch.   It became a habit to check them and now they are officially part of my list.                 One of my most exciting finds has been the airings of Midsomer Murders during the week.   Each weekday half of an episode is aired.   While I do prefer to watch the shows in their entirety, I love the show too much to care that it is split in half.   At least of the episodes I have seen.   If I have not seen an episode, I want to first see it on DVD where I can view it all at once.   After this is does not matter to me how many parts the episode is in, as long as I get to watc

                  Wednesday nights for the past few weeks have been really good on Food Network.   I start with Restaurant Stakeout , follow with Restaurant: Impossible , and end with On the Rocks .   Usually I do not see all of On the Rocks , but I do catch the full episode when it replays on the weekends.   Unfortunately it appears my Wednesday night trio is being broken up.   According to the website On the Rocks is no longer on Wednesdays.   I am sad about this, but I am happy to watch On the Rocks any time.                                 Similar to Restaurant: Impossible , On the Rocks is about remaking a business but this time it is bars instead of restaurants.   John Green comes into struggling bars and works with the owners and staff to make it successful.   He remodels the bar, trains the staff, and brings in someone to revamp the menu.   It is a very similar setup to most of the other shows, but there is a big difference.   John fires all the staff and makes them ear

                    It is probably apparent by now that I like makeover shows.   I especially like the ones that redo either a house or a business.   There is something about watching an expert come in and help someone turn their business and life around.   It gives me hope that even though things are dark it does not have to stay that way.                               In the show Restaurant: Impossible Chef Robert Irvine comes into struggling restaurants in an effort to turn them around.   He has only two days and $10,000 to figure out what is wrong in the business and to remodel the restaurant.   That is not a lot of time or money at all.   With the remodeling, Chef Irvine does get help from a designer and a general contractor.   The problem is some of the things the designer and the general contractor have to do eat money and time up so quickly.   There was one episode where the floor had to be dug up in order to fix what was underneath.   That is quite costly and time consum

                 I came across this book when I was looking for conspiracy books written by Richard Belzer.   A book about love and a search of conspiracies probably sounds like an odd combination, but there is a logical reason these two things came together.   Richard Belzer wrote the afterword for Remember How I Love You .   With the new search function my county library system has put in on their website, when I type in Richard Belzer everything involving him comes up.   This is how I went from conspiracies to love.                            Jerry Orbach portrays my favorite detective on Law & Order , Lennie Briscoe.   I watched him on the TV show Murder, She Wrote and in the movie Dirty Dancing .   Even though I did not know it until recently, I also listened to Mr. Orbach as Lumiere in the animated film Beauty and the Beast .   I have been watching Mr. Orbach for quite awhile, but I did not know much about him as a person.   He spent many years in the theater, nobody ha

               My brain is not a brain that slows down very often.   It is constantly running with one topic or another.   Always thinking, I have a tendency to combine sentences when I speak because I am trying to get both thoughts out at the same time.   This usually leads to people looking at me as though I am not too bright in the head.   That is not a look I like to see.   I know what I am saying.   It just comes out a bit jumbled because of everything else going on.   This has nothing to do with intelligence.                 Lately, in order to give my overactive brain a rest, I have taken to doing nothing.   I do not mean I just stare at the wall or lie on the couch and have my eyes glaze over watching the TV.   Instead I give myself time to just be.   Sometimes I read or do a puzzle.   Often I lay with my eyes closed and try to clear my mind of all thoughts.   No matter which direction I choose, I make sure to concentrate on one thing instead of several as I usually do.  

                  Matchbox Twenty is my favorite band.   When I pick up one of their albums I know I will enjoy it.   I would be absolutely shocked if I did not.   That is how much I like this group.   Now, this does not mean I do not have any objectivity.   I do, but I like this band so much that the negatives of an album are always far outweighed by the positives.                          To be honest, I am not sure where to start with North , Matchbox Twenty’s newest album.   It is the first completely new one in quite awhile.   There was Exile on Mainstream awhile back, but not all the songs on that one were new.   North is completely made up of new works.   When I found out this album was released, I was very anxious to hear it.                 Before I heard the whole album, I saw the videos for the two singles.   “She’s So Mean” is the first one.   It is very upbeat despite talking about a woman who is mean and does not treat the person who she is in a relationship with

            Either two or three years ago, my cable provider decided to take Travel Channel away from me.   I was not happy.   But despite my disappointment, I knew I would survive.   Through the years, every once in awhile I would look at the TV listings and something from this channel would catch my eye.   Sadly I would remind myself that I could not watch the show and move on to what else was listed. Now I do not have this problem.   Because Travel Channel is back!   I knew I missed this channel, but I cannot believe how much I did until it was returned to me.   Since I am able to watch again, I do not have any idea how many hours of Ghost Adventures and Mysteries at the Museum I have watched.   It is probably a lot more than I should ever admit.   In my defense, both shows offer a lot to learn.   Of course Mysteries at the Museum is pretty much a show of solid information as it discusses different items in museums, but it is given out in an interesting way.   I cannot quite

                There are times when I run out of things to read.   Of course I do not mean this literally as I have plenty of books.   But sometimes absolutely nothing is appealing to me.   This is when I usually raid my mom’s books.   I ask her whether or not she has anything for me to read and she nearly always does.   This time she gave me The Lady Most Willing… a romance novel written by three different authors.                          Taran Ferguson, a powerful early 19 th century Scotsman, is determined to see his name carried on.   As he does not have any children, or a wife, the only way for Taran to do this is through his two nephews.   They must marry, and marry well, but neither one seems fully willing to do this.   So Taran decides to take things into his own hands.                 Determined to find brides for his nephews, Taran takes his men and goes to a nearby party and kidnaps three eligible women: Marilla Chisholm, Fiona Chisholm, and Lady Cecily Tarleton.

                 I was not one of the original watchers of Downton Abbey .   In fact, I did not know the show even existed until the awards committees began nominating it.   While I was intrigued as to what all the excitement was about, it took me awhile to finally get the discs and find out for myself.   At first I did not see the thrill.   My dislike was to the extent that I almost did not get the second disc, but I did.   The reason for my not liking the show was mainly because of one character.   Mary.   I could not stand her.   As a matter of fact, I still cannot.   I think there is a point in each episode where I try to get rid of her.   Thankfully the other characters have begun to shine and I have found so many positive reasons to continue on with the series.                       The show is about a high society family and the people that work for them.   Starting in 1912 with the sinking of the Titanic, the series stretches quite a few years in the first three seasons, i

                Alfred Hitchcock is my favorite director of all time.   Tim Burton comes in a close second, and I mean extremely close, but Mr. Hitchcock takes the prize.   Now every Sunday in September Turner Classic Movies is airing a day of Hitchcock movies.   As I am not exactly a football person, which takes up a lot of the channels on Sundays, this day of great films is fantastic for me.                         While I own quite a few Hitchcock movies, there are so many I have never seen, or even heard of.   These Sundays let me see so many films that I may never be exposed to otherwise.   Last Sunday alone I watched one movie I had never seen ( The Wrong Man ), and three I did not know even existed ( Stage Fright , I Confess , and Foreign Correspondent ).   Some I liked better than others, but I was thrilled to experience them all.                 As much as I enjoy watching the films, they are not the only thing I look forward to.   Before and after each film either Ben

                As far as I know of my high school did not have Saturday detentions.   I am not even sure how popular regular detention was.   Yes, people got into trouble, and maybe they went to detention, but it was not something I really paid attention to.   If I had gotten detention, I think I would have preferred for it to be after school instead of using up an entire Saturday as it does in The Breakfast Club .                          In this classic movie, five students are forced to attend a Saturday detention for various reasons.   Only two of them, Claire (Molly Ringwald) and Andy (Emilio Estevez), know each other as they have similar social circles, but the others all have different crowds.   Rebellious John (Judd Nelson), loner Allison (Ally Sheedy), and studious Brian (Anthony Michael Hall) are not exactly the types popular Claire and wrestler Andy would hang out with.   Actually John, Allison, and Brian would probably not hang out with each other either.   They all s