8 Reasons To Be Thankful This Season

Thanksgiving is upon us! Tomorrow we’ll be gathered around the TV hoping there are no balloons going rogue, stuffing ourselves full of food, and reflecting on the many things in our lives we have to be thankful for. So in lieu of your regularly scheduled blogging this week I thought I would take some time to reflect on some of the things we are thankful for this television season.


Izzie who?

This year we have been blessed with a wonderful present – a practically Izzie-less Grey’s Anatomy. While she’s been off filming movies and spending time with her newly adopted daughter, we been able to enjoy Grey’s ever so much more. Even better news? She’s taking another hiatus immediately after her brief return for a belated “maternity leave.” Know who I bet would like a longer maternity leave? Ellen Pompeo who just pooped out a baby for realz. Take your time, Katherine Heigl. Grey’s is doing just fine better without you.

Glee

I still can’t quite believe Fox did it. They managed to make a television show about a glee club which features multiple musical numbers per episode into a critical and financial success. Somewhere Cop Rock is crying in their TV grave.

Nathan Fillion on our TV

We are ecstatic that Castle is doing well in the ratings department. It’s a fabulous little show that keeps getting stronger and stronger. Anything that keeps Nathan Fillion consistently on our television sets is something to be thankful for in our book. Now come on Castle – throw us a bone. Get Becket a hair cut. That mullet gots to go.

I see gay people

Holy moly, look at all of those gay characters on network TV! Grey’s Anatomy, Glee, FlashForward, Ugly Betty, Modern Family, Brothers and Sisters, all featuring gay characters in regular or recurring roles.

SYTYCD ~ Fall edition

While it’s true we sometimes curse this 6th season of So You Think You Can Dance for airing so close to the previous season that it’s difficult to look at these dancers with fresh eyes. We also miss it being the highlight of our week like it is during the summer versus another show on the pile of programming we have to get through during the fall. Even with all that, it’s impossible not to be thankful for Cat, Shankers, Mary and Nigel and all of the dancers (except Mollie and Nathan – they can GTFO).

Double the Joel, double the fun

Thanks to Community and The Soup we now have Joel McHale gracing our television sets two times a week. Now if only we could find a way to sneak him in on the Saturday through Wednesday. Oh, and just for fun:

Ghosts of television yet to come

Looking to the future we have so much to be thankful for that we might as well start early. Lost is premiering on February 2nd in the Tuesday at 9:00pm time slot. Us old ladies like that – 10:00pm was ridiculous. Chuck is returning January 10th (a full 2 months earlier than originally scheduled). Warehouse 13 is coming back for a second season, but we wish we didn’t have to wait until the summer for it!

It’s what makes time travel possible AKA 2 dual recoding DVRs

What kind of people would we be if we didn’t acknowledge the hardest working members of our household – our DVRs. Where would we be without you? Take Thursday nights, for example, when we are recording 7 TV shows in a two hour period. Woof!

What are you thankful for this season?

Happy Thanksgiving everyone! Go stuff yourselves!

Glee ~ Ballad

This week we got a peak of unrequited love to various degrees of heartbreak and hilarity. We focused on Rachel’s temporary school girl crush on Will, Kurt’s never-gonna-happen love for Finn, Finn’s love for his Baby that he’s never going to know, a dash of Puck’s feelings for Quinn and the baby, plus a little Emma loves Will action. We also got some baby drama out of the way when Finn’s Mom and Quinn’s parents all got the news broken to them. Surprise surprise, Quinn’s parents freaked out. Will’s mother took it quite well though. Guest starring this week as the crazy Suzy Pepper who suffered a horrible case of Mr. Schue-itis was Sarah Drew aka Kitty from Mad Men who recently popped up on Grey’s Anatomy as well. I was darn impressed with myself when I was able to place her.

No Sue this week, or Figgins, but still a solid episode. Also our deep love and appreciation for Bangs aka Brittany continues to grow.

Quotes and a whole mess of GIFS (I hit the motherload!):

“Ballad. Who knows what this word means?” ~ Will
“It's a male duck.” ~ Brittany

''I bet the duck's in the hat.' ~ Brittany

''I could totally sing this song with Finn, but screw him if he thinks he's taking the Diana Ross part from me.'' ~ Kurt

''I love the days when I don't wear underwear. Full commando.'' ~ Puck

“Crap, she looks crazy right now. I know this look.” ~ Will

“If we were to rank crushable teachers in this school, you'd be number-one with a bullet.” ~ Emma to Will

“Yes, it means I'm very young and it's hard for you to stand close to me.” ~ Rachel after Will’s Young Girl/Don’t Stand So Close To Me mashup.

''Your lashing out at me is fantastically compelling and inappropriate.'' ~ Kurt

''Let me tell you a few things I learned from two years of intense psychotherapy and an esophagus transplant . . . .We're both mildly attractive and extremely grating. Love is hard for us. We look for boys we know we can never have. Mr. Schue is a perfect target for our self-esteem issues . . . . Trust me, I'm a cautionary tale.'' ~ Suzy Pepper to Rachel

''I don't know why I find his stupidity charming. I mean, he's cheating off a girl who thinks the square root of 4 is rainbows.'' ~ Kurt about Finn and Brittany

''I have to go — they'll think I'm pooping,'' ~ Finn on the phone with Kurt

The Other Asian?

She's a cautionary tale. Would Rachel have OD'd on berries?

Bangs attacks Rachel with HUGS!

Trust fall to Other Asian and Bangs? Bold choice.

Bangs has gone crazy!

Call me!

No seriously, call me.

So You Think You Can Dance ~ Top 14

There they are America – your top 14 dancers! It was a pretty decent week for most couples. Here’s our quick spin on last night’s performances.

First of all, we were a little worried about Cat’s ensemble at first, but it grew on us. By the end of the night we both agreed that she looked fabulous.

On to the dancers:

Kathryn and Legacy: We thought they ruled the night with their paso doble. Legacy was good, and he was especially charming in his post performance talk with the judges. Kathryn was on fire. She more than made up for her week character work in last week’s performance. At the moment we’re calling her our favorite girl. Of course now that we’ve put that in writing she’s destined to be cut early (hopefully not!!!!). If they aren’t safe this week we will be upset.

Ellenore and Ryan: They were granted the gift of a Travis Wall contemporary piece and did not disappoint. Strong performances from both. Plus Ellenore’s outfit was really cute. Certain to be safe tonight.

Jakob and Ashleigh: As much as we hated Ashleigh in the beginning (which was quite a lot) we enjoyed her in this NapTab hip hop piece, and we have to admit that she’s been pleasing us week to week. Darn you, girl! We wanted to hate you so hard! We love Jakob and everything he does is magic, so no qualms there. They should be safe this week.

Noelle and Russell: We thought that they did a fine job with this foxtrot. It was smooth and nicely done. Was it enough to get America to pick up the phones? We hope so, but we’ll have to wait and see.

Channing and Victor: Tyce’s dance was certainly interesting, and pretty much guaranteed to give Courtney bird-fear related nightmares. As apathetic as I am towards Channing, I thought they did a pretty good job with it. Here’s why they could still end up in the bottom: the music was downright distracting and by the end of the night I had completely forgotten that this dance existed.

Mollee and Nathan: Despite the judges claims that this was a vast improvement over last weeks and that the these two are a couple of the most talented young performers they have ever seen – we just aren’t buying it. We didn’t think that they did a good job with this routine. If they are not in the bottom three it will be entirely because of their teeny bopper following and the luck of a Lady Gaga draw.

Karen and Kevin: Oh guys. Not good. When Cat greets you after a dance and says that she remembers how good Shirely Maclaine danced to that song in the movie, and then says nothing about your performance, you should know you are in deep doo doo. As the judges all were very quick to point out, this wasn’t something you can pin on bad choreography (newbie Spencer Liff is breathing a big sigh of relief) – ya’ll just weren’t good in it. What should have been high energy and quirky came across as down right sleepy. While I feel a little bad for Karen because Nigel got all pervy on her during his judgement basically saying that she was worth nothing without her sex appeal – we might kind of have to agree. Worst performance of the week. Sorry guys.

Agree? Disagree? Thoughts?

30 Rock ~ Problem Solvers

I think that the moral of this week’s episode of 30 Rock was that Kenneth is immortal and he can get damn scary when he wants to – so just let him get you some lunch, ‘kay?

Broadway’s Out Magazine’s Entertainer of the Year Cheyenne Jackson made his debut this week! Despite the fact that he was clearly not playing the silver robot man from last week’s episode, that’s who he is! Way to confuse all the broadway geeks who were keeping an eye out for him in last week’s auditions. Sly move, 30 Rock.

To quickly sum up the episode, Liz and Jack start work on creating a Dealbreaker talk show which is promptly mucked up the “The Problem Solvers” Tracy and Jenna, Kenneth has serious problems with Cheyenne’s character Jack Danny because he won’t let Kenneth be his slave and has scared Tracy and Jenna into holding back on him too, and Padma invented the sandwich bag (Glad will be so proud).

Quotes and GIFs!

“Dealbreaker: The Book for You Man No Good, by Lesbian Yellow-Sour-Fruit” ~ Liz reading the cover of the Engrish version of her book from China.

“Spittake! Are you serious?” ~ Liz

“I feel about as useless as a mom’s college degree.” ~ Kenneth

“Raise your hand if you’re cool with what’s happening!” ~ Liz

“So what if Kenneth’s bitter? He’s an underhuman!” ~ Jenna

“Who said I’ve been alive forever?!” ~ Kenneth (best Kenneth moment ever)

“So you think you can just replace me?” ~ Liz
“Of course not. We can do better. We've already spoken to Padma Lakshmi.” ~ Jack
“Then who's gonna host Top Chef? You are ruining my life!” ~ Liz

Glee ~ Wheels

Oh Glee, we missed you so! Never let silly old baseball come between us again.

This week we got a lot of what we’ve been missing in pasts episodes: more Artie and Tina! Emma, Ken, and Terrie were all MIA this week, but no worries – they’ll be back next week! We had more of Kurt’s Dad who we love. Mike O’Malley you’ve got GUTS and HEART! (topical ‘90s Nickelodeon reference – what what!). Brittany (aka Bangs in our household) is very sneakily working her way in as one of my favorite characters. We met Sue’s sister, Jean, who has Down’s Syndrome and enjoys pom poms and fairy tales. Heart sufficiently melted. We got our Wicked Diva showdown between Kurt and Rachel which we’ve been prepping for, and it did not disappoint. We found out that Tina has been faking her lisp and that Artie has a fully functioning penis (in case you were worried). We now sit back and wait for the babby daddy drama to explode into the open and wonder how’s that Baby swap plan with Terrie going, because Puck is getting real attached to that mohawked fetus.

And now quotes and GIFS:

''If I have a pregnant girl doing a handspring into a double layout, the judges aren't going to be admiring her impeccable form, they're going to be wondering if the centrifugal force is going to make the baby's head start crowning.'' ~ Sue

''As soon as a cheerleader rolls herself out onto the field in a wheelchair, she becomes decidedly less effective at cheering people up. Just a fact.'' ~ Sue

''Well, you sing like a girl — you know, in a good way — look, Kurt, I don't how this music stuff works, I'm pretty exclusively committed to my Mellencamp collection, but isn't there more crossover nowadays? You know, chicks doing construction? Guys wearing dress shoes with no socks? Didn't that girl from your high school just join the boys wrestling team?'' ~ Kurt’s Dad

''Mr. Schue, kids are busier than when you went here. We've got homework, and football, teen pregnancy... lunch.'' ~ Finn

"I find recipes . . . confusing." ~ Brittany

“[Ramps] are what I call lazy-makers. They discourage able-bodied students from getting proper exercise by using the stairs.” ~ Sue

''Well, you're irritating most of the time. But don't take that personally.'' ~ Artie to Rachel

''But I want to be very clear — I still have the use of my penis.'' ~ Artie

“Maybe one of these days you'll find a way to create teachable moments without ruining my life.” ~ Rachel

“I don't care if my baby comes out with a mohawk, I will go to my grave swearing it's Finn's.” ~ Quinn
“It would be pretty awesome if it came out with a mohawk.” ~ Puck

“That was perfectly measured!” ~ Quinn

“You think this was hard? Try auditioning for Baywatch and being told they're going in another direction. That was hard.” ~ Sue

Mad Men Finale!

After a shamefully long hiatus from the world of blogging, we are finally back! What better to herald this return than the season finale of Mad Men? Off we go!

(how much awesomeness can one room handle?)

Mad Men sure loves it some slow builds, and this season demonstrated that more than ever. These last few episodes really made it worth the wait. Betty not only found out about Don’s past, but has even gone as far to demand a divorce so she can run off and start a new life with Mr. Creeper McCreep aka Henry Francis. After a year of stifling under the Brits’ control, only to have Sterling Cooper sold again to McCann, Don stages a mutiny and convinces Pryce to fire him, Roger, and Cooper so that they can start their own Agency. Pryce is joining the new agency bandwagon, and Peggy, Pete, and Harry also get super secret invites. Poor Kinsey. Also called in to help get the organized and steal what they can before sneaking out was JOAN!!!! Damn right. We knew she was coming all episode, but it didn’t make her or her sassy pants any less exciting. We’re looking forward to next season when Sal gets to join the party, because you KNOW they need and art department and we need us some Sal.

Oh and REALLY, Betty? You just left Sally and Bobby with Carla for 6 weeks right before Christmas? Really? Just checking.

Side note: I know we’re supposed to be all about Pete and Peggy in the long run . . . but damn I’m loving Pete and Trudy together right now.

And now, what we’ve all been waiting for:

GIFS!!!!!


Happy Christmas!


Hells Bells!


(a little dark, I know)


By the end of next season they will all work for Joan.


hehe, it says "fart" department.


Oh good - I was worried Pete might have forgotten his gun. It's all good.

Thanks Mad Men, it's been a blast of a season. And now, just for fun - a few more GIFS to take us out: