I'm kind of worried about Chuck.

I'll be honest and admit I don't exactly help the ratings. I have a DVR, and I have about ten unwatched episodes of both Chuck and 30 Rock on it. I keep intending to marathon it, and keep not getting around to it.

Anyway, for most of the season, I haven't worried about it. Chuck's got some fans among the bigwigs at NBC, so I assumed it'd be safe. But now, after reading interviews with the cast, I'm concerned - because it sounds like they've basically prepared themselves to be gone. And it sounds like the writers wrote a season finale that could easily double as a series finale

Despite the fact that I barely watch it, if Chuck gets cancelled, I'll be very sad: it's pretty much the only non-reality tv show I make time for at all.

I have to admit that since Alias ended, I've been at loose ends tv fandom-wise. There are several shows I watch (notably Chuck and House and Dirty Sexy Money) but nothing that gets the fanficcing juices going the way Alias did. This might be premature, but I think that MIGHT be about to change.

( Possibly spoilery comments about My Own Worst Enemy )

On a different note entirely, Cassie Clare is quoted on Bookslut. Something about that makes my head hurt.

I was on the phone with my mother having the same conversation I have with her every year between Thanksgiving and Christmas; namely, that my brother and sister are impossible to buy for and we never know what the hell to get them.  It went thus:

Mom of Muzy: I have no idea what to get your sister.
Muzy: You could get her the series boxset of Six Feet Under.  It's out of my budget.
Mom of Muzy: How much is it?
Muzy: $150
Mom of Muzy: Yeah, I guess so.  I never really liked that show.
Muzy: I liked the first couple of seasons, but not as much after that.
Mom of Muzy: TV shows are less amusing when you know families who are actually like that.

And yeah, it's true: I won't say which side, but one of the sides of my family could have actually served as the blueprint for the Fishers.  And yes, it's as fun as it sounds.

We talked about Friday Night Lights too, and talked about how neither of us can really enjoy it because, well, we lived it. Anyone who's grown up in a small town in the Midwest or the South has lived Friday Night Lights.  The town religion isn't necessarily football in the upper Midwest (it was a combination of basketball/girls' volleyball/wrestling in my lhometown) but it works the same way.  High school was not fun, partly due to that dynamic, and part of the reason that I was bound and determined to get out was because of the whole sports are king thing there.  So when I watch Friday Night Lights, a show clearly helmed by someone who knows what he's talking about, I'm not watching a well-acting tv drama; I'm watching my high school life, and dude, I do NOT want to go there.  All in all, I'd rather watch Chuck.

We hypothesized that a lot of the fans of the show grew up in places where school sports weren't the predominating religion (larger towns, urban areas? Other parts of the country?).  I think that's part of the fandom, and the other part is probably those people who had a spectacular time in high school and have colored those years as their golden years. 

Hey, somebody had to love high school out there.

Last night was a big tv night for me; the series premiere of "Sexy Dirty Money" and the first part of the finale for "Top Chef."

Of Sexy Dirty Money, I'll say this; Peter Krause is still totally one of my crushes, and he's wonderful in it, as is the rest of the cast. It's definitely a keeper.

Then I watched the rerun of the Top Chef Finale (part 1) - thank you Bravo, for reruning right after the original run, because it was on opposite SDM - and it was awesome ( cut for spoilers even though I doubt anyone else on my flist watches )

Last night I wrote a little vignette that I think I will tweak and MAYBE use for this year's NaNo. Brought on my too much Top Chef and Tony Bourdain, it's a romance where the hero is a hotshot chef, and the heroine cooks...tuna casserole and meatloaf. Need to flesh out characters and outline the plot, though.

Fun meme from yahtzee63:

Congratulations! You've been put in charge of a brand new television network, dedicated to bringing canceled shows back to life for a new season. You've got ten how ever many I want, dammit hours of prime time to fill per week, and any show, regardless of how long ago it went off air, is eligible. What's playing on YOUR network next fall?

( This Fall from the Muzy Network... )

The beauty of this schedule is that after your brain has exploded from the Saturday evening showing of Lain, you can detox the next night with two hours of frothy comedies.

My television watching continues to dwindle. I'm actually kind of glad Heroes is on hiatus right now, much as I miss it, because I've been suffering from TV overload and have spent more than one night a week with the tv off of late. And I've also dropped a few shows.

I stopped watching Lost some time ago when it started annoying me far more than I enjoyed it. I've pretty much given up Veronica Mars now, not because of anything I've seen lately - in general the third season's been vastly superior to the second - but because of the revamping its probably getting for season four. I have no desire to watch Veronica the FBI agent. It kind of turns me off, to be honest.

The latest casualty to disinterest and annoyance is Grey's Anatomy. gekidasa makes fun of the soap opera aspect; frankly, I don't mind that. But with Kate Walsh leaving for her spinoff and Sara Ramirez reportedly leaving as well (and we won't even discuss my feelings about George/Izzie and Izzie in general, frankly), I just can't summon the interest. I love Cristina Yang, but not enough to basically watch the show for her. So what's left?

• House: uniformly awesome, even if the cases get increasingly implausible (next week: Plague on a Plane!)


• Heroes


• Survivor: NOT A WORD. >.>


• ...and that's about it, regularly. I may pick up Bones for the STEPHEN FRY. Stephen Fry, people. Come on.

I gave up Veronica Mars late last season (even before the season finale of unrealistic WTF) because Veronica wasn't doing a good job of convincing me she actually cared about the bus crash, and I was bored. I watched it last night, though, in part because the World Series has deprived me of House and I needed something to amuse me.

A lot of people have been skeptical of the new three-arc style, but when it was announced, I figured it would work better than the one mystery format of the first two seasons (the one mystery emphatically DID work with Lilly's murder, but that's because you could easily buy Veronica's investment in the case). If it continues in the strong way that it started last night, VM could easily become part of my watching schedule again. It was a good blend of Mystery of the Week as well as setting up what I presume will be the first mystery arc of the season. Veronica's in good, snarky form, Tina Majorino is playing Mac really well so far, and I so far love the new potential love interest, who will undoubtedly become an actual love interest once Logan & Veronica crash and burn again. I'm probably one of the few people who likes them A LOT more as antagonists with chemistry than together and squishy.

Even Dick Casablancas is exhibiting what might be depth. If you squint.

Anyway, as of this moment, the jury's still out on whether I'll become obsessed and fannish over this show again, but the premiere exhibited potential, and I'll keep watching for now.

I've been listening to Keane all day, a band that makes me think Grey's Anatomy since one of their songs was featured heavily in either S1 or S2 - I can't remember which since I blew through both seasons over three weeks in July.

GA is returning tonight; this is a very good thing, as I've been in the mood for it for about a week, to the point where I've been having fic brainstorms on the walk home from the office in the afternoons. I think George and George/Callie may be my muses for this series atm, with possible Izzie and Addison ideas. I DO actually like the screwiness of McDreamy and Meredith, and Cristina is still my favorite character, but frequently my favorite character and the character(s) I write for don't match up.

Six Degrees is also premiering tonight. I'm going to try it even though I'm not sure it'll be my thing; after all, I didn't think Lost would be my thing either.

Bought wine glasses from Target last night since I finally have the cupboard space for them. Unfortunately my favorite wine (which was served on the riverboat after the wedding last Friday), Wollersheim's Prairie Fume, is a Wisconsin wine and they can't ship to New York. I curse the labyrinthian wine shipping laws in the U.S.

On the writing front, I haven't done a thing since I finished my Aliases ficathon entry, but I'm muddling over a couple of ideas including a Sarkchel fic that breaks the usual random mission encounter scenario I usually go with for them, and a gen PoT fic with Chitose and Miyuki. And I'd like to do something for this week's alias500 alternate universe challenge, because AUs are some of my favorite kinds of fics just look at the myriad AU universes I created for Prince of Tennis.