Lately I’ve been addicted to watching the Tour de France, well until I went back to Cincinnati for a few days. Here in Denver I have Comcast cable service which carries the channel Versus (formerly OLN). Versus has been broadcasting every stage for the past week or two. But back in Ohio, in the land of Time Warner, they don’t have Versus. I was without the tour for five days or more. I was able to record each day on the DVR, but that leaves with with well over 20 hours of coverage to catch up on. I’m still hoping that I can catch up before it’s all over on Sunday.
Archive for the 'TV' Category
Sorry for the late in the day post. I wanted to get this up earlier, but my installation of gallery was not cooperating. It appears that a recent update that I installed a day or two ago may have broken a couple of things. So instead I had to add some pictures to my flickr page. I guess this is also a good time to announce that my mom has officially moved her pictures to flickr since yahoo photos is apparently shutting their doors.
Anyway, a local Denver 7-11 store has been converted over to a Kwik-E-Mart to promote the upcoming release of the Simpsons Movie. And given that 7-11 is giving away free squishees today for their 80th birthday I just had to stop in and check it out. I got my free sour apple squishee, took a few pictures, and even bought a six pack of Buzz Cola and a box of KrustyO’s. Click here to see a list of Kwik-E-Marts and see if one is in your area. If not, you can still get a free squishee today from any 7-11 store. If they only had Duff Beer my day would be complete.
A couple of weeks ago, I attended a baseball game at Coors Field between the Cincinnati Reds and the Colorado Rockies. Naturally I wore a red Cincinnati shirt (it was actually a Bearcats shirt and not a Reds shirt) to the game and was rooting for the Reds, as were many of the others in our group. This must have helped us stand out in the crowd and towards the end of the game my scruffy face was actually on TV. Multiple people that I know saw my appearance, and my brother even taped it on their DVR. I was hoping to get the recording off of the DVR somehow, but the best that could be done was a video from my mom’s digital camera. And now after a little editing, everyone can relive the moment…
For those of you yet to experience the wonders of a DVR (are you living in a cave?) I am selling our old ReplayTV box on eBay. The beauty of this system is that it can be used with just about any cable, satellite, or standard TV setup, as long as you activate and pay the monthly $12.95 fee for the programming guide. We loved this system, but currently Comcast offers a built in DVR for cheaper than $12.95, so we switched over to that.
We used our DVR to tape American Idol last night and zoom through the 2 hour show in less than an hour and a half, just by skipping the commercials. I’m still a fan of Chris Sligh even though I had no idea what song he was singing. I also think that Blake Lewis is going to do really well in the competition as well. I though the show was a little below average when compared to past seasons, but it was just the first real episode. The girls will be singing tonight. Be sure to check out the early predictions on DialIdol.com, if you want to ruin the surprise all season.
Who else is excited about the return of American Idol? I will admit that these audition episodes that have been on the past couple weeks are pretty painful to watch. I used to think that these were hilarious, but the humor has definitely worn off, at least for me. I did see a couple of good auditions throughout the various cities, so I’m really looking forward to when the actual season starts.
Here’s a video that cracked me up last night. To make it even better he actually was pretty good and advanced to the next round:
In the little free time that we have, we’ve been trying to catch up on our recorded TV shows before we loose them all in the move. Last night we made it through just about all of the remaining episodes of Survivor: Cook Islands. The only thing left is the second half of the reunion show, which I’m not sure we’ll watch all of. I’m sure we have some other recordings that should take a higher priority.
Anyway, I was a little surprised by the outcome of the finale. I always figured that Yul had a good shot at winning, but I wasn’t sure if he would get the most votes from the jury after some of his actions. This was especially true when it came down to the final three. At that point I thought that Ozzy would win for sure. If the jury wasn’t able to ask questions to each of the final three, I still think that Ozzy would have won. But after watching Yul win everyone over at the last tribal council, I wasn’t too surprised by the results.
Is anyone watching the Amazing Race this season? I’ve been trying to keep up with it and last night I watched the most recent episode. I’m sad to say that Kentucky, one of my favorite teams from a previous post, was eliminated from the race. I knew they weren’t going to win, but they were fun to watch in the meantime. There are only five teams left and one of them is a team that I said to look out for in that earlier post, Tyler and James. I really think that they have a legitimate chance of winning. They just need to watch out for those beauty queens.
Things have been slowing down after work for Kim and I, which is nice since the fall TV season is in full force. One of my favorites, Amazing Race, is back for its tenth season. If you haven’t been watching it, they are only two episodes in so you aren’t far behind. Early favorites of mine are David and Mary, a coal miner and his stay at home wife from Stone, Kentucky, mainly because you never know what they are going to say. Think of them as the Wild Hanlons of Amazing Race. They provide lots of laughs but probably will not make it too far in the race. In my opinion, the teams to look out for are Tyler and James along with Peter and Sarah, but it’s so early that it’s anyone’s game. The episodes only get better as the season goes on, so tune in on Sundays to pick your favorites.
Hopefully I didn’t convince too many of you to watch Treasure Hunters. In the end the show was pretty awful, especially the finale. This final episode was an hour long but the winner of the competition was revealed within the first ten or fifteen minutes. The remaining time was spent talking to all of the teams, some of which I didn’t even remember being a part of it. The series could have ended with one less episode and it would have been better. It still wouldn’t compare to the Amazing Race, but it would have been better.
I’m a little leery of recommending any other shows, but I just realized that Rock Star is back. I enjoyed the first time this show was on when INXS was searching for a new singer. Now a new band, Supernova, is also searching for a singer. The band is comprised of Tommy Lee on drums, Jason Newsted (formerly of Metallica) on bass, and Gilby Clarke (formerly of Guns N’ Roses) on guitar. The remaining singers in the competition are all pretty good, minus a girl named Storm. Each of them is way different from the next, so it will be interested to see who the band (along with the fans) picks to front Supernova.
Has anyone else been watching Treasure Hunters? I was hoping it would be just as good as my latest experience with Amazing Race, but so far it’s been kind of a let down. On the night of the premiere Kim fell asleep watching the show. I’ll give her credit though since it was two hours long.
Last night’s episode flew by, but maybe that’s just a sign of the show getting better. I think the hard part is that there are so many teams right now that it’s hard to get to know any of them, let alone pick out a favorite. Right now I just hope the Fogal family gets knocked out ASAP. After that I’m pulling for the Wild Hanlons just so I can continue to be entertained by them. One Hanlon rocks a mullet, the other two are his son and brother. Last night they left the last mission to grab some food on a eighty mile round trip and somehow still made it back in time to avoid elimination by solving the puzzle.
The show is on Monday nights at 9PM eastern and 8PM central. I’m hoping that it’s only going to get better from here, so maybe you should check it out next week if you have not already done so.