'The Good Wife' Now Tilting More Toward Familial Fall-Out From Political Scandal

*Warning, spoilers ahead from recent episode of The Good Wife.*

The recent episode of The Good Wife was a game changer, bringing the sex scandal that sent Alicia Florrick's (Julianna Margulies) politician husband Peter (Chris Noth) to jail squarely back into the Florrick home.

For several weeks, Good Wife episodes have tilted too heavily for my taste toward becoming a legal procedural with only a little sprinkling of the drama that makes this show different from all the rest of the legal procedurals: A woman rebuilding her life with her children after her husband publically humiliated her with dalliances with hookers. I wanted to see the dramatization of how women (Silda Spitzer, Hillary Clinton, Elizabeth Edwards) remain in their marriages in the wake of such devastating events.

This week my waiting paid off. The Good Wife prominently featured a hearing to determine whether Peter Florrick could remain at home under home confinement while awaiting trial. Alicia Florrick had to testify during the bail hearing about whether her lying, cheating husband would be welcomed back into their home. Under questioning by the prosecution, Alicia was asked, "So you and your husband would share a room? . . . [Y]ou're saying under oath that you intend to share a bed with a man?"

Alicia then responded that she wouldn't be cowed by the prosecutor's intrusive questions or humiliated and would answer only germane inquiries. In the end, Peter was denied bail and not allowed to go home to the new, smaller apartment his wife had rented in the days following his imprisonment, after selling their home in the 'burbs.



Previews for next week's episode -- in which one of the women with whom Peter had an affair gives TV interviews and depicts Alicia as "frigid" -- seem to indidicate that there's life in this betrayed political spouse/legal procedural yet.

'The View' Panelists (Except Joy) Slam Newsweek's Palin Cover

It was heartening to see that the panelists on The View -- with the exception of Joy Behar -- put politics aside and agreed that for Newsweek editors to put former GOP vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin on the cover while wearing jogging shorts was demeaning and disrepectful. (The link to a terrible quality video of the segment is here. You have to really punch the volume up to hear it.)

I don't care that Palin originally posed for that photo for Runner's World, a magazine where men and women appear in running attire and in which her photo was in the proper context. She did NOT pose for that photo with the intention that it would be on the cover of a news magazine that parses all things politics and national events. This was just not right and is a naked example of media bias.

Here's the lame explanation offered by Newsweek's editor Jon Meacham:

"We chose the most interesting image available to us to illustrate the theme of the cover, which is what we always try to do. We apply the same test to photographs of any public figure, male or female: does the image convey what we are saying? That is a gender-neutral standard."

Sorry Mr. Meacham, I'm not buyin' it. You wouldn't be doing this to Hillary Clinton or Michelle Obama or Nancy Pelosi.

Health and Human Services Sec'y Says, Nevermind About Those New Mammogram Guidelines

Following days of uproar after a federal government panel told fortysomething American women that regular mammogram screening doesn't save enough of their lives to justify the costs or the "anxiety" caused by biopsies and additional tests (which don't often result in a cancer diagnosis), the U.S. Secretary of Health and Human Services yesterday told everyone to basically ignore the new guidelines.

Maybe all those women who said their cancers were detected through routine screenings when they were in their 40s and said they would've been dead if they'd waited until age 50 -- as the new panel suggests women now do -- had an impact. Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said in a statement released yesterday:

"The task force has presented some new evidence for consideration but our policies remain unchanged. Indeed I would be very surprised if any private insurance company changed its mammography coverage decisions as a result of this action."

Given that during his speech to a joint session of Congress earlier fall President Obama said that under his health care reform plan ". . . [I]nsurance companies will be required to cover, with no extra charge, routine checkups and preventive care, like mammograms and colonoscopies because there's no reason we shouldn't be catching diseases like breast cancer and colon cancer before they get worse. That makes sense, it saves money, and it saves lives," it would be nice for the federal government to send a consistent message and not tell people that preventive care is important, then recommend that they not get it.

In the meantime, USA Today reported today that major health insurance company spokespeople are saying that they won't stop covering mammograms for women in their 40s as a result of the US Preventive Services Task Force guidelines:

"Some of the companies that told USA TODAY that they will continue paying for mammograms for women in their 40s include Kaiser Permanente, Aetna, Cigna, Geisinger Health Plan, Group Health Cooperative and WellPoint, which operates Blue Cross/Blue Shield plans in 14 states. Together, these plans cover more than 73 million people.

A spokeswoman for Kaiser Permanente, Farra Levin, says, 'We believe that focusing on prevention and early detection is critical in improving women's health and saving lives.'"

So that means that saving the lives of fortysomething women IS worth the cost of mammograms?

Please Help Me Out with the Dysfunctional Family Bingo Contest, You Could Win an Autographed Book

* Cross-posted on the Picket Fence Post blog. *

For the past few years I’ve addressed the issue of holiday stress – particularly when you gather multiple generations together for a high-pressure holiday dinner — by creating Dysfunctional Family Bingo cards. I take awkward-but-realistic scenarios that might occur during (before or after) your family’s Thanksgiving dinner and place each one into a box on a BINGO card and pray that no one checks off enough boxes to actually win.

In some twisted way, writing up all of these scenarios amuses me and serves as a reminder that EVERYONE experiences a bit of familial dysfunction during holiday dinners so we may as well just find the humor in them. (For the full history of Dysfunctional Family Bingo, go here.)

What kinds of scenarios am I talking about? For the past couple years, I’ve used a few of my own holiday experiences (though there’s no way I’m ‘fessing up which ones are autobiographical) as well as some which my friends have shared with me in order to fill out each box on the Bingo card. Here are a few from my 2008 Dysfunctional Family Bingo card:

– Some older children at the gathering taught your impressionable young child how to spit, the glory of purple nurples and new vocabulary words like the “F” word.

– Your mother suggests that you join her in starting a diet in the new year, noting that your pants are getting “a bit snug” and asks you if you’ve ever heard of the term “muffin top.”

– It gets heated when several members of the family cannot agree on the best, fastest route to take from this location to the mall.

– A male relative drags you outside and points out everything that’s wrong with your house, from the roof and gutters, to the window screens and the chimney.

– Maxi pads, whose box you had tucked away in a bathroom cabinet, were taken out by a young nephew who decided to remove the paper strips on the back and stick them all over the bathroom wall in a random pattern.

This year, I’m going to ask you, my smart and witty blog readers, to please contribute YOUR OWN oddball/dysfunctional family holiday dinner scenarios which could happen (or have happened) during the celebration of Thanksgiving. I’ll use reader suggestions along with my own to create my 2009 Dysfunctional Family Bingo card. Please e-mail me your contribution (everybody’s got to have at least one amusing scenario) — to meredithobrien@hotmail.com — no later than noon on Monday, November 23.

The best four contributions (as determined by me) will earn their creators an autographed and personalized copy of my collection of humor/parenting columns, Suburban Mom: Notes from the Asylum, where the motto is, “Parenting is best done with a hearty sense of humor.” Looking forward to reading your e-mails!

Image credit: AP.

Say What? A 'Gilmore Girls' Movie? Is This a Joke?

Entertainment Weekly’s Michael Ausiello is usually on the mark when it comes to intel on all things TV. So when I read his report that the creative genius behind the fast-talking quirkfest that was the Gilmore Girls, Amy Sherman-Palladino, had said that not only did she not watch its series finale (she left the show before the final season), but that she had other season-ending plans for the characters AND that she wouldn’t reveal those plans because there might be a movie in the future, I went, “Hold on, what? A movie? Is this like the ghost that is an Arrested Development movie, which keeps getting discussed forever but never actually happens? Or is this like a Sex and the City movie that’ll actually see the light of day?”

I, for one, would love to see some fresh Gilmore material on the silver screen. I miss those wise, loquacious Gilmores and wasn’t quite satisfied with how the show ended. (They live on in repeats on ABC Family.) When the series wrapped in May 2007, Kelly Bishop, who played Emily Gilmore with exquisite aplomb, told the Washington Post that she felt as though the finale didn’t provide an adequate conclusion to Gilmore Girls and was “disrespectful” to the show’s many fans. “I felt like the bottom dropped out,” Bishop said.

While we fans wait patiently for any glimmer of news about even the mere possibility of a Gilmore Girls film, GG alumni have been popping up on a wide variety of TV shows:

Roles have been particularly plentiful for Rory’s old boyfriends. Rory’s first love Dean (Jared Padalecki) has been starring in The CW drama Supernatural (about Lucifer, demons and the like) for several years. Rory’s second boyfriend, Jess (Milo Ventimiglia) has had the most high profile role of all the Gilmore alums to date, starring in NBC's Heroes as Peter Petrelli, a man who absorbs superpowers of others. (Ironically, the woman who plays Peter Peterelli’s mother Angela -- Cristine Rose -- played Rory’s grandmother, Francine Hayden for two Gilmore Girls episodes.)

Rory’s final boyfriend – who proposed marriage to her at a party celebrating her graduation from Yale, and then she shot down his offer -- Matt Czuchry is a supporting character on CBS’ The Good Wife, playing a smarmy, over-confident young defense lawyer competing against Julianna Margulies. In recent The Good Wife episodes, Chilton Academy grad Francie (Emily Bergl), who tangled with Rory in the Chilton student government, also showed up as another junior associate at the defense firm after having appeared in 36 episodes of ABC’s Men in Trees for years.

Lauren Graham -- the queen mama Lorelai Gilmore who’s been in a number of films like Evan Almighty and Flash of Genius – was recently added to the cast of Parenthood, after Maura Tierney dropped out after she was diagnosed with breast cancer. (Tierney’s 44 by the way, an interesting fact for the US Preventive Services Task Force which wants to stop fortysomethings from getting mammograms.) I adored the 1989 film Parenthood and can only hope that the TV show adaptation is a fraction as good.

Among other Gilmore castmates, Lorelai’s ex-husband, Christopher Hayden (David Sutcliffe) appeared in a dozen or so episodes of Private Practice as Kate Walsh’s cop love interest. Others who’ve also appeared on Private Practice include: Lane Kim (Keiko Agena), Miss Patty (Liz Torres) and Sookie St. James (Melissa McCarthy) who’s slated to appear on the medical drama soon, now that her comedy Samantha Who? has been canceled.

Sadly, the only thing I’ve seen of Kelly Bishop was a one episode guest appearance on Army Wives. And we haven't seen a lot of Alexis Bledel, Rory the brilliant, who has appeared in a couple of films (the Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants movies and the poorly received Post Grad this year). I’m still waiting for her to find a new role in which she’ll shine.

Another interesting factoid about Gilmore alums: Several have appeared on Grey’s Anatomy, including: Richard Gilmore (Edward Herrmann), Paris Geller (Liza Weil), Mrs. Kim (Emily Kuroda) and Liz Danes (Kathleen Wilhoite).

Fun Gilmore trivia: Which award-winning actor played a man who took Lorelai Gilmore on one of the most boring dates of all time? Place your guesses in the comments section.

So, Gilmore Girls fans, any interest in a movie?

Image credit: ABC Family.

Gov't Task Force: Mammography for Fortysomethings Saves Lives, Just Not Enough to Justify the Cost$$ & Stress

It’s about money, these new recommendations unveiled yesterday by a federal task force which tell women between the ages of 40-49 that, unless they know that they have the breast cancer gene or have had extensive chest radiation, there’s no need for them to get mammograms.

You see, even though there’s data which says that women’s lives ARE SAVED by preventative screenings, such regular screenings of fortysomething women (particularly those with dense breast tissue) cause those women angst because they’re oftentimes told to come back for more screenings or require a biopsy when, most of the time, those women don’t have breast cancer. The angst caused by mammograms and those biopsies which don’t turn up cancer aren’t worth the risk of screening fortysomething women for cancer, the government task force says. That, and the fact that it’s all about the money.

The New York Times summarized the US Preventative Services Task Force's (USPSTF) new mammography guidelines (which, it's not hard to envision, being adopted by health insurance companies) saying:

“Over all, the [USPSTF] report says, the modest benefit of mammograms – reducing the breast cancer death rate by 15 percent – must be weighed against the harms. And those harms loom larger for women in their 40s, who are 60 percent more likely to experience them than women 50 and older but are less likely to have breast cancer, skewing the risk-benefit equation. The task force concluded that one cancer death is prevented for every 1,904 women age 40 to 49 who are screened for 10 years, compared with one death for every 1,339 women age 50 to 74, and one death for every 377 women age 60 to 60.”
 
Aw, what’s the big deal if you ONLY reduce the death rate of fortysomething women by 15 percent with regular mammograms? Why make all those other fortysomething women so very nervous with biopsies when they likely don’t have cancer. It’s too much bother. That, and it’s all about money. And if you’re a woman who's 75 or older, you don’t need the screening ‘cause the task force thinks you’re too old and you’re likely to die from something else so they don’t want to waste money screening you anymore.

Twice, during my own experience getting mammograms (two members of my family have had breast cancer), I experienced some angst when I had to come back for another mammogram or get an ultrasound to check out a suspicious area, but I was wildly relieved when I got the all clear. I’d rather live with the anxiety experienced while awaiting test results and for a negative biopsy to learn that I DON’T have breast cancer than roll the dice that I’ll never get it, at least when I’m in my 40s, because a government panel doesn’t think it’s likely that I have it.

The New York Times explained what the task force members saw as the downside of regular mammograms for women in the fortysomething age group:

“While many women do not think a screening test can be harmful, medical experts say the risks are real. A test can trigger unnecessary further test, like biopsies, that can create extreme anxiety. And mammograms can find cancers that grow so slowly that they never would be noticed in a woman’s lifetime, resulting in unnecessary treatment.”

I guess a fortysomething woman can avoid the horrid and "real" side effect of "extreme anxiety" from having to go back for a second mammogram or having a biopsy if she’s already dead because she was unlucky enough to develop breast cancer when she was in her 40s. She’d certainly save lots of money for the bottom line. (I think I’d have more anxiety if I were being audited by the IRS than I've had while sitting in the mammogram waiting room.)

Many doctors and breast cancer specialists quoted by news outlets today are livid.

Dr. Daniel B. Kopans from Massachusetts General Hospital Cancer Center told the Boston Globe that the task force’s recommendations “will condemn women ages 40-49 to unnecessary deaths from breast cancer.”

Dr. D. David Dershaw, a mammography specialist at New York’s Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, likewise, put it bluntly to the Globe saying:

“How many cars do you have to put seat belts in to save a life? How many colons do you have to screen in order to save a life? How many people do you have to immunize for the flu in order to save a life? These numbers are totally within the acceptable range of what we routinely do as part of a civilized society.”

The American Cancer Society says on its web site that, after examining the same data used by the federal task force, that their organization continues to recommend regular mammography for women starting at age 40 because “lifesaving benefits of screening outweigh any potential harms.”

It continued:

“With its new recommendations, the USPSTF is essentially telling women that mammography at age 40 to 49 saves lives; just not enough of them. The task force says screening women in their 40s would reduce their risk of death from breast cancer by 15 percent, just as it does for women in their 50s. But because women in their 40s are at lower risk of the disease than women 50 and above, the USPSTF says the actual number of lives saved is not enough to recommend widespread screening.”

Most poignant have been the personal stories of women -- those with no family history of breast cancer -- who were diagnosed with breast cancer in their 40s who say they wouldn’t be here but for mammograms.

The Times quoted a now 54-year-old Manhattan woman who found out she had breast cancer when she was 48 after getting an annual mammogram: “You’re going to start losing of a lot women. I have two friends in their 40s who were just diagnosed with breast cancer. One of them just turned 41. If they had waited until she was 50 to do a routine mammogram, they wouldn’t have to bother on her part – she’d be dead.”

Bottom line: It’s about money. It should be about lives.

A prediction: These recommendations, issued by a panel established by the federal government to create standards for medical care, will help to kill, or seriously wound, the attempts to federalize the health care system, especially when that panel says that saving a fortysomething from breast cancer through routine screening is only considered a “modest” benefit and that her life isn’t worth the cost.

Cheap Shot: Palin on Newsweek Cover in Shorts

Seriously? Shorts?

Sure, dissect Sarah Palin's speeches, her book (being released this week), her interviews, her political point of view. All of that is fair game. (I’m going to be among those ODing on Palin-Palooza this week because I’m working on a column about the former GOP VP candidate.)

But putting Sarah Palin on the cover of a NEWSweekly while she’s wearing shorts (and I don’t care if the photo originally appeared in the pages of Runners World where males AND females are in running shorts; context is key) wreaks of sexism, as if they're trying to undermine her by the fact that she’s in shape and looks great. When was the last time Newsweek ran a photo of a male politician in shorts on its cover?

This spring I loudly griped when the Washingtonian ran the beefcake shirtless paparazzi shot of President Obama on its cover (the photo was taken when Obama was at the beach with his family, again, context). I thought that that cover was a disrespectful choice for editors at a magazine of Washingtonian’s ilk to make.

Last time I looked, Newsweek wasn’t gunning for the lad mag Maxim audience.

Image credit: Newsweek.

'Desperate' Monday: The Coffee Cup

*Warning, spoilers ahead from the latest episode of Desperate Housewives.*

I was really, really ticked off after watching the latest Desperate Housewives episode, “The Coffee Cup.” Why? I couldn’t stop thinking about the treatment of Lynette Scavo by her so-called friends and neighbors Carlos and Gabby Solis because they learned that a working mother had the temerity to get pregnant and not terminate the pregnancy for their convenience. How selfish of Lynette, getting pregnant and not putting Carlos’ business deals first.

Lynette got pregnant – with twins no less – by accident, which, last time I checked, was not illegal and does not make you a horrendous employee, particularly when Lynette fully intended to go back to work after giving birth because she’s the only adult drawing a paycheck in her house, with her husband Tom re-living his college days.

Several weeks ago, Lynette was going to tell Carlos that she was pregnant, soon after she herself figured it out. But before she could tell him, Carlos started openly bragging to Lynette that he’d passed over another female employee for a promotion because she was pregnant. He – a man with two daughters cared for his at-home wife -- decided to give the promotion to Lynette. The new promotion would include a big pay bump, which Lynette, with her growing baby bump, desperately needed. Sure, Lynette could’ve come clean with Carlos anyway, given that he’d just admitted to discriminating against another employee because she’s pregnant and he’d have been put in a tenuous situation. But she didn’t. She needed the money.

During last night’s episode, Gabby found out that Lynette is four months pregnant. Did Gabby talk to her friend about the pregnancy and how Lynette and Tom feel about it? Even bother to learn that Lynette was unhappy at first with the news and contemplated ending the pregnancy?

Nope.

Instead, Gabby – the professional housewife who has no qualms about screwing with other people’s lives so she can spend her days shopping instead of home schooling -- stormed out of Lynette’s house, angry that Lynette “let Carlos down,” that Lynette wasn’t acting like a dedicated employee.

Carlos, in turn, morphed into the calloused piece of granite he was in season one: Telling Lynette she can either take the transfer he's offering her and move to Florida or quit, knowing full well she can’t take the transfer and that she's the only Scavo adult with a full-time job. This is how you treat a neighbor, as if Lynette planned the whole thing to screw Carlos over when, in reality, she was making arrangements to make sure Carlos would have adequate coverage for her three-month maternity leave, for which Carlos is required to give her by law?

Since last season, Desperate Housewives writers seemed interested in softening up Gabby and Carlos, bringing them down to earth, giving them feet of clay, turning Gabby into a “regular” mom and Carlos into a man who put his family ahead of other things, like opulent consumerism and cut-throat deal-making. (Remember when he wanted to work for a non-profit to help the blind? When he was an at-home dad? I liked that guy.)

Now the writers have entered a time-warp. The Solises are being portrayed as a heartless, selfish, craven jerks who care nothing for a family with whom they’ve been friends for years, acting as though Lynette’s pregnancy is something that was “done” to them, as if they have any say in the Scavos’ reproductive decisions.

I don’t know if there’s any turning back from this development, if indeed the writers have the Solis’ go forward with firing Lynette because she’s pregnant. It’s definitely ticked me off . . . more so than the incredibly lame story about Nick Bolen choking some nameless girl in a coffee shop and that he likely choked Julie Mayer. So don’t care about that.

Image credit: Ron Tom/ABC.

Kim Raver on 'Grey's Anatomy,' Humanizing of The Chief, All Good Things

*Warning, spoilers ahead from the recent episode of Grey's Anatomy.*

I’m not big on trying to revive an occasionally creatively sagging TV show by haphazardly tossing a bunch of new characters -- particularly of the young and sexy variety -- into the mix just to see if the chemistry changes.

In the "absence" of its lead actress and beating heart of Grey’s Anatomy, Ellen Pompeo (she wasn't a vital part of storylines because Pompeo was pregnant and then on maternity leave) -- as well as the absence of major original cast member Katherine Heigl (who’s going to be taking another leave of absence from the show for a maternity leave) -- Grey’s spent several weeks this season trying the let’s-throw-a-hospital-merger-and-a-whole-mess-o-new-doctors-into-the-show to see if sparks of the dramatic and romantic kind ignited. And I hated it. Hated the Mercy Westers versus the Seattle Gracers. Hated the ER-ish tone. Didn’t – and still don’t – like the crop of new characters because they haven’t been fleshed out. They’re like fresh new moving parts of the scenery, akin to remodeling a kitchen when there’s something not quite right about the house surrounding it.

However last night, both Pompeo and Heigl were back, full-time (at least Pompeo was walking around instead of having to passively lie in a bed) on Grey's, though I thoroughly and vigorously don’t buy that Izzie would just abandon her new husband Alex because he supposedly “got her fired,” not after Izzie recovered from what should’ve been fatal cancer diagnosis, not after her emotional wedding ceremony to Alex as he married a woman whom he wasn’t sure was going to live out the year, not after Izzie died in his arms and was brought back to life by her now former colleagues. Alex even went to live in the woods in Derek’s trailer for her. And Izzie would leave Seattle and cut off all contact with her friends and husband because her job was the “one” thing she had left? What about the mere fact that she had a life to live? And a husband?

Izzie seemed ready to heave her career overboard after Denny died and she spent some quality time in that pink prom gown, but now her job at Seattle Grace is everything to her? She willingly risked her job for Denny with the whole L-VAD wire business, but her marriage to Alex doesn't mean as much? Sorry, I just don’t buy Izzie’s current behavior which seems out of character for someone who’s always valued relationships.

However there were two strong elements going for Grey’s last night: Kim Raver and, at long last, the humanizing of The Chief.

I was not a fan of Kim Raver when she played Audrey Raines in 24. I found her to be a whiny tool. But as a high-powered magazine editor on Lipstick Jungle, who had a philandering college professor of a husband and then she had her own affair with a much-younger, budding photographer, Raver was a perfect fit. I was saddened when the Lipstick Jungle was canceled, in part, because I wanted to see more of Raver’s Nico Reilly.

Last night Raver was introduced on Grey’s as Teddy Altman, a cardiothoracic surgeon extraordinaire who left a promising surgical practice after her best friend was killed in one of the Twin Towers on 9/11 and signed up to be an Army surgeon serving in Iraq, where she met Owen Hunt. Close friend and erstwhile love interest of  Owen's, Raver’s character seemed more fully human in a single episode – admitting to weaknesses, demonstrating strengths and an emotional range – than all of the Mercy Westers combined over the course of recent episodes. When Teddy celebrated the rain (because she’s been in the desert for so long) and then kept her cool while a child coded on the table and she waited for Cristina Yang to make the right choices in surgery, I crossed my fingers that she’ll be in this for the long-term.

Then there was Chief of Surgery Richard Webber (James Pickens Jr.). For weeks and weeks, he’s been an automaton, acting rashly and emotionally closing himself off to everyone, alienating his former friends and his wife. Last night we learned that it 's because he’s started drinking again. The Chief has always been a complex character, particularly with his relationship to Meredith Grey and his lingering guilt over his extramarital affair with Meredith’s mother which was a contributing factor to Meredith’s lousy childhood. But too often, The Chief's stories get pushed aside for newer, younger, sexier characters. But I like characters, multi-dimensional ones with whom you can empathize or at least somewhat understand on a number of levels. I’ll take those kind of characters over McSexy drones any day.

Do you like Kim Raver's character? Any predictions about The Chief? Think Izzie's actions are out of character?


Image credit: Randy Holmes/ABC.

When a 'Spoiler's' Not REALLY a Spoiler

Whenever I do a review of a TV show the day after it has aired, I usually include a bolded, italicized warning at the very top, “Warning: Spoilers ahead from the latest episode of [NAME OF THE SHOW].” Likewise, when I Twitter about the show after it has aired, I try not to put reveals in them and instead write very generally. It’s a bit of courtesy I extend to my DVRing/TiVoing friends who’ve delayed watching a program for whatever reason. But I don’t keep quiet forever. If you’re really a fan of a show and a significant episode has aired, like a finale, the thinking goes that you’re going to watch it sooner rather than later. If you wait too long, then if you hear about what happened, it's your fault.

However in the days – yes DAYS, as in plural – following the Mad Men finale, some folks on Twitter were complaining that others were spoiling the finale with their tweets. In fact, some were threatening to “unfollow” anyone who “spoiled” the Mad Men finale for them.

Then the backlash started against the “don't spoil” backlash. One Twitterer mocked the complainers by posting this tweet: “I’ve watched the Mad Men season finale so feel free to talk about Betty Draper’s psychotic break and tri-state killing spree.” A TV writer/blogger started posting what he called “old school spoiler alerts,” including this Friends-oriented one: “Ross and Rachel get together in the end.”

The blogger behind Televisionary took on this issue in a long post on his blog:

“I firmly believe that, once an episode has aired across the country, all bets are off. It's a free-for-all, as far as I am concerned. Writers, critics, bloggers, whoever, should be free to discuss the episode's intricacies and plot developments with abandon. There's no need to label a post, an interview, or anything as a ‘spoiler’ because it's not spoiling anything.

The details about the latest episode's plots, reality series eliminations, character deaths, etc. are out there in the public consciousness. Consider them public domain, if you will. And the onus to avoid them isn't on the part of the writer but on the reader.”

He said, rightly so I think, that if you haven’t seen something yet, it’s YOUR responsibility to refrain from going to web sites and social media (like, say, Twitter or Facebook), where you might accidentally come across unwanted information about the show you haven’t decided to watch yet.

What do you say readers? Can information about an already-aired show be considered a spoiler? Is it in poor taste to Twitter or use your Facebook status update to reveal information about show information?

Q&A with ‘Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Dog Days’ Author Jeff Kinney

*Cross-posted from my parenting blog, the Picket Fence Post*

My three Diary of a Wimpy Kid fans were eager with anticipation for the fourth installment of Jeff Kinney’s series, Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Dog Days to arrive in our home. The day it came, it was in such high demand and there was such a struggle for each kid to be the first to read it that I decided to do the democratic thing and read it aloud to the three kids over the course of a weekend.

They were so jazzed after we finished reading the fourth book about the Wimpy Kid’s summer vacation that the four of us — me, my twin 11-year-olds and my 8-year-old — e-mailed questions to Kinney about his best selling series, featuring Wimpy Kid-in-chief, Greg Heffley. The Q&A is below:

Meredith O’Brien, Notes from the Asylum: Your portrayal of Greg’s summer, where everything seemed to go wrong — his family’s adoption of a dog wasn’t what Greg hoped it would be, his trip away with Rowley’s family went awry, his “landscaping business” failed and his mother tried to make him read books in which Greg had no interest — had my kids simultaneously laughing and feeling badly for Greg. What were your childhood summers like? Anything like Greg’s?

Jeff Kinney, author of Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Dog Days: I think Greg’s childhood summer was much worse than any of mine. Like Greg, my friend and I tried to start a landscaping business, but my grandmother wouldn’t give me a recommendation (due to poor service on my part), and so we never got past the starting gate. But I think most kids can relate to Greg who has grand plans for his summer that didn’t pan out.

O’Brien: Here’s a question from my 8-year-old son, “When you were Greg Heffley’s age, were you like him?”

Kinney: I was like Greg in some ways. I could be immature and self-centered, but really, I was a normal kid. I think Greg has very exaggerated faults. I wasn’t perfect, but I wasn’t as flawed as Greg.

O’Brien: Here’s a question from my 11-year-old son, “Where did you get the funny ideas for your books?”

Kinney: I spent a lot of time thinking and remembering funny things I’ve seen or heard. I try to make sure my ideas are realistic, because I think that’s what makes Greg’s story relatable. When I’m writing, I spend every night sitting and thinking with a blanket over my head, trying to come up with a good idea. Most of the time, I fall asleep.

O’Brien: A question from my 11-year-old daughter, “Which one is your favorite Diary of a Wimpy Kid book? Why?

Kinney: I think I’ll always have a soft spot for the first book, since I didn’t have any success in cartooning before it was published.

O’Brien: Another from my daughter, “Who is your favorite character in Dog Days?

Kinney: I think Rowley will always be my favorite character. He’s a good kid and he’s not tainted the same way Greg is.

O’Brien: Another from my 11-year-old son, “Can you give us a preview of the next book?”

Kinney: Sure . . . it will be about Greg and Rowley’s friendship, and whether or not it can be salvaged as they start to grow apart.

Still Reveling in Afterglow of 'Mad Men's' Finale

*Warning all you procrastinator Mad Men fans. This entry contains spoilers from the finale. Watch it already will ya?*

I remain blown away by Mad Men's season three finale, "Shut the Door. Have a Seat," as do many critics and bloggers who've gone ga-ga over the hour of goodness that was both fun and exciting (had a bit of that madcap caper feeling), as well as occasionally leaden heavy with elements that made the heart ache.

As I continue to absorb and contemplate the re-booted Mad Men -- Don'll be single (if everything goes as Betty hopes while she's in Reno), he'll be working for an upstart new company, Peggy's asserted herself as being on equal footing with the men, Betty'll be married to a politician -- here are some cool Mad Men items I've found while surfing around them there internets:

Don Draper's 10 Tips on Succeeding in Business: A GateHouse News Service writer has a great column where he says that everything you need to know about how to be a successful businessman, you can learn while watching Don Draper. Tip number eight: "If you call a subordinate into your office to be fired, don't invite them to sit. It's easier to absorb a blow standing up, and they'll appreciate that you didn't lull them into a false sense of security."

Joan Holloway Harris Paper Doll: Mad Men-obsessed illustrator Dyna Moe has released her new Joan Holloway Harris (I hope she dumps the hubs and becomes Holloway again) paper dolls. Among the items you can dress Joan in include the green dress with random blood splatterings from the unfortunate incident with the riding mower. I'm anxiously awaiting Dyna Moe's illustration for the season finale. There's so much to choose from.

Everything Don Ever Said: A blogger who runs the site Unlikely Words has taken an extraordinary amount of time and claims to have chronicled every word that's ever come out of Don Draper's mouth. And he's put it under the heading, "Everything Don Draper Said," and it's organized by season and episode. Now I can't vouch for whether the blogger's captured every single utterance -- I haven't fact-checked him or anything -- but while scrolling through it it looks mighty comprehensive to me.

Which Characters' Futures Are Uncertain? TV Squad writer Joel Keller wondered about how much we'll see of Sal Romano, Betty (once she divorces Don) and others in season four.

Cast Discusses Finale: AMC's Mad Men web site has posted a video which includes interviews with the cast -- mostly Jon Hamm and January Jones, as well as show mastermind Matt Weiner:

'Desperate' Monday: Careful the Things You Say

*Warning, spoilers ahead from the latest episode of Desperate Housewives.*

I’ll say this for the latest episode of Desperate Housewives, at least there was no Karl in it. That’s a plus.

I found this episode much more entertaining than other recent ones, with the exception of the whole who-strangled-Julie mystery, which I really could care less about.

Gabby’s homeschooling struggles with her ill-tempered child were well done, particularly when Gabby, who’d warned Juanita that if she didn’t study she’d wind up being a cleaning lady, willingly scrubbed floors so that her math PhD possessing housekeeper could tutor Juanita in fractions.

What I don’t understand is why Gabby’s had to go all I Love Lucy, doing stuff behind Carlos’ back and inevitably getting caught in spectacularly embarrassing fashion. Gabby can be very persuasive -- when she’s not whining -- so I don't understand why she’s agreeing to let Carlos control the purse strings. I thought that, especially in the wake of Carlos’ blindness and the time she spent caring for the family, that Gabby and Carlos decided to be partners and no longer have one spouse in a more senior position over the other. Apparently that’s all gone by the wayside.

The forced Bree-Angie catering partnership is like oil and water. Keith Olbermann and Bill O’Reilly.Wall Street versus Main Street. What other polar opposites could I invoke here? But I do like the combo, very much so. Great potential. I like this pairing more than the Katherine-Bree duo. That was two upscale, Stepford Wife, Type-A perfectionists put together. They were too similar and not sufficiently interesting.

It was satisfying, in a very juvenile kind of way, to see Susan, a high school mean girl get her just desserts, by way of a Fairview police detective whom Susan used to tease (Susan accidentally gave her the nickname “Moose” in high school) who was investigating whether Katherine strangled Julie (at Susan’s behest). After learning that Katherine had a solid alibi, the detective arrested Susan for accidentally shooting Katherine and not reporting the incident to the police.

The big surprise of the night was that Angie knew that Nick had had an affair with Julie. After saying that neither of them can go anywhere because of some big, as yet unnamed mystery, Angie slugged him in the face. “I’ve put you through a lot, so you get this one,” Angie said to Nick. “But that’s it.”

Best line of the episode occurred when Carlos offered to pay for a housekeeper so that Gabby could fully concentrate on homeschooling Juanita. Gabby wanted a tutor instead. “You’d rather scrub toilets than teach your daughter?” Carlos asked.

“Well at least the toilet won’t talk back,” Gabby said.

Do you think Bree and Angie make an interesting pair? Why do you think Gabby’s allowing Carlos to call all the shots?

Image credit: Ron Tom/ABC.

'Mad Men' Monday: Shut the Door. Have a Seat.

*Warning, spoilers ahead from the season three finale of Mad Men.*

This was everything I expected and nothing I expected. I spent the hour saying, “Oh my God” and being pleased that while I could anticipate some of the plot turns, the way in which they were executed were creatively interesting and loaded with unexpected twists.

First of all . . . is Betty actually going to marry Henry Francis, a man she barely even knows?! Can this be possible? How can she trust him? How can she not worry that she could be being duped a second time because she doesn’t know Henry that well? To see Betty, baby Gene and Henry on that plane headed to Reno while Carla was home in Ossining with Sally and Bobby (for what, six weeks?) and Don was in Manhattan toting suitcases into a furnished apartment . . . was surprising and yet somehow not.

Clearly Betty felt irreparably humiliated by the discovery of Don’s Dick Whitman information, more so than she did when she learned he was screwing Bobbie Barrett and countless other nameless women, and, when coupled with the emotional iciness Don displayed after the Kennedy assassination, that solidified for Betty that she and Don were history. She decided her best option was to run away with a man who was willing to upend his entire life and accept three children, including a baby, into his life in order to be with her. Betty did all of this coolly and effectively. She was uncowed by Don and his typical attempts to wear her down pin the blame for the collapse of their marriage on her. (“Come on Betts, what are you doing seeing a lawyer?” he said, trying to tell Betty that maybe she was just upset about Kennedy and perhaps should see a psychiatrist. “I want to be civilized about this, please don’t act surprised,” she replied.) Man, it was as if Betty had tapped some of that ice water from Don’s veins and injected it into hers.

Their angry confrontation after Don learned that Betty and Henry had some kind of a romantic relationship, simply allowed Don to verbalize his deepest fears: That someone like him, a poor farm boy with his sordid conception and screwed up family, couldn’t ever get an affluent, educated woman from an established society family like the Hofstadts to love him and be his wife. (“You got everything you ever wanted! Everything! And you loved it! What, now I’m not good enough for some spoiled, mainline brat?”) To watch Don hypocritically call Betty a “whore” -- after his well known, epic philandering, plus given the fact that his mother was an actual prostitute -- was devastatingly sad.

When it was clear that the Draper family would be no more, Don watched as everything else around him crumbled, and he couldn’t help recalling dreary moments of his hellishly bleak childhood, including witnessing his father kicked in the head by a horse. (How poignant was it for Don to come home late one night to find Sally -- who hated and feared “Grandpa Gene’s” room but braved the scariness in order to sleep in her dad’s bed – and to snuggle beside her?) Don lost his wife. He broke his children’s hearts by moving out of the house permanently. (Money says Sally’s going to go haywire next season. Imagine her response if Don openly started dating Miss Farrell?) He lost his major account who called him a “prized pig” when he learned that Sterling Cooper was going to be no more after it, as well as PPL, was being bought by McCann.
 
And from this we saw the birth of a new Don, one who had to be humble again, like the boy from the farm. Don had to admit that in order to form a new ad agency – in that wonderfully espionage-like story about stealing all the clients away from PPL before they knew what hit them – that he had weaknesses that he couldn’t paper over. He wasn’t good with numbers. He wasn’t good with accounts. He couldn’t always see the ways of the future coming at him (the way Pete did). He didn’t value relationships. (“You’re not good at relationships because you don’t value them.”) In order to get the freedom he wanted – to not be part of McCann’s “sausage factory” – Don, ironically, needed people and relationships and humility. And he needed to be plain about it all.

So while Don lost Betty, he had to make amends and appease people, like with Roger Sterling. Don had to go, hat in hand, to Peggy’s apartment and apologize for acting like a Neanderthal toward her, admit that he took her for granted, beg her to come with him to his new company, and say he didn’t think she’d just follow him around like a “nervous poodle,” as she put it. (“I will spend the rest of my life trying to hire you,” he said when Peggy asked if he’d never speak to her again if she turned him down.) He and Roger even set foot in Pete Campbell’s apartment – the domicile of the man who threatened to reveal Don’s secret identity to Bert Cooper as a bargaining ploy in order to secure a promotion – and plead with him to bring his portfolio of accounts to join them.

Joan – yay Joan! – was pulled out of the department store in order to prove how savvy and valuable she is. Trudy – hey, new partners at Sterling Cooper Draper Pryce, hire this lady – was a source of brightness and light as the new members of the just-born ad agency commenced work in cramped hotel quarters. It was a great scene, seeing the Sterling Cooper refuges – Roger, Bert, Don, Lane, Joan, Peggy, Pete and Harry Crane – in that hotel room, starting from scratch, a humble beginning, all together. Likewise, it was delicious to see not only Lane blithely allow the patronizing British snots of PPL to sack him (as he stabbed them in the back), but to see the rest of the folks not asked to join SCDP wonder if the Sterling Cooper offices had been robbed. When they figured out what was happening, the look on Paul Kinsey’s face when he realized Don had asked Peggy to join them and not him – once again, Paul was on the outside looking in – was priceless.

However, hands down, one of the best scenes was when the SCDP folks were pilfering company files and Roger said, “Peggy, can you get me some coffee?” Peggy -- who eloquently and fearlessly stood up to Don (who rightfully she said Don used her to kick whenever he failed and feeling badly about himself) earlier in the episode – quickly and flatly said, “No.” A new era was been born, for everyone, and now I’m unreasonably curious to find out how the new era of Mad Men will unfold next summer. (Bert Cooper jokingly threatening to lock Harry in the store room was a close second for comedic relief.)

What did you think of the Mad Men finale? Did it meet your expectations?

Image credit: Carin Baer/AMC.

Is 'The Good Wife' Turning Into Just Another Legal Procedural?

I like Julianna Margulies. And I’m fond of the premise of The Good Wife: A woman -- a wife and mother -- is trying to pick of the pieces of her shattered life after her corrupt politician/husband humiliated her by having affairs with hookers and is now in jail because he was found guilty of abusing his office.

The first few episodes of The Good Wife deftly balanced Margulies’ Alicia Florrick’s attempts to attend to the needs of her children and shield them from the tawdry nature of the allegations against her husband Peter (Chris Noth), with her own personal resurrection as she returned to the professional world as a lawyer after having been out of practice for more than a decade. Alicia was ostracized from her so-called friends and her social circle as a result of the scandal and continues to struggle with her mother-in-law, who moved in with Alicia and her two teenaged children in their new apartment, away from their leafy suburb. The mother-in-law, who frequently defends her son, took it upon herself to bring the two Florrick kids to visit their father in jail for the first time against Alicia’s wishes.

All of that was good material, I thought, as the first few episodes aired and garnered top 20 ratings.

But as more installments have aired, there’s been less and less about Alicia and her family members’ lives, about the impact of Peter’s imprisonment and more emphasis on the legal cases, for which Alicia usually comes up with the miraculous key to winning the case. Don’t get me wrong, her husband Peter’s imprisonment/sex scandal is mentioned in each episode, but it’s becoming a means to an end because Peter was a prosecutor and can assist his defense lawyer wife by providing valuable information.

This is exactly what I didn’t want to see. I was hoping this show would heavily focus on a dramatization of how political wives try to carry on – for themselves, for their children -- after their husbands behave atrociously and were publically chastised for doing so, like so many real life pols (*cough* Edwards, Spitzer, Sanford *cough*). I wasn’t looking for an updated version of The Practice, with a light sprinkling of the life-as-the-betrayed-wife-of-a-lying-cheating-pol tossed in like spice, as added seasoning.

While the latest Good Wife episode “Conjugal” featured, as you might expect from its title, a conjugal visit between Peter and Alicia, the contact between them was verbal and chiefly about a murder case. Alicia wanted information from Peter to be shared privately, away from the guards’ surveillance, and the only way to obtain privacy was via a conjugal visit. Peter did attempt to hold his wife’s hand while she slept on the bed and he on the floor, but she quickly released it.

Maybe things will change and become more focused on the personal once Peter is released from prison and tries to stage a political comeback – and I’m hopeful they will – but I’m disappointed that The Good Wife appears as though it’s in danger of turning into a garden variety legal procedural.

Image credit: CBS.

'Big Love' Season 4 Teaser: All Talk, No Scenes

Big Love returns for its fourth season in January, in case you're in the market for a new show to help fill the vacancy of Mad Men. And HBO's starting to drum up anticipation by releasing a new promo. What's disappointing about it is that it contains no new scenes, only audio. I'm anxious to find out what happens with the new Church of Bill and Barb's fears about "outer darkness."

'V' and 'FlashForward:' Can These High-Concept Shows Go the Distance?

I watched the premiere of V last night on ABC, you know, that new drama about the aliens "visiting" Earth as their ginormous spacecraft hover over the world's biggest cities.

The pilot episode was intriguing, but I think I’m a tad biased because I'm a fan of Elizabeth Mitchell (Juliet from Lost) who plays single mom FBI agent Erica Evans on V and has been convinced that the "visitors" want to annihilate humankind. She’s not as enthralled by the attractive, smooth talking aliens as, say Scott Wolf (Bailey from Party of Five) who’s been flirting with the alien's leader, Anna, and, as ambitious TV news guy Chad Decker, is benefitting from being the one journalist on Earth to whom Anna will grant exclusive interviews . . . that is if he agrees not to ask any questions that cast the aliens in an unflattering light.

So there’s a battle coming: The skeptics, like Erica Evans, plan to take on the aliens and subvert them because they believe there's at least one (if not more) sleeper terrorist cell of aliens -- who look human on the outside -- that has been on Earth for some time and whose members are bent on doing evil things. Meanwhile, the vast majority of Earthlings appear to be celebritizing the self-professed peace loving aliens -- who have the power to miraculously heal the sick -- as they entice young people into joining “ambassador” programs and training them aboard their ships. People are selling, "I Love Vs" T-shirts and bowing down reverently in the presence of the "visitors'" ships.

That’s all obviously good potentially dramatic material. On paper. But can the writers maintain the momentum and promise of the pilot, keep things fresh and not get bogged down with minutia and subterfuge too quickly?

Plus, there’s the odd decision made by ABC execs to air four episodes and then go on hiatus until 2010 after the winter Olympics. If V succeeeds in getting traction and ratings, all that will grind to a halt. If it’s stinking up the joint, will ABC just pull the plug? Why not just hold the entire series until 2010 so they could air the 13-episode run in consecutive weeks? This puzzles me.

Anyway, here’s a snippet from last night’s premiere. The scene features Wolf’s character prepping for an interview with chief alien Anna:



Over on ABC’s other cataclysmic/conspiratorial new show FlashForward – where (virtually) everyone on Earth blacked out for nearly three minutes and saw a glimpse of their lives six months into the future – six episodes have aired. As with V, I liked the pilot, but feel as though the show has lost some steam since then, gone creatively astray a bit what with tangents about the crows, a Nazi prisoner and bizarre congressional hearings.

What keeps me tuning in to FlashForward -- there've been a few times when I wanted to just delete an episode, unwatched, from my DVR -- is that I like the main characters and am eager to find out how they get from where they are now to where they are in the flashforwards. (Once that happens, I hope the writers have a logical plan as to what'll they'll do then. Hopefully not another global blackout.)

For example, Sonya Walger (Penelope from Lost) plays Dr. Olivia Benford who’s married to FBI agent Mark Benford (Joseph Fiennes from Shakespeare in Love). In Olivia’s flashforward, she finds herself living in her same house but her daughter, as well as with another man she'd never met and his son Dylan. After they experienced the flashforwards, Dylan became Olivia’s patient and he remembered being in her house and seeing Olivia's daughter during his flashforward. FBI agent Mark is holed up in his office in his flashforward, back on the bottle (his drinking had caused a previous marital separation), and he’s investigating the cause of the blackout when he’s attacked by masked gunmen. Seeing how Olivia and Mark get from point A to point B is what has kept me watching through the nonsense about the crows and the inane power politics of Washington, D.C.

I’m also interested in the storyline for FBI agent Demetri Noh (John Cho), who doesn’t have a flashforward and assumes that that means he’ll be dead before April 29, 2010, the date everyone saw during their blackout. When Demetri posted his experience on a web site where others have posted the details of their flashforwards, he received a call from a woman who said she knows he'll be murdered.

However, as much as I was a fan of Dominic Monaghan when he was the self-sacrificing chap named Charlie on Lost, I can’t stand what I’ve seen of him in FlashForward, but then again, I’m not supposed to. Don’t like his whole sinister this-is-one-big-science-experiment-gone-wrong storyline. Don’t really care either.

The video below is of the man and his son Dylan at Olivia and Mark’s house on Halloween night; both the son and the father realized that this was where their flashforward took place:



While lots of folks like to knock Lost because it’s become so complicated in recent years, it wasn’t that way at first. It was a character drama where a group of strangers crash-landed on an island and were presented with constant, life-threatening situations. The storyline slowly unfolded by explaining the characters and their backstories so viewers felt they understood their present actions and what was motivating them. By the time the show got to the level of Easter eggs and requiring a PhD in Lost-ology in order to understand the episode threads, viewers had already bonded with the characters. Which is why I think it’s important that, while they advance the plot forward (which some viewers complained Lost didn’t do very well in its initial seasons), the V and FlashForward writers need to make sure that they make us care about what happens to the characters in their shows. Otherwise if they waste time with extraneous distractions, they could wind up being high-concept, high-profile bombs on their hands.

'Modern Family' and 'The Middle:' Two Comedies You Should Be Watching

Two freshman comedies on Wednesday nights on ABC have been giving me something to look forward to every week: Modern Family and The Middle. And given that Mad Men’s season three finale is on Sunday, we need something to fill the void each week.

My weekly Pop Culture and Politics column over on Mommy Tracked this week is about how these two comedies have filled the space in my heart that used to be filled by the wacky Malcolm in the Middle. Modern Family’s snarkily sarcastic, while The Middle, featuring Patricia Heaton, is charmingly kooky.

These two videos give you a taste:

'Desperate' Monday: Don't Walk on the Grass

*Warning, spoilers ahead from the latest episode of Desperate Housewives.*

Gabby Solis – who didn’t realize the Soviet Union had broken up – as a homeschooling “bad mom?” That unbelievable situation was matched only by Tom Scavo answering to the moniker of “T-Scav,” Bree Van de Kamp Hodge contemplating marrying a lying philanderer, one Carl Mayer, and Katherine Mayfair is continuing to act like a psychopathic stalker who’s apparently trying to wrestle every woman on Wisteria Lane.

Gabby the Homeschooler

Why is everyone always saying that Gabby’s a bad mother? Why is this a running thread, a joke carried over several episodes? What, seriously, is wrong with Gabby’s parenting? I want some specifics here people.

Sure, she swears sometimes, but so does her husband. (If swearing makes you a bad parent, then I’m in big trouble.) She can be impatient, as can her husband. (Ditto with me and a lack of patience.) She might be a little liberal with letting her kids play on their own around the house and get into mischief – like last week’s sledding down the stairs incident – but that just means she’s got a “Free-Range Kids” point of view on parenting and doesn’t think she should hover over her kids. Last week, when the man who promised to have a monkey perform at Juanita’s birthday party tried to renege on his agreement to play the party, Gabby didn’t want her daughter disappointed so she insisted that the monkey perform even though his owner said the animal was tired. Is that Gabby’s fault that the monkey went nutty on the clown, or is the monkey’s handler’s fault? The world, apparently, is blaming the mom on this one.

Yet the theme “Gabby’s a bad parent” is omnipresent, including in the latest episode where, when 7-year-old Juanita couldn’t pronounce the word “persecuted” during her elementary school’s Thanksgiving play and the girl then dropped the f-bomb while on stage. From the dictator principal’s point of view, the onus for Juanita’s use of blue language fell squarely onto Gabby’s shoulders, not on BOTH Gabby and Carlos. “If you want to assign blame, you might want to look at your dubious parenting skills,” the principal said. In response, Gabby dropped some f-bombs of her own and said she was withdrawing Juanita from the school, hence her unwilling foray into the world of homeschoolers when she and Carlos learned all the area private schools had no openings until the next school year.

Now I’ll give you that Gabby’s not the sharpest knife in the drawer (“The Soviet Union broke up?”) and is ill prepared to homeschool her daughter -- plus she shouldn’t be seeking affirmation of the quality of her parenting skills from her 7-year-old -- but she’s not a BAD mother. Jeez.

T-Scav’s On the Case . . . Or Not

Tom Scavo going by T-Scav, bringing home drunken puking college peeps, buying them kegs of beer and promising to get them pancakes following a “cut-throat game of beer pong?” Were these pieces of evidence pointing to a mid-life crisis? Nope, just a middle-aged man cutting corners in college (bribing the students who obtain the answers to the statistics exams) so he can get his degree and thrive in a new career to help support his growing family of soon-to-be six kids.

I’m kind of ambivalent about the whole Tom-is-cheating-in-statistics storyline, though I did take distinct umbrage to his likening Lynette not revealing her pregnancy to her boss to his cheating on exams. Lynette’s job is crucial to the family’s economic survival in a recession, which I suppose could be argued about Tom’s career. But Lynette’s situation isn’t comparable because pregnancy discrimination is a serious thing that happens to women, penalizes them for being pregnant when being pregnant isn't a bad, unethical thing, unlike knowingly cheating on tests when you've booted your studies.

Bree’s an Idiot

The facts: Carl Mayer cheated on his first wife, broke her heart, stole items he’d given her as meaningful gifts and later blamed her for “losing them,” urges his clients to break the law, openly ogles women’s breasts in front of his girlfriend, parks in handicapped parking spots without concern and re-gifted a supposedly cherished family heirloom with a lame line. So why in the world would Bree risk her friendship with Susan Mayer, risk her own heart with a proven cheater and thief and soil her reputation in Fairview? For good sex?

Please Knock It Off W/the Gal-on-Gal Tousles

Someone at Desperate Housewives must’ve received some kind of network memo that says, “Have more scantily clad chicks fighting. It’s great for ratings. The more cat fights, the better. Be sure to show cleavage.” Only such ugly cynicism could be behind the repeated scuffles between Katherine and other Wisteria Lane women: Fisticuffs which end with lingerie-clad Susan and Katherine wet and thrashing about in a bubble bath, Susan accidentally shooting Katherine in the arm while Katherine was wearing short shorts at the time and Katherine wrestling with Bree in a fully decorated wedding reception hall while they’re both wearing attractive dresses (which have been getting more and more revealing as the season has progressed).

Katherine’s become unhinged because the man she loves has returned to his ex-wife. She’s miserable. She’s angry. She’s heartbroken. WE GET IT. I had an inkling of hope that, like Katherine, the writers were going to finally “take the high road” and have Katherine be conniving and manipulative and smart about how she’s going exact her revenge on Susan and get Mike back. The whole you-should-have-me-over-for-brunch-so-I-don’t-sue-you bit was mildly amusing. But when she called Mike late at night, dressed in a nightie and sexed up her boudoir with candles, rose petals and champagne and then fought with Susan in the tub, I felt as though adolescent boys had started writing the scripts, trying to see how much humiliation with a twist of sex appeal they can create.

I’d love to hear your thoughts about “Don’t Walk on the Grass.” Do you think Gabby’s a “bad mom?” Is Bree being foolish? What do you think about Katherine impersonating a WWF wrestler?

Image credit: Ton Tom/ABC.

Is This the End?

* Warning, spoilers ahead from the recent episode of Mad Men*

Upon seeing this pointed scene between Don and Betty Draper last night, what did you think? Is this the end of the Draper marriage? A speed-bump? Betty's revenge for feeling betrayed and hurt?

'Mad Men' Monday: The Grown-Ups

*Warning, spoilers ahead from the recent episode of Mad Men.*


The latest episode -- built around the assassination of President Kennedy and the destabilizing impact that violent act had on everyone in the Mad Men world -- was unexpected and outstanding.

I would’ve never imagined, for example, that the combination of losing the senior accounts post to Kenny-boy Cosgrove and watching the news coverage of the Kennedy assassination would've prompted Pete Campbell to retreat into his apartment with Trudy where they clung to one another, to opt not to attend Margaret Sterling’s wedding (a risky professional gamble) and to seriously consider Pete jumping ship to Grey with Duck Phillips.

Betty Draper became unmoored, especially after seeing Jack Ruby shoot Lee Harvey Oswald on live TV. Don Draper -- who has appeared distinctly uncomfortable with outward, expressions of deep emotion and sadness -- responded by glibly telling Betty to take a pill and go to bed the night Kennedy died, and continued repeating the line, “Everything’s going to be all right,” as though it was a mantra that would fix everything. But it didn’t. Kennedy was still dead, as was Don's marriage and Betty's trust in him. But, ever the ad man, Don seemed as though he was trying too hard to push the "Everything's going to be all right" pitch, thinking that if he said it enough times, it would be so.

I absolutely did not see coming that witnessing Oswald’s murder on TV would send Betty running to Henry Francis, particularly after the doting behavior Don displayed toward her at the Sterling wedding. I was likewise stunned to watch as Henry proposed marriage to a cash box-hurling woman he doesn’t even know.


The more I thought about the varied reactions to the Kennedy assassination, the only parallel I could make that resonated with me personally was 9/11. On Sept. 11, 2001 and in its aftermath, not only was I, along with millions of other Americans, riveted to news coverage for upon days and days as we sat there feeling stunned and shocked, but there was the lingering fear that we were no longer safe (something Trudy mentioned when she said that if they could get to the president, they could get to anyone). There was an instinct to draw closer to the things and people who were important to you. Thanksgiving 2001 was particularly poignant for Americans as we remembered and cherished what was dearest to us.

Perhaps Mad Men mastermind Matt Weiner was trying to convey that same powerlessness and fear created by Kennedy's and Oswald's public deaths as he had his characters do things that they otherwise might not have done, like ask a veritable stranger to marry you, tell the spouse who’s been lying to you since the day you met that you no longer love him and feel nothing when he kisses you, call your former lover on the phone – your voice brimming with longing -- when your shallow young thing of a second wife is passed out drunk on the bed beside you, and blow off opportunities to advance your career at work when you determine that there’s no longer any future in it.

While darkness and gloom swirled around each character – in particular around a broken Don who sat alone in his shadowy bedroom after learning that the thing he always feared would happen if the truth about his identity came out, had actually came true: that someone like Betty would never love someone like him – there was a bit of lightness in the person of Margaret Sterling in all her bratty, self-centeredness. As the scenes switched from location to location depicting people’s reactions to news that the president had been killed, mostly with tears and astonishment, there was Margaret, in a heap of rich, blindingly white fabric crying, “It’s all ruined!” Mourning her wedding, not the president.
 
Mourning . . . doesn’t that seem like a common thread throughout “The Grown-Ups?” Don was mourning the death of love. Betty was mourning the president and the death of her marriage. Pete was mourning his once promising career at Sterling Cooper and the fact that people at work cared more about business than what had transpired in Texas. Roger seemed to be mourning the fact that he no longer had Joan as a confidante. Margaret was mourning the disintegration of her parents' marriage. And there were Sally and Bobby, their childhood innocence shattering, bit by bit, as they sat in front of the TV and learned that the president’s young children had lost their father.

What did you think of “The Grown-Ups?” By the way, was anyone else miffed that the preview for the season finale contained no new footage? I'm unwilling to accept that next week is the last new Mad Men episode until next summer.

UPDATE: Just saw someone mention on Twitter that there was a similarity between the Aqua-Net storyboard in Peggy's office (four people in a convertible) and Kennedy's limo. I didn't catch that.
Image credit: Carin Baer/AMC.

What Will the Gosselins Do With Their Free Time Now that ‘Jon and Kate Plus 8’ Has Suspended Filming?

The New York Post reported this week that, in the wake of Jon Gosselin’s demand that his kids no longer be featured in a TLC reality show (the one that made the Gosselin's a household name), it's entirely likely that we've seen the last original episode of Jon and Kate Plus 8. "This is the last episode for which we have completed filming," a TLC spokeswoman told the Post. "We remain suspended."

The Post reporter read between the lines and offered this: "It's believed that, behind the scenes, neither the network nor Kate are pushing Jon to rescind his ban on filming the kids."

That leaves the separating/divorcing Gosselins with some extra times on their hands. What should they do with that time?

While one of Jon’s girlfriends, 22-year-old Hailey Glassman, has told The Insider that Jon already spends a good bit of his time having “mantrums” (man tantrums), taking his temper out on her and lying (“Sometimes he has trouble with the truth and he will dance and dance around his lies,” Glassman said), it’s being rumored that Jon will go out on a date with the Octomom as part of a reality show. (And if they brought all their kids along on the date, they'd have the equivalent of the population of Rhode Island in tow.)

Meanwhile, Kate has told the media that she doesn’t think anyone would want to marry into her situation and is contemplating returning to her nursing career. (Wonder how her bedside manner would compare to Edie Falco's Nurse Jackie?)

In case Jon and Kate are looking for something to help them to fill their days, which were once spent in front of TLC cameras and promoting the show and their "happy" family, I've got some suggestions for them:

Jon could try to improve his reputation as a devoted father of eight young children by writing a book about how challenging it is to be a divorced father while in the glare of media spotlight (at the same time he's courting said spotlight . . . but he doesn't need to mention that.). When he’s done, he can have his publicist arrange to hold his book launch party poolside at a Las Vegas hotel next to svelte bikinied women, seeing as though “hosting” a party at a similar locale earlier this year did so much to boost his loving daddy image.

Or Jon could take a page from the father of Sarah Palin's grandson and give a tell-all, scathing interview about his soon-to-be ex-wife to Vanity Fair, pose for photos while holding a photo of Kate’s head on a stick with the eyes cut out (as Levi Johnston did with a photo of Palin),  then offer to pose naked for Playgirl, continue to give interviews where you taunt the person who you now loathe (in Jon’s case it would be Kate who he’s already trashed on ABC by saying he “despises” her) and say that you’ve got “huge” stories about that person that you've yet to reveal, as Johnston did on CBS' Early Show this week.

Given that Kate has told the media that she feels comfortable in front of the camera, maybe she could consider becoming a third co-host of the 47th hour of the Today Show, accompanying Kathie Lee Gifford and Hoda Kotb. Kate and Kathie Lee can take turns rolling their eyes, cracking wise and making exaggerated arm motions as they discuss the news of the day.

Do you have any suggestions as to the next career moves for Jon and Kate?

Image credit: TLC via the Examiner.

'24' Promo Featuring Jack 'Call Me Grandpa' Bauer Coming Out of 'Retirement'

The promo for the eighth season of 24 -- which starts January 17 -- features a nicely recovered Jack Bauer (out of the morphine-induced coma he was in at the end of season seven after the effects of the chemicals in a bioweapon became too much for him to bear) with his cute-as-a-button granddaughter. She calls him "Jack." He asks her to call him "Grandpa."

Later in the trailer, Jack grumbles something about having "retired" from government service, even though we see shots of him racing around shouting at people and, once again, protecting the U.S. president and the entire country from certain doom.

Retirement, "grandpa," what is this, the AARP version of 24?

'Friday Night Lights:' Promos for Season 4

Unfortunately for fans of Friday Night Lights who don’t have DIRECTV, (including yours truly), we’ll have to wait until 2010 to get our fix of our favorite Texas high school football coach, his high school principal wife and the angst-ridden students who populate the show. For those of you who do have DIRECTV, you’ll be able to see the premiere of this wonderfully nuanced drama tomorrow (that's Wednesday, y'all) at 9 p.m.

In the meantime, we can all enjoy promos for the fourth season featuring a town divided, as Tami Taylor is the principal of one high school and her husband, Eric Taylor, is the football coach at the cross-town rival high school. I can’t wait.

Notes on Politics: Women & the Health Insurance Reform Debate

While Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid attempts to muster enough votes to back a public option in a Senate health insurance reform bill (as White House officials cast doubt on the likelihood of a bill including a public health insurance option passing), one group of constituents is amping up its public relations efforts to make sure their needs are represented in whatever health insurance reform bill becomes a law: Women.

A few weeks ago, I wrote a column on Mommy Tracked urging women to pay close attention to this debate because issues that go to the heart of health care for women are at stake. Women who've had C-sections or can still get pregnant or plan to utilize maternity care services in the future, I wrote, are denied health insurance in some states or are forced to pay higher premiums than men, unless they get sterilized.

But the discrimination against women goes further than that. According to CNN and the National Women's Law Center, women who have been victims of rape or domestic abuse can and are denied health insurance in some parts of the country.

One woman told her story this week to CNN. She was raped by two men, took anti-HIV meds as her doctor recommended, then her health insurance company dropped her. The woman, ironically, works in the health insurance industry.



The advocacy group National Women's Law Center is currently running a pro-health insurance reform ad entitled, "A Woman is Not a Pre-Existing Condition." It's pretty powerful stuff.



Remember in September when Arizona Senator Jon Kyl said during a debate about the Senate Finance Committee's insurance reform package that he didn't want to mandate that health insurance policies include maternity care because he didn't need it and it would make health insurance policies too expensive? (Maternity care, by the way, was utilized by his mother, his wife and his daughter.) That, that attitude right there, is treating women like a "pre-existing condition." It's no wonder women are peeved.