Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution, Week 5: In which we learned about the Valentine's Day Jamie cooked naked

Icebergs melted, walls fell, unicorns danced in circles, bison burgers were enjoyed by all, and Alice paid Jamie a tiny bit of praise.  After months of gentle wooing, Jamie has almost succeeded in endearing himself to Alice and becoming the British person she almost tolerates*.  Our story began with Jamie and Rod from the radio telling stories, laughing laughs, and working in harmony at the morning show until Doug Shiels, the man in charge of the local hospital called into the radio station and offered himself up as Jamie's next quasi-adversary/eventual partner in health-making. After finding out that even more people were worried about how Huntington would appear on television**, Jamie cut to the chase, told some dude in a suit that his objections were really weird, and then told the group of worried skeptics how much money he needed.

With the money business put to the side for the rest of the episode, Jamie headed back to the schools to complete the cycle of the narrative before next week's episode.  In what he thought was a risky (but I thought was pretty savvy) move, Jamie apologized to a mob of disinterested-looking, texting teenagers for taking away their french fries and told them that his success or failure was basically in their hands.  In what appeared to be a response to the idea that Jamie respected them mingled with curiosity about the promise of  pasta for lunch, the high schoolers were kind enough not to destroy the show.  Oh, and some kids drank plain milk, the principal of the elementary school lost some weight, and everyone's skin is looking a lot better.

Product placement of the week:  Last week's Green Giant product placement was a little odd, but this week's mini-ad for Green Truck worked a lot better.  While it was still a little awkward because the little interview/explanation very much an advertisement, at least with Green Truck we could see it in action and actually introducing a new idea into the community.  I'm pretty sure Huntingtonians were aware of frozen vegetables in the B.O. (Before Oliver) era.

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* I sort of love Alice, and mostly because she's totally a super hard sell and generally unimpressed by everyone.  She seems like one of those people who doesn't let you know where you stand with her unless she has to, but who also has a legitimate problem with being malicious or the cause of anyone's downfall.  I thought this was especially apparent when she was honest about how Jamie's programs were working in the school (some kids like some things better than others - fair enough), but she wasn't going to submarine the whole thing, either.
** I really had no idea that Huntingtonians being portrayed as having an obesity issue on t.v. might be a deterrent for new industry.  I kind of thought that businesses that find West Virginia attractive would find it attractive regardless of how an AP wire interprets a CDC report.

16 and Pregnant, Week 9 (Lizzie): Do we have a 2010 version of "emo" yet?

Before I can say anything - and I mean anything - about this week's episode of 16 and Pregnant, I need to get this out of my system:  SERIOUSLY??????!!!!!!!! An aspiring glassblower/part-time thrift store employee named Skylar?  Who cheats on you, like, the same week*  you get pregnant and then cries sincere emo tears and gives you the space you need until you decide to take him back?  IF WE CANNOT LEARN FROM THE 1990s, WE ARE DOOMED TO REPEAT THEM.

Ahem.

On this week's 16 and Pregnant, we learned that babies mean giving up your dreams of becoming a flutist for the Virginia Symphony, that parades are generally boring for teenagers**, and, that contrary to popular belief, the pregnancy belly-button ring does exist***.  For the majority of the episode, Lizzie fluctuated between being responsible (congrats - for real- on finishing high school five months early through home school), being an entitled only child (it's a known fact that parents know nothing and teenage children are always smarter), and oddly ridiculous (Seriously, you didn't keep up with your birth control because you didn't want a pelvic exam?  Yeah, I can see how having a kid is less invasive than an hour in the stirrups.).

I did like how Lizzie and Skylar were really trying hard to maintain some independence through careful budgeting and planning in the very small space of Lizzie's bedroom, but I felt as though their experience of the  world didn't extend beyond those walls.  When Lizzie was out with her friends at the midpoint of the episode and was bragging all about her perfect baby, her perfect life, and her perfect relationship, I couldn't help but think that she was both insufferable and hopelessly naive****.  And I think I was right on both counts.  While I've been worried for the past couple of weeks about the general feeling of unbearable weight at the end of recent episodes, this time I was worried about the larger context for Lizzie's behavior after the baby was born.  Lizzie - while in some ways, just run-of-the-mill 18 year-old mixed with a little only child for good measure - took on a new, and very unexplained pattern of behavior when she became more and more adamant about not wanting to be physically separated from the baby (even when Skylar was holding her).

The lack of discussion about this seemed larger than the conversations about it,  as did Lizzie's lack of self awareness and her immaturity, which was immune to even the most pithy attempt to permeate the thick teenage skull in 16 and Pregnant history: (to paraphrase), "I wish I had been as smart as you when I was younger.  Because everything I thought I knew, I turned out to be wrong about."

MTV's 16 and Pregnant - MTV Shows

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* Math is mine, not MTV's.  But, seeing as Lizzie is about 8+ months pregnant when she finds out that Skylar looked up with some girl named Krista (or something) 8 months ago, I think if we use my patented "counting backwards" method, we can construct a timeline that supports my hypothesis.  On another note, why was I the only person nodding "yes," in response to the question, "Do you think he would cheat on you?"
** This was puzzling.  I would have thought that most teenagers had already discovered this when they realized they were too old to have candy thrown at them and too young to be publicly drunk in the name of St. Patrick/America/the Harvest.  While my brother may have had a buttload of fun marching with the band in high school at town parades (I'm not sure, I haven't asked), when I was Lizzie's age, I really liked that parades meant that there was an empty house for sleeping in late and having some alone time while the rest of my family was out standing in the street.
*** Again, have these kids never heard of the '90s?  Aside from learning about the existence of pregnancy belly button rings, I also learned that people still get belly button rings.
**** Most people over the age of 18 can tell you that the second you start letting a little of that "my life is so perfect business" fly, you might as well throw the shit directly into the fan yourself.

The Celebrity Apprentice, Week 5: Did Bret Make Us Feel Something Real?

This week was all about family and commitments outside of The Celebrity Apprentice: Sharon Osbourne still had the black plague (which Trump wasn't so ready to forgive), Cyndi Lauper got to meet President Obama and prove that she's not just Tenacity's lovable screw-up, Michael Johnson left the show for undisclosed reasons related to his son, Bret lost his shit over and over again because his daughter might be diabetic like him, and Goldberg showed us that he's really uncomfortable when other men cry.  Okay, so that last bit didn't have anything to do with a player's attention being drawn away from the game, but in all honesty, Goldberg did look like he wanted to be anywhere else than with a sobbing Bret Michaels.  We also watched Donald Trump clean the floor with all the contestants (except Maria and her major boots) in the saddest game of H-O-R-S-E ever  televised (I mean, it's for charity, people!  You can't even hit the rim?) while Ivanka looked on in cold disinterest.  In other news, we learned that Summer and Holly are still going strong in their mean girl love fest, Selita doesn't know that her type of pretty doesn't last forever (and apparently, doesn't cloud George's vision), and Maria has been marked as the snake in the grass on team Tenacity.  Over at Rock Solid, Curtis showed us he could lead (with Clyde Drexler co-starring as his personal chorus of common sense) as his team literally dissolved around him - in terms of numbers AND pools of tears*.  When it came to firing time, Selita** was unmoved by the termination of her fake employment and appeared to be willing to engage only with the very unnecessary Trump elevator operator.  My favorite part of the episode, however, was noting how everyone was trying to think of a new way to say "throw under the bus" without saying the actual phrase: "push off a dock," "throw under the car," "crush with my velocipede," "toss under a truck," "perambulate all over," and so on.

Unsolicited prediction:  Everyone on the women's team keeps talking about how Maria's the person to watch out for, but I think Summer Sanders is the real one to keep an eye on.  While she's tight with Holly, that's going to change the longer they're in this game together.  We can't forget that Summer tried to get rid of BOTH Sharon and Cyndi by pretending that she forgot they had passes and good reasons for not participating.  Basically, Summer tried to play it all nice girl and eliminate one player that annoys her and another player that could be a competitive obstacle.  Summer's playing it cool and pretending to be - as Sharon put it "little Miss Perfect" - but this is an act a blind man can see.  You can take me out for hot dog when she literally pushes Holly in front of a New York City taxi trying to out-fundraise*** her. 


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* For a cool/interesting discussion of how Bret Michaels actually brought reality to The Celebrity Apprentice through his relatively raw displays of emotion this week, check out Dalton Ross's recap at Ew.com.  He says it better than I ever could and, I believe, admits to being moved to tears by the increasingly complex lead singer of Poison. 
** Yeah, I'll admit I learned her name.  But she's gone now, so it doesn't matter.
***There have been no fundraising challenges so far this season.  I think we need one, because that type of challenge tends to really bring the out the nasty.

The most perfect spring song ever?

 

Ever since I graduated kindergarten, I haven't really connected much to Sesame Street, but this duet by Jason Mraz and Elmo managed to put all the feelings I have on a sunny day to music. 

Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution, Week 4: All We Eat Nowadays is Beef Stir Fry

And they were cookin', cookin' in the streets...because Jamie was trying to win a bet.  This week's episode* took a break from the will they/won't they tension between Alice and Jamie in the elementary school kitchen and focused on Jamie's work in the larger Huntington community.  I was too young for Moonlighting, but I imagine that the chemistry between Jamie and Alice is like watching Cybil Shepherd and Bruce Willis all over again. While I'm glad we escaped the tedium of the permit office at town hall and spent more time capturing the magic of a Marshall University dance program flash mob, I would still like some more reality in this particular reality program.  We did see Jamie promoting the Cook-a-Thon and Jamie's Kitchen through interpretive dance, the shortened format of the show doesn't allow us to actually appreciate the enormity of Jamie's task and the popular opposition he faced in Huntington.  The quickened pace of Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution gave us a story arc that threw up plot flags at every turn:

• Jamie grows sad and frustrated with Rod from the radio, 
• Jamie attempts to win Rod over by ordinary means, 
• But Jamie must resort to extraordinary means,
• And managest to win Rod over with emotional appeals and boyish British charm, 
• And by Friday everyone feels good and completes a giant picture wall.  

There's a lot to like here; I just wish we could slow down a little and see how it actually all happens because I'm worried that the Huntingtonites (?) (Huntingtonians?) only know how to make beef stir fry.

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* We also learned that it's been two months since episode one, which means that time flies when you're having fun in West Virginia.  Do I have to contact Ryan Seacrest directly to get some answers about the collapsed pace of this show?  Because I WILL write him a letter.

A Cyndi of Another Era

 

While she wasn't a major player in this week's The Celebrity Apprentice because she was in Washington, D.C. watching the president sign hate crimes legislation into law, seeing Cyndi sing a little on tonight's episode made me want to post a little tribute to her.  My review of tonight's episode should be ready in a day or two.  So, until then, enjoy.

16 and Pregnant, Week 8 (Leah): Exit Ex-Boyfriend, Pursued by Bear

Having never been one, I'm no expert on teenage boys, but from what I understand, they tend to get really weird about being eyed as father material for other people's babies.  In this week's plus sized episode of 16 and Pregnant (more than one baby = more story), we met the super fertile couple Leah and Corey, the participants in an "I'm sure my Depo shot still has some juice left in it" rebound encounter in Corey's beloved truck.  While we saw a few tender moments from the newly formed but now permanently linked couple when Leah peed her pants, the rest of the hour and a half was a slow-burn of pain*.  Though I thought it went on a bit too long at the time, I'm beginning to appreciate the length of the episode for the following lessons learned:

1. It is necessary to keep up with the maintenance of one's birth control**
2. Denial is nasty (the lies Leah and company told themselves include, but are not limited to: at school, it's like I don't have have babies at all; when she's at school, I pretend she doesn't have babies because she seems the same to me; he'll love me just the same if I want him back; senior year of high school is super important)
3. For better or worse, it is impossible to select a different father for your children after the fact
4. If you attempt to do #3, the consequences will be painful.

Until I took a step back and realized that Leah was a very young 17, I started to get angry with her as she took a flamethrower to her personal life and threw herself into a social world of friends who seemed to get off on being terrible enablers (Where on earth was that Kayla girl for most of this episode?).  Having taught for a few years, I can spot trouble, but Leah doesn't have my superpowers and was thus completely blind to the fact that Robbie was the bad, selfish kind of trouble that you look back on at 25 and pat yourself on the back for leaving behind and Corey was the redeemable, somewhat disappointing kind of trouble.  Leah's episode was exhausting - from her hard, hard pregnancy to the emotionally draining way she carried on and then was smacked with the consequences - and even though I said it last week, I'm still worried that the kids are not okay.

MTV's 16 and Pregnant - MTV Shows

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* And yes, most episodes of 16 and Pregnant are studies in pain and sadness.  But this week was a new animal entirely. 
** While MTV is good at giving definitions of what's going on medically on 16 and Pregnant, I feel  like the gesture towards getting more information about birth control by running those commercials that sends viewers to a website is a little half-assed.  I think there's room for definitions of birth control and their proper use and potential for misuse when it inevitably gets discussed during the whole "how I ended up a pregnant teenager" part of the story.  For example, in Episode 5, I know how and why Lori got pregnant by mixing her birth control with antibiotics.  In fact, my exact words were, "Well, shit, that will do it."  But it was such a short moment in the episode that it seems like a casual, less well-versed teenager might not put all the pieces together.  This week, I knew how and why Leah could have forgotten to get a shot (outside of probably thinking she didn't need to keep up with it because she wasn't with Robbie anymore) because Depo Provera (which I'm assuming is what she was on when she said she got shots) lasts for 12 weeks, and the gap between doses can make it easy to forget when you're due if you're not super on top of it. 

Seven Sentence Review: Celebrity Apprentice, "Muggles and Wizards," (Week 4)

I am coming to realize that when I settle down for an evening of competitive celebrity reality television, a show like The Celebrity Apprentice forces me to confront several key issues in today's infotainment.  The harsh reality of the world we live in that I faced this week was this: When is the attempt to rehabilitate or improve one's image by starring on celebrity reality show so futile that it actually reinforces and adds dimension to one's already questionable reputation?  On an unrelated note, should I be identifying with Bret Michaels as much as I do, especially when he notes that some people on his team are starting to sound like child molesters in the dark, smoke-filled, Harry Potter-themed room they've lured a group of children into?  Much has been made of Rod Blagojevich's technological incompitance and Donald Trump's nearly desperate (and correct*) attempt to fire Bret Michaels instead of getting rid of the governor, but today I'd like to speak about my favorite aspect of Rod Blagojevich's character: he cannot stop simultaneously lying and telling the truth. In the boardroom, NOTHING was the incompetent project manager's fault.  According to Blagojevich, honestly assessing your boss like Curtis Stone and Michael Johnson did is part of an elaborate personal vendetta, but he absolutely refused to put blame on the person (Bret Michaels) who absorbed his incompetence and who was the most likely target for Trump's firin' hand**.  The best and most demonstrative part of the show (meaning it shows both why Rod Blagojevich is probably the person most of us think he is and why he makes compelling television): When Donald Trump asked that really ambitious Victoria's Secret model*** what the former governor was doing on the plane home from Florida and she answered that Blagojevich was sleeping, Blagojevich's response was not to own up to the fact, but to note that while this whole thing happened on camera, he was wearing sunglasses, which means no one can prove any of this beyond a reasonable doubt.

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* It was noted in a recap at EW.com this week that Trump's attempts to get Blagojevich to bring Michaels back into the boardroom for firing time was a self-interested move.  And I think that recap was dead on.  Because Rod Blagojevich makes for far more interesting television than Bret Michaels does.  Next to the former governor, Michaels looks like a down-to-earth everyguy who just likes to hit on anything vaguely female, like your high school friend's really creepy dad.  Or in my case, the orthodontist.  And that doesn't really bring The Celebrity Apprentice party.  Working for RockSolid, the governor is a hot mess; Michaels is just vaguely annoying.
** Even Bret appeared confused about not being held accountable for being the de facto project manager and admitted that he should be up for firing.
***I am still not going to learn her name.  She was good, but she's not long for this show.  Sharon Osbourne's bronchitis or plague or something is going to clear up soon and she's going to become even more powerful.  Telling the other women that without Cyndi, watching Tenacity work together would be like watching ice melt was just part of a much longer, multi-level plan that knocks out good, but boring players.

Tulips!

It's been a crazy week, and I plan on going on a review-posting bonanza soon, but until then, enjoy the flowers. They're pretty. 

I got my mom to give me these after complaining on Easter that no one gives me flowers during my family's traditional post-bagel brunch flower exchange.  (Note: Basically, I made the case that I am no different from my 94 year-old aunt and should be treated equally.  The main exception to this new maxim is that I still expect my duck-themed Easter basket to be hidden cleverly and full of Peeps.)  I'm an adult who doesn't live with her parents, so I don't see why I'm still counted as a member of my parents' household for flower allotments.  (Read: I am actually too lazy and cheap to spend $5.99 at Wegmans and get my own bunch of tulips.)  Then, my mom said she'd give them to me, and I said they were hers. (This was the moment when I realized that I had complained about flowers I could easily buy myself and that might wilt while being transported across state lines.)  Then, she told me she wanted me to have them.  So I took them and enjoyed them all week. (Success.)

Thank you, Dooce

While my situation last week bore no resemblance to Heather Armstrong's (like, I didn't get to go to the White House and then have people crap all over me for it), I totally felt it when she wrote these lines last week:

Some of you, and you know exactly who you are, you can go right ahead and suck it.

I'm a regular Dooce reader, even though I am not a mom and appear to be less cool than the entire Armstrong family, I was totally on board with her standing up to the shit she got for being selected to attend the White House Forum on Workplace Flexibility*.  She made some excellent points in her post "Because it needs to be said," especially when she pointed out the fact that most people - naysayers and supporters alike - wouldn't have known about the Forum if she hadn't announced she was going.  AND it was on a topic that is both interesting and important for a lot of people.  AND I'm glad she drew my attention to it so that I could watch some of the Forum in my office and see that my government actually has an interest in discussing how a lot of people (particularly women) work and live in this country.  Especially since this grad school business prompts a lot of inner wrangling about how to balance work and life both now and in the future.  For a lot of people, the fact that there's a larger conversation going on about this type of issue in our government should be the thing to take note of.  Getting pissy over who actually got invited though, that's just silly.  Because really, a successful small business owner who basically leads her field is going to get invited to the White House before the rest of us slobs any day.  And she seems to know what she's talking about, so I'm good.

And while she'll probably never see this, I'm glad that Heather Armstrong shares her cool adventures, her life, and her humor with the rest of us hanging around the internet.  And I, too, would like to sit down and have a beer or four with her, especially because she would probably be a great help when I need to someone to peer edit my screeds in which I tell others to suck it.



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* And it was an actual government forum, not a fancy code name for Dooce Day at the White House.  It seems Heather Armstrong had to work rather than shop with Michelle, hang out in sweatpants in the Oval Office and shoot the shit with the President, and test drive Marine One to see if she wanted it for her personal use.  It also appears that she wasn't the only person there, but I guess that might be hard to see with tunnel vision.

Seven Sentence Reviews: Behind the Times Edition

I watched a lot of television last week, but wrote very little about it.  I'd like to say I was digesting what I had seen and mulling it over in order to craft intelligent and interesting responses, but that would be a lie.  I'd also like to blame my tardiness on my intensive Easter preparations, but since the holiday was less than 24 hours ago, it seems too soon to make up lies about it.  But now that I'm back, here are my reviews of the reality shows I watched and learned from this week.

16 and Pregnant: Week 7 (Nicole)
New week, new Nicole, whose friends are forcing me to issue the following public service announcement: If I am ever pregnant and at your slumber party and am experiencing discomfort, PLEASE CALL THE HOSPITAL or, at least, LOOK CONCERNED, because I might be watching your ass on MTV someday.  Oh, and if I am like, two seconds away from being someone's mom, please make sure I'm not caught on camera prank-calling prostitutes.  This week, we defied the standard 16 and Pregnant formula of immature father/rapidly maturing mother and went with an immature/immature dynamic with mixed results.  Everything was sort of strange, with both Nicole and Tyler appearing to be both ready for parenthood and far too young to understand what it meant, Nicole's mom being oddly supportive, and Tyler's mom being the only voice of reason (things were getting a little strange with no one having a problem with those two reproducing).  In contrast to last week's pregnant-child-of-a-teenage-parent dynamic that came off as supportive and helpful, this week Tyler's mom Farrah, who had him at 17, was rightfully and fully pissed at her son for most of the episode.  She softened when he went back to school, but the episode made it clear that unlike Nicole's mom, Farrah would not be giving herself over to the baby party and would be the one who was unafraid to set the kids straight on some of the finer points of baby-raising (like how all the adults were sick of having a baby foisted on them in a relatively predictable rotation).  After a hour long game of musical baby, we seemed to realize that babies have bedtimes, need stable homes, and that in this instance, the kids might not be okay.

MTV's 16 and Pregnant - MTV Shows

Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution: Week 3 ("Jamie cooks for Huntington High School")
I am pleased to announce that no British chefs were harmed in the filming of this episode's critical french fry-removal scene.  While continuing to sow the seeds of discontent with Alice over at the elementary school (while also making some very positive changes), Jamie headed off to Huntington High school to see if he could build a rag-tag group of junior chefs who could help him change the food culture for the bigger kids.   After a quick cooking lesson and a few scenes of Jamie listening to the teenagers tell their stories, Jamie asked the Bad News Bears of cooking to help him prepare a fundraising dinner for local dignitaries, a senator, and their parents.  And the kids rose to the occasion, even though there were bumps along the way, which made the show seem far sunnier than it actually is.  While Jamie made significant inroads with the group of kids he surrounded himself with at the high school, it seems as though there's plenty to still be done and that the food guidelines by which he must comply are absolutely ridiculous (not enough veggies in that pasta?  are you kidding me?).  Like I said during the premiere, this show is setting up clear heroes and villains, even though some of those villains are reluctant bureaucrats and workers who are actually just trying to do the jobs they're good at.  The main silver lining to everything, though, was that it was genuinely nice to see teenagers on prime-time television voice valid opinions and be accepted by their community as having something of value to contribute.