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It's a weird world out there.

Today started a little strangely.

In my ongoing effort to shield a certain husband of mine from my SportsCenter addiction and statistical / win-loss observation / bracket preparation, I watch ESPN in the mornings at the gym. I don't mind that it repeats, but I do mind when someone "accidentally" changes it from Sports Center to plain ol' ESPN News. BO-RING. Anyway, this morning ESPN was covering the much ballyhooed appearance of Roger Clemens before members of the House committee on steroids in baseball this morning. Somehow, the whiz collection at ESPN managed to create a montage using highlights of Clemens' lawyer talking, George Mitchell delivering the report, any and all follow-up news coverage, and Brian McNamee's lawyer talking. I'd never seen a lawyer highlight before, but there's a first time for everything.

Here's something that's not at all weird - today my Grandma (we call her Gommy) turns 90. I asked her today if she was excited to be getting past 89. Her answer: "Man Alive!" In May she had a stroke - or a series of strokes - and was on the mend for most of the summer. Now, though, she seems mostly recovered and is in good spirits and relatively good health. What a blessing!

We moved in with Gommy in 1984. I know my brother, sister, and I have benefitted from her wisdom, her sharing life lessons regarding not drinking any water if you've been bombed on champagne, and her immesurable contribution to our lives, our projects, and our day-to-day well- being (including and especially the introduction of Apple Jacks to my diet circa 1987). I told her as much today, and I'm grateful that despite the strokes and other health challenges she's faced in the last year, she's seen it through to this day. I wished her as many more as she can handle.

Oh dear.

So I'm going to write about politics here, and I won't make a habit of it. Until recently I've occupied a corner of the fashionable apathetic tent. I do want to comment, though on what I find to be puzzling, and that's all this vitriol directed at John McCain.

It's baffling to me that McCain, whose recent political career contains instances of *gasp!* working with democrats, can't be trusted precisely on those grounds. This is crazy talk. One of the things that has moved me to stand outside of the apathetic tent is the possibility that there will be a candidate on the ballot in November who is thinking in terms of progress, and not entirely ideology. Politics in this country has to be pragmatic to a degree, and that's the lesson of the last sixteen years. Dynastic politics comes with divisive philosophical commitments, cronyism, and other skull-and-bones BS. That thinking has gotten us nowhere - people are still poor, our schools are still suffering, kids can't get the health care they need because costs too much (!), our soldiers can't get the care they need when returning from war, we're still arguing about abortion instead of dealing with the issues at the root of the problem, and so on, and so on.

Here's the thing. No Joe American wins when ideology is driving political choices, either by the administration or party in power or by the factions of people in this country who are similarly motivated. It seems like it's time to start solving problems - from what I can tell, John McCain and Barack Obama (or "Oback Arama" as one reader of this blog mistakenly mentioned one night) are the only candidates who have the sense and credibility to make progress. And it's high time politics in America focuses on some pragmatic mix of philosophy and progress.

What words are next to you?

Susan has tagged me with this meme. I will participate.

Pick up the nearest book of 123 pages or more. No cheating! The nearest book is Magda King's A Guide to Heidegger's Being and Time

Find Page 123. Find the first 5 sentences. Post the next 3 sentences: "The phenomenon of conscience and the new formulation of care prepare the ground for finding the answer to the question, How is it possible for man to understand being? Although Heidegger does not expressly say so, the internal evidence compellingly points to the conclusion that here is the basis from which Division Three would have to start. The immediate function of the long preparatory inquiry, however, is to lead up to the second half of Division Two."

Tag 5 people: The Author; David; Drew. Really, besides Susan I only know a handful of bloggers.

Relief!

First: 207 improv types freeze simultaneously in the great hall of Grand Central Station. Amazing!

After a few weeks in the desert of American Gladiators, Pros vs. Joes, reruns of The Office and The Biggest Loser, LOST has returned. It could not have come at a better time. Last week we recorded Antiques Roadshow in HD.

I was really impressed with Thursday's episode because the writers have managed to move the story forward. Moving the story forward is not the same as answering questions, but in the age of overblown plot-lines and questionable character development being able to advance the plot is an achievement to behold on network television. Lance Reddick asking Hurley "Are they still alive?" cemented the future trajectory of the show. It also managed to give us the specter of a villain, which the show needs. Sorry to those of you opposed to binary oppositions, but a good story needs a villain (or at least an entire cast of characters with questionable morals - cue the Wire).

I am part of a telly-obsessed family, so most of us gathered last night for tapas and LOST deconstruction. The hawkeye - my sister, KK - confirmed that it was Jack's dad in the rocking chair. Cue speculation! This will send a few of us hunting for Christian Shepherd in the next few episodes.

According to AICN, no Jack flashback/forward in sight. Michael is guaranteed to return in the last ep of this short season. Good! Who cares about Jack!?

Also returned (to my great joy): Gordon Ramsay's Kitchen Nightmares on BBCA - it's not as good or as entertaining when bleeped, but the stories are still horrifying. We watched the first episode of Eli Stone, and I thought it was pretty good. The George Michael soundtrack didn't hurt.

Making the old new ... again

In response to my earlier post on Will Okun's approach to the classics, regular reader and commenter SA makes the following observation: One might ask whether we read classic literature in order to affirm specific truths of some kind, or to discover something? If the former, it would make a great deal more sense to offer students some texts which contain the same truths as older texts but do so in language that is intelligible to them. I agree with SA's point that if the task is mere affirmation (i.e., we're trying to teach life lessons here), then the old text isn't necessarily necessary. I wonder though, in response to this point, if discovery and affirmation aren't two sides of the same coin, particularly when teaching older texts.

She continues with a nice turn of phrase: Perhaps, for those teachers finding sleeping students a problem, encouraging students to approach these supposedly "irrelevant" texts more like a sleuth than a slave would keep some students awake in class.

I like the "sleuth" idea a good deal, and find that when we're hunting and happen upon something it's pretty good. I'm trying this out in the first part of my introductory class by re-configuring the way we look at Descartes and Hume. Previously I taught Descartes and Hume in the context of epistemology only, but this semester I'm using a "span" approach to these thinkers, with the aim of talking about the connections between worldview, knowledge, God, and structure.

For example, I'm beginning with Part II of Descartes' Discourse on Method (1637) to try and divine the approach he'll take to the investigations in the Meditations (1641-42). The idea here is that we are able to understand - from the Discourse - more directly the kinds of values that Descartes thinks are important when it comes to the discovery of knowledge. Then we will examine the Meditations (1-3, 6) to see how well his stated values are honored. We'll look at portions of Hume's Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding (1748) - especially sections 2-7 - and see which values Hume emphasizes with respect to knowledge, and see how they emerge in Parts II and V of the Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion (published posthumously in 1779), which is Hume's thoroughgoing attack on monotheism and Natural Theology.

The aim here is for students to see the texts in three ways: first, in terms of philosophical content - these texts form classic answers to the questions "What can we know?" and "What can we know about the existence of God?" Second, they should see and evaluate these texts in terms of their consistency by considering structural questions - are the stated approaches and positions of the earlier works honored and consistently expressed in the later work? Third, they must consider the models and structures offered by Descartes and Hume in terms of their own body of knowledge - what do they value when it comes to epistemological matters? This approach to the text should model the discovery - affirmation continuum that SA discusses above.

This disrupts the order of the textbook I'm using, but that doesn't bother me too much. It seems like at the beginning of every semester I'm thinking of new ways to approach the problem of teaching equivalent classics in my discipline. This is a funny thing, because my teaching (and probably life) mentor has been teaching literature for 35 years, and he starts over every time. I wonder if this problem changes when one is a minister/pastor. Probably not, but I'd be interested to find out.

The tale's in the telling.

The NYT has a special section devoted to the presently-absent Awards Season. Here, you can find Manolha Dargis raving - again - about David Fincher's Zodiac. There's also a little article in the side bar about editing, which I happen to think is pretty interesting and important. Here's the link to the article.

One fascinating thing about the film theory class I took last year was that it demanded I look beyond the content of a story to see how it was being told. I was given the tools to give attention to things like shot composition (tools which bubble to the surface during all episodes of Heroes, when such poorly composited shots are thrown in to save the sinking story) and editing. But I don't think training in film language is necessary to watch well, though. It just gives a little more vocabulary for what we're seeing in action.

Anyway, read about the editors ... and that intrepid fellow who edited The Bourne Supremacy. Cue vomiting!

I liked The Bourne Supremacy, but it made me sick to watch it. And a little worked up.

Making the old new (?)

This morning I found a well-timed little reflection in the NYT. Will Okun (guest-blogging for Nicholas Kristof in the Times) gives an "on the ground" perspective of the usefulness of teaching classics in the urban high school classroom. I'd recommend reading the post, but I'll comment on a couple of points he makes. Here's his opening salvo:

Of course, it is my responsibility as a teacher to engage the students in these classics so they can understand, analyze and appreciate the writings of our greatest thinkers. But I cannot. I have tried strategy after strategy, sought advice upon advice, and still, I am unable to spark sustainable interest in the vast majority of my students. Few students do the readings and even fewer seriously consider the ideas or themes presented in these writings. The class discussions are disgracefully unanimated and the student essays are dull, tedious and impersonal. For most students in my class, the months dedicated to the canons of Western literature are a dreadful waste of time. And yes, I know, this failure is mostly my fault.

Okun continues by explaining that his students are moved by authors that speak more directly to their situation, which by all accounts is determined by ethnicity and economic standing - instead of, say, Hardy (sorry AV) they are motivated by Wright or Angelou. He seems to salvage the class discussions and sleeping students with authors generally marginalized by the canon (although he doesn't say how he makes this transformation ... a miracle!). He all but leaves the classics to the "miracle workers" and runs by a mantra of "if it doesn't motivate student discussion, then why are we teaching it?"

Okun concludes:

The books I hope will foster the students’ love of reading are well written, intelligent, thought-provoking and clearly relevant. If these books produce more response, thought, engagement, learning and other academic results from the students, shouldn’t these writings form the backbone of my literature class? Considering my abilities as a teacher and the personal and academic interests of my students, I believe I am better serving the present and future needs of my students by offering more accessible readings that will hopefully ignite a lifelong passion for reading. After all, isn’t it better to have read and learned, than never to have read at all?

I can sympathize with Okun here, because - believe it or not - making texts relevant to students is something that rings true with every philosophy teacher out there, unless they don't care.

I mean, how do you make epistemology interesting and accessible to the freshman intro student without sticking Descartes in the stove, or giving some discussion about Hume's turban, penchant for backgammon, Kant's precise 3:00 walk, etc. etc.? This may sound like a stupid lesson, but it's one I learned early on last semester - these little trifles are good for a chuckle, but they don't make philosophy any more accessible, and they don't make it any more substantively interesting, either (although we may all pause to wonder in amazement that these trifles remain really important to me).

Also, a lot of what's out there and "relevant" (at least by Okun's lights) in my discipline is potentially too difficult to hand to the introductory student without the requisite background. Part of what makes Franz Fanon or Simone deBeauvoir interesting is the context they're reacting against - to appropriate philosophy for your group or your gender is to say hey, Descartes was wrong and here's where he falls short. I don't get this sense of context from Okun, and missing context is a big problem when it comes to teaching out of books. I guess what I'm puzzled by is Okun's insistence that all one can do is read the classics and teach only old lessons from them. Isn't the fundamental challenge of teaching in the liberal arts and humanities (especially) taking the classics and seeing lessons that fit our world?

There's really no reason to bulldoze your students with the idea that the "seminal texts" are that for a reason and are not to be challenged, and must be taught no matter what. In other words, the CANON (at least in philosophy) might be a dang myth, perpetuated by people who are intimidated by - or can't teach - the "classics." That's a bold statement, but I think we'd do better to think and teach in terms of a continuum, rather than a canon, or an atomistic approach dictated solely by social factors. That's my training though - the teachers who I hope to emulate have approached books - philosophical, historical, literary, or otherwise - in this way.

Anyway, it was a provocative little article.

One Year ... Milestone

Weirdly enough, today is one year since I made my hosting debut at KUVO. Pretty exciting. KUVO has an awesome play list function - you can search for songs or shows that you liked. The shows I've hosted (and AV has planned) are linked to the left.

At least Hurley liked it.

On a tip from a friend, I started looking for reviews of LOST and Philosophy. The amazon customer reviews are nice (my chapter even gets a direct mention). It appears Jorge Garcia - who plays Hurley on the show - likes the mention of his character as exemplifying Mill's Utilitarianism. Hmmm.

So much for that idea ...

We have spent the last week playing the Nintendo Wii with AV's family. I have tennis/bowling elbow. We tried other games, but tennis and bowling were more fun, faster, and captivating to watch (which is weird, I know) than the real thing ... mostly.

In more news about things I like, season five of The Wire starts on Sunday night. I can barely contain myself. We recently worked our way back through seasons three and four, and could not believe the storytelling, craftsmanship (in terms of writing, directing and acting). Even AV, champion of David Milch and Deadwood as the best show on television recanted after seeing these last two seasons. It's like a novel on television, and almost every article out there makes some kind of comparison to Dickens. That's good, because I don't read novels anymore I may as well watch them. Certain circles of mine will be horrified by that statement.

Two articles: The Angriest Man in Television; The Believer - Interview with David Simon (by Nick Hornby). Follow at your own peril, since social realism generally employs bad language.

Susan has indicated her plans to blog about her in-process thesis - I begin the research phase of mine this semester, and so I am interested in bits and pieces here and there. No New Years Resolutions (or erroneously-titled "Long-Term Projects," which faded by June last year) this year - just hopes for health, happiness, and full Intro to Philosophy courses.

Back, Looking

I'm relieved to announce that all that is left is grading. I shouldn't say "all," I guess, because that is pretty much everything. In the last week I finished up an internship, finished up an article on lies and special effects (that I thought wasn't due until next week, but there's nothing like working under pressure, right?), and said goodbye to the 106 students who made it through to the end of the semester.

As a celebration, we saw I Am Legend this afternoon. Some individual decided it would be a good idea to bring his young children to see this film. There is a series of gut-wrenching scenes - even for adults - that made one of the kiddos cry. That poor kid continued whimpering for a little bit, and that little sound of despair set me crying. Fortunately, the family left shortly after that ... and a good thing too. The movie was a little more than intense. Exhibit A: I spent about 75 minutes with my hand over my mouth in an attempt to muffle a scream that I was certain would come out of my mouth at any second. Exhibit B: the woman two seats over who insisted on narrating the film for us at regular speaking volume: "Oh, he must need that specimen for scientific purposes."

Those who know me and tolerate my company know I'm a regular reader of Ken Jennings' blog. After last week's announcement that Alex Trebek suffered a minor heart attack, he wrote this post. Best wishes for a swift recovery, Trebek. Come back soon to continue putting the screws to folks in the studio audience asking you poorly-conceived questions!

There's a lot more in my mind than I can muster the typing strength for, but I hope that the next week or so will return this pasttime to a semi-regular status. I'm looking forward to a spring semester threatened, not by the grading required by 121 students, but by Husserl and Heidegger (and maybe even Levinas and Derrida ... but who knows), preparation for a Master's Thesis, and another go-round with Intro to Philosophy and Logic. At least in the interim, I'm looking forward to a break.

28 On The Way

I turn 28 tomorrow.

Being 27 has been much better - and as a whole much more interesting - than 26 was (as evidenced by this post, made about this time last year). In the last year I've had two things in print, I started a volunteer career in radio (again), I went to my 10 year high school reunion, I saw an unbelievable storm blow in over the Atlantic Ocean while on vacation, I've been able to play volleyball with my usual gusto, and I've made a career teaching (and doing some) philosophy. Good!

I'm grateful for AV, for my friends and family, blessed and lucky to have people of note (GinaOscar! Molly! James! Meagan! Susan! Dave! KentMarilyn! BQP!) in my life, and hopeful that the next year will be just as interesting as the last one. That's not too much to ask, right? Never a dull moment?

Arrived

November has been quiet for a couple of reasons, not the least of which being the massive strain of work I am fighting. Six classes is too much, too exhausting, and too much grading! I have a week off, which is much needed and well-earned.

In other news, you can now find Lost and Philosophy: the Island Has Its Reasons in bookstores everywhere, as of today. A great birthday present (because really, everything that happens within one week on either side of November 26 counts as a birthday present).

Thanksgiving this year will be spent with my folks, brother, and grandma. Always a good spread of food, and of course good company. AV has perfected the brussels sprouts cooking (with bacon and high heat), and they're excellent. While I generally pride myself on being an adventurous eater, one thing (among a few, really) that I cannot abide is turkey. For some reason, I have never liked it. So I make my thanksgiving dinner from side dishes, which are aplenty - the aforementioned brussels sprouts, rice pilaf, jello with fruit in it, rolls, mashed potatoes, stuffing, and - the piece de resistance - green bean casserole.

I'm a real grinch about holidays (and here's a brief explanation of why), but I do love getting together with family and friends to sit around and eat, drink and visit. I love the visiting.

A (very) Tiny Rebuke

At last night's dinner table:

Aunt Pucky: ... Yep, we got our boots kicked!
Niece MK: Pucky, that's sinning. When you talk naughty, you are sinning.
MK's Mommy: Yes MK. That's right. When you talk naughty, you are sinning.
Aunt Pucky: What? I said boots! I didn't say anything naughty! I meant boots like "booty!"

Stage Directions: Niece MK looks at Aunt over her eyebrows (a la George Clooney); Aunt Pucky shuts up and keeps eating.

Great (?) Moments in Teaching

One thing I love about teaching philosophy is the occasional break it takes into narrative. In general, this can be dangerous and it is something I've tried to avoid. In my first semester of teaching, I received a comment on an evaluation that said "teacher tends to babble." After that evaluation, I consciously tried to remove myself and my stories (perhaps what I thought were useful illustrations) from my teaching. Lately - and motivated mainly by exhaustion - these stories have managed to creep back in. I'm not sure of their effectiveness in delivering content, but too bad! It's too late now!

Today I was discussing A.J. Ayer's "Freedom and Necessity." Ayer says that we are responsible for our actions (and have chosen freely) just in case (a) there were options from which we could choose (this elusive notion that "I could have chosen otherwise"), (b) we were not acting under pressure from some neruosis, and (c) we were not being compelled to act by any certain agent. While not all of us act compulsively - Ayer cites the kleptomaniac, who has no choice but to steal - we might be able to recognize points at which our agency (point (c) above) has been made forefit for some reason, and in such cases (c) we may not be held responsible for our actions. In order to illustrate what Ayer is after here, I told a story about my brother and sister.

When Patric(k) was a young feller, he thought once it would be a good idea to take a puff of our neighbor's smoldering cigarette. As he proceeded to take a drag, our sister Kerry walked in the room and caught him smoking the cigarette. For some unknown reason, Kerry determined she suddenly had some leverage. For the next many years anytime Kerry wanted something, she would ask Patrick to take care of it for her, "or else" ... generally under the threat of telling mom and dad that Patrick smoked that cigarette at Jo's. Many is in bold for a reason - I don't think it came to light until Patrick's early adulthood that Kerry had a cigarette over his head for fifteen or so years. In any case, this is an effective demonstration of constraint because Patrick's actions were - at least on Ayer's account - never free, as long as they were motivated by Kerry and the threat of telling. My students got a chuckle out of this story, and so they will be writing a quiz on Friday about Kerry, Patrick, and constrained actions.

Stories are also highly effective when I teach Kant's second articulation of the Categorical Imperative ("act as to treat humanity, whether in your own person or in that of any other, in every case as an end in itself, never only as means"). I always take a survey of how many students have waited tables or worked in retail - these are prime areas where an individual, a rational being with plans, projects, and goals have been used as mere means to someone else's end. In one of my ethics classes on Tuesday, this took a hilarious and unbelievably raucous turn into "what's the worst job you've ever had?" and/or "what's the worst interaction you've had with someone at work?" Some of my students who wait tables for a living educated their peers about their hourly wage ($3.64 an hour) and the consequences of not being tipped and receiving voided salary checks. Another student discussed the day in her job at the airport when a woman whose flight from Aspen was delayed threw her bags over the counter at my student's head.

Besides an extended version of the "what's worse" game ("Being Electrocuted"), Tuesday's class had an interesting unintended consequence of demonstrating why individuals should be respected - why servers should be given tips, why gate agents should be treated kindly, why you should be patient with retail employees, etc. In fact, one of my students said they would never stiff a server again, because now they have a face with the plight. Even if they didn't learn anything about Kant, at least they learned some common decency for folks in the service industry.

I refrained, I should say, from giving the "You treat your professor as mere means when ... " lecture, although I was sorely tempted. Alas, I refrained. We'll see if I can corral the conversation tomorrow.

I am a bandwagoneer.

I have never watched the Rockies with any seriousness, ever. In fact, my fan-ness of baseball links only to those disastrous Mets. In any case, I count myself among the disbelieving class of Colorado residents who finally got behind the Rockies when things started going well. And really, they're playing exciting sports - I like exciting sports.

Interestingly enough, the New York Times has given a burst of Rockies coverage over the last few weeks (for unsurprising reasons). Suddenly, Dan O'Dowd's recruiting and managing paradigm (Denny Neagle, who?) is a good one.

Crazy Jobs I've Had

Here is a list of crazy jobs I've had in my life:

(1) Replacement troops babysitter after my sister sliced her hand open while opening a can of Chef Boyardee. My sister was paid in "combat pay" after that.

(2) Algebra tutor for at least three people. I'm not sure that was such a good idea, but I think some of them passed.

(3) Cashier at "tacos at the mall," serving tacos and churros that rotated for goodness knows how long.

(4) Graduate Assistant in Student Activities, which was a good time EXCEPT for those instances of having to scrape drunken vomit out of the back of a bus with a dustpan. Or having to wipe the drunken vomit off the bathroom wall at the location of the fall formal.

(5) Summer Conferences, at the beck and call of 400 screaming cheerleaders, their coaches, and their camp organizers (who were not informed by any discussions I had with corporate about the apparently dangerous floor I ordered) ... Kristen and Chris, I know you're out there!

HT: Scot McKnight

Week Seven

I am counting weeks.

This weekend I attended a departmental gathering (perhaps one of the most enjoyable of these sorts of things, ever) with my former professors and now colleagues. In particular, it was funny to hear Tom Duggan (the Grand Ole Opry of R's philosophy department) relate a story from one of his first outings as a Jesuit Scholastic, which involved scaring the living crap out of a study hall full of freshman boys. And one of the freshman boys in this story is the father of one of my former classmates and acquaintances. This acquaintance of mine won the venerable "Mr. Regis" competition by stuffing 78 grapes in his mouth, which I - in my co-hosting Vanna White get up (an old prom dress) - had to catch as they came out of his mouth in a hail of spit and grape juice. Memories. Pretty entertaining, if I do say so myself.

Speaking of memories, AV and I are s-l-o-w-l-y making our way through The War. We just finished the second episode last night, and one thing I found myself enjoying immensely was the color photographs and color film, particularly of Tunisia. It's a habit of students of history to imagine things in black and white (or in bland half-color, thank you Steven Spielberg*), thanks to newsreel images. It's a surprise and a kind of visual shock to see events of WWII recorded in color. We are still with last week's observations about all the foley work (Crash! Bang! Boom! Explode three times for effect!). But, the stories are still good and riveting, and I even teared up a little bit when I saw Rosie burning holes in airplane parts. Women's lib, man!

*The notable exception is Terrence Malick's The Thin Red Line (1998), which is in full color and features a pre-JC Jim Caveziel in a heartbreaking role. It's Malick, so it's poetry and amazing, but I'm not sure if it aspires to be the historical document that Saving Private Ryan (also 1998) does.

In other news, I had "the talk" with one of my classes about the persistent text messaging. One of our class meetings last week was an absolute zoo - people were talking, texting (you know, as if I can't see what you're doing), sleeping, the whole works. It's exhausting to try and teach in those conditions, because it's so damned distracting. I told my students as much this afternoon, and as I was giving the talk I'm pretty sure that one of the students was sending a text message. AV and I had an enjoyable conversation with another teacher this weekend, and she suggested a kind of in-school scrambler for cell phone signals. It's like the TV-B-Gone but for beleaguered teachers. A battle I'll never win, I guess.

I'm planning to spend at least part of the evening watching the ROCKIES hopefully pull out one of the most exciting playoff chases in recent memory. I need something to distract me from the a-miserable Mets' catastrophic collapse yesterday. This picture, which was on the front of this morning's NY Times, really is worth a thousand words:

PHOTO: JOHN DUNN - NEW YORK TIMES

Story ... Straining

Behold the appearance of Beardy MacJugface!

Just when I thought it couldn't get any worse, Heroes manages to get worse. The insistence on adding more characters is really a bad move, because in trying to keep up with them all we learn absolutely nothing in terms of plot advancement. Either they get rid of half the characters or they fire the writers who can't hold the story together. Also, what was up with that totally belabored (and belaboring of the nothing that followed) sequence of shots around the Bennett/Butler dinner table? What the heck was the point of that? Oh man.

I've said it before, but one of the reasons LOST is so much more conceptually successful is that they pick a character and tell that story for the ep. I'm with the slow-moving, no-end-in-sight problems that plague LOST, but they're nowhere near as bad as the monster that is Heroes.

I will keep watching, I will continue holding my poor spouse hostage for 40 minutes once each week to determine where the train wreck will go next ... and hopefully I'll have the dander to keep blogging about it. Because if blogs are useful for anything, they're tailor-made for groundless rants about television shows.