Boob Tube: The Weaning

As of a few weeks ago, I am no longer a nursing mother. I've heard quite a few woman say that ceasing to breastfeed their sprouts was a source of great sadness and melancholy; they miss the quiet bond, the togetherness. Harvey's daycare provider told me she cried the day her younger son decided he was done.

I'm sad for a different reason — now that I'm not awake for an hour or so every night, I have no idea how to manage all the television shows I've recorded on the old TiFaux. I've lost seven-plus hours of weekly TV that I either have to make up during waking hours (which, no) or just do without. Hence, my own weaning process as I go through the backlog of series recordings. What stays? What goes? I'm saying, it's an issue. And with two female-centric favorites starting back up tomorrow — Nurse Jackie and The United States of Tara — I've got to decide fast. So, on to the list.

Kell on Earth: Stays, obviously. I look forward to this show every week, and it has yet to disappoint. Where else am I going to watch a crazy woman freak out on her employees and then lean across her desk to say, "Let's not be afraid of the abundance we've created"? I mean, apart from going back in time 10 years and hanging out with my old boss?

House: It's become formulaic enough that it's begun mocking its own formula, but I don't care. Stays.




Parenthood: This is a tough one. I like family dramas about quirky people with pressing first-world problems as much as the next thirtysomething white lady (see also: Grey's Anatomy), but so far I'm underwhelmed. The main thing that's kept me watching so far is the fact that it's set in Berkeley and Oakland, so there's sometimes a glimpse of recognizable scenery, like Oscar's in the first episode. That's not really enough. Goes.

Life Unexpected: Same deal as Parenthood, except this one is set in Portland and is supposedly kind of Gilmore Girls-esque. Honestly, I don't remember anything about either episode I watched, so there's my answer.

Shear Genius: Project Runway, but with hair, in case you're unfamiliar with the premise. This is one of those shows that I started watching sometime during the delirium of a multi-month stretch where the kid was waking up to eat an average of twice a night, and I would wake up in the morning never quite sure if I had maybe just hallucinated the whole show. Did the contestants really have to style hair inspired by food? Did someone really just make reference to a cock ring? Why is everyone wearing leather pants? Who watches this? Yeah, it goes.

FlashForward: The first few episodes of this were so gripping that I was totally cool with being awakened twice in one night by a hungry, squalling baby. And then it had some sort of hiatus and I forgot about it and I watched a little bit the other night and one of the Hobbits was murdering Ricky Jay. Clearly, I've missed a lot. So bye, FlashForward; I'll catch up with you later on Netflix.

Modern Family: Stays, especially as I feel that I have much to learn from the parenting stylings of Mitchell and Cameron. I'm not even done relating to the whole Ferberizing episode.













Cougar Town: Surprisingly, stays, although I have convinced myself that I'm watching it "for work" and have yet to write about any aspect of it.

Parks and Recreation, 30 Rock: Usually the highlight of my week, and I'm not even talking about just the TV aspect of my week. I should probably be a lot more embarrassed by this.

Project Runway: Stays. Models of the Runway: Goes.

Grey's Anatomy: Feh. Goes.

The Late Show with Craig Ferguson: Sigh. The problem here is that is just doesn't feel right to watch this show during any time of day that doesn't qualify as wee hours. I haven't been following the whole late-night debacle lately, but I'd be psyched if they put Craig where Jay Leno used to be. I don't think he'll tank. Not with those hand puppets.

Any TLC or A&E show about compulsive hoarders: Should probably go, as it's time to own up to the fact that my guilty pleasure is not any of the shows previously listed. No, my most furtive hours of TV-watching involve people who cannot stop filling their homes with crap, sometimes literally. I decided I'd had enough when one episode of Hoarders featured a woman who watched as a cleanup crew wearing Hazmat gear unearthed one squashed, flat cat after another, and was all, "Huh, how did that get there?" And yet I've continued to record them. Maybe it's aversion therapy: The more I watch people reduced to cooking their dinners in the two square feet not taken up by wads of tinfoil and mountains of empty detergent containers, the more compelled I am to actually recycle my own piles of magazines.



(Not my house.)






Keeping Up With the Kardashians: Wait, really? How did that get there? Now I am embarrassed.

Boob Tube: Kell on Earth kept me awake

Harvey woke up to eat not once, not twice, but three times last night/this morning. The only upside, as ever, to this was that I got to see the new episode of Kell on Earth in its entirety. And then I couldn't get back to sleep because once I was able to tell the two Stephanies apart (the short morose blonde is on top of her shit; the tall morose blonde looks like Busy Phillips and is unable to close her mouth completely), I went on to be confused by a number of things.

Like: Okay, many of Kelly Cutrone's employees clearly don't know what the hell they're supposed to be doing, and when you take an employee who doesn't know what the hell she's doing and have her delegate the many things she doesn't know how to do to interns, it's obviously going to be a massive clusterfuck. And so when Kelly blew up at her interns over the fact that they couldn't assemble a simple gift bag, I got it. I mean, it's common sense — you give away a gift bag, it should look nice and not be covered in Sharpie scrawl.

However. After Kelly loses her shit at the interns, there are several scenes of her hanging with the Irish intern and chatting with his mother on the phone, telling her what a great job he's doing, and also talking with Disaster Stephanie. And, I don't know, wouldn't it be a better use of her time, instead of being all Mama Wolf with her employees and interns and buttering up their parents, to actually train them? (Or, if Irish kid was responsible for the horrifying "Fincial District" legend on one of the gift bags, to teach them to spell?)

Also, really, having never worked in fashion PR I know I’m being a little presumptuous, but how difficult is it to ensure that people have RSVPd to your fashion show and keep the seating order sorted? Is it really cause for the Defcon 1 levels of chaos around that office? Or is everything made exponentially worse by the fact that it’s summer in that overpacked office and they can’t use the air conditioning because it interferes with the sound quality and Kelly, for some reason, is alternating her screaming jags with bouts of incense-burning hippie intensity?

Also? The word "jeggings." Second only to "shooties" in fashion lingo that makes me want to wear nothing but mom jeans and beefy Ts for the rest of my life in protest.

I don’t know. But I will say that I love Kelly's assistant Andrew. If you close your eyes and listen to him talk, you could easily mistake him for Santino of Project Runway season 2. I keep expecting him to burst into a round of "Lighten Up, It's Just Fashion!" In fact, I really hope that happens.