Reviews and More

One of my younger cousins is a sophomore in college, and he is an active member of the Beta Theta Pi fraternity. As with most students who embrace greek life on campus, he just loves everything about his fraternity. All he ever talks about anymore is his brothers, their house, and of course their parties! Plus, his wardrobe has been completely transformed: it seems that all he owns now are greek shirts, hats, and jackets with his fraternity’s letters on them.

I can totally understand where my cousin is coming from. Although I never joined a sorority in school, I did play sports and I always wore team t-shirts and jackets wherever I went. So instead of giving my cousin a hard time like others in my family are doing, I think I’ll buy him a couple of extra shirts instead!!

Prison Break’s sixteenth episode of its second season is called “Chicago”. Here’s what happened to our favorite cons in the latest installment.

Michael/Linc/Kellerman/Sara: Yep, you read that correctly: Sara has finally hooked up with the guys again. Of course she was more than a little dismayed to see that Michael and Lincoln are working with Kellerman, so she tells Michael about that bathtub incident where Paul tried to kill her. That doesn’t sit well with Michael, and he makes his feelings known to Kellerman.

The gang has a look at the key that Sara found by her father’s body. Kellerman recognizes it right away: it’s a key to a private cigar club in Chicago. So they hop on a train in Evansville, Indiana and prepare for the 5-hour ride.

During this time, Kellerman gets phone calls from Caroline urging him to meet up with her and to bring Michael and Lincoln with him. Once Caroline sees the brothers, she will do everything in her power to make things “normal” between her and Kellerman again. Later on, however, we discover that it’s not really Caroline calling Kellerman at all. It’s one of Kim’s flunkeys using a voice synthesizer. Fortunately, Kellerman figures it out and obviously doesn’t reveal anything regarding their plans.

T-Bag/Hollander Family: T-Bag is still determined to make the Hollanders accept him as part of their family — despite the fact that he has to tie them up (again, how does he do this with one hand?) before they sleep and that he has to carry a gun or knife at all times. Anyway, after entertaining a visitor in the Hollander home for a good, long time, T-Bag decides that they can’t stay there. So he orders everyone to pack up, and they drive off.

Mahone/Bellick: Oy, why is Bellick still around? Am I the only one who can’t stand this guy? Mahone gets him out of prison on condition that Bellick help him track down the remaining cons by working “under the radar”. Bellick’s first lead is a Haywire sighting, so he goes off to Wisconsin to track him down. When Bellick finds him, Haywire takes off running and ends up on trop of a grain elevator, where he stays until Mahone arrives. Mahone goes up there presumably to talk him down, but actually talks him into jumping. Bye bye, Haywire. RIP.

C-Note: He and his daughter were in a Minnesota diner when some drug addict comes walking in and sticks the place up. C-Note can see the guy poses a real danger, so he steps in to help the robbery proceed in as orderly a manner as possible. He even talks the gunman into letting him and his daughter leave before the cops arrive, but turns back when he sees the guy grab a waitress (obviously with the intent to rape/kill her). C-Note disarms the would-be robber, then escapes through the back door with the help of the grateful waitress.

My Reaction: I don’t know, I’m still not feeling the Prison Break love. It just seems like it takes soooo long for anything to happen on this show. I mean, can Michael and Co. do a single thing without having the cops on their trail before the end of the episode? I know they’re fugitives with APBs out all over the place, but geez… it makes every single ep drag on and on. The whole show was about them moving from Point A to Point B yet again. I’d like to see the action speed up considerably.

And I really, really can’t stand Bellick (though I do have to admit that the scene of him practicing how to flash his badge was pretty funny). But it looks like he’s going to be around for awhile, so I guess I have to deal with him.

The only thing I liked about this episode was the fact that Michael and Sara were able to talk a bit and share their feelings. Other than that, it didn’t feel like any other plot point moved forward.

I’ve been fortunate enough to vacation in some lovely destinations in my lifetime, but perhaps none have been as memorable on a personal level than Italy. Back in 2000, my husband and I spent a week in Rome, and I’ll never forget all the great sights I took in: Michelangelo’s Pieta in St. Peter’s, the Colosseum, the Sistine Chapel, the final resting places of Keats and Shelley, the catacombs, etc. It was an amazing time!

I would give anything to go back to Italy sometime soon. Instead of hitting the tourist spots, however, I would go to some of the lesser-known places. For example, I’m interested in visiting the seaside town of Calabria. It’s located right in the “toe” of Italy’s boot shape, and from the pictures I’ve seen of property in Calabria, it looks like a very charming place that would offer me an entirely different experience in Italy.

I’m still hopeful that we’ll make it back to Italy someday. After all, I did throw some coins into the Trevi fountain before we left!

This week’s episode of 24 takes place between 12:00 PM - 1:00PM (I only know because I’m looking at the TV Guide description right in front of me). Anyway, as is usual with 24, the action picks up right where we left off last week, so let’s get started on the recap.

Jack/Graem/Phillip: Graem orders his henchmen to dispose of Jack and his father, then he drives away to presumably continue with his evil master plan. Jack and Phillip are handcuffed in the back of a van and are driven to a remote site where there’s a large hole in the ground just waiting to receive their bodies. And there’s a cement truck looming in the foreground as well.

But there’s no way anything serious would happen to Jack this early in the series. He and his father manage to overpower the bad guys and escape. Jack promptly calls Bill and tells him to set up a world-famous CTU “perimeter” around his brother’s house. The perimeter actually works this time, and Jack storms in with the rest of the agents in order to capture Graem.

Graem’s not talking, so the only thing left to do is resort to torture. Under the influence of some kind of pain-inducing drug, Graem reveals that he was the one who ordered David Palmer, Tony, and Michelle killed, and who tried to set up Jack to take the fall. Jack is stunned by this info, and Phillip also seems to be watching intently.

At the very end of the episode we see the reason for Papa Bauer’s interest: he was in on everything with Graem. But he’s afraid that Graem won’t be able to stand up to more torture at CTU, so Phillip goes ahead and kills him on the spot.

CTU: Speaking of CTU, Milo, Chloe, Morris, Bill, and the rest of the gang got a little more accomplished in this episode. Specifically, they picked up some “chatter” that turned out to be a cell phone call between McCarthy and Fayed. The voices were positively identified, and the gist of the conversation was that McCarthy found an engineer capable of rewiring the nuclear trigger devices — but the engineer must be coerced into working for Fayed. McCarthy transmits a photo and CV, which CTU intercepts. After piecing together the corrupted file, they see that the engineer in question is Morris.

Too bad he left CTU just minutes before after getting a bogus report that his brother was injured in the bomb blast and is in critical condition. The last we see of Morris, he’s being dragged away from his car by McCarthy and his girlfriend.

White House Bunker: Tom Lennox tries to move forward with his plan to get President Palmer to enact mandates that would waive numerous basic civil liberties in this time of crisis. That sits well with the VP (didn’t catch his name), but in the end (after talking to his sister Sandra), the President doesn’t go for it.

My Reaction: I thought this was a much stronger episode than last week. I was able to guess the Morris reveal because I figured it would be someone already connected to the story (i.e. not an entirely new character) and we know what kind of background he has. Actually, it was between him and Milo in my mind, but as soon as Morris got the notice about his brother and asked with that quizzical look, “What was he doing in Valencia?” I knew it was him.

The other big reveal of the evening, of course, was Phillip being even more evil than Graem. I didn’t predict this one until Phillip said he wanted 5 minutes alone with his son. That tipped me off because on 24, characters never seem to come out of those private meetings unscathed.

Anyway, I thought this episode moved the plot along nicely. I hope we see more Fayed next time, and I don’t know about you, but I’m ready for many more action scenes. Those have been a bit lacking this season….

I’ve had this Reviews and More blog since September, and in six months I saw my Google Page Rank improve from a 0 to a 4. I know that a lot of people might scoff at that number and say that six months is way too long to wait for that kind of improvement, but I’m actually very proud of how that worked out.

I have to admit that I never paid much attention to PR rankings until a few months ago, but now that I know how important those numbers are to my site, I’m doing everything I can to at least maintain (and hopefully increase) my current rank. For example, I’m really paying attention to link popularity now and am trying to make sure that my links appear on quality websites. I might not know all the tips and tricks that real SEO pros recommend, but I still must be doing something right!

I posted a review of the UseNeXT Usenet access service a few days ago. In my review, I complained that the search function doesn’t always turn up the right files, even when they are available on the server.

Well, a couple of readers have written in to tell me about an easy fix. UseNeXT apparently supports nzb files (sorry, I don’t know what that means), so all you have to do is go to a site that offers free nzb downloads and import the nzb into UseNeXT. You’ll then see the entire filegroup associated with that nzb without having to rely on the search function.

So, all you have to do is Google “free nzb downloads” and take it from there. Good luck!

I’m not a fan of those expensive video game systems like PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, or Nintendo Wii. I find that most of the software titles available for those systems are way too complicated for me to play (I like games that I can understand instantly) and most of the other gamers I meet take things way too seriously. I’m more about the casual gaming scene where people just get together for fun and some friendly competition.

Recently, I heard about a site called Cafe.com that seems to be exactly what I want in a gaming site. Cafe.com offers several free arcade-style games that I can play against other people on the site. This is much better than other websites that only offer games with AI opponents. In addition, I can create my own avatar, which can then be personalized in lots of different ways. This is a feature that definitely makes the whole experience much more fun!

It’s easy to get started playing all the free games at Cafe.com. All you have to do is create a free account, then click on the game you want to play. If it’s your first time to the site, you’ll be asked to install the Cafe.com client that actually allows you to play the games. Then you can either join a room or create your own room to start playing. Simple!

I just got done watching episode 2×14 of How I Met Your Mother. It’s called “Monday Night Football” and shows how the gang tries to avoid hearing any news of the Super Bowl until they can sit down and watch it together.

The episode opens with Ted, Barney, Robin, Lily, and Marshall sitting at the bar planning their annual Super Bowl party. Everyone’s excited about the prospect of eating chicken wings, drinking beer, watching the game (or the commercials), and, in Barney’s case, betting on every conceivable occurrence associated with the event. However, their plans suddenly get derailed when they’re informed that they have to go to the funeral of someone named Mike (or Mark, or Matt — I can’t remember and neither could they!).

Ted is upset at the prospect of not being able to go through with the tradition this year, so he makes everyone agree that they won’t find out anything about the game until Monday night (18 hours away) when they can watch the game together. That leads to various comic moments: Barney has to handcuff himself to Ted’s radiator to keep out of the way of temptation; Marshall starts getting extorted by one of the kids in Lily’s class; Robin has to try to make it through a newscast without hearing the sports segment; and Ted has to work from home to avoid contact with the outside world.

I thought this was a decent episode. There were some good laughs, like when Ted put on his makeshift sensory deprivation gear so he could go pick up the chicken wings. But overall, it wasn’t one of the best I’ve seen. (P.S. There was also a cameo by Emmitt Smith, but it wasn’t anything special IMO.)