Reviews and More

The most recent episode of The New Adventures of Old Christine aired on Monday, April 9 (yes, I’m a little behind in posting recaps). It was called “The Real Thing” and dealt once again with Christine’s feelings for Mr. Harris, Ritchie’s homeroom teacher. Here’s what happened in the episode, which was production number 2×18.

The show opens with Christine giggling over her laptop. Apparently, she’s forwarding an email to her friend Barb as a joke. The original email was from Mr. Harris and just informed the parents about the parking situation at school. Christine went into the original email and changed it around to make it “sexy.” But when she goes to send it, she accidentally hits Reply All, so the doctored email goes to all the parents on Mr. Harris’s mailing list.

Of course, this gets both Christine and Mr. Harris into a lot of trouble with the school. It’s one more embarrassing thing for Christine to deal with as far as the other mothers go, and it causes both her and Mr. Harris to be brought in front of the teacher who handles ethics at the school. Christine explains that it was all a big misunderstanding, and both get off with a warning.

During the meeting, Christine learns that Mr. Harris is seeing someone new. This makes her extremely jealous, but at the same time shows her that it’s time to move on. There’s no sense in holding out for Daniel (I think that’s Mr. Harris’s first name) if he’s decided to date someone else. So Christine agrees to go out with one of Richard’s friends, a contractor named Tom.

Tom takes Christine to a Chinese restaurant, and it happens to be the same place that Daniel is meeting his new girlfriend. While Tom is in the bathroom battling a case of IBS and Daniel’s girlfriend is held up in surgery, Christine and Daniel have time to talk and reconnect. They really enjoy each other’s company, but of course can’t take things any farther. As he’s leaving, Daniel says the only reason he’s going out with someone new is to try to forget about/get over Christine.

My Reaction: I thought this episode was pretty boring. I think they’ve done the Daniel/Christine angle to death already. I mean, I’d rather have her move on and start dating other guys (more opportunities for different types of laugh) than be treated to the same tired jokes about Christine’s stalkerish/pretend relationship with Daniel. And once again, there was nothing about new Christine in this ep, and the other regulars made only minimal appearances. Overall, I thought “The Real Thing” was forgettable, and hope that this series finishes out the season with much stronger eps.

Whenever tax season rolls around, I naturally start looking at ways that I can reduce my liability or increase my refund as much as possible. One option I’ve been considering seriously for the past few months is the possibility of forming an LLC or even a corporation to protect the profits from my various income streams. Towards that end, I’ve been doing research into different companies that can help me if I do decide to move forward with this plan.

I soon discovered that most of the companies out there offer the same basic services, but their prices are vastly different. Of course I’d want to save money on the whole process, which led me straight to IncParadise.com. IncParadise can help you form a corporation or LLC in any state, which is particularly convenient since laws and fees vary a great deal. For example, the steps involved in forming a Delaware corporation aren’t the same as forming an Illinois corporation or a Texas corporation. I only have business holdings in one state, but I can see how IncParadise’s ability to help in any state would be highly attractive to others.

I found the IncParadise website to be very helpful and informative overall, and loved the articles that addressed common questions about corporations and LLCs. I’m going to be talking to my accountant very soon, and at that time I’ll ask him his thoughts about the implications of forming an LLC. If he says it would be a good move, I’ll likely go ahead and do it through IncParadise!

We’re getting down to the stretch run as far as the television season goes, so hopefully viewing schedules will be more stable from here on out. How I Met Your Mother was finally back on Monday night (April 9) with just its second original episode since February 26. The latest was called “Bachelor Party” and dealt with Marshall’s bachelor party as well as Lily’s shower. Here’s what happened on episode number 2×19.

Marshall wants a low-key bachelor party without strippers, so Ted plans something that involves attending a big boxing match and going to a restaurant for steaks afterwards. Barney, however, can’t accept that as a real bachelor party, so he gets a stripper.

Unfortunately, she breaks her ankle during her “act” (which involved a smoke machine and a hippity-hop toy. The guys then have to take her to the hospital and that causes them to miss the fight. Furthermore, the stripper insists on going through with her show, which apparently was really disgusting because none of the guys (save for Barney) can eat their expensive dinner afterwards. To top it all off, Barney failed to extinguish the Cuban cigar he was smoking. That led to a small fire in the hotel room, which in turn led to all the guys getting kicked out. They return home that same night.

Meanwhile, Robin (on Barney’s advice) buys Lily a vibrator as a gag gift for the shower. Of course, Lily didn’t know that the shower was arranged by Lily’s mother and grandmother, meaning that all the women there are at least 50 years old. Robin is horrified at the thought of Lily opening the gift in front of these women, so she tries to swap it out with an identically wrapped package. But Robin eventually comes clean and admits that the gift came from her.

Later on at the bar, Marshall is upset that his bachelor party was such a disaster. He blames Barney and says he’s not even sure he wants Barney to come to the wedding. That’s when Lily jumps in and says the only reason she came back from San Francisco when she did was because Barney flew out there to tell her how much Marshall loved her and how great a couple they were. He also gave her a ticket so she could come home. No one else knew that Barney did that, and of course that changes everything. Marshall decides to make Barney a co-best man, along with Ted.

My Reaction: I didn’t like this episode very much at all. I mean, let’s see here: a bachelor party with stripper jokes and a bridal shower with vibrator jokes. The show’s not exactly breaking new ground here, know what I mean? In fact, I don’t think I laughed out loud even once during this ep. Yes, some parts were a bit amusing (like when Robin was listening to Lily’s grandmother describe her gift), but for the most part, the whole thing seemed rehashed and lame.

Top search engine placement is the key to success for any website, which is why people are willing to spend hundreds or thousands of dollars on SEO services. But most of the time, the SEO tactics webmasters purchase carry no guarantees of success. Wouldn’t it be much easier if you could just use that money to bid for position instead of hoping that other techniques work?

Well, now you can! There’s a powerful new directory out there called Big Web Links that allows you to get top placement just by putting in the highest bid. All the listings are sorted by bid amount, with the top 10 being shown on the homepage and the top 20 on the top links page. This gives you complete control over the placement of your site, which is precisely what most webmasters want. What’s more, the listings are permanent, so you’ll likely get a great ROI in the long run.

Check out Big Web Links today, put your bid in, and watch your site go straight to the top!