Saturday, June 25, 2011

Popeye

Oh also, I saw a clip of this story about Popeye the bulldog on a weather channel. The poor thing suffered heat stroke, and I found this page about it. (He's an American bulldog, not an English one. They're different breeds, as we know.)

http://miami.cbslocal.com/2011/06/23/strangers-donate-to-save-heat-stroke-stricken-dog/?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter

I hope he gets into a loving home after all this is over.

Love Bites - Sky High

In other news, I successfully dyed my hair red last month, after going to a salon where there were two stylists that were really experienced. It turns out all-over dying my hair doesn't lift the color enough, so they went back and did foil highlights on throughout, and it finally worked. My roots are starting to show now, and I'll have to decide whether to go back to the salon or try one of those root touch up kits from the store.

Anyway, I also watched the latest Love Bites episode. (I'm skipping episode three, "Keep on Truckin'" because I didn't like it as much. It was very blah, much like the pilot.) So here's what I think of the 4th episode, called "Sky High."

Great news

Woo hoo! New York passed the gay marriage bill! And here I was thinking that all the delay about religious exemptions was going to lead to not getting the votes before the end of the session. I'm very happy for all the couples now that will have equal rights at last.

It's also some positive news I needed, what with Rick Perry beginning his overtures to for a presidential run. It's so sickening. I also recently received a letter from my senator, Kay Bailey Hutchinson, saying she still would not confirm Obama's judicial nominations. So I wrote her another email letter, though I guess it won't make any difference. She's no more likely to change her right-wing ways than Rick Perry, even though they probably hate each other.

At least Obama announced the troop withdrawals from Afghanistan. I know it's not as much as many people want, but it's more than expected. With the public support collapsing, the war shall finally end.

Sunday, June 19, 2011

More Pinkerton

To learn more about Kate Warne, I read "The Expressman and the Detective," the book that Pinkerton wrote earlier than the two tales I read already. Sadly, I found this book much less enjoyable to read. Not only was the Expressman case confusing, but the plot was slow-moving and tiresome.

The thing about Pinkerton is that he's perfectly content to let a case take weeks or months to resolve, while he sends multiple detectives around to shadow suspects and their loved ones. I can't help thinking that Sherlock Holmes, had he been on the case, would have tried to deduce more or engineered some trick to get the secret out of the criminal much more quickly.

Saturday, June 11, 2011

Love Bites - Decent Proposal

Today I watched the 2nd episode of Love Bites, a romantic anthology series on NBC. I didn't actually intend to record it; it just came up as a Tivo recommendation. Anyway, I watched "How to..." and was surprised by how much I liked it, given that I'd heard the pilot got bad reviews. As I understand it, there are only a few recurring characters on Love Bites, including Annie, the blonde restaurant chef who's carrying a baby for her sister and brother-in-law, and Judd, a married tattoo artist played by Greg Grunberg. Other characters are friends of either Annie or Judd, and the stories/events are sometimes tangentially connected to each other.