First of all, I have to say that the new version of The Office has totally won me over, and you know how obsessively in love I am with the BBC version. It's hilariously funny in its own special way. "As a doctor, you wouldn't tell your patient if they had cancer." Hee. I am sure it will be almost immediately cancelled, but it's not like NBC has a whole lot happening in the way of the sitcom, and this one is probably relatively cheap to produce (no yooge stars). Plus, they did stick with Seinfeld. So maybe I'll get lucky and it will stay on.

I am also watching the fourth season of Queer as Folk, which just came out on DVD. It's terrible so far. They did ridiculous things to the opening credits, the "Pussy Posse" plotline is way over the top, Ted's badly dubbed opera singing is the most ludicrous thing I've ever heard, and they still won't let the lesbians have sex. I don't think they had a single sex scene in the third season! Fortunately I have a tape of The L Word, thanks to maya. So next up: lesbian sex.

And speaking of sex, I am still working my way backwards through Sex and the City. I'm almost done with the third season. Not much to say about it at the moment; I'm reading the thread over at Television Without Pity and enjoying the debates about how selfish Carrie is, how she never grew as a person, and which one of her boyfriends was the best. Me, I didn't like Aiden at all, and I hated Alek. But I haven't seen much of Big yet, either, so who knows how I'll feel about that.

I'm also watching American Idol and The Amazing Race, as usual. Unlike my Fantasia-love last season (which comes in a set with my Kelly-love and my shameful Clay-love) I haven't found anyone to really root for this season. I loved Carrie's performance of "Alone," but she hasn't grabbed me other than that. Constantine is growing on me, but really he makes porn faces when he sings. Bo is my pick to win in the office pool, but I don't like him as much as other people seem to. I liked Anwar at the beginning, but he's not doing so great and I think he might even be gone this week. Scott is creepy. Anthony is the poor man's Clay. Vonzell is fabulous, but forgettable for some reason.

I am still irritated that Mario is gone, because way back before the season started, I said that a Latino or Asian guy was going to win it all, and I guarantee you that Mario would have won, and that I would have enjoyed watching him do it.

As for The Amazing Race, most of the teams I liked are gone. (Like the team that went this week.) I like Rob and Amber, but don't want them to win because they're just too smug. Meredith and Gretchen would be easier to root for if they didn't suck at everything. Ron and Kelly are irritating, and if next week's preview is to be believed, Kelly is sort of an awful person. Uchenna and Joyce, especially after the head shaving, are the only team that would make me happy as winners. They have beautiful love, and they deserve it.

Whew! Had no idea I had so much to say about television shows. But on to the movies.

On the plane back from my trip, on my handy dandy individual television screen, I watched the new Bridget Jones movie, as well as Erin Brockovich, which I'd seen before. I forgot how good it was, though. Bridget, eeh. It wasn't as horrible as I'd been led to believe, but it was still pretty bad and contrived. (Let's Darcy and Cleaver fight again! Let's have Bridget humiliate herself again! Let's not show why these two people love each other at all!) I hated the second book more, though, mainly because Hugh Grant does such a great job as Daniel Cleaver.

I also was forced by my romantic comedy love to go see Fever Pitch, which was terribly cute and sweet and all that romantic comedy stuff. Drew Barrymore and Jimmy Fallon were a very smart pairing, right along the lines of Drew and Adam Sandler. But of course, Fever Pitch doesn't have "wedding" in the title, so it isn't the perfect movie. It's still above-average. Next up: another wedding movie with Jennifer Lopez! It doesn't even look good, but as you know, I have a problem.

And speaking of romantic comedies, I finally saw the great Harold and Maude. (This was on an emergency basis, as Ian was appalled that I hadn’t ever seen it.) Of course everyone has seen this film, and everyone knows exactly how brilliant it is, and there's nothing I can really say except I loved it too.

Other recent Netflix included Alfie, The Woodsman, and The Five Obstructions. They were forgettable, flawed, and fascinating, respectively. For once, I have nothing further to say about any of these movies.

And finally, The Best of Youth Parts I and II. This is a pair of Italian movies that have been wildly critically acclaimed, and only four prints exist anywhere in the United States. So we spent six hours on a Saturday sitting in a lovely independent movie theater and watching this movie.

It's like The Godfather, except without the Mafia stuff. Basically a six-hour Italian family epic, enjoyable but certainly nothing spectacular. The first half seems like it might be leading up to some important political or social insight, and the second half is suddenly a Jane Austen book, with idyllic romances everywhere you look.

The bottom line is, there is no reason on earth to watch The Best of Youth in the theater as opposed to watching it on video. The acting is excellent, the story is engrossing, but it certainly doesn't live up to the hype, as far as I am concerned.

And well, I think that's it! I can't believe I've done all this television and movie viewing in the past two weeks. Apparently, I have too much time on my hands.