After cleaning out my home office and filling up four bags full of old CDs (mostly compilations, soundtracks & CD singles) and VHS tapes to sell, I felt a sense of accomplishment. That was short lived.

Tonight I brought those items to Rasputin, and then applied every cent of the store credit earned from the sale of the CDs and tapes to obtain 7 new DVDs. 

In alphabetical order, here are the latest additions to my collection:

DINER
1982. Directed by Barry Levinson. Starring Kevin Bacon, Ellen Barkin, Tim Daly, Steve Guttenberg, Paul Reiser, Mickey Rourke and Daniel Stern. Classic college, coming-of-age male bonding film.

THE GIFT
2000. Directed by Sam Raimi, co-written by Billy Bob Thornton. Starring Cate Blanchett, Katie Holmes, Greg Kinnear, Keanu Reeves, Giovanni Ribisi and Hilary Swank. Underrated thriller with Blanchett as a psychic. Reeves plays against type and pulls off town creep with great success.

ONCE
2006. Directed and written by John Carney. Starring Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova. From Sundance to the Oscars, this was the little-film-that-could, and last year’s indie darling with the best soundtrack of the year.

POSTCARDS FROM THE EDGE
1990. Directed by Mike Nichols, written by Carrie Fischer. Starring Annette Bening, Richard Dreyfuss, Gene Hackman, Shirley Maclaine, Denis Quaid, Rob Reiner and Meryl Streep. Fischer’s thinly veiled autobiography on the big screen, she was a mess and it made for a very entertaining film.

ROMEO + JULIET
1996. Directed and co-written by Baz Luhrmann. Starring Claire Danes, Brian Dennehy, Leonardo DiCaprio, John Leguizamo, Harold Perrineau (Michael on Lost), Paul Rudd and Paul Sorvino. A very visual and fast paced contemporary adaptation of Shakespeare’s original.

THIRTEEN DAYS
2000. Directed by Roger Donaldson. Starring Kevin Costner, Steven Culp and Bruce Greenwood. Fascinating look at Kennedy and his team during the Cuban missile crisis.

1. Friday Night Lights will now premiere exclusively on DirecTV, months before it airs on NBC
2. Scrubs is tentatively scheduled to move over to ABC
3. Project Runway is moving to Lifetime (NBC Universal owns Bravo; both are claiming foul play)

NBC does not have a reality series goldmine like American Idol or Dancing with the Stars (in terms of ratings, Deal or No Deal is nowhere near as popular as those two) so letting go of these shows seems like an odd move. If Law & Order were my highest rated series, I’d be fighting to save any and all shows with built-in, dedicated fan bases like the ones listed above.

Is NBC going the HBO route? After Six Feet Under, Sex & The City and The Sopranos ended, the cable network offered up less than stellar programming to replace those beloved series’ and none were successful. Then they alienated and angered fans by canceling Deadwood prematurely. And now HBO has postponed all of their popular summer shows (Entourage, etc.) until fall, leaving them to air movies only, with absolutely no original programming.

NBC is facing the loss of ER after next season, one of their longest-running series. Their strongest night and lineup (Thursday) will take a hit with the loss of both Scrubs and ER, and all of NBC’s hopes will be pinned on 30 Rock, The Office and My Name is Earl.

It appears that some network and studio executives are out of touch with their core audiences these days (if it weren’t for the Writers Strike, they still wouldn’t acknowledge online viewers and those ratings). They don’t allow the opportunity for ‘appointment television’ because shows are constantly moved to different nights and time slots. Additionally, there is no time to develop brand loyalty (to a series or a network) because their hooks are too quick; too many new programs are yanked off the air for good after only an episode or two.

I’m not trying to be morbid, but I am attempting to be a little less tightly wound, and adopt a carpe diem attitude. Recent back surgery forced me to contemplate/acknowledge my mortality for the first time, and I have made an effort to become more flexible (emotionally, mentally & physically) as a result. I simply need to relax, enjoy and appreciate life more than I have in the past (and for the future).

I can’t believe that this entire post was inspired by a friend dancing onscreen with Ellen for three seconds, and I’m not sure I even had a point. Oh well. I know that my List of Things To Do Before I Die will be amended and updated shortly and often, because there are far more places I’d like to travel to and events I’d like to attend.

Thanks for reading yet another entry of rambling and lists. Good night!

In a recently announced deal between DirecTV and NBC, the third season of critically acclaimed series Friday Night Lights will air first on the satellite service, and months later on NBC.

Now there is a rumor floating around that Comcast may do the same with CBS, reviving the recently canceled fan-favorite show Jericho.

In my opinion, it isn’t a coincidence that both FNL and Jericho are being resuscitated so soon after the resolution of the Writers Strike. International attention to the digital media distribution of television and film was long overdue, and major networks/studios are only now beginning to research and acknowledge the number of online viewers. NBC and CBS are the first to boldly explore new distribution territory, figuring out ways to save and offset the production costs of beloved shows by licensing them to other mediums such as DirecTV and Comcast. If successful, the life of a series may no longer be determined by conventional ratings alone, giving hope to the cult classics and outrageously underrated shows with smaller yet feverishly dedicated audiences.

As for the amount of time I spend on this hobby…I estimate that I watch three hours per weeknight; either a movie on DVD or television on TiVo/online/iTunes/DVD. On the weekends I tend to watch an additional movie or two, and several episodes of shows I’ve missed.

As for my blogs, I alternate posting entries on both blogs every other night for about an hour each. I am also online for an average of 3-4 hours every night after work, reading news and other blogs, and preparing my own.

What the hell is Twitter? It’s kind of like cyber-stalking, but with permission.

Officially:
Twitter is a service for friends, family and co-workers to communicate
and stay connected through the exchange of quick, frequent answers to
one simple question: What are you doing?

As REM would say, “follow me, don’t follow me.” Your choice.