Pilot Palooza - The Premise

My friend Vicki recently said, "I don't know why people don't just watch what you tell them to watch. You have excellent taste in television."  You guys, she isn't wrong.  That's not to say that I don't watch bad shows because I do.  But I only ever recommend that people watch things I believe they'll genuinely love based on their own sensibilities and I have a very high success rate with these recommendations. Have I ever recommended that someone watch One Tree Hill?  Yes.  But I recommended it to people who enjoy bad, soapy melodramas as much as I do and they did, in fact, like it.  I don't go around telling everyone they should watch One Tree Hill though, that would be ridiculous.  

I do go around telling everyone they should watch Friday Night Lights and to-date I've convinced 12 people all of whom have loved it unabashedly and have gone on to convince others to watch it as well.  FNL's universal appeal is the exception, not the rule. 

Recently, I've had a run of success convincing people to take my advice and learn to love shows they should have been loving all along.  My friend Mike is one of my pet projects.  After turning him on to FNL, Gossip Girl, and The Vampire Diaries, he agreed to catch up with some old shows that would help him develop a better appreciation for the great shows of the past and better understand half of the references I make.  He's nearly finished with The O.C. and now it's time to pick his next adventure.  There are too many good ones to choose from so I was having a hard time figuring out what should be next.  That's how we came up with Pilot Palooza. 

This Saturday we will spend the entire day viewing the pilot episodes of the shows I've determined he's most likely to love.  I've put them in a specific order taking into account the duration of the series (the longer the series, the harder it'll be for him to get through it since he's kind of slow) and the likelihood of him choosing it to be his next adventure.  Most of them were chosen by me, some of them were added to the list at his request.

The Schedule
Veronica Mars
Everwood
Greek
Life As We Know It
Joan Of Arcadia
Felicity
Gilmore Girls
Buffy The Vampire Slayer

He's a smoker so we end up taking frequent breaks which means that while I could watch these 8 pilots in just over 6 hours, it may take Mike all day.  Like I said - slow.  However, if he's unable to make a choice based on the pilots alone, and we have adequate time, we will narrow it down and watch an additional episode of his top choices. 

Come back here on Saturday and find out how this project is going or follow us on Twitter (@PhantomRat and @miaz169) for the random thoughts as they occur to us.  And if you'd like to suggest other shows that you feel I've overlooked, I'm already preparing for Pilot Palooza II, leave a recommendation in the comments. 

How I Spent My Summer Vacation, Part 3

California, Day 2:

I took the girls and Tyler to Malibu where it was ridiculously cold and overcast. I thought for sure it would rain on us but it never did.

Anyway, the weather didn't deter us from hitting Zuma. Tyler played with his fancy camera and the girls actually played in the water because when you're from Michigan you take any opportunity to play in the ocean even if it's freezing.

I sat on the beach shivering and getting sun burnt (I hate my skin) and eventually the kids joined me in sitting on the beach and shivering and the girls attempted to get sun with me but apparently only pasty people can get color when it's cloudy.

At some point we could stand the cold no longer so we piled back into the car and stalked some star-homes while we waited for it to be dinner time.

The blue one is Adam Sandler's.

Goldie Hawn and Kurt Russell's.

And of course, Matthew McConaughey's.

We also saw Courtney Cox and David Arquette's Malibu pad but it was harder than hell to get a picture of that while flying by on the PCH. There were others too but by now I've forgotten who the other garage doors belong to.

We then had dinner at Neptune's Net - delicious food but the very definition of a dive. The girls were wary to say the least. Especially after Meg went to use the restroom and reported back that it was a porta-potty with a spigot outside that you got water out of via an algae-covered foot pump to wash your hands. But then they saw that it was Zagat rated and that both Rachel Ray and Adam Sandler (wearing one of their shirts on the cover of Parade Magazine) had eaten there and they agreed to try it. Both were very impressed with the grub.

The girls had originally wanted to get sunset pictures at the beach so we were going to try and hang around Malibu until sunset but it because quite clear that the sunset would not be spectacular if the clouds were so thick we could never see the sun in the first place. So instead they requested we take the extra-long way home through Thousand Oaks and try to locate the home of Zac Efron. Turns out that Thousand Oaks is a gorgeous community and the drive up there from Malibu was spectacular. I don't think that condo is where Zac Efron really lives (I could be wrong though), but it was a really pleasant jaunt none-the-less.

California, Day 3:

We had big plans to pick Chase up from summer school and then head for Venice Beach and Hollywood. While we waited for summer school to let out, Lisa and Meg and I swung by Taylor Lautner's house where he was sadly NOT mowing the lawn with his shirt off. Oh well. We all decided that Chase should get a job as the Lautner family's house boy since they live a mere mile or so from him.

Once he got out of school we grabbed some food and headed toward the beach but no sooner were we clear of Santa Clarita than Lisa (who has epilepsy) had a seizure in the car. We pulled off the freeway for a bit until the seizure stopped then turned around and headed back to my Aunt's. Lisa was fine but her seizures take a lot out of her so she needed to rest. Chase and I ran to the store for some emergency staying-home supplies (my aunt doesn't keep any good snacks around, and we needed DVDs) then Meg and Chase hung by the pool for a while and I stayed with Lisa and eventually all 5 of us wound up on the couch enjoying a Big Bang Theory marathon.

We took a break after dinner to go get some Santa Clarita sunset pictures and some ice cream before resuming our marathon.

California, Day 4:

We were supposed to head home early on Saturday and stop at the outlet mall for some shopping on the way but Lisa, Meg and Chase were all way too excited for Venice Beach for me to deny them so we adjusted our plans and spent Saturday doing what we were going to do on Friday.

We drove down Hollywood Blvd. but nothing was open (at 9:30am on a Saturday...what the hell Hollywood?) and the kids said they'd rather star-stalk then do the walk of fame anyway so we busted out the map and hit the hills (Hollywood, Beverly and then Bell Air).

It probably sounds hopelessly dorky but it really is hilarious and fun to drive around neighborhoods looking for stars' homes with people who get crazy excited any time they see something like, say, a car in the driveway with it's door open (Tim McGraw and Faith Hill's house), someone in a suit behind the gate walking to the car (Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes' house), or even an open mailbox (Courtney Cox and David Arquette's house).

Anyway, Lisa wanted to see as many of the Friends' houses as we could so we hunted down Courtney's first. We were surprised to see someone had left the mailbox opened but we were careful to go no where near it ourselves. I don't mind stalking but I'm not breaking any federal laws. Then I agreed to go to the edge of the property and snatch a couple of pebbles from their front yard for Lisa. I'm hard-core.

Then we saw Jennifer Aniston's house.

And the building that Matthew Perry's condo is in. I briefly considered tweeting him to let him know we were downstairs and could he buzz us up. I didn't mention that to the girls because they would have stollen my phone and gone through with the plan and we'd all be in jail now.

There were tons more that we saw but the only one I can recall well enough to match the picture to it is Mark Wahlberg's house.

Oh, we also saw the house Michael Jackson died in again. Lisa was a huge fan of MJ so we parked down the block and walked over for her to get a picture in front of it. She also got a couple of pics through the gate of the courtyard (really pretty). She brushed the tree-debris off the security box, picked a fallen leaf up off the driveway as an souvenir and then we headed for the beach.

It's been YEARS since I went to the Venice boardwalk on a weekend and sweet Jesus in a feather boa was it packed! Even on a slow Wednesday I hate Venice Beach. The combination of too many visits, my advanced age and the corresponding drop in interest of people being strange to get attention, and my lack of interest in cheap tchotchkas combine to make it of exactly no interest to me whatsoever. But teenagers freaking love it and Meg, Chase and Lisa are no exception.

The three of them bought an ass-load of cheap crap, stared in wonder and amazement at the assorted dipshits, and generally enjoyed the hell out of the Venice Beach boardwalk.

We stayed down there a lot longer than I'd planned and didn't manage to get Chase home and get us on the road home until after 6:00 so we weren't home until nearly 2:00am. Lisa slept most of the car ride home but Meg and I kept each other entertained as usual. At least until around Quartzite when Meg succumbed to exhaustion and sacked out for a couple of hours. Then I used candy (sugar high!) and a particularly fun iPod playlist that the girls had vetoed previously on the grounds that they didn't know any of the songs to keep myself awake the rest of the way home.

Finally back in Arizona, Tibby and I smothered each other with smooches then tucked ourselves into bed and slept like babies.

How I Spent My Summer Vacation, Part 2

Road Trip

The girls LOVE a road trip so there was oodles of singing, laughing, goofing, and picture taking in the car on the way to California. A lot of the laughing was at my expense on account of my sudden stupidness. All of that was well deserved.

For some reason, Megan has always been fascinated by the windmills that you pass in the desert between Indio and Palm Springs. Lisa also found them pretty entertaining.

California, Day One

Our first California day was pretty much for me. I always wanted to take a studio tour and so that's just what we did. We went on the Warner Bros. VIP Studio tour and had maybe the most fun I've ever had on this continent.

For all of my fellow Pretty Little Liars fans, I got a good look at Spencer's house, Aria's house, the high school and City Hall.

Turns out a lot of the sets in PLL are recycled pieces of Gilmore Girls' Stars Hollow. Luke's is now the Rosewood Grill (or whatever they call it). And Spencer totally lives in Rory and Lorelai's old house.

The town square no longer has the gazebo up, but I did stand it it with my eyes closed and picture the gazebo there. Because that's just the kind of huge dork I am. Oh, and Miss Patty's is still there and still just Miss Patty's. They have not re-appropriated that yet. Thank God.

Around the corner from Stars Hollow was Chicago and the El Station that everyone in the history of E.R. found themselves arriving at or departing from.

And down the street the New York subway...

Central Park...

The Big City...

China Town...

And suburbia.

From the back lot we headed over to the front lot where we got to go onto The Big Bang Theory's sound stage. That was a particular highlight for Megan and I. We saw the out of order elevator (the greatest inanimate object on television today, I think), the roof set from the final episode of the third season, the lobby set, and the take-out menus on Leonard and Sheldon's fridge, but pretty much everything else was all covered in plastic so as not to get dusty during the hiatus. The girls and I did manage to surreptitiously walk "into" the boys' apartment when our guide wasn't looking though. We're so bad-ass!

We weren't aloud to bring cameras into the sound stage with us so no pictures of any of this awesomeness. Or the awesomeness of the "museum" where we got to see clothes and props from many of our favorite shows and movies. You weren't supposed to touch but I'm a rebel so I managed to "brush up against" clothes worn by Simon Baker in The Mentalist, Zachary Levi on Chuck, Heath Ledger in The Dark Knight and both Jared Padalecki and Jensen Ackles on Supernatural. I pretty much brushed up against anything that anyone hot ever purportedly had on their body. Don't judge me.

From there we headed to the garage where we looked at cars which totally all work - seriously, someone could actually drive that Batmobile to the store for some ice cream! I was mostly excited about the Nerd Herd car because, you know, Chuck!

Oh, that's also where we took a ridiculous green screen picture that was then superimposed with a background from Harry Potter. I don't watch (or read) Harry Potter so this one seemed extra silly to me.

Finally, we visited the Prop Department where they have a room that they have dedicated to keeping the set of Central Perk (Friends) preserved for posterity. Turns out that Friends is Lisa's all-time favorite television show so when we walked into that room she about fainted with joy.

Our tour guide was a total doll and he was particularly fond of the girls and I since we were the only ones in our group who appeared to be excited by the things we were seeing. Also I was the only one who could answer all of his trivia questions because I'm apparently the only person on that tour who watches obscene amounts of television. Whatever - paid off for us because he let us get a little more up-close and personal with the Central Perk set than he was technically supposed to, but I'm not going to post those pictures (he specifically asked me not to) or tell you his name because I wouldn't want him to get in trouble for being awesome. Instead, I'll just show you Lisa's second best moment in that room...

As our tour was ending and we were on our way back to the WB Gift Shop both girls told me that it was one of the best days of their lives. We all got souvenirs and then Lisa gave Bugs a big hug and we went in search of lunch.

Oh, we also went in search of a Star Map so that we'd be prepared for our star stalking in Malibu and Beverly Hills the rest of the week.

Map purchased and bellies full, we did a bit of shopping at Universal City Walk and then went back to Santa Clarita to rest up and regale the family with our tales of the day.