Obsessions and Confessions

I have a confession. I never watched 30 Rock until a few weeks ago when I started watching it on Netflix. I powered through the whole first season in a weekend. I can't believe how funny it is, and that I had no idea. They just started their 6th season! There are a couple of possible reasons. One, I have never been too crazy about Tracy Morgan. And two, I think I sort of gave up on sitcoms. Aside from Big Bang Theory, I only watch hour-long dramas. Part of it is because if you don't like the sitcom on after, and there's a DVR conflict with what you want to record before and after, it's tricky. So we only watch things in one hour blocks. But oh boy, what I have been missing! I feel like an idiot which can only be remedied by the fact that I have a lovely new obsession...Kenneth the Page!

Played by Jack McBrayer, Kenneth is the over-eager NBC page assigned to Liz Lemon's (Tina Fey) show, TGS with Tracy Jordan (Tracy Morgan). He's from Stone Mountain, Georgia and has the strong Georgia accent to match; a young man who grew up on a pig farm, and moved to New York to follow his show business dreams. He loves only two things: "Everyone, and television." And he is hilarious. And good-hearted, and gullible, and full of bizarre ideas. He just wants to take care of everyone at TGS, no matter how ridiculous their needs and demands. And he has this smile...this brilliant, sometimes a little creepy, but beautiful smile.

I've been having a rough time at work lately. And some days, all I could think about was getting home to watch some more 30 Rock and seeing what my lovely Kenneth is up to. I have been squeezing in 2 episodes, sometime 3, a night during the week. Then the marathons on the weekends. I just finished Season 4 last night.

I didn't mean to write a TV review, there is plenty out there about the brilliance of this show. Tina Fey and Alec Baldwin, who plays Liz Lemon's network boss Jack Donaghy,  have each won several Emmys, Golden Globes and SAG awards. And Jack McBrayer was nominated for an Emmy himself for playing Kenneth.  It just goes to show how there is so much out there, so many choices, that something like this could escape my notice all this time. But I've found it now. And I'm in love!

In other news, the Jehova's witnesses came to my door a couple of Saturday's ago. I saw two women carrying bibles and figured they were from the ward. But it was this mother and daughter who came to offer me a bible study. I talked to them for a little while through the crack in the doorway; I was in my pajamas still. I ended up telling them one of the reasons I stopped going to church was because I had conflicts with the church's views on homosexuals. I was getting ready to go over to John and Pedro's in fact to sit with the dogs. The younger woman gave me a copy of Watchtower. It had a picture of the destruction in Haiti from the recent earthquake and asked the question: are natural disasters punishment from God? Yeah, that crazy stuff. I politely took the pamphlet anyway. The older woman shuffled through her stack of Watchtowers and pulled out one that addressed God's real intentions for sex. First the daughter tried to discourage her from handing me that one. Obviously, as someone who accepts and cares about gay people and their rights, I was probably not going to appreciate something saying that sex is strictly for procreation and nothing else. She gave it to me anyway, as if it could really change my mind. After they left, I put them in the recycling pile. Then I went down to John and Pedro's. I'm here now again as the guys had to go to San Francisco. And after the bad day I had on Thursday, the puppies were a sight for sore eyes. Literally. My eyes were like swollen slits from an episode of crying I had at work during this team building seminar. It just set me off for some reason. Afterwards I talked to Theresa and we determined it might have to do with the hostility I feel in the office due to all the right wing wackos. Anyway, ruined my day. I woke up yesterday, eyes still sore, and then I came to see my puppies. They always make me feel better. The puppies and Kenneth. I just want to give them all a big squeeze. Funny thing is, Kenneth is one of those Southern Christian fundamentalists, he says the wackiest stuff sometimes, but everyone at TGS, in the midst of the liberal bastion of New York media, just smiles and loves him anyway. How could you not?


Addendum: I finished Season 5 of 30 Rock shortly after writing this.  Season 6 is only 4 episodes in, and I'm all caught up!

Sleeping Pills

My doctor gave me a new prescription this week to help me sleep. I've tried many different medications. Some meant to help with sleep, some meant to help with other things but that also cause drowsiness. The latest is Mirtazapine. Before that it was Temazepam, and before that Diphenhydramine. Seroquel worked great as far as helping me get to sleep, but waking up was a bit of a problem. This newest one seems kinda like that. But all the good ones are. Otherwise, they don't help you get to sleep any faster than if you tried on your own.

I have to try taking this one much earlier in the evening. But then, I'll drop off before I've had a chance to do anything. Last night and the night before I ended up taking it and then getting sleepy before I was ready. I'm afraid that if I take it too soon, I'll fall asleep on the bus home and miss my stop.

Friday, my first day after taking it, was pretty much shot. I could barely get myself up and to the doctor for my appointment. And even then it was a bit sketchy. She could tell I was "relaxed" to say the least. On the way home I was going to stop and see my friend Ralph as I often do on the way home from the doctor, but I was just so sleepy, I probably shouldn't even have been driving. I got home and actually went back to bed and set the alarm to wake me up at 4:00 for the Mets game.

"It's just time, they kill," as Brett Anderson sings. The rest of the weekend was just me trying to get as much as I could done in between being too sleepy to get up, or stay up. Hoping not to let them kill too much time. And here I am, Sunday night; I can already feel them working on me now. Will I even make it through this week's episode of Doctor Who?