Off Topic: That Was the Week It Was - December 11, 2016

Good morning! Since it's Sunday, it's time for my weekly off television topic reflection on the week gone by in both words and photographs I've taken along the way. This is a regular Sunday part of this blog in addition to the television posts. 

If you're a fan of Survivor, please stop in Wednesday night for the big two-hour season finale blog party! The show (and blog party) start at 8pm ET. I'll be live-blogging the major happenings as they air here.

I really have very little to report on this week and even but a few photos. It's not really my favorite time of year and my health pain-wise has been rough. Plus, it's been cold! Supposedly, we're expecting snow this afternoon and evening, but it's supposed to turn to rain and warm up overnight.

Despite my pain issues, I'm going to arm myself with some ibuprofen, go into work early tomorrow, then head into the city after work. I haven't been going into Manhattan because I haven't been feeling all that well lately. But I now have a reason to go and a purpose. An online friend of more than 20 years from Glasgow (Scotland) is visiting the city. It's one of those odd nowadays tales of knowing someone so well and so long, but never actually meeting in person. He's much younger than I am. I recall he was an older teenager when we first met in a CompuServe forum circa 1995. At that time, he was barred from flying here due to some sort of marijuana issue.  

Now, fast forward twenty years -- he got married in his kilt a year or so back and he and his wife are passing though after visiting her home town of Ottawa. While I'm meeting them on the Lower East Side for dinner, I'll be arriving at Penn Station, walking over to Herald Square to catch the subway down there and taking a different route back up through the city and returning home by bus from Port Authority at the edge of Times Square. So, I'll definitely be taking some photos even though I won't hit Rockefeller Center and such. To be honest, they do look the same year after year anyway although if you haven't been there during the holidays, you need to get there sometime! The bus home drops me off across the street from my apartment.  

That's it. Here are the few photos I took this week. Clicking on an image will open it in a larger version. 

Holidays at the Plainfield Police

"Darn it, Jim. I'm a cop, not a tree lighting design engineer!" But the sentiment is there! The green lanterns by the entrance to the police department aren't holiday related. When I lived in CT or upstate NY, I never saw green lanterns by police department entrances. I noticed that NYC police stations had the lights, though ... as does Plainfield which is much closer to the city. So, I looked up the meaning behind them. I found this reference -- "According to the NYPD website, "It is believed that the Rattle Watchmen, who patrolled New Amsterdam in the 1650's, carried lanterns at night with green glass sides in them as a means of identification. When the Watchmen returned to the watch house after patrol, they hung their lantern on a hook by the front door to show people seeking the watchman that he was in the watch house. Today, green lights are hung outside the entrances of Police Precincts as a symbol that the "Watch" is present and vigilant." Huh. Interesting. The original Green Lantern(s)!

Here, then gone. Here, then gone.

The struggle is real. I fear the dandelions will lose the war; winter will win it soon.
 

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Survivor: Millennials vs. Gen-X Blog Party - December 7

As Survivor airs here on the East Coast, I'll be live-blogging with the major events. Although tonight's show is only an hour, two castaways will get the boot!  As always, the real party is in the comments area. Please feel free to join in on the fun!
 
Here are the blog pool match updates from our good buddy, Lifeguard Laurie:

Survivors
Adam Klein - Brian, Kelsey NY, Sharon N
Bret LaBelle - Brandi Peralta, Judi Sweeney, Skyriverblue
David Wright - Buzzmaam, MikesGirl, Sharon C
Hannah Shapiro - David, meb, Terry is a Texan
Jay Starrett - Becky, Jackie, Shayne
Ken McNickle - Dolores in Hollywood, Margo, Russ
Sunday Burquest - Brenda, Kristen from Ohio, SueGee
Will Wahl - Cheryl, Indiana Jane

Jury
Michelle Shubert
Taylor Lee Stocker 
Chris Hammons 
Jessica Lewis
Zeke Smith

Survivor fans ready? 

Will has delusions of manhood from his Tribal Council vote to oust Zeke. Bret is trying to think of how he'll stay alive in the game without his ally Zeke. He and Sunday go to Adam saying that David, Will and Jay are the most dangerous players left in the game.

Will? Dangerous? Um, well, maybe because he can't be trusted. 

Oh, right to the Immunity Challenge! Race out to disks, stack them, over balance beam and wire maze ... reminds me a bit of a recent BBOTT comp.  Will is dangerously keeping in last place.

JAY wins Immunity! 

Jay talks to Will about taking out either David or Ken. Will, who's the Big Man on Campus, thinks he's calling the shots and goes around telling people to target David. David thinks he himself is the target, too. Adam isn't too keen about Will thinking he has the power. So, HE goes around bad-talking Will. He tells Bret. Bret and Sunday will both target Will. Hmm. Adam tells Hannah. Now she's a Nervous Nelly all over again. 

Now Adam thinks HE's in charge of the game.

No time wasted tonight, it's off to Tribal Council! No real clues in the questioning.

The tally:
David, David, Will, Will, Will, Will, Will.

Ha! That's what happens when you get too cocky!  

Jay knows he's all alone in the game. He tells Adam not to take David to the end. Adam tells us Jay needs to go home. 

Onto the second Immunity Challenge! Solve a block puzzle, timer in the form of a Survivor pinball doohickey that times them out in errors. Good challenge! They have to toss a ball through a maze, work on the puzzle, retrieve the ball before it gets caught in the pinball time-out.

Adam is helping Ken! KEN wins Immunity! 

Adam's plan is for David to go home. David is worried. Jay wants David to go. David thinks they should set Bret up to go. Meanwhile, Hannah thinks they should target Sunday because she thinks Sunday will be brought to the finals because she'd be easy to win against. Adam tells Ken and Hannah they need to vote for Jay. He wants either Jay or David out. 

Adam tells Jay he needs to use his idol tonight. Then he tells him his Mom is dying of cancer and he's playing for her. Jay's Mom also has big health problems. Now they're besties once again.

Hannah is still pushing the Sunday Out Bit. She doesn't want David to go as she loves him.

Time for Tribal Council.   

Jay plays his idol.

The tally:
Jay, David, David, Sunday, Sunday, Sunday, Sunday.

Woot! David stays, Jay's idol is flushed out and Sunday goes!  

Next week is the two-hour season finale!  

Off Topic: That Was the Week It Was - December 4, 2016

Good morning! Since it's Sunday, it's time for my weekly off television topic reflection on the week gone by in both words and photographs I've taken along the way. This is a regular Sunday part of this blog in addition to the television posts. 

After what seems like an eternity of covering Big Brother and Big Brother Over the Top, that's done and over with until summer comes around. I might post newsy bits now and then about BB stuff in between now and BB19, but (thankfully) no juggling blog coverage of it and work at the same time. I'm live blogging Survivor episodes as they air on Wednesday evenings. Come join the blog parties! I might also post some other television-related stuff, but I'm definitely going to take a bit of a breather from other daily show posts for a bit.

Work in my real world is exhausting me. At least now I'll get a bit more rest. I hope.

I really don't have much to report on for the past week here. Nor did I even get any great photos this week. Oh well. Onto the photos anyway! Clicking on a image will bring up a larger version. 

What? No one going to Manhattan?

I could jump on that bus and head into Manhattan for the evening. Nah. When I took this shot, I just wanted to go home. Home is where the cat is. Watchung Avenue, Plainfield.

There it is! Plainfield's Christmas Tree!

While I didn't stick around in the cold and wind on Thursday for the actual lighting of the tree, I could see it on Friday from Watchung Avenue across from the police station. I had had a rough day at work and didn't feel like walking over there. I will do that someday.

Trying to stay warm

With no hawk around, the pigeons gather where the sun shines on the brick of the Chotola Apartment Building on North Avenue. 

**CLICK THE 'READ MORE' LINK TO SEE THE REST OF THE PHOTOS**

BBOTT: Season Finale ... the winner is ...!

Tonight is the first and only live Julie Chen hosted show of the season! One of the final three -- Jason, Kryssie or Morgan -- will be voted the winner by America and win the grand prize. This version only has a grand prize of a quarter-million rather than a half-million. I believe second place still gets the 50 grand, but I could be wrong on that.

So, let's see which of the two win. Oh. Did I say two? I guess I did. Eh. I'll go with it. Let's see whether Jason or Morgan win ...! 

I had no sound when Julie started the show. Once we went back to Jason winning HoH, the sound came back.

 
Mostly recapping at this point. They're doing diary room speeches with video from the season.

Speeches over, the previously evicted hamsters are brought on stage.

Neeley's opinion -- impressed with Danielle kicking it into gear.
Scott - Shelby's being a lawyer shocked him.
Monte - Sister twist was good, proud of Morgan.
Whitney - Surprised at Shelby's secret, but knew she was smart.
Alex - Her alliance was scared America would target them if they targeted Jason.
Morgan and Alex are both sure they'll be closer now.
Shelby - Live diary room helped her, didn't hurt her.

Now we see diary room highlight clips.  Julie mentions the bad language.

Justin - A clip of his dancing. Strategy or being himself. Being himself.
Shane - Sacrificed game for Danielle? Regrets? None. Now has short hair.
Danielle - In a relationship with Shane now. 
Cornbread - Surprised to see Kryssie in the final three. He's blown away.         

Online voting.
Alex, Whitney, Shane, Neeley and someone else voted Jason.
None voted Kryssie
Justin didn't vote.

Now it's speech time with the two minute speeches from yesterday.

Julie announces the votes have been tallied.
The 2nd prize is 25 grand, not 50.

Third place and evicted -- Kryssie. What a shocker! 
Julie talks with her.  

MORGAN wins!
 

Survivor: Millennials vs. Gen-X Blog Party - November 30

As Survivor airs here on the East Coast, I'll be live-blogging with the major events.  As always, the real party is in the comments area. Please feel free to join in on the fun!
 
Here are the blog pool match updates from the Lifeguard Luau Laurie:

Survivors
Adam Klein - Brian, Kelsey NY, Sharon N
Bret LaBelle - Brandi Peralta, Judi Sweeney, Skyriverblue
David Wright - Buzzmaam, MikesGirl, Sharon C
Hannah Shapiro - David, meb, Terry is a Texan
Jay Starrett - Becky, Jackie, Shayne
Ken McNickle - Dolores in Hollywood, Margo, Russ
Sunday Burquest - Brenda, Kristen from Ohio, SueGee
Will Wahl - Cheryl, Indiana Jane
Zeke Smith - Beachmom, monty924 , Glenn

Jury
Michelle Shubert
Taylor Lee Stocker 
Chris Hammons 
Jessica Lewis

Survivor fans ready? 

Hannah is beside herself about the Jessica rock pick. David is ticked that he burned his idol for no reason at Tribal. Zeke thinks he's winning the war over David. 

Ken came across the Legacy Advantage note he received from Jessica. If he can make it until Day 36, he'll be using it!

Reward Challenge time! Jeff starts bringing out loved ones. Tears all around as usual. Adam, whose mother is in stage four cancer and whose brother came, mentions his advantage to steal someone's reward. He will not be using it. 

They have to be tied to a rope and go through obstacles. Prize is the loved one at a barbecue. Jay wins Reward! He takes Will along as he had promised. For his second, he chose Sunday as "they" had made a promise. He gets to pick one more and even though they've been "brawling" all this time, he chooses Adam. 

Whoa! Adam, in appreciation of Jay's move, gave Jay his advantage with no strings attached. 

Will decides to defect to David and company. Hmm.

Immunity Challenge time - Endurance, they have to clench a thing holding a bar. David out first. Hannah out. Will out. Bret out. Sunday out. Zeke out. Jeff is torturing them about the hot sun baking their minds. Ken out. It's Jay versus Adam. Jay out.

Adam wins Immunity!   

With Will aboard, the move is on to vote out Zeke. Zeke thinks something is amiss because the others are too calm. He thinks David might have another idol and he needs to throw someone else under the bus. That someone is Hannah.

Ken gives Will a third-degree treatment before being willing to trust him. Will tells Ken that "they" will be voting for him. Uh-oh. Ken tells Jay that Will is saying his name. Will claims he needs to play his game for himself.

Gah! Adam calls it right that it was a stupid move on Ken's part! Now Will is going to be solid with the others as he can't trust his "new" group.

Tribal Council time. Both sides vie for Will's vote. He may be the youngest, but he has the deepest voice! 

Adam pulls out his idol! He plays it for Hannah!

The tally:
Hannah, Hannah, Hannah, Hannah, Zeke, Zeke, Zeke ...

Zeke is out!   

BBOTT: PoV and the Final Three - Tuesday, November 29

Determined to win?

Well, well, well. Of course, the only really big news of the day was the Power of Veto comp.

• It was called End of the Road.
• They had to run through metal police crowd control barriers set up in a switchback kind of queue.
• Jump over hay bales.
• Grab a hamster face picture, then return back the same way they came.
• Nine pictures in all. Had to get one at a time.
• The puzzle questions might have more than one possible answer.
• But there is only one correct solution using all nine.
• Justin was into making sound effects and cussing as he went along. He started to put faces in the spots first, getting a few wrong.
• Morgan decided to get all the faces first and solved some as she was bringing them back.
• In the end, it wasn't really any contest. Morgan solidly beat him, had all the answers right while he had some answers wrong on the board and didn't have all the faces.
• Surprisingly, in view of his behavior the last few days, he left the house on a good note.
• Julie came to the final three in video form, congratulating them and telling them they need to prepare a two-minute speech each.
• Those speeches will air live on Wednesday at 7pm ET/4pm PT. 
• The final three -- Morgan, Kryssie and Jason -- popped the champagne and got giddy. 

All spiffed up to host the comp

Monty was there.

Game faces on

The running was unreal.

It wasn't an easy puzzle, either.

Morgan WINS! She's in the Final Three!

Says he loves them. Yeah, right.

BBOTT: Nothing to see here. move along - into Tuesday, November 29

Eddie McGee, BB1 Winner

The Power of Veto comp isn't scheduled until 5pm today, Tuesday. I will report late tonight on its results. Otherwise, things have been pretty much the same in the house with even more tension due to the boredom.

In other news, I watched the Elementary episode from November 20th and immediately recognized BB Season One winner Eddie McGee in it! 

BBOTT: Into Monday, November 28

Jason being mellow? That won't last!

Well, Justin got up a bit more today ... 

• Unfortunately, he decided Morgan is his buddy now.
• Now, they're both slated to go head-to-head in the Power of Veto comp (today, Monday) together.
• She's been almost constantly studying or spending time with Jason and Kryssie.
• In comes Justin.
• The not so smart thing he does is to keep talking about how he has to win this comp, then the game, then "rub it in their faces."
• Um.
• He's saying that to his competitor.
• Morgan has been actually restraining herself quite well -- not saying much about how SHE needs to win the comp and then the game!
• Kudos to her for her restraint!
• At one point, she did say something. Justin claimed none of the people in the house have souls. She said, rather quietly, "Everybody has a soul."
• Justin, at one point, sat down with the rest and ate something. As they all talked, I noticed he was paying absolutely no attention to the others, would occasionally glance up at a camera and then start dancing in place to music in his head. 
• The others are right that he's very camera-conscious.
• I don't know how Morgan is putting up with all of Justin's bragging about his game and how he will win.
• Darn it, she wants to win, too!
• He told her how the LNJ had to keep fighting to keep in place and now the ones remaining have deserted him.
• Heck, Justin. Morgan's side also had to fight with the up/down power changes week to week! And, she's the sole remainder from the Ball Smashers!
• I'm also sick of hearing him tell how many women are willing to have sex with him and how much he misses having sex. @@
• We'll know more once the PoV comp goes down.
• May the best woman win that one!
• Heehee. 

Justin actually posed for one HoH camera shot

Morgan studies some more

I don't like any of these people

Off Topic: That Was the Week It Was - November 27, 2016

Good morning! Since it's Sunday, it's time for my weekly off television topic reflection on the week gone by in both words and photographs I've taken along the way. This is a regular Sunday part of this blog in addition to the television posts. Right now I'm covering Big Brother: Over the Top daily -- you can find those posts at this link. I'm also live blogging Survivor episodes as they air on Wednesday evenings. Come join the blog parties!

I hope everyone had a nice Thanksgiving! As per my usual, I spent the day here with Vincent. I don't really have much family left and, of what few are left, no one is local. I often turn down invites to join families of friends for the day. I would feel like an intruder and, after all, it's not my family. After decades of such, I've grown to like the peaceful solitude of the day. I made a turkey breast feast for myself and relaxed. I always have to work the Friday and Saturday after the holiday, so I can't travel anywhere. I'm also in a very busy and stressful work environment, even worse at the holidays. So, I'm content with what I do for the holiday. Maybe, if I ever do get to retire before I pass, I'll travel to visit family. But for now and many decades gone by, as they say, it is what it is. Christmas is pretty much the same.

So, this isn't really my favorite time of the year. I do enjoy seeing the excitement of children, especially toddlers, seeing the hubbub and lights. I do have some very good memories of the season. But it's all photographs and memories at this time for myself. And, work, work, work, then more work.

I am thankful for the friends and family I have in my life, as well as you folks who faithfully follow this blog! I'm certainly thankful for Vincent, as well as my previous cat companions over the years. I'm thankful I've always held a job and kept a roof over my head even though I'm so ready, beyond ready, to retire and pursue things I want to do rather than things I have to do. I'm thankful for Peapod Grocery delivery so I don't have to deal with supermarket madness. I'm thankful I live in an area with so many different kinds of people with lives so different from my own, yet enriching my own life and enforcing the realization that the majority of people are good at heart.

Okay, onto this week's photos! I didn't really get great shots this week. I managed to arrive near the train station one day just in time to snag a few photos of another (the same?) Red-Tailed Hawk atop the Chotola Apartments Building on North Avenue just as he was preparing to fly away. 
 

Sitting in the railway station ...

... got a ticket for my destination. Whoowoo. ('Homeward Bound' - Paul Simon) I was actually homeward bound. This is last night when I arrived back home in Plainfield after yet another workday in life. Although the train itself stretches perhaps a long block, only about ten people got on or off at this time at the Plainfield Station. However, inside the train -- the two cars that were open -- it was quite full for a train this day and hour. Many people were heading home to NYC from the holiday or just heading into town (Manhattan) for holiday season happenings. I just wanted to get home and put my feet up.

Where'd they all go?

Y'know ... there was a party going on with pigeons and starlings here. I come and they all flew away! Do I have bad breath? Am I inappropriately dressed for the party? Every time I try to join in on the bird fun, everybody leaves me here alone! I feel shunned! It's enough to give me a complex! 

Getting ready to swoop away.

At least I got nice detail on that red tail of his!

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