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SPOILER ALERT!
If you haven't seen Survivor, and are planning to, just skip to the next planet. If you don't care about Survivor, skip to the next planet. If you think I'm insane for being this wrapped up in Survivor, skip to the last planet, then skip over the text afterwards, and leave this site immediately. You don't understand.
Okay, so every preview leading up to Survivor: Palau screeched at us about the fact that there were TWENTY SURVIVORS starting the game! TWENTY! And that they would be given NO HELP WHATSOEVER when they got to the island! NO HELP!
TWENTY! NO HELP!
Thrust in our faces for the past month, that's the message we got from CBS. A totally cool, totally new twist was coming, because there would be TWENTY SURVIVORS who would receive NO HELP WHATSOEVER when they got to the island! It would be DIFFERENT! What a TWIST Mark Burnett pulled on us! Whoa!
So we see the TWENTY SURVIVORS rowing their big-assed canoe towards the shore of Palau for a bit, getting to see a few faces. Mostly pretty faces. Oh, there's the gay guy. In a pink polo shirt. He's a hairdresser. How lovely. At least Richard Hatch had the decency to be fat, tough and overbearing. Ever since Brandon in Africa, we've gotten gay guys who are all sissy-boys. Not that I have anything against sissy-boys. I like to date sissy-boys when I get the chance, because they're lots of fun. But for Survivor? Not so much.
An insane older woman who has made up many songs about Survivor? The casting directors are on crack. I'm surprised the other castaways haven't pushed her off the boat. But they may need an insane troubador since they're TWENTY SURVIVORS who will receive NO HELP AT ALL!
Jeff Probst shows up all studly-like, looking for his next castaway conquest, and to give them the information that on this island (that contains NO HELP AT ALL!), there are two machetes, a map to water, and "the most valuable thing in this game," TWO immunity necklaces. One for a man, and one for a woman. Oh, and did I forget to mention they each have a canteen? So that claim of having NO HELP AT ALL really means, JUST ENOUGH HELP TO GET BY. Which is fair enough, I suppose.
All the castaways (except the obligatory odd chick...this time she's kind of goth) are dressed like they're going into the boardroom on The Apprentice. Now, since Pearl Islands, one might expect that these folks might consider the fact that Burnett likes to repeat himself, so they may end up wearing those very same clothes for their entire stay. But apparently, Survivor is like a jury trial: nobody can be allowed to have seen the show ever before in order to get cast.
So they row, and they row, and two dorks decide they can swim half a mile faster than eighteen people in a canoe can row, which is a pretty stupid move, but okay, kind of ballsy. They don't make it. In fact, the two people who make it are a skinny dolphin trainer and a kickass, buffed-up lawyer who looks like she could smack down Lucy Lawless with one swipe of her hand. So they have immunity. And machetes. And a map to water. And canteens. But NO HELP AT ALL!
Mind you, the uber-strong lawyer? Is wearing a dress. And heels. Nice way to go to the islands, don't you think? But it could be cool to see how she (and the others wearing similar corporate business-casual clothes and/or pink polo shirts) deal with creating new outfits that are practical out of what they have on. Because there's NO HELP AT ALL! For TWENTY SURVIVORS!
So Jolanda (the Amazon lawyer) asks for a "strong man" to cut the heels off her shoes. Good move, as she'll most likely be climbing things and running around a lot. Though why she needs a "strong man" to do it is beyond me, because her biceps bulge out so far as she claps for the guy who does this for her that Lou Ferrigno is sitting back in his chair and saying "Day-um! That's one buff chick!"
Anyway, the group sent to "find" the "water source" goes about twenty feet into the jungle and is led to a well with a cover and everything. And behind it is a BIG BAG OF THEIR SHOES! So this "only wearing the clothes on your backs" idea? Lasted all of ten minutes into the first episode. Way to stick with a concept!
Angie (the gothy chick) and Coby (the hairdresser) form an instant bond, because they're both "freaks." Because, you know, nobody in 2005 America has tattoos. Or is gay. They decide to form an alliance right then and there, because all the rest of the normal people won't notice that the two most obviously outside people are hanging around together a lot.
And in the shot of them walking back with the water? Is a cooking pot. So for NO HELP WHATSOEVER, let's take some stock so far: Machetes, a well full of water, a map to find the very obvious well, a bag of sneakers, and a cooking pot. Man, they're really taxing these folks, leaving out the... the... umm... what is it that the past four seasons of this show have gotten that these folks haven't? Oh, a change of clothes. Except in the Pearl Islands, where I don't think they got their shoes back. But, whatever. At least we're starting the show with the ORIGINAL CONCEPT OF TWENTY SURVIVORS!
Jeff shows up, wearing his Sandals of Authority, and tells the castaways that the immunity will last...for the next ten minutes.
And then this is what happens that makes me wonder if I'm ever going to watch the show I have loved for nine seasons ever again. Jeff says:
"We're going to divide into two tribes with nine members each. That's eighteen people. There are twenty of you. Two people will not be selected to be on a tribe. Two people will get on a boat immediately and be sent home."
Okay, so they completely destroyed the concept of NO HELP WHATSOEVER, and now they're telling us that the game is going to be played with eighteen people, and not TWENTY, as advertised. And, in fact, the way to determine the two people who will not be allowed to play the game is, in effect, a game of "Red Rover, Red Rover."
That is the most mean-spirited, deceitful, ridiculous thing I have ever seen any reality TV show do, ever. Hundreds of thousands of people apply to be on this show every season, and twenty are picked, only to be told that two of them will immediately be dismissed; not on their skills, not on a contest, but based on who, based on a single day's interaction with them, will pick the next member of the team.
Nice. These folks aren't allowed to leave the islands for the full 39 days, of course, because of the media coverage that follows voted-off castaways. So you take a trip, row a canoe, rip up your clothes, form some bonds, and expect to participate in a show only to have smug little Jeff Probst tell you that a popularity contest is going to determine whether you stay or go, on the second day of the game.
Now, I realize that Survivor is mostly about popularity, and interpersonal politics, but at least there's an element of "who's pulling his/her weight" and "who's good or bad for the tribe" in every other season. This TWENTY SURVIVORS thing? Was nothing but a publicity stunt, and an extremely poorly executed one at that.
Why didn't they just cast 4,000 potential survivors, ship them in on an aircraft carrier, and tell them that 3,982 of them won't make the cut? At least then, the producers could include in every episode, a shot of yet another castaway that isn't playing the game getting on a boat and leaving in tears because Skippy the Machinist from Kentucky didn't like your attitude upon arriving on the beach.
The rest of the show was usual Survivor fare. An obstacle course for the first challenge? Twisty! Oh, and it's a combined reward-immunity challenge. The reward for the winning team? All the supplies they would have gotten on any normal season of the show, with the inclusion of a big bag of food. Part of the strategy is to decide what to take with you through the obstacle course, but that, again, just drops the concept of NO HELP WHATSOEVER out the window entirely.
I expect that the reward challenge next week will be for a fully-stocked vending machine and a couple rolls of quarters. The week after that? The winning team gets to move their camp to the Palau Hilton.
And every immunity challenge from now on will be based on a slam book that's passed around camp, rather than anything physically demanding.
I may be done with this show. The people are interesting enough. The scenery is pretty cool. But to drop two folks out of your contest before the contest even starts is just plain wrong. The Amazing Race starts up in two weeks, which I have liked much better than Survivor for a couple of years now anyway. There's not much else on Thursdays that appeals to me, but maybe I could spend that time writing or reading or sticking hot pokers into my ears or something more fun than watching a truly original, groundbreaking concept go down in flames the way this episode has indicated it will.
Ahem. I didn't expect to turn all Television Without Pity on you. I'll go back to talking about something actually real.
In the spirit of all new digital camera owners everywhere, I continue to take endless pictures of myself. However, this time it serves (somewhat of) a purpose. Although I promised myself that I wouldn't do anything but slug around the house all day long, I actually went out and got some things done. One of those things was a haircut.
I like having floppy hair, but I only have a day or so between "floppy" and "Florence Henderson Flippy", and I'd reached Carol Brady status a couple of weeks ago, so it was time to head to SuperCuts.
The stylist asked me what I wanted, and I was tempted to say, "Give me a haircut exactly like Treat Williams'. Laurie thinks I look a lot like a young version of Treat Williams, and I'm pretty flattered by that comparison. If I look one-eighth as good as he does, I'm happy. Of course, if I looked one-eighth as good as he does, I'd probably get more dates.
Anyway, what I told her was, "cut it just like it is, only shorter," because there's no way my hair can do anything else. I've tried parting it in the middle, spiking it, getting a perm (shudder), buzzing it down to a crewcut, and yet, this is the only thing that suits me. I've accepted it.
Since SuperCuts is next to Marshall's, I wandered over there and picked up two pairs of pants that aren't some shade of tan or brown (navy blue and grey, if you're curious), another pair of wind pants in which to run, and a baseball cap.
I don't normally wear baseball caps, but I thought this one was kind of cute. It's tan, and I can wear it when I start running outside to keep the sun off my nose, and by the pool to shade my eyes when I'm reading. The amazing fact about this baseball cap is that it fits my head (which is as big as a melon). For that fact alone, I had to buy it. If I were a real Bostonian, I'd have bought a Red Sox cap, but I really don't know if I'll follow baseball again since they won the World Series and are no longer the Team of the Damned. There's something masochistically satisfying about always rooting for a team you just know isn't going to win, and I'm not sure what Boston residents are going to do next year when the curse of the Bambino has been lifted.
I also visited Chris' shop today, to go over the table he's going to build for the art show at the Consulting Company. He had given me a catalogue of nothing but table legs to peruse, but doing so only confused me, as would telling Chris to write me a ten-minute play would confuse him. So we went through the catalogue together, him telling me what he thought was good for a table that I'd picked out, and me nodding my head as if I knew anything about what he was saying.
I got home after my errands and decided to heed every professional writer's advice I've ever read and submitted a story. This was a short-short (flash fiction?) piece of about 700 words sent to Strange Horizons. It's a silly piece of humor that I'm not sure will be taken seriously enough to even consider, but you never know. I enjoyed it when I wrote it, and if it gets rejected, I know full well why.
In doing so, I got an e-mail back from Karen Meisner, who is apparently on the submissions committee, telling me it was good to see that I was submitting things. I miss her journal terribly (she probably has one again, I didn't ask her when I replied).
So right now, I have two ten-minute plays and two short stories submitted, and I'll be anxiously awaiting the rejections. I know they're going to come, and I'm okay with it. I have a little more faith in the ten-minute plays, because I'm better at that format than I am at short fiction, but it's always a gamble.
What I am doing is writing that ten-minute play I mentioned a couple of days ago. The "can complete it in about an hour" comment I made? Was made under the influence of crack. Sure, it's going smoothly, but I want it to be a laugh-out-loud comedy (since there isn't any real character development), and remembering to get to the funny bits and leaving out the extraneous bits is always difficult for me. It's like trying to write erotica. By the time I get to the reason for choosing the genre, I've included enough backstory to just leave out the sex altogether. I need to work on my internal editor.
At any rate, I have that play about halfway done (for the first draft), and another one bubbling in my head, so I'll be sure to have something to submit to the Hovey Summer Shorts this year, and maybe something good enough for the Boston Theater Marathon in November for their 2006 production.
I also have asked Suzanne to do some illustrations for the hand-bound books of the stories I'm doing for the art show. She said she could probably have something done in a week or so, which will give me enough time to perfect my bookbinding technique. I used to be able to do it quite well, but even the kit I used today to "cheat" with didn't come out exactly as I wanted it to.
I did manage to take some time completely to myself, by ordering Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind on pay-per-view. My love for Charlie Kaufmann knows no limits. It was mesmerizing. It was heartbreaking. It was clever and silly and challenging and wonderful. And it had a lot of things that were very familiar to me, because I thought of them, too.
I already told you about The Gentle Art of Memory Loss, which was my concept for a script that's just about the same thing as Eternal Sunshine. However, one of the characters in Eternal Sunshine is named Clementine, which is a character in one of my plays. The play is called The Tangerine Room, which also deals with memory and brain chemistry. And Clementine's other name in Eternal Sunshine? Is Tangerine.
It's nothing earth-shattering, but I found it to be some sort of a sign. I'm on the right track, I just have to keep on writing, because the ideas I'm coming up with are on par with the ideas that real screenwriters and novelists are using, and they're getting published/produced.
It's all about writing the words and sending them out. It's not rocket science. I know I can put a decent story together, it's just a matter of practice and judicious editing to make sure that I have publishable material, and the motivation to keep the submissions going out. I've started a spreadsheet to track what is where, so that I can keep up on my progress.
Hell, I already have twenty produced plays on my resume. That's not a bad track record. Sure, it's been exclusively non-professional stuff, but that's where one starts. I have queried and submitted to Equity houses, but not quite as much as I should have. Unspoken Arrangements and Office Work are very good scripts with unusual formats that would be perfect for one-act play contests, and yet they sit on my hard drive because I haven't yet had the motivation to look at the new opportunities e-mails I get just about every day. That's going to change. If I can motivate myself to do something as ridiculous as work all the time, I can certainly get to the important stuff in my life.
After the movie, I went to visit my cousin Diane. I've made a commitment to myself to visit family and friends as often as possible, and I have felt closer to Diane than to any other cousin on my Mom's side. That's mostly because all those cousins are closer in age to Mom than they are to me, but Diane has never taken that into consideration.
Diane was feeling a little low because her daughter Chrissy (who is in the army and came for a visit, leaving this afternoon) ships off to Afghanistan a month from now, and I worried that I might have come at a bad time, but she told me that looking forward to my visit helped to ease the pain of sending Chrissy back to Colorado for the last time before she's in the field.
We started talking about everything under the sun. It was me, Diane, her husband Dave, and my Aunt Sis at the dinner table, and there's never a lack of conversation when Quinns are involved. Sis showed me the beautiful little in-law apartment that Diane and Dave built for her. She's been diagnosed with Alzheimer's, so she's a little scattered right now, and I'd like to get in as many visits as I can before she stops being lucid. (I wasn't able to do so with my Aunt Kathy, and I really regret that.)
It was a wonderful time, if a little too short. Dave needed to go to the hospital because the IV antibiotic drip he has was backing up (he broke his leg into about a million pieces months ago, and he got a bone infection, so he's off his feet and on IV antibiotics for the next six to eight weeks), so I said my goodbyes and got an invitation to drop by anytime. And apparently, Chrissie has said that she doesn't want her Colorado home to be completely empty for the year that she's gone, so I was offered the keys to the place whenever I want to go there. (I already have a standing offer to use their house in Maine whenever I want to.) Maybe a trip to Colorado could be another vacation for me? I could even drive it, maybe with Laurie, and we could see some sights along the way. There would be no hotel costs, gas and food is all that we would have to worry about, and we could finally get a vacation together. (We haven't taken one since London in 1996.)
Plans, plans. I'm full of them. But I'm also lacking in the sleep department, so I'll close here, where I started; going home from Diane's house and watching Survivor.
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Patrick's Daily Journal
