Bravo

For some reason, I have been watching a lot of Bravo. The West Wing and Columbo more than Queer Eye. Today, I watched that episode of The West Wing where everyone gets shot at. It was the season finale a few years ago. I remember hearing it being talked about. That was back when I was never home on the nights of the week when the show aired. I rarely ever watched it, and I don't remember really missing it. I knew it was popular, and I enjoyed the episode or two I had seen. But I wasn't dismayed at how much I didn't see. I remember when the entertainment news talked about how the big shoot-em-up at the end of the season was going to assist in negotiations, because anyone who didn't sign back on without a fuss could just be written out as dead. A somewhat Machiavellian bent to creative narration, I thought. I don't, however, remember who ended up getting killed or what the shakeout was. Fortunately (I think), the next episode will air tonight, and I'll find out without having to wring my hands all summer long. I'm a genius in that respect.

Bravo runs so many of the same commercials, though, that I find myself lampooning them after a while. Even the heartstrings-tuggers. Like the one for Saint Jude's Children's Research Hospital. In the voiceover, a father applauds the team at the hospital, saying that good isn't enough for them. They demand greatness. And I keep picturing the next sequence being a cancer-ravaged child crying on the balance beam, being barked at by some Svengali-like Eastern European gymnastics coach. It could be on a treadmill, too. Any number of scenarios will work. My sense of humor makes some people think I'm mean.