So far all I’ve seen is a few flurries, but the snow is starting to accumulate in parts of Houston. We’re expected to get 1-4″ over the next several hours, and a hard freeze overnight. This is the earliest in recorded history that Houston has seen snow on the ground. When I was outside a few minutes ago, it was about 40 degrees and the mercury is headed lower in the coming hours. It’s definitely a grey day. People are covering plants and the roads were treated against icing last night.
I received a royalty check for On Writing Horror last night. Since there is such a large group of contributors, the royalties get divvied up into a fairly small share per person, but the book has continued to sell since its release and this year’s check is about 25% larger than last year’s. Enough to buy a Happy Meal, at least.
I’m not sure that Survivor would have been this interesting without Russell, but it’s turned into a fun season. The look on John’s face last night when he got two votes was priceless. He had just finished talking about the two people whose names would be written down that night, and his wasn’t one of them. Turns out that outside of him and Shambo, everyone voted for John. Jaison was worried that this would flip Shambo back to vote with the others, and I suppose that’s a possibility, but the best that would lead to would be a 4-4 split of votes. Besides all of them voted for John, too, so it would be flipping from one bad bet to another. At some point, though, this group of four+1 is going to start looking at Russell very carefully. I wonder if he’ll have to whip out the idol again next week.
Fringe was good last night. Those critters were nasty — especially when Walter yanked that one out of the victim’s throat. Yech. Unlike other shows of its ilk, Fringe has a humanizing element, and that’s Walter. Sure, Peter can let his hair down and play basketball with a suspect’s son, but Walter is suffering at the same time as he’s enjoying himself. We sympathize with his plight — of course he’s an adult who should be allowed some freedom and independence, and yet at the same time we know that he’s not quite capable of looking after himself, and it’s not always him who bears the repercussions.
At least one show will have new episodes next week (Fringe). I was surprised to see that Flash Forward is going off until March. I guess they have to make way for the return of Lost in February but boy are they going to lose the fragile momentum they have going for them now. The show still hasn’t gripped me as completely as Lost did. I often find myself listening to the show while attending to other matters, whereas with Lost, I’m glued to the screen.
