"That Jaeger, and his press releases... What is to be done?"

Last night and tonight, bouncing joined me for viewings of Season 1 episodes of The Sopranos. After 2 discfulls (4 episodes each), I think I'm all Sopranoed out. I've got disc 3 sitting on the shelf, ready to go with more insane drama whenever we're ready. Meanwhile, disc 1 was dropped in the outgoing mailbox earlier this afternoon, so something else on my list can be dequeued for viewing as soon as the postal service completes delivery. I think I could get used to this netflix thing.

I suppose something resembling a mini-review of The Sopranos (what I've seen so far) is in order. The brief summary would be that it's a show about a mafia family living in modern day America. The narrative largely centers around Tony Soprano's talking sessions with his therapist, who he began seeing because stress-related panic attacks caused him to lose consciousness on semi-random occassions.

Much gushing has been done by others about James Gandolfini's acting job, so I'll not spend too much time adding to that redundancy. I'll just say that the acting by the entire cast is excellent.

As for the content of the show... I know it must be interesting, because I've spent hour after hour after hour watching, and it has held my attention flawlessly from scene to scene. But after the viewing session is all over, I look back and think, "What did I just watch? Where did those 4 hours go?" 4 hours?!? It can't have been that long. I don't remember that much stuff happening. It must have been something though. A hypnotic spell, etching a thousand subliminal memes into the dark recesses of my brain. Then, with the snap of the theme music, I wake up, only to hit "Next episode" and go back into a focused story-sleep again.

Events in the show start to blend together in my mind, and I can't remember whether a certain thing happened in this episode or that one. But it's all there, building, foreshadowing, gradually mixing in more strokes of the painting. You may not know it when the first blots of ink hit the paper, and they may not all make total sense until seen in a context yet to be revealed, but a picture is certainly forming. Spooky.

The show also benefits from not having been shackled to a specific time slot (40 minutes to an hour; whatever is needed to finish an episode's arc), no slots for commercial interruptions, and no need to adhere to censor-happy FCC definitions of what is acceptable to broadcast on television. (These are mobsters being portrayed; what sorts of words do you think they would use?) The show just flows.

In terms of DVD production quality, I'd say it's on par with the best of the television releases. Crisp, anamorphic widescreen picture, 4 episodes per disc (the One True Way), Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack. Top caliber stuff. The pilot episode also featured a commentary track by the creator of the show and some other guy (producer maybe?) Moderately interesting. I wouldn't want to listen to them talk all day though. Within an hour, they had pretty much run out of unique stuff to say. With that in mind, it was probably wise to only put a commentary track on the first episode.

Moving on...

Went Christmas shopping during the afternoon. Me, mom, and bouncing are all chipping in to get dad a new bed. The one he has is ancient, and he's been having trouble sleeping on it. We went to the mattress store, and picked out one that we suspected would be good for him. We'll see.

This evening, we went to that steak place we were thinking about going to last weekend. Dad had managed to obtain a gift certificate through one of his "channels". (And no, I don't think it's because he works in the mafia, because he doesn't. And no, I'm not in denial. Geez, I have been watching too much Sopranos!) The Texas Road House.

Let's just put it this way: In the area where people are waiting to be seated, they have a huge barrel of peanuts. Everyone is welcome to take them out, eat them, and (get this)... You throw the shells on the floor. What a mess! An entire floor surface littered with peanut shells. Uncouth to the max. No, it's not a joke. I almost wish it was, although the nuts did taste good.

In it's favor, I will say this: The steak was absolutely delicious. For a moment, I imagined myself feeling like Cipher as he negotiated his nefarious deal with agent smith. Well, the restaurant environment was nothing like it, but the steak certainly was. Mmmmmmmmm.

Tomorrow, I buy presents for mom and bouncing. Tonight, I got the sneaking suspicion that my dad might have the same idea regarding what to get mom that I was thinking about. While he was in my apartment, he inquired about which model number my new DVD player is. Model number? At the moment he said it, it didn't register. I asked if he was planning on getting one for his place, and he said "No, certainly not." It didn't occur to me until later that he was probably thinking about getting one for her (and would ask me about the model number since I am supposably some sort of pseudo-authority on all things regarding technology). Since she has been dropping subtle hints, it is entirely possible that he could have picked up on them just as I did.

I suppose I would do well to call him and find out whether or not I'm imagining things before marching out to Best Buy tomorrow. Twould not be good for us to both give precisely identical gifts.

As for bouncing, I still haven't decided what I'm going to get for him. This is highly unusual, because normally he is the easiest person in the family to shop for. I'll figure something out though.

I'd also like to get something for grandma and grandpa. Since I'm such a chronic last minute shopper, it would obviously have to arrive late (doh). They're really hard to shop for, because I don't have a clue what they want or need. [sigh] Tomorrow, I will be among the hordes crowding the stores to the point of insanity.

etc etc etc

I think I'll sleep shortly.