Milestones



There are a couple major milestones I felt worth noting about. First, Pablo (my car) reached 100,000 miles a couple months ago. As I have written about before, my relationship to my car is a special one and I felt both proud and thankful for reaching this milestone. Having driven some pretty awful, unreliable cars in the past, I definitely am not one to take this for granted. The dependable yet always fun driving experience that he has provided me throughout these 100K miles mean the world to me. So here's to another 100!



The other noteworthy event of this summer was the end of the "MTV-era" of my life. It actually wasn't an official grand declaration that "I'll never watch MTV again" or something like that, but in an effort to save about $30-40/month on my cable bill, I switched to the Dish Network "All-HD" plan a few months ago. Which means I still get most of the channels I always watched without skipping a beat (i.e. ESPN, ESPN2, Food Network, Discovery, Local channels, etc). But it just happens that MTV does not have an HD feed and thus does not fall within the All-HD package.

For those who have known me over the years, this may come as a pretty big surprise to hear that I finally "gave up" MTV entirely. It surprised myself too, actually, that I barely thought twice about giving up the channel that I used to watch almost religiously.

My MTV days started maybe later than most people, I never really watched it at all until my freshman year of college. But once I did get started, I found myself being absorbed pretty quickly into all the trashy shows and the whole MTV "culture" very quickly.

It started with following the simple daily countdown shows like TRL, or just watching music videos cycling throughout the night with friends. Then the pop music phenomenon took off, a certain "singer" named Britney Spears came along, and before I knew it, my TV was set to MTV almost exclusively. I got sucked heavily into all the trashy shows that MTV became known for, and I even wrote a good amount of entries in this blog talking about or psychoanalyzing the "characters" in all of these shows.

Perhaps I finally grew out of that little phase of my life during this past year or so, and thus it wasn't that hard to give it up this tim. Then again, I still watch Gossip Girl each week (Mondays at 7pm on the CW), so maybe that's not a valid explanation at all... haha. But when I think about it, a show like the Hills which was once my favorite show, no longer interests me as much as it used to. Music-wise, I'm not so in tune with the Emo-craze, punk bands, or even the hip-hop stuff that seems to dominate today's music scene, so it's not like I would watch it for the music factor. The point being that leading up to this decision, I really wasn't really watching the channel that much anyways.

Then as I thought about it more, I realized that the whole "MTV culture" is a pretty unhealthy influence that I am probably better off without to begin with. Not exactly an earth-shattering realization, but I guess I just never really stopped to ponder that part of it. It's a culture that promotes materialism, disregard for authority, and low moral standards. While it was entertaining to tune into the channel for that period of my life, I'd have to say that overall it did not make me a smarter or happier person at all to watch MTV all day every day - it had more of the opposite effect, if anything. The channel is definitely not something I would want my kids watching, for one thing.

Still, it does seem strange nowadays when I hear people talking about those shows, and I have no clue what's going on in any of them anymore. So admittedly, I will miss the "MTV Era" of my life, but like many other parts of my past, not so much that I would actually make a significant effort to go back to re-live it. In any case, as I make note of this milestone, I figured I would pay a short tribute by creating a little top-10 list of Best/Worst of MTV as I remember it:

- VMA's - In the past several years, the show just has gotten overhyped and just isn't the same. But during the prime years, this was actually a legitimately huge event that was worth watching live. The most memorable moment for me, which should come as no surprise to anyone, was Britney's 2000 "fake-strip" performance. Wow, I can't believe how long ago that feels now.



- CT from RW Paris and all the RW/RR Challenges - "I will WORK you. WORK. YOU." What a beast though.

- The Real World as a whole - I've written about this show so many times before in this blog, so no need to really rehash any further. Out of all of them, my favorite entry would have to be: My Real World Application (published 12/12/2005)

- Pimp My Ride - As with many other MTV shows, it got old after a couple seasons. But man were we hooked in the beginning. Xzibit as the host was a genius idea. Ironically, he'll probably be remembered more for that than for his rap career, but that's ok. No shame in that if you ask me.

- Serena Altschul and Ananda as VJ's - Not everyone will remember those names, but I know some who will agree with me that they were very underrated. I wonder whatever became of them. One thing is for sure - they were 1 million times better Jesse, the kid who became a VJ by winning some contest. That kid was quite possibly the most retarded and annoying human being ever

- Punk'd - Seeing Justin Timberlake almost cry like a baby, and call his mommy for help, was priceless. I also found the Jessica Alba episode to be very fascinating, to see how she turned into a major biatch.

- Celebrity Deathmatch - Of all the shows that get cut from television every season, it's amazing that the horrible claymation episodes of Celebrity Deathmatch managed to last as long as it did. Another thought worth noting here is that I probably associate Mills Lane more with this show, than from his work in all the major boxing matches he officiated or even from his own TV show later on, Judge Mills Lane.

- Tom Green Show - Overall not a big fan of the guy, but if anyone defines the word "obnoxious" in the dictionary, it would no doubt be Tom Green. Whatever his specialty was, he just did it so "well" that I almost have to give him credit for that alone. More than that though, I have to admit that some moments from this show made me laugh more than anything else I ever seen in my life. For some reason I can't think of that many right now, but "Undercutters Pizza" seems to come to mind as one of my favorites. And of course, the "Bum Bum Song" may have been the masterpiece of his legacy, before the mediocre movie career. "My bum is on the sweeee-dish"... hahaha



- Jackass - While Johnny Knoxville and Bam Margera probably got more attention as the "ringleaders" of the group , I think many of the show's "loyal fans" (such as myself) will agree that Steve-O was the real star of the show. Anytime a segment came up featuring Steve-O, I found myself bracing for something really horrible. From swallowing/regurgitating a goldfish, to snorting a line of wasabi, and stapling his butt cheeks together, very few people in this world manage to disturb yet entertain me at the same time like he did.

- Laguna Beach, season 1 - The love triangle between Steven, LC, and Kristen was one of the most gripping storylines I have ever followed in any show, reality or otherwise. Ironically, the one "character" that I liked the least out of the three, LC, was the one who went on to have the most success. I still miss Kristen. Something about the way that she talked, I just found to be strangely attractive. Haha don't ask me to explain because I can't. By far the best moment of the show, as I'm sure many will agree, was from the "Cabo" episode. This being when Steven was watching Kristen dancing with some other guy at the bar, and yelled "SLUT!!!" across the room. That's a scene I'll never forget.