Underpants On The Outside

I’m a big fan of 24. Sure, the story is good [Ed note: not last year!], but I’m mostly impressed by how much Jack Bauer manages to squeeze into a day. To illustrate, I compare each hour of Jack’s day to the corresponding hour in my own day.

Jack’s Day, 5-6 PM: I can’t think of an intro.  Jack is in cuffs, and Evil is free to walk the land.

5:03 PM: The Scumbag talks to OH MY GOD ONE MORE CORRUPT FEDERAL AGENT.  At least this one’s finally a chick.  Last season was an endless stream of bad guys.  That was lame.  So this year it’s going to be an endless stream of bad guys PRETENDING to be good guys.  Muuuuuuch better.

5:05 PM: Jack and the Redhead are trying to talk their way out of arrest, and they are put into a squad car.  The Redhead deduces that the Colonel must know what’s going on, and the Waitress is going to get killed.  She reminds Jack that they shouldn’t have put her in danger.  Jack in turn reminds her that they didn’t have a choice. It was a week to us watching at home, but they had this conversation not ten minutes ago.  I just wish I could think of who the Redhead is starting to remind me of… it’s on the tip of my tongue… something about her shrill voice and her constant negativity regarding Jack’s plans…

The argument ends when the Redhead points out that the Waitress “is a human being.” Jack doesn’t respond.  She might as well have said it in Portuguese, that’s so far outside of Jack’s understanding.  I don’t think this relationship is going to work out.

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I’m a big fan of 24. Sure, the story is good [Ed note: not last year!], but I’m mostly impressed by how much Jack Bauer manages to squeeze into a day. To illustrate, I compare each hour of Jack’s day to the corresponding hour in my own day.

Jack’s Day, 4-5 PM: As you’ll recall from the post I put up just a few hours ago, when we last saw Jack the Presidentess’s husband had been shot and the Redhead seemed to be hanging on by a thread.  She really seems like she could lose it at any second.  She’s looking, like… Sally Field crazy.

4:02 PM: The EMT’s arrive.  Good thing the ambulance made out of unicorns wrapped in magic carpets was available.  When one of the EMT’s is calling in to the hospital, Jack points out that it was a 9mm bullet.  I’m not sure that was pertinent at this point, but whatever.  Then he calls the Presidentess.  He can’t be looking forward to this conversation: he lost Colonel Whatshisface, her husband has been shot, and the one piece of information he does have – that it was a 9mm bullet – probably isn’t going to make her feel better.

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I’m a big fan of 24. Sure, the story is good [Ed note: not last year!], but I’m mostly impressed by how much Jack Bauer manages to squeeze into a day. To illustrate, I compare each hour of Jack’s day to the corresponding hour in my own day.

Editor’s note:  It feels like I’ve been writing these forever, but I’m getting caught up tonight, come hell or high water.  Just bear with me.  Then I’ll go back to finding something different yet equally inconsequential to write about.

Jack’s Day, 3-4 PM: After Jack’s impressive hour last episode, my optimism is renewed, though guarded.  Even after the debacle of last season, I have not closed my heart to 24, and if Jack can retain his momentum of deadliness, I believe I can renew my sense of awe and fear that made me love this show.  That being said, if Audrey shows up, I’m outta here.   I don’t love the Redhead, but she’s leagues better than the Buzzkill.

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I’m a big fan of 24. Sure, the story is good [Ed note: not last year!], but I’m mostly impressed by how much Jack Bauer manages to squeeze into a day. To illustrate, I compare each hour of Jack’s day to the corresponding hour in my own day.

Jack’s Day, 2-3 PM: As you’ll recall from the last episode, Jack finally got his first kill, and I think I speak for the wife when I say that we couldn’t be happier for him.

2:05 PM: Jack follows the truck with the Prime Minister. When it pulls into a building, he tells Chloe to get the security specs.  It takes her about twenty seconds.  I hope Janeane Garofalo is watching, because I like her; she just makes for a piss-poor Chloe.  It’s not just that she’s quite inferior from a technical standpoint; she got the character motivation wrong.  Janeane’s Chloe impression seems bratty, where real Chloe is snippy.  Garofalo’s character is frustrated because she’s overwhelmed and helpless; Chloe is frustrated because people (Bill) keep her from doing her job.  The difference is difficult to describe in text, but it’s apparent when you see the both of them.

By the way, you know how people are supposed to drive with their hands at ten and two?  Bill drives with his hands at 11:59 and 12:01.  Like my mom.  It needed to be said.

Later that minute, Jack tells the Redhead that he needs her help, but he doesn’t say for what.  Jack is actually facing away from the camera when he says this, and I get the feeling he has one eyebrow raised suggestively.

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I’m a big fan of 24. Sure, the story is good [Ed note: not last year!], but I’m mostly impressed by how much Jack Bauer manages to squeeze into a day. To illustrate, I compare each hour of Jack’s day to the corresponding hour in my own day.

Quick recap: Minutes ago, Jack shot the Redhead in the neck and buried her body in a ditch… in an effort to save her life.  I hope Jack knows what he’s doing.  I’m worried that days from now he’ll be in front of some inquiry board shouting, “I thought she’d be fine!  I mean… look at Tony!”

Jack’s Day, 1-2PM: At 1:04, Bill and Chloe arrive to clean up Jack’s mess.  Usually that means they take the girl home and buy her a new bra (he tends to “interrogate” them off) but this time it means dig her up and give her CPR.  Bill is smart enough not to give her mouth to mouth (lest Jack see that as a challenge) while Chloe grabs a shot of adrenaline.  Bill injects it into her heart, but it’s bullshit: not only does the needle slide in easily, the redhead wakes up with just a slight gasp.  New rule: anytime a filmmaker shoots a scene where someone injects adrenaline into another character’s heart, they have to mimic Pulp Fiction.  Or they can take footage straight from the movie.  Honestly, if 24 had cut from Bill and the Redhead in a ditch to John Travolta pounding on Uma Thurman’s chest, then cut right back to the ditch, I wouldn’t have minded in the slightest.

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I’m a big fan of 24. Sure, the story is good [Ed note: not last year!], but I’m mostly impressed by how much Jack Bauer manages to squeeze into a day. To illustrate, I compare each hour of Jack’s day to the corresponding hour in my own day.

It’s been a while since I wrote one of these recaps, and there’s at least one of you (Tooth Fairy) who doesn’t watch the show at all, so just as a reminder, Jack and his crew of ne’er-do-wells have trapped the prime minister from fictional African-country-stereotype Sangala in a panic room in the embassy.  Jack and Tony are undercover, but ostensibly their hope is to deliver the prime minister to evil Colonel Unpronounceable, (whose name is actually quite pronounceable, but we never see him often enough for me to remember it.)  Colonel What’s-his-face also has the CIP device which allows him to hack into any part of the U.S. infrastructure.  The goal of all this is to keep the U.S. from interfering in the Sangalan civil war, though honestly, I think he’s setting his sights low.  If I was in his position, I’d at least challenge the city of Dallas to the biggest game of Red Light/Green Light ever.

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The first thing you must know to understand my story is that Wonder Wife and I have no security at our building, so any packages we order have to be delivered to my job at “The Magic Kingdom.”

The second thing you have to know is that Wonder Wife and I are the type of lame-asses who order coffee from across the country.  We drink expensive coffee and cheap wine.  That fact didn’t seem stupid to me until I had to write it out.  That’s like saying I’ve got a solid gold bedspring for my futon.

A box of coffee arrived for me at the office the other day.  The entire mail room smelled like it. The mailroom attendent even commented on it by saying she couldn’t smell anything else.  I replied, “That’s the idea!”  For some reason I wanted to imply that I was using the coffee to transport cocaine and thereby seem bad-ass; looking back on it now, I hope I didn’t give her the impression that I had farted.

(Dear “Magic Kingdom” HR reps.  There was no cocaine in the box.  I also did not fart.)

By sheer coincidence, we had some co-workers from our Chicago office in town, and I had had a spirited discussion about coffee with one of them the day before.  I had even given her the name of my supplier.  (To reiterate, HR reps: no cocaine.  I did, however, fart just now.)

With a box of the good shit in my hand, it occurred to me that my colleague might enjoy a little sniff or two. (Okay, that time I tried to make it sound like coke.)

There are times – all too rare in my life – when I actually think about what I’m going to say before I say it.  Thankfully, the short walk from the mail room back to my desk gave me just enough time for such an opportunity.  Otherwise I would have walked right up to a co-worker, in an office environment, and invited her to take a whiff of my package.  Oh dear.

Regretably, the moment of realization came afterI had got her attention.  So now that she was looking at me expectantly, all the muscles in my face went slack as I stared off into space and tried and think of a better wording. But under the pressure, every phrasing I could think of was worse than the last.  Wanna smell my box?… Put your nose to this here box of mine…My package gives off a fragrance you’re sure to enjoy…

In hindsight, I was way too focused on the verb, rather than the noun. If I had just thought of the word “parcel” I’d have been home free.  Eventually, I went with something filled with too much social awkwardness to ever be mistaken for a come-on: “The, uh… contents of this box… which I received in the mail just now, mind you… give off an odor that… er… I think you would enjoy… y’know, from a safe distance…” (In my high school years, that was how I asked girls out.)

Just when I think my career has made a Matrix-style bullet-dodge, another co-worker sitting two feet away whips around and says, “He wants you to smell his package!” then looks at me like I should high-five him.

In the end, I think the moral of this story is that there are many ladies who should take my package gently in their hands, bring their face in close, open up their sensory organs and prepare to be amazed.  If only there was some way for me to tell them that…

Oh yeah.  If you want a kilo or two of this high quality shit (though they’ll probably make you buy it by the pound) go to Graffeo.com.  Get the dark roast.  Personally, I get the shit raw and step on it myself.  (I mean, you can’t beat fresh grounds, right?)  Tell them Z sent you, and I want to say thank you to Thunder Lizard for hooking me up in the first place.

Man, I miss The Wire.