Vortex Drinking Game

I know. It's Monday. How inappropriate to be thinking of spirits so early. But I was catching up on my DVR-ed Person of Interest eppies and had an epiphany: Reese shoots people in the leg. All. The. Time.

This may not sound like a grand revelation; and if you are familiar with his Batman-ish vigilante code, you would understand why this is significant, but it started me thinking about what else we can count on with regularity here at the Vortex (It certainly isn't my posts-ha!). Here's your game:

Vortex Drinking Game

Every time you look at Jim Caviezel and cannot help thinking Jesus Christ!, take a shot.

Every time you wish you had a time machine to take you back to before you put your foot in your mouth, take a shot.

Every time someone alters "MacGyver" into a new part of speech (as in "I Macgyvered that dryer vent with duct tape"), take a shot.

Every time you watch Terra Nova and are tempted to feed the Shannon family to the dinosaurs so you can have Jim all to yourself, take a shot.

Every time you see man-titty on a novel cover, in homage to Fabio and Romancelandia, take a shot.

Every time you're watching a movie that tiptoes dangerously close to the creepy-older guy/too young girl romance (ala Thorn Birds, Portrait of Jeannie, Harum Scarum), take a shot.

Every time you wish Lost would come back, take a shot.

Every time you see a red telephone booth, take a shot.

Every time you see a chatchke that feeds into the Elvis Presley estate machine, take a shot.

Every time you hear a Keith Urban song and wish to go down under (take that how you will), take a shot.

Every time you feel the injustice of an unfair Words with Friends move, take a shot.

Every time someone speaks of the truth and your mind immediately heads for Mulder and Scully, take a shot.

Every time you hear the word quantum, take a shot.

Every time you see a close-up shot of Beth Chapman's talons or spiked heels on Dog the Bounty Hunter, take a shot. (Seriously, we got that she's a vixen already)

Every time you watch a Harry Potter movie or a Beavis and Butthead episode with another person who then insists on imitating the unique vocal qualities of either ad nauseum, take a shot.

Every time your watch stops, take a shot.

Happy Monday and Happy Drinking, everyone!

The Communist Chocolate Hellhole of Time Travel

First, some pesky business. Vortexer Charles Gramlich is all up into the time travel thing, and it snuck up on me. I learned via a cold Google Alert that "Battles, Broadswords and Bad Girls," is part of the pulp fiction anthology A Rip Through Time. Charles, Charles, Charles. You've been holding out on us. Vortexers, head over to Smashwords and pick this up. Ga-head. I'll wait.

Terra Nova is holding its own in the ratings battle, coming in last week in the middle of the pack in its time slot. I've held on longer than I anticipated after the second episode. Maybe it's the sixteen pack abs and that Jason O'Mara-time travel-effect, but it still slides into my DVR dutifully each week, and I still watch it when I'm caught up on all my Alfred Hitchcock Presents eppies. There are no stellar award-worthy actors here. The CGIs are laughable at best. Do I care that love is blossoming in the younger set? Nah. Give me a skeleton autopsy and a wicked hot flip of the collar, 80's-style, any day. This is, after all, Thriller Island.(Middle Aged Male clip)

Though a bit of old news, still Vortex-worthy and waaaay too sweet to pass up...

A man claiming to be from the future was arrested at Switzerland's Large Hadron Collider back in April 2010. He was searching for his time machine power unit, something that resembled a blender, near the facility's kitchen. According to police, he wore a bow tie and "rather too much tweed for his age," and refused to reveal his country of origin. Upon arrest, the man claimed, "Countries do not exist where I am from. The discovery of the Higgs boson led to limitless power, the elimination of poverty and Kit-Kats for everyone. It is a communist chocolate hellhole and I'm here to stop it ever happening."

To show you how much I adore this six-ways-of-awesome randomness, I will inject a young man with a bow tie and "rather too much tweed for his age" into my next story. When the world becomes a communist hellhole, I can't think of anything better than a Kit Kat to make that medicine go down.

Have a great Monday, everyone.

Terra Nova, The Dino Poo of a Lost Attempt

Let me lay it all out there before I dissect Terra Nova. The show is a thinly-veiled attempt to recapture the win that was LOST, a wannabe that will never be. Good. Now that that's out of the way...

I adored the first hour of the pilot, Genesis. Maybe that's because I'm more into time travel than dino poo. Though a bit heavy-handed with environmental agenda, I loved the concept of where our planet will be in a hundred and thirty some-odd years. I loved a protagonist that I could root for from scene one. I love that he is sixteen ways of hot, is all alpha-male, resourceful, tortured and fiercely protective of those he loves. The selection process to determine who would go back in time to be part of a new colony was exactly as I'd always imagined it: first, the most desirable citizens who had the most to offer a new civilization; second, a lottery. I love the infinite and baser conflicts inherent in trying to begin humanity anew.

The second hour lost me, pun intended. With precision and extensive dissertation, I can draw parallels between the characters in Terra Nova and the characters in LOST. The waterfall, the cryptic drawings, the overbearing, mysterious compound leader, the rogue sect, the young hottie to draw in the hard-to-pull-away-from-the-CW demographic of teenage girls. Need I continue? The only difference I could spot was dinosaurs instead of polar bears. I respect what Stephen Spielberg and FOX are trying to do.  Wait, no I don't. Why is it when networks get something truly fresh like Life on Mars (NBC), they give it a shoestring budget and mere weeks to get a foothold before they yank it, while they spend twenty-plus million on a tired spin they believe to be a guarantee? Sounds like another industry I know.

Will I continue to watch? For a time, I suppose. There is no crime in stacking up the DVR with Jason O'Mara deliciousness. But if they go all black fog on me, I'm out of there.

What do you think of Terra Nova? Am I just disgruntled because the only time travel will be in the pilot eppie?