Taking a Blogging Break

There are only so many hours in the day . . .

So goes the cliché, but it’s true, oh, so painfully true. As much as I’d like to think that I can get everything done on time – from meeting my column deadlines, blogging deadlines, attending to editing duties, remembering to pick up my kids/drive ‘em places, realizing that it’s time to make dinner or refill the fridge, continuing to do my volunteer work in a timely fashion– it’s been an exceedingly difficult task as of late.

And something’s gotta give ‘cause one person can only do so much at once.

For the next few weeks, I will TEMPORARILY stop blogging here and at my other blog. (I WILL, to quote Arnold, be back, so don’t give up on checking here.) Why the break? I need to finish editing a manuscript for a novel -- about blogging, ironically -- that I’ve been working on for two years but have not had the chance to complete. The plan is to finally get it edited and then, hopefully, find an agent then a publisher for it. (*fingers and toes crossed*)

But you can still get your fill of my writing in the meantime: I’m still going to be writing weekly columns on pop culture and politics for Mommy Tracked, so come on by to read my new pieces, posted on Tuesdays. I’ll be writing about TV at CliqueClack TV, where I’m covering some TV shows for them. And I’ll be tweeting on Twitter -- @MeredithOBrien. I just won’t be regularly blogging on my two blogs until the book is done.

I look forward to coming back to this space with renewed creative vigor and hopefully good news about my project to announce.

Notes on Pop Culture: 'Nurse Jackie' S3 Teaser, Tumultuous 'Parenthood' & 'Good Wife' + Family Politics

Nurse Jackie Season 3 Teaser

After last year’s sharp season, Edie Falco’s Nurse Jackie returns for a third on March 28 and I can not wait.

When last we left the acid-tongued Jackie, she'd been caught by her husband and best friend lying about her drug habit. The season three promo promises that she’ll have to deal not only with the fall-out from that confrontation, but from the fact that no one at the hospital knew she was married because she kept it secret, for whatever crazy reason.

Tumultuous Parenthood

While Adam and Kristina Braverman were finally able to put their angst to the side (for the time being) as their daughter returned home, two other families were having a pretty rough go of it during the latest Parenthood episode, which I reviewed here.

From Sarah Braverman (Lauren Graham) flipping out because her ex-husband is in town, to Crosby Braverman not at all liking the fact that his fiancé is bossing him around, there was plenty of angst in which the younger Braverman siblings could marinate.

Good Wife + Family Politics

The Good Wife has been doing a stupendous job depicting the impact of a political campaign on families, what with Alicia Florrick (Julianna Margulies) having to stop the distribution of a flier asserting that her teenage son impregnated a girl and then the girl got an abortion (it wasn't true), to her teen daughter being stalked by a rival campaign and tricked into saying things to be used against her candidate dad in a YouTube video.

My pop culture column this week centers on how some of the things we see playing out for the Florrick family on The Good Wife aren’t that far-fetched when it comes to the children of real politicians.

Image credit: NBC.

My Favorite Super Bowl Ad Amid a Sea of Mediocrity

Loved it, particularly as my two boys have, at one time or another, stalked things around the house while wearing Darth Vader and/or Storm Trooper masks and toting plastic light sabers.

Notes on Pop Culture: 'The Company Men' as a Horror Flick & 'Big Love's' Margene Drops Bombshell

Yes, I’m still here. I haven’t fallen off the face of the earth or become trapped under 47 feet of snow in my front yard as we in the Northeast cope with with a never-ending-depressing-as-hell snow apocalypse. Truth is, I’ve been under the weather, but I seem to be slowly on the mend and have a pair of pop culture quick hits for you:

The Company Men as a Horror Flick

Before falling ill, The Spouse and I finally saw The Company Men. And it scared the hell out of me as I identified a bit too much with the Ben Affleck/Rosemarie DeWitt suburban dwelling parents. (When I saw DeWitt's character driving a black Volvo, drinking iced coffee, carrying reusable grocery bags and wearing clothes that look a lot like what I wear, suffice is to say it was unsettling.) Their life was idyllic . . . until Affleck’s initially arrogant character got laid off and he became humbled by the fact that he couldn’t find work for many months. His wife's nurse’s paycheck wasn’t enough to finance their lifestyle, forcing them to sell their home, move in with his parents. He wound up taking a job with his brother-in-law on a construction job.

I wrote a column about how The Company Men made me question what has happened to the good, old fashioned American dream which told us that if people from financially modest circumstances went to college, got a degree or even two (extra points for an MBA), worked hard (as in never seeing your family) and aggressively climbed the corporate ladder, you could reap monetary rewards, like Affleck's character did. In this new, frightening economic climate where millions of jobs have been shed, that doesn't seem to be the case any more regardless of what academic degrees are hanging on your wall or how well you do your job.

Big Love's Margene Drops a Bombshell

Ep. 46: Scene Clip - The Ice Capades

I also got a chance to review the third installment of Big Love in which a massive bombshell was dropped upon the Henrickson family. (Don’t read any further if you haven’t yet seen the episode . . . )

Margene admitted that she was only 16 when she married Bill when the age of consent in Utah is 18, seemingly leaving Bill open to potential statutory rape charges should this information become public. Like he needs any more bad PR. (I'm supposing this would make Barb -- who has now started drinking to the point of inebriation -- and Nicki accessories of some kind?)

Between that little tidbit, the horrifically awkward four-across ice skating and Adaleen’s odd Alby-embracing decision (remember when Alby tried to blow her up?), the episode was quite gripping.