My hair hurts.
Sarah Jane Adventures (S04E01/2 - The Nightmare Man)
I just caught up on the first two (half) episodes of Sarah Jane Adventures. I thought the first part of the episode was pretty boring, but I guess they had to set the scene again and explain how we got to Luke going away to uni. (Has that been written to write Tommy out for chunks of time to co-incide with his own school work?). The second part was much better, I thought, except the nightmare man was too clown/evil-mime-like and therefore extra creepy.
The World's Strictest Parents (S03E01 - New Jersey)
I don't usually watch this, but for some reason I did last night. And OMG it was so touching! The basic premise of the show is that two (unconnected) British teenagers who have gone off the rails or out of control in some way are sent to spend a week with strict parents elsewhere in the world who try to sort them out. This week's teens were a 19 year old guy who lives at home, doesn't work, sponges off his mum and is totally uninterested in the fact he's soon to become a dad and a 16 year olg girl who gets very angry because she struggles to communicate with her parents and takes drugs and parties a lot. They got sent to New Jersey to stay with a gay (male) couple and their 5 sons (3 adopted, 2 fostered, mostly all with some kind of troubled background). One of the parents worked on the guy, sending him to work and teaching him pride in earning his own money and then sending him to do 'chores' for a neighbour which turned out to be watching her 14 month old son while she did housework. He changed so much over the week... he took pride in his work (in a diner), broke down in tears after caring for the boy because it hit him he'd have a daughter and spent his $86 wages on baby clothes. I really hope he now has a job and has stayed the person he became while he was there. The other parent took on the girl and earned her trust, built up a relationship with her and got her to open up. He then invited her to stay a further 2 weeks as he knew if she left after a week she'd be straight back out partying. She really seemed to get more comfortable in her own skin. He even flew home with her to help her have the discussions she needed to have with her mum. The family seemed so lovely and genuine... like they were helping because they cared, not because of the TV show.
I'm not sure if I'll watch other episodes though, from the trailers the kids seem mouthy and rude and some of the parents don't seem much better!
I had a good skating lesson this week, but even better was the practice time afterwards. I really put in a lot of effort on my backwards one foot glide (passed forever ago, but I've never really been able to do it), backwards inside and outside edges (very important for pretty much everything I'm doing now) and my forward chasses (open and crossed/closed) which are part of bronze dance and which I can actually do most of the time! I stayed longer than usual, put in serious effort and made a lot of progress, so I'm happy! I just need to maintain it now...
I have a dentist appointment tomorrow before work. Ugh.