So January 1st I continued my avid pop culture consumption and fired up the first episode of…The First.

Absolutely nobody is watching this…this is another tv show they made just for me. Thanks. (The show has 1,500 twitter followers! A Raptors game is 20K!! Their IMBD rating is based on less than five thousand votes. And they spent $60 million on the first season…it’s so not getting a second season. $60 million so some dumb kid in Scarborough not wearing pants can watch something while he eats Lucky Charms on his Christmas Break is lousy economics.)

The First is created by the guy behind House of Cards and stars Sean Penn…it’s basically set in an Elon Musk type space company working with NASA and it shows the hardcore sacrifices…the emotional, physical and spiritual cost of trying to get to Mars…from engineering to astronauts and their families. (From the trailer I initially thought something ominous or sinister was gonna happen…it’s just a straightforward drama just set in a sci-fi visionary world of self-driving cars.)

Anyways…I’m getting to why I’m telling you this. In the third episode, Sean Penn had tasked this Colonel…this lady to recruit some non-army candidates to hopefully become Mars astronauts. So there’s this scene where she’s convincing this biologist to leave her University post and come to discover life on Mars. The professor balked…if I fail at this she says I lose years of my life and it sets my work back. The Colonel trusting her gut that the professor is rock-solid promises you won’t fail; you got this.

Fast forward in time and Sean Penn is looking at the Colonel’s recruits and he has to cut some people…after discussion (he made good points) with the Colonel (she made good points! I kinda see what they’re both saying!!) who initially protested she acquiesced and agreed with Sean Penn and they cut the professor. So you can see from her face she knows she broke her promise to the professor…she cost the professor’s life and work!

The next scene she’s with her lover in bed and can’t sleep so they get up and make tea. (I’ve seen 4 episodes and in every single one there is a major tea scene…it’s an American show…I dunno where all this tea is coming from…nobody is drinking coffee…even the overworked engineers! WHAT?!) and the Colonel…sips her tea and her frustration and her hurt bubble to the surface so in this dark kitchen she says:

“Decisions get made: fine. And some are wrong: fine. Can I live with this one? Yes. But I always make it work. My whole career. And I…I just feel like at this point, enough already! I mean…listen to me: I know what I’m talking about. I’ve been giving this command for a reason. I’ve earned it. I’ve excelled at it. And I…(she slams her tea down) And here we again!”

OH SNAP! That’s me because I recruited some people for Girth Radio and I promised them freedom and their shows and creativity and now I hafta tell em you’re all cut. You’re done.

But it’s also so many of us and so many of the frustrating discussions we have…”I mean…listen to me: I know what I’m talking about. I’ve been giving this command for a reason. I’ve earned it. I’ve excelled at it.” That’s all of us. That’s the most articulate expression of the frustration at the position we continually find ourselves in. (Much more polite than my current motto: Soon can kiss my ass.)

The even crazier thing was as soon as the scene wrapped up…the next scene it cut to a shot of a giant cross…what the what?! One of the characters is in AA and so this AA meeting was in a church the next day so the director established the shot by focusing on the cross. We went from the angry tea scene with nobody listens to me even though I know what I’m doing to a giant cross.

So I dunno what any of that means…other than I think they really did make a $60 million show for a dumb kid in Scarborough.

As for Girth Radio and the end of Pacific Junction Hotel bar…the new owner wants to meet next week…what do I ask for?

Do I take this opportunity to shut it down and do…something different?! Or do I push and plead with her to keep it going and we re-launch in a new direction? I dunno what I want anymore.

To be fair, I recognize it is her bar and she’s free to do what she wants: so I’m willing to listen to her vision and her plans. I hafta factor that in as well.

Hopefully, she gets what we do so we get off to a good start. (This could also be an opportunity to evict the snake too. We’ll see. Be great to evict him from Girth Radio for all of us…)

This weekend my Christmas Break is done and I was hoping to have an answer or two.

And that’s how 2019 has started…

-28-

Listen to My Summer Lair @ W • T • F

Also published on Medium.