I'm back! It's been more than a month - a pretty hectic month at that and I've been itching to blog and now I can :) Thank God of long weekends, which luckily, I have now. Being bumped up at my job certainly has some perks - and holidays off is one. Yes, that's what's been keeping me busy for the past month a new position at work and also, family stuff too.
Paolo updates: he's improved a lot in a month :) His team of interventionists now meet twice a month instead of monthly to review their programs since he's been good at acquiring all the skills that they've been teaching him (they have to develop new programs constantly). He's gotten better at searching the net too - he now knows how to narrow down his searches to get the specific things he wants. For example, if a search for 'Patrick' does NOT give him Spongebob Squarepant's friend, he will then add the word 'Starfish' after 'Patrick' to get what he wants. I've seen it and it's amazing. Even grownups don't even know the basics of narrowing down your search! He also knows to search for videos on YouTube too, memorizing the whole web address - right after seeing me browse the site. He actually picks up on stuff I surf on the net and most recently has acquired the word 'Skins' in his library of words he knows how to spell and read. And why is that? Well, it's because it's my latest favorite thing to watch on the net.
It's something that I just found. Me with the whole websurfing thing, I find the oddest and coolest kinds of things. It started with Maximo Park. I got addicted to their song 'Apply Some Pressure' and wanted to know how they looked like or sounded like in an Interview. So I YouTubed them. I found an Interview on a UK show called Popworld, which was kind of a quirky MTVish type show. Curiosity ensued again and I searched for more Popworld videos and found quite a few with the host Simon Amstell in it. After a few videos, I became quite intrigued, especially with his Babyshambles interview, that didn't make any kind of sense at all. I go on and Wiki-ed him to find out that he's quite known for his non conventional interview style - which more often than not, leaves interviewees confused or appalled. He once made Britney spears walk out - commenting something in the lines that she may be crazy. Checking further, I found out that he's currently hosting a game show 'Never Mind the Buzzcocks'. So, I then found YouTube vids of it and enjoyed it quite immensely (I should make me a note of posting this later - this show is hilarious!). Since I loved him so much - he's my new favorite celebrity - I tried searching for other things he was involved in. This in turn resulted in watching 'Skins' - a UK TV show about teens where he co-wrote one episode. Now, I could certainly say, I'm hooked and a big fan of 'Skins'.
After viewing a few episodes available online on YouTube, I knew I had to watch the whole season of the show. I know, I know, I shouldn't be watching these teen themed shows, I'm too old for these, right? I hate to admit, I do like these kinds of shows sometimes. Blame it on my underpriviledged teenage years - no parties or proms or boyfriends, being in a very very conservative all girls Catholic school and with an immensely strict dad to boot. I never did get hooked on the OC or One Tree Hill though, but Skins has a certain draw to it. One word to put it - it's edgy. It's like, Saved By The Bell, but on dope.
Primarily, it's about a group of friends, 17 year olds, in college, and their lives growing up. Sounds pretty simple right? Having gone through the whole season these past few days, the premise is quite simple, the plot not so complicated - though, the way they tell the story and excute it is quite original. I'm not sure why they called it Skins in the first place, but judging from what I've seen, I might think it's because they show the most amount of skin than in any other teeny bopper shows. The first episode for example, gives you a voyeuristic shot of a nude woman (yes, boobs are seen) being eyed by one of the teenagers from his room's window. He's also half naked wearing only his boxer briefs (that's briefs, not shorts - so it's a bit form fitting). Also, one of the other episodes has one of the main characters completely naked and walking around in the streets. It has a hint of 'American Pie' in it, but tonnes more swearing than I've ever heard in a teen film or TV show. It kind of reminded me of my other favorite UK TV show 'Shameless' ( which according to my husband, chronicles the life of a 'white trash' family, UK version). Hearing that it was created by the same people, made me love the show more.
The main ongoing theme for the first season is boy falls in love with girl but girl has a boyfriend which incidentally is the boy's best friend - the Classic Love Triangle. Girl knows boy is in love with her but thinks of him as only a friend. She tries to hook him up with another girl that eventually falls in love with the boy but is devastated by his cluelessness of her feelings for him. Then, throw in some friends - a sex hungry, party going Muslim boy, his gay friend, their hyperactive drug experimenting friend and a fiesty clarinetist who would readily shove her clarinet up you ass if you get in her way. To spice things up, the boyfriend is a cheating, lying, manipulative, but sometimes lovable chum. In one episode, gives the gay friend a head, just for kicks. The boy in love is your typical geeky, dorky boy that occasionally enjoys wanking (which we see him do twice in the series) and has several nudie girl pictures in his room. The girl hoplessly in love with him is an obsessive-compulsive anorexic who loves food - but not to eat, but to arrange in a neat and orderly kind of way. The girl, who's the object of affection, seems to be the only one who's almost normal in the lot. She's the stereotype party-girl, who wears the most fashionable clothes and loves to get attention from the opposite sex. It's character driven, well written and is lucky enough to have a great cast who knows how to flesh the characters out the right way. Weirdly enough I can relate to two of the main characters, who uncannily resembles me and my husband more ways than one.
In the next bit, I will indulge in re-telling the story of Skins - focusing on my two fave characters Sid and Cassie. Yeah, do forgive me, I have to get this out of my system ;)
So Sid, is the loyal best friend of Tony (played by the boy in 'About a Boy', Nicholas Hoult) - a very cool good-looking guy who's girlfriend is Michelle - Sid's lifelong crush. He's geeky-dorky and nice, which makes him the typical non-boyfriend but bestfriend type guy for girls. He abhors this as he knows Michelle sees him as such and she also tells him so (at this point my husband says 'hey that's me!'). He's also a virgin too at 17. So, Tony, the cool friend that he is, sets him up to get laid at a party with the help of Michelle who hooks him up with her friend Cassie, who just got out of the clinic for an eating disorder problem. Cassie, looks extremely kooky and the first time she meets Sid, it seems that she'd taken a few pills of ecstacy. She hugs both Sid and Tony (even kissing Tony) and looks a bit out of it for the most part of the evening . Here's a real nice clip from YouTube, something that Cassie says while on the trampoline is something that I say to my husband on a regular basis. 'Hey, it's us!' he says, it's an inside joke and I find it hilarious:
Cassie doesn't OD, but she's still anorexic and doesn't eat. The fact the Sid notices it, kind of makes her fall for him. There's a real great scene here where she is on the second floor looking down at people on the lower floor. She sees Sid passing by and wants to convince herself that he likes her, asking for a sign that he does by saying 'Look up if you like me. Look up if you like me'. (How many times have I done that in my life? There's the, if he wears red today, he likes me, if I hear my favorite song on the radio, he likes me, heads he likes me tails he doesn't, he loves me, he loves me not...) He doesn't look up wherein she reacts by saying 'Oh bugger' and retreats to her class:
She was actually hallucinating that Sid was sending messages for her to 'eat' which prompts her to go back to the clinic. She still he likes him and feels crushed that he's head over heels for Michelle and can't even consider going for someone else who's there and actually likes him back. She's not discreet about showing him he likes her, but Sid, being thick as he is, doesn't get the message. She suggests going out on a date - they set one up, but he gets grounded that same day to force him to do his history homework. When she gets the news, the reacts cherrily saying 'Oh, I didn't eat for three days so... I could be lovely' but suggests stopping by later. Sid sneaks out, urged by Tony, to accompany Michelle to his choir concert which turns out to be a disastrous evening as Michelle catches Tony cheating on her. Tony has actually planned it and suggest that Sid comfort Michelle and that it's 'his chance'. When Sid catches with Michelle, they encounter a gang of 'chav' girls that beat them up - Michelle getting away with only a punch in the eye while Sid a much much worse beating and gets peed on by homeless man while he cringes near the gutter. Sid then comes home, bloodied, bruised and reeking of piss seeing Cassie waiting for him:
The next day, Tony urges Sid to take Michelle out on a date - offering her as a 'gift' for Sid. He tells Tony that it's all fucked up, but gives in by giving Michelle a call which Cassie overhears - making her feel more crushed as she was the night before. As Sid and Michelle go on their 'date' Cassie loads up the squirt gun she stole from Sid's room with Vodka, takes in a whole bag of pills and chases them down using her Vodka squirt gun. It's a nice an artsy scene suicide scene with Cassie swaying to Portishead as she takes in the effect of the drugs. Tony shows up where Michelle and Sid are and Michelle takes Tony back in. Sid realizes this as another one of Tony's manipulative schemes and leaves, only to call Cassie and hear the news of her suicide attempt.
Tony goofs up again on his relationship with Michelle when he attempts to give their gay friend Maxxie a sexual favor right in front of a sleeping Michelle when they go out on their field trip to Russia. She wakes up seeing this, but feigns sleep, only to be hurt when Tony thinks nothing of it and doesn't apologize after the fact. Too devastated, she goes to Sid offering him a chance to get in bed with her. Surprisingly, Sid was unable to perform - admitting to Michelle that he thinks he may be fancying another person and considers Michelle as only his friend now. So, they head up to the clinic where Cassie is staying with Michelle convincing Sid 'Just because you made someone try to kill herself doesn’t mean she won’t be glad to see you.' :
They don't see each other a few days after, but after Tony comes to Sid asking for a favor to find his missing sister - Sid manages to discover Cassie following them randomly as they go around town. He calls her, asking her to meet up with him:
Cassie is peeved, feeling unimportant as Sid chooses Tony and Michelle over her, so she writes a letter to Sid to let him know her feelings. Sid in turn realizes that he may be in love with Cassie ( I just love how he writes his letter ;) ):
He goes off to the clinic in a hurry, wearing mismatched clothing - intent on letting Cassie know of his feelings. Mistaking him as an escaped patient, they lock him in a padded room for the rest of the day. Tony comes to the rescue and bails Sid out, carrying with him Cassie's letter, that she left on Sid's bed earlier that day. He leaves to look for Cassie. Cassie, out and about in town is seen by Tony. She tells him to tell Sid she's going away to Scotland. He then gives her a going away gift - Sid's unfinished letter.
Here's the cool part about this - may be cheesy for others, but I liked it :) Tony gets run over by a van just before he admits to Michelle on the phone that he truly loves her and Sid breaks out into a song after he reads Cassie's letter. (An unconscious Tony also sings along too):
Ain't it a great show? So there, I got it out, I'm never going to blog about this again like a giddy teenager telling a story about her latest crush. If you're like me, I think you'll enjoy this show immensely - even if it is about teens. It's fresh and original, it's got sex, drugs and lots of cool music too. That Pete Doherty song when Sid and Cassie kiss - really, really great. I don't care if Pete Doherty 's a crackhead, he really knows how to make good songs. And most of all, it's more real then any other show I've seen - even in the end when they break into song. Life IS a sing-along musical...or maybe just for me.
I know this is posting's a media overload, but just to top it off, here's Pete Doherty's 'For Lovers'. Enjoy!
