8 Minus Jon Or Kate

I have been an avid watcher of Jon & Kate Plus 8 for about nine months.  I watched nearly every episode since going to school and actually having cable.  After just the first episode, I was hooked.  I was very impressed with Jon & Kate and the kids are adorable.  Jon & Kate show so much love for them and tried hard to keep their lives normal despite their fame.

However, my opinion has drastically changed since the semester ended.  The allegations against both of them for cheating was just the beginning.  Now, at least one of them is on the front cover of every tabloid every week.  I have no idea what is true and what isn’t, but there is obviously something going on.

Now, Jon & Kate are getting a divorce.  That in itself is not what bothers me.  Nearly half of all marriages end in divorce in this country and although that is incredibly sad, it remains a fact.  The Gosselins are choosing to get a divorce.  Not that big of a deal.  It is incredibly sad for their children, but it is what’s going to happen.

One of my favorite episodes of this past season was the one where Jon & Kate renewed their vows in Hawaii.  It was such a beautiful ceremony.  But what sticks out most in my mind was something Kate said.  She said something about how the children know that a lot of parents get divorced, but she wanted to reassure them that that will never happen in their family.  And now, only months later, they are getting divorced.

What bothers me is how they are handling the situation.  Namely the fact that they are continuing with the show.  Kate specifically said, ‘The show must go on.’  That, in my opinion, is kind of ridiculous.  Is it really in the children’s best interests to continue the show after they’ve been in tabloids for the past two months?  Probably not.  They’re never going to get to live a normal life now.

In one episode, Kate mentioned something about how they always ask the children if they want to continue the show before each renewal time.  The kids apparently always say yes.  However, I have a feeling they feel pressure by Jon & Kate to say that.  Children like to please their parents.  There’s a reason guardian ad litems are appointed for children involved in court cases.  I read in one tabloid that the children have told their aunt and uncle that they don’t want to continue the show.  I have no idea how accurate that tabloid is, but I tend to believe it.

The show is going to now feature Jon doing stuff with the kids and Kate doing stuff with the kids.  They should change the name to ‘Sometimes Jon Plus 8 and Sometimes Kate Plus 8′.  Honestly, I think the best thing for these kids would be to stop the show and let them try to live a normal life.  Jon & Kate once said they started the show in order to earn money to pay for things the kids need.  That’s believable.  Raising eight kids takes a lot of money.  But at what cost?  Buy the kids less clothing and go on fewer vacations and take the cameras out of the house.  I think they’ve earned enough money now anyway, judging by the size of their new house.

I have to mention the one thing that impresses me about this situation, though.  And that is the fact that the children will not be shuttled back and forth between parents.  Jon & Kate will be taking turns at the house with the kids.  I have to give them credit for that.

Thirteen Really Random Things (TT#6)

I haven’t done a Thursday Thirteen in a while, mainly because I can’t think of anything.  So, today I’m just going to post thirteen random things.

1.  I watched a movie in Creative Writing today that was about a Nursing Home Beauty Pageant.   It was possibly the strangest thing I have ever seen in my life.  I could have done without the scene where the old lady put on her stockings.

2.  I am very addicted to MyLeaky, The Leaky Cauldron’s newest form of online communication.

3.  Benny ate half of a homemade bread the other day, because my mom didn’t put it in the microwave when she left.  The only reason he didn’t eat the whole thing is because there was only half of it left.  I’m just happy he didn’t eat the tin foil it was wrapped in.

4.  It is very cold today, yet sunny.  It is going to be 40 degrees on Saturday, which is pretty much a heatwave for Upstate NY in the beginning of February.

5.  They keep the dorm rooms way too warm at night.  The heat is on too high if you have to kick off your blankets when you’re trying to get to sleep in February.  Why don’t they turn it down and save money?

6.  I am not very good at the drums on Rock Band 2.  I am decent at the guitar and not very good at the singing.

7.  I have to write a 3 page paper about research methods for psychology, but not in my Research Methods class.  It is for my Honors class.  That means I have done research methods in every single class this semester except Creative Writing.  Maybe I can write a story about how much I detest research methods and then I will have done something involving it in every one of my classes.

8.  Dr. Foreman did something incredibly stupid on House on Monday.  Something that could have cost him his medical license and probably would have if it had been done in real life.  But since it was House, he was able to keep his license.  Also, 13 (another doctor) got cancer due to Foreman’s stupidity, but was cured the same day she was diagnosed.

9.  My iBook’s battery is dying and I will soon have to purchase another one.  However, my bro informed me that 2.5 hours is a perfectly acceptable amount of time for a battery to last.  He would think this since he does not have a Mac.

10.  I have a bunch of pictures to post of Benny, but have not done so because uploading pictures to WordPress takes forever due to the fact that you can only upload one at once.  Also, WordPress no longer lets me post pictures from Photobucket, which drives me insane.

11.  LeakyCon is less than four months away!  I cannot wait to meet other people who are obsessed with Harry Potter as I am.

12.  I have way too many classes on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays.

13.  Nobody has shown up to my tutoring sessions for Statistics yet.  This might be due to the insanely early hour I hold them.  Nobody wants to do Statistics at eight in the morning.  Thus, the three sessions I have had so far were in essence study halls for me.

Welcome Back Friends!

I used to watch Friends everyday, back when it was on FOX every evening.  This started shortly after we got rid of cable and were down to four channels.  I absolutely love Friends and was hooked immediately.  I’m sure I’ve seen almost every episode.

Unfortunately, shortly after they stopped showing new episodes, FOX changed their evening lineup and Friends was no longer shown.  I was quite angered about this, especially since it was replaced by another episode of That ’70s Show and Everybody Loves Raymond.  Thus, for the past couple of years, I have had to go without watching numerous Friends reruns due to my lack of cable television and FOX’s poor choice of evening sitcoms.

Then, they decided that all TV was going digital and we would have to buy some kind of converter box for both our TVs if we had any hopes of watching any TV after February 2009.  Last week my parents and my bro went out to buy the boxes.  My bro installed them and we were all thrilled to find that we now get around four more channels.  We have no doubled the amount of channels we receive.  One of these channels is some kind of FOX subsidiary called MyTV.  For a long time, I have been wishing we got this channel for the sole reason that they show two episodes of Friends every weekday.  Life is good, I now get to watch an hour of Friends almost everyday.