TMI: RIP

It seems like there has been an unusually high number of celebrity deaths the last few weeks. Each one reminds me about my own impending mortality -- and a day I do not look forward to.

Other than watching them on TV as a child, I admit I do not have many memories to tell about them. My brothers had posters of David Carradine (as Caine in "Kung Fu") and Farah Fawcett. Karl Malden filmed a scene for "The Streets of San Francisco" in front of the building where my father worked. My grandmother used to order books and magazines while dreaming of the day Ed McMahon would knock on her door and present her with a big check from Publisher's Clearing House.

I had to fly half-way around the world to almost have something in common with one celebrity. I was standing on the balcony of The People's Palace in Bucharest, Romania and pretended to wave to an imaginary crowd while enjoying the scenery.



At that point, the tour guide pointed out that Michael Jackson was one of the first people to stand in the same spot I had been. He had a large audience of real people, of course. But apparently while waving, he yelled out, "I love Budapest!" Fortunately, I did not make the same mistake about the city name.

I imagine one benefit famous people have is that they will always be remembered, and in that sense they are immortal.

TV: Amazing Race 12: Ep 8

After last week's episode, this week seemed a bit more tense. Maybe because the teams visited the busiest city in the world. Maybe because the Goths had a penalty to serve and it was guaranteed to be an elimination leg. I did not even note who came in first. The whole show was basically a race between the Goths and Nate/Jen for second to last place. In the end, Jen got a friendly bit of help while Kynt misread directions completely and lost.

The leg began with all the teams trying to book flights from Florence, Italy to Mumbai, India. Fortunately not too much time was spent on airport drama as it turned out all the teams would get bunched together waiting for a news stand to open in Mumbai.

I spent a day in that city a few years ago, and it is true that the first thing that hits you is the smell from the pollution and the crowds and various other things -- especially around the International airport. Some of the teams wore masks while waiting for the stand to open.

Jen / Nate were the last to find a clue hidden as an ad within a newspaper. It was not the hardest task in the world, but they never figured out how to divide and conquer the search. Fortunately for them the Goths had a pretty bad taxi driver and immediately had to perform the Speed Bump penalty. They were sent off to a different part of the city to perform Yoga exercises. Maybe it was a good penalty for them since they had gotten so tense in Italy.

The next challenge was a detour involving putting up a movie poster or stringing a flower necklace together. This is one of the few times in this race where the teams divided almost equally between the two tasks. The grandfather / grandson team finished the poster first since the grandfather had some experience with billboards. TK and Rachel finished the flowers first working well together as a team. Ron and his daughter took longer with the poster with Ron acting mean again. Finally Nate / Jen struggled with the flowers almost as bad as they did with the newspaper with the Goths making up a bunch of time.

The roadblock challenge was very similar to several others in this race. Deliver items to certain addresses in a part of town where the streets might be hard to navigate and pick up proof of delivery. This was one of the few times where physical strength was needed with TK being able to carry a bunch of propane tanks at once and finishing in first ahead of the grandson.

Ron risked aggravating his hernia but still finished before the last two teams would fight it out to avoid elimination. Somehow the Goths arrived at the final challenge moments before Nate / Jen but then committed a huge tactical error by choosing to enforce the U-turn -- but on the wrong team. Had they chose Nate / Jen, they would still be racing. But trying to take out the Grandfather / Grandson team was a mistake since they were already ahead, and at that point they incurred the wrath of the karma gods. Both Kynt and Jen misread the directions. Kynt was exchanging the order with the receipt when he should have kept both, while Jen forgot to pick up the receipt from the door completely. The two even crossed paths insind one building where Kynt picked up additional bad karma by keeping an elevator stuck on the second floor to temporarily prevent Jen from making a delivery to the 5th floor. Eventually one of the customers reminded her to pick up the receipt. At that point she realized she had to go back to the first customer and pick up that receipt as well. Kynt did not realize his mistake until he thought he had completed the task. By then it was all over, though they could have gotten lucky with the taxi ride to the Pit Stop. But it was not meant to be.

In the next episode, it appears TK and Rachel choose a road less traveled. But will it pay off? I cannot wait to watch it but I will be on the road myself.

TV: Amazing Race 12: Ep 7

This leg of the race turned out to be scenic but fairly non-eventful. The granfather / grandson team took a fast forward that involved getting tattoos and ended up winning a trip to Cancun. The Goths may have gotten lost on the roads of Italy and finished last. Luckily it was a non-elimination pit stop but they face a new twist of a Speed Bump (an extra challenge) in the next leg.

The teams were bunched up pretty quickly when taking a ferry across the Adriatic to Italy. At that point teams had to drive to a town called Empoli. Some of the teams did not know about road construction and ended up either waiting in traffic or taking some windy side roads to the next clue box.

From there, the Road Block challenge had one of the team members riding an ultralight plane over Tuscany in search of a clue from the sky. It was almost a needle in the haystack style challenge. Either TK had a particularly hard time seeing the clue, or he just loved the scenery so much that he went back up three times while all the other teams passed him up. I do not have much of a fear of flying, but I imagine that in an ultralight I might have grabbed something so tight, there would be a hand shaped dent in it.

TK and Rachel had a tough time overall. First they left a clue behind before going to Empoli and had to turn around and retrieve it. But they were fortunate someone told them a faster route to take with the construction going on. Then TK could not see the clue from the sky that told them to go to Vinci. Then they had a flat tire driving to the pit stop.

Somehow TK and Rachel still beat the Goths who had their own car breakdown and started to snipe at each other. Ron also seemed mean to his daughter again. Nate and Jen continued sniping at each other yet always managed to finish near the top.

The tattoos seemed kind of small. It was funny to hear the grandfather hope they would have to shave their heads instead. Tattoos supposedly can be removed these days, but I have little clue on the details of cost. As much as I avoid getting a tattoo, I suppose I might keep the FF under the circumstances.

Next week we get to see if the Goths can survive doing an extra challenge. Somehow they don't seem to be very long or require much physical endurance this season. Maybe that changes next week.

TV: Amazing Race 12: Ep 6

In this episode, it was another case of airport drama as teams tried to catch early flights from Lithuania to Croatia. Not listening to details probably cost the race for the brother / sister team who had one several of the early legs. They were booked business class seats instead of economy by a travel agent. It was hard to tell if the agent was just upselling or if the economy seats for a flight other teams were on were all booked anyway. In any case, the order of arrival in Croatia mostly determined the order of finish for the racers.

Actually Nate and Jen kept messing up and still finished 3rd in spite of themselves. They arrived in Croatia first but got lost trying to find the first clue box, which allowed the father / daughter team to go into first. Then they were turned down by a taxi driver for being too wet. They were so frustrated by this, they desperately broke the rules and coaxed a local to become a taxi driver to the pit stop. They were caught and had to go back to hire a real taxi. That allowed the Goth team to pass them up for second place. The editing made it look like their relationship has no hope. But maybe they do belong to each other despite the arguing. They sort of remind me of The Needlers from Saturday Night Live. Nate also had the quote of the episode with his reference to a "cherry on top of a melted sundae."

TK and Rachel cruised into 4th place. They and the grandfather / grandson team (5th place) missed a connecting flight in Prague. It is a beautiful city to be stuck in I must say, but I suspect these poor teams never saw anything outside the Prague airport. I never saw the airport myself since I took a very scenic train ride to that city from Berlin back in 2001. The teams had to rebook through Vienna to travel to Dubrovnik. Vienna is another beautiful city, just a short hop by plane, train or automobile from Prague I suspect. My visit to Vienna actually occurred way back in 1991 or 1992 when a co-worker and I drove there from Paris, France with several stops along the way. We were going to drive all the way to Budapest, Hungary but we were turned back at the border because my co-worker did not have the right dates in his visa paperwork. Fortunately, the conference we attended was in Vienna, so we did not get into trouble.

Anyway, it looks like Dubrovnik is another cool European city to visit. All the remaining teams saw a nice view as they drove to the harbor and rode a zip line from one turret to another in the fortress near the harbor.

I probably would have decided to do short / long instead of long /short because I do not know how well I would have rowed around the city walls.

TJ and Rachel were checking out the prize they had one in the previous leg. Looks like they will be staying at the New Otani in Tokyo. I stayed there way back in 1994. Luxurious hotel with a nice garden and convenient location (well my company has an office in Japan that is practically next door). Well I did almost mess up my back when I slipped in the bathtub. But that was the only one of two lowlights of a fun trip. I will save the other lowlight for a future blog entry if it ever enters my mind again.

Hopefully Hendekea has learned that knowing how to say, "There's a party in my pants" in Bosnian is not a huge advantage over other teams.

Next episode: Grandpa gets freaked out.

TV: Amazing Race 12: Ep 5

This was probably one of the more uneventful episodes of AR I can recall. However, one team went from almost worst to first and another team was eliminated after earning bad karma in the previous leg, so it was not a bad episode overall.

It seemed like most of the leg had the teams scrambling for flights from Burkina Faso in West Africa to Vilnius, Lithuania. I imagine it is not a popular flight route so the local travel agents had difficulty finding fast flights from Point A to Point B without having a couple of layovers perhaps.

Once in Lithuania, teams had to deliver messages to people in some old town square. I guess the beauty salon was hardest to find since it was a little bit tucked away. Anyway, it was very similar to the road block challenge from the last episode. Then a product placement opportunity arose when teams had to find a particular gnome used as a mascot for a travel web site in some farm land.

Finally, came the detour challenge. Counting posts or walking on stilts. Seeing people try to master the stilts was sort of funny but I know I would have had a very hard time of it myself. Counting never makes for exciting TV, but seeing some teammates get snippy with each other was mildly entertaining.

It was good to see the calm, quiet TK & Rachel win this leg.

I do not think the bus was very close to hitting the wannabe bombshells. But it did remind me of a scene from one of the few episodes I have seen of Life, where the main character's car was involved in a side collision.

I did have a chuckle when one of the contestants said they should do some research at an Internet "buffet."

Hopefully more action and tougher challenges are in store in the next leg.

TV: Amazing Race 12: Ep 1 and 4

As I stated in a previous blog entry, I lost a few episodes of this season's Amazing Race. I believe they were 2 and 3. This means I can comment only on 1 and 4 and hope I do not lose any others going forward.

The 12th Amazing Race started at the Playboy Mansion in Los Angeles. I guess it was as good a place as any to start since most of the teams were from Southern California. I did not pay close attention to see if most of the LA teams took the shortest route to the 405 freeway and LAX (a left according to Google Maps). I have been on that stretch of highway several times, though never because . I was kind of surprised the traffic was not worse.

The producers tried to bring some new types of couples to this race. Interestingly, there were no teams this season with two young guys. The only married couple were the lesbian ministers. There is a grandfather / grandson team this time around. The Goths might be interesting or annoying depending on my mood. The Miami sisters are the cutest but I already know they will not be around long.

The teams immediately have to find flights to Shannon, Ireland. Because a flight gets delayed the teams that were on an earlier flight out of LAX actually arrive later than the teams on a later flight. One gets to see how green Ireland is, but the Amazing Race is still not filmed in HD. Hopefully this will change in the future.

The restaurant worker team decides to steal a taxi reserved for another team. The bad karma they earn from that move bites them in the ass in the form of the most stubborn donkey on the planet. It did not help that they had no "donkey whispering" skills preferring to just yell and pull instead. Hence they came in last and were eliminated. Another couple who seem to have an unstable relationship also had trouble with their donkey, but eventually figured out how to push him/her down the path and arrived in second to last place.

The team that won this leg looks like they could be the toughest team in the competition. But if they are anything like my sister and me, they will be at each other's nerves after a few days together.

The only fun challenge in this race was biking along a high-wire with a teammate suspended below to help keep the bike balanced on the wire. I think there was another wire above for safety. With my discomfort with heights, I am not sure if I would want to be the one biking or the one hanging out on the bottom. At least the scenery might have been nice enough to make me live with the fear.

Fast forward to Episode 4 where the teams are in Africa. It appears we have lost the ministers and the sisters in the prior two episodes. Young kids seem to be everywhere and are usually helpful to all the teams. The teams have to temporarily adopt a chicken and one team names theirs Phil, which seems appropriate given Phil's hair style.

At the detour teams had to choose between dancing and gold panning. I would have chosen mining for a couple of reasons. One: I cannot dance. Two: With the price of gold rising, I would have mined a few extra ounces of gold and tucked it in my pocket. Given how easy it was for teams to find gold out in the open like that, I wonder how real the gold was and how much was actually placed there artificially. I had a similar experience in Alaska where the tour guides admitted that they had to add the gold into the mud. It was fun, but I am not even sure if I eventually misplaced the tiny gold flakes I found or gave them away to my relatives.

None of the judges in the Dancing competition came across as tough as Simon Cowell. But it was funny that one of the teams that incurred a 10-minute penalty for not being creative enough included a former L.A. Clippers cheerleader. That penalty could have cost them the win in this leg, where they lost in an exciting photo finish to the brother and sister team.

The team eliminated in this leg seemed like a nice couple. They fell victim to a U-Turn penalty used by the wannabe Blond Bombshells.

Africa is a continent I have yet to visit. I do want to see the pyramids of Egypt and/or some nature preserve (with nice accommodations since I have never slept inside a tent / sleeping bag -- It even took me a long time to remember the word for this -- Camping).

Web: A Parody of 24

I must be officially old when people start to reminisce about life and technologies in the 1990's as they do in this Engadget Blog Posting.

Spin the clock back another 15 or 20 years and now you have a television show with no cell phones, pagers, or even personal computers and it would be doubtful anything could be done in 24 hours. Roll the clock back just a bit more, and the show would be called, The Wild Wild West.

TV: Amazing Race: All-Stars - Finale

A very belated congratulations to Eric and Danielle for winning the Amazing Race and $1 million dollars after being "Yielded" twice, surviving an elimination penalty, and basically tolerating each other. The editors made their relationship look less stable than maybe it really is. I did not think they would survive so long in the race. In the end, Eric's memory of Danielle's opinions of the other teams may have made the difference. In other words, he did "listen to the woman."

The final challenge was a inventive one. Based an answers to questions about the other team, one team member generated a 4-digit code to lock the sort of safe you would see in a hotel. Then the other team member would enter the room and hope to arrive at the same answers to unlock the safe.

It was an interesting final leg. It did not look like the teams left 12 hours after they arrived like they normally do. It may have been more like 24 hours. The teams had to fly from Guam to Hawaii and for a while it looked like Charla and Mirna had once again found a better flight than other teams to gain a 20 minute lead. The first challenge did not seem very difficult or take long to do. The order did not change as each team finished as the next team arrived at that first challenge. The next challenge was a little more difficult as the teams had to paddle a kayak in rough waters to reach the next clue. [Memories of my second to last shoulder dislocation came haunted me when I saw the Beauty Queens capsize.] Charla and Mirna fell deep into last place and I thought it would spell the end for them.

However, the next clue told teams to go to San Francisco but they had to book flights into Oakland International Airport. The smaller number of flights to choose from allowed the teams to be tied again. This brought them to the final challenge mentioned above. The teams left for the final pit stop just a few minutes apart (1st were Eric and Danielle, then the Beauty Queens, and Charla and Mirna) but I guess the traffic in San Francisco and random taxi drivers did not allow for any lead changes.

Funny that last week I talked about flying from San Francisco to Manila via Hawaii and Guam. Travel has changed quite a bit since then. The teams had to go to Tokyo (Narita) first to get to Honolulu.

I have visited most of the Hawaiian Islands except for Lanai. Although I have lived practically my whole life in San Francisco, I have never been inside the Old Mint or the Botanical Gardens. I would still need Google Maps to figure out the fastest way between those two points as well. I only rode the cable cars for the first time a few years ago. But I guess it is typical for people to visit the tourist attractions closest to them last. I will be spending a bit more time in San Francisco next week for Oracle OpenWorld. Maybe I will hit a few more tourist spots then. Yosemite is still on my list of places to visit.

Next Episode: The First Leg of Season 12 and a chance to see some hopefully interesting brand new teams.

TV: Amazing Race: All-Stars - Ep 12?

This episode marked the end for Danny and Oswald. Not sure how they fell behind again after all the teams were bunched together in Guam. They must have gotten lost driving again. Despite the bunching, the Beauty Queens seemed to breeze through this leg from start to finish. It left very little tension in the race. The airlift and search and rescue exercise were highlights in this episode, and may have been the most unique aspect of this particular race. Granted I barely remember the episodes from seven months ago, so I don't remember what cool stuff they did before.

I actually spent a short amount of time in Guam when I was 3 or 4 years old. I flew back to the Philippines with my mother and perhaps some other relatives to attend my grandfather's funeral. I think my father stayed behind to watch my brothers and sister who did not miss school. Funny thing is I cannot remember if my sister was there too or not. Anyway back in 1970, that flight from San Francisco to Manila included changing planes in Hawaii and Guam. All I remember of those two stops was that it was raining, humid, and the plants were huge and green. Plus we always had to dash to get onto the plane -- either that or my mom just wanted to stay out of the rain. I thought it was called a runway because we had to run on it to reach the stairs into the plane.

My other memories of the flights back and forth was that it was a double-decker 747 and I snuck upstairs once or twice. The airline food was pretty bland (and unusual). Of course, I should save all the memories of that trip for a separate blog entry. And yes, I do remember several things that happened in my life even before I was 3 years old...

Next up is the final episode and a 67% chance that an all-female team wins the million dollars. The race is long over so I guess I should not even waste time predicting who the winner is. And believe or not none of my friends have ruined it for me all this time, and I avoided any web site that might spoil the outcome for me. That, in itself, is kind of amazing.

TV: Amazing Race: All-Stars - Ep 11?

In this leg with no airline flights involved, one would think a six-hour gap between first and last place would be safe. But Team Cha Cha Cha decided to do just about everything wrong.

1. Earn bad karma by dealing with the devil team disguised as blond beauty queens.
2. Never ditched their incompetent taxi driver (or at least a driver with communication issues)
3. Waited to long to ask for directions.

Once again it was a non-elimination leg, so the sins might be forgiven. And it was a tense leg for Eric and Daniele who had to overcome another Yield and a 30-minute penalty for not coming in first.

I didn't know Macau was so close to Hong Kong. I might have to stop by there next time I am in that part of the world. Of course the last time I was out there, Macau probably was only beginning to transform itself into the Asian version of Las Vegas.

The drop from the tower looks like fun, and the views looked spectacular. But I would have had a hard time doing the walk around the tower in the wind and rain. I wonder how much my knees would be wobbling up there.

If I ever train for the Amazing race, I will have to remember to learn stick shift. There has been much driving on the left side of the road this season. Unfortunately, there may not be many places to practice driving on the left inside the US. I think the Barney Oldfield ride in nearby Great America is the closest I can get to having the steering wheel on the right. But it is not stick and there's no crazy traffic.

Next episode: Danielle has a break down. Can't wait...

TV: Amazing Race: All-Stars: Ep 10?

Okay I took a six-month+ leave of absence from my blog for reasons I may or may not go into someday. On top of that I lost my notes for an episode (if not two) of the Amazing Race All-Stars. But since the new season starts tonight, I better post what few notes I do have.

This leg involved teams racing from Kuala Lumpur to Hong Kong. The order of finish was pretty much determined in the Kuala Lumpur airport as teams jostled for spots on various waiting lists. That order was influenced by two Amazing Race laws: "Maintain good karma" and "Listen to the woman." Team Cha Cha Cha being the nicest of the surviving teams managed to find the various airline offices at Kuala Lumpur airport first. This allowed them to be the first team on standby, survive a flipped over stunt car, and win a return trip to Hong Kong for Chinese New Years. By not listening to Danielle, Eric kept getting lost on the roads of Hong Kong and perhaps missed a chance to move up a spot with the help of another AR Law: "Know your directions otherwise ask." Fortunately, it was a non-elimination leg, so the pair do get to live to race another week.

Hong Kong is one of the cities I have actually visited. I was supposed to work there for six months but the whole exchange was canceled at the last minute. My manager did not want to lose a veteran for someone who had only been hired a few weeks earlier. Eventually, I did get to visit Hong Kong for a week for business reasons, but I spent most of my time at a customer site and never did get to see most of the places the teams went to -- Victoria Park and the Jockey Club. The apartment I would have lived in was in Happy Valley near the Jockey Club. I did take the subway to Kowloon, but did not feel like taking the ferry back.

Also I have changed flights in Hong Kong more times than I can remember. I think the last time was the day Great Britain handed over control of Hong Kong to China. Oh no, that was the second to last time as I went to Singapore. My return flight from Singapore also went through Hong Kong shortly after monsoon Dot had passed through, and experienced the scariest air pocket during takeoff. Sometimes when I see the airplane coming apart in "Lost", it reminds me of what when through my mind that day. But otherwise I try to forget that was my last trip through Hong Kong. I will still go back someday if only to check out the newer airport and all the construction that must have happened over the years.

The Kung Fu fighting detour looked like a bunch of fun. But I think I would have had more fun in the stunt car. How they set things up so that the car would flip back up on its wheels at the end was pretty cool.

The other detour was called Lost in Translation, but last I checked that movie took place in Tokyo. Teams were wise to avoid what sounded like a Needle in the Haystack challenge.

Mirna was quoted the episode title. And Charla on roller sneakers was kind of cute.

Next episode brings us some Yield drama. Back to my DVR I go.

TV: Amazing Race: All-Stars Ep 7 and 8

This episode turned out to be a two-parter. What started out as a gap of 16 hours or so between first and last place ended with the last few teams just a few minutes apart. However, a 30-minute penalty incurred at the end of a non-elimination leg resulted in Team Guido being Philiminated. Meanwhile, Team Cha Cha Cha decided to try to win some karma points by allowing Joyce and Uchenna to win a prize at the Pit Stop where the Teams finished in first together.

Episode 7 basically boiled down to who could find the best travel agent to book the earliest trip from Tanzania to Warsaw, Poland. That competition was won by the Beauty Queens who were patient with their agent while Mirna and Charla may have placed too much pressure on their agent by crowding in too closely. It would take 7 hours for their agent to find an alternative route to Poland. Joyce and Uchenna chose the wrong travel office, and it was funny that when they called another travel agency, it happened to be the one where all the other teams were sitting. The other teams convinced the agent to hang up on Uchenna abruptly. Eric and Danielle and The Guidos had to settle for using the original airline tickets provided at the beginning of the leg. Unfortunately, missing a connecting flight put them way behind the other teams. The tension between Eric and Danielle finally started to boil over.

Joyce and Uchenna had a chance to catch up with the Beauty Queens on a connecting flight through Frankfurt but I guess for a change they were not able to talk their way onto a plane. This allowed the Queens to cruise to victory in this leg with the Guidos somehow finishing last in a non-elimination leg and incur a 30-minute penalty if they did not finish first at the next Pit Stop.

The Guidos were so far behind that other teams had actually starteed the next leg before they finished. Fortunately, there were a couple of bunching points that allowed them to catch up to the other teams. The first was waiting for buses to take the teams to the Auschwitz Concentration Camp. The next was an Intersection that ultimately had members of four of the teams each eating a 2-foot long sausage. The whole eating contest was made for one of the most hilarious moments of the All-Star edition.

Eric and Danielle played it smart to just make sure they stayed close enough to Team Guido to the next Pit Stop, so they would not be eliminated. For a while it looked like there was a chance that Mirna and Charla would have had such a hard time getting directions from locals that they could have lost the race, but maybe their troubles were exaggerated or the distance to the Pit Stop was not very far at all.

I liked that the Race spent some time in Poland. I have yet to visit that country, but it is near the top of my list of places to go. Before a trip to Vienna, Austria in the early 90's, the mother of a good school friend loaned me a book by James A. Michener called Poland. It was excellently written, and made me really appreciate that part of the world, its history, and particularly the plight of the people of that country. [Unfortunately, I still have the book and never have gotten the chance to return it.]

The scenes at Auschwitz were particularly moving. On my airline flight, the day after viewing this episode on my DVR, I watched a touching movie called Freedom Writers. It also talked a bit about the Holocaust. Thirdly, Mirna and Charla discussed the Armenian genocide. Given some very current events around the world, it was interesting to compare how the world has for the most part gotten better -- though not by much.

I suppose the producers decided to relieve viewers from some heavy thoughts by having us see the teams struggle to eat giant sausages. I was laughing out loud when Mirna belched so loudly. Next, we witnessed Dustin suddenly throw up shortly after swallowing the last bite of her sausage. Then we had to watch Charla try to practice bulimia. That was sick but kind of humorous.

Other notes:
I wonder how long the poor guy playing Frederic Chopin had to stay in costume and sit in the misty weather waiting for the last few teams to arrive.

I never really learned how to play the piano though I had one in the house I grew up in. I did kind of learn Chopsticks and would watch how the piano tuner would work. So I know the little black spongy thing is used to do more than just clean the wire (according to Mirna). I have a decent ear for music notes but I likely would have made the same mistake as the Team Cha Cha Cha by snapping the piano string a couple of times.

I don't remember Charla falling down so often running to the Pit Stop the first time she ran the race. Fortunately, it does not look like she has gotten injured in those falls.

TV: Amazing Race: All-Stars Ep 6

This leg of the race was largely determined by luck in getting chosen off a waiting list for flights from Mozambique to Tanzania. The most dramatic moment was Eric and Danielle getting booted off a plane after they had already been seated. It was interesting that Eric had a premonition that something like that could happen. It also seemed a bit unfair given that they were the first team to get on the waiting list.

Once all the flights were sorted out, it was boiled down to a two team race to avoid elimination. Team Guido was much more methodical and solving a jigsaw puzzle, and they left Teri and Ian in the dust.

The race for first was kind of funny. Charla and Mirna started out with a huge lead going into Tanzania. Unfortunately "bad weather" held them back a night and allowed a few other teams to catch up. Team Cha Cha Cha had passed them at the puzzle challenge but then they made an odd decision to stop for fruit. The fruit may have been cheap to buy, but it also cost them the first place prize of a couple of catamarans. Hard to tell if they would have made more use of it than Charla and Mirna who looked confused about what they had won.

It would have been interesting to know how long it took for some of the teams to hit a target by throwing those sticks. I think in a couple of cases, contestants hit the pole holding the target instead of the target itself.

Next leg ... a two-hour special. Guess I will have to catch up with it on another evening.

TV: Amazing Race: All-Stars Ep 5

The key to this leg of the race was depending on the kindness of strangers. Charla and Mirna moved from last to first [as opposed to Romber who fell from first to last in the previous leg] by getting a local to give them directions around Maputo. They also were quick to find both men and women willing to pay to have their nails painted. Meanwhile, Joyce and Uchenna showed that nice guys can finish last and live to see another leg. I think they were saved by at least one non-elimination leg in the season where they ended up winning the race.

The teams were separated by as much as two or three hours at the start of the leg, but the first challenge and airline schedules caused a bunching situation as the teams raced to Africa.

It was good that the Amazing Race raised a tiny bit of awareness of a couple of problems being dealt with in Mozambique (and many other places around the world for that matter). The first is the high number of landmines buried during a civil war. It's encouraging to learn that trained rats could be used to sniff mines vs. using expensive anti-mine equipment. The second issue was the high rate of AIDS.

In lighter news, the Beauty Queens gained some karma points by taking time to paint the nails of a young girl who had no money. It may have helped them to a second place finish, but in general the task they chose was much easier and faster than filling large bags of charcoal. It helped Teri and Ian finish third.

It was also funny watching Phil avoid a hug from the coal laden Team Cha Cha Cha. That is probably the most we have ever seen him move in the history of this show. It would have been interesting to see how the Miners (David and Mary) would have done in that task.

TV: Amazing Race: All-Stars Ep 4

I'll have to post some very quick recaps of the last few episodes as I've fallen way behind in my TV viewing. Perhaps it has just taken me this long to get over the shock of this episode.

On this leg, the Karma police decided to strike down Team Romber pretty early instead of making Rob feel the huge disappointment of losing on the very last leg. I was hoping that when Rob and Amber were married, that maybe Rob would become a nicer guy in these reality shows. Instead it was Amber who became a little more deceitful, and that was a shame.

Ultimately, it was a spelling error (Phillipeans?) at a Detour that cost Romber the race. Coincidentally, Ferdinand Magellan himself never did make it around the world. He was killed in battle in the Philippines (correct spellig), and only 18 members of his crew completed the first known circumnavigation of the Earth. Much to the slight disappointment of my parents, that is about all I know about Filipino history.

I thought there might be a chance for Romber to save themselves at the mail sorting task, since that is a typical "needle in a haystack" type challenge where luck can play a bigger role than skill. But Rob seemed to be conceding defeat at that point.

The only other bit of trivia we got to learn this week was that Kandace snores pretty loudly.

Not as surprising, more commentary from Eric is interested in Danielle mostly because of her ample boobs. That does not bode well for a long-term relationship.

TV: Amazing Race: All-Stars Ep 3

This week marked the end of the race for the beloved Kentucky miners. All through this leg of the race I kept hoping the karmic police would step in and punish Charla and Mirna for trying to cut in line. Their panic can also be a bit annoying but that does not impact Karma points. Fortunately, they gained some points for inadvertently helping the hopelessly lost Team Guido. The miners somehow missed an exit on their way to a clue, but it was not really clear how far it had put them behind all the other teams.

We learned a few interesting though not very surprising tidbits about the teams this week:

- Danielle and David have never touched live fish before. But David managed to learn how to handle them faster, while Danielle somehow overcame her discomforts with them eventually. But it cost her team a bunch of time.

- Team Cha Cha Cha needs to do much more cardio work. Granted I do too, so I cannot really make fun of them.

- The Beauty Queens are in really good shape at physical tasks, and they have not gone into a panic. Now they just need to pay much more attention to directions and clues. Otherwise they may not last longer. They were incredibly fortunate not to lose any ground in skipping a clue.

- Amber seems to do most of the Road Blocks. I guess Rob does most of the plotting. But since all the other teams know the game, it may not be much of an advantage this time around. Following signs carefully did allow them to pass other teams at the end and finish first for the 3rd week in a row. However, taking a brief wrong turn early in the leg did show they are not perfect.

- I guess we now know from comments at the fish challenge why Eric is dating Danielle, but that was not too hard to guess. If I put the word he used a lot in my blog I might start getting some interesting hits from people searching for that word. So I won't.

Every team chose the rafting detour instead of a rock climb. Well the Queens did the rafting by accident. I wonder if the 40-foot climb would have been faster considering the time needed to drive to the rafts, get changed, raft, and catch a shuttle back to the cars. Teri was remarkably calm for someone who fell into the rapids. I wonder how quickly the guides were able to pull her back into the boat. The river rafting would have been frightening for me - a dislocated shoulder waiting to happen. The closest experience I have to that is riding the Rip Roaring Rapids at Great America. I vaguely recall that ride had a category associated with it but I cannot find that information anywhere right now. But people are restrained securely to a tall seat within a big rubber tire on that ride, and there are no sharp rocks to worry about.

Mirna spoke the title of the episode this week, but I have not been keeping track of this as much as last season where Mary spoke some classic lines.

Next week the teams may finally make their way out of Chile, with a finish that is sure to shock people.

TV: Amazing Race: All-Stars Ep 2

The theme of this episodes race revolved around paying attention to details. Missing one instruction about speed limits cost Kevin and Drew the race while Romber cruised to another victory.

The Road Block challenge took the teams into a staged boardroom meeting. Letters on buttons or pens or shirts had to be combined to find a secret word that would get them the next clue. Eric should have been the first to figure things our, but sort of outsmarted himself. This allowed Dustin to be the first to solve the puzzle. The interesting thing was seeing Amber being nice to other teams, which did not please Rob too much. I guess Rob still does not believe that karma has been an influence in many of these races.

The Detour challenge had teams choosing between putting a giant tire on a giant machine or moving some gravel around. It turned out that the gravel was easier to do while the bolting wheels required some attention to detail, and that cost some teams a bunch of time. Teri and Ian almost made a fatal error by not knowing where the cars where. Then a bunch of teams took a wrong turn, but ultimately it was the insistence of not driving over 40 km/h that cost Kevin and Drew the race.

Outside of the interesting terrain that teams had to drive through to get to the Pit Stop, there was not much in this episode that might make viewers want to book a trip to northern Chile. Almost all of my international trips have been to Europe and Asia, so it's hard for me to comment on places in South America (unless they ever visit Bogota, Columbia).

There also weren't any big surprises in the order of finish. But this is the Amazing Race, so who knows what the future holds. :)

TV: Amazing Race: All-Stars Ep 1

The Amazing Race is back and well I guess I am too.

I guess I now better appreciate people who manage to post entries more regularly. It is so easy to let blogging slide way down on the "To Do" list.

Anyway, it is hard for me to comment on the first leg of the race because I messed up. Not entirely but pretty badly. I forgot that by DVR was set up was specifically to record the Amazing Race 10 and not the Amazing Race in general. I did not realize that until I arrived home after a party. Fortunately, I did try to watch the show while I was at the party, but for various expected reasons, it was really hard to hear anything that was going on.

At best as I can tell, there were supposed to be some surprises with the teams this season. The two biggest surprises both involved John Vito and Jill. First, they are an ex-couple who, I guess, are still friends. Second, they managed to be eliminated quickly, falling victim to the oldest pitfall of any race - getting lost.

Not as surprising is the fact that Eric and Danielle are now dating and racing together this season. I personally would have preferred to team up with the other Dani of Team Pink (not that I would have had a chance with either of them). Anyway, I think Eric had a better chance of winning if he had stuck with his original teammate, Jeremy.

Least surprising is that Romber came in first place. Love them or hate them, they are skilled reality show competitors. It will be interesting to see how other teams keep up. Joyce and
Uchenna did beat them before, but they happened to get very lucky at the right time, and it seems unlikely that lightning will strike twice.

It's still too early to predict an elimination order. But I get a general impression that teams from earlier seasons are outmatched, along with the Miners who may not be able to form any sort of
alliance this time around. I'll still hope

Oh well, hope I correctly record the second leg and hear the audio.

TV: Amazing Race 10 - Finale

Congratulations to the Models for winning the Amazing Race 10. I guess it is nice to see a couple of reformed drug addicts show what people can do if they set their minds to it. My gut thought Rob and Kim would win, but as usual, I guessed wrong. I should have known the Models would win when challenges included putting a dress together and traveling between the fashion capitals of Paris and New York. Overall, this was a race full of surprises particularly after more recent editions were almost foregone conclusions after the first leg.

It would have been interesting to know how close the race really was. It would be interesting if the main key was finding a taxi driver with a fast pass versus one who had to wait in the cash only line at a toll booth. Something tells me the Models jogged the two miles faster than our bickering couple as well despite the editing. Or the taxi driver they found for the last 56-mile drive to the finish line was just driving that much faster.

At the beginning of the episode, I had a feeling the racers would have to go to the Sagrada Familia eventually. Not sure how one could go to Barcelona and not go there. As I said before it is an amazing building. Too bad they did not go inside. They would have had fun trying to race up at least one of the spiral staircases to find their next clue. My knees were shaky coming back down one of the church spires, but it was due to slight acrophobia and claustrophobia rather than fatigue. I guess hiding the clue in a nearby park was good enough, but I knew they would bunch up at the airport.

The Bama Moms were smart or lucky enough to have a travel agent send them to Orly Airport instead of CDG. I have never been through Orly, but I think it is a shorter commute to central Paris and maybe a much easier airport to get in and out of in general. It put them into first place inside Paris. The Moms went to the well once too often in trying to find a flight back to New York from Orly. It is possible that if they went to CDG first, that they could have gotten ahead of one of the other teams on the waiting list. However, somehow Rob and Kim managed to find the right person and negotiate an early checkin even though they arrived at the airport after the Models. The race was almost decided at that point.

Other Notes:
I guess the Miners' shirts were passed from the miners to the Chos to the Bama Moms. Either that or David and Mary had a bunch to pass around. I wonder if the racers had a separate laundry budget or facilities to wash their own clothes at the pit stops.

Google Earth just added new Geographic Web Layers. I noticed it when checking out the location of the Eiffel Tower and Place de la Concorde. There are some cool links to pictures of both locations and other pointers. The two locations are pretty close together but I guess the racers had to take a major detour and stop by Omaha beach for skydiving.

I think I mentioned before that I have visited Paris. I stayed at a hotel about 3 or 4 blocks SW along the Seine from the Eiffel Tower. The fancy restaurant where I dined, Ledoyen, is just WNW of Place de la Concorde. That area is also where the Tour de France traditionally finishes.

I have stayed in New York a few times as well, but I never passed by any of the places where the teams had to find clues.

Hopefully the woman in the yellow cap stayed dry in rainy weather by standing under the sculpture. Maybe there were spotters that let her know when any teams were close? I wonder what the auditions were like for that brief role. "Are you willing to wear a loud yellow top and hat?"

The woman judging when the dress was finished may have been the harshest judge in the history of the Amazing Race. There were challenges involving putting together some Ikea furniture and Greek statues with judges who were almost as serious about enforcing the rules.

I guess the teaser for next season confirmed the next race is an All-Star edition with some secret teams to be revealed while other teams have relationships that have changed since they originally raced. Oh well, until February, I'll have to find other subjects to write about.

TV: Amazing Race 10 - Episodes 11 and 12

The Thanksgiving holiday, a pileup of work assignments, and apartment cleaning prevented me from paying attention to my blog last week. Bad way to start off Year Two of my Chronicles, which is due for some minor tweaks to take advantage of the new Beta Blogger features.

Anyway, this edition of the race has remained true to form and had the teams finish in almost the exact reverse order than I predicted. The Beauty Queens were finally eliminated after being in the gun sights of every other team for several legs now. Their strategy for winning almost worked out for them, and they were a strong team that never had any conflicts, but in the end Karma demanded its pound of flesh (not camel meat) and so they were doomed. Even if the Queens had not overshot a challenge a week ago and put Rob and Kim into last, they would have still lost since Rob and Kim came in first this week and would have avoided the 30 minute penalty.

Granted the stress of having to come in first could have caused Rob and Kim to crumble this week. I totally thought they were goners once they chose to search for a clue in a pile of tomatoes while getting pelted by locals. I thought they were headed for a nuclear meltdown. Usually the "find a needle in a haytomato stack challenge" has taken down the strongest of teams, but somehow Rob and Kim and the Bama Moms found the clue to the Pitstop rather quickly.

The Bama Moms have proven that one can go fast by starting slow and staying calm. Last week they took advantage of not getting an earlier flight to study some maps of Morocco, so they did not get lost while other teams relied on sometimes unreliable locals for directions. They could have finished first last week while the Models had to run back to their car to get some good luck charm. This week they walked through a maze and were the first to find a way out of it. If they did not have such bad luck with taxis, they could have finished first again this week. Congratulations to them for being the first all-female team to get into the final 3. At first I thought the Bowling Moms had achieved that feat, but maybe they only made the final 4.

Other Notes:
The chariot races looked fun but dangerous. I wonder how they stayed in those things on such a bumpy track. Having a couple of stunt charioteers take a spill was pretty cool.

Hopefully Rob and Kim can avoid driving the rest of the race. I cannot recall another team having worse luck with cars.

Kim needs to see more of the world. This week she mistook some goats as dogs. I almost fell off my chair when that happened. Though I am not sure if those were goats or lambs. I was on the island of Nevis where a local had to teach me that goats have their tails up while sheep have tails that go down.

One pound or half a kilogram of meat is quite a bit of food no matter what animal it is. I probably would have made the camel kabobs a little too spicy.

I had the pleasure of visiting the beautiful city of Barcelona five or six years ago. On my last day there, I spent a whole day walking around the city. I started from my hotel to the incredible Sagrada Familia via the Diagonal. Then I went to the old bull ring, Magic Fountain, and Art Museum where the pitstop was this week. I went further up that hill to the Olympic stadium. Then I walked by the spot where the Olympic diving and swimming competitions were held. I recognized that site when I saw the first split second of the music video "Slow" by Kylie Minogue. From there I took an aerial tramway down to the harbor, walked along the beaches, and ended my trek by walking up Las Ramblas where one of the Detours took place. I do not recall the distance from Las Ramblas to the Pitstop being very far. With traffic it might be hard to say if a taxi would have been much faster than walking.

Next week, one of the final three teams will earn a million dollars. I have no clue who that will be, and I imagine I will be glued to the TV until the end. Plus I am already looking forward to the next Amazing Race. It is going to be an All-Star Edition featuring the return of the very loved and hated Team Romber. I vaguely recall getting an unusual cluster of hits to my website from Miami a few weeks ago too. Hmm...