methodwriter85

I listened to Blake Shelton and wasn't that impressed by him, either. He had a rather hilarious mullet, which was fine by 1992 standards but just a little weird for a guy in 2000/2001.

Yeah, I figured it had to be at 9:11 at night. I can't imagine anybody being willing to get up at 6 to 7 a.m. in the morning for a wedding. I do think it's stupid for Will to have a stocked bar...he's opening himself up to all kinds of legal ramifications if he gets caught since he can no longer play the "I'm a juvenile" card, and they really tried to crack down on underage drinking in this decade. I can't tell you how many people I know got "underage possession" or "providing alcohol to a minor" charges in college. Although because Will doesn't really throw a lot of parties the way Brad did in high school, I don't think the risk is high.

Good to know. I still think it's in character for JJ to not even want to take that chance, though. I actually think it'd be good for JJ to get stoned every once in awhile because he's so damned uptight, but it just wouldn't be him. He might use painkillers, but that's about it for downers. It's much more likely for him to wind up using "uppers" like Adderall or coke to keep himself perky and alert through long practices and travel days. Adderall will probably be especially important to keep his weight down. As for the Brad/Robbie stuff... You gotta remember that we're actually 7-8 months removed from the events of Paternity, and these people were "off stage" for 6 months their time. A lot of stuff can happen, and it looks like Robbie really learned his lessons from what happened when he decided to take it upon himself to become JJ's crutch, and Will/Robbie's relationship has developed in a really positive way during the off-time. As for Brad, I think that it's always one step forward, two steps back for him. As much as he wants to be positive and wants not to be such a control freak, it's really something that he can't help, especially when it comes to Will, who he on some levels sees as an exntension of himself.

I think it's a tradition to give the mother (or grandmother's) engagement ring to the eldest male child, so that he can give it to his future wife. Darius is the eldest male grandchild of Isidore's, so he gets the ring. And it works out well, because Darius is the most tradition-minded of the kids. How is Darius like Billy? Billy was an insecure follower with a lot of passive-aggressive action that ultimately lead to his downfall. The closest to Billy we have in the 3rd generation is JJ, and I think JJ is still more active than Billy was. Darius is more like a mix of Ace and Jack- he has Ace's love of the party life and women, but Jack's compassion and ability to get along with everybody.

That moment when reality shows become especially "real"... Big Brother Finds Out About 9/11 It was especially fascinating to watch this, because the Big Brother cast was isolated within the house and couldn't watch the endless news feed that was going on about 9/11...all they could get was what the producers decided to tell them.

Chapter 28 -When Will recieves his family ring back. "Who I Am" by Jessica Andrew -When Darius gets the 1963 diamond engagement ring from Isidore. "I Hope You Dance" by Lee Ann Womack Am I just hallucinating, or was this period of country just especially cheesy aside from the Dixie Chicks? Is this typical of pre-9/11 country music, Blue? I remember the hey day of Garth Brooks and Faith Hill in the early 1990's, but the late 90's/pre-9/11 is generally lost to me, unless you count Faith Hill and Shania Twain's extremely pop stuff. That's why it was such a big deal that the Dixie Chicks were bucking that cheesy kind of sound, right?

I remember I first thought it was ridiculous that Hank would force people to do a wedding ceremony on a Tuesday just to have the letters 9/11, but then I remembered how it was such a big deal for "matching" dates like 7/7/07 blah blah blah throughout this decade. Luckily the last match we have is 12/12/12 so now that's all over. Count on Ace to have a negative reaction. He's on the surface like Darius,but Ace is a much more judgemental and reactionary person. He strikes me as the kind who would to this day still defend the Dubya adminstration.

Well, it's pretty true. Pot stays in the blood system for two weeks instead of racing through like amphetamines do, so JJ really can't touch pot since he's subjected to random drug testing. As in someone can literally show up at his house and demand a drug test. Besides, JJ doesn't strike me as someone who wants to be mellowed out. JJ is much more likely to use amphetamines like Adderall or the "will be popular again soon" cocaine. (Anyone else think it's kind of funny that coke made its comeback during the Bush II administration?) So since Mark decided that JJ doesn't carry around female Louis Vuitton handbags, I'm assuming JJ is probably all 'bout the sunglasses, the luggage, possibly the backpack. I'm not sure about the clothes, though. Were LV clothes popular in 2001? I think JJ would probably carry around these kinds of bags...they look a bit like a briefcase and are made for men: I could see JJ carrying that around instead of a backpack. Messenger bags were pretty popular starting at this period, and it wasn't considered a femme thing to do. I can also see JJ being big into Burberry, which was a pretty hot label in the early 2000's. Anyway...so the other shoe drops. You guys realize that Windows on the World Trade Center was a pretty big hot spot for weddings, right?

Hey, I thought in honor of this, I'd track down our old correspondence from the Yahoo group: Title: The Final Chapter Approaches By: Mark Dated: September 19th, 2008 CAP will consist of 48 chapters unless my erstwhile editor demands changes. 47 should be posted within the next few days with the final chapter shortly thereafter. Then I'll have to think of something else to do in my spare time. Re: The Final Chapter Approaches By: Jeremy Dated: September 19th, 2008 How about a sequel that takes the characters to 1968? Re: The Final Chapter Approaches By: Mark Dated: September 19th, 2008 That's an interesting idea, Jeremy. Why 1968? Re: The Final Chapter Approaches By: Jeremy Dated: September 19th, 2008 Why not? That was the year that America fell apart... Soooo much was going on in 1968. Vietnam coming to a boil. Bobby Kennedy and Martin Luthor King. The National Convention riots of 1968 in Chicago. In terms of our characters, JP would either recieving his tenure at Northwestern or going somewhere else. Jeff, Stefan, and Sammy would be done with college. Ace would be five years old and starting school. Jason will hopefully be working on his doctorate...if he gets his act together, that is. I dunno, I think a sequel that jumped five years forward would be cool...especially since that would be 1968, which was one hell of a year. **** And with that, you hit the ground running on doing a sequel, and here we are 5 years and 11 stories later. It's pretty incredible that the series has spanned 39 years of American history. (If you don't count the Box.)

It wasn't the first time, either. I still wonder what things would have been like if you had gone through with the original version of Man in Motion. Holy crap. Everything would have been different. The Brad "man scorned" scenes, plus the Will "scorched Earth scenes" really make me wonder what it'd be like to be in a break-up with you. LOL.

Right. But it doesn't make her significantly better than Marie, which was the point that Miles seemed to be trying to make about the kindness that Claire extended to people like Mouse. I mean, at the end of the day...if you think pretty hard about it, everyone in CAP has some pretty shitty tendencies. The only people we've had that come close to being moral vanguards would be Tonto and Wade. I think it's just the nature of the fact that this is a dramatic story, as drama is fuled by the morally grey as opposed to people who always pick right over wrong. I feel like girls/women are put on a higher standard than guys are- there's this double standard that boys will be boys, but as soon as a girl steps out of bounds she's nearly condemned. I think it harkens back to the Republican Motherhood ideal, which holds the premise that women are morally superior towards men and thus it is up to her to install the values of republicanism in the next generation.

In terms of Clarie's kindness to Mouse...would she have even noticed him if Brad hadn't brought it to her attention? Does anyone honestly think that Claire would have talked to Mouse otherwise? High School Claire would have only hung out with other preppy people in high school, and if you noticed, part of her kindness to Mouse was giving him a preppy makeover so that he would look like the other people in her crowd.(Ala Alison's makeover in The Breakfast Club.) We at least know that Marie isn't a follower, and she's not someone who would take clothing labels as a prequisite for friendship, and we can't really say the same for High School Claire. I'm not saying Marie isn't a snob, but her mother had some pretty bitchy qualities at 15, too. It took the double whammy of having to get an abortion and losing her twin brother just shy of their 16th birthday to get Claire to where she is now. The other thing to think about...when exactly would Marie run into people like Mouse? Marie doesn't go to public school in 1980 California like Claire did- she goes to private school in Atherton, California, where the average household income is around 200k. The closest she's gotten to being around poor people was when Gathan's family visited. She hasn't even really had the opportunity yet to respond to people who are less fortunate than her. In any event, I'm not sure the Bitty comparison works here. Marie is being a bitch because she feels like Will took her friends and he's usurping her in the family. Bitty was always, relentlessly a bitch, much like MaryEllen. The one compassionate thing she did was giving Darius and JJ away to Brad to raise, and even that got ruined 9 years later.

I would seriously love to see you get into a debate with Private Tim over something you disagreed with. As for me, I'm going to retreat because I don't feel strongly enough to draw a line in the sand about this particular subject in CAP.

I'm saying that it stands to reason that if Marie was on some kind of MaryEllen trajectory, we would have seen no positive traits about her whatsoever. There hasn't been a single thing that MaryEllen has done that hasn't indicated that she's a sociopath who only cares about herself, whereas we have seen instances of Marie being a good person. As for the crowd thing, no it doesn't make her a saint. What it makes Marie is someone that didn't judge people based on how they dressed or how popular they were, because she's an eclectic person who likes what she likes without feeling the need to conform to what people tell her she should. It's in stark contrast to Claire at 15, who basically didn't deal with you unless you were in head-to-toe Lacoste preppy-wear, and Ella, who ignored that Carter was a homophobic ass towards Will because she wanted an "in" with his crowd. I think it is very much a positive trait, and that already puts her ahead of someone like MaryEllen or Alexandra Carmicheal. I mean, no one's perfect, and these characters are no exceptions. I remember it wasn't too long ago that people were wondering if JJ was going to wind up a villain, until they discovered why he was the way he was. I don't think Marie's gotten even close to being as much of an ass as JJ was to Will. And I'm not seeing where she's on a trajectory that leads her to MaryEllen-ville. Until she lets herself get beaten up in order to further her agenda (which is seriously sociopath), I'm not too worried. It's just typical teen high school bitch behavior, of which I saw quite often. It's the mindset of, "You're alllll against me and you all hate me, and you're runining my life!" , and she's lashing out with bitchy behavior. She'll get over it, probably by college.

But you're forgetting what we saw as the good side to Marie- the girl who didn't like Carter's crowd and didn't try to suck up to them like Ella did, and didn't try to conform that whole Abercrombie prepster ideal, and who had her crowd take in Will because Will clearly didn't want to play by the rules of the uber-popular crowd, either.

Marie's a 15-year old girl who is used to getting her own way by batting her eyes at her Daddy or the cute upperclassmen. I doubt she's heading for MaryEllen status. There's teenaged bitch, and there's teenaged sociopath. As someone who went to high school that was like 66 percent girls, you really do learn the difference.

Like I said, back around 2001 Rufus Wainwright was the "go to" cool indie music guy. I was 15 when he broke out, and while my taste wasn't ready for that(I was more into Good Charlotte), I had friends who were older that talked about him constantly. A lot of his work showed up in movies and T.V. shows in the early 2000's. I think people who were in college or mid/late 20-somethings in 2001 would probably know him well, if they were into non-pop music.

Chapter 27 -When Will and Kai say their goodbyes. "Here's To The Night" by Eve 6 -When Will arrives back home. "California" by Rufus Wainright -When Will and John go to the "End of Summer" party at Brendan's house, and Will makes his peace with Erik. Among other things. "Hit 'Em Up Style" by Blu Cantrell God, this would have been such a good song to use when Brad started fucking up Robbie's truck. Too bad that scene was from late 1999/early 2000 instead of 2001.

I'm actually debating not putting music into the actual 9.11 chapter. I don't know, for me, 9.11 was defined by the "silence" of the skies, and I thought it might be interesting to go silent for that.

The context of Will's coming-of-age is really interesting- it's post-gay rights movements of the 1970's and 1980's, and it's after AIDS stopped being seen as a death sentence in the Western World. (Mid-1990's.) It's also when gay teenagers were able to meet other gay teenagers online, which became common in the late 1990's. (Although that's something that hasn't really been a factor in Will's development yet- it does seem like the one thing Brad did was monitor the guys's online habits.) Will is emerging as being representative of that first generation of gay men who were openly gay by middle school and never got any real crap for it, and don't know what it's like to be gaybashed because society had become much more open and accepting. It's also taking place when more and more men are willing to own up to the idea that sexuality isn't quite so black and white for them, which we're seeing with Gathan, and likely with JJ later on. It's in stark contrast to the mindset that Brad's generation grew up with, where you were either straight or you were gay, and if you were bisexual you were just kidding yourself. Here, you're seeing phrases like "bromance", "metrosexual", "heteroflexible", "pansexual", and "bi-curious" becoming common, because society had advanced to the point where people were more accepting of not just gay people, but people who didn't fall into either binary. (Although let's be honest- bisexually-shaded guys still get a lot of crap from people.) It's why Tony is being made into a pretty important narrative piece, because Tony represents the classic closet case, which is starting to become anachronistic during this decade. Very true. Even though Will is described as having the mindset of an 18-year old, they're still pretty damn immature for the most part. I don't think I really came into maturity without it being an act until I was 25 or so. Grad school kinda forces it out of you.

I liked how this chapter, as well as Will's home renovation storyline in general, evoked the whole feeling of home improvement T.V. shows like Trading Spaces with a dash of Extreme Makeover- Home Edition. Really "of" the time period- as home values skyrocketed, home improvement was pretty huge. An entire network- HGTV - was set up in devotion of it. I wonder if we're going to get a storyline where Stefan decides to build a housing development in say the Inland Empire, or in the O.C.

Chapter 26 -When Will shows off the Extreme Home Makeover to Kai's family. "Beautiful Day" by U2 -When JP reminsces about falling in love with Sam in 1968, and about Will's relationship with Sam's son. "Love Is Blue" by Paul Mauriat

Chapter 25 -When JP and Isidore discuss the amicable end of their marriage of convenience. "Make Your Own Kind of Music" by Mama Cass I picked this one because it was the song that Mark picked for 1968, when JP goes home in their Chicago home and sees the very different kind of family he's built up with Isidore. -When JP and Isidore discuss their grandchildren, and JP expresses his concern about how JJ seems to have become almost too self-reliant. "I Am A Rock" by Simon & Garfunkel -When Will ruminates over how much he likes Kai and enjoys his company, but the sex with Tony was so much better, and wonders if he can have both great friendship and mind-blowing sex in the same guy. "More Than This" by Roxxy Music This song will always be the tune that Bill Murray sang in Lost in Translation to me.

You're thinking of Laguna Beach: The Real Orange County: The O.C. was never really like that. It was centered by a bromance and the two power couples of Ryan/Marissa and Seth/Summer...Mean Girls wasn't really a running undercurrent of the show. Every generation has a show. For my oldest sister born in 1977, it was 90210. For my sisters born in the early 80's, it was Dawson's Creek. For me, it's the O.C. For you people born in the early/mid-90's, I'd say it was Glee.

Why do I get the feeling that you're not just going to let JJ finish out the rest of his teens in relative peace as he diligently and quietly makes his way towards the '06 Olympics at Torino? I do think it's interesting how JP worries about JJ, because JJ is kind of this enigma that he doesn't really get. JJ's not like any one else in the family. He doesn't wear his heart on his sleeve like Will does.