"…or she is still out there after getting burned by Saul and leaving town. I'd like to see if be her being angry and potentially coming into the equation down the line."

I think there's a slight technical difference even with that comparison. Bolton was not confirmed by the Senate, but his confirmation was not outright voted down. The Dems simply filibustered it into the recess.

Can somebody explain to me how Claire or her husband would have a single fucking shred of dignity or credibility after this?

The joke is really on me at this point for thinking that they'll turn a corner and have the story advance in some meaningful way towards an end-game.

If I could sum up this episode in one sentence, it would be: The plot was forced to go where the writers needed it to go, any sort of consistency or coherence be damned.

Yeah, I agree. It was kind of odd to miss such an on-the-nose metaphor. As you say, it seemed to be a way of visualizing that nothing lasts forever. As intricate and beautifully designed as your plans are, they will be swept away into nothingness, like everything else.

The political scenarios have moved well past fantasy and into farce. Nothing about the inner workings of politics this season has made any sense.

It was a bit better than last week's bland entry. I just watched both episodes yesterday, and I'd be lucky to remember a combined 4-5 sketches (out of what? 20? More if you include WU characters) off the top of my head.

Speaking of drinking games, "TWO CHIVAS, PLEASE!"

It also interesting to me that Rick, despite the bravado, still has a pretty fluid definition of what "us" is.

I'm not sure what a 22 minute ad costs in prime time, but surely Apple must have kicked in a few extra bucks for that snipe (which may have been one of the lines of the night): "It's called privacy. Google it."

It was a unique and interesting story-telling device, but the story itself was as paint-by-numbers as you can get for Modern Family.

Mark struck me as Parks and Rec's Jim Halpert at first. This was when the show was trying way too hard to be The Office.

NEXT WEEK, ON THE MID-SECOND-HALF-SEASON FINALE…

I guess I'm going to out myself as a guy who liked BB for the "wrong" reasons. I'll go one step further and suggest that nearly everybody liked BB for the "wrong" reasons on some level.

I like to think that, in an alternate reality, there is a Breaking Bad featuring the Kettlemans instead of Walter White.

Oh, man. I loved that juxtaposition of Chuck going through this great, epic ordeal in his own mind and the old lady just watching some weirdo in a space blanket steal her paper.

I have to agree with the "wink-winks" in the first two episodes. They were solid, but that fan-service almost became a touch too obvious. The previous two have definitely begun to carve out their own direction.

It seems that they've pretty conclusively wrapped up the Leslie vs. her team conflict, which was the most fascinating, compelling, jarring development they've tried in years. It actually gave her battle some raised stakes because we were invested in everyone.

25 square miles is ridiculously small compared to most National Parks, and all but one on the mainland USA. Most are easily 10 to 100 times as large and contain something of significance. The Hot Springs in Arkansas is the only one smaller on the mainland, but contain, you know, a natural hot spring.