U.K. Survivor Update: HOORAY! I hereby take back everything bad I said about ITV on Friday. In addition to showing Survivor two nights a week, they’re also showing a two-hour recap of the week’s episodes every Saturday night! (Well, I don’t know about every, but they sure did tonight.) So I got to watch the second episode and boy, was it good.

• The bug eating was great. They were all so hungry by that point that a few of them really seemed to savor the big, meaty grubs. Snookums declared that he couldn’t eat them if they were wriggling, but I felt that I probably could, as long as I didn’t have to go first.
• The immunity challenge was much harder than it sounded on paper. The teams had to build stretchers in 15 minutes, and then four from each team had to race through the jungle to find their missing teammate. On the way back, the path was narrow and as one of the Ular carrier’s went down, it looked like Helang would overtake. Eve, who was *on* the stretcher, however, threw her body in the path of Helang and managed to slow them down. It all came down to the final sprint, when one of the Helang guys collapsed three times. Weenie. I was especially heartened to see that Ular, the winning team, actually had a girl (Sarah, the model) as a carrier.
• Lots more swearing this time. The best was when J.J. got mad that everything had washed away and the whole camp was untidy and they kept losing things. She let lose with a tirade that’d curl your hair. That was the nail in the coffin for her, I think.
• When J.J. finally did get voted off, her final moment was pretty venomous. She turned to the group and spat out, “I know exactly who voted for me” before literally running off into the jungle. And during the closing interview, she ranted about Charlotte (even rolling her eyes at the very name, like I do at the fact that Charlotte brought no less than THREE bikinis with her) and called her the most useless person on the team. That woman has issues.
• Funniest moment: watching schoolmarm-ish Jayne brutally whack a shark upside the head with a rock so she could eat it for supper.

And “Big Brother” started today too! I’m in a time-sucking vortex of reality television. I’d say I pity you American folks faced with nothing but re-runs… except I’m going to be back in the USA myself this time next week!

Score one for the Yankees! (No, not the baseball team.) A federal appeals court has overturned the injunction against “The Wind Done Gone”. I’ve already checked Amazon and it’s not up for pre-order yet. It’s supposed to be out by the end of June though. I’m definitely stoked to read it.

I know I don’t normally blog so much news, but there’s just tons of interesting stuff on the wires today. And some of it’s a matter of life and death! (Don’t hyperventilate, Ma. The Hammersmith Bridge is the only place they’d want put a bomb around here, and I’m far enough away from that.) Summertime excitement!

The old comments have all been added to the system! Yes, your deluded rants and ravings have now been preserved for Internet posterity.

What do you call your significant other? (Hypothetically, then, if you don’t have one.) I know Brigita likes “SigOth”. I generally just call mine “Snookums.” Or when I’m talking to others, he’s my “boy” or my “boyfriend” or my “honey bunny poopie pie.” (Just kidding about that last one.)

Well, that explains where MetaFilter has gone. And here I figured it probably had something to do with that damn Kaycee story.

Gael linked to an interesting cultural experiment of sorts: lists written by people of various nationalities detailing the way they live and the things they think. The ones I can vouch for (American, British, and German) are pretty much spot-on. Is your country represented? You should send one in. (I’m trying to get Snookums to do Australia.)

The last five comments box is back! Go me.

UK Survivor: Damn it! You know the fundamental difference between British and American television? In America, when a show is relatively popular you can be assured that it will be on at the same time every week. In England, when a show is relatively popular you can be assured that the producers will schedule lumps of episodes together at random times so as to frustrate their viewing public into submission.

What’s the point of this rant? Apparently ITV have decided to show Survivor on TWO nights a week, but not tell anybody about it. Therefore I missed the second episode last night. Double damn. But since everybody’s counting on me for their UK Survivor fix, I sucked it up and went to the website for ya. From what I gather:

• The big problem for days 5-7 was hunger. Like, STARVATION. Apparently nobody was catching any fish, so the producers grudgingly handed out a couple cans of fruit and meat.
• The reward challenge was the bug-eating thing, which Ular won. They were awarded “strawberries and cream”, which they ate right in front of the other team.
• Helang, the losers, discovered the their entire camp had been washed away while they were at the challenge. And they had no food. But they found a dead rat and barbecued it. GROSS. Sucks to be them.
• The immunity challenge had something to do with rescuing a teammate whose parachute had gotten tangled in a tree in the jungle. (Is this a recycled one? It sounds dumb.) Apparently it got interesting though, when the two teams started “felling” each other and got into a big fight. Ular ended up winning, which royally pissed off J.J., the drill queen of Helang.
• The vote came down to a tie between Uzma and J.J., and when the revote was done, J.J. got ousted. She pulled a bit of a “Susan” and stated just before she left: “I’d just like to say I know exactly who voted against me.” In the post-Tribal Council interview, she ranted about the “fluffiest most useless person” on the team (referring to Charlotte, the tart that brought the Twister game). Unbeknownst to her, though, it was Simon who had changed his vote.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got some errands to take care of. (First, send a complaint to ITV about their scheduling. Next, go check prices on a Tivo…)