$12...Really!!?

Nothing screams kickem' while their down like an offer of $12 to reimburse a person for their troubles. I don't think I'd be offended by that offer if I had to wait too long in line at a store or restaurant. I am fairly sure that the offer would piss me off something serious if it was to help ease the pain of my possible exposure to high levels of radiation!

That is what the people of Namie, Japan (and other town around the damaged Nuclear power plant) have been offered for their "troubles".

Seriously, what the hell!!  Too many dropped calls is trouble. A payment being misapplied is trouble. Growing a radioactive lump on your testicle or having a child born with half an arm is a little more severe.

According to a story over at CNN,  "The company (Tokyo Electric) called the initial offer "payment for their troubles," and would not detail how much money is being offered to each community. But Kousei Negishi, who is the manager of general affairs for Namie, said that it was 20 million yen -- about $12 for each of Namie's roughly 20,000 residents."

Talk about making a bad situation worse....We are so sorry for the inconvenience of you having to move out of your homes and your jobs. We understand that the stress of the situation, along with the possible effects of radiation leaks may cause a serious drop in your quality of life. So, for your troubles we would like to offer you this foot long sub, large Pepsi and a bag of sun chips....but wait there's more...free cookies!! 

The only way the $12 offer could have looked worse to me is if they had presented every person with a giant novelty check for the amount!

Seriously...get you act together and realize that just because the situation may call for an offer of money to the people doesn't mean you should make an offer with the first number that comes to mind!

The Event

Well, looks like I may be walking down a familiar path real soon. As I said the other day when talking about The Cape getting pulled by NBC...things unfortunately do not look strong for my other favorite new show, The Event.

According to the Syfy news forum Blastr, " The series returned from its three-month mid-season hiatus with two back-to-back episodes that could only score a 1.4/4 rating, with 5.53 million total vies in the first hour and 4.59 in the second, or a shocking drop of 25 percent."

When will networks learn that what a show NEVER needs is three months off the air when it's trying to find an audience.  A week here and there is bad enough to screw with the most loyal watcher of a new show. But, three months off in mid-season is a killer!

Blaster went on to quote show executive producer Evan Katz (who previously worked on Fox's 24) about the down time. "I think the mistake was not starting us in January to begin with. I mean, as a serialized show. It was like, we need to run these episodes straight through."

I agree with Katz. One of the great things about 24 was that once it started it hit the ground running and you knew that, baring a national event, there was going to be no break in episodes. 24 even had the added bonus of running episodes on back-to-back nights to increase the pull.

The Event is a good show, with a great cast. I personally love serialized drama like this.

Another point the Blastr artricle brought up was that DVR numbers are another story for the show. When the last episode aired in November it got an almost 53 percent boost in DVR numbers. I think it's about time the networks realized that the traditional TV view who sits down and watches a show as it airs, on the night it airs has become a thing of the past.  The family that sits down around the TV every Monday night at 8pm to watch their favorite show is dead...long live the new king...and that king is the DVR.

Fingers crossed that the network gets the message and waits until all the information is in and doesn't make a knee jerk reaction and cut the order or can The Event all together.