Yet another great episode title here. Most of them are, but I love the ones that can be interpreted in more ways than one. ‘Raised by Another’ refers of course to Claire’s psychic telling her in her flashback that she cannot let her unborn child be raised by anyone other than herself.

When Charlie hears of Claire’s back story and how the psychic (Malkin) changed his mind from originally insisting that she raise the child herself, to then suddenly setting her up with a foster family in L.A. under the condition that she had to be on Oceanic flight 815, he theorizes that somehow Malkin knew that Oceanic flight 815 was going to crash on the island, therefore leaving Claire no choice but to raise the child herself. This plan of Malkin’s would make it so that the baby could not be ‘raised by another’. 

That being said, we will later find out that ‘the others’ are very interested in Claire’s baby and intend on convincing Claire to live amongst them with her child. Though we wont find this out until much later in the series, we’ll learn that Ethan is ‘the other’ that will eventually pursue Claire and her baby, and the end of this episode is the first time that it is implied that Ethan is definitively one of ‘the others’. So you could interpret ‘Raised by Another’ as ‘Raised By An Other’. I love when the writers do stuff like that!

I’m kind of going in reverse of the actual order of the episode, but it’ll work since I am not trying to avoid spoiling anyone who is not current with the show. Ethan is officially revealed as an ‘other’ when he appears in front of Claire and Charlie creepy-looking and alone when Charlie and Claire had been expecting Ethan to get Jack to come to Claire’s aid. This happens near simultaneously with Hurley coming to the conclusion that Ethan’s name was not on the flight manifest that Hurley was using to cross reference his census that he was making.

Fun other little sidenote, perhaps common knowledge to many ‘Losties’ but Ethan Rom can rearrange the letters in his name to create the words ‘other man’. hmmm

Hurley created the census because of Claire’s claims that she was attacked in her sleep. The first incident seemed like a nightmare, but Claire awoke with bloody palms because she dug her own fingernails deep into her own hands out of fear of her nightmare.

However, Claire isn’t convinced that it was completely a nightmare. In her dream sequence she experiences the feeling of having lost her baby. She was not pregnant anymore and heard it screaming in the jungle. When attempting to find her child, she stumbled upon Locke who was sitting at a desk that appears to be the same as her psychic’s desk. This ‘dream-version’ of Locke has one eye that is completely white with no pupil and one that is completely black with no pupil. This is the recurring theme of black vs. white / dark vs. light / perhaps good vs. evil that we have seen many times before and will see again. Locke also says in the dream that Claire had been warned, and that this all happened because she didn’t raise the baby herself. 

**THEORY ALERT**

This dream sequence as well as Malkin’s warning to Claire actually triggered a theory for me. I just couldn’t help thinking that Aaron is going to grow up to be an evil person. It seems reasonable. After all, you would think there would be repercussions for Aaron being raised by another, otherwise why was it of such importance that the baby’s development be influenced by Claire’s kindness and goodness? Perhaps Aaron is a new dictator or evil leader for the islands future? Perhaps it is setting up a battle between Aaron and Walt over the future of the island? I definitely believe Aaron will be important to the overall plot, but that makes it even more curious that he was not on Ajira flight 316.

Back to Claire’s dream, her claim that it could have been real may have been false, but she did see the Oceanic plane mobile during her dream state, which she will see for the first time several days later when she is kidnapped. This isn’t the first or last time that premonition has come to a character via dream. 

Fate is most certainly a major theme in this episode, especially as it pertains to Claire and her pregnancy, but really this episode is just an example of how fate has had its impact on just one of the survivors on 815. It has its impact on everyone at some point, but this is a prime example because of how directly connected actions or events coincide with the idea of someone’s destiny.

If Claire doesn’t get pregnant her encounter with Malkin never happens. Not to mention, if her boyfriend didn’t leave her during the pregnancy there wouldn’t have been a question as to who is going to raise the baby. She only wants to put it up for adoption because she feels that she cannot handle being a single mother. Claire wanting to put the baby up for adoption may also be a result of her ‘daddy abandonment’ issues as her compassionate boyfriend so kindly refers to it. Which at the time we may not have thought too deeply into, but now know that the daddy that abandoned her is in fact Jack’s daddy too!

Perhaps the biggest sign of destiny and fate comes at the hands of one of our very favorite promotional products: the promotional pen. When Claire is trying to sign the contract to officially give up her baby, the first pen she tries to use does not work. Have no fear, lawyers always carry promotional pens on them. Even if they’re fancy executive pens, I’d be willing to bet that if it is coming from a lawyer, it has an elegant looking imprint on it with their firm’s name and contact information. Alas, this lawyer must have gotten his custom printed pens from a place other than Motivators because this one doesn’t work either. This was enough to deter Claire from giving up the baby and she returned to Malkin to hear him out. Next thing you know she is on a plane to the island and the rest is history.

The funny thing about fate as it specifically pertains to Claire, is that despite these very convincing examples, Claire herself says that ‘there is no such thing as fate’ when she is talking to Sun and Shannon in ‘Exodus’, the finale episode of season one. 

Part of the problem with going backwards in this post is that I feel it necessary to explain that Claire’s ‘attacks’ come in the beginning of the episode. This may seem somewhat irrelevant, but it allows there to be a big build-up to what is a really great cliffhanger ending. So to recap, throughout the duration of the episode Jack maintains that Claire is experiencing stress induced hallucinations and not actually being attacked. However, to be safe Hurley creates a census so that they can keep track of what has turned into their little island society. The end of the episode is an exciting culmination of Hurley discovering that Ethan is not on the census, Sayid stumbling back into camp disoriented and assuredly claiming that the survivors are not alone on the island, meanwhile the mysterious Ethan has positioned himself to kidnap Claire and her baby.

Questions answered but plenty of new ones have arisen. I think the real question is: Is it possible for anyone that’s been watching every episode so far, to not be completely hooked in at this time? I remember knowing that I needed to go to bed because I had to get up in a few hours, but watched the next episode anyway!

Sayid has always been one of my favorite characters and still is. Even though it may not have seemed obvious to Naveen Andrews at first, this British actor was cast as one of the best characters in a television series, maybe ever. I know it’s hard to determine these things especially when comparing one Lost character to another. There are just so many to choose from, but for my money it certainly seems like a jackpot role when you can be as intelligent, resourceful, intimidating, knowledgeable, tough, savvy, kind, understanding, heartfelt and rational as Sayid Jarrah. I am sure there are other superlatives that I am leaving out, but when I first started watching Lost, I joked a few times that the show could have easily been named ‘Everybody Loves Sayid’ – I know I do.

I was glad that they followed the last episode with a Sayid-centric episode because in case you needed it, it gave you that confirmation that Sayid was long from gone as a main character in the series, even though he had just left camp to go out on his own. I knew he wouldn’t be leaving for good, but when I saw him leave I wasn’t 100% sure when we would see him again. Luckily we didn’t have to wait long. 

His flashback scenes were interesting because it gave us a deeper look into the complexity of Sayid’s past. Sayid is an honorable man, but is faced with difficult moral dilemmas in his duties as a member of the Republican Guard. In this particular flashback we see how Sayid was assigned to torture his long time love interest, and eventually chooses his loyalty to his love, rather than to his job. As we have and will see a lot in Lost, losing a loved one tends to be a common theme among many of the main characters. 

Present day on the island, Sayid’s shame and struggle with what he had done to Sawyer not only accentuates his sentiments in his flashbacks, but his departure from the camp led us to another of the islands mysteries. In fact it led us to a few of the islands mysteries all in one, we just didn’t realize it at the time. The cable that Sayid finds partially buried on the beach leads him to get caught in a trap that was set in the jungle, little did we know at the time that if he followed this cable to the ocean instead of into the jungle, it would lead to an underwater DHARMA station called ‘The Looking Glass’.

After Sayid wakes up after being trapped and captured, we find out for certain that it is in fact the woman from the distress signal and has been on the island for all 16 years since she recorded it. Sayid came to the conclusion that she was in fact the woman from the distress call with the help of one particular promotional product that he saw hanging in her shelter. The custom printed promotional jacket that had the name ‘Rousseau’ printed on the back of it helped Sayid to safely assume it was the French woman they heard in the transmission.

We learn a little more about Danielle and how she came to be on the island. She slightly elaborates on her team being ‘sick’ and how she had to kill them all because they were infected. I think it's cool whenever the writers work the word 'Lost' into the script. Especially in this case where Rousseau says that by the time she had to kill the other members of her team, (including her lover) 'they were already Lost'. She claims ‘the others’ infected her camp and that they control the distress signal. This is the first time the ‘others’ are referred to and she is convinced that Sayid is one of them. Though despite her certainty that there are ‘others’ out there, she claims never to have seen any of them, but hears their whispers. Sayid finds this part of her story hard to believe, yet he warns her of the island’s ‘monster’ when they both hear a noise outside of her shelter. She responds by saying that ‘there is no such thing as monsters’.

This exchange of course makes Danielle a very interesting character as well, especially early on when we knew nothing. On the island surviving for 16 years by herself and hasn’t seen a single human or ‘monster’ but yet hears whispers and is certain that ‘others’ are out there.

Part of her belief that there are others out there undoubtedly comes from the fact that she is actively seeking out her child named Alex. When watching for the first time, at this point we know she has lost her child but we don’t yet know how.

But since we have now seen exactly how she loses Alex, doesn’t that make a liar out of her when she claims that she has never seen any of ‘the others’? Unless I am mistaken, I thought she was present when Ben abducted baby Alex.

Some theories suggest that Rousseau went crazy after first arriving on the island and thus her entire story is not exactly accurate. Though this is not exactly a confirmed theory, it makes sense because it also lends credence to the reasoning as to why she did not recognize Jin when she eventually meets with the survivors of flight 815 in 2004. She should recognize Jin because her and her crew found him washed up on the beach in the 80’s unbeknownst to him (and them) that he was skipping through time with the rest of the island after he was flung from the exploding freighter.

I guess you can make sense out of her losing her mind if you put yourself in her situation. Your crew mysteriously ‘comes down’ with something that makes them turn on you, but only after a giant smokey monster pulls them into an underground temple, ripping one of their arms off when all of the sudden the Korean man that was standing next to you has now disappeared. Yeah I’d say she gets a free pass for being a bit confused.

I’d of course be remiss to leave out one of the great feel-good moments of the first season, especially because it involves some of our favorite and most common promotional items! I am speaking of course about promotional golf balls! Were they Oceanic promotional golf balls or perhaps just some golf balls given to one of the passengers as a corporate gift? I’ll have to get back to you on that one, but either way Hurley built a small golf course on the island to relax everyone and take their minds off of the terrible experience they were all having and it actually worked!

Not only were people able to take their minds off of things, but even Sawyer sees and takes his opportunity to open up to the rest of the passengers in the form of a wager, betting that Jack would miss his game-winning putt. Other people start getting in on the bet and the relationship building process between Sawyer and the rest of the passengers is slowly starting to blossom.

Other notes of interest include the introduction of Ethan. I love thinking about how we never really knew that Ethan was so connected to the island until just recently.

And of course the relationship between Locke and Walt grows as Locke agrees to help Walt learn how to throw hunting knives against a tree in the jungle. This relationship has been developing right from the beginning, but it continues to become more intriguing as you realize that both Locke and Walt have a special relationship with the island. Walt may not even realize what his relationship with the island is, but Locke does seem to know or understand that Walt is different in a special way and wants Walt to be able to ‘realize his full potential’.

Michael is not very happy with Locke’s relationship with Walt, but Michael isn’t always the most attentive parent, as is seen in this episode on a few different occasions.

Love the ending, though it is definitely one of those endings that almost forces you to watch the next episode as Sayid is made into a believer about the whispers that Danielle spoke of when he hears them himself after they separated, as he heads back to camp.

It's not a TV show, but I'll say it anyway: I hate Twilight. I hate it, I hate it, I hate it. Maybe it's the fact that I've grown accustomed to hating what the rest of the world likes, (not even loving NCIS as much as I used to, sadly) but I really hate all things Twilight and I think I have a legitimate reason: vampires don't sparkle. I think it was John Bell from Z100 who said it best when he said "why is it that everytime they describe this guy he's the most beautiful creature ever? Is anyone that beautiful? Really? And what's with the sparklling?"

According to Wikipedia, Edward Cullen, the lead character in the Twilight series is compared to the Greek god Adonis and his skin is "like marble that sparkles in the sunlight."

I'm sorry. What now? What vampires SPARKLE IN THE SUNLIGHT? Last I checked, vampires were supposed to, oh I don't know, BURST INTO FLAMES when they go out during the day. I wonder why I would think that. Oh that's right, that's because that's been the way the tales are told since the very beginning of time! And by the beginning of time, I clearly mean Murnau's Nosferatu who was the very first vamp to fear daylight and I'm terribly sorry but Stephanie Meyers vs. Friedrich Murnau? That's not even a contest. Please, that's not even an entry in a contest.

Everytime I read that "since twilight, there's been a huge popularity resurange with vampires" I really want to vomit. Did the show Buffy The Vampire Slayer mean NOTHING to you people? It even caused a spinoff about a lead character...who was...you guessed it: A VAMPIRE. And while Angel was out of the ordinary because gypsies cursed him with a soul, he sure didn't sparkle when he went out in the sun. He sizzled. And according to one of my favorite lines from one of my favorite epsiodes, after he sizzled he apparently smelt like bacon. That seems about right. Vampires should totally smell like bacon after stepping outside for a (pardon the pun) hot second. They shouldn't be blinding people with their beauty.

But alas, Twilight is what's in. That's why there are twilight promotional calendars.

And Twilight promotional blankets. And Twilight promotional t-shirts and Twilight bedding

and Twlight everything else in the universe.

So as much as I love seeing every single type of promotional product with the Twilight logo on it every time I go to the mall, I can't help thinking that little Mr. Sparkles really isn't all that. And where might I ask, are the Twilight promotional barf bags? Cause THOSE I would purchase.

And just for fun, I found some Angel promotional playing cards over on ebay. Because merchandising and sparkling aside, Angel vs. Edward is like Murnau vs. Meyers. Angel wins. HANDS DOWN. I mean, come on...REALLY? Is there even a contest? What's sparkly gonna do? Hair gel him to death? Come on.

From the beginning Sawyer has been one of the most compelling characters in my opinion. While he has undoubtedly grown to be one of my favorites, I will regretfully admit that I was not too fond of him at first. I say regretfully because I have always been a fan of the villain. Whether it be ‘the bad guy’ in wrestling or that really calculated and devious character that always seems to be a step ahead. Case in point is my love of Ben, but for some reason Sawyer just rubbed me the wrong way in the beginning.

Having said that, I know that he was supposed to make me feel uncomfortable but it wasn’t the rude nicknames or snappy comebacks that made me dislike him. It was more the fact that he was blatantly making surviving a more difficult task than it already was. As we have learned, Sawyer is clearly of the mentality that it’s ‘every man for himself’ even after listening to Jack’s inspiring speech about living together or dying alone.

Sawyer’s approach really shines through in this episode when he refuses to cooperate with Boone and Shannon when it is believed that he is hoarding Shannon’s asthma medicine despite the fact that she is experiencing an asthma attack.

As strange as it sounds, I think I began to become more intrigued and less annoyed with Sawyer’s character in this episode because this was the episode where you realize that he was either ‘off the deep end’ or just refuses to play by anyone else’s rules. Not only was he making everyone else’s life more difficult, but in this episode it was made clear that he didn’t care if he was making his own life difficult either.

The flashbacks were well done because you see the life that Sawyer led before the crash, which was not all that different from the life he led on the island after the crash despite the fact that everyone was given a second chance at life. The connections between the flashbacks and life on the island are always interesting. In this case the similarities are clear at first, but it is not always what it seems on the surface.

We will eventually learn that the letter that Sawyer carries around was not written to him, but by him. This makes his character much more complex than what was originally thought. Though he still cons and steals on the island, we learned that this life was almost given to him rather than chosen. This is evident in a flashback when he calls off a deal with a couple that he was conning once he realized that they had a young son. The fact that he called off the deal, put himself in danger from a man whom he owed money but his heart led him in another direction because of his past experiences. 

Not that this is a direct similarity to what happens on the island, but he most certainly put himself in danger and increased the size of the target on his back by not cooperating with the asthma meds. Even more curious is why he would put himself in this ‘line of fire’ when he never even had the meds in the first place. He negotiates a kiss with Kate as payment in exchange for the meds before he reveals that he never had them, but he also earned himself a professional torturing from Sayid and a few solid punches to the jaw from Jack.

It was at this point that you had to start feeling like Sawyer had a death wish or somehow thrived on creating animosity and hostility with the other survivors. Especially Jack and Sayid, whom along with Locke seem to be the leaders of the group of survivors.

Could this have been Sawyer positioning himself in this game that keeps unfolding on the island? In his flashback he speaks about making someone feel like its their idea even when its actually not, but this is a long way to go to prove a point isn’t it?

The way he acted up to this point is what led everyone to assume that he was the one with the meds. He then perpetuated this idea by never denying that he had them until after he was beaten and tortured. This could’ve been to prove to Jack and Sayid that you can’t be a good and effective leader by assuming things. Maybe it was because he just really desperately wanted that kiss and saw his opportunity to get it, even if it meant putting himself through excruciating pain and almost cost him his life.

Either way, we see a glimpse of how complex Sawyer’s character really is, and both Jack and Sayid must deal with the decisions that they have made. Jack bandages Sawyer up and essentially saves his life after Sayid accidentally hits an artery after becoming enraged at Sawyer’s lie. Sayid then decides to go on his own to map the island by himself because he cannot stand to stay at the camp after feeling the shame of what he had done to Sawyer.

In other island news, we see a theme from ‘The Moth’ repeated in this episode as Jack helps Shannon conquer her asthma without the use of her medicine since she has no access to it. This is very similar to Charlie giving up his dependence on heroin as it correlates to the moth needing to struggle out of their cocoon in order to gain the strength they need to proceed in life.

Charlie-centric episode. Not that I dislike Charlie, but his character has gotten on my nerves from time to time. Although, getting to know more of his back story (especially in this episode) makes you realize that his character was not always the way we know him since the crash.

It’s not even that he’s a bad guy or anything. He means well, but you can see how the events of his life really influenced him and molded him into the person he is today. I guess it’s kind of sad when you think about it. He was wholesome and believed in the moral value of things before he was repeatedly disappointed by his older brother, whom he looked up to. This led Charlie down the wrong path in many situations and I believe that Charlie is one of the most obvious cases of a character transformation via the island.

It may seem like it’s stating the obvious, but the title and its implications that we learn about later in the episode are proof enough that this is the case. That being said, I have always thought that the comparison to a real moth applies to everyone on the island. Not just Charlie, even though it is very focused on Charlie’s life in this episode.

Speaking of concepts that apply to all the characters, I thought that a line that the priest said to Charlie in the confessional during Charlie’s flashback was very fitting to the general theme of the show. “Life is a series of choices…etc” Yes, I know – it would have done my sentiment more justice if I knew the exact and complete line, but you get the point. And I’ll explain further…

In my opinion, this bit of advice from the priest winds up being a major theme of the show, which is described in greater detail when we learn more about Desmond. Not only is life a series of choices, but in metaphorical terms those choices are essentially either a right or left turn. Each decision you make shapes your path, and where that path leads or ultimately ends up was determined by each individual decision you have made, even if it was a decision that seemed insignificant or irrelevant to your path’s current position.

This applies to Charlie because the decisions he makes in his flashbacks are directly responsible for him arriving at the island. These decisions culminated with him visiting his brother Liam in Australia to try to convince him to get the band back together. Sydney, Australia as we know was the place where flight 815 took off from en route to crashing on the island.

You really get the sense something is going to go wrong when Sawyer uses his knowledge of a cave-in involving Jack to ruffle Kate’s feathers. He tells her that Jack fell victim to a cave-in specifically leading her to believe that Jack was dead or at the very least, in serious trouble. She runs off to try to help, leaving Sawyer to carry out Sayid’s plan. This causes unrest for the audience because it is easy for one to assume that Sawyer will purposely screw up the plan for some reason, even if that reason is just to spite Sayid. This does not wind up being the case, but despite everyone doing their part, Sayid is attacked from behind before he could acquire the signal.

Meanwhile, Charlie really struggles with his heroin addiction but of course, none other than John Locke is there to help him. And not only help him, but his methods are calculated and he is very sure of himself and the influence of the island. Almost as if he has done this before. Charlie isn’t convinced at first and finds himself wondering why Locke has taken such an interest in his personal battle. Locke means well, but Charlie is not interested in anything other than getting his fix. Locke finally explains the meaning of the episode title as he finds a moth almost ready to break from his cocoon.

As with many people on the island, the moth is a great example of how one must struggle and experience difficulty before they have the strength to proceed with the rest of their lives. Just like a moth must struggle and fight their way through their cocoon in order to build the strength to survive the rest of their lives in the wild. Without the struggle, they wouldn’t be strong enough to live in the real world. This clever metaphor can be applied to many characters and situations on the island, but the concept really comes to fruition at the end of this episode as Charlie is the unlikely hero that helps Jack free himself from the cave-in by finding a small hole in which both of them were able to break through. Much like a moth emerging from a cocoon, Charlie is able to experience Locke’s example first hand, which leads him to find the strength to give up the last remaining drugs all on his own.

This morning started out like any other morning. I woke up, watched a little Angel (there's no better way to start off the morning than a vamped out David Boreanaz), had some Egg Nog coffee, showered, got ready for work, and set the TiVo for General Hospital.

Wait...WHAT?

It was circa 2000 in my apartment this morning, as I had the strangest feeling of deja vu. I haven't watched GH (its what the cool kids call it, keep up now) in years and while my mother is still a devout viewer and occasionally feels the need to call me at work and give me updates (not kidding, she called last week to tell me "Scott Reeves is on! He's so short!), I really haven't felt the need to watch GH at all. Why? This guy's no longer on it.

This guy, of course being Chad Brannon, aka Zander Smith. The one reason that I legitimately watched General Hospital in the first place. As a die hard Y&R viewer (that would be the Young and the Restless) I loathed any and everything ABC. Try going to the Daytime Emmys and outright admitting you hate General Hospital. I did that and my mother nearly backhanded me. "You don't do that here!" she hissed and I remember standing at Radio City, 13 years old in the gown that I wore for my 8th grade graduation (and would later where to my sweet 16) and being thoroughly confused. What was so great about General Hospital anyway? I decided at that moment that I would officially hate anything GH related for the rest of my days.

Until this guy. I could blame my friend Krysten, who was also the one who got me obsessed with WWE (another blog for another day) but it wasn't her fault. It was this guy. I remember Krysten calling me and saying "Oh my god, you HAVE to watch GH this week! Emily's getting kidnapped!" I remember my answer, "Krysten, I don't care." But alas, I rolled my eyes, gave in and turned on the TV. I didn't really care and I fully intended to watch just so I could tell her that it was stupid and that I hated it. But then I saw this.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vacn36axxfQ

You see it doesn't take long to get sucked into GH and figure out what's going on and this scene specifically blew me away. You may recognize Emily, since she's played by Amber Tamblyn (Joan of Arcadia, Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants) but at the time I hadn't heard of her and I certainly hadn't heard of Chad Brannon. But after that one scene, I called Krysten and just yelled at her. "As if WWF and the Backstreet Boys weren't enough! Now you've sucked me into this too!"

And sucked in I was. I set my VCR every day and followed what I would deem the best soap opera love story for my generation. To all the Luke and Laura fans out there, calm down I'm only 26. I'm not begruding the most classic love story alive, even though Laura's locked up in some institution (or was the last time I checked) But for me, I was a die hard Zander and Emily fan. And for just one day and one day only, Chad will be back on GH this afternoon. It's just a one time thing, he's not back from the dead.

So today will be a bittersweet day for GH fans, as most of them go "Wait, is that? Oh my God IT IS!" Yeah, it is. It's nice to see him again isn't it?

Over the past 9 (going on 10) years, I was fortunate to meet Chad Brannon and hang out with him on several occasions. I'm proud to say that I was even there when he won his Emmy award, and got a hug right before that. I even managed to be the keeper of his embroidered jacket from the 10,000th episode of GH. It's giant on me, but nonetheless, I wear it occasionally. As someone who's met her fair share of celebrities, I can honestly say that a truer, kinder, gentler man doesn't exist to my immediate knowledge. Chad was always there for his fans, whether it was responding on his message board or taking a bunch of us out after an event. Thanks to him, I've made lifelong friends and had some ridiculous memories most of which I would never share on this blog.

But I will share this one. I was 17 years old, and at a mall appearance that Chad was doing. It was my very first time meeting him, and I was 17 years old, of course I was ridiculously excited. I remember talking with the woman who organized the event, and basically drooling over her job. I couldn't believe someone would actually get paid to do that. Did a more brilliant job exist? I remember asking her, "So what is this and how do I do it?" The friendly red head just shrugged and responded, "It's just PR."

Yes Chad, I owe you some thanks.

~Sarah Shepherd
PR Coordinator, Motivators, Inc.

P.S.: I know it's not Arrested Development quote day, but I just watched that episode last night, the one where Maybe just says "Marry ME!" to get out of certain situations. God that's hilarious. Just yelling Marry me right out of the blue. Who would do such a thing?

Want a Nerd Herd lanyard? Want a nerd herd t-shirt? Want a Nerd Herd hat? In short...want this?

Um, I work in the IT department over here, so I'm a proud member of the Nerd herd! I'd say apologies to my IT team who do not consider themselves nerds, but I hate to break it to each and every one of you...you are! Get over it, we're awesome. I mean, we're in the same category as Chuck Bartowski...minus the knowing kung fu/government secrets thing.

This awesome gift package retails for $52.00 over here at the NBC Universal store, and look at that, it's on sale for $46.99. But if you're too busy spending your money on more important things this holiday season like the dry cleaning bill of your sand worm costume or Jeffster Holiday CD, you can win it today on twitter. Simply go on twitter and RT this to your followers before 8PM:

RT @nbcstore http://twitpic.com/thxzg - RT b4 8pm est to enter to win a Nerd Herd gift package. #ChuckOnNBC

Go forth nerds and proclaim your nerdom!

Seriously guys. Get on that. And I will willingly give up my Nerd Herd hat should I win. Me and hats...we don't so much work.

Episode opens with Sun’s eye. - I wonder who hasn’t gotten an episode that’s started with their eye opening? I’m thinking of a few off the top of my head, but I could just be forgetting about theirs.

Well what do you know? It’s a custom imprinted watch! But this watch does not evoke happy feelings like the Custom Swiss Army watch that you get for free from Motivators.com if your promotional products order comes to $1500 or more. No, this watch is causing individuals to fight and even attempt murder.

Sure, Jin has a right to be mad. He’s on an island against his will with a bunch of strangers that can’t understand a word he says. (Except for his wife, Sun) On top of this, he has just found out that Michael is wearing his watch. One that is very near and dear to Jin’s heart. 

Michael claims he found it with the wreckage, (which is easy enough to believe) but how could he have not had an idea as to who it might have belonged to? The episode in which we get a closer look at the watch is a few seasons in the future, but if my memory serves me correctly, that imprinted watch had Korean characters on it. I think it’s a pretty safe bet as to who the rightful owner of that watch is. Even if you picked it up and put it on your wrist without thinking anything of it, wouldn’t you have gotten a clue once an angry Korean man tried to drown you seemingly ‘out of nowhere’?

Instead it winds up taking a while to come to this conclusion and it comes with the help of Sun, whom we (and Michael) dramatically find out, can speak English. Were the Korean characters on the watch a detail that was overlooked at the time they wrote it? Not that big of a deal, just an observation.

With each episode I’ve seen since ‘Walkabout’, I am buying more into my theory that Locke has been strongly influenced or even partially overtaken by the entity we affectionately call the ‘Man in Black’, whom I also assume to be the smoke monster. – Maybe that’s something that is obvious to everyone else. It also could be completely wrong.

Locke just seems to know everything since his encounter with ‘the monster’ in episode 4. In many cases it seems like he might even know what’s going to happen before it actually happens. A few examples of this come up in this and the next episode especially, and right now they tend to be focused on Charlie. 

Locke didn’t even have to assess the situation at hand when Charlie stepped on the bee hive. He was ready to handle the problem and knew exactly what to say and do. I’m writing this from my notes, but I remember it feeling like Locke recognized what was going on before Charlie even did.

I feel like Locke takes on people as his projects. In season one especially. First Charlie, then Boone, then Claire and so forth. Later in the series we’ll see Locke pay special attention to other characters as well. It’s like he’s helping them on their personal journey, which at the same time could be interpreted as ‘moving the chess pieces’ into position for future events.

‘Adam & Eve’ – this has always been intriguing to me, as it has to everyone else I am sure. Of course we want to know who they are, and ever since first seeing this scene (and as Locke points out) we all safely assumed that they were the remains of people that were on the island before the crash of flight 815. That being said, I would now assume that there’s a good chance that they actually ARE survivors of flight 815 that were flashed back in time. This of course limits the possibilities of who they might be, especially knowing that it’s a male and a female. One way or another, it’s probably people we know. I noticed what looked like a purple shirt on one of the corpses. Last we saw Sayid he was wearing a purple shirt. Just sayin’.

Of course the other important part of the ‘Adam & Eve’ discovery is the small sack with the two rocks in them. One dark, the other light. Which of course has been a staple theme in the show that has shown up in a few different forms. Science vs. Faith, Good vs. Evil, Lies vs. Truths, and to a degree, overcoming personal demons can also relate to a two-sided battle. And we all remember the infamous scene with Locke explaining backgammon to Walt in which a dark side vs. a light side is the fundamental element of the game.

I like the song at the end too. Willie Nelson’s ‘Are You Sure’ was obviously chosen because of the literal interpretation you take from the lyrics. This is the episode in which the survivors split up into two groups, some moving to the caves and others staying on the beach. So the most obvious connection between the song and the episode are the feelings of the survivors as they contemplate if they made the right decision on where to make their camp. I thought it was a cool way to ease the episode to a close.

“Oh look around you

Look down the bar from you

The lonely faces that you see

Are you sure that this is where you want to be

These are your friends

But are they real friends

Do they love you the same as me

Are you sure that this is where you want to be…”

So I know it has been a while and I already used my ‘caught in a net’ reference, so I’ll just be honest. It’s been busy here on the island and it has been difficult to find the time to re-watch the episodes, let alone write about them. But as I found out from @LOST_WFTB on twitter yesterday, there are only 55 days left before Lost comes back to premiere the first episode of the final season of the series. Therefore, like Locke after he had been shot and left for dead by Ben, I have work to do! 

This time around I am going to do things a little differently. I have been cramming as much information and analysis about each episode as I could into each post, but since time is short and I don’t have any DHARMA stations or a Frozen Donkey Wheel nearby to help me manipulate time, I’ve decided to take another page out of the @LOST_WFTB book (WFTB = Watch from the beginning) and just jot down some of my own personal feelings or observations about the episode instead of taking the time to write it all out the way I have been. Not to mention, if you’ve been reading these, you’ve probably seen the episode already so I probably need not include all of the back story like I had been doing. As I understand it, for quite some time now the community of tweeters that love Lost get together at a scheduled time and watch each episode together from their respective computers and live tweet about it.

I regretfully missed out on this because I showed up late to the twitter party, but that is why I’ve decided to join from a distance with my new format of posting about Lost episodes. I enjoy focusing mostly on the significance of particular events that lead to or reveal clues about the ongoing mystery and purpose of the island, but as usual i'll be sure to point out any promotional products I can find in each episode. I have a lot of catching up to do, and it’s unlikely that I will catch up to the @LOST_WFTB crew, but I love analyzing Lost from the beginning after having seen everything that has currently been aired. My next post will kick us off again starting with episode 6, ‘House of the Rising Sun’ and future postings should be coming much more frequently if I ever want to complete my re-watch before February 2^nd so stay tuned and enjoy.

Let me start this out by saying my one goal here is to try and make Hart Hanson guffaw. For it was he who asked the question “What does all this mean?” when he read the news that his hit Fox series Bones had been ranked as the number 2 most searched show on Google in 2009 and it is I who have a fairly intricate knowledge of the big G and can answer that question with a series of accurate statistics, real time data, and just the right amount of sarcasm.

I’m not going to explain what Google is to all of you. You should all know. You are all not my mother who recently exclaimed that she can’t be on eBay because she doesn’t have a pen pal account. We all know that Google…is essentially kind of like the other big G: an omnipotent being with the answers to every question from “where can I find discount orangutans” to “what is the meaning of life?” And seeing how Google indexes websites from all across the web, if you’ve come here looking for the answers to either of those two questions, I got nothing on the first one and as far as the second one is concerned, I’ve been working on it and I’m fairly certain it involves string cheese. I’ll get back to you, but back to the topic at hand.

Bones is the 2nd most googled TV show. What does this mean?

Well, in short it means people are going to Google and typing in Bones. According to the popular keyword research program, Google Adwords (an intense highly mathematical algorithmic program created by the big G to determine popular keywords for advertising purposes) approximately 6.12 million people type the word bones into google every month. Now don’t get all excited just yet, because of those 6.12 million people, many of them are probably college students who are just laughing at the word "bones" or old people who don't quite get "the google" and are looking for information about osteoporosis.

I know it’s brazen to think that that many people are amused college students but aside from napping and playing Farmville on Facebook, they really don’t have that much going on. However, if we refine our search just a tad, we can see that the keyword "bones tv show" yields a monthly search volume (henceforth known as MSV, I’m lazy) of approximately 74,000 (note: October rendered 110K). Looking at that statistic we’re working with approximately 888K per year, which is fairly impressive but it certainly doesn’t warrant #2 status when it comes to the big G. What about the keyword "bones tv series"? That results in a MSV of 14,800. And if you look at the keyword “bones season” the MSV is 368,000.

You see, Google has an algorithmic process that’s akin to being inside Zack’s head. It can figure out numbers and data the likes of which mere mortals such as I can only imagine. They’ve taken all the data from various keywords and compiled them to find out that people all over the US are searching for information on Bones, the tv show.

So what does it all mean? It means they like you. They really like you. They want to spend their free time looking up information about you instead of doing things like that marketing report or their homework. And just for funsies, here’s some more fun data from adwords:

3 Most Googled Bones Episodes:
The Pain in the Heart
The Hero in the Hold
Yanks in the UK.

“Booth Bones” has approximately double the search volume than “Booth Brennan”.

Oh, and in case you were wondering Mr. Hanson, you have an approximate MSV of 1,600. Hart Hanson twitter results in a MSV of only 260, but I liken that to the majority of the world being like my mother who doesn’t understand what “tweeter” is.

Yes, Hart Hanson or Fox could have paid people in suits many dollars to figure out this information for them and their pie charts would be far prettier than mine. But I did it myself because this is marginally work related since I am talking about TV and because just like millions upon millions of other people, I like you. I really really like you.

And as far as payment is concerned, I need none. This was simply a testament to being, as Adam West would put it, “a true Boner.”