Episode from 12-13-2015

I know that I don't update this blog as much as I should. But, I do have a lot of episodes prepared to be blogged about. You should now see this blog more linked up to my blog about The Good Wife from this episode forward. I decided to jump the gun and publish the most recent to air episode in this blog while it was still December as it was a Christmas themed episode. This should put this blog more on par with The Good Wife one for a while, at least. I just need to get caught up on tapes. So enjoy the blog post published early due to it relating to Christmas.

I have no idea when the next new episode of Madam Secretary will be. They could be waiting a while. I might even give a play by play update of each Sunday that happens without a new episode. In fact, Undercover Boss will be returning in this show’s place like last year until it can replace The Amazing Race until that show returns for its spring season. Also, last week’s CSI: Cyber was preempted. If this show ever ended, I’d probably talk about the sports CBS shows sometimes before the start of The Good Wife on that blog of mine. In fact, I might do that should a new episode of this not be on but that show is. I used to like Undercover Boss, but I stopped watching when they decided to air the moronic opinions of an employee about autism that had nothing to do with the rest of the episode.

I tune into my primary CBS affiliate and they are set on airing shows on time as football is not on it. I check my secondary CBS affiliate and they are airing a Broncos/Raiders game. There is still a lot of game left so they will certainly be airing things on delay. Meanwhile, if one of my channels once again doesn’t record well on my laptop and the other one does, I’m just going to use the other channel that is on tape delay as I’m sick and tired of having to put shows on tape. I’m three posts behind now and two of them are because of that stupid problem. I check FOX and they are showing a game of the Packers playing a team I believe to be the Seahawks. As usual, I can’t tell who is winning. Football is expected to last until seven on this network.

The game is not actually against the Seahawks. It is against some Dallas based team. The Packers are winning the game against them. Since shows will not be delayed on one of my affiliates, I will be watching 60 Minutes at a regular time. Also, the Raiders are winning the game on CBS.

I miss checking the games during a 60 Minutes break and the game they were showing on my other CBS affiliate is over and it is airing a delayed 60 Minutes. I missed the score, but the OT says that the Raiders, I believe, were the winners. But I could be wrong and would have to check the score to know for sure. Also, what the heck does OT stand for? It seems to have no meaning to its name. What kind of name has no meaning? My name has a meaning. It means that my parents were uninspired in some way and decided to name me after the very first man. I don’t know who won the FOX game as of yet. I miss 60 Minutes trying to catch the score. I could wind up googling the score. But I don’t have to. The Packers ended up winning the game. Thank you CBS sports updates.

Today’s episode is brought to you be either 28 minute or no delay. We begin with a flashback of the current Russian president killing the then current now dead Russian president since she didn’t like him helping with the west. It appears as if Russia and the US are possibly at war, but maybe are just in some other type of fighting. Anyways, I think that the Russian guy that Henry was training is in the ranks of the Russians successfully.

In segment two, we have more of the Russian thing with the spy revealing his information to Henry about where the US and Ukraine should strike. Meanwhile, while it isn’t that important to the episode, I have to remember that the 10^th episode of the second season that aired on December 13^th 2015 is a Christmas episode. This is for future rewatch of the show, should there be any. I think that this is the first holiday related episode of Madam Secretary. Elizabeth and the president’s team try to prevent World War 3 from happening. Speaking of which, how often is that the plot of an episode of a show? I hope that World War 3 never does happen. Meanwhile, in another cliché, the Russian president thinks the wrong person is the traitor.

In segment three, the Russian president thinks that Ukraine is responsible for the hack of Air Force One. How did she find out this information? Is it something that she’s guessing? By finding stuff that her doctor did, they find out that she may have killed her husband and are looking at ways to prove this so that they can take her out of power. Also, I forget when this was, but they watched video of her singing at one point.

In segment four, there are tense moments as the US and Russia try to talk about peace. The Russian president, whose name I can’t remember (hence me referring to her as the Russian president) knows about a spy and wants them to give him up. There are tense moments regarding this. The planned extraction of the spy fails.

In segment five, we learn that there was an agreement over giving up the Russian spy as part of negotiations with the Russian president. There is then a strange closing segment where I guess we are lead to believe that something bad might have happened to the US president. There are no scenes from the next episode, so I guess we’ll have to wait until sometime next year to see what happened. I don’t think that they would have killed off Elizabeth, but I’ll have to wait to see for sure what happened. They might have killed or tried to kill the Russian president. For now, this is Adam Decker, signing off.

Episode from 10-11-2015

Okay, so continuing the list regarding TV shows, the next episode of 8 Simple Rules to watch is a Halloween episode. Hopefully, I’ll be able to roll this choice before October is over. You see, I would have watched it automatically if it were removed from the list and it would have to be added back onto the list so I could watch the episodes between that and the Thanksgiving episode the first season. Hopefully I can do that before Thanksgiving or I could easily be screwed. Also, Thanksgiving is when I have to watch the season 7 episode of NCIS that relates to Thanksgiving which probably means watching it sometime in November. Hopefully I can watch any Halloween episodes this year with some of the shows that I’m watching, although I’m certain that I won’t be able to for some. At least, by now, 8 Simple Rules will get an automatic watch.

I learn that today is a doubleheader day on CBS. What that basically boils down to is that there will be at least a 30 minute delay for shows, if not longer. This will be the first of multiple doubleheaders this season. So I tune into my primary CBS affiliate and see that the Patriots are playing the team from Dallas. The Patriots are winning. I check my FOX affiliate and they are not airing football at all. Were games blacked out in this affiliate and that’s why they aren’t airing football today? Whatever the reason, I will be watching FOX shows until at least 7. My secondary CBS affiliate is airing the same game as my primary CBS affiliate. I just wish that I could remember the name of the team from Dallas. It looks like I might not be able to watch ABC shows today. This could change. No ABC today means no Once Upon a Time or Quantico for me. The epg doesn’t list the shows that are on FOX today. How am I supposed to know that the shows will be 7- The Simpsons, 7:30- Brooklyn Nine-Nine, 8- Family Guy, and 8:30- The Last Man on Earth? Wait a second… I guess it is just the 6 to 7 hour that I don’t know today.

They are showing the Grinder on FOX at 6. Since I’m not interested, I’ll switch back to football, even though I’m not interested in that either. I don’t have good alternatives. Plus, I need to make sure that I have the right amount of time of the delay down. Will it be 30 minutes or more? There’s basically no change in the football game as the Patriots are still winning. In fact, it will probably not change. I don’t see how the team from Dallas can turn things around. There seems to be a consensus on this and they are declared the winners. Due to the four minutes of commercials that they need to air after a sports game for some odd reason, it looks like the delay is just a bit over 30 minutes. I watch Bob’s Burgers in the meantime. Soon, I will watch the Simpsons and record this on VHS while watching Brooklyn Nine-Nine and Family Guy.

Today’s episode is brought to you by 33 minute delay. There is an important Russian figure that is missing. This would make sense as we see more Russian stuff throughout the season that I have already seen before this one. Here we set up Henry talking with Demetri and other Russian students of his. I can’t tell what to make of Elizabeth’s subplot just yet. You’d think that me watching this on tape instead of my TV tuner would be helpful, but maybe not.

In segment two, Elizabeth talks about the prisoner and learns that someone is coming to visit to talk about it. There are problems with Stevie from the previous episode. Henry is working to resolve that. After getting information in the form of a video, Elizabeth gets more information with the case at hand she’s working on.

In segment three, more of the captive case is revealed. It turns out that the people who took him captive were not Taliban as previously thought. They were people that thought they were wronged and weren’t able to get into the US like they wanted to. People try to rescue the captive.

In segment four, various people are in the situation room talking about what’s going on. Someone is brought in to help the situation. There is a tense and dramatic situation. The president decides not to attack the Taliban and just orders the person evacuated.

In segment five, there is more of the talking stick, which seems pretty stupid to me at least. They learn that Stevie is trying to get into law school. A person comes to visit the McCords. That is when they learn that the Russian president is dead, something that ties into future episodes. Henry does more into getting Demetri to help him in the future.

On the next Madam Secretary, Elizabeth tries to make stuff good with Russia. I’ve already seen and blogged about the episode in question, even though you’ll probably see it as normal instead of out of order as I saw it. For now, this is Adam Decker, signing off.

Episode from 10-4-2015

Well, I’m going to talk to you about the shows I’ve been watching on DVD. Well, I could be doing that, or it could be some sort of alternative format that is about an hour or shorter. Sometimes long things sneak in there. But I’m going to tell you about any changes in watching shows. I decide what to watch by rolling from a list. Whatever is alphabetically first is the number one choice. Such the list continues until number five and number six is getting caught up on VHS tapes of shows I recorded (like this one sometimes). Now I’ve mentioned in previous posts what shows I’m watching. I’m not going to mention how the shows were renumbered. But I will say what replaced what. Also, I’ll be sure to point out when the actual important part of this blog begins.

While watching through NCIS season 7, I realized that the next episode would be a Thanksgiving episode which, in turn, would be followed by a Christmas episode before going back to normal episodes. So I’m replacing it with the next on the list, which happens to be NCIS: Los Angeles season 1, which I got because it takes place at the same time as the NCIS season I mentioned. I stopped watching NCIS: Los Angeles earlier after waiting to watch a Christmas episode until it was actually December.

Next I finished watching the VeggieTales DVDs that I have. I will probably add the VeggieTales VHS tapes that I have to the list later. For now, The Big Bang Theory season 4, which I had watched some of until a New Year’s Eve episode was next. After waiting until the last week of the previous year to watch that episode, this year is when I add it back to the list. Shortly thereafter, I finished watching Farscape season 1 that I was borrowing from a friend. I replaced that with season one of Dollhouse.

You know, here’s a quick segue away from the original post. I will mention two completely unrelated things here. The first is that it is possible that I end up creating a blog about Bob’s Burgers (a TV series for those that didn’t know) next instead of one about the CSI franchise. One of those two will probably be created next, but I’m not sure which path I’m going down just yet. Also, I did a google search of Madam Secretary blog and was pleased to find the link for this link on page 6 of the results. Of my other three blogs, I could only find one other one of them through a google search and the other two I gave up looking for after looking through a lot of choices.

There’s a reason that I’m choosing certain TV shows on DVD (or other close enough alternatives) to replace other things that I’m watching. There’s even an order for me to add them on the list to which is why they are in that order and not any other order. I have a lot to add for a while that I won’t have to buy anything new for myself which can be a mixed blessing.

Now I’m to an interesting part of my TV on DVD watching habits. You see, it is time for me to add season 2 of Charmed back to the list. What’s the problem with that? Well, season 6 of Charmed is still on the list. I don’t want the same letter being on the list at the same time another letter is on the list so I’m going to alternate between the seasons when I have to replace something from the list. This will work until I either reach the Halloween episode of the third season or the end of the sixth season so that just one will remain on the list. I finished watching Big Bang Theory season 4 due to constantly rolling the same number over and over again. Ironically, I didn’t roll this number enough when it represented Charmed. I am ultimately replacing The Big Bang Theory with Great Nature videos. Why is that back on the list? I normally wouldn’t start rewatching something the year that I finished watching something, but more copies of them turned up so I’ll have to finish watching them again.

I switch back to watching Charmed season 6 when I finished watching the great nature videos. I replace those videos with more Bible Specials. Well, there will just be one more of them compared with the previous number. That was the only other thing besides the nature videos that I had to add back to the list because it turns out that I didn’t have all that I could have had of it (if that makes sense).

I switch back to Charmed season 2 when I finish watching the Bible Special. I replace the Bible Special with Thomas the Tank Engine. Now that’s a complicated one to add. I have a lot of it and it could remain on the list for a long time. My collection is mostly on VHS with a few DVDs in the mix. I don’t know a good way to watch them as the episodes aren’t in any logical order sometimes. Anyways, back when I was a kid, I decided which one to watch by using a process of eeny-meeny-miny-moe, which made me discover that the way that I do that game can lead to a predetermined outcome based on where I start. Regardless, I’m using that method again to watch all the episodes that I have.

Here’s another thing that changed: I didn’t remember that there was a Valentine’s Day episode in the second season of Charmed. Normally, I would wait until Valentine’s Day to watch it, but I ended up seeing the whole episode. So, I will have to wait to add season 2 of Charmed back to the list until after Valentine’s Day next year. This means that I’ll stick with season 6 of Charmed for now.

My friend who had the first season of Farscape has now lent me the second season of Farscape. I finished watching the first season of Dollhouse and will lend it to this friend. So I’m replacing Dollhouse with Farscape, for the moment at least. I also finish watching through Charmed season 6 and since I don’t have other seasons of Charmed, I will be replacing it with the first season of 8 Simple Rules. At this point, I finished watching the first season of NCIS: Los Angeles. I was going to replace it with Ancient Civilizations, but it turns out that this isn’t actually what I expected at the two DVDs of it are only previews for it and not the actual thing itself. Thus, I will replace it with a tape containing various episodes of The New Adventures of Winnie the Pooh.

There is now a point that I have reached where I will be adding another list of TV shows on DVD since there are that many others to add all at once. I will, ultimately, mention that list elsewhere (not in this blog). I will also have to add that list to the current list over time. So I’ll only mention new shows when I can add them to this list or combine them into one. I’ll be sure to keep you updated.

Anyways, I have finished watching Moonlight and replaced that with my VeggieTales VHS collection. That was from the alternate newer list, originally, but I moved it to this list. October is fast approaching and I guess that I’ll mention more of the list later.

So it is now the day that the new season of Madam Secretary will start. I check my primary CBS affiliate and see the news which means that there are no sports on it tonight. I check my secondary CBS affiliate and see a different news. So, that means there will be no delays tonight on CBS. Awesome. I check FOX and the Rams are playing the Cardinals. Did you know that the Cardinals used to be in St. Louis? They left for Arizona prompting St. Louis to get a new team, the Rams. I believe that the Rams are just barely winning the game at the moment. I check the score again later. Although it has changed, it is basically still basically the Rams barely winning. I learn that the final score of the game has the Rams winning. I guess that’s all the information I have to share about sports this week.

THE IMPORTANT PART OF THIS BLOG POST BEGINS NOW! Today’s episode is brought to you by no delay. We begin with the vice-president at a golfing game where he gets sick. The president is out of the country. It turns out that the speaker of the house is with him. Elizabeth’s staff is working on a song for her to sing: a parody of Billy Joel’s The Longest Time. She doesn’t feel confident enough to sing it. Henry learns that one of his students is a closeted gay man and that he works with Russian intelligence, but this may not work out for him. Meanwhile, when Air Force One goes missing, the staff gets the president pro temper to become acting president. They did not let him because that due to memory problems of his thinking, for instance, that Ronald Reagan was still president. Since the next in the line of succession is the secretary of state, Elizabeth becomes acting president. Morgan Freeman, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, gives her the oath of office. I guess that Morgan Freeman is the first season since William Howard Taft to be both president and Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. It’s a shame that both of those roles aren’t in the same canon.

In segment two, Stevie, who changed her hair color, is still sleeping around. This time, she’s with the president’s son. As long as she picks a single lover, I’d probably be more okay with that than not. She thinks that he might be using drugs and the president’s staff comes and takes them away, possibly in regard to what has happened with Air Force One. Elizabeth gets used to being acting president. She informs her staff of what is going on.

In segment three, Elizabeth doesn’t like being called Madam President as she is not really president, merely acting president. I do wonder what one would be called in that situation: maybe just their regular name or their current job. But some people tend to avoid correct terminology. Remember all the times in 2012 when Mitt Romney was referred to as Governor Romney instead of the more accurate Former Governor Romney? Anyways, they might have to shoot down Air Force One which is still on auto pilot, even though it lacks communication with the outside world. And both of her parents now know about Stevie being with the president’s son.

In segment four, Stevie tells Henry about the heroin that she has and why she has it. It can only be guessed that Alison and Jason know this now as well. Elizabeth is upset about a decision that the president has made. It turns out that the plane is okay and everyone on board is safe. The only problem was that communication was down and we don’t know why yet.

In segment five, Elizabeth tells the president about the person who she freed while she was acting president. He also explains the choice behind the person that he chose to lead the NSA. Her staff decides to do the song for her. Am I the only one who noticed that it was night on Air Force One? Shouldn’t it have been daytime? What route was it taking? If it was over the North Pole, then this might make sense. But, we learn that the reason communication was cut off was because of malware that was somehow put on the plane. Elizabeth declares this an act of war. The vice-president is also fine, we learn after an unrelated incident.

On the next Madam Secretary, it looks like there is some sort of international crisis as usual. I’m not sure I remember/know who the guest star is. Meanwhile, I’m just wondering why there are always two spaces before the last paragraph when I always write just one like the rest of the paragraphs. Would not having it create just one regular gap? I guess it’s annoying, but since I don’t know how to change it and since it doesn’t affect much of anything then I will just ignore it. I’ll also come up with better ways of having filler in blogs of mine. For now, this is Adam Decker, signing off.

Episode from 4-12-2015

I knew before this episode aired that the Masters would probably delay the start of this episode. I just didn’t know how stupid the delay would be. Why do I think that the delay was stupid? Simple: the Masters had a winner and they wasted time by airing stupid stuff afterwards. I guess it just wasn’t over enough by their standards. This reminds me of when they aired a playoffs football game. The game was scheduled to end at 9:00 and it did. But they aired a post game show that delayed the start of a Scorpion episode that I was going to watch. It was a new one. I just didn’t understand why they had to do a post game show when they could have started the show at the right time. I will complain about sports causing delays for as long as they do cause delays. I’m one who never liked sports.

Today’s episode is brought to you by 16 minute delay. We start with an interesting thing happening on a submarine. Then we switch back to Elizabeth and her husband. Do you know that Téa Leoni and Tim Daly are supposedly dating now? I do have to wonder how many people who play romantic partners on TV shows actually do end up dating in real life. Stevie asks her sister Alison to take a picture of her (Stevie) and the president’s son off of a website. A bunch of stuff happens as usual that I either have a hard time summarizing or could do a better job summarizing that I don’t do. I want to be a professional writer someday so I definitely need to work on that on blogs of mine like this one. Anyways, Henry is hunting with an important person. There might be war issues being started.

In segment two, people talk about the rogue submarine. Someone important is retiring and Elizabeth is there to talk about it. But she still needs some use out of him. One of her daughters complains about the photo that’s online.

In segment three, Elizabeth talks to the retiree about the mysterious submarine. My mother thinks that the locations on this show are impressive. I wish that I knew where they filmed this show at. I could probably know if I paid attention to the closing credits, but I don’t. Daisy gives a talking to Alison about what she should post online and then talks to Stevie about how one shouldn’t date their boss. More stuff happens with the sub.

In segment four, Elizabeth is doing what she can to prevent war. They still have to figure out what is happening for sure regarding the sub. It could be attacking the United States. The submarine is asking for help, it seems. Stevie is getting unwanted attention. She decides to break up with her boss, which I knew was going to happen since I’m watching this out of order. I don’t mind watching things out of order. It doesn’t bother me like it does some people. The people on the sub talk about what was going on and why. They had problems and secrets that they didn’t want America getting their hands on.

In segment five, people are glad that the sub situation was resolved well. In my mind, this is one of those times where the promo made the episode look more interesting than it actually was. That seems to happen a lot in television. It seems unfortunate, actually. My mom likes the episode and I guess I do too. I was just expecting something better. Anyways, I was probably too distracted when watching the episode which is a problem I tend to have sometimes. For now, this is Adam Decker, signing off.

Episode from 11-23-2014

This was an old episode that I had to get caught up on. I have not seen it as I recorded it on VHS. Why did I do that? You see, CBS aired a football game that overran its programs. I started the tape recording the show 60 Minutes while missing the beginning of the Simpsons. (Thanks to the power of reruns, I was able to see the beginning of that Simpsons episode.) The delay was at a weird time, which is why I recorded it on VHS instead of my laptop. The tape starts with a set of commercials before we reach the second segment of a 60 Minutes episode. After that, then we get to the Madam Secretary episode that I will blog about. It was the episode involving torture, I think.

Well, the matter of me getting caught up on VHS tapes can depend on how far behind I am on them. If there comes a certain time when I have a pile of six different tapes that need to be watched, then I ignore any other TV shows on DVD that I watch and get caught up so that the pile is at a more manageable number. On 2-5-2015, I have six tapes to get caught up on, so I start getting caught up on them. I will not watch anything else for a while until I can get to a lower number. On 2-28-2015, I’m able to reinstate the rolling list, but that might not last too long, depending on whether I have to tape a lot before I can watch more of the tapes.

Using this method, I was able to find the Madam Secretary episode in question. It aired at a 40 minute delay. I don’t know when I’ll post this blog update, but it shouldn’t be too long. Since it is an older episode, that might be part of the problem with me not knowing when to post it since it is late. But I’m sure I’ll post it at some point in time. I also hope that I can get more caught up on VHS recorded shows so I can get back to rolling and watching other shows of mine. I just hope that this blog post isn’t too much better than it otherwise might be. Why worry about it being better? Well, if most of the posts are one quality, then I don’t want it to be a better quality in the case that I recorded it on VHS instead of the usual TV tuner. Watching it on VHS would give me more time to blog about the episode while watching the episode. If you don’t believe me, then check up my Survivor blog. The posts from before the twenty-seventh season would have delayed posts that I watched on my laptop. The VHS option became better from the twenty-seventh season onward so I could give more detailed posts and stay updated with the confessional count. Link to that blog: http://adamdeckersurvivor.blogspot.com/

Now we get to the episode. We start with a news story of a foreign city taken over by ISIS. (For the record, it is pronounced eye-sis, not is-is. If you’ve never heard of it and only read it, then you might get that wrong.) There is also a plot that relates to what happened to the original secretary of state, a mystery that surrounds the show. Let’s face it, with a lot of new shows, you need a recurring mystery like that to get people to come back week after week. Elizabeth acts like a mother to her daughter Stevie. There is then a lockdown due to a shooter in the area. They are at the white house, right?

So we get to more of the situation. “You might be some deranged guy’s hostage.” “Well, technically, I’m my mom’s hostage.” That’s the exchange that Stevie has about not being able to get to work on time. Also, I should apologize in advance if I ever point out flaws in the show because I am a fan of CinemaSins and that makes me think about various flaws in shows and movies a lot.

It’s hard to summarize a lot of what happened. The subplot with Daisy’s romance seemed strange at best. I’m glad that they are trying to focus on other characters in the show, but it didn’t seem well developed to me. Daisy’s current lover meets her old lover. That leads to a bit of conflict. Also, the conflict with the shooter is taking place at the state department building and not at the white house, I think. Elizabeth also confesses to her daughter that she approved the torture of a man. This episode was less about torture than I thought that it was.

A strange subplot on Stevie possibly donating her eggs is part of this episode. Weird, huh? But I guess without a woman’s eggs, none of us could be here. But I would never donate sperm. Not unless it was in the conventional way by having sex with my wife. Of course, I’d have to find a wife first. But I’ll worry about that later. Daisy no longer has a fiancée which might put her back with her old lover whom she still works with. Why can’t I remember his name? Anyways, this episode explains why Stevie hates her mother for a while, although that might be solved by now.

I can’t tell if this post was better or worse than others in the past have been. I haven’t posted that many blog posts here anyways. We’ll see what happens as time goes on. I mean, my Survivor blog didn’t find its stride until later seasons after I started blogging about it in the twenty-fourth season. I also don’t know when I’ll be posting updates in this blog as I might have to wait until after I have recently updated my TV blog. I’ll post a link to my TV blog in an earlier or later blog post. Yes I’m confusing and weird. I’m Adam Decker. And for now, I’m signing off.

Episode from 5-3-2015

This episode is the first season finale. So this will mean that I won’t be writing about new episodes until the show returns sometime next season. I probably should have never started this blog, but I think that I am stuck with it for quite some time. Well, maybe not too long, but it could be a while. Hopefully I can post this update pretty soon. With the Good Wife airing more episodes after this one tonight, my blogs can be a bit lopsided. Of course, the Good Wife has to return for next season for it to stay tied into this blog. I also have to remember that I had a dream where I had a Bob’s Burgers blog. So I might have to start a blog about that to. I don’t know yet if I will. Meanwhile, I wonder if there is a cliffhanger in this episode that I have to wait through the summer to see how it is resolved.

Today’s episode is brought to you by no delay. We begin with Elizabeth talking to her friend (or former friend) about the events of the last episode. This friend says that Elizabeth will get into trouble for the torture that she authorized. This could lead into the trouble that this episode promised in the promotion. She talks to various people about it.

In segment two, Stevie talks to her boss about how they broke off their relationship. He thought that she was flirting with him. She also puts on a nice looking dress to go to an event at the white house. Subpoenas seem to come up in this episode a lot as Henry gets served. Also, Elizabeth is more or less forced to take some time off, I believe.

In segment three, the mess of a hearing going on continues to rule and complicate the episode at hand. It wasn’t a vacation that Elizabeth was forced to take. She was forced to use executive privilege, it seems. I don’t fully understand what that is. But she might have violated the espionage act. There are also flashbacks to Elizabeth potentially working in Bagdad. Also, a picture of the former secretary of state is planning on being replaced. Much like Daisy’s romances, Stevie has strange romantic subplots that don’t seem to be worked out as well as it should. Also, Elizabeth decides that she should testify after all.

In segment four, Stevie hooks up with her boss, by the appearance of things. Elizabeth says that she broke the espionage act for the good of the country. There might be negative repercussions for her. Maybe this is all a set up for season 2.

In segment five, it’s hard to summarize the end of the season. The person who tried to kill an Iranian diplomat is still being interrogated, but that wasn’t as much a focus as it could have been. I’m not sure where they are going with season 2. I just know that there is a strange end to season 1. Meanwhile, I have two blog posts from earlier season episodes to do first before I post about the second season in the future. For now, this is Adam Decker, signing off.

Episode from 4-26-2015

You might be wondering why I haven’t updated you recently on what has changed with my TV show on DVD watching. The watching that I do has (somewhat) recently recorded shows on VHS. When I get backlogged on them, I am not able to watch any of the other stuff that I normally do. So it could be a good long while before I can finish watching one thing and replace it with another. I have a lot of shows to add to the list too. This could be troublesome.

In case you are wondering where last week’s episode is, that was recorded on VHS and will be watched later. For now, I will skip to this week’s episode before I get to watch it on VHS. Some of these posts should have been on VHS but weren’t. Last week’s was put on VHS. That was because the Masters caused a tape delay. It should have ended on time since a winner was already determined, but they aired pointless crap afterwards that delayed the episode.

Today’s episode is brought to you by no delay. It begins with a black family having a meal. Then we get to Elizabeth talking about her PTSD to a therapist. There was a woman who committed treason and is believed to have killed the former secretary of state. I’m guessing that’s what happened, but I’ll have to get caught up with old episodes before I know for sure.

In segment two, people continued to disagree on international policy regarding various issues. Basically, people were protesting what could happen. It’s hard to make much sense of it, but as usual, people aren’t sure if it’s a good idea to do what they are planning on doing.

In segment three, people continue wondering how to handle the situation at hand in Iran. We also have Alison learning how to drive. Meanwhile, they go over the seating situation and the mysterious woman of the episode shows up again. The FBI goes after her family’s house.

In segment four, Jay has a heated conversation with Elizabeth trying to prevent the stoning to death of a man. She says that the laws in that country don’t really work that well. Somebody is then trying to assassinate a president who I believe to be from another country.

In segment five, the treaty with Iran is signed. Unfortunately, a gay person is executed. That does seem like a bad law: executing someone for being gay. In cases like that, I do wonder why he couldn’t lie about being straight, but maybe they would have seen through it. But, surviving the Holocaust probably wasn’t as simple as lying about not being Jewish if you were. Sorry if I go off on tangents like that. Anyways, Alison is still learning more about driving. “The right lane is turning into the left lane.” “That’s its problem.” I like that line. I know that it means that the lanes are merging. Of course, I did pass my driving test the first time I took it. A potential person hired to assassinate the Iranian president is quickly captured before anything bad can happen. Juliet, who was partly responsible, is also captured. Now she’s the reason that the black family was at the beginning of this episode. I still don’t know why there was a man with a baby. What Juliet is supporting makes Elizabeth question her support of this deal.

On the next Madam Secretary, the season finale happens. Don’t worry though: this show will be back for a second season in the fall. In fact, in the first post of the new season, you can probably expect me to do a long post of what TV shows on DVD I finally was able to watch. Every time I think I am done catching up on VHS for the moment, it appears that another tape backlogs me even more. But since I don’t record much of anything during the summer, I will probably not have many tapes left to watch. The promo was far too vague for me to talk about. For now, this is Adam Decker, signing off.

Episode from 4-5-2015

This new episode aired on Easter. There were new episodes of stuff on Good Friday and Maundy Thursday as well. I’ll never understand why TV keeps airing new episodes on any of those three days. Plus, there might be two shows that I want to get into now. Both of them air on NBC. One is the A.D. miniseries which interests me because I’m a Christian. The other is American Odyssey, which looks pretty interesting. I should have been interested in American Crime on ABC and even had a chance to watch it. But I decided not to watch it since it hasn’t been getting that good ratings. I do wonder why NBC is doing so many miniseries and why they rely on Dateline so much. Do they not have better choices for midseason? I know that CBS would sometime put 48 Hours Mystery in the time slot of a cancelled show. That hasn’t happened for a while, but could this season.

There was no sports delay that I know of so this episode aired at a normal time. We begin with the McCords visiting their old house, I believe. Stevie flirts with the president’s son. He was in rehab for a while. There is a situation in Greece and they are taking Greece stuff away from the Smithsonian.

In segment two, Henry is offered a job. He thinks that he probably won’t accept it. He is also worried about his wife travelling to another country since the last time she travelled, bad things happened. Nobody is quite sure what is going on, but a former cabinet member seems to have created problems of some sort or another.

In segment three, not much seems to have happened. Maybe some stuff has. There was some sort of medical situation at the white house. A person pees outside and a police car shows up. What is that about? People still don’t seem to know about the situation in Greece.

In segment four, it seemed that not much of anything happened once again. For some odd reason, the episodes lately seem pretty boring. Maybe it will pick up later in the season. Maybe after the exciting episodes, we just need a break from excitement for a while.

In segment five, the situation in Greece is resolved. It seems like people in Greece were wanting to do a secret meeting without the United States present. But the US was able to crash the meeting and resolve everything. I still don’t know how the public urination thing ties into all of this. People seem okay with selling the old house and Henry is sure that he will accept his new job.

On the next Madam Secretary, a sub in Russia may have caused an incident that could lead to war. But the incident was a mistake and they don’t want to start a war over a mistake. There have been wars started by mistake in the past, but it would be best to avoid that in the future. I look forward to the episode. For now, this is Adam Decker, signing off.

Episode from 3-29-2015

Okay, this will be a bit of a complicated post. I knew that March Madness would delay the beginning of this episode. But, it was not as long a delay as I would have liked. There were things I was doing outside of the house that prevented me from being home exactly when it started. So I decided that I will watch the beginning of this episode online and blog about what I can later. The first two acts will be blogged about when I can see that part online. The third act onward will be blogged live! Isn’t that cool! I don’t know if I can live blog that often (and obviously, you won’t be seeing this updated as soon as you’d probably want me to update it), but today is weird and brings forth an exception. Today’s episode is brought to you by a 17 minute delay. But at least Duke beat Gonzaga in the game. Or, at least, I think that was the game that was on CBS.

Let’s start at the beginning. Elizabeth talks at some sort of dinner. We learn about a cult in Bolivia. This is the part that I remember from later, since I’m blogging about this and the second part later. Elizabeth talks to her daughter Stevie about the internship she is doing. Elizabeth is doing her best to handle the situation at hand in Bolivia. Basically, they are concerned also about Stevie dating her boss. I decided that I don’t care that much about this episode in question.

In segment three, someone meets up with Elizabeth regarding a kidnapped congressman. She thinks that bringing her husband, Henry, into the situation will help improve it. I’m getting distracted a lot during this episode so it might lead this post to be stranger than usual (like you’d ever know the difference). I will do the best that I can to keep up and may just rewatch the whole episode to make sure that this blog post is up to par.

In segment four, Henry talks with the kidnapped congressman or his captor. I can’t tell what is exactly. Now a kidnapped congressman is something that TV can do, but it would more than likely never happen in real life. Henry says a possibly fabricated, possibly real story about why religion means a lot to him. Elizabeth makes it seem that the story is, in fact, real. I think that’s what it is or not. With the strange religious beliefs of the Good Wife on right after this, it is hard to tell what to make of a lot of these things. But I shouldn’t get worried about the religious beliefs of people that don’t really exist. The situation with Henry gets tense. Turns out he was probably talking with one of the captors. There is a problem the he accidently creates.

In segment five, the situation gets tense as they try to rescue the congressman. Everyone important to the episode seems to get rescued, but others end up dying. Henry talks to Stevie about Arthur who is a boss of hers and also her lover. On the next episode, a bunch of crazy things happen as usual. For now, this is Adam Decker, signing off.

Episode from 3-22-2015

If you remember, you’d know that I said to not trust the fact that sports delays would be over for the year. Just when one type is over, the next one starts. With March Madness going on, I wondered why they thought that the game they were showing would end at six. I knew that it wouldn’t. But the game ran long and thus delayed primetime on CBS. Thankfully, the delay was the same on both of my CBS affiliates as they were showing the same game along with probably every CBS affiliate. And while I would normally put this on VHS instead of my laptop, that didn’t end up happening for various reasons that ironically left the VCR unused. FOX was showing Nascar that cut into their programming which ultimately just left the Simpsons rerun they were showing cut short by cutting out the beginning of it. I always found it annoying when they did that, but now they don’t seem to do that with new programming anymore. They must have learned that in those rare cases, they should just do tape delay like CBS does. The basketball game that was on was Wichita versus Kansas and Wichita ended up winning.

Today’s episode is brought to you by a 35 minute delay. We begin with Elizabeth thinking about what happened in the previous episode. She might have PTSD. Or does she? Jason starts at a new school since he was expelled from his old one. Elizabeth gets worried about the whole situation since she sees active shooter drill on the schedule for the future. She also freaks out a woman while getting wounds healed. Very confusing indeed.

In segment two, we get to a bodyguard that people want to hire for Jason. Elizabeth suffers from flashbacks of the events of the previous episode. Jason doesn’t like the idea of having a bodyguard, but he’s stuck with one anyways since his mother is a bit paranoid.

In segment three, there’s a pretty basic plot where Elizabeth has a panic attack based on all the stuff that has been happening lately. Maybe this is more like Hilary Clinton than I think it is. But, we still see more drama in this show than we do in real life.

In segment four, Elizabeth gets more emotional as she prepares for stuff in her life. It’s very hard to summarize what is happening. I seem to have that problem a lot. But we’ll see if that problem persists. The point is, Elizabeth gets help for her problems.

In segment five, we get to a finishing wrap-up. Maybe this episode was just more boring than it was supposed to be. It seemed more like filler than an actual episode. Elizabeth plays video games in hopes of overcoming fears she has about being shot at. She talks to Bob Schieffer about what happened.

On the next Madam Secretary, there is a religious incident of some sort that could be happening. Is it bad? It could be. We’ll see. But it puts Henry in danger. For now, this is Adam Decker, signing off.

Episode from 3-16-2015

I had a very busy weekend and am glad that I made it in time to see the schedule on shows. There might have been sports related programming on both FOX and CBS but both ended before they could cause any delays. There might have even been times when sports footage has switched broadcasting from one network to another. You wouldn’t think that such a thing is common as it would probably piss off people who don’t have the network they are moving the broadcast to.

Today’s episode is brought to you by no delay. Someone is under house arrest as I try to make things work having cutting things really close setting up the recording of this and other shows. Also, my computer is running out of room for things on it. I record things for another person but this person doesn’t have the sense to watch it for some dumb reason. There is not infinite room on my laptop.

In segment one, we learn more about the coup that is happening. I’m not familiar with the word or term coup considering how it is pronounced like coo. Also, Matt and Daisy are still together which serves the mostly meaningless subplot that seems poorly developed to me. I’m glad that they are giving side characters stories, but this one seems so random and pointless. You’d want it to go somewhere, right? As usual, is it hard to summarize what happens in the first act.

In segment two, Elizabeth decides that the best way to prevent the coup in Iran is to go there herself to mediate things. She’s concerned that she will not come back. This leads to a humorous scene involving her giving her husband permission to remarry. Of course, since the show is about her, a Madam Secretary, then it seems unlikely that she’ll die. Something bad could happen to her, just not death. I hope that nothing bad happens, but we’ll see.

In segment three, we see more of what’s happening in Iran. The situation seems to be going well at first, but then it gets out of hand right before the commercial break. There is an explosion and shots are fired. The Iranian official that Elizabeth was meeting with gets shot. Is he the one that will die? For the moment, it looks like a main character won’t die.

In segment four, not much happens. What we do know is that the Secretary of State is missing. Is that even possible in this day and age? You wouldn’t think that it would happen nowadays, but it might. It just seems highly unlikely.

In segment five, Alison’s birthday gets more somber. But there is a silly string attack to take people’s minds off of the situation at hand. Elizabeth is alive and well. The prime minister, as expected, is dead. Word that Elizabeth isn’t hurt reaches back to the states which makes her family actually feel good. The president reports to the country about what is happening. A random suicide and note to Elizabeth is how the episode ends.

On the next Madam Secretary, Elizabeth is under trauma based on what happened in this episode. There’s probably more to what will happen, but that’s pretty much all the first promo is talking about. Guess I’ll have to look forward to it. For now, this is Adam Decker, signing off.

Episode from 3-8-2015

Here’s an update before I get to anything else in this blog. You might have been wondering why I’ve been waiting so long to post about episodes of Madam Secretary. You see, with this tied into other blogs of mine regarding when I post them, it delayed the posting of this and other episodes. But dreams and possible computer problems leaded me to posting a blog update for the next three weeks. I should be here with every episode in the future, but we’ll see what ends up happening with that.

Okay. I created a new blog. Here’s the link: http://adamdeckergoodwifetvshow.blogspot.com/. Why did I create it? Simple. This show, Madam Secretary, once aired at an hour long delay. Since it aired in the time slot that The Good Wife did, when The Good Wife returned to its normal time slot, I decided to create a blog about it. Of course, I only created this blog because of a dream about having a blog about it and the fact that people weren’t reading my blog about TV as much as I would have liked them to. All of these blogs are connected to each other is some way. How? Well, besides the fact that I write them all, some of their postings are linked to my main one about Survivor. But I should get to the point of this blog which I’ll get to after the next paragraph.

CBS can lead one into a false sense of security with their Sunday schedules. Sports always tend to put things on tape delay. There’s a good reason why they do that, but I’ll never like it and wish that they would air no sports whatsoever. Unfortunately, they bring too great ratings to their network so it probably won’t ever go away. But that’s when one might think that if football, the main sport that they show, is over, than wouldn’t their sports showing be over for the season? I have since learned that other sports are typically shown once football season is over making it so that one never knows when Sunday shows on CBS are airing at the right time or not. That’s why I always have to check the schedule around 6 Central to see if their shows are on delay or not. For this week’s episode, there is no delay of any kind. So that’s good.

In segment one, we have more of the fallout from the previous episode. Jason is more or less forced to unfriend someone by his siblings’ pressure. There is a crisis going on as it was in the last episode. Boy it can be hard to summarize stuff in this blog.

In segment two, Jason gets into a fight with the person that he unfriended after said person called his mother a liar. Meanwhile, Elizabeth goes to Turkey to settle the situation that’s happening there. And one of her lies was revealed as she knew that it probably would be. Daisy is also in a bit of a bad situation due to constantly being in press conferences about the situation at hand.

In segment three, the injury that Jason caused was pretty serious. They want an apology from him. It looks like Elizabeth might be hiding different secrets and one that may or may not be true is preventing any progress from happening regarding the Turkey problem.

In segment four, we get to more of the situation in Turkey which seems to have resolved itself somehow. I’m not entirely sure if it has or hasn’t yet as there is a tense situation towards the end of the whole thing. Plus, Jason agrees to apologize for breaking that one person’s nose, but not for the other thing which his parents seem to be okay with.

In segment five, Jason gets expelled from his pretentious school, something that he actually wanted to happen. He decides that he wants to go to a more normal school and his parents are okay with it. The whatever weird situation that is complicated and hard to understand reaches a boiling point of sorts and leads to a cliffhanger.

On the next Madam Secretary, more on the problems in Turkey, the US, and whatever else they want us to focus on about. It’s hard to summarize confusing shows and that tends to happen to a lot of TV shows like this one. Anyways, this is Adam Decker, signing off.

Episode from 3-1-2015

Good news: Madam Secretary fans! The show has been renewed for season 2! Isn’t that nice? Now there are rumors that this show only exists so that Hilary Clinton gets elected president. Are people that dull? I mean, if they were going to do a show with that purpose, then wouldn’t they have done it back in 2007? Plus, this show is more interesting than real life. A new crisis every episode? That’s not going to happen in the real world. This show is different enough that I don’t understand it. At best it’s inspired by Hilary Clinton, but the similarities quickly end to an observant person. I might even do a post as to why I don’t think that this show is actually about Hilary Clinton.

I probably should have chosen a different domain name for this blog of mine. It says my name (Adam Decker) and it also says the name of this show (Madam Secretary). I didn’t realize that my first name was in the word madam. I don’t think that I should have put my name with this blog, in the link for it, at least. But, it doesn’t matter that much. That’s all the randomness that I can mention for now. Well, that, and the fact that I’m not sure that this show will last that long. It could, but we’ll see if it actually does or not. A season 2 renewal is a good sign for the future. But we’ll see if it lasts long or not.

Since the show (Madam Secretary) was gone for so long (strange, isn’t it?), I kept changing the TV show watching that I did. I finished with the fifth season of Charmed and went into the sixth season. I also finished the historical stuff, which was number 4 on the list, moved Moonlight to number 4, and added VeggieTales DVDs as number 5. Then, I finished with the great nature videos, moved Moonlight to number 3, and added the seventh season of NCIS as number 4. Why the seventh season? You see, I have the first eight seasons on DVD and was slowly watching through them all. I didn’t want to watch the seventh season Halloween episode until it was Halloween. I did accomplish that purpose in October and will thus continue watching that season until another holiday conflicts with the list.

Now there’s another update that I need to tell you about. I have probably told you before that I don’t know when I can update this blog. You see, I have a blog about TV and only started this blog because nobody was reading that blog. While I still update my TV blog, I do it less often. But I still have the tie-in of that blog to this blog and I might hold back on posting about episodes in case my TV blog is still unread in the future. Link to that blog: http://adamdeckertv.blogspot.com So for those of you that don’t understand: this blog may be updated less than it should be. But I will update it whenever I can.

The Sunday schedule on CBS is changing. CSI is no longer on it. It looks like it is probably not coming back. At least the ending was pretty good, although they could have done better. Battle Creek is replacing it. I hope that it is good. Typically, good promos for shows mean that the show will be good. They were airing good promos for Battle Creek. I still don’t know when my Good Wife Blog will be started. In both of my affiliates, it has to air at the right time (8 o’clock Central) for me to start it. New blogs are complicated for me. I don’t even know when I’ll post about old episodes on VHS for me to catch up on. I probably will if any of the recent ones can’t be posted yet. I’m not even sure which post this will end up being part of. Hope for no delay or a manageable one or recent episodes won’t be blogged about for a while.

Good news! Today’s episode is brought to you by no delay. In the first segment, Elizabeth is preparing for a congressional hearing. She doesn’t think that she’s as prepared as she needs to be for it. At the hearing, it is revealed that the person she is trying to support possibly used tax payer money to gamble and he also had questionable choices with women.

In the second segment, Elizabeth deals with the fallout of the congressional hearing and considers replacing her whole staff. Now most, if not all, of her staff is members of the cast, so I don’t think that it will happen. But, you never know what could happen. While this is happening, Stevie, due to her knowledge of the French language, gets some sort of job or volunteer work due to sheer dumb luck. Jay, who is the policy adviser for Elizabeth, seems to be in the most trouble, before the commercial break, that is.

In the third segment, they do not address anything regarding Jay. But we do hear Elizabeth asking another man for a job, we just don’t know what job. Stevie gets an internship at the place she went to. Meanwhile, there is some sort of blown operation internationally that few people could have caused. What happened? That’s a mystery for now.

In the fourth segment, it is revealed that Jay was, in fact, fired from his job. The rest of the people that work with him wanted him back. Stevie’s internship can only be done for college credit, bringing yet another reason why she shouldn’t have left college. Will this bring her back to college? We’ll see. It’s hard to tell what to make of the possible mole storyline. It would help if I knew the name of the person accused of being a mole.

In the fifth segment, Stevie decides that she will go to Georgetown (if accepted) and she asks her parents to borrow money to do that. Jay was not actually fired in this confusing plot that keeps twisting at every turn. It was part of some sort of ruse that I don’t fully understand. When they go to the president with a possible security matter, they learn that two agents were assigned the job about it and one of them was the one who died in the first episode. Who was the other one? Well, they go to the person’s house and find a letter in the arm of a teddy bear.

What happens in the next episode? Well, they continue looking into a potential international crisis. I do wonder if three episode event means that somebody will die. That happened in Person of Interest and the Good Wife. We’ll see what ends up happening. For now, this is Adam Decker, signing off.

Episode from 1-11-2015

I knew it wouldn’t take long for one of my choices of things to watch on VHS or DVD that is an hour or shorter to change. Well it did. The Bible Special has been watched and is now gone from the list. It has been replaced by the complete series of Moonlight. So here’s the new order: 1- Charmed, 2- Farscape, 3- Great Nature Videos, 4- Historic Stuff, 5- Moonlight, with six being the recorded shows on VHS that has at least one old episode of Madam Secretary. It might have other ones in the future. We’ll see what ends up happening with that.

This episode is airing against the Golden Globes, which I normally watch. With no reception problems with NBC (a good thing, believe me), I decide that I will record Madam Secretary on my laptop and probably ignore anything else that’s new tonight. FOX was airing a movie and not sports so I don’t have to worry about them. ABC is coming in, but I can’t watch it. My secondary CBS affiliate is airing a football game: Indiana versus Denver. Indiana is winning. I then check my primary CBS affiliate which is airing the same game.

The EPG that I use says that Madam Secretary isn’t set to begin until an hour later. Now if it airs an hour later than usual or my two CBS affiliates are airing shows at different times, when Madam Secretary returns to its normal time, I will then start a new blog about the Good Wife. So you may have to look forward to that other new blog if you are a fan of that show. I’ll post the link here when I start it, which I probably will. The football game was only in its third quarter so there’s a lot of it left to play. I decide to watch the red carpet special of the Golden Globes in the meantime. During a commercial, I check CBS again. The game is still airing and Indiana is still winning. I go back to NBC. I do stuff during the commercial break and thus I don’t have a chance to check CBS for stuff. The next break, I do check and Indiana is still winning. That also means that the game is still happening this long. At the next break, I haven’t noticed if the score has changed on the football game. The game ends with Indiana winning. The Colts beat the Broncos. This is before it becomes seven, but that doesn’t mean that they will start the next programming immediately. I’ll check back later, if I can.

It turns out that they are airing a post game show I think. This is probably to make sure that the programming doesn’t start earlier on the programs for those who DVR the programs instead of watching it live. I’m glad that they treat their DVR viewers better than their live viewers (sarcasm!) as if I had my way with CBS, they won’t air any sports on Sunday and thus, would never have to worry about delays as to when their programs air. At least it will be a manageable delay. I’ll be sure to record the show and watch it later. As for other Sunday shows, as I said before, I don’t care about missing them this week. I’m always annoyed that the other networks air new things against the Golden Globes year after year. I mean, other award shows don’t have counterprogramming to them and these people are continuing as if nothing unusual is happening. Treat the Golden Globes seriously!

I wind up recording this show on my laptop. As usual, I will blog about it later. I need to find a good method of writing this blog while watching this episode. Also, I need to figure out when to watch it. Remember that I’ll never know when I post, just that it will probably not be on Sundays, when it airs, or on Wednesdays, when I’m sure to post a different blog of mine about Survivor (unless something strange happens or it is during Lent or Advent, when I post about the episode the next day). So look here whenever you can after a new episode and I should post about it at some point. Just not sure when. Meanwhile, I need to get to the point of this blog.

Today’s episode brought to you by an hour delay. It begins with a foreign diplomat who committed a crime and wants to use his diplomatic immunity to get away with it. Henry’s father is visiting his family. Not sure what to make of that. They decide to act against the foreign person.

The next segment brings up the topic of a stolen pen. While I like this show, I don’t like it when it has terrible b plots like that. Elizabeth talks to the person who was the victim of the serious crime being dealt with in this episode. But it’s hard to make much of it yet.

Elizabeth has supper with a different diplomat from the same country as the one who is in trouble. She sends the bad people back while convincing him to act on it in his country, since he has more authority. Meanwhile, Stevie learns that her grandfather isn’t in a strong position with his union like he originally claimed. Not sure what to make of that. Apparently, the stolen pen ended up on Elizabeth’s desk and she gives it to a kid at an event, not knowing what it is. Then, the good diplomat is killed when he’s announcing that action will be taken again the bad one and there are issues with what should be done about the funeral regarding whether or not Elizabeth should go to it.

In the end, Elizabeth does go to the funeral. She does it without her staff, but, I’m guessing, there’s some protection, right? They wouldn’t just let someone that important leave without any security, right? Back to the grandfather: he’s sorry for what has happened regarding the union that he was pretty much kicked out of, I think.

The last segment clarifies some things for me. Turns out that Elizabeth didn’t actually do to the funeral, although she did visit the country to talk to someone there. A lot of people have positive reactions to that. Then, we have the pen situation which serves a romantic subplot. The person will get a replacement pen. And I have to learn that character’s name.

There’s no new episode this coming Sunday due to an AFC championship game. Guess that I’ll be back some other time with a blog post on the next episode. I’ll also let you know when I started my blog on the TV show The Good Wife by posting a link here when that blog is started. Not sure when it will be, but hopefully, it will be soon. If this show isn’t on delay, then you can expect a new blog.

Episode from 1-4-2015

Hello, this is Adam Decker and I blog about Survivor and TV in general. Now, I’m starting a blog about the CBS show Madam Secretary. This blog was mostly started due to a dream of mine and the fact that people weren’t reading my TV blog as much as they used to. I have strange television viewing habits, but I will still blog about this show. Don’t expect to see the posts immediately after the episode airs. There are a lot of good things on TV. I typically record some shows while I watch other shows. That is why this might be delayed in some way. But, I will watch episodes online should I ever miss things. I’m rambling already. Sorry about that. Anyways, I’m doing a blog about Madam Secretary and I hope that you like it. This blog will encompass every episode from the moment that I first start watching, which should be as soon as the year 2015 starts. I’ll also write about any episodes I’m catching up with on VHS. In fact, if that happens, I’ll keep track of it here. If you don’t know my other blogs, then you should know about how OCD I am.

I’ll be starting each blog post with updates on what the football schedule is for the day. Football overrun leads to tape delays which would affect how I see the next episode. There is currently one episode on VHS that I’ll have to get caught up on. There are also other shows that I watch on Sundays. In addition to Madam Secretary, I also watch 60 Minutes, Once Upon a Time, The Simpsons, Brooklyn Nine-Nine, Resurrection, Family Guy, Bob’s Burgers, The Good Wife, and CSI with the latter two being possible new blogs of mine in the future. I’ll let you know if I do create them or not. Since I cannot watch all of those shows on one night all at once, I record them in sets, always on a week to week basis, meaning I don’t know going into the week which shows I watch live and which ones I record. I also don’t know which method of recording I’ll use on each, since I typically have a TV tuner for the more important shows and a VHS tape for less important shows (although all are important as I insist on recording them or watching them live).

I might even have to ignore the Golden Globes this year, but I have problems with my NBC affiliate as it does not always come in. And there are new shows on other networks every time they air the Golden Globes, which I never like since that’s the only Sunday in the whole year that NBC is actually airing something good. (They had potential with Crisis, but they screwed it up. Well, the writers of Crisis screwed it up.) I also have problems with my ABC affiliates as one of them almost never comes in and the other one has trouble coming in a lot. With both NBC and ABC in my area being so bad at coming in, I can pretty much know that I’ll be missing whatever good shows they air during the summer since that’s when they care the least about signal quality, it seems. Now I’d tell you which affiliates they are if you are someone who can actually fix them. (I also have problems with a CW affiliate which I no longer have, a FOX affiliate that I no longer have, and a PBS affiliate that I no longer have, although none of them really matter as I have other affiliates for those networks that do come in pretty well all the time. Lacking alternates for the ABC and NBC affiliates is why I complain about them when they don’t come in. And, if you didn’t figure it out, I have no problem watching either CBS affiliate of mine as they always come in. While I would like the other PBS station back as PBS is always different on each channel, I don’t care about it enough to complain about it.)

So with two CBS affiliates and a FOX affiliate, I typically turn on the TV on Sunday slightly before six to see if shows will be affected by delays. CBS is more than likely going to be delayed. That is, of course, if it aired football or any other sports for the matter. What’s interesting is that sometimes my two CBS affiliates are either on two different delays, or one is on delay while the other isn’t. I also keep track of FOX shows, which rarely, but sometimes, air on delay, so I know what to watch on it. Now sometimes CBS delays are manageable because they are either at or close enough to a half hour mark (either XX:30 or XX:00) and I can know whether to watch some or record some. If it airs at too weird of a time, then I record shows from CBS on VHS and watch everything else normally. The CBS show that’s supposed to start at 8:00 Central time will be watched after nine from the moment that I started watching to the moment that it ends while I stop recording the show during commercials after leaving a warning on the tape to my future self that I will be doing something with the episode. Now I try to only use VHS tapes when three good things are on at once so I will avoid using them whenever possible. That means that Once Upon a Time’s hiatus should mean that I don’t have to worry about that time slot for the moment. But that may not happen. It may not be that easy.

Now here’s what you can expect from this blog. I will post random updates about the TV shows that I watch on DVD. That includes stuff on VHS of fairly short length (an hour or less) and anything that I have recorded from this TV season to catch up on. Since I have a lot to catch up on, I have a system where I roll for stuff to watch on DVD, with six different numbers representing each different show. And if I’m really behind on recorded shows, I ignore the list and just watch tapes to catch up on them. In case you were wondering, these were the shows to watch, intentionally arranged in alphabetical order: 1- a bible special (just one thing on VHS to watch that has a short running time), 2- Charmed season 5 (which I’m watching again since I like it), 3- Farscape season 1 (which I’m borrowing from a friend and I’m not sure if I’ll finish watching yet or not), 4- great nature videos (the name I’m giving to various nature related specials on VHS), 5- historical stuff (mostly a VHS series by Walter Cronkite, which I’m just now realizing that I might have seen already in history classes back from high school, but will watch them anyways), and 6- recorded shows on VHS (basically, if three great things are on at once, there is something that I want to record when I won’t be able to watch anything, or just two things are on but my laptop isn’t an option for recording as either someone else is using it or I don’t want to use it for reasons that might include bad weather, then I record a show on VHS and have to get caught up on it). In case you are wonder, I got half of those items from my grandparents who were giving it away and I wanted to watch it. I shouldn’t have to tell you which half as you should be able to figure it out for yourself. I currently have a bunch of alternate items for the list lined up so I’ll let you know if one gets replaced, what replaces it, and what items, if any, have to be reordered. Now with this incredibly long and worthless introduction done, I will get to the actual blog post.

I check the primary CBS affiliate of mine slightly before 6 o’clock. They are airing the news, which means no sports delay. My secondary CBS affiliate is also airing the news so it is not airing on a sports delay. I check the FOX affiliate of mine and they are airing some football game with the lions playing another team. Due to lacking a widescreen TV, I cannot tell which teams are playing or what the score is. I believe they are calling it a wild card game, whatever that means. Meanwhile, 60 Minutes is starting at the right time. Before we get any further, I would like to point out that I don’t think that I’ve seen any of these Walter Cronkite specials before. I check the FOX affiliate to see if I can figure out who the lions are playing and I discover that it is the cowboys. I missed the score, but it is not tied. I watch the first segment of 60 Minutes in the meantime before I check back on FOX. Remember that the quality of this blog post will vary depending on how I ended up watching it. Not all of them will be watched live and it could be recorded on a format that will delay the time it takes for me to see it.

After the first segment of 60 Minutes ends, I check FOX again and see that they are still airing the same football game I mentioned earlier. Still not sure what the score is. I check ABC and it looks like I might have some Resurrection to watch. Even if it isn’t new, I might not have seen it. I go back to CBS and watch the second part of 60 Minutes. The third part happens while I worry about the FOX shows starting on time. After that segment airs, I check the FOX shows again. They are airing the post game show. The cowboys won. It looks like this show will start soon. I ended up recording it on my laptop and will watch it that way. I will finish the rest of this blog post and post it after watching it, or later. I’m not sure when these posts will happen, so I thought that I’d tell you about.

Okay, I should be getting to the actual important stuff: what happened on the Madam Secretary episode that aired on the date I mentioned in question. We begin with a shootout of some sort where somebody dies. The person responsible is named Ocinka? I don’t know how to spell his name. Elizabeth gets ready for a vacation with Henry. She is worried about leaving and has to be forced out the door. Alison and Jason play with a football inside that results in him getting hurt. A situation like that could only end badly anyways. The Texas governor doesn’t want Ocinka to be brought to America. They have to get rid of the death penalty or they won’t be able to bring him here. There are some legal raggling issues.

Now there might be some sort of prison break where Ocinka is imprisoned. But that’s hard to tell at the moment since it is left intentionally ominous. Anyways, Jason hurt his ankle and they don’t know if it is serious or not. He doesn’t want his parents to come home. Henry and Elizabeth want Stevie to spend time with her college friends so that she will return to college.

Elizabeth and Henry have trouble trying to get a good restaurant. Ocinka, which is the wrong pronunciation of the name, goes by the first name Carlos. Thus his name will remain. Anyways, Carlos is captured by Texans. That causes problems, of course.

Klaus, a French guy from a previous episode, shows up at the date of Henry and Elizabeth. He seems to be pretty mysterious and it doesn’t make a lot of sense as to why he is here or what his purpose is. So I don’t know what to say about that.

It turns out that Klaus wasn’t up to something. Or he was, but he wasn’t caught with any evidence of it. With him being clean, we return to the rogue governor of Texas. Ultimately, they don’t know what to do about the Carlos situation so they decide to call in Elizabeth. She hadn’t even been gone a full day and there’s already trouble.

Elizabeth goes to Texas to and convinces governor Lockheed or whatever his name is that it would be in his best interest to let Carlos go or he could be facing criminal charges. I’m not sure that he learned any lesson there which is to be expected in politics. I’m not sure what to make of the Klaus storyline, but I guess they will get more into that in future episodes.

What’s happening next on Madam Secretary? Well, I didn’t actually record the promo. This week was pretty weird for me as I got sick at one point and missed a lot of my shows. I even didn’t post my Survivor blog as usual. Oh, well. It doesn’t matter.