stuff on tv

For no reason at all except that Gigi and PopPop LOVE having Landry around and Landry LOVES to be at their house, she went ahead and spent Sunday night and Monday night with them while Jeff, Korley and I came home. This gave me a chance to catch up on Tivo'd shows and watch some other stuff.

So.....

OPRAH

I finished watching the episode that Mike Cope's sister-in-law was on. She did a great job. I had read the NY Times article previous to her being on the show through Mike's blog. It was easy to see why the story broke Pam's heart...it did mine as well. The most upsetting thing to me was how young these children are. I have a 5-year old and it breaks my heart to think of her having to work 12-14 hours a day 7 days a week doing hard manual labor. What these poor children endure is just terrible. It definitely makes me grateful for all that I have and certainly makes me rethink how exactly "tired" I am. Also, I think back to how scared Landry was a couple of years ago in swimming lessons--how she would cling onto me or Jeff or the instructor until she felt safe and comfortable (...many lessons later!). It made me so sad to think of these small children being thrown into freezing water in the pitch black of night, not knowing how to swim and potentially getting tangled in the fishing net. Anyway, kudos to Pam for her work in Ghana (and the work her foundation is doing in other countries).

Another Oprah I caught up on was the one John Edwards (the "Crossing Over" guy) was on as well as the real-life inspiration for the show "Medium". I think her name is Allison--not sure though, because I refuse to watch Medium. I'm the biggest chicken in the whole world...in fact, watching this episode of Oprah will probably give me nightmares, but it was interesting. What do y'all think about that whole psychic/talking to the dead thing? I'm not sure what I think.

PRIMETIME

Since there is NOTHING on Tuesday night TV, I watched Primetime last night. They did a segment on this school in Massachusetts for children with Autism. It costs about $200,000/year and is paid for by taxpayers. It's a controversial school and here's why: they hook these electrodes up to the students' arms and legs and when they "exhibit wrong behavior" they get an electric shock to the skin. And, as the school's founder and director said, it hurts and it's meant to hurt. Most of the students wear these 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. I personally thought this was appalling and disturbing! Anyone remember the total outrage this country had when we "dehumanized and abused" Abu Ghraib prisoners/terrorists by taking pictures of them in their underwear?? But, it's acceptable at a pricetag of $200,000/year to have children be shocked for doing something like yelling?? Wow....