Burt Notice

Our erstwhile tropical depression now has a name: Bonnie. We almost had a Bonnie a few weeks ago, but that storm couldn’t get its act together. For some reason I keep hearing “My Bonnie lies over the ocean” in my head. “My Bonnie lies over the sea.” Current predictions put the storm well east of us, so it looks like I won’t be using my super-duper new solar-powered flashlight. I don’t think I mentioned that—remember that viral marketing kit I got for The Colony? Turns out that the flashlight/radio that was included is a $30 solar-powered radio/flashlight combo that also has a crank on the bank so you can wind up a charge. There’s a USB port where you can plug in your cell phone and charge it, too. Pretty cool.

I reread “The Vengeance,” my new science fiction story, last night and made only a handful of very minor changes. Then, when I reread it this morning after keying in the changes I made a helluva lot more, so I guess I’ll wait until the weekend to submit it.

Burt Reynolds was the special guest star on Burn Notice this week. He played a retired Cold War-era agent who got peeved at a local politician and blew his cover by posting diatribes on a message board, which brought him to the attention of Russian spies who still had a gripe against him. The running gag was that the Russians didn’t believe the Michael Weston was a real person, more of a legend, so they pretty much started shaking in their shoes whenever he showed up. Reynolds did well—it was good to see him back in the saddle again, so to speak, and poignant considering the fact that the agent was suffering mild dementia and eagerly jumped at the chance to relive some of the old glory days.

I wonder if the women contestants on Big Brother have noticed yet that they’re getting whittled away one by one. I don’t know that there’s a concerted effort to “get rid of the women” but that’s the overall outcome so far. I thought Brittany’s taped goodbye sob-fest to Monet was hilarious.