I used to pride myself on the fact that I only watched high-quality reality TV. This was maybe five, six years ago - before I'd succumbed to LAGUNA BEACH and then THE HILLS; before SHEAR GENIUS damaged the good brand set out by shows like PROJECT RUNWAY; before CROWNED: THE MOTHER OF ALL PAGEANTS was a glimmer in anyone's eye.

So, yeah. I DVR'd the first two episodes of DENISE RICHARDS: IT'S COMPLICATED and LIVING LOHAN. I ... I am practically speechless. This is trainwreck television at its absolute worst.

First up, let's talk Denise, whose potty mouth is so horrible she makes me feel positively G-rated. Okay, fine, she curses. Whatever. Denise is all about presenting herself as a Good, Single Mother and Devoted Daughter and Victim of Tabloid Journalism. She complains about past boyfriends, yet refuses to break out of her pattern of picking well-endowned dark-haired bad boys (hey - I'm only quoting Denise here). She breeds her pet pigs, gets an at-home airbrush tan, references WILD THINGS a dozen or so times. The entire series so far is about us watching Denise as she wanders through her life, wide-eyed and looking somewhat psychologically imbalanced.

Trainwreck TV.

Although I do have to say, there was a moment in last night's episode, when Denise goes to confront a tabloid journalist, and the journalist talks to Denise like Denise is a moronic piece of trash not worthy of the hack's time. In that instance, when Denise storms out, calling the hack the c-word, I almost - almost - cheered.

Next up is LIVING LOHAN, which is so much, much worse. Witness Ali Lohan, kid sister to Mistress of the Trainwrecks Lindsay. You can't blame these girls - watching Mama Lohan do her thing, you can totally see how they were victims of DNA. Dina swears that she's doing this show purely to set the record straight about her family - which is what Denise claims is her MO, too. I'm sure neither of them really care about the money or publicity or anything. No, it's all about truth in journalism. Dina Lohan is VERY concerned about this, and begins each day reading Page 6 and the tabloids for news about her daugther and herself. She even adds "Google us" to her assistant's list of duties. Self-absorbed much?

But last night's episode - in which the Lohans confront their twentysomething music producer friend about an article in which he's quoted as saying he's Lindsay's new boyfriend (when in reality he's never even talked to the girl on the phone) - oh, that took the cake. First, Ali gets all hyperdramaqueen on his ass, calling him a liar and slamming out of her bedroom vowing never to talk to him again. Then Mama Lohan sits her down and explains how Jeremy is the Bambi here, and how he doesn't understand the way the evil tabloids will twist his words. So, they sit down with Jeremy together, and Dina gives him the what-what, and then dismisses Ali from the conversation. In her one-on-one, it becomes pretty clear that Jeremy DID plant the fake story, but does Dina flinch? No, she merely informs Jeremy that she's using him as much as he's using them.

Flash forward to a party scene in NYC, where Dina is being honored for being on the cover of a magazine. Jeremy is there at this party, and I swear to god, Dina is eyeing him up like he's a Whopper with cheese and she hasn't had a meal in the last month. Cougar alert! No wonder she doesn't want to dismiss the cutie, even if he is an opportunistic liar. I would bet money that Mama Lohan tries to bed this boy at some point, whether we see the footage or not.

I do not think I will be watching LIVING LOHAN going forward, as doing so makes me feel like I need a shower. As for Denise - the jury's out on her. For now.

So, this is the first weekend in forever where I didn't have the word "STELLA!!!" on my to-do list. Because yes, I turned the manuscript into my editor Wednesday night as planned. I also don't have my freshmen research papers coming in until Tuesday, and since they're starting their magazine projects this basically means I have no grading or class prep to do for another day and a half.

Now, there are still a million things I can be or should be doing: laundry, cleaning the kitchen, taking my online defensive driving course, etc. But this morning the boy and I finally had our fancy pants birthday brunch with my parents at the Mendenhall Inn, and after stuffing ourselves silly we had very little energy to do more than chill. Sometime this afternoon I looked at my actual MySpace page for the first time in forever and realized the background I'd been using had somehow disappeared, so I found a new layout and loaded it. But it ran off the browser page, and this annoyed me. Actually, MySpace annoys me to no end. But having a page is, like, mandatory in the YA Universe, so earlier this year I caved and now I have this ugly, annoying thing I have to maintain on a semi-regular basis. Anyway, I asked the boy to help me, and while he messed around with the coding (because he is the best boy in the whole wide world), I slinked off to the living room to watch MY FAIR BRADY and the mini ROCK OF LOVE 2 marathon I taped because Carlie insisted it was gold and I tend to trust Carlie's reality TV judgement.

How disappointed was I to find out that BEAUTY & THE GEEK'S Megan (of Scooter and Megan) as one of ROCK OF LOVE 2's contestants? I mean, wasn't BEAUTY & THE GEEK about dispelling the very stereotypes reinforced by ROCK OF LOVE? Didn't she learn ANYTHING?

It's going on six and the boy had to run to a meeting and won't be back until eight-ish, and I know I should be tackling some of the household chores and applying for jobs and being a productive member of society. But really, all I want to do is cuddle with my pooch and zone out in front of some of the cooking shows I DVR'd this weekend. Food porn: I'm totally addicted.

(Speaking of food porn, if you're into that sort of thing you totally need to check out Hogwash, a new blog I discovered today. It is priceless.)

(Speaking of food porn again, the boy and I have talked several times about making a YouTube video featuring clips of stars from the Food Network eating, scored to classic '70s porn music. Although I bet someone has probably done this by now, because we're not so quick with our brilliant ideas.)

Lastly, watched AMERICAN GANGSTER last night as part of my bid to see as many Oscar-nominated movies as possible before the ceremony later this month ... and managed to fall asleep through 20 crucial minutes during the second half. I'm still trying to figure out what Ruby Dee did during those 20 minutes I missed to garner an Oscar nomination, because the stuff I did see her do wasn't so very noteworthy. But who am I to judge? And oh! It looks like the Oscar question might not be a question at all soon: I hear the WGA is veryveryclose to settling their strike. Which means we may have a May Sweeps season yet!