Keith Urban & Survivor Re-Caps

It was a wild & crazy weekend in the World of Jill, so we'll start with Friday night and the Keith Urban concert at Scotiabank Place.

First of all, let me make one thing clear: Urban was awesome. The show was spectacular, he was at his sexy best, and he had everyone on their feet from start to finish.

Oh - wait. Sorry. Not everyone. Section 209 never got to their feet. Ever. And just take a guess at where our seats were? Yup. Section 209.

I've never been told to sit down at a concert before. But that's exactly what happened on Friday night, after Keith took to the stage for his first song. Immediately, Stacy, Caryl, Sarah & I leapt to our feet, hooting and hollering and ready to party. It wasn't long before I started to hear people yelling at us to sit down. It quickly became clear that we were in the grumpy old people section, and we eventually moved to the empty section next to ours, where a few other people had moved so that they could stand up and have fun without being roared at and glared at by all the losers we were sitting with. Like, seriously. You're at a concert, people. If you wanted to sit back, stay at home and watch a Keith Urban DVD. Talk about party poopers!!!

Once we moved, we definitely had a lot more fun. Keith played all his hits, with highlights for me being "Stupid Boy", "Somebody Like You", and "You Look Good in my Shirt", as well as a sweet rendition of "White Christmas" that he played to kick off his encore. He made full use of his stage and the long cat-walk out into the crowd, even spending part of the show with his entire band doing an acoustic set out on a platform at centre ice. The crowd ate it up and it was obvious everyone was having a blast (everyone, that is, except for Section 209).

The best part was late in the show, while we were up & dancing in our new empty section, which was right at the side of the stage, Keith came right out at that side of the stage and we were waving at him, and he pointed right at us...very cool! Made the move worthwhile (even though it still pisses me off that we had to move after paying $95 for our original seats).

Now, on to my Survivor re-cap:

I haven't blogged on Survivor in quite a while, so we'll just fast-forward to where we were at going into last night's finale: My favourite, James, was voted out a few weeks ago after he failed to use one of the two hidden Immunity Idols he had in his possession. Otherwise, he should've been a shoo-in for the Final 3. He never should've trusted his alliance!

However, once James left, I quickly switched my cheers to Todd, the flight attendant from Utah who has a dual-citizenship and comes to Canada often with his mom, who is from Scarborough. So luckily for me, Todd was in the Final 4 last night with Denise the lunch lady, Amanda the beauty queen, and Courtney the waitress. I wasn't sure how Todd would fare out with three girls going into the finale, but I happened to fall asleep about 20 minutes in, and I woke up just as the Reunion Show was starting, just as Jeff Probst was revealing Todd as the winner of Survivor: China! So yeah...this re-cap kinda sucks, but I did enjoy the Reunion, so I'll just talk about that I guess.

I was pleased to discover that I wasn't the only person in the world who fell in love with James. Probst talked about James' popularity with the viewers quite a bit, claiming he's probably the most popular player they've had on the show in a long time (I'm thinking since Colby or Rupert). James' likability translated into a big prize for him, despite the fact that he didn't finish in the top 4, as fans voted for him and he was awarded $100 K for being the most popular player.

Denise also came out with a little extra cash, after she revealed that her life since Survivor has been hell. She returned home and found that she had lost her job as the lunch lady at the school she worked at, and is now employed at night working as the janitor. Mark Burnett, the mastermind behind Survivor, heard her story and feeling terrible for her misfortune, told Jeff Probst on a commercial break that he personally wanted to give Denise and her family $50,000 to help her to get back on her feet.

Another of my favourite moments was when Denise explained her hairstyle, after being encouraged to do so by Probst. Denise has a very distinct mullet, which is a cut that is more often mocked than admired by most people. As it turns out, Denise needed to have short hair around her face because of her job around food in a school cafeteria, but because she also wanted to feel like a woman and look beautiful for her husband, she wanted to keep her long hair down her back. It was one of those "awwwww" moments when I realized why she styled her hair in such a hideous way.

Another interesting moment was when Jeff revealed that the next season of Survivor, which will begin in February, is going to be Fans vs. Favourites. They're bringing in a collection of super-fans who have studied the game from the beginning and have been dying to get on the show (much like Todd was), and they will be going up against favourite players from past seasons. Jeff didn't tell us who would be playing, but he did say at least one cast member from China would be back. (The way the camera lingered on James was a bit of a hint...Yay!!)

I suppose it would be too much to hope for Colby to return, as he's already played twice. I haven't had a whole lof of "favourites" over the past few years, so who knows who will be back. If James does return, he'll definitely be the one I'm rooting for!!

So in between Keith Urban and Survivor, it snowed. It snowed and snowed and snowed. But I'm panicking a little because on the Weather Network website, they're calling for rain on the weekend...Ahhhh! One of the guys here at the office has told me we now have enough snow that it would have to be 20 degrees for a week and rain steady for me to lose my snow, so he doesn't figure it will be a green Christmas.

My fingers are crossed!!