cultural interlude: television!

I went to start writing about this past week, starting with the footy game and ending with yesterday's awesome drive to the coast, but as I'm watching the finale of MasterChef, I'm going to start off with some Aussie culture/media observations!

• There are a lot of funeral home/funeral services ads on TV, which I feel would be totally strange in the US.
• Australia is in the midst of a huge public awareness campaign about speeding. The entire last commercial break was taken up by a PSA by the campaign, with talking head interviews of people involved with/affected by a car crash caused by speeding, starting with witnesses and first responders, then going to friends, girlfriend, other passenger, then on to the father, mother, and brother of the young driver who was killed in the accident. Pretty heavy for the commercial of a reality competiton.
• MasterChef is one of the most popular, if not THE most popular TV show on right now. Earlier tonight was a debate between the Prime Minister, Julia Gillard (of the Labor Party), and the leader of the rival Liberal party, Tony Abbott. This debate was originally scheduled for during the time slot of this MasterChef finale, but it was changed since they knew most people would be watching this show instead. That's some pull. The finalists are Callum and Adam, and I'm not really leaning toward either of them, so this is pure entertainment right now.
  
• In Australia, the Liberal Party is the more conservative party, and the Labor Party is more liberal.
• So in Australia, retirement funds are called Super Funds, which throws me off every time i see a commercial for one, seeing as Superfund is uh, something rather different in the US.
  
• There's a lot of American shows on Australian TV, especially daytime TV (The View, Oprah, Dr. Phil, Jerry Springer and Maury, various soaps)
• That's not to disregard the primetime American shows, which are generally of the crime drama variety (NCIS, CSI of various varieties, Lie To Me, [Law & Order] Criminal Intent), though there are a lot of American sitcoms as well.
  
• There are also lots of Aussie crime drama and real-life crime/law enforcement-related reality shows.

Okay, now on to the week in review. If I get around to it after the end of this show.