California, here we come

I've spent the better part of the last two months obsessively watching The O.C. The show originally launched my junior year of college and it only seemed appropriate that my friends and I, living in Huntington Beach, would gather every week to watch the caricature of the county in which we lived and the people in which we lived amongst. From the first episode, we were immediately pulled into the lives of the "Core Four": Marissa, Summer, Seth and Ryan. We maintained our O.C. watching for quite a while, until my boyfriend at the time moved up north and most of my friends got a bit too caught up in drugs. With the disintegration of my friend group and graduating from college, my O.C. obsession subsided. I had barely made it to season 2.

Years later, finding myself a bit homesick, and largely thanks to the magic of the internet and Sanam's vast dvd collection, I started back at the beginning of The O.C., revisiting Ryan and his ceasless brooding, Marissa and her tragically screwed up life, Summer's wit and sass, Seth's cowardly yet hilarious antics, Kiersten and Sandy and their undying love, and probably my personal favorite- Julie- the manipulating temptress that managed to destroy lives while looking her best (she actually turns out to be a pretty stand up human in the end). I was enthralled, yet again.

Many hours of sleep were lost on the wonderment of the Core 4, until finally, all four seasons of the O.C. were voraciously devoured. Let's see, that breaks down to 93 episodes, at roughly 45 minutes each, leaving us at almost 70 hours (not counting the many watched bonus features) of amazing teen drama. One grows unnaturally close to fictional characters after so much time spent getting to know them. Its no surprise then that watching the final episode of the show turned out to be a heart wrenching, messy, tear filled goodbye; I was yet again saying good bye to some of my closest friends (even if they were fictional). The O.C., I shall miss you dearly but I'm happy to relay that I'm officially off of t.v., internet included. Time to go dust off them books.

If per chance you are feeling a bit useless and want to do a whole lot of sitting on your ass, I'd suggest you watch the O.C. All four seasons are available here.