(S02E12) This is an early review.

Bob Balaban plays Tom's father in this episode, and I must say he was the perfect choice. He and Tim Heidecker, who plays Tom, have the same kind of soft-spoken, halted delivery, and it seems perfectly natural they would be father and son, even if Walt doesn't seem to care much for Tom.

The episode opens at the airport with Tom waiting for his father's flight to arrive. We assume he's visiting his son, but actually it's just an eleven minute layover (which is, funny enough, also the length of the episode). Tom doesn't let his father's lack of time keep him from making a minute by minute itinerary, which includes a father/son embrace (tentative). Tom's father sells fish coolers called "Coldinizers" and he doesn't want to miss his flight, else he lose all his sales on the Eastern seaboard. Tom insists they have time to do everything on the list, however.

(S01E05) Oh snap! The heist is on and stuff is not going the way it was planned. However, with all the set-backs, Nick handled things surprisingly well. He even let Jack pray for the team before they took off for the airport. That seemed like a pretty big deal, because after what happened to Wanda, Nick does not seem like the religious type.

Random side note. I didn't realize Jack's nick-name was Bump. This episode, more than others, Nick kept calling him Bump and for a while I had no idea who he was talking about. I had to check out the Thief website in the middle of the show to figure that one out. Guess I need to start paying attention more and it's a good thing I did, because this episode was jam-packed.

American Idol judge (and my junior high crush) Paula Abdul is being accused by two workers at the Silverton hotel and casinoin Las Vegas of getting them fired. The story goes that Abdul called the front desk in the early morning to change her flight plans for later that morning. The two girls working the front desk began to print out flight schedules, but in the midst of it all were called again by Abdul who told them the flights were all booked. She then blamed them for causing her to miss her flight. The workers, Carol Good and Damon Rosa, were both fired. I won't pretend to know who was right or wrong in this situation, but I was impressed that Good stayed past the time her shift was supposed to end in order to help out, if only because I used to work in the hospitality industry. Typically, once my shift was over I pretty much stopped caring about the residents of the hotel. This makes me a bad person, I know. I've been trying to improve myself through meditation.