Switched to Tubi for Jem. "Last Resorts" takes Jerrica and her group to a Colorado ski resort for a much-needed vacation. They agree to give a concert for a friend whose resort is in danger of being bought by a duplicitous rival and sleazy lawyer Eric Raymond. The Misfits, the Holograms' hard-rock rivals, challenge them to a ski race. The Holograms are devastated when the Misfits sabotage their efforts, but Jem and her boyfriend/manager Rio run across a precious discovery in a cave that makes them understand why Eric wants the resort so badly.
Rode to work after the show ended. I wish I hadn't. Work was a mess and a pain in the rear end from start to finish. If people aren't spending their beginning of the month money, they're panicking over the snow we were supposed to have later in the afternoon and on Monday. I couldn't keep the carts stocked, the trash can overflowed, the bathrooms looked terrible, and they still called me to put away cold items. I had no help, either. The head bagger went in a register when I arrived. I grabbed more soda with a good online coupon after I left, then rushed home.
(Incidentally, I rode home in snow squalls and strong winds. They didn't amount to much besides looking pretty coming down. We're not supposed to get any real snow until Monday morning.)
Watched Match Game Syndicated when I got in. Holly Hallstrom, Richard Paul, and Elaine Joyce join Brett, Dick Martin, and McLean Stevenson for the first week of 1981. McLean gets his trial by fire on the Star Wheel with "Inferior __," while Holly wonders why Johnny Olsen isn't announcing refrigerators.
Worked on the inventory while the show was on. I searched for The Time-Life Treasury of Christmas sets for years before I finally turned up Volume 1 at a thrift shop on the New York/Massachusetts border during a vacation with Lauren in 2019 and Volume 2 at the Audubon Goodwill three years later. (As it turned out, it only had disc 1 of Volume 2, but that was ok.) I used to borrow my Aunt Terri's cassette copies in the 80's and 90's when she'd visit for Thanksgiving as a festive way to kick off my holiday season.
For some reason, Buzzr jumped back to the very first week of Match Game '73 after that, so I went elsewhere. I'd heard of Hot Dog...the Movie before, but had never caught it before it turned up on Tubi. No, this has nothing to do with sausages. Freestyle skier Harkin Banks (Patrick Hauser) picks up pretty runaway Sunny (Tracy Smith) on his way to a major competition at the Squaw Valley Ski Resort. He's initially impressed with his European idol Rudi Garmisch (John Patrick Reger), until the arrogant skier treats him and Sunny with nothing but contempt.
Turns out Rudi is the reigning world champion at Squaw Valley and resents anyone who tries to compete with him. It doesn't help that the organizers of the tournament are courting European sponsors and are pretty much willing to let Rudi and his friends do whatever they please if it makes the sponsors happy. Patrick befriends veteran skier Dan O'Callahan (David Naughton) and his buddies, along with sexy female skier Sylvia (Shannon Tweed). After a disastrous party that ends with him in Sylvia's arms and Sunny ready to walk out, Patrick throws himself into the tournament. When the judges show clear favoritism to Rudi and his friends, Dan and Patrick insist on a fairer downhill competition with no rules and no judges...and the chance for this ski bum to prove Americans can compete with the skiers from the Old Country as well as anyone.
Considering all the negative reviews I've seen for this movie, it was honestly much better than I expected. No wonder this movie was a surprise hit in 1984 and apparently remains popular with real skiers to this day. The Japanese skier can come off as stereotypical, but he's also played as a member of the gang and takes part in most of the same escapades as the others. Sylvia is a bit on the one-note side as well, but Sunny is more interesting, including her attempt to learn to ski in the second half. The big winner here was Naughton as the long-time ski bum who sees Patrick's rivalry with Rudi as a way to stick it to the European jerk.
Is it a masterpiece? Not at all. There's still the expected sex (including a lot of topless nudity), bad language, moronic comedy, and stereotyped characters one usually found in teen comedies from this era, and the female characters aren't always treated as well as they could be. Still, this is a lot more fun than it has any right to be, especially if you have interest in either winter sports or the slobs vs snobs teen comedies of the 1980's.
Switched to The Roku Channel during dinner for Hart to Hart. Jonathan is happy to be playing his trumpet with friends in "Deep In the Hart of Dixieland," including a man who is seeing the singer in the band. His joy turns to horror when the woman turns up dead and his friend is framed for the crime. Turns out the woman was a wealthy beauty whose shenanigans left her in debt to the point where even her secretary despised her, but neither she nor the secretary were what they seemed to be...
Stayed at Roku to finish the night with a more sober episode of The Facts of Life. Natalie and Tootie are excited when Tootie's big brother Marshall is home from college. He tells the girls "Let's Party" and brings them to a big college shindig with lots of beer drinking and bad jokes. Jo isn't amused, Blair even less so. Despite Marshall having had more beers than anyone should ingest in a night, he still insists on driving Tootie, Blair, and Natalie home...and promptly runs into a tree. The girls are badly shaken but thankfully unharmed. Tootie refuses to admit her beloved brother has a problem, until Jo and Mrs. Garrett reminds her that yes, beer is alcohol, and he could have done far worse to her and the others in that car than scaring them to death.