I started watching Boardwalk Empire lately. The first disk of Season 1 arrived from Netflix nearly a month ago and has been lying around ever since. We’re probably in the top ten favorite customers for Netflix. We watch a lot of streaming vide0 (mostly TV shows), but when it comes to those disks in the mail, we’re very slow. Sure, there are spurts of activity. Like right now, with the Oscar’s quickly approaching, we’re trying to get in every nominated film possible, including even the documentaries (one of our favorites) and even stuff just nominated for a song or technical bit. We’re literally turning disks around in a day, watching them as they arrive. But for whatever reason, we decided 11pm on a weekday night was the perfect time to start watching Boardwalk Empire. We watched the extended series premiere and episode 2 back to back, making it a very difficult morning. I can’t wait to get the next disk, but with Oscar season, I have a few weeks to wait.

For those of you who haven’t seen Boardwalk Empire, it’s set in Atlantic City, New Jersey during the prohibition era. The show starts with a countdown the eve of when alcohol becomes illegal and looks at the mobs and corruption of rising speakeasys and the continued flow of booze. I was amazed how much of a joke the series makes it seem. The country is dry, but you wouldn’t even notice being  in AC. It got me thinking about bathtub wine, moonshine, and homebrewing, and how one would survive their boozy fix if they needed to rely on their own.

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