Down With Bears! Vote Colbert!

Steven Colbert is running for President! In one state. I'm moving to South Carolina to vote for him. For one, he's the only Presidential candidate who understands the danger bears pose to our homes, our families, and our way of life. I'm looking at you, Sugar Bear. Two...there is no two. Bears are the gravest threat to humanity in the world. Reason number one is reason number enough to vote for Steven Colbert.

Colbert's presidential announcement

Update: Uh oh. He's already involved in his first scandal.

Doctor Who

I love sci-fi, and I really want to like the BBC remake of Doctor Who. Here's the problem.

The first episode is about an evil alien that possesses mannequins and other plastics on Earth. The second is different: alien ransom plot. The third: evil spirits from another dimension possess the dead on Earth.

The only other bit of the show I've seen is a few minutes of a future episode, where a virus breaks from the hackneyed stereotype of infecting people with a deadly disease. Not this time. This virus has its own agenda: infecting people with a deadly disease that turns them into zombies. Kind of like being possessed. On Earth!

The characters are interesting and the show has promise, but so far the plots have been uninventive and hackneyed. If I were a mean executive producer, I would tell the writers to get infected with some talent.

I'm probably just feeling grumpy right now and being overly harsh. I'm going to watch another episode or two, at least. Do you watch the show? Does it get better?

Update: The writers are getting the "alien possesses human" idea down pat. Episodes 4+5 is a two-part "aliens impersonate humans" special. It's well-done though. Doctor Who's sense of humor (both the show and the main character) is starting to grow on me.

Lost: Season 3 (spoiler-free)

I watched 16 episodes of Lost: Season 3 over the past week, and just finished the season finale. The finale was good, although the show had a few moments where its efforts to keep a sense of mystery appeared contrived. Dialog along the lines of:

"Don't press the Mystery Button!"
"Why not?"
"I can't tell you. But don't press it!"

After watching the finale, I browsed a few forums looking for theories on the show's mysteries. Most of them are silly, but there is one theory I found extremely plausible. It's the best explanation I found so far.

Watch "This American Life"

The popular public radio show debuted its television version on Showtime last week. I'm watching it right now--Showtime is letting people watch the first (and future?) episode for free.

The Other 364 Days

7:00 A.M. LOS ANGELES. Jack Bauer is sleeping in his bed. The alarm goes off.

DISC JOCKEY1 VO: “Hello, Los Angeles! [DJ rings bell a few times] Time to stop L.Aying in bed and smell the sunshine.”

DISC JOCKEY2 VO: “More like “Smogshine” today. Yuck yuck!”

Bauer whacks snooze button.

7:09:57, 7:09:58, 7:09:59, 7:10:00
Bauer’s alarm goes off.

DISC JOCKEY1 VO: “Here’s Stacy McLacy with the Q107 Traffic Minute!”

STACY VO: "Bad news, Bob. Route 1 West is bumper to bumper after a tractor trailer hit another tractor trailer, which hit a school bus full of kittens. It’s going to be hours before—"

Bauer whacks snooze button.

7:19:57, 7:19:58, 7:19:59, 7:20:00
Bauer’s alarm goes off.

DISC JOCKEY1 VO: “Okay, Leslie. If you can scream like a hyena for 107 seconds non-stop, we’ll give you 107 dollars of Q Cash. Go!”

LESLIE: "AIEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE!”

Bauer grabs alarm clock and throws it across the room.

7:45 A.M. LOS ANGELES.

Bauer is wearing an undershirt and boxers. He brushes his teeth for a few seconds, lifts up his undershirt, looks at his beer belly from the side, and sighs.

9:30 A.M. LOS ANGELES.

Bauer is in a Laundromat, removing laundry from a dryer. He hears a sharp sound. He quickly ducks and rolls to the side, coming up with his gun drawn. A squeaky rat scurries past him.

12:30 P.M. LOS ANGELES.

Bauer is making soup. He adds some vegetables, and then a skinned rat. The phone rings.

BAUER: “Bauer.” [caller says something unintelligble] “You have 15 seconds. Tell me everything you know about MCI.”

12:51:57, 12:51:58, 12:51:59, 12:52:00

BAUER: “...and then my daughter, Kim, gets kidnapped, get this. Not once, not twice. Three times. In one day. [garbled] Yeah. Totally unbelievable. Wow, I can’t believe I finally told someone about my feelings. You’re a great listener. [long garbled] Uh, the thing is, CTU has a long-term contract with AT&T, and... [quickly] Gotta go.”

Bauer hangs up. The phone rings again. Bauer hesitates. He quickly picks up the phone and hangs it up again.

2:15 P.M. LOS ANGELES.

BAUER is standing in front of a full-length mirror, and holding a long, pink dress. He holds it close to him, as if imagining what he looks like in it. He then throws the dress on the ground, too ashamed to look at it.”

BAUER: “No, no!”

3:30 P.M. LOS ANGELES.

A teddy bear is tied to a chair. The bear is in poor condition. It is dirty and has a few limbs and body parts disconnected from his body. Bauer is holding a red and blue wire connected to a battery.

BAUER: “Where is the bomb? Where is the bomb! [pause] You brought this on yourself.”

BAUER shocks the teddy bear with the wires.

5:10 P.M. LOS ANGELES.

Bauer is watching a small TV in a dim-lit living room.

OPRAH VO: “Today on Oprah: Estranged fathers reunite with their sons.”

Bauer tears up and cries.

9:45 P.M. LOS ANGELES

BAUER is sitting on his bed, twiddling his fingers. He makes a phone call.

VOICE: “Hello, this is Audrey.” [BAUER breathes heavily] Hello?”

BAUER hangs up. He sighs, crawls into bed, and turns off the light.

The Internet TV Archive

It's called "TV Links", but I like my name better. Lends a sense of grandeur.

It's a hodgepodge of links to TV shows online. Most the shows are currently running or have recently aired, but there are some links to some ancient oddballs too. Like Legend of Zelda: The Animation Series. (Actual line from show: "LINK: Well, excuuuuuuse me, princess.")

Movie Recommendations?

My desire to move out of my Mom's house is debatable by the fact that I signed up for Netflix's free two-week trial and arranged all my speakers so the sound waves would form a nexus directly over my bed, on which a bank of pillows has been thoughtfully placed.

It's been a while since I've rented a lot of movies, so I need some recommendations. First, here are mine:

Movie theater: Little Miss Sunshine. It's hilarious, heartfelt and lives up to the glowing reviews.

Rentals: Full Metal Alchemist. It's a Japanese anime series (English dubbed) about two young brothers on a request to restore their bodies into their original, human form. I watched 13 1/2-hour episodes so far and it keeps getting better. The series' creators wholly adapted the language of film, and it shows up in all facets of the story telling, from the camera angles used to the evocative music.

Dodgeball: Ben Stiller: Evil Dodgeball guy. Vince Vaughn: Good Dodgeball Guy. That's pretty much the whole movie. The movie has a lot of funny, silly moments that somehow makes its formulatic elements more comforting than annoying. If this movie were a food, it would be pizza.

Battlestar Galatica: If you like TV science fiction, this is your best bet. Hot pilots, gripping drama, and robots. What more could a sci-fi fan ask for?

Jim Gaffigan: Beyond the Pale. I've watched the shortened Comedy Central version of his stand-up three times. Besides the fact that his jokes are hilarious, I admire him for choosing to be funny without using crutches like cursing or taking cheap shots at ethnic groups.

Okay, so what do you recommend? Post a comment with your picks.

Futurama Back?!

Why wasn't this the lead story on the evening news? Seriously. The only downside is that new episodes won't air until 2008.

Full Metal Alchemist

Does anyone watch this show? It's a cartoon drama that airs weekly on The Cartoon Network at night. I watched a few epsidoes, and so far, I'm very impressed. The storytelling and writing is better than most of what is on TV, animated or otherwise. I'm thinking of subscribing to NetFlix just to watch the episodes.

NO!!!

NO! NO! NO! NO!

This moron is completely wrong.

I hate Chloe. The only way she has "charmed" the audience is if "charmed" means "repeatedly forces me to scream to my roommate, 'WHY HAVEN'T THEY KILLED HER YET?! THEY'VE KILLED EVERYONE ELSE."

To respond to a specific passage in the article: "A large measure of Chloe's appeal (NO) is due to Rajskub, whose unenviable challenge (YES) is to humanize (IMPOSSIBLE) a character defined by her scowl (CONSTANT) and techno-jargon. And she does. (NO) Convincingly. (ABSOLUTELY NOT) "

If I ever meet Mary Lynn Rajskub on the street, I'm going to punch one of her names out. I TiVo 24 just to fast-forward through the Chloe parts. There are large parts of the plot that I have missed because Jack was talking to Chloe at the time. The only thing that would make watching Chole bearable is if the writers rename her Cholera, and replaced her head with a diseased, non-talking intestine.

24

* How many packs a day does Keifer Sutherland smoke to shape his Code Red danger voice?

* Why is CTU the easiest place in the world to infiltrate? Every season, they have a minimum of two moles, along with at least one terrorist walking in the front door with a fake ID card he made at Kinko’s.

SECURITY GUARD: “I haven’t seen you before. Who are you?”

TERRORIST: “Pizza man.”

SECURITY GUARD: “We didn’t order any pizza.”

TERRORIST: “Um, plumber?”

SECURITY GUARD: “Finally! It’s about time someone fixed that leaky toilet next to the poorly-guarded warhead. Come on in.”

Terrorist sets off metal detector. He freezes and slowly places his hand on a gun hidden above his hip.

SECURITY GUARD: “Freeze! [...] Holster wrench?”

TERRORIST: “Ja.”

SECURITY GUARD: “I knew it! You plumbers are all alike. It’s cool—don’t both taking it out.”

TERRORIST: “Danke.”

SECURITY GUARD: “Oh, and in the basement, make sure you flip the left switch, not the right. That’s the light switch. The right one is the self-destruct switch. There’s usually a “NO!” sign above it, but the masking tape fell off and Edgar hasn’t had time to waddle his fat ass downstairs and replace it.”

* I’m so annoyed at the fictional President in the show that if I ever meet the actor that plays him, I’m going to punch him in the face. President Dweeby is the worst President ever. He’s so horrible that he makes George W. Bush look like George H. W. Bush, George H. W. Bush look like Prescott Bush, and Prescott Bush look like President Taft.

* Just once, I’d like a terrorist to say “Help me and I’ll let you live” and actually let the person live:

METALSMITH: “Okay. That’s the last canister. Please, don’t kill me. I won’t tell anyone, I promise. I have a wife and two kids.”

TERRORIST LEADER: [pulls out gun with silencer and aims it at man’s head] “I have two kids too.”

METALSMITH: “Noooooo!”

The metalsmith closes his eyes. After a few seconds, he open them, and the terrorists begin laughing.

TERRORIST LEADER: “Gotcha!”

METALSMITH: “You’re not going to kill me?”

TERRORIST LEADER: “Naw, dawg. We were just playin’ wit you.”

METALSMITH: “Whew! [laughs] To be honest, I was kind of assuming you’d kill me from the beginning.”

TERRORIST LEADER: “Yeah, that’s our usual M.O. But, you know, it can’t always be frowns and downs.”

The Nationals

I went to my first Nationals baseball game last Thursday. Baseball moves much faster in person, mainly because you don’t have to watch it. You can eat, drink, talk to friends, and there’s a game on to fill in the lulls in conversation.

Baseball is a happy game. It’s laid-back and demands little from fans. Cheering is more joy than obligation. If the team doesn’t come through, it’s just one out of 162 games. And in the middle of the sixth inning, everyone gets up and sings together.

There’s one major exception to ballpark joy. The pitchers. The pitchers look like they are in prison. They are trapped in the bullpen at the outer field wall, their forlorn faces pressed against a mesh fence, their fingers curled around the metal weave. They know each other too well to talk and live in hope that a fly ball will pop up near them and they ask the outfielder how his kids are doing before the smell of his sweat leaves the air.

Tickets for National games are very affordable. The price of a beer is almost as much as a ticket in a cheap seat. I tried holding off buying anything, but I broke down after being enchanted with a sign for “Mom’s Old Fashioned Fresh-Squeezed Lemonade”.

Here’s the secret to making $5.50 “Mom’s Fresh-Squeezed Lemonade”:

1. Fill cup to rim with ice.

2. Drop half of lemon on top.

3. Fill with sugar water.

Mmm, mmm–just like Mom used to make it. If my Mom were a crack whore.

After the game I had the opportunity to partake in one of my favorite activites: being part of a mob. It was free umbrella night at the ballpark, and they waited until after the game to hand them out so rabid D.C. fans, notorious for keeping it real Detroit style, wouldn’t stab each other in the hearts with the rounded metal tips in a Miller Lite-fueled drunken rage.

The solution, for the safety of the fans, was to put eight umbrellas in each rope-tied box, put the hundreds of boxes on three tables, and surrounded the boxes with a metal gate while mobs of people shoved each other and reached out their arms over the gate like it was Free Cabbage Day in the former Soviet Union. Once someone got an umbrella, he or she, harkening back to the nobility of the Knights of the Round table, would lower it like a lance and ram through the crowd. I shook my head in sadness, and then darted through the wake.

My progress was hated until one enterprising fan had a clever idea: reach over the gate and pass out the umbrellas himself. The boxes flew open and people grabbed handfuls of umbrellas, usually at the same time, ensuring a tugging contest with an unseen opponent. It was disgusting. I got two. Some old lady took my third one.

Even without Free Umbrella Night, I might go back to a Nationals game. The crowd is enthusiastic and it’s a relaxing way to spend an evening. Although if the Nationals wanted to seal the deal, Free Numchuck Night would do it.

Friday Cat Blogging

I've long envied cat owners for their ability to take part in Friday Cat Blogging (where, as the name says, you post a photo of your cat on your blog on Friday).

Then I realized: "Hey, I can just sneak into my neighbor's house in the middle of the night, steal his cat, and a beer or two, no more than three, take a few photos, and then when my neighbor storms into my house demanding I return his pet, as he did last night, I can pretend to be deranged and claim the cat is infused with the spirit of the sun devil and must be cleansed through his soul entering the all-seeing eye.

The plan worked perfectly. And the beers were delicious.

The Family Guy

The opening joke of the Family Guy's return to network television was awesome. The show was good too. Clips that came off as so-so in the promos worked well in the context of the show. It was so close to the style of episodes three years ago that I wonder if the script was written back then.

As for American Dad: somebody tell me when it becomes good.

A Post on Farscape, A.K.A. I've Neglected the Geek Inside Me for Too Long

Farscape has made me remember my inner nerd. I love science fiction, and considering so it's odd that I've written so little about topics related to it in the two-plus years I have been blog writing. Isn't that the point of having a blog, to share the minuate of your selective interests with a bunch of people, most of whom could care less?

What is Farscape? Why should I watch it? Oh, my friend, your questions will be answered.

The short:
Farscape, a sci-fi show that ran for 4 years, is the best sci-fi show in terms of character development ever made. No exaggeration. It has some flaws, but if you ever wanted to see a show where the characters and their relationships evolve in almost every episode, this is the show to watch. Some of the episodes also display a wicked sense of humor.

To get a sense if you will like the series or not, I suggest renting "Farscape: Season 1: Episodes 19 & 20: Nerve / The Hidden Memory" from an online DVD service such as NetFlix. And let me know if you do. Heck, if there's interest, I'll make it into a contest.


The long:
There are two types of TV shows: plot-driven and character-driven. In plot-driven shows, the characters and their relationships with each other are static, for the most part. The character in season 1 is essentially the same character in season 2 as he is in season 3, and so on. A plot-driven show can have extremely well-drawn out characters, but that alone doesn't make it a character-driven show. For example, the character's in Seinfeld were excellent, but no one tuned in to see if George would finally have an epiphany about his selfishness.

Character-driven shows are the opposite. In a good character-driven show, the characters gradually evolve from episode to episode. And because the character's development carries on from episode to episode, many of the plotlines carry over too.

Most television shows, especially sitcoms, are plot-driven. Season 1 Picard is essentially the same as Season 7 Picard, which is amazing considering that in real life, seven years of kicking ass and making Junior High kids titter every time you call for your second in command would change most people.

Deep Space Nine started off a plot-driven show and shifted towards being character driven in later seasons. When people argue whether ST:TNG or DS9 is the better show, they are essentially expressing their preference for plot-driven shows or character-driven shows. No format is inherently better. It's just a matter of preference.

That's why I suspect people who enjoy DS9, or character-driven dramas in general, would like Farscape because it has a relentless focus on character development. If I gave you an episode from the beginning, middle, and end of the first season without telling you when they took place, you could place them in order solely based on how the cast acts towards each other.

I think that's pretty cool. While this type of character development is a staple of any good drama, it is the first time I've seen it play a central role in a science fiction series. Central may even be too weak of a word--its really the defining characteristic of Farscape.

Well, that's my pitch. If you have a chance, watch two or three episodes and see if it catches your interest. It's been off the air for a few years; so your best bets are an online DVD service or downloading them from a file sharing service like EDonkey.

Warning: Do Not Wear Helmet

The helmet to protect people you don't really love (link from BoingBoing).

Yes, this blog has degenerated into a collection of links I find on other blogs.

Degenerated? More like evolved. Hooooo!

Shut up. I created you. I can destroy you.

Destroy me? You can't even find your car keys. Besides, I'm a manifestation of your psyche. An incorporeal being, unlike your ear hair. How are you going to destroy me, drive a spike through my brain?

I could watch four hours of VH1's "I Love The 80s" where a bunch of C-list comics make fun of D-list musicians and actors from the 80s who used to be considered B-list artists and are now remembered for a few A-list works, the relevancy to their own lives of which is lost on the C-list comics whose stand-up acts consist of popping a few pills of E before going to stage to tell F-laden jokes about the difficulties of finding a woman's G-spot that will go over crowds five years from now like an H-bomb, if the comics are lucky enough to be shown on "I Love The 00s".

Okay. I'll be good.

Nanny 911

I watched my first episode of FOX's Nanny 911 a few nights ago. Here is a condensed transcript.

Scene: Dining room.

A middle-aged woman with unruly hair gently scoops out a spoonful of applesauce, steadies it in midair, and then pours it on top of her baby's head. The baby desperately tries to wiggle the applesauce streaming down her cheeks into her mouth. A matronly British nanny is nearby, shaking her head.

BABY: "WAHHH!"

The woman, on the verge of tears, slams the jar on the table.

MOTHER: "I don't understand. Why won't my baby eat?"

CUT TO: Dylan, the 4-year-old, is in the living room with his father. He is screaming and kicking on the floor because his dad, the brutish oaf that he is, asked him to stop smearing his feces on the wall. The nanny rolls her eyes. The mother runs into the room, lifts Dylan up and cradles him in her arms.

MOTHER: "It's okay, sweetie. Mommy is here. What happened?"

FATHER: "I kind of asked him to stop installing our walls with poop plus."

Dylan wails and tightens his grips on his mother.

MOTHER: "Daddy's sorry, honey. You can stop crying now. Mommy loves you very much."

The nanny, relying on her reflexes honed from decades of parenting, rolls her eyes again.

FATHER: "Do you think, I don't know, I mean, I don't want to intrude on your territory, but maybe we should be firm with him this time?"

She stares at her husband like he just suggested they let Dylan go on a weekend road trip with the Croc Hunter and Michael Jackson.

MOTHER: "I'm all for disciplining our children, but not if it makes them unhappy."

Out of habit, the nanny's eyes roll again. Unfortunately, they were already rolled up and are now stuck. Little Dylan, sensing something is wrong, throws a truck at the back of her head.

COMMERCIAL BREAK. Number of condom commercials: 4.

Scene: The nanny is having a heart-to-heart talk with the parents.

MOTHER: "We're not bad parents. We're just clueless."

NANNY: [under her breath] "Actually, you're bad parents."

FATHER: "What was that?"

NANNY: "Nothing. Here is the problem. Susan, you are an emotion-phobe who thinks any expression of negative emotion should be avoided. By coddling them every time they cry, you are rewarding their tantrums and undermining your husband's efforts to discipline them. Brad, you're a good father is decent instincts. But you're also a giant pussy. And both of you are letting your children sleep in your beds so you can avoid dealing with your lackluster sex life and utter lack of passion in your marriage."

Brad and Susan are stunned speechless. Dylan breaks the tension by throwing a truck.

COMMERCIAL BREAK: A post office employee points out the new services UPS is offering, including new wide-mouth mail boxes that are now large enough, the voiceover points out, to stuff a small child through them.

Scene: Montage of the next seven days. The nanny follows the parents around, shouting helpful advice like "Poop doesn't go there" and "Applesauce in the mouth." Miraculously, after only seven days, the couple's parenting skills improve greatly and the kids' rambunctious behavior is almost completely wiped out. This is because on the night of Day 6 the nanny gives up and swaps the parents and two children with look-alikes from another, superior family.

NANNY: "Well, my job is done. The Smiths has dealt with their problems, their kids are better behaved, and they are now truly a happy family. Until next week."

The family, everyone smiling, waves goodbye.

REAL MOM [from closet]: "Let us out!"

NANNY: "After the commercial break."

LeGuin Responds To Earthsea Miniseries

This will probably only interest 1 out of 20 of you, which, considering the number of people that visit my site, comes out to a right arm and part of a torso.

The SciFi Channel recently ran a 4-hour miniseries based on Ursula K. LeGuin's EarthSea books, a well-liked fantasy series that I suspect holds particular appeal to teens because of its realistic portrayal of adolescence.

Based on other adaptations of books to the screen, what do you think is her reaction to the TV series?
1) Pleased with the result and appreciates all the time and effort the writers and producers made to stay true to the spirits of the books.
2) Mad that they fucked everything up.

With the exceptions of The Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter, two books with vastly greater fan bases, has it ever been #1? Ever? In fact, isn't fucking things up the job of writers and producers who translate novels to the screen?

It's why that while I respect LeGuin's opinion, my heart remains a snug three sizes too small. No one held a magic staff to her head and threatened to turn her into a balderbeast if she didn't sell the TV rights to her books and relinquish all creative control in the contract. And based on the sample size of every single novel adapation in history, how could she expect anything different to have happened?

On another note, if you are looking for a good read, check out her novel, The Left Hand of Darkness. Excellent sci-fi book, even if you're not a huge fan of the genre.

Dess Daglig Försök?

The Daily Show in Sweden? NPR is on the case.

Suck it, Koppel

John Kerry on The Daily Show tonight.

The Family Guy

Back in 2005 on FOX. Old episodes shown throughout the year. Props to The Cartoon Network and Kazaa.

Daily Show

If you missed The Daily Show last night, go out of your way to catch the first 10 minutes of the repeat tonight at 7:00 (in the DC area). It encapsulates the best about The Daily Show and reminds one of the worst habits of major media outlets: avoiding or being timid about saying the truth in fear of seeming biased.

In Tribute To Last Tuesday's Finale of "24"

CONTESTANT 2: "Marsupials for $600."
ALEX TREBEK: "This is the largest type of marsupial."
CONTESTANT 2: "What is…I know this one. What is...um, what is--"
TREBEK: "YOU'RE OUT OF TIME, MAURCIE! YOU'RE OUT OF TIME!"


CUSTOMER TELEMARKETER: "Hello, is Mr. Henry Pittington in?"
MR. PITTINGTON: "Speaking."
CUSTOMER TELEMARKETER: "I have some bad news about your subscription."
MR. PITTINGTON: "My subscription to what?"
CUSTOMER TELEMARKETER: "Don't play coy with me."
MR. PITTINGTON: "What are you talking about?"
CUSTOMER TELEMARKETER: "YOU'RE OUT OF TIME, PITTINGTON! YOU'RE OUT OF TIME! That is, unless you renew in the next two weeks."


[In the Spy Museum in Washington D.C. A trans-universe rip in the space-time continuum opens and two aliens in the shape of translucent pink starfish emerge from the rift. The aliens communicate by emitting and absorbing colored light-pulses through their skin. This information, although interesting, is completely unnecessary to the joke ahead. One could even argue that, by building up a level of tension that this simple joke has no hope of justifying, this preamble is, word by word, lessening whatever humor the reader may find in the following sentences.

Then again, the person making this argument is likely in the group of people who voted for Fantasia more times this week than they had voted in the last five Presidential elections, assuming they were old enough to vote in any of them, which they weren't.]
PAA-PIT-WIISH-WISH: "Where are we? This isn't our universe. The temporal funnel--something must have happened. But where--"
ZOONA-REESH-AUK: "YOU'RE OUT OF TIME, PAA-PIT! YOU'RE OUT OF TIME!"
PAA-PIT-WIISH-WISH: "Well, if I'm out of Time, so are you."
ZOONA-REESH-AUK: "Oh, yeah."
PAA-PIT-WIISH-WISH: "Maybe if we materialize one of these beings can help us."
ZOONA-REESH-AUK: "Don't be ridiculous. What are we going to do, ask them for directions? There's no way these inferior beings know how to get to Hoboken."


I'm going camping. Have a nice weekend, but preferably not nicer than mine, because I judge the quality of my weekends solely on their relative joy to the time of others.

X-Rated Oprah

I l ike Oprah. One day she's talking about miracles from heaven, the next tossed salads. The latter provoked some funny complaints to the FCC.

Comedy 101: Lead them one way, then surprise them.

That poor child.

Microscopic No More

One of the effects of HDTV is that it points out flaws that were hidden by the low resolution of the older format. Set designers for sitcoms are starting to make more intricate props because what looked like a real mahogany table now looks like spray-painted pine.

HDTV (may) also bring out blemishes and minor cosmetic flaws that actors used to be able to cover up with makeup and clever lighting. This is significant because the standard of beauty for television actors is near perfection, a standard that most people can't help comparing themselves to and thus drives the fashion, makeup, and cosmetic surgery industries. When HDTV becomes more commonplace, one of things will happen. One, actors will meet this new standard through better makeup, more plastic surgery, etc. Or two, actors will find that makeup can't cover everything and plastic surgery is either not worth it or impractical for everyone to get.

I personally think the first option is much more likely than the second. But whichever way it goes, something will change. Either people will be more obsessed about beauty and less tolerant of their imperfections, or the standard of beauty will lessen and people will think it is more acceptable to have small flaws.

Back from the Holidays

After visiting my sister Michele in New York, we drove home with my sister Tina and spent the last week with my Mom. A pile of mental notes I made during my stay are now either in the dark corner under my mental desk or mistakenly flushed down the mental toilet after watching an episode of "Rich Girls," a show on MTV that provides the best argument in American history for a progressive tax system. These notes grow grander each day they are lost. I know I had the cure for cancer. It involved peaches, envisioning the cancer cells as those Tribbles from the original Star Trek, and a mass of white T-cells in the shape of James Kirk calmly firing a phaser set to "No More Trouble" at the cuddly masses of evil cancer cells.

I'll be writing more soon. And to all my friends, from fundamentalist Christian to non-practicing Christian, Happy Holidays!

Tonight on Leno

I watched Leno for a few minutes tonight. A woman from Sea World was on with a brigade of furry, cute animals. One of them looked like a cross between a raccoon and a koala. This isn't a word-for-word transcript of what Jay said, but it's very close:

LENO [animal crawling of his shoulder]: "Now, I noticed they have very soft fur. Is that why they're endangered, because of their fur?"
WOMAN "Actually, it's because they only live in the forests in Madagascar, and 90 percent of their habitat has been destroyed."
LENO: "Do they make good house pets?"
WOMAN: [stunned pause] "Um, no. They're an endangered animal. There are only 1,000 of them left."

Joe Millionaire 2

A story on Joe Millionaire 2's low ratings led me to the show's message boards, where tens of people analyzed the shocking ending:

(courtesy of JOHNNYF10)
It was amazing how happy David was when the butler gave him his own house.

He is a simple man, a cowboy who just want's to be left alone on his ranch.

But he really wanted a girlfriend because, as much as he loves his horse and dog, he could not develop a deep enough relationship with them to find happiness.

Now he has Linda to ride on the horse with him.

It's like a fairytale.

The end.

The Expectations Raised By Hollywood Squares

I turned on the TV; up came The Family Feud. I was about to change the channel when the contestants caught my eye. "Is that Whoopi Goldberg? And Jim Carey?" A graphic flashed by: "Celebrity Family Feud." A block-shaped older man with large sunglasses, a few strands of hair greased back and a wolfish grin stood next to Jim Carey. "Oh my god…Jack Nicholson is on the Family Feud!"

I couldn't believe my luck. What was Jack Nicholson doing on the Family Feud? Barbara Streisand, I can understand. The guy that looks like Tim Allen, I can understand. The…wait. Looks like Tim Allen?

In a harbinger of the future of intelligent television, the graphic reappeared: "Celebrity Look-Alike Family Feud." Carey's tooth was colored black. Tim Allen's skin was pale like a pearl. The women were a sea of fake diamonds with real breasts.

Except the Jack impersonator. He still looked like Jack.

***

My suggestion for the next Family Feud gimmick: "Celebrity Look-Alive Family Feud." Zombies dress up as their favorite celebrities.

HOST: "Twenty seconds on the clock. Time will begin when I finish reading the question. 'The part women find most attractive in men."
ZOMBIE GEORGE W. BUSH: "BRAAAIN!"
HOST: "Most common item purchased at the supermarket."
ZOMBIE GEORGE W. BUSH: "FRESH BRAAAIN!"
HOST: "The age at which AUGGH! [Zombie Bush bites into forehead of host. The opposing team, Zombie Jackson Five, moonwalk their way to the plump floor director.]

Shee Shee Lemon

Did anyone catch The Simpsons a few weeks ago? Very weird. (more clips here).

This Was Going To Be an Extra Post, But It Took Too Long To Write. Plus, I Had To Go To The Bathroom. And I Didn't Capitalize 'an.' Should I Have?

I feel like I'm in the Army, catching quick naps as the Humvee barrels into enemy territory, but always ready to jump up at full alert and ready to start making monkey jokes.

I may have mentioned this before, but there is what should be an awesome series on string theory currently showing on NOVA. The series is based on Brian Greene's book "The Elegant Universe." Based on his writing style, I'm expecting the series to be similar in approach to the one Robert Crow-something-or-other did for ABC a few years back. The Washington Post chat today on the series will have more information for those interested.

I like to hide related links in my posts, but I'm putting this one in the open because it's too good to miss.

Show schedule: The series is showing in WETA 26 (D.C. area) on Tuesdays at 8:00 and Saturdays at 1:00.

On Tonight's No Spin Zone

It's Bill O'Reilly versus Fake Mustache Bill O'Reilly.

O'REILLY: "I'm right, you're wrong!"
FAKE MUSTACHE O'REILLY: "I have a fake mustache!"

O'REILLY: "I won 15 Peabodys!"
FAKE MUSTACHE O'REILLY: "You can't ignore my mustache! It is virile and manly, like a bull."

Tonight at 10:00.

(I can honestly say I have never spent that much time deciding how big to make a mustache.)

Random Thoughts

* I never understood how dumb Colin Quinn is until I was watching the first few minutes of Tough Crowd and realized: "Oh my god. This is with cue cards, dress rehearsals, and professional writers." Do you realize that Colin Quinn on Tough Crowd is five levels of dumb above Colin Quinn in real life? How does real-life Colin Quinn put on his pants? Can he open doors? What about jars? I've seen guys with spears stuck in their heads that are smarter than him. If Colin Quinn entered a debate with a man with half a brain lobe and a two-foot javelin sticking out of his head, I'd bet on the javelin guy and toss a horseshoe at his head for good luck.

* I meant that to be a lot shorter. I'm surprised at how angry I got. I haven't felt like that since Ann Landers was alive.

* Democrats want to beat Bush so desperately that they'll support anyone who they think can beat Bush, including Jeb Bush and Anheuser-Busch.

* I'm tired of waiting for a majority of Americans to push aside their bigotry and support gay marriage. Here's my compromise: gays get 10%. We get five out of the 50 states in America, selected at random from a giant bingo ball after next year's NBA draft. Straight people can still live in those states, but gay marriage and related rights gets automatically approved, with no way to repeal it. The other 45 states can throw all the stones they want.

* Cats hate dogs.

The New Joe Millionaire

For the next "Joe Millionaire," FOX gathered a bevy of European ladies and told them an American cowboy with an $80 million oil fortune is looking for a wife with broken English, but not a broken heart.

"Ha, ha!" us viewers will say. Because we heard the rest on the promo and know that he really makes only $11,000 a year.

FOX, did you really have to make him that poor? Is this likely to happen?

COWBOY: "I have something to tell you. I'm not really a multimillionaire."
WOMAN: "It cannot be!"
COWBOY: "I'm a night manager at 7-11. I make $34,000 a year."
WOMAN: [crying] "This is horrible. How could you lie...oh, $34,000? That's fine. I thought you were going to say you make under $20 K."
COWBOY: [laughs] "Not as long as people throw away their aluminum cans!"

Mysteries of the Universe

How does Colin Quinn get work? I ask this question seriously. It keeps me up at night. I can speak better than him, and I stutter. Someone should give him a medal for being brave enough to write his own jokes, and them whack him with another medal to make him stop. What does this twitchy ball of energy do before delivering every one-liner, snort one?

If C.Q. were a magazine, it would be written in crayon, a third of the pages would be numbered, and every issue would have a 16-page photo spread of three chimpanzees and a movie monkey flinging crap at each other. Mysteriously, it would only sell four issues a month but still be published for three years.

Last night in his monologue, he complained that he has never gotten invited to host an awards show. How about instead being grateful for the existence of inertia? Colin Quinn should hire a conceptual artist to make a statue representing inertia and one-up the Muslims he makes fun in every show by kissing its ass six times a day.

Okay, my crankiness is over. Thanks for reading.

Best line...

...from Fox's 101 Things Removed from the Human Body special:

"He was a miracle. But he was a miracle with a pole stuck through his head."

Another good one: "He went to his doctor, complaining about constipation." (It turns out the guy somehow ate dozens of rusty nails.) What was that doctor-patient conference like?

DOCTOR: "Jerry, I have some bad news. We found out what is causing your stomach pains and constipation."
PATIENT: "What is it? Rotten fish? An ulcer? Low-fiber diet?
DOCTOR: "Actually, according to the chart [glances at chart] it appears to be A BOX OF FUCKING NAILS."
PATIENT: "Oh, yeah... The nails. Kind of makes sense, now that you--"
DOCTOR: "YOU IDIOT, WHY DID YOU EAT NAILS? NOT NAIL. NAILS. YOU ATE MULTIPLE NAILS. AFTER YOU ATE ONE NAIL, YOU DECIDED TO HAVE SEVERAL OTHERS. LIKE IT WAS A SNACK PACK. WHAT THE HELL IS WRONG WITH YOU?"
PATIENT: "Um, too much iron?"

Modernism, Postmodernism, ...

This is either going to sound stupid or prescient in six months...This article and Trigger Happy TV are two symbols of a new movement that is currently evolving and hasn't grown to a point where it is easily identifiable and nameable.

I apologize for the vagueness--I just thought of this a few minutes ago--but my gut tells me there is something unique about society today that has given birth to these types of pranks. Maybe it's a reaction to reality TV, based on these premises:

1. Real life is different from television. (Ten years ago, almost all television programs clearly existed in a different, more exaggerated world than the one we wash our laundry and drive to work in.)

2. In the past several years, non-scripted reality programs have "hijacked" reality and brought it into the TV world. In other words, the definition of what TV is (previously, only scripted programs) has expanded, and the definition of what is uniquely real life (previously, boring stuff like living in a house with roommates) has shrunk.

3. In response to this, perhaps out of subconscious resentment at having real life processed for entertainment rather than experienced, some people have begun to take the weirdest, most artificial elements that used to be exclusive to the TV world and put them in real life (e.g. an improv group taking all 39 listening booths at a Virgin Megastore)

Hence Trigger Happy TV and the pranks by the people in these articles. I'm unsure about what I wrote for #3. I could very well be off. But I do believe this form of a prank is unique to our time and has been spurned somehow by conditions in the last ten years. If you want to add your own thoughts to what's motivating these types of pranks, I'll link to your web page or post your comments here.

Update1: The real motivation for these pranks may be a "I've seen everything" attitude shared by many people, created both by an entertainment culture that has almost reached its limit trying to one-up itself, and greater social acceptance of "different people." You may look twice if you see a man walk down the street in full drag, but think of how someone would have reacted 30 years ago (or 30 years from now).

So these pranks can be looked at as another way to one-up what has been done before (e.g. a man dressed in a squirrel suit rather than drag) or as a way to gently poke fun at people who bury themselves in their own worlds because the real world isn't interesting enough to deserve their attention. Perhaps before, comedy and drama asked the question, "How would Character X act in this unusual situation?" and now we want to know, "How would real people act in this unusual situation?"

I'm probably done pontificating on this line of thought. Although I do enjoy using the word "pontificating".