beancounters

Friday fun: have you heard the one about

Today's Fark photoshop challenge: drop superheroes into different franchises. They had me at Hello Spock.

Clement Freud tells his funniest joke. (mildly NSFW, as most of the best jokes are, let's face it.)

The greatest movies, summed up as infographics

Speaking of infographics, I could relate to the one about the morning routine.

Um, I know why church pews are outfitted with kneelers, but why is this necessary for a toilet? Guys, help us out. On second thought, guys, just keep it to yourselves.

It's a rug! No, it's a slipper farm!

And, in response to this week's amazingly boring non-news story: Conan actually has it made. Now can we drop it?

Back from the dead

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Spinal Tap Extended Performance
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Spinal Tap Performance

Though Spinal Tap came out in 1984, and their new album came out last month, it's taken me this long to learn all the verses to 'Gimme Some Money.' And I call myself a fan. Shocking, that's what it is.

Another reality TV illusion shattered

The real secrets behind a HGTV FreeStyle design show makeover.

The crew, meantime, was peeling off price tags and planting $1,000 worth of newly purchased furniture and accessories in other rooms. Then later, we could conveniently "find" them, exclaiming how great this lamp, those pillows and that bamboo mat would work in the living room.

I knew it. It always bothered me about that show, that a homeowner might have wonderfully decorated bedrooms and dens, but a crappy-looking living room. Who really lets that happen? Thought it was a bit of TV hyperbole, but not to this extent!

What's your TV theme song score?

Baby boomers and Gen Xers, this quiz is for you. How many of these TV theme songs can you remember? Me, I got a perfect ten, plus a major dose of deja vu. Gotta stand up and walk it off. [via Nag]

Happy Christmas, peasants!

For my mother, who feels that America made a big mistake in kicking out the Brits back in 1776, I give you Queen Elizabeth in her first televised Christmas address to the people, 1957.

Isn't she a dish? Ahem! Terribly sorry. Not that one expresses one's admiration of British royalty in such familiar terms.

I love how she informs us she's inviting us into her home for a few casual minutes, then proceeds to give the most stilted speech I've ever heard. More speeches and historical video footage may be found on the new Royal Channel. [via Neatorama]

Cash Cab

Bunny and I watched a cool game show today. Do you watch game shows on television these days? They make me so impatient. They're all ultra-dramatic, with the suspenseful music and the lights and the sweating and the monologuing by worried contestants. But this one is great - the contestants get into a NYC cab, and boom! They find out they are actually riding in The Cash Cab. And they answer trivia questions for the whole ride. If they answer every question, they make it to their destination, get paid in cash and get a free cab ride (which seems to thrill the New Yorkers as much as winning money). But if they get three strikes, they get have to get out of the cab immediately. It's totally great, and moves fast.

Here's the online version of the Cash Cab game. So far, I've only ridden about 25 blocks before being brutally ejected and then virtually mugged by Cash Cab TV execs. Maybe when I'm healthy I'll do better. Naah, who am I kidding? I think we all know how bad I am at these things.

It's a wonder we survived preschool

I'm curious. What did you make of this news? They produced the first seasons of Sesame Street on DVD, but the NYT is "warning" the parents who have the purchasing power that these pilot episodes aren't for children's consumption.

The slightly tongue-in-cheek article cites these non-PC violations, among others: Big Bird is delusional because only he can see Snuffleupagus; Oscar is such a grouch he seems rabid; Cookie Monster smokes a pipe; little kids have milk and cookies with strangers.

There wasn't anything perverse about Sesame Street's early years, was there? This is all just a carefully-written gimmick to get us intrigued enough to buy some random children's show DVD right before Christmas, wouldn't you say? Surely what we survived back then won't scar the children of today. I mean, I watched the first years of this show with my little brother and a roomful of preschoolers, and we all understood that Sesame Street was fiction. We knew better than to accept favors from strangers in the real world. None of us grew up to smoke pipes or be mortally afraid of garbage cans.

(I do eat way too many cookies, but I hardly think I can blame Cookie Monster for that. Even back in the day, we kids could all tell that Cookie Monster chewed but never swallowed.)

"Me eating fruit now. Keep Cookie Monster regular."

10 worst sci-fi TV shows

How this guy managed to stop at ten is beyond me.

I was traveling down the list ... congratulating myself that I'd somehow completely avoided seeing Team Knight Rider and Cleopatra 2525 ... when Far Out Space Nuts clocked in at number three!

And even then, I didn't remember watching it. My brain had utterly blocked the memory, until I clicked on the You Tube, and all the words to the theme song came flooding back. Good ol' Sid and Marty Krofft ... they warped my childhood in so many ways ...

Exhibit A

Rabbit-ears find a new generation

For BB ...

[S]ome consumers are spending thousands of dollars on LCD or plasma TVs and hooking them up to $50 antennas that don't look much different from what grandpa had on top of his black-and-white picture tube.

They're not doing it for the nostalgia.

Local TV channels, broadcast in HD over-the-air, offer superior picture quality over the often-compressed signals sent by cable and satellite TV companies.

And the best part? Over-the-air HD is free.

I offered to climb on the roof and dismantle our ancient antenna, a relic from bygone days (and it looks it). BB said if I do, he might just have me replace it with another one. I didn't understand until I read this. Everything old is new again ...

Treknowledgy

Here's an encyclopedia that reminds me of one of the things I like best about the Star Trek franchises - all the inventions! [via Grow-a-Brain] Follow this link to an analysis of the Jefferies tubes over the years ... You can never underestimate the importance of tunnels through your plotline flagship.

(Okay, who's gonna say it first ...?)

The best part of the Oscars

Happy Monday! Did you watch the Oscars last night? I was at my mom's house, when I wasn't on the road. And as a rule, I always skip the Academy Awards. But I never miss the fashion recaps the day after. I used to call it a guilty pleasure, but Go Fug Yourself has helped me look deep, deep within and admit how much I like to read about Hollywood costumage; now I've dropped the word "guilty".

American public service announcement

If you skipped the Super Bowl yesterday (like we did) but you're ad-curious, or you want to see a replay of the infamous (but surprisingly inoffensive) K-Fed/fast food commercial, there's a place for you: iFilm is carrying all the good Super Bowl ads today.

We now return you to our regularly-scheduled blog, already in progress.

In which I am (probably) killed by a fictional character

I had a weird dream where I landed on (or near) the fabled "Gilligan's Island". (Actually, I was swimming toward land.) And who was swimming out to meet me but Thurston Howell (III).

He started reciting what sounded like a lost verse to the theme song. I can't remember it exactly, but the jist of it was, he himself had built the island out in the Pacific for himself and his wife, so they could get back to nature. Their plan was to "accidentally" strand themselves upon it. And then the Howells would be waited upon for years by the rest of the passengers and crew of the Minnow - which, as you recall, really happened.

The alarm woke me before I could find out why Mr. Howell had confessed all to me. But if you think about it, having told me his great secret, he surely could not afford to let me live ...

(Has this theory been around? I wonder. Started to search for something along these lines, but all I got was a bunch of self-important bloggers who wanted to describe their dreams. Borrrring.)

High school tragedy: acid wash jeans are out!

Typical. Today's my first day back to school, and I've slept, like, 45 minutes. Finally got  up and fired up the coffee and the television.

Things I learned this morning from cable TV:

* MTV actually does still run music videos - from 3 a.m. to 5 a.m.

* As far as the music videos go, you haven't been missing much.

* HGTV still runs an old show called Room By Room. This is a design show where two very, very perky hosts decorate people's kitchens using just a few yards of nautical fabric, some flotation devices, rope and a hot glue gun. The results are, well, very very 90's-looking. I can't believe I used to think this show was cool.

* Saved By The Bell, which I'd never watched an entire episode of, turns out to be wildly overacted, and painfully predictable, yet not as tough to sit through as I'd imagined. Hayley Mills is a high school teacher. The school walls are made of cardboard - very surreal. Hayley has, like, eight students in her whole class. They are all dressed in 80's fashions and have big hair. The students walk and talk using bi-i-ig gestures like they've all trained for the kabuki theatre. Every episode, one of them has a "problem". When Hayley sees the Problem Person moping in the school hallway, every conversation goes like this.

Miss Bliss: [Concerned] Zach, I see you've been moping today. Is something wrong?

Zach: [Walking around with an arrow sticking out of his skull] Why no, Miss Bliss. No problem! No problem at all! [Audience laughs]

Miss Bliss: Now, Zach, I can't help but sense you're - well, you're holding something back. What is it?

Zach: Well, all right! It's this arrow sticking out of my skull!

Miss Bliss: [Gently] Yes?

Zach: Well, gee, Miss Bliss! All the kids are laughing at me! Even Skeezer and Marie! And evil Mr. No-Nose the Janitor? Said I look worse than he does! [Audience screams with laughter]

Miss Bliss: [Lays a comforting hand on his shoulder. Music cue.] You know Zach, being a teenager is a tough time for everybody. 

Zach: I guess so. You're right! Thanks, Miss Bliss!

Anyway, now you know what's going on on TV while you are sleeping. Next time we'll cover all your basic home shopping channels and the research will be complete.

Reminiscing about MTV

Best MTV-related title this week: MTV won't say how old it is (but it's 25).

I've decided to adopt the same attitude. I'm going to tell people that I won't say how old I am, but that I am 25.

In truth, I am older than 25. I had just graduated high school the year MTV appeared. I remember some of the first music videos I watched in 1981. "Video Killed The Radio Star", of course. And a Steve Miller video to Abracadabra. Watch the woman waving scarves backwards. Her hands were, like, following the scarves! It was magic!

Prior to MTV, what few music videos existed were only shown late Friday nights, on the first nationwide TV channel. The name escapes me right now. Ted Turner started it. Anybody?

Actually, the very, very first music videos I ever saw were on The Sonny and Cher Comedy Hour. Such as this one. Go and look at it, I dare you!

You young people? You have it good. Look what we had to settle for! See why the scarves thing had us riveted?

Seven deadly castaways

This visionary posits that the seven stranded castaways on the TV show Gilligan's Island were patterned after the seven deadly sins. The Professor was Pride, Mr. Howell (the millionaire) was Greed, Ginger (the movie star) was Lust, Mary Ann was Envy, Mrs. Lovey Howell was Sloth, the Skipper was Anger, and Gilligan was Gluttony.

I don't think this would ever have occurred to me. Has this theory been around a while? Mind-blowing!

Bothered and bewildered

So, Karen passed a quickie meme to me, which I've been pondering ever since. It is this: Which sitcom character would you most like to be?

As usual, I put way too much thought into it, but after narrowing it down to a few prime choices ... no wait. Hold the phone. I just this moment decided.

(Did I ever make you read my post about 'Bewitched' at Hogwarts? No? Mwah-ha-haa!)

I always loved Samantha Stevens. She had all this potential - she visited the moon! she played harp for Henry VIII ! - yet she gave it all up for true love in the suburbs. Let's not condemn her choices by today's standards - in the 60's she was living the dream, for sure. Still, part of me always wanted her to bust out, not be so repressed, and quit living through her cousin Serena. If I were Samantha, look out.

Besides, BB says most men thought Darren was an idiot for snubbing Samantha's powers all those years. He says that if he'd been married to Samantha, he would have had no objection to family trips to the Middle Ages and the like.

These are wonderful

Utopian Endings for Reality Shows

The Apprentice

Fired intern says, "Great, I wanted to leave anyway. Your capitalist mindset is a futile path to happiness," then slips into a Che Guevara T-shirt. The other contestants mumble that it sounds good to them, and leave the boardroom en masse. Tired of the tyranny of their possessions, they abandon their wheelie suitcases, take the stairs to the lobby, run past the taxis, and go into the streets, where they use sales tactics to organize an anti-greed protest march. This culminates in thousands of people encircling Trump Tower, which is then turned into a free university.

Facing the inner monster

C00kie M0nster asks some tough questions on McSweeney.

Me thinks me have serious problem. Me thinks me addicted. But since when it acceptable to call addict monster? It affliction. It disease. It burden. But does it make me monster? ...

No one calls Grover monster, despite frequent delusional episodes and obsessive-compulsive tendencies. And the obnoxious red Grover—oh, what his name?—Elmo! Yes, Elmo live all day in imaginary world and no one call him monster. No, they think he cute. And Big Bird! Don't get me started on Big Bird!

I always felt he got a raw deal on that show.

Stay tuned: Sacto on TV

One way or another, this crazy town is gonna hit the airwaves in the next few weeks.

* Last night, West Sacramento's mayor ended a rousing speech at the annual State of the City dinner - by coming out to all assembled. He had spent his entire adult life in politics, and in the closet. But lately he got up the nerve to come out for the benefit of an upcoming MTV program about gay and lesbian themes. It seems a camera crew has been following him around for a week, ready to capture the moment he finally told the town. Odd timing, to be sure, but more power to ya, Chris! [via Eyes of Argus]

* The crew of the Oprah show came to town to profile Kevin Johnson, who used to be a basketball player and now has several hometown projects in the works, including the administration of our largest charter school.

* And for those of us who aren't sure what we want to be when we grow up, exciting news: 'The Apprentice' is in town Friday morning, casting for the next series.

Am I going? Well, I could ... it is a state holiday, so I wouldn't have to take vacation time ... But do you think I could stand to be in the same room as The Donald without reaching over with a pair of scissors and chopping off that combover?

No! I got it! BB should go and audition! Granted, it'll be a challenge. He hates All Things Trump worse than I do. How will I trick him into dressing up and letting me drive him someplace before 9 a.m.? Hmm ...