An hour til The Sopranos finale and I’m giddy with anticipation. I would be curious to see the stats on the how the number of phone calls in America drops during the 9:00 (EST) hour tonight, and then how much they spike at the top of the 10:00 hour. In case you were thinking about it, calling me during this hour would be pointless, unless you just enjoy my current outgoing message.

When I first moved to LA I realized quickly that I didn’t fit in. People out here were different than me. Realting to folks was difficult. I would often times be at dinner, or at a club, and be completely left out of conversations. You see, I didn’t watch American Idol. Me and my roomie started recording the episodes so that we would no longer be social outcasts. I have decided to keep a diary of tonight’s finale. Times will not be used because (1) I’m watching the west coast feed and (2) I am timeshifting with the DVR.
There’s some blonde girl and everyone is cheering. I think she’s the girl that won before that’s not the black one or Kelly Clarkson. Hey it’s a white party, but not one of the cool ones like hip-hop artists throw. Kat’s working some major league cleavage. Emmy for the wardroe department. Old guy’s stylist missed the cow lick. Did a 13 person number really need a back up chorus?
Seacrest is dressed like a Man In Black, or a Blues Brother or a Mormon Missionary or a Hasidic diamond merchant. Take your pick. He’s also working not one but two mics. The editors are having fun making the judges (although, you, America, are the real judges) look like morons. Randy says “dude” and “dog” a lot. Paula can’t keep her dosage regulated. Simon is arogant. He also likes to touch his face frequently. Didn’t know he rolled so much. No package for Ryan.
Who gave those twin girls mics? Don’t they know that microphones amplify your voice so you don’t have to yell. Kids die their hair grey? And judging by the family freindliness of the event, it seems the children have done this with their parent’s aproval, if not encouragement or possibly even assistance. That’s just sick. They’re having Kat’s party at City Walk? That sucks. I has hoping for a little more coverage of the EssOhh.
Paris is working some Al Jarreau. Holy shit! There’s Al. He’s aged pretty well, but still makes those stroke victim faces when he sings.
Oh geez. Creed boy is singing with Live. They worked better with Tricky. Live has really gone adult contempory. I would hate this song even if douchenozzle wasn’t taking a share of the lead vocals.
Looks like they’re going to be making fun of Kelli for not knowing about seafood. Someone must’ve watched Newlyweds. “I’m gonna be traveling the world touring.” Oh Kelli, I admire your optimism. And now she mispronounces words. HAHAHAHA. She also doesn’t know what escargo is. Instead of teaching her about food, maybe someone should teach her how to do her eyebrows.
Meatloaf has another Bat Out Of Hell album coming out? His name is Robert Paulson. His name is Robert Paulson. His name is Robert Paulson. Man’s still got pipes. These two are not working well together. Kat’s two for two on the cleavage sporting dresses. I wonder how these artists feel about playing second fiddle to reality show wannabes? Nevermind, I”m sure the already under contract musicians are happy to be on network television.
David Boreanaz in the house. I don’t think I can give a bigger compliment to him or the show Bones than this — when I watch that show I don’t think of him as Angel.
Mock awards show. Look out MadTV. I can’t make fun of them making fun of other people. And isn’t this what they did back in January?
More with Kelli Doolitle. She’s scared of the lobsters. Now she’s sneaking up on the lobsters like she’s Steve Kerwin. You can’t go wrong with the country mouse goes to the city bits.
An American Idol male group sing. Thank you shitty music gods. They chose BTO. I’ve got $20 that says at least four of them can’t keep this 1/4 beat. They let old dude bring his harmonica. Look out, it’s a medley. Bad dancing, enhanced by terrible stage moves. This may be the least metal moment in television history. They’ve got a teleprompter with the lyrics. DAMN IT! This REALLY IS kareoke.
They got free cars, and Taylor pantomimed starting the engine. Enjoy your 12 month lease on that Mustang. I wonder who gets which one? Winner get first choice, or the other way around as a consolation prize? My pick? I like the black one. He is good Ghostbuster.
Who’s the inbred cheering for Elliot’s mom? That was scary. Elliot’s gonna bust out One. You’re no Bono, or Michael Stipe or Johnny Cash. Mary J. Blige has covered this song as well. It’s on the verge of becoming the modern Yesterday. I like that Mary moved Elliot’s hand to the beat (and damn near threw him into the front row). The poor kid was lost on that stage.
Underwood is singing again. Keep showing up Kerry. You’ll be out from under that 19 Records contract before you know it. Do they have an order of succession for American Idol? Like if the winner dies or poses for Penthouse or something, do they move the next one up? Or does the position remain open until next May?
My poor ears. Taylor is busting out In The Ghetto again. And it’s a duet with Toni Braxton. The fuck? Did they just throw names in one hat and songs in another? Up next, Keith Sweat and the Little River Band perform Fly Me To The Moon.
The females are doing a Shaina song. Good choice. I mean if Shania can sing it, can’t be that tough. Uh oh, here comes the medley. Fox seems to be focusing Kat’s camera on the shoulders up. Even though this is her first non boobarific outfit tonight.
Look it’s KD Lang. No, wait, Clay Aiken got new hair, maybe even some work done on his face. And just gave his doppleganger a masturbatory moment for life.
I didn’t know Burt Baccarach had a new album to promote. All the guys are in tuxes and all the girls are in matching dresses. This is like the world’s lamest wedding party. And here’s Dionne Warwick. I can’t believe I’m seeing this performance without getting a free buffet and a $10 slot voucher. This show is gonna kill in Tunica next week.
Wow! MOTHER FUCKING PRINCE! OK, this was totally worth 90 minutes of my life, just for that. Yes he is still the man. MOTHER FUCKING PRINCE!
One more quick song before the results huh? Time Of My Life? Whatever. While they sing, did you hear that some producer is sampling She’s Like The Wind for a hip-hop song? The world is ready for a Swayze comeback. Patrick or Don, either will do. Speaking of Swayze, the Roadhouse sequal was supposed to be filmed in New Orleans last fall. I was so looking forward to being near that. Fuck you Katrina. And Fuck you Army Corps of Engineers.
And now, at last, the results. 63.4 million votes? Your American Idol is… Taylor Hicks. My three sons of bitches. Wait, was Hasselhoff crying? Don’t worry, you may still get a cameo in the Knight Rider movie.
I just checked outside. Despite all the love for homegirl, there is no rioting in Sherman Oaks. That’s right, I was expecting (maybe even kind of hoping) to see people looting the Ralph’s on Ventura Boulevard or burning down the In-N-Out on Van Nuys Boulevard. No such luck.
Time to go back to the drawing board. It’s official… democracy does not work.

I was browsing through the archives of my blog the other day and noticed how many obituaries I had written. I was kicking myself for only celebrating people I respected and admired postmortem. I started racking my brain trying to think of someone who was still alive that I had not yet told the world how much I think of them. Unfortunately, one of those names that crossed my mind was not Peter Jennings. So now, here I go again with another retrospective on a life that is no more.
He was Canadian, he was a high school drop out, he started his broadcasting career at the age of nine. These are the nice trivial facts that are fun to talk about. But what were the reasons when I chose to watch a national news broadcast I usually chose ABC (even though I didn’t watch their local news until much later in life)? I gotta think a primary reason was Peter Jennings. Those broadcast tended to focus more on international affairs (something my local news wasn’t giving in depth coverage on until the past four years or so). There seemed to be more of a world focus on ABC’s coverage, and I like to think Jennings had a major role in that. This Canadian high school dropout (look trivial facts) seemed annoyed by the coverage of the Simpson trial and the Lewinsky scandal.
But when I think back to the two major events of my adult life (the millennium and 9/11) I remember Peter Jennings. He was my major source of information, my eyes to the world, my conscience to a degree. The moment that stands out to me the most though (and I’m sure it will be replayed thousands of times in the next few days) was when he talked about calling his children on September 11, 2001. He was not concerned about their well being (he knew they were no where near any of the three crash sites) but wanted to talk to them about the turmoil the world was in. He wanted to make sure they knew that he was thinking about them and didn’t understand what had happened any more than they did.

Man, Jim Carroll could write a song about this week. Terry Shiavo’s death eliminated about 1/3 of my act this week. Topical humor must be topical. Couldn’t really start the set “remember a couple of days ago when Terry Shiavo was still alive? Well here are some things I thought then…” I might as well have just riffed on the Lincoln assaination. Johnny Cochran’s death got completely overshadowed. Rascism in the media I tell you. And then this afternoon the Pope finally passes. To quote my buddy from earlier today “I don’t think CNN and Fox News knew what they were getting into with the round-the-clock coverage of the Pope-watch. Don’t think EITHER of them expected it to take up THAT much of their coverage. I bet they were starting to think “what are we going to do here?” Because I’m guessing it just doesn’t look good to break away from Pope-watch coverage because the poor guy was taking just too long to die.” Really they seemed to be running out of Catholics to talk to. Priests will now be telling the parrishoners “Be fruitful and multiply so that MSNBC will always have sound bites.” The electronic media had plenty of time on their hands though, seeing as how those video retrospectives on the Pope’s life had been in the can for a few year. I am anxiously awaiting the process of selecting the new Pope. That’s got to be one cut-throat competition. Some of the logic baffles me already. There was a guy on the radio today saying they’ll probobly pick an older pope so he’ll die sooner. Apparently they don’t want another long reign. Is that how they can justify a Latino Pope? But surely they can’t have two in a row that aren’t Italian. And on top of all this, my favorite contemporary comic (and one of my all time favs) drops. Mitch Hedberg was a comedy legend in the making. But it’s a sad case we’ve all seen before and unfortunately will see again. To borrow a Todd Snider lyric “Alcohol and pills / It’s a crying shame / You’d think they might have been happy / With the glory and the fame / The fame don’t take away / It just pays the bills / And you wind up on alcohol and pills.” At first I was sad thinking of all the great material he was depriving me over the years. Then I became angry thinking of all the great material he was depriving me of over the years. So fuck you Mitch! God damned junkies. Now time to mourn in my own little way — beer and a jager.

After a horrendous season two, The Apprentice is back again. I just can’t stay away. Maybe it’s because this show started the same week I quit my job last year, I identified with the concept. And the first season was cast wonderfully, the second season, well I convinced myself to like a couple of the candidates, but I really didn’t, the whole season was like watching a Tennessee-Florida game. So this is street smarts versus book smarts, in case you weren’t sure, it was mentioned approximately 2,457 times during this 90 minute episode. So, we can already eliminate half of the field from the field of potential winners. Anyone who has watched this show knows that Trump has a raging boner for degrees. However, the edumakated ones immediately showed their ignorance by naming their team “Magna,” as in Magna Cum Laude. You think maybe they would have gone for “Summa” as in Summa Cum Laude what with it being a more prestigious degree distinction and all. Why not just named your team the Silver Medallists, or the It’s An Honor Just To Be Nominateds or the Buffalo Bills (oops already taken). Once again the contestants start the season in a task that in no way, shape or form allows them to display CEO qualities (but there was CMO qualities, but I’ll hate on Danny later). Here were my first impressions on the wannabes that actually made an impression.
Tara — Gets my vote for the hottest chick on the show. She is one of three black contestants (and two black females, which has to be a record) and thus far appears to be sane.
Tana — Is that even a name? If it’s short for something, I haven’t figured it out yet. A bulldog peed on her, then the camera zoomed in on the puddle. Or maybe it was just stock footage from the Osbournes.
Kristen — Who?
John — He has a big head (as best I can tell someone in the casting department has a thing for guys with big heads). Seemed like a nice guy, a solid leader and did a great job of not being an overbearing leader (a refreshing change of pace for this show).
Craig — The black guy… that owns a shoe shine business. Are you kidding me?
Chris — Who?
Brian — He has a big head (I mean that Viking helmet must have been like an 11 3/4). He got bleeped twice while at a fancy dinner with his potential boss (or maybe he has Turrets, which if I’m correct we haven’t seen on reality TV yet). He is into urban legends but I gather has never read snopes. Also he should look into clip on ties, because that knot thing appears to be beyond his abilities (or maybe it’s Carpal Tunnel). So let’s look into Brian, dressed up like a cowboy, possible pituitary gland disorder, possible spontaneous profanities, possible manual dexterity problems. Should be fun.
Audrey — Who?
Angie — Who?
Danny — Who brings a musical instrument to a job interview? Somebody please take that guitar and go El Kabong on his ass (or at least Bluto Blutarski). What was that church bizarre looking Bozo rip-off game he set up? And the dancing, singing, playing the guitar thing? Me thinks someone got to NYC a day early went to Time Square and saw the Naked Cowboy. Did he get his wardrobe from a Hate Ashbury thrift shop? And he likes to think “outside the box.” What is that? What is the box? What’s so wrong with being inside of it? I frown on the corporate jargon that plagues this show.
Todd — He has a large jaw. He was a No Fear salesman. He is fired.
Verna — The other black female. She has braids, so she must be bitchy and crazy. She did roll her eyes at Danny’s songs, so points for her there.
Michael — He has a big head.
Stephanie — She had good marketing ideas. Couldn’t stand up to Danny.
Erin — WOW! She cried in the first freaking episode. She couldn’t work a cash register. She apparently wore a pink bath mat for her confessional interview (and constantly flipped her hair).
Kendra — She was the first to have the balls to jump off the bash Danny train (not that I wouldn’t be in line to purchase a ticket). She’s got a little something we like to call potential, which I believe is an old Cherokee word for “ain’t done shit yet.”
Bren — Is that a name? Short for Brenda maybe? He’s a Southern attorney who wears a bow tie. YAY! It should be noted, he also has problems with ties. His was crooked for most of the episode.
Alex — The smarmy one? The gay one? I’m going with a lot from column A and a little from column B.
I hope this show avoids the pitfalls that almost made me stop watching last year. I come in with an open and optimistic mind. I have but one reality show vice, please make it worth my while. And props to Joey for the line of the night “My wife hasn’t been born yet.”

To the surprise of pretty much nobody, The WB “network” cancelled “Angel.” This may have surprsed some people though, those who thought the show had been cancelled years ago. The show was nitch programming. Sci-Fi/fantasy pulls in that loyal, but small, audience. The plots and story arcs were always hit/miss, but this show made up for that with some of the most amazing character development in television history. The greater tragedy in all of this is the fact the Joss Whedon now has zero shows on TV (down from three a little over a year ago). Compound that with Aaron Sorkin’s departure from “The West Wing” this season (and boy does it show) and the medium has lost possibly its two most talented writers. Bemoaning the decline of network television is rather cliche, but hey I can join in. It’s time for a new trend, right?

As best I can tell by NBC’s promos for “The Apprentice,” the big selling point of the show is not watching people use their business skills to win the opportunity to run a Trump company, but watching The Donald fire someone. All the ads just show pictures of big Manhatten buildings, then a close up of Trump saying “you’re fired.” Apparently the geniouses at GE think they could have a hit by Donald Trump just firing 44 people every Wednesday night (or is this show on Thursdays? Will they decide). The biggest problem I have at this show is that all of the contestents are already successful in the business world. It wouldn’t have hurt to toss in a couple of self-made high school drop outs. Maybe a bartender or waiter.

Just found out Comedy Central will no longer be airing Saturday Night Live starting Jan 1. Great, now I’ve got to go get a day job.

I appreciate the WB wanting to get viewers of one show checking out another, but was it just me, or was the guy trying to kill Lana on Smallville last night one of the Wolfram & Hart Senior Partners from Angel?

Only eight hours away from the Buffy finale (although I’m about 16 hours from being able to catch the tape delay after work), and time for the Andrew Charles Healan Top 10 Buffy Episodes. [10] Prophecy Girl (1) – Buffy overhears Angel and Giles discussing the Master’s prophecy and quits her job as a slayer. Changes her mind, dies temporarily, brought by by Xander, kills the Master then parties with the gang. “The part that gets me, though, is where Buffy is the Vampire Slayer. She’s so little.” — Jenny Calendar [9] The Gift (5) – Glory plans to open the portal and destroy the world. Buffy vows to protect Dawn (the Key) and gives her life to save her sister and the world. “She saved the world a lot” — Buffy’s headstone [8] Bad Girls (3) – Faith has an entertaining effect of Buffy. She skips school to slay, breaks into a sporting goods store and dances with Faith. Wesley debuts, Faith kills the Mayor’s assistant. “Want. Take. Have.” — Faith [7] Graduation Day part 2 (3) – Faith beat into a coma, Angel feeds off Buffy, the enitre school comes together to stop Mayor Wilkins assention. Buffy lives out every kid’s dream and blows up the school. ” My God. He’s gonna do the entire speech.” — Buffy [6] Becoming part 2 (2) – Buffy gets kicked out of the house and expelled. She forms an alliance with Spike. Willow returns Angel’s soul, but Buffy still kills him in one of the most powerful scenes in BTVS history. “But we know the world didn’t end, ’cause…check it out.” — Oz [5] Fool For Love (5) – Buffy asks Spike to tell her how he bagged two slayers. Great stories and a great history of Spike. “Lesson the first: A Slayer must always reach for her weapon. I’ve already got mine.” — Spike [4] The Wish (3) Anya grants Cordy’s wish that Buffy never came to Sunnydale. We see a town overrun by Vamps. In the end, most everyone dies. Very dark. “Bored Now” — Vampy Willow [3] Hush (4) — The Gentlemen come to town to steal hearts and take everyone’s voice. Over half of the episode is done with no dialouge. Brilliant writing by Wheadon. And as always, uses what most series would have as a gimmick show as a way to drive a major plot line (Buffy and Riley). ” ” [2] Once More With A Feeling (6) – A spell causes everyone to break into song revelaing their true feelings. Horrible singing, but brilliant writing. I can’t think of another show that could’ve pulled this off. [1] Innocence (2) Another case of using a ratings grabber (the heroin loses her virginity) to move plot lines forward. After Buffy and Angel have sex, he reverts to his much cooler Angelus persona. Xander and Cordy are outed. Willow makes her move on Oz. And, Buffy gets to use a rocket launcher. “You know what the worst part was, huh? Pretending that I loved you. If I’d known how easily you’d give it up, I wouldn’t have even bothered.” — Angelus. I hope tonight’s grand finale can at least make this list.