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Friday, December 10, 1999
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AND, NOW "2 LINES ABOUT 1 WOMAN:"
Happy Birthday, Deborah
You'll always be my only one...
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WE'RE NUMBER TEN!!! WE'RE NUMBER TEN!!!
Here are some suggested comments for future weeks' listings:
Oxymoron lists are so 1994...
Still auditioning for a listing at the Center for the Easily Amused
Just what the weblog community needs: an aging former disc jockey with a shoebox full of one-liners
Crossing the line between self-effacing humor and masochism
The BLOAT Top 10 is rapidly making itself into the Web's answer to Mr. Blackwell's Worst Dressed List... and you know how sick everyone is of THAT list, and it only comes out once a YEAR! Good luck, Tenpenny. (Any relation to Bond's Miss Moneypenny?)
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Thursday, December 9, 1999
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Topical convergence, Los Angeles style: They removed the last of the sheep from the Channel Islands off the Southern California coast, on the same day that a group of Rams that were also removed from the area proved they are doing well in their new home.
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In the mid-80's, during a semi-professional association with KROQ-FM, I was subjected to the new-wave-white-boy-rap song "88 Lines About 44 Women" in heavy rotation until I, brainwashed, married a Deborah (first name on the list). So I consider myself qualified to reccommend The Brunching Shuttlecocks' 88 Lines About 42 Presidents as the smartest song spoof I've heard or read in a long time. (discovered by PoCuJuM)
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JUST WHEN YOU THOUGHT IT AS SAFE TO GO BACK OUT IN THE REAL WORLD, that professional 'blogger, Netbuzz Lightyear, pointed out an essay in Feed about the new social acceptance of TV watching (Feed seems to have lost the page, maybe temporarily, or maybe it was shut down by somebody who feels this is something we aren't meant to know... either way, Buzzy saved an excerpt here). Emboldened by this knowledge, I'm going to blather on about some TV shows I've seen, and some that aren't even on the air yet:
You have to believe that the Fox Network is getting seriously desperate when they make a deal to develop
a live-action version of (my all-time favorite superhero spoof) THE TICK. Apparently the producers who are going to try to bring Ben Edlund's collection of grotesque heroes and villians to life are the same ones behind the glorious failure of the New Fantasy Island (despite the objections of Herve Villechaize's ghost it was a very smart show, starting with the opening credits sequence where Malcolm McDowell's Mr. Roarke rejects a closet full of white suits). But bringing the big blue guy to life without looking like Captain Nice may still be technically impossible, ("There Is No SPOON?") or it may turn into "The CG Artists Full Employment Act of 1999". Still, casting such characters as Sewer Urchin and Chairface Chippendale is the fanboy equivalent of Fantasy Football, as demonstrated on AICN's Talkback Board, where there's a lot of support for putting Patrick "Puddy" Warburton (friend of M&Ms everywhere) into the freaky-big blue suit.
Then there's the prospect of ABC bringing The Minister of Silly Walks, John Cleese, to American TV (if not as a performer, at least as producer/creator) in a partnership with Jeff Reno and Ron Osborn, whose team resume' includes Cupid, Duckman and Moonlighting. This show's premise:
The as-yet-untitled sitcom will be set inside the law firm of Karpool, Ruumki & Whetfish. Some of the partners have literally made deals with the devil and have become demons; a few are regular humans who are kept around so the demons can keep tabs on the enemy.
At the center of the action will be a young female lawyer recruited as a demon candidate. The plots will focus on the battle between good and evil for the soul of the newcomer.
In other words, a more realistic version of Ally McBeal
One project you WON'T see is a TV-SF fanboy's dream (at least mine): a collaboration between X-Files' Chris Carter and Babylon 5's J. Michael Strazynsky for CBS. According to JMS's newsgroup posting, a production studio with a name that will become obsolete in three weeks withdrew its support of Carter producing somebody else's idea because that was what happened on Harsh Realm, and that show flopped big time. The Babylon Guy is still shopping around the idea by himself, but it's probably too late to get the still-mysterious show on any network before 2001, thus giving his fans reason to hate Rupert Murdoch as much as they hate Ted Turner.
And, wouldn't it be funny if CBS thought they'd made a development deal with Jonathan "Dr." Katz, but discovered they'd actually signed up Jon "/." Katz instead?
Okay, it wouldn't be funny.
As long as I'm hanging around CBS, did you notice on the network site for the new series Now and Again, there's a place marked with the words: "WARNING: DO NOT CLICK HERE". And when you do click there (I knew you would), you go to a site claiming that the "brain harvesting" at the center of the show's plot has actually been done in real life. When contacted by Reuters, Jack Parmeter, vice president of on-air promotion at CBS, reportedly said "hey, it worked for Blair Witch!"
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And the Sunday after Thansgiving will be remembered as the day X-Files truly became Speculative Fiction, as it aired an episode set in the future.... alright, a month in the future. Apparently, the Fox Network (which, remember, doesn't have a very good batting average these days) thought the "Millennium" episode was worth airing during the all-important November Ratings Sweeps, and why was that? Because they thought a lot of people would want to know what happened to Frank Black, the main character of the ultimately-misnamed series Millennium? No, actually, I'd much prefer the ending (still in progress) from the fan-written Virtual Season scripts at the Millennium Compendium site. Or did they think that the story's premise, cutting closer than usual to mainstream Christian mythology, would churn up lots of controversy? The scene with the Necromancer changing clothes with a corpse while muttering a familiar prayer was moderately jolting, but after four years of Touched by an Angel and its "hunky Angel of Death", who cares? No, the Foxes-that-be thought X-Fans would tune in for the scene at the very end when Mulder and Scully finally kiss, a few hesitating beats after the stroke of New Years midnight! And how was it? Well, when Mulder commented that the world had not, in fact, come to an end, I couldn't be sure if he was talking about the Y2K bug or the kiss. What turned out to be the most-noticed moment on the show was this verbal exchange (already quoted by more than one weblogger:
"2001 is actually the start of the new millennium".
"Nobody likes a math nerd, Scully".
But then, the Weblog Nation has a much higher proportion of math nerds than the public at large, and some of us are among the most annoying people in the world (I am NOT naming names). I have to acknowledge that other professional weblogger, Dan Gillmor, for the best argument why some people should consider 2001 the real millennium:
Anyway, since I can't party this time around, I intend to revert to the reality I'd planned to ignore.... I realize that my only chance to do serious millennial celebrating on a New Year's Eve will be on the one that comes next year.
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Speaking of Gillmor, I've noticed that on the e-mail version of his column, the title is displayed in the usual putting-as-much-emphasis-on-plain-text-as-you-can style of capital letters with spaces inbetween, but no extra spaces between words so it looks like this:
D A N G I L L M O R O N T E C H N O L O G Y
Now, I may have spent too much time on my oxyMORON list, but does that seem to spell out something different?
Well, here's some Dang Ill Moron Technology from Gillmor's publisher: An e-mail sent to subscribers to his column:
Our marketing staff publishes eNews, an online bulletin describing what's new from the Mercury News. If you'd like to receive it, do nothing and we'll automatically e-mail it to you from time to time.
I'm sorry, but the "opt-out" methodology is for book clubs. And didn't Gillmor himself recently do a column attacking AOL's use of "opt-out" for privacy issues?. Well, he cancelled his AOL over it, and I'm cancelling my subscription. Sorry.
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Wendellsday, December 8, 1999
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MURPHY'S LAW LIBRARY
"Don't do anything I wouldn't do twice." - Thomas Brown IV's Law
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The Los Angeles Times published a front-page article about epinions and other similar sites last Friday:
The second most trusted Epinions reviewer is Brent Celmins, a movie buff who goes by the handle "Scorsesian." His thoughtfulness and clarity in 87 reviews seems to rival that of many professional critics. Surprisingly, (my emphasis) Celmins is a 19-year-old USC film school undergrad.
I didn't say it was a good article, but it's nice to see something about the web on the front page that doesn't involve major felonies.
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FOOP DISCLOSURE Yes, Virginia, there really is a right sidebar on the Foop page, it just couldn't be seen half the time, due to a dependency on Tripe-Odd technology (another thing I won't do twice). And, yes, Anita, neither your weblog nor journal made the cut, but look on the bright side: when I link to you within my 'blog, it counts the same as a link in the list to Beebo, until it moves to the archive. As for me, I am pleased to see the Foop listed on Metafilter's fun and fabulous floating 'blog list. This is powerful technology... I just hope it doesn't fall into the wrong hands (like MINE).
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Monday, December 6, 1999
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The Foop's Department of Rants, Raves and Reviews
Must check my calendar. We must be entering the silly season. John Dvorak's feature for Boardwatch consists of two pages ranting against SPAM and a page praising olive oil. (from Robo-Jorn)
I hate to disagree with any of John Scalzi's choices for The Best of the Millenium, but as far as the Best 15 Minutes of Fame are concerned, Monica Lewinsky can't hold a candle (or a cigar - couldn't resist) to Hazel Frederick, the woman caught on film looking at Mary Tyler Moore throwing her hat in the famous TV opening. Now there was someone who really wasn't pursing fame, power, sex or anything; she was just wondering what the hubbub was out in the plaza with the cameras and the woman with the hat. And she didn't even meet her "co-star" until more than 20 years later. But her death (the same day Scalzi immoralized - excuse me - immortalized Monica) made the news. Of course, it was a slow news day, but that pretty much sums up what Hazel Frederick was all about: she was at the right place at the right time.
 Sigh. Still trying to fix my Credits page, so I think I'd better give some credit here in the 'blog: John G. Robertson "Senior Scribe" has a good educational site with (before I did the OXY2K) the largest list of Oxymorons I could find on the web. Over 1100 oxys, including over 300 that weren't on anybody else's list (I used only half of them in my list; we disagree somewhat on what makes a good oxy).
So, what does it take for a new website featuring above-average geek humor have to do to get noticed? Well, just like a prime-time TV sitcom, sometimes it helps to do a Very Special Episode. And if you're Benjy Feen, and you're in a Seattle office building in the middle of the WTO Riots, sometimes the Very Special Episode comes to you.
Among Benjy's regular writing, my personal favorite is his analysis of non-linear humor, titled "Putting Underwear on the Dog", which contains some excellent examples (I don't often giggle at my computer), plus literary references to The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, which means a lot to me.
So, what have we learned from the events in Seattle?
1: that the WTO stands for "World Tirade Association"
2: you shouldn't be surprised that the police overreacted in the first city where Starbucks replaced all the donut shops
3: "Free trade" is not what happens at Burger King's Pokemon night
4: "Civil disturbance" and "fair trade" belong on the
By the way, LARadio.com had some interesting sidelights to the WTO crisis: apparently, one L.A. local talk jockey went to Seattle to do a remote broadcast, just so he could ridicule free-trade opponents wearing Nikes; there was a smattering of signs promoting syndicated schlock talker Tom (Doesn't) Leykis who gets his highest ratings in the NorthWest; and some of L.A.'s top radio talent don't even come in to the studio - they do their shows from their homes, including half of KROQ's morning team, and HE lives in Seattle! (he missed the unrest and tear gas - he was in L.A. last week for contract negotiations)
In other news, the potential loss of the Mars Polar Lander (no relation to David L. Lander) inspired an oxymoronic headline this weekend: Mars Probe Maintains Deafening Silence.
Police Say Dead Man Was Not A Celebrity. I know this story makes L.A.'s police, media and general public sound like heartless jerks, but if you read the whole story, you'll learn that the speculation arose because (1) the LAPD had mobilized a special investigative team that usually only handles "high profile" situations, and (2) the Holiday Inn with the parking lot where the body was found has a very notable long-term resident, whose initials are O.J. So, when you get all the facts, you'll understand that in L.A. we ARE all heartless jerks!
I Am Proud to announce that I've finally made the Open Directory's Web Log List, but I've been beaten to the Yahoo List by The Stuffed Dog (a.k.a. Overfed Pitbull) and twernt (a.k.a. twas too!). What I don't understand is how The Scoop Index got on Yahoo. With all our individual and collective desires to quantify everything (not to mention enough ego-driven competitiveness to fuel a college football team in Texas), this seems to be the device that goes just a little bit farther than humanity was meant to go. (In other words, it don't work!) Note that, as of 1:00PM PST, Beebo's Metalog is credited with 4 "scoops", which should not be possible because nothing appears on that list until it's been on at least 4 OTHER 'blogs.
FOOP DISCLOSURE If everything is functioning correctly, you should see one blue 'sidebar' column on the right. If not, please e-mail me, but break it to me gently...
As for the content of the sidebar, yes, like many others, I have trimmed down my 'blog list. Some of them were deleted with extreme prejudice, others just accidentally fell off and rolled under the couch. Several just barely missed the cut, but will definately be on my Personal Portal Page fro all to see when I get THAT done.
Call it "The Beebo Effect", but it seemed the best way to express my support to them I support the most; also, it helped shrink my slow-loading index page.
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The official registered URL is: www.oneswellfoop.com, but for now, all links lead to: oneswellfoop.tripod.com which I trry to explain here.
