Yay! nubbin is back. Argh! But the font is too tiny for me to read anything on the page . . .

So I was watching the "masculine itching" Tivo ad again (Boy Howdy! 'cuz I had to show it to a coworker) and then I found this Powerball Ad that features Mr. T. Too funny.

Swwwweeeeet. I do need a new van.

(It's one of the Island Hoppers vans!)

If someone buys/wins this, do they also get the Ferrari? A chance to hang out at Robin's Nest or the King Kamehameha club with Rick and T.C. and Higgins? Wouldn't that be cool?

(Yes, I am a TV Geek. But you knew that).

[Here's a link to a place where you can buy a similar shirt that hasn't been sweated on by Tom Selleck. And another one. And I thought that this particular shirt was already in the Smithsonian?]

Oooh, I like this Magnum, P.I. site. Hadn't seen it before.

(Don't look now, it's Rick and A.J. . . . )

If it seems like I don't post as much TV news as I used to, that's 'cuz I tend to assume that people who are interested in that kind of stuff are reading (or at least skimming) TV Tattle regularly. It's a fabulous site, in my dreams I'd have time to build such a page to go with my TV Picks. Thank goodness someone else did it so I didn't have to try.

Today as I made the rounds of reviews I really did get crabby. And then I remembered that I hadn't read Harry's review of the film yet so I visited ye olde AICN. And he's posted a great review (though you really shouldn't read it until after you've seen the film. Really! Trust me). Suffice it to say that he loves the movie as much as I do. Yay!

And this does my heart good, and also reminds me why (among other reasons) Harry and I are friends and that we haven't communicated nearly enough this past year, dangit (so I sent him email, natch).

I saw Best in Show a couple of weekends ago and loved it. Laughed and laughed and laughed. Haven't heard a crowd laugh that much at a movie theater in ages.

And tonight I saw Unbreakable. I loved the film, I liked it better than The Sixth Sense. Well-crafted, well-done, just superb. I'll want this one on DVD. I saw the film with my Dad-- he commented, as the credits rolled, "I hope they let this guy keep making movies. And that he's not out of ideas yet." Amen to that. Go M. Night Shyamalan, go.

Someone wrote in to James Lileks at ye olde Backfence to tell him that "one of the newer trends with Christmas trees is to suspend them from the ceiling."

Is it really?

I guess I was ahead of my time (as usual, mwhahahaha) as back when I was a freshman in college, my roommate and I suspended a Christmas tree in our dormroom.

Of course I think we handled it a bit differently . . . and of course the idea sprang forth when a well-intentioned parental unit suggested we have a tree and we remarked that our room was too small, the only way we could fit one in was if we hung it from the ceiling . . .

What we ended up doing was taking a smallish fake tree and duct taping it to the ceiling. That is, we duct taped the base of it to the ceiling so the tree was actually upside down and then we made little presents and taped them to the ceiling to cover the duct tape so the presents would be "under" the tree.

We strung lights on the tree, of course. And hung some little ornaments on it. And then later when we were in serious Avoid Homework mode, we made paper snowflakes and hung those from the ceiling with thread and yes, eventually there was a whole winter wonderland on our ceiling.

Ahhhh, for days when I had so much free time on my hands . . .

[And here's a shout out to Diane Olson, my roommate from those days in Solberg Hall @ Augustana in Sioux Falls . . . and to all my other dorm-mates from Solberg and Tuve and classmates and profs at Augie: Happy Holidays!]

This picture makes me laugh and laugh. Don't you hate it when that happens? (What's in the picture, not the laughing and laughing).

Pinups are strange. If you haven't yet read James Lileks' look at the twisted art of Art Frahm, you really should. It's all about celery and loose panties (more or less).

I adore Scottie dogs and that's how I stumbled on these particular pinups on ebay. I'm sorely tempted to start a collection (just of the ones with Scotties in the picture, really) . . . or swipe some of these images for use on my webpages, at least. Ahem.

This picture must be a sequel to the one above. Though why the woman should be so shocked at the appearance of a penguin now is beyond me (oh wait, he escaped from the JailCrate . . . ).

This is not what my fishing trips usually look like, though it's a nice thought. Though as a kid I did usually have a Scottie or two nearby when I fished from our dock.

So was the Scottie in the suitcase and that's how he ended up with a bra around his collar or . . . ?

I may have had occasional difficulties when walking two Scottie dogs, but I was never dressed quite like this at the time.

Another woman and her Scottie dog.

Okay, I'll stop now.

Pop vs. Soda.

It's called pop, people.

(Yes, I was born and raised in Minnesota).

(I used to hang out on the #umn channel on IRC (EFnet) and there was a bot there that would correct anyone who said "soda" by telling them it was "pop").

One of these days I'll put together a page about how much I love my Tivo, I just worry that once I start gushing about the magic box, I'll never stop. It truly is probably the best thing I've ever bought (replacing my Palm Pilot, the old Best Thing I Ever Purchased).

This piece at ironminds is a good start at describing the joys of sharing one's life with a Tivo. Um. I mean. Having Tivo. D'oh.

Boy Howdy! It's my favorite Tivo commercial.

A really good Babylon 5 quotation website.

Lisa Schmeiser on TV's Hercules, Kevin Sorbo (or should I say, "Gene Roddenberry's TV's Andromeda guy"?):

Sorbo is the human embodiment of a comic-book hero. Consider the chiseled jaw! Gaze on the blue eyes, unclouded by abstract thought! Note well the flowing locks -- since hacked into a haircut Dirk Benedict would remember from the 1970s -- and the superhero physique! Kevin Sorbo deserves to be barking italicized commands in all-caps on page 18 of an Image imprint, but since he's human, he has to make do with syndicated television.

Ain't that the truth. Sorbo is from my hometown, by the way. I'm obligated to mention this whenever his name comes up. I have embarassing photos of him from the St. John's Lutheran Church Directory.

And speaking of Lisa Schmeiser (who wrote the article I quoted), you should check out her fab website and Dot.minion News Log.

December issue of the 11th Hour is now online. Cool!

Werner Klemperer passed away at home, of cancer, last Wednesday. He was 80 years old.

Of course he'll always be remembered as Colonel Klink on Hogan's Heroes and I really don't see that as a bad thing at all (nor did he). He was a truly gifted actor, adept at both comedy and drama. He won two Emmy awards for playing Klink, he was also nominated for a Tony in 1988.

As Hogan's Heroes is one of my favorite shows ever, I've read a lot of interviews with Klemperer and always found him fascinating. Sad to hear of Klemperer's passing.

I was a bit croggled by how one early obit said that he didn't want to be remembered as Klink, while later obits said he didn't mind being remembered for the role. Get it right, people!

Cool quote from a brief piece from biography.com:

For a lot of colleagues of mine, actors who have made a great success in a series on television, once the thing is over they do not want to be connected with it and practically deny ever having done it. That is an attitude I cannot share.

And here's a fine biography.

Forget Internet Link Exchanges, join The Internet Klink Exchange.

You can watch Hogan's Heroes regularly on TV Land and in syndication in many markets. TV Land is airing four great Klink episodes tonight from 7pm-9pm Central Time.

This weekend I learned that Gwendolyn Brooks passed away on December 3rd, quietly at home, of cancer.

Brooks was probably my favorite poet when I was in grade school and high school. I forget when I stumbled onto her work, but I loved it . . . it had heart, bigtime. And rhythm. And many of her poems told of a world that I really didn't know at all.

Invariably when the time came in English class to pick a poet to research, I'd pick Brooks and then hit the library and check out her books and books about her. From all accounts I read she was a remarkable, caring, giving woman and I always admired that about her, too . . . the work would've been enough, but that she was so classy and giving, too . . . she was an impressive, amazing lady.

This piece by Rohan Preston of the Star Tribune is wonderful, sums her up nicely.

The searing gifts of celebrated artists often are not matched by a correspondingly felicitous humanity. Gwendolyn Brooks was not just a luminary, singular poet -- endowed with a rare literary style, insight and kind truthfulness that she unspooled in 20 books, including "Annie Allen," the 1949 volume that made her the first black person to win a Pulitzer Prize. She was not just a highly esteemed figure -- the recipient of nearly 100 honorary doctorates and a former U.S. poet laureate when the office was called by another name. She is not just a woman whose features have been beautifully etched in bronze at the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, D.C. Brooks was more than a vaunted figure.

[ . . . ]

Brooks was a humane, sociable, sincere and magnanimous person, someone who cared deeply for people, especially children. In her "Speech to the Young," she wrote: "Say to them, / say to the down-keepers, / the sun-slappers, / the self soilers, /the harmony hushers, / 'Even if you are not ready for day / it cannot always be night.'"

In a sense, Brooks more closely resembled a social servant or minister, albeit a minister of the word. Although she ascended the mountain half a century ago, she did not declaim or proclaim from it. She showed her love by quiet action, mentoring generations of writers of all levels of accomplishment with her own checkbook. For example, she gave annual awards to 100 poets in every grade from elementary school through college. And she funded these prizes, which she began in the early 1960s, out of her own pocket.

She will be missed and remembered.