Thursday, May 5, 2005

Public Appeal

Many moons ago, there was a 78 RPM novelty record performed by Larry Vincent and the Pearl Boys entitled "Sarah Sitting in a Shoeshine Shop." Dr. Demento plays it every other decade but I'm looking for a copy — like, an MP3 file — for a friend. Anyone got one? I need the whole thing, not the 30 second excerpt that floats around the Internet.

• Posted at 11:10 PM · LINK

Lately on Leno

The other night, Jay Leno's musical guest was Bright Eyes, singing a rather amazing song — amazing because it was allowed on network TV, I suppose. "When the President Talks to God" isn't much of a tune. There's very little melody and the ends of most lines feel like they should rhyme but don't. Still, it's kind of startling to hear someone go after George W. Bush that way...and on a show that's sufficiently Establishment that it welcomed the First Lady to its guest chair just a few nights earlier. You can view an online video of the number here.

Someone who did wrote me the following message...

I was amazed that Leno had him on to do that song and I got the feeling that Leno didn't want him there. Jay introduced the song and then you can see him getting up right away like he was walking out on it. Am I imagining something?

Yeah. Neither Leno nor Letterman — nor any current talk show host I can imagine — has on guests they don't want. Once upon a time, Dick Cavett was occasionally forced by ABC (which, in turn, was forced by the Nixon White House) to book certain guests for political messaging. In Cavett's case, it was sometimes a gent named Brent Bozell whose son of the same name, three decades later, is also making a nice living arguing that all news items unfavorable to Conservatives are biased reporting. But no, Bright Eyes would not have been on Leno's show doing that song unless Jay was comfortable with it.

What confused you was that the way the Tonight Show set is constructed, the performing area is way off to one side, so if Jay's behind his desk, he can't see the musical act well, and they can't see that he's watching at all. So he makes a point of always getting up and walking over to just in front of the last guest spot on the couch and standing there during the performance. I've seen him do this every time I've been at a taping. He was getting up to go watch Bright Eyes, not to walk out on him.

• Posted at 2:54 PM · LINK

Fair Warning

If you know what's good for you, don't click on this link.

(If that doesn't work, don't try this one.)

• Posted at 2:53 AM · LINK

Looking for Dial-Up Suggestions

My Internet comes to me via cable from Comcast, and I've had relatively little problem with them. My one big complaint is that for some reason, they don't offer a dial-up number so you can connect to the 'net while on the road. To solve this, I subscribed to a cheap dial-up Internet Service Provider called Access4Less that charged very little and required only a month-to-month contract. Alas, Access4Less is getting out of the dial-up business and handing their accounts over to Earthlink. I received a couple of e-mails (and one robotic phone call) from them informing me that if I did nothing, my month-to-month Access4Less account (for $5.95 per month) would automatically convert to a year-long subscription to Earthlink for $119.40, which they'd bill quickly to my credit card. Ain't that a heckuva bait 'n' switch?

So I've cancelled Access4Less and am looking for something similar. I need a dial-up ISP that I can access from anywhere in the nation but especially from Los Angeles. I'd like the lowest rate and no long-term commitment. I don't care about bells or whistles or parental controls or anything of the sort...just a decent connection.

Anyone have any recommendations?

• Posted at 12:04 AM · LINK