Feed Me

Posted on Thursday, January 26, 2012 at 10:17 AM

I am informed by a couple of folks that the RSS feed for this site is not working properly, at least not in Google Reader. I would ask my tech-savvy webmaster to get right on this except that my webmaster is me and I ain't so tech-savvy about RSS feeds and syndication and other stuff like that. I've fiddled with a few of them over the years before deciding that it was more organic and proper to just go to each site I like individually and read them on their premises.

Before I start trying to educate myself enough to fix this problem, I thought I'd ask: Is there anyone reading this who knows RSS and knows WordPress and can advise me what to do? For that matter, is there some other kind of syndication feed I should be offering here?

Today's Video Link

Posted on Thursday, January 26, 2012 at 10:10 AM

Jim Henson's first TV show was a five minute show called Sam and Friends that aired twice daily on WRC-TV, which was the NBC affiliate in Washington, D.C. The series lasted from May 9, 1955 to December 15, 1961 so he did a lot of them but only a handful of episodes have survived. One that has is this one that we present in its almost-entirety…

As in many episodes, the big feature is the puppets "lip-syncing" to a record — in this case, Stan Freberg's 1953 spoof of "C'est Si Bon." The Henson character doing the lead vocal was named Moldy Hay and the two back-up singers were called Hank and Frank. Don't ask me which one is Hank and which one is Frank, and stay tuned after the song for a word about Esskay Franks…

Con-Struction

Posted on Thursday, January 26, 2012 at 3:55 AM

The San Diego City Council has approved a $500 million buck expansion of the convention center. As this article notes, a significant concern is to keep the annual Comic-Con International in San Diego and not have it wander elsewhere after the current contract expires in 2015. The piece notes that Anaheim and Las Vegas are "beckoning" for the convention.

My understanding is that Vegas has done very little beckoning. Anaheim and Los Angeles have beckoned, as have some cities a bit farther off. Personally, I think Vegas and L.A. are ill-suited to host the event. We may find out on in March how suited Anaheim would be to it. The WonderCon in March is being held at the Anaheim Convention Center…and WonderCon is operated by the staff of Comic-Con International. (In case you missed early explanations, WonderCon is usually in San Francisco but this year, the Moscone Center up there is undergoing extensive renovations and could not offer WonderCon acceptable dates and facilities.)

I doubt that Comic-Con will move out of San Diego; not unless the city planners down there do something really, really stupid to drive it away. This expansion still has to be approved by a number of parties but assuming it goes through, it'll probably lock Comic-Con in for another 4-5 year pact. Fine with me. It's a great city and I like the idea that when we're there, we own it.

My Tweets for 2012-01-26

Posted on Thursday, January 26, 2012 at 12:03 AM
  • At Whole Foods Market again. Fabio isn't here this time but there are 9 men who look just like him. And 5 women. #
  • Newt didn't resign his speakership due to ethics violations. He quit to spend more time leaving his family. #
  • Americans would earn more if they weren't all wasting time calculating how long it takes Mitt Romney to earn their annual income. #

Still More About Dick Tufeld

Posted on Wednesday, January 25, 2012 at 4:43 PM

Obituary for Dick Tufeld. I still think people pay too much attention to his role voicing the robot on Lost in Space. That's fine but I'm more impressed by the thousands and thousands of TV and radio announcing jobs this man had.

Here's a link to another one. This is from the 1978 CBS Anniversary Special. They did a gathering of every CBS star they could round up and that's Dick Tufeld you hear introducing them as they enter. This was from a period when Dick was pretty much The Voice of CBS, doing about 80% of all their promos. Around the same time, he was also The Voice of Disney, doing most of the trailers for Disney movies until the job passed to Marc Elliot.

(For extra points: See if you can figure out how many stars in the CBS clip weren't actually there when they did the big walk-on and were taped at another time and edited in. I'll start you off with Bill Cosby and The Smothers Brothers. There are several others.)

Harvey

Posted on Wednesday, January 25, 2012 at 10:14 AM

Cartoonist Drew Friedman writes of his encounters with (and admiration for) the late Harvey Kurtzman. Kurtzman was one of those guys whose talents and visions exceeded that which comic books could accommodate at the time he was around but he made do. You look at his body of work and there are two possible reactions. One is how good just about all of it was…or you can think, "Oh, if only there'd been a more perfect showcase for what he could do." That he never quite found a place where he could be as good as he could be — and be paid commensurate with that — is one of the many sad songs of the form.

Anyway, read what Drew has to say about him…and read anything Kurtzman did. None of it is without interest and some of it is almost as good as he was.

Today's Video Link

Posted on Wednesday, January 25, 2012 at 3:56 AM

My buddy Doug Molitor explains the differences between Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney…

VIDEO MISSING

My Tweets for 2012-01-25

Posted on Wednesday, January 25, 2012 at 12:02 AM
  • I seem to be the only person in America not delivering a rebuttal to the State of the Union address tonight. #
  • Obama should come out tonight and say, "The State of our Union is good…if you're really, really rich. I mean, if you're Romney rich." #
  • My pal Roger thinks Mitt's wealth proves he can be entrusted with the U.S. economy. By that logic, so could Larry Flynt. #
  • Newt demanded an open marriage. After seeing their options, I think Republicans are going to start demanding an open convention. #

Tonight's Political Comment

Posted on Tuesday, January 24, 2012 at 11:15 PM

The most interesting thing about the State of the Union address to me was how it, taken in tandem with Mitt Romney's release of his tax records, has probably defined this election. Barring some intrusive element like a war or terrorist attack, it's all going to be about Income Inequality and whether we're going to adjust the rules so they're not weighted quite as heavily in favor of the Romneys of the world. I don't think that's a bad platform for Obama to run on.

It's hard to say who he'd do better against, Romney or Gingrich. Mitt would be in a more awkward position than Newt if that became the issue of the election. But Newt is Newt, so easy to dislike.

My friend Roger tells me Gingrich is a Great Debater, who would singe Obama's eyebrows in a one-on-one. I don't think so. I think Gingrich is really good at hitting the buttons that set the Rush Limbaugh audience all atingle but at the same time, he rallies Democrats, Independents and even Moderate Republicans (I hear there are still a few) against him. Gingrich also hasn't been in a situation lately where anyone was interested in correcting certain anti-Obama "facts" of his claiming. There's a reason Rush never debates anyone he can't mute with the push of a button.

You've Either Got Or You Haven't Got Stylus

Posted on Tuesday, January 24, 2012 at 3:56 PM

I don't agree with all of the computer-related columns authored by Farhad Manjoo but I'm with him when he touts the joys of iPadding with a stylus.  So what if Steve Jobs wanted us all to finger-paint on whatever we bought from him?   I don't have the daintiest fingers in the world and a stylus works much, much better for me…though not all of them.  I tried a number that were just too short and I returned to an Office Depot one brand (sorry, I don't recall which one) that was made to work with an iPad but wouldn't register at all on mine.  I also liked the idea of having a pen in my stylus for those increasingly-remote times when you need to actually write on a piece of what some still call "paper."

The Kensington model gives me a great stylus and an acceptable pen — oh, and as you can see, it has a clip on it which I also consider an absolute necessity. It's not perfect. I wish I had a wider, slightly heavier stylus with a gel-pen ink supply. I also wish that on the packaging or in the advertising for these things, they'd tell you how to buy a refill for the pen when it runs out. The Kensington says "Uses Parker ball pen refill" (which alas, does not seem to mean the Parker gel pen refills, just the ballpoint) but the other ones I've seen don't tell you. That's one of the reasons along with its length and balance that the Kensington is the best one I've found. If you want to try one out, here's an Amazon link.