I usually think online petitions are a waste of time but this one somehow feels worthwhile. Five boys named Marx grew up in a home on East 93rd Street in New York. Developers are aiming to eradicate the house of Groucho, Harpo, Chico, Zeppo and even Gummo. Take a moment to go to this page, read a message from Woody Allen, and sign two petitions they have there — one to preserve the home, the other to rename the block "Marx Brothers Place." If they can name things in this country after every lousy elected official we've ever had, we can name something after the Marx Brothers.

The Garfield Show, the new series I've been working on, starts May 5 on Boomerang UK, meaning England. There's a sparse page about it here and at the moment (this will change soon), there's a preview video on this page.

The series is already airing in France and several other nations. It's been sold just about everywhere except, they tell me, Japan and the United States. It'll get to both those places eventually, I'm sure. We just don't know when. In the meantime, we're starting production on Season Two…

Back in this dispatch, I gave a highly-biased recommendation for a new book, The Best of Simon and Kirby, featuring epic work by Joe Simon and Jack Kirby. At the time, it wasn't out…but it is now. Check your local bookseller or order it online.

And if you're still not sold, check out this online preview. Read an early Simon-Kirby story and one of my several chapter intros from the book. Or better still, just read the Simon-Kirby story…and remember: That's the kind of thing those guys were doing when they were just starting out. They just got better and better and better and the book is full of examples.

Adding to the depths of trivia that interests me enough to post, I have this from Ken Tucker…

I've been a fan of your blog for a while now. I know you're a fan of the old game shows on GSN, though you're not that fond of Password. (I've got to admit I'd rather have What's My Line? back instead of Password myself!)

Anyway, there's an interesting phenomenon with these old Password shows that I don't know if you're ever noticed or commented on. In some episodes there's apparently some "print-through" on the audio track, so you can hear a faint "ding-ding-ding" just slightly before someone guesses the right word. It's more apparent in some episodes that others, but has been particularly noticeably in the Barbara Rush-John Forsythe episodes shown this past week. It's especially funny to see in cases where someone suddenly realizes what the word must be — first you hear the ghostly ding-ding-ding, and then you see the person's face light up and they say the word, and then you hear the real ding-ding-ding.

I'm sure you know that this happens when audio tape is wound on a reel and stored for a while, and some of the magnetic information from one layer of the tape gets transferred to the next layer. I assume these early color videotapes had the video information stored in diagonal tracks from a spinning head, just like in a modern (if you can still call it that) VCR, but the audio information must have been in a linear track on the edge of the tape.

Anyway, just a curiosity I though you might find worthy of mention in your blog.

I hadn't noticed this…but then I've only watched Password on occasion lately. I remember enjoying the show when it first aired but I find it slow-paced and repetitive these days. In fact, it made me realize that what I liked about the reruns of What's My Line?, I've Got a Secret and To Tell the Truth was not so much the game as the history. On any of those shows in their recent GSN rebroadcasts, you were transported to a different era with performers and newsmakers of the day. Password doesn't do that for me…though if what you say is so, it may make for more surreal viewing. I'll have to give it another look.

One other thing about waterboarding. There seems to be a growing fad among pundits and journalists — especially those who wish to defend the Bush administration — to announce they've had themselves "waterboarded" and it's no big deal.

I'm no expert on this but it seems to me the premise of waterboarding in the real world is to make the prisoner think he's about to die; that this could be the time they go too far with it. Being waterboarded by someone who cares about your welfare — who probably would go to prison if you actually did die — is not the same thing. To simulate the experience of an enemy prisoner being waterboarded, you have to be waterboarded by someone who wouldn't be all that upset if you drowned…and might even get some jollies from it.

Norm Coleman wants the appeals process in that Minnesota election to take as long as possible.

A Democratic group has cleverly set up this fund whereby people who want Coleman to go away pledge to donate a dollar to the Democratic party for each day it takes until Al Franken gets seated. It's a good idea but I get the feeling that some wealthy Republican is paying Coleman something like $20,000 a day for each day he can delay it.

At age 14, when the TV series Family Affair first appeared on my TV, I had a tiny crush on Kathy Garver, the lovely young lady who played Cissy. She was a bit older than me but, hey, it's not like I was ever going to meet her and act on said crush.

Plus, she was cute and I felt an odd "closeness" to the family on that show. The apartment building in which they allegedly resided — the building used for exterior shots — was and still is on Wilshire near Beverly Glen, not far from where my family lived. We drove by there all the time and though I knew the show actually filmed somewhere else and that it was all fictitious, it was still kinda fun to imagine them in there. I'd guess that Mr. French was scurrying about to try and find Mrs. Beasley before Buffy realized she was missing. And I'd guess Uncle Bill was rubbing his face in exasperation because that was the main thing Brian Keith always did on that show: Rub his face is exasperation. He was very good at it.

Then, about the time my crush on Kathy Garver was winding down — or, more accurately, being transferred to Yvonne Craig on Batman — I got the chance to go on the set of Family Affair. The lady who lived next door to us, an actress I've mentioned here, was playing Brian Keith's secretary in a couple of episodes. I can't recall why but I remember my father driving us over to watch a little of the filming and I remember a certain excitement that I might get to see Kathy Garver in person. It was accompanied by a little fear that I might have to talk with her. At that age, I didn't do well conversing with famous people. At times, I still don't. Anyway, I'm not sure if I was disappointed or relieved but Ms. Garver wasn't on the set while we were there.

Flash forward to a few years ago. Kathy Garver has long since become a fine grown-up actress…one who does a lot of voiceover work, including cartoon voices. I met her at a convention, had her on a couple of my Cartoon Voice Panels and generally got to know her. She's a very bright, smart lady with loads of great stories to tell of all she's done in show business — on Family Affair and so many other shows. You can hear some of those stories — yes, this is a commercial and I tricked you into reading it — tomorrow (Wednesday) on Stu's Show, the Internet-only talk show that I often recommend.

This is not a podcast. You can't download it and listen to it whenever you want. You have to "tune in" when it's on — 4 PM to 6 PM Pacific Time, 7 PM to 9 PM Eastern. They do the show live on Wednesday and it reruns on other days, usually in the same time slot. But try and listen live and if you do, you can even call in and ask Kathy a question. Just go at the proper time to the website of Shokus Internet Radio and click in the appropriate place. And while you're there, check out the schedule for some of the other fine programming you can hear on that station.

In the summer of 1959 when I was seven, my mother took me on a trip east — to New York, Hartford and Boston in that order. The idea was to sight-see and introduce me to relatives. I guess she thought I was old enough to see just what kind of family I was a part of.

The week in New York, we stayed at the Taft Hotel on Seventh Avenue between 50th and 51st Streets and did touristy things like riding the Staten Island Ferry and visiting the Statue of Liberty. One morning, my mother announced we were going to go to Rockefeller Center, walk around for a while, then take in a matinee of the movie that was playing at Radio City Music Hall. It was The Nun's Story starring Audrey Hepburn. If you ever decide your seven-year-old deserves a good beating but wish to avoid corporal punishment, make him sit through The Nun's Story, instead. Whatever it was he did, he'll never do it again.

Before we got to that, as we wandered through Rockefeller Center, a polite man approached us. He explained that he was recruiting audiences and that he could arrange for us to get a free tour of the NBC Studios, see one of our favorite game shows done live and (he emphasized the "and") take home a prize. All it would take was about two hours of our time. My mother motioned to me and said, "I thought you had to be a certain age to be in the audience for a TV show."

I guess they were desperate for warm bodies that day. He looked me over and said, "Yes, well, usually but he seems like a well-behaved lad. I can arrange for special tickets so he'll get in." My mother decided we could catch a later show of The Nun's Story and asked if we could see them do Treasure Hunt, which was then a popular NBC game show starring Jan Murray. The gent scanned his clipboard and said, "I'm not sure if there are any special tickets left for Treasure Hunt. They'd have to tell you upstairs."

He was probably lying to us. He probably knew darn well there were no tickets of any kind left for Treasure Hunt. His mission was to get us upstairs where we could be diverted into some other show that was hard-up for seat-fillers.

The next thing we knew, we were getting a quick mini-tour of NBC, conducted by a cheery tour guide who showed us almost nothing but kept encouraging us to ask questions. I did and she couldn't answer a one of them. Then we were at a high desk — these are images I remember — where another cheery person informed us that they couldn't get us into Treasure Hunt but we could see Concentration. We liked that show too…and what the heck? We were already there and it was free and that show gave out prizes to the audience, too. So we were handed tickets and directed to a line of other folks who'd been conscripted from the street.

There, we waited for what seemed like days. Minutes you spend waiting seem like days when you're seven. I was bored silly until, suddenly and without warning, Jan Murray came by. He was wearing a loud checked sport coat and I think he was out there to apologize to people who'd been waiting in another line to see Treasure Hunt and didn't get in. But then he came over and shook some hands in our line and I got to meet him.

I had met TV stars before. The lady who lived next door to us back home was on an ABC series then but this was different. She was like family and Jan Murray was a person who, insofar as I was concerned, existed only on television. He was also male and funny and charming and he made a big impression on me. I never wanted to be on TV but I do vaguely recall a little wish-dream that struck me at that moment. It had to do with people being as happy to see me as everyone was that day to see Jan Murray.

Then Mr. Murray did something amazing…even magical.  Now, you have to remember that this show was done live.  As he did it on stage, it was broadcast simultaneously to much of the country.  There could be no delays in starting.

The stage manager came out into the hall to fetch him and to say, "Jan, three minutes," meaning, "Get your ass in there, fella.  The show's about to start!"  Jan nodded and continued greeting people in line and signing autographs.

Then it was "Jan, two minutes."  Jan acknowledged the time and went right on signing his name on whatever scraps of paper people could come up with.

Before you knew it, the stage manager was saying — with great desperation in his voice — "Jan, please…one minute!" Jan told him not to worry, he'd be fine…and went on signing and shaking hands.

There was a black-and-white TV monitor on a stand in the hall. Suddenly, it was showing the opening of Treasure Hunt, the opening that America was watching. The announcer was about to introduce Jan Murray and Jan Murray was still in the hallway signing autographs for tourists! The stage manager was pleading but Jan, with no ruffled feathers, merely told him to relax. Then he thanked us all again for coming, turned and walked into the studio —

— and five seconds later, walked out onto live television!

I saw this. I saw this with my own young eyes. A human being in full-color who was three feet from me turned, walked through a portal and emerged on live, black-and-white television.

It still gives me a little chill to recall it. That, folks, is magic.

I had not quite gotten over it when, maybe fifteen minutes later, we were herded into the studio where Concentration was done and seated in bleacher-type seats. Ours were way over on the end and from where they stuck me, I could see absolutely nothing of the area where the host and players would be. I could see about a third of the big Concentration game board and that was about it. This was not because of my lack of height back then. It was because of all the lights and cameras and equipment in the way. Kareem Abdul Jabbar would not have been able to see anything from where they put me. I ended up watching the whole show on one of the monitors and thinking, "Gee, I could have seen exactly the same thing at home without waiting in that line, plus I could be eating cookies."

To further diminish the experience, the show's regular host Hugh Downs was off that day and someone else (I don't recall who) was filling in. Because he made his entrance after we sat down and exited before we left, I never saw him except on the monitor.

We'd been promised prizes and usually in the world of game shows, the word "prize" suggests large amounts of cash, household appliances and vacations. In this case, it suggested one tiny, travel-size tube of the white Vaseline® brand petroleum jelly. As we filed out, an NBC page handed one to each of us and even the adults were audibly disappointed. The next day, I saw them for sale in a pharmacy and they were 39 cents, which wasn't much of a prize even in 1959. I'd been expecting a new Chevrolet and a case of Turtle Wax…although come to think of it, maybe Turtle Wax is the white Vaseline® brand petroleum jelly.

All in all, it was not the most memorable part of that trip to New York. I think the most memorable part, not counting Jan Murray ascending into the airwaves before my very eyes, was after The Nun's Story when my mother, partly by way of apology, took me to the famous Automat restaurant. I liked that. That place was kind of magical too, even if no human beings walked from reality right onto a TV screen.

John Morrow, publisher of The Jack Kirby Collector, informs me that the Doctor Doom factoid on Wikipedia was taken from an "April Fool" article in his magazine. Someone apparently didn't read all the way to the end. The story has now been removed from Wikipedia. It was up there for quite a while, I'm told. Which should serve as a reminder to us that you can't believe everything you read on Wikipedia. Or anywhere.