We are dismayed at the news out of New York this morning: MAD Magazine — the most successful humor publication in the history of mankind if you don't count The Washington Post — is downsizing. Its frequency of publication is being slashed from monthly to quarterly and all its ancillary publications, like MAD for Kids and the reprint books — are being axed. There is or will be a corresponding cut in its staff.

I am a devout MAD fan, having followed it through good times and bad. I have a complete collection. I've published a book on the history of the magazine and have interviewed just about everyone who ever was a part of it. I've written a few articles for the publication. And you see that painting up above? It's from the cover of MAD #46 and the Kelly Freas original to that painting hangs on one of my walls downstairs.

That 1959 cover was a joke but the new cutbacks aren't so funny. Which is a shame because lately, the magazine has been. Its current editor, John Ficarra, and his crew have kept the old tradition but made it relevant to today with sharp writing. (John is being quoted today as saying, "The feedback we've gotten from readers is that only every third issue of MAD is funny, so we've decided to just publish those.") The only thing really wrong with the magazine is that, perhaps unavoidably, it's a magazine.

Being a lover of its heritage, I'd be the first to trash Ficarra if the current MAD was unworthy of its name. It absolutely is not. But this kind of decline is very common in the periodical business. Playboy, this year, will only publish eleven issues and it isn't because the public is losing its interest in gorgeous nude women. Even before we all began living on the Internet and doing 90% of our reading there, magazines were on the way out. And since everyone got a computer, it's only become worse and worse. MAD has evolved to survive, adding color and advertising when that was necessary…but it can't escape the fact that people just don't read things on paper these days.

MAD will not go away. It's too valuable a brand name to ever disappear. (National Lampoon is still around. It just hasn't been a magazine since around 1988.) Today's announcement probably translates as follows: "We need to keep the name alive and to keep key staffers and contributors in the family. But it's losing money and we're going to scale it back and minimize those losses while we figure out what to do with it." Its new configuration is not a long-range plan…and maybe that long-range plan, whenever they arrive at it, will restore MAD to its former glory in some venue.

In the meantime, it's a shame. One of the best things about the magazine lately has been its topical humor, especially of a political nature. Being quarterly will kill most of that. Some of its best people (i.e., "The Usual Gang of Idiots") will probably go elsewhere, which will further wound it. I don't know what they can do with it but I hope they do it soon.

There are damp cats on my back step, staring at me like it's my fault it's raining.

Back in this posting, I talked about how my Aunt Dot used to go to the market and, as she shopped, nibble on items for which she had yet to pay. I asked how customary or acceptable this was and I got a lot of responses. Here are a number of them, starting with this from Alex Stroup…

I don't know if it is a new thing, though I knew several kids in college who would regularly do the thing of eating something and then hiding the packaging in the store and never paying for it. Not surprisingly, one of them was the same guy we discovered would generate an excuse to go back into the restaurant after a group dinner so he could steal the tip.

When I was a kid it was pretty standard to go ahead and open something while shopping (usually something to drink, but sometimes food) and then pay for it on the way out. That said, our grocery stores were independently owned neighborhood stores (though still the size of a smaller Safeway, we're not talking corner convenience stores) where the staff pretty much knew everybody who shopped there regularly. Maybe it is a habit that doesn't survive the transition to mega-corporate grocery stores very well.

Though a couple months ago, I was shopping (in Safeway) and was just suddenly overwhelmed with extreme thirst and so for the first time since I was a kid opened something – a bottle of water – and drank it on the spot paying for it on my way out. I felt like quite the rebel.

This one is from Keith Enright…

Just read your article about eating while shopping and I agree that it's always made me uncomfortable to see people doing that. However, here in the Twin Cities, there is a grocery chain (Rainbow Foods) where the carts actually have drink holders right in front of the push handle and they have signs encouraging you to enjoy a beverage while you shop and pay for it when you are at the registers. I've done it many times there, but still nowhere else!

Nathan Phillips sent this…

I am an ex-grocery store employee (surely one of many you've heard from by now) and the behavior you mentioned recently is very common among (frankly) the less enjoyable and polite customers, especially with beverages and fresh items like pastries. I worked in the deli and regularly saw folks downing sodas and such. Nearly all of them would hand the empty can (or what have you) to the cashier and pay for it at the end of their session, but once in a while our security person would catch a sly character consuming a donut or something and the customer would be confronted at the line and politely told something like "My dear sir/madam, you've forgotten to pay for your donut/muffin/cupcake/cookie, I'm sure it was an honest mistake" and the embarrassed shopper, not having known Big Brother was watching, would of course pay up, the wrapper invariably having mysteriously appeared in the patron's coat pocket or a nearby wastebasket.

The worst incident I ever saw of this sort, and the reason I now write to you, involved a loudmouthed middle-aged woman who liked to barrel around the store noisily munching on chips. One particular evening she spied some crab dip in the seafood department and snatched it up to supplement her usual on-the-go meal. One bite later, she appeared in front of the deli counter with a disgusted look on her face and practically threw the open tub of dip at me, a sizable chunk missing off the top. "I don't like this," she snarled matter-of-factly, "so I'm not going to pay for it." I just stood there kind of dumbfounded and she must have noticed I was a bit put off by her behavior because she felt the need to add "It's terrible, honey, honestly" before disappearing down another aisle.

My mother most definitely never taught manners of that kind, and I'm sure your Aunt Dot didn't either.

No, she sure didn't. This next one is from a reader who asked to remain anonymous…

We have a lot of problems with that in the store I work in. There are people who eat things while they're in the store and then don't pay for them. The ones who do what your aunt did make it harder for us to police the situation and identify the ones who don't pay.

There are also people who open a bag of crackers, eat a few and then decide they don't like them and they ditch the bag somewhere in the store. Of course, we have to throw it away then. Then there are the people who put a bunch of grapes in their cart and snack on them as they shop. By the time they get to the checkout counter and we weigh the grapes, they're a lot cheaper. A lot of people do this and don't realize what they're doing.

The other problem that is related happens at least once a day. Someone walks around the store drinking a Coke or a Pepsi or a bottle of water and then when they get to the checkout, they say "Don't charge me for this. I bought it next door and brought it in with me." We have to go along with that but how are we supposed to know? People do this a lot and it just puts us in an awkward position.

And here's another message from someone who shall go nameless. He brings up another aspect of this…

You make good points about the subject of noshing on food while shopping. I used to never do it, and all throughout my life, I would see opened packages of food tucked into the backs of shelves, obviously from those who wanted to eat something without paying for it.

One day I went into my Walmart Supercenter, and I was starving. One of those weird days where a fat man forgot to eat all day, and his energy plummeted suddenly 15 minutes after the grocery cart started to be filled. I knew something sweet would give me a temporary boost, but I didn't want to grab a single candy bar and open that. First off, the single candy bars were way upfront at the checkout counters, and I was trying not to make it look like I was trying to steal something. I grabbed a package of 6 packaged Little Debbie treats, and took small bites until my burgeoning headache and dizziness subsided.

The concerned young lady who asked your Aunt Dot not to munch on anything was at the very least concerned about the perception of things. I try to be aware of these things, too. I've had a terribly embarrassing experience where someone thought I was stealing something from their store. Beware being a heavy man pulling up your pants in a store, because someone who sees you at the wrong angle might believe you're stuffing something into those pants to avoid the checkout register. How fun, explaining that you didn't shoplift, you were just adjusting yourself.

I wish I were as 'black and white' about this subject. I'd rather never do it, and I mostly don't. But depending on the store I'm in, I'll break out into a heavy sweat. When that happens, I usually get a package of picnic napkins and use them to dry myself, so as not to look like I'm dying. I just make sure I do everything right out in the open, not hiding anything. When I get to the checkout counter, I tell the checker that I opened this package or that, and I tell them why.

My standard is not to do this thing in stores, unless it's necessary. I've seen people be brazen enough to grab a handful of grapes and eat them as they shop, and that's obviously stealing. There's no way to accurately tell how many grapes were taken, so the store's poop-out-of-luck.

I probably shouldn't be doing it this way, but I don't see myself changing.

I received about thirty other e-mails with no clear consensus. Store employees said it caused them problems but that in some stores, it was tolerated and perhaps even encouraged. And I guess that kinda answers my question. There's no universal custom or policy. Even knowing that, I'm still uncomfortable doing it.

Things are just getting worse and worse for the Screen Actors Guild. That big around-the-clock strategy meeting ended without a firm plan of action and divisions within the union are even deeper than ever before. Chief Negotiator Doug Allen was not fired, as many demanded, but he's clearly not the guy to bind things back together. His latest idea is a terrible one. He is now proposing that SAG put the producers' last offer to a vote of the entire membership. This is the offer that the SAG negotiators and Board of Directors turned down months ago as utterly unacceptable. Such a vote would probably make a bad situation worse. Here's why.

When a union negotiates with management, each side has demands they do not seriously expect will be in the final deal…things they ask for just so they can trade them off in the late stages of negotiation. The AMPTP is still demanding some things they're prepared to drop…and so is SAG. Call them bargaining chips…and of course, the longer these things go, the more once-serious demands turn into bargaining chips. To cite one biggie: SAG, right now, is probably going to have to abandon its quest for a substantial increase in DVD fees.

To vote on the last AMPTP offer is to vote on an offer with all the producers' bargaining chips still in place. To accept it is for SAG to give up all its bargaining chips without getting anything in return.

Obviously, it would be dreadful for the SAG rank-and-file to vote to do that. But rejecting it would also probably be disaster because it wouldn't get defeated by more than 80% of the membership, which is about what it would take to put the AMPTP on the defensive and change the game.

The members of SAG are weary, frustrated, angry, scared, divided and — most of all, worst of all — they don't see any effective stewardship. Those who side with Mr. Allen and SAG President Alan Rosenberg (and many do) question whether they can lead a union where so many members are circulating petitions demanding their ouster. It's one thing to want to charge into battle…quite another to believe there's some workable path to victory out there. SAG has splintered and no one in either faction looks at their leaders and sees someone with the power and organization to command a long war.

That's kind of what happened when the Writers Guild did its spectacular belly-flop in 1985. A lot of members thought the offer was abominable. It was…though I don't think any of us realized at the time how abominable. We thought it was a turd about the size of Kansas and it turned out to be more like the Louisiana Purchase. Even at Kansas-sized level, we were quite prepared to storm the beaches and take no prisoners…if (huge IF) we had the leadership in place to do that. We didn't.

Our guild's board and Executive Director (who was also our Chief Negotiator) were divided and so was the membership. A hefty-sized minority thought the deal was fine, the battle was too treacherous and we should take what we could get without a struggle. The majority wanted to fight but it wasn't 80+% of the Guild. The vote to strike was tepid — enough to strike but not enough to scare the other side. And even those us who voted to walk were arguing about which direction. "We're in no shape to fight this," a lot of my friends said as they voted for a contract they thought was lousy. Sometimes, you have to cut your losses and get out with your BVDs intact.

So if SAG votes on that last contract offer, they're screwed either way like it says in my subject line. If they accept it, they get the worst possible deal they could get in their present situation…a deal they could have gotten last June, which makes the last six months of squabbling and uncertainly look pointless and self-destructive.

But then if they reject it, they expose a bottom line. It would fail by ten points (if that many) and then the AMPTP could say, "Fine…we can wait two weeks, drop one minor bargaining chip and then announce that SAG has 30 days to accept it or we're pulling it off the table. That will win over enough people to make it pass." And if they thought that, they'd probably be right. By that point, enough SAG members would be worried about the utter destruction of their union that they'd rush to grab it.

Okay, so it's a lose/lose situation to vote on that offer. What if they don't? What happens then, Mr. Wizard? The other option is the strike authorization vote: Give the negotiators the power to call a work stoppage if the AMPTP refuses to improve the proposal. And the reason that's not a good option is that the AMPTP is no longer afraid of a SAG strike, especially one that would pass by a very narrow margin…if it passed at all. It very well might not; not with the economy circling the plughole and so many members unsure if their leaders could work together long enough to order in lunch. Some are even unsure who those leaders might be next week. (Several SAG blogs are running a "Doug Allen Deathwatch.")

The SAG constitution says that they need a 70% [CORRECTION:] 75% vote to strike. There seems to be enough opposition around that it's questionable they can get that. If they can, they surely can't get much more than that…which puts them in the same situation: Management will know it doesn't have to improve the deal much, if at all, to win the necessary votes. They may even be emboldened enough to not drop the bargaining chips they were once willing to toss.

In the meantime, the clock ticks away. The WGA achieved some amount of clout last year by threatening to make a shambles of the Academy Awards. This year, the ceremony is on February 22, one month from today. So with no SAG vote scheduled, the union has lost that opportunity. AFTRA, which took the producers' crummy offer, is signing contracts for shows which might have been SAG. And with each passing day, the belief that SAG leadership doesn't have it together grows stronger and stronger, as do worries that the whole union may collapse.

As I hope my tone conveys, I'm horrified that it's come to this. I'm not a SAG member but I've been rooting for them all the way and if they ever do strike, I'll be out there on the picket lines with a "WGA Supports SAG" placard. I think their cause is right and that this all represents an immense failure of strategy. Alas, in this world, that's the reason a lot of righteous crusades don't go the distance. Please, please…somebody pull this Guild together and prove me wrong.

Here, thanks to the referral of reader Tim Davis, are some amazing photos of the inauguration as taken from space. If you look carefully, you can make out the Washington Monument, the Lincoln Memorial and Aretha Franklin's hat. (That's a switch on a joke Leno did the other night but it fits.)

Let's catch up on a number of items posted here in the last week or three…

• Remember that gaffe-filled production of A Christmas Carol that I attended? Well, a blog over at the L.A. Times has been covering its aftermath, including reports that due to dreadful box office receipts, many of the folks who worked on the play have not been paid in full. Here's the latest item and if you're really interested, the links in that posting will take you to earlier reports.
• Alan Burnett (thank you, Alan) sent me this link to a longer report on the recent Stephen Sondheim-Frank Rich interview. At least, it's longer than this one to which I linked.
• There seems to be a lot of debate around the 'net regarding Patti LuPone breaking character and stopping a performance of Gypsy because someone was taking photos from the audience. Some say it was unprofessional because it ruined the show for the rest of the theatergoers. I don't know that that's true. It was probably a split decision with some hating it and others thinking, "It's about damn time." You'd probably have to have been there to have a valuable opinion on it but from afar, it doesn't sound awful to me. People are writing, "Patti spoiled the mood because she came across as an arrogant diva." That's kind of what you're supposed to be when you play Momma Rose…
• Lastly: The item about U.S. Airways paying $5000 to each of the passengers on the infamous Flight 1549 brought some notes from folks more cynical than me. They suggested the airline was trying to buy the folks off; to obtain releases in order to avoid lawsuits that might be more costly. Perhaps. But it sure seems smart to me of U.S. Airways to at least make that kind of offer and make it swiftly.

And, oh yes: I just checked and George W. Bush is still the ex-president. I intend to check often, just to make sure.

I'm telling you for the last time: Today (Wednesday) at 4 PM Pacific Time, you can hear Gary Owens, Janet Waldo, Frank Buxton, Earl Kress and me on Stu's Show on Shokus Internet Radio. We'll be on for two hours talking about the art and commerce of cartoon voice acting. Read this for more details. Tune in. Call in.

Mark Rothman is one of the best writers of situation comedies and screenplays around. He'll tell you some of his other credits when you read his new blog but I first knew of him when he was a writer and sometimes show runner on The Odd Couple, Happy Days and Laverne and Shirley.

In the seventies when I was a story editor on Welcome Back, Kotter, there was a day when I was up at ABC and a top executive came up to me and started telling me that the opening of last week's episode was kinda slow. It took a few minutes for us to figure out that she had her Marks confused. Despite an utter lack of physical resemblance, she thought I was Rothman and was talking about the previous Tuesday's Happy Days. I said something about how I wished I had his success and/or pay grade.

Anyway, Mark has just launched a weblog. He's a funny guy so it stands to be a funny weblog. Go take a look. And tell him to "Sit on it!"

This is a very belated obit. I just found out that Bernie Zuber died October 14, 2005 at the age of 72. Those who knew him are probably amazed he made it to that age.

Bernie was a sweet little guy who was, by his own admission, often out of his mind. He attempted suicide every now and then, and went through periods of deep depression when he'd willfully destroy every aspect of his life that brought him any joy. When he was sane, he was a talented artist and a major fixture of science-fiction fandom, especially the wing that embraced the work of J.R.R. Tolkien. He was the editor-publisher of The Westmarch Chronicle, the newsletter of the Tolkien Fellowships and also co-authored The Tolkien Quiz Book, a very successful paperback. He hosted many Tolkien fan gatherings and did illustrations for Tolkien fan publications.

Bernie also worked in comic books, though I don't think he ever got his name in one. The Grand Comic Book Database has no listing for him. He was a production artist from approximately 1950-1978 in the Los Angeles office of Western Publishing Company. There, he worked on Dell and Gold Key Comics and survived so many downsizings at the firm that by the time I began working for them in '72, he was the entire production department. Later, as his life and work became unstable, another artist had to be brought in to backstop Bernie and take over many of his responsibilities. (The job of a production artist, by the way, involves lettering corrections, art touch-ups, laying out advertising and other editorial material and generally doing whatever in the office required the services of someone who could draw a little.) He also lettered comics and occasionally assisted other artists by inking backgrounds or doing minor artwork.

In the late seventies, Bernie lost all control of his life, screaming a lot and threatening violence to himself and those around him. All the available avenues of treatment and hospitalization failed. Despite the best efforts of friends and family, his marriage — once an ideal one — ended and he began living in the street or, when panhandling paid off, in flophouse hotels. For a year or two there, this is how he ate: He'd find some restaurant that didn't know him and he'd go in, eat a meal and then casually tell the server and manager than he had no money and they could either arrest him or let him just leave. Some let him just leave. Others detained him, gave him access to a phone and told him to find someone to come pay his bill. I must have received a dozen of those calls but his timing was almost always off. All but one came when I was asleep or out and by the time I heard them on my answering machine, the restaurant had either let him go or called the police.

One time he caught me in and, perhaps unwisely, I drove up to the Ben Frank's coffee shop on Sunset Boulevard to bail him out and, I hoped, take him somewhere for treatment. By the time I arrived, he was gone. The cashier told me he'd begun yelling and smashing things so they threw him out. I muttered something about helping the guy and she said, "Don't waste your time. I've seen people like that. No one can help them until they help themselves."

As it turned out, she was right. Bernie's downward spiral continued and he lost all touch with old friends for a time…but at some point, sure enough, he began to help himself. And then once he'd helped himself, he began to help others. He became a tireless helper of folks with problems like the ones that had cost him so much. This article, which he wrote about his own personal hell, is indicative of the message he spread late in life. I was glad to read it. I don't know that I concur with his views about mental disorders or fandom…but most of it is outside my dubious areas of expertise so I'm hesitant to disagree. I was just glad to see something sane from my old pal Bernie…something that suggested his life had at least a modicum of Happy Ending.

Stephen Sondheim doesn't like theater critics or South Pacific.