Dumb Things I've Done (11 in an unnumbered series)

As a budding 6-year-old comedian, I was always studying what people thought was funny. While over at my parents' friends' house, we caught Every Which Way But Loose on HBO. While not an out-and-out comedy, I noticed there were a few laughs from the grown-ups very now and then.

The biggest laugh was after Clint Eastwood beats the crap out of the Black Widows, a biker gang. As our hero makes his getaway, Clyde the orangutan pops out of the back of the truck and flips them off.

I didn't know why it was funny, but I couldn't ignore the laughs it got. I made a mental note to try it out on my friends.

A few days later at lunch, I saw my friend Jimmy waiting in the hot-lunch line. Now was the time.

"Jimmy!" I yelled across the cafeteria. He whipped his head around, saw it was me, and waved.

I held down my ring and index fingers down with my thumb (as novice bird-flippers often do), and let the bird fly. Jimmy practically exploded with laughter, and I glowed, proud that I had performed the gag satisfactorily.

I saw a shadowy figure swoop in from my left; it was one of the other first-grade teachers, and did she look pissed.

"I don't ever want to see you do that again!" she yelled at me. "Do you understand me?"

I was so shocked--I had no idea I'd done something wrong--that I could only nod numbly. Jimmy came to the table a few minutes later, and I was still so shaken that my eyes were welling up with tears. Yes, I was a wuss.

"Hey, what's wrong?"

I held up the half-eaten sweet pickle from my lunch and explained that while eating it, I bit the inside of my cheek. Somehow it was OK to almost be in tears for that rather than being shrieked at by a teacher.

Now here's the clip that lead me down the path of unbridled evil. DO NOT copy what Clyde the orangutan does if grown-ups around. Learn from my mistakes, people.

Today's serving of WTF

Now, I watched the Donny and Marie show a lot as a kid. I had a little crush on Marie, despite her being a "little bit country." I'm a sucker for brunettes; what can I say?

However, this YouTube clip is just, I mean, I can't decide if this is better or worse than The Star Wars Holiday Special. I'm going to give this a few bonus points for convincing Kris Kristofferson to dress up as Han Solo.



Remember this the next time someone bitches that George Lucas ruined Star Wars with Jar-Jar Binks.

A thought before bed.

My children have turned into phlegm factories. This does not bode well for my wife and I this week.

I bet that hurt...

The sad fact that plagues copy editors: the I and the O are right next to each other on the keyboard. Back in my newspaper days, any time I typed "three-point shot" in a sports caption or any reference in news stories to "public meetings," "Department of Public Works" or God forbid, "Public Storage," I asked everyone else on the copy desk to verify that I had in fact typed what I thought.

Hey, it's Friday night...

Friday nights are usually when people hang out, go out, or black out (sometimes all three). In honor of the celebratory nature of Friday nights, I present the awesomest walrus I've ever seen, who I call Chumley. Break it down for us, Chumley:

New commenting system

Trying out Disqus as a replacement for the old-school commenting system. This should make the comments more discussiony, which will be cool.

Thanks to Josh for the tip.

Oh dear God, Microsoft...why?!

We here at Siftin' often celebrate the less than successful. Or in other words, hooray for crap!

I think you can learn more from bad ideas than good ones sometimes, and I came across this post on CNET's Crave blog that runs through the 8 worst Microsoft promo videos.

With all that money and talent at their disposal, how bad could it be, you ask?

Check out Josh Lowensohn's post and find out for yourself. Don't say I didn't warn you.

Tuesday's child is full of FAIL

I've never been particularly graceful, thus shooting the whole "Tuesday's child is full of grace" thing all to hell.

But when I dipped into my baby book to see how old I was when I hit a baby milestone recently, I noticed that I had a lot of coordination trouble. Here are the top 5 greatest hits, so to speak (with approximate age):

5. (5 months) Hit head against fireplace bricks at grandparents' house. Result: "Small bruise on forehead -- fine afterward."

4. (1 year) Fell down in back yard and split open my top lip. Result: "Swelling went down after a couple of hours."

3. (13 months) Stepped on a sewing needed; it almost went completely through my foot. My mom has told me about this one. apparently, the head of the needle was poking up, tentpole-style, in the skin on the top of my foot. Result: "It hardly bled at all. Jeff didn't cry much at all. Fine a few minutes later."

2. (16 months) Fell on the floor while sucking on a bottle. Cut lip on outside. Result: "Cut bled pretty good. Jeff was fine as soon as he was given an ice cube to suck on." One of the big memories of my childhood is the taste of an ice cube wrapped in a paper towel. This happened so often, I thought it was one of the major food groups.

1. This is the first one I actually remember, as I had just turned 4. I was at preschool on the swing set. Always the social butterly, I was swinging on a two-person swing. I think it was one of the ones that looked like a seesaw.

It was almost time to go back inside, and while my classmates weren't having any trouble with this, I was. Being short, my feet couldn't quite reach the ground, and since I was riding solo, I had no one to help me.

Well, I didn't want to be late, so I thought if I grabbed part of the main frame, that would slow me down enough, and I could hop off. Note that waiting for a minute or two while I slowed down naturally didn't actually occur to me.

I grabbed the bar as I was swinging back, and I guess I miscalculated. I heard a giant gong, and it felt like the back of my head was on fire.

Yep, I practically brained myself because I didn't want to be late for making macaroni arts and crafts.

The result: "Bled for a while, but was fine afterward. No swelling."

This filled up the Accidents page in my baby book before I even made it to school, where I was the Gerald Ford of Portola Elementary School.

I'm not exaggerating. I was on a first-name basis with Lindy, the secretary, and every time I came into the office, she'd turn to the mini-fridge next to her and reach for an icepack for me.

I would trip constantly, slide occasionally -- one time requiring a quick trip home to change clothes, as I'd slid all the way up my left side in mud during soccer at recess -- and I ran into stuff a lot.

You'd think a giant storage locker bigger than a Dumpster would be a pretty easy thing to work around, right?

During a game of Soak 'Em (or Bombardment, depending on where you went to school), I saw a random ball bounce near me. I ran for it at top speed to get it before one of the bigger kids did, and somehow neglected to factor in that giant storage locker, which I plowed into with the top right side of my head.

No blood, but a ginormous goose egg was sprouting on my head, which meant that my record, if not my skull, was broken, and it was off for another icepack from Lindy.

To add insult to injury, I had to do a speech in front of the class that day, which I did, holding the ice on my dome.

And no, it wasn't on playground safety.

I'm here, sort of

I'm spending a little too much time at The Prelinger Archives these days. To be more accurate, I'm looking at more than the Prelinger collection, but there's a lot of public domain goodness to be had. Check it out.

More movies enter the Siftin' vaults!

Having already nabbed The Essential Ernest film collection while out shopping with my parents (how any Ernest collection can call itself essential without including Ernest Goes to Camp, I don't know; I wanted it mainly for the commercials anyway), I was looking elsewhere when my dad motioned to me.

"Here's something you need for your blog," he told me. He was holding Cult Classics: 20 Movie Pack. Now I'm fairly skeptical of multimovie packs. The quality is often on par with a half-assed transfer of a VHS tape that had been buried beneath a 100-year-old outhouse. But on the other hand, if you get one or two movies worth watching -- and I use the word "worth" very loosely; that's how I ended up watching Night Train to Terror -- it's not a total loss.

I scanned the back to check out the lineup. Off the top, there was Reefer Madness, which is always a crowd pleaser. There were also the semi-companion films to that classic, The Cocaine Fiends and Sex Madness. But there were two in particular that caught my attention. See if you can pick them out from this list:

Chained for Life
Child Bride
The Cocaine Fiends
Delinquent Daughters
Escort Girl
Gambling with Souls
Joyless Street
Mad Youth
Marihuana
The Marijuana Menace
Omoo-Omoo, The Shark God
Reefer Madness
The Road to Ruin
Sex Madness
She Shoulda' Said No!
Slaves in Bondage
Ten Nights in a Barroom
Terror of Tiny Town
Test Tube Babies
The Wild and the Wicked

Oh, hell yes. Finally, I'd get a chance to watch Terror of Tiny Town, a western with an all-little-people cast. Yes, you heard me. I read about this in The Golden Turkey Awards, and all these years later, I own it.

Second one I noticed: Omoo-Omoo, The Shark God. How can you not want to watch a movie with that name?

Don't answer that.

Well, I've got lots of movie watching ahead of me. Wish me luck. And lest you think it's a film festival with boobies galore, I should point out that the most recent film in the collection is still over 50 years old.

YouTube as educational tool

Sometimes, I really could just spend hours checking out videos on YouTube. For example, as regular readers are abundantly aware of, I'm obsessed with old TV shows and commercials.

Now what's great is all the people who had VCRs back in the Stone Age top-loader days are uploading samples of their collections to share with everyone. I love this, because it's one thing to read what shows were on during a certain time, but it's another to watch the opening credits to them, because there are shows that you just don't remember because they weren't syndicated or they didn't last particularly long.

Thanks to uploader videoholic2008, here's a sample of what you could find on TV if you tuned in in early 1977, which is about the earliest I can remember any TV shows specifically.

Why don't they bring back Scrabble?

One of the joys of staying home from school was watching game shows in the morning instead of avoiding mockery courtesy of some classmates.

One that never failed to keep me watching was Scrabble, hosted by the man himself, Chuck Woolery.

Why?

Well, the players would pick tiles, which would give them two letters to choose from to put into the particular word they were trying to guess. And every so often there was an exchange like this:

"OK, you've got a D and a P."

"I'll take the P, Chuck."

Potty jokes are always funny. Here's a clip from the first episode so you can see how it worked.

Songs that should be used for commercials, but aren't

Yes, it's that time once again. Time to ruin another handful of songs by pairing them up with unlikely products in the name of advertising campaigns.

And again, I hope I never see any of these on TV. For a number of reasons.

ELO - Turn to Stone: Viagra

The Seeds - Pushin' Too Hard: Preparation H

ABBA - Waterloo: Kohler toilets

Zero Seven - In the Waiting Line: The Department of Motor Vehicles

Little River Band - Lonesome Loser: World of Warcraft (I kid, I kid)

Muse - Supermassive Black Hole: suppositories

Rolling Stones - Paint It Black: Sherwin-Williams

Doobie Brothers - It Keeps You Runnin': Ex-Lax

The Who - I Can See For Miles: LASIK surgery

Johnny Otis - Willie and the Hand Jive: Adult pay-per-view movies

The Bar-Kays - Soul Finger: See your proctologist public service announcement

Frankie Lymon and The Teenagers - Why Do Fools Fall In Love: eHarmony.com

Steve Lawrence - Go Away, Little Girl: Girl Scout cookies

The Isley Brothers - It's Your Thing: Sex education public service announcement

Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers - Don't Do Me Like That: The Kama Sutra

Men at Work - Who Can It Be Now?: Caller ID

Air Supply - Making Love Out of Nothing At All: Herbal male enhancement pills

Taco - Puttin' On The Ritz: Ritz crackers (no-brainer)

and finally...

America - A Horse With No Name: Ann Coulter's next show


HEY-OOOOOOOOOO!

Day of discovery

Some days, you just learn things whether you're trying or not. Today, for example, I learned:

It's "Take a load off, Fanny," not "Take a load off, Annie."

Guinness really is pretty filling; two even moreso.

I'm glad there was finally a new episode of The Office.

And I must be a giant dork, because I laughed way too hard at this picture, which I found on this blog:



What did you learn today?

"I shall triumph over human lethargy!"

I know, I know.

So many of you keep asking for my fitness secrets that I had to break down and spill the beans.

There is one book I consult when considering doing actual exercise:


The Mighty Marvel Comics Strength and Fitness Book.

Before I hit puberty and discovered that exercise shows were populated by girls in skimpy leotards, this was the coolest may to learn about exercising.

I used to check this book out of the library from time to time as a lad. Of course, the library's copy had additional artwork in it; some artist wannabe had seen fit to add explosive fart clouds to the figures where he thought necessary, which, from the look of it, was just about everywhere.

But fortunately, the copy I procured from eBay (eBay: Buy all the crap your parents wouldn't let you have as a kid!) suffered only from mild water damage.

I look at it now and am a bit skeptical as to the benefit of some of these exercises. I mean, look:



Leaping up and down may look cool when the Silver Surfer does it (if I were a bigger nerd, I might say he looked Radd, but I'm not, so I didn't), but I must have been doing something wrong, because I never got buffed doing it.

I worried that I might look like a moron doing these exercises, and they must have realized that, because look at Spider-Man performing The Little Miss Muffet.



Poor Spidey. This is almost as embarrassing as Spider-Man 3. Still, I guess you burn some calories doing this. So like if you ate three Fritos and did this for an hour or so, you'd probably have burned off a third of those calories.

At a certain point it seemed like they ran out of ideas. Granted, this was written in 1976 before Olivia Newton-John invented aerobics or whatever, but what the hell is this supposed to accomplish?



WTF?

Coincidentally, many of you may be rolling your eyes right now, too. Medusa (of the Inhumans) also showed how to do jaw exercises (insert your own Lindsey Lohan joke here), chin-ups (where you press against your thumbs with your chin muscles--to prevent double chins), scalp pulls (I clearly did that one wrong), and the ever-so-difficult lying on a mildly inclined plane.

No, really.

So I don't know how beneficial the book is, but you wanted to know my beauty secrets, and here they are, revealed just for you, true believers!

Excelsior!

Oh jeez, not another LOLcat...

moar funny pictures

This is one of those things that's probably funnier to me than to others, but that's okay.

More pudding pie news!

The nice person at Hostess who responded to my missive informed me that right now, the vanilla pudding pies are still discontinued.

Bah.

I can only hope that if the chocolate pies do really well, they'll bring back vanilla.

In times like these, you can rely on Siftin' to bring you the news that really matters.

Carry on...

Wicked garden

April, 1979.

In a few more weeks, I'd officially be a big brother. For now, I just wanted to help where possible. I was practically a man at that point -- 4 1/2 -- and I knew that I needed to help around around the house.

Aside from cleaning my room. That just was not going to happen. Once, lured with the promise of cinnamon rolls, I managed a blitzkrieg on the clutter in my room. But as I neared my deadline, I ended up shoving half the stuff under my bed, feigning surprise when my mom pointed it out during the pre-cinnamon roll inspection.

But this day was one of those blue sky California days; not too hot, not too cold. And being 4 1/2, I wanted to get out of the house. It was after noon, so The Monkees was already over. It was a bunch of boring junk until the afternoon, and I had time to kill.

So I asked my mom if I could water the garden in the back yard. I had a feeling what the answer would be; after what happened the first time I watered the lawn, I was not asked to return to that job.

In my defense, I was a little fuzzy on homonyms as a 3-year-old, so when my mom asked if I could be a dear and water the lawn while she pulled some weeds, I thought she meant "deer" and peed on the grass.

Perfectly honest mistake.

But if I couched this latest request in the guise of being helpful, I thought it would improve my chances.

"Mommy," I said, putting on my best doe-eyed face, "Can I go water the garden?" She was about to say something when her face changed suddenly, like someone had just kicked her or something.

"All right," she said.

I jumped up and down in excitement and ran to the back door.

"Jeffrey?"

"Huh?"

"This time, if you have to go pee-pee, come in the house, okay?"

"I know, Mom," I said, rolling my eyes before heading out the door.

Suddenly, I was a cowboy in the Old West, heading to a showdown. I imagined my spurs clanging as I hiked up my Toughskins (a size too big so I'd grow into them) and prepared to face off with some no-account villain.

I'd seen lots of John Wayne movies by that time, so I had the walk down pat. It was sort of the same walk I did when I got a wedgie. Just more dignified.

I saw my "gun" lying near the shed. Our garden hose had a pistol grip on it that made it easy to target certain plants (or any stray cats on fences). If you wanted the continuous stream, a little ring flipped down to hold the trigger in place, sort of like on gas nozzles.

I turned the faucet, and watched the hose seem to spring to life like an angry snake. Tiny jets of water streamed out where the hose connected to the faucet. Everything was ready.

I grabbed the hose in my right hand and clasped my left over it to steady it as I unleashed the fury of botanical badassery.

I was now in control of nature and my own destiny. I was watering the garden -- all by myself! John Wayne would be proud.

And after I'd made my first sweep of the garden, I got a little cocky. Surely I didn't need both hands to steady the hose. In fact, I could do a quick draw, just like The Duke himself.

I slung my shooting iron in my imaginary holster and got ready to draw, legs akimbo like any good gunfighter. My pants hung low; better to imitate chaps.

I drew.

I won.

All the plants in the garden were victims of my shooting spree. It took all the strength I had in my right hand to keep the hose from getting away from me, but I was doing it.

Just when I felt uberconfident, my pants slipped even lower. Beyond chaps territory. If I didn't grab them, anyone walking into our back yard would have a good chance at seeing me in my skivvies. What if it was a -- gulp -- girl?

Well, that just wouldn't do.

I let go of the trigger so I could set the hose down and fix my pants, but that's when I found that during my superfast quick draw, I knocked the ring over, keeping the stream going whether I held the trigger or not.

I tried to hitch up my pants in one hand while holding onto the hose with the other, but by that point, the trigger was wet and slippery, and I lost grip of the handle.

As the first jet of extremely cold water hit me in the face, I must have screamed. Something got my mom's attention. Luckily she had the camera nearby so she could capture for posterity what she saw when she went to see what I was screaming about.



Thus ended my desire to do any gardening-related chores.

Always choose the right job for your skillset

And that's one to grow on...

That sounds familiar!

OK, I noticed this the other day while perusing TV show openings on YouTube uploaded by my new hero, bobcnn.

Go to about 4:30, when you get to the theme song for Today's FBI. Listen to that song.



Then listen to the main theme for one of my favoritest movies ever, Stripes.



They sound more than just a little similar. They both came out the same year, 1981. And they were both the work of Elmer Bernstein, if IMDB is to be believed. I wonder why the themes are so similar. I mean, it's like the Stripes theme turned around a little, really.

Just struck me odd; thought I'd share. You're welcome.

Photographic proof!

If you've always wanted to see part of my desk, boy oh boy, are you in luck. Check out the latest edition of CNET's Buzz Report.

Oh, and this totally happened.

Trying out a few things

Blogger is offering a few new gadgets and whatnot, so I thought I'd give a few a try.

1. If you just can't live without me...
Now you can easily subscribe to the blog (or the comments) with the click of a button. Chances are you already know how to do this, but every time is someone's first time, so I thought I'd add it.

2. Blogger Play
It's just a box that cycles through the latest pictures to be added to Blogger. I dunno. Some people like pretty pictures. When it bores me, I'll probably remove it. Unless I forget about it. Buh-leeted. Let's see if that was the one bogging it down...

3. Search the site
Now, with the help of the little box at the bottom, you can search anything mentioned on the site, or linked to from the site. I haven't had a chance to try it out, so let me know if it's worth keeping.

4. New YouTube vids at the bottom
I usually have the video feed at the bottom pull in stuff tagged "classic commercials," but I've updated it to pull in videos uploaded by bobcnn, a YouTube user who has uploaded tons of sheer TV awesomeness. Check it out.

5. Publish in the future
Finally. Sometimes, I actually have "real-life" stuff to do, so I don't get a chance to post a blog until the very end of the night. Now if I get ahead, I can just set it and forget it. I'm actually testing this right now. This should publish the morning after I'm writing this.

So, if you have any requests or comments, just let me know, and if you aren't a jerk, there's a good chance that you'll get what you ask for. Thanks again to everyone who reads and comments and doesn't tell me how much I suck.

In case you have an hour or so to kill

I'm always checking on Hulu to see what's been added, and much to my surprise, there's a bad movie there!

And because I'm that lazy helpful, I'm just embedding the thing right here.

It's called Cutting Class. I'd be willing to bet the only reason this thing has been added to the lineup is because Brad Pitt is in it before, you know, he was Brad Pitt.

That said, he's not horrible in this; I mean, he does what he can with what he's got. Martin Mull, who I love, plays the lead girl's father, and there's a running gag that involves him getting injury upon injury. Alas, it's really not funny, and it just doesn't seem to fit.

Still, if you, like me, are a fan of cheesy horror movies, you could definitely do worse. Give it a shot. It is rated TV-MA, on account of language, gore, and, if memory serves, a boobie or two. You've been warned.

Yes, I'm a geek.

Some prankster slapped these signs up on the restroom doors here.


I'm not saying who.

Guest post alert!

While the layout here is extra-wonky today for April Fool's Day, there is actual serious content over at my pal Genevieve's blog, Momologue, where I am the first guest poster for her observation of Autism Awareness Month.

If you're wondering why I might possibly have an interest in this, you might want to go check it out. (I swear this is not a rickroll. Honest.)

I pity the April Fools!

I know a lot of you are thinking that because it's April Fool's Day, it's going to be nonstop shenanigans around here.

Well...









And completely unrelated, but it happened today, and I didn't want to wait until tomorrow: I finally found a YouTube clip of one of my favorite commercials.

CBS 1974 Saturday morning cavalcade

And now it's CBS' turn in the Saturday morning spotlight. While it offered the longest lineup, it started things out with a few repeats.

8 a.m. Speed Buggy
Yet another Hanna Barbera cartoon with yet another anthropomorphic car, with yet more generic adventures. At least they had Mel Blanc doing the voice for Speed Buggy, so it had something going for it.



8:30 a.m. Scooby-Doo, Where Are You?

If you're reading this blog, I'm going to guess you're at least familiar with the concept of Scooby-Doo shows. Since you've all seen this intro likely a skrillion times, here it is in Polish!



9 a.m. Jeannie

Another law of the 70s was that a portion of the Saturday morning programming had to be an animated version of an old live-action show. NBC already had The Addams Family and Star Trek; here's another. I saw this a lot in syndicated packages, and I remember liking it a lot. Instead of blonde Jeannie and Major Tony Nelson, we had a decidedly nonblonde Jeannie and surfer dude Corey Anders, not to be confused with a later, curvier Kory Anders. Corey found Jeannie's bottle on the beach while on his way to Tosche Station to get pick up some power converters or something. Yes, voice artist supreme Mark Hamill provided Corey's voice.

Along for the ride with genie was Babu (I don't know if he was sweet), voiced by former latter-day Stooge, Joe Besser. Babu's job was to never get his magic to work right. And while Barbara Eden didn't return to portray Jeannie, Julie McWhirter did a fine job.





9:30 a.m. Partridge Family 2200 A.D.

Dear God, why? Why couldn't this have just been a Jetsons spinoff as it was originally planned? And even if that fell through, how did it end up being the Partridge Family? That would be like taking Fonz and the gang from Happy Days, teaming them up with a cutesy alien and sending them on adventures through time and space. Oh, wait. Um, never mind.

If you don't believe how awful an idea this is, just watch for yourself.





10 a.m. Valley of the Dinosaurs

Watch the intro first and see if you notice anything, um, unusual.



So let me get this straight: a family gets stranded in a strange land where there are dinosaurs and other prehistoric creatures? Wasn't this just on at 9 a.m. on NBC?

I don't think I ever saw this, even in the days of independent stations. I weep.

10:30 a.m. Shazam!

The live-action tales of Captain Marvel, who was given his great powers by the wizard Shazam. In this TV incarnation, Billy Batson traveled with Mentor in a Winnebago, helping out where they were needed. One of the coolest episodes was a crossover with Isis, which was a later episode, but still pretty cool...





11 a.m. The Harlem Globetrotters Popcorn Machine

This is why I'm bummed out that I was only an infant when this was on. How can you beat that name? And how can you beat the Globetrotters? This had to be all kinds of awesome; much better than the crappy cartoon version.



11:30 a.m. Hudson Brothers Razzle Dazzle Show

Another one I would've liked to see, if only because it featured Rod Hull and Emu. Singers The Hudson Brothers hosted this variety show for kids. The theme song is pretty catchy. Five years after this show, Bill Hudson's daughter Kate was born. I wonder if he had copies of this to show her when she was little. That would've been a trip.



Noon The U.S. of Archie

Everyone was gearing up for the bicentennial in 1976, so there was tons of shows with an American history theme. And who better to tell kids about history than Archie, Jughead and the gang?




12:30 p.m. Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids

As a rule, I distrust cartoons with a laugh track. If nothing else, it just shows how dumb they think the target audience is. So why this ostensibly educational show had one is beyond me. Still, there is a soft spot in my heart for this show. I bet if they tried making it today, he wouldn't be able to be called Fat Albert.

As a bonus, here's an authentic elementary school Fat Albert joke:

What did Fat Albert say when he was sitting on the toilet?

Hey, hey, hey, bombs away!



Well, that about does it for a look at the various network offerings for the fall of 1974. Hopefully before too long, I'll be able to tackle 1975. The cartoons just keep getting better--and worse.

For my favorite Wookiee

In honor of my son Harry, who would've been 3 today, I offer you The Star Wars Holiday Special, which centers around Chewbacca, who is trying to get home to celebrate Life Day with his family.

I'm always conflicted about posting about Harry. Some might consider it morbid for me to keep bringing him up year after year, but I'm always thinking about him.

When people ask how many kids I have, I feel guilty if I say two, but I don't want to bring everyone down by telling the story over and over. But I still want people to know who he was, even if he was only here for a short time.

Feel free to make a donation in Harry's name to either here, here, or the charity of your choice.

As promised, here's the special. Don't say I didn't warn you.



Oh, if you can make it all the way through, color me impressed. I still haven't quite made it yet.

And now these messages

While we're waiting for CBS' Saturday morning lineup, we'll be back after this:

NBC's Saturday mornings in 1974

Having already covered ABC's Funshine Saturday lineup from 1974, this time, we'll take a look at NBC's roster. I've always considered NBC to be the weak sack network when it comes to Saturday mornings, partly because they usually had the shortest lineups, and partly because they showed The Smurfs. Not surprisingly, NBC would be the first network to drop an official Saturday morning cartoon lineup.

But in 1974, they were plugging along with a few winners.

7 a.m. The Addams Family

While I loved the classic 60s sitcom, this 70s animated version just didn't do anything for me. Given that this was right in the middle of the whole movement to improve Saturday morning TV by eliminating anything less than wholesome, I wonder why anyone would try to make a cartoon about a macabre family in the first place.

But hey, at least Jodie Foster got some voiceover work as Pugsley.


7:30 a.m. Wheelie and the Chopper Bunch

If my son had been born when I was, aside from having some bizarre family pictures, he likely would've been obsessed with this cartoon, instead of the movie Cars, as he is now. Yet another Hanna Barbera product, this followed the adventures of Wheelie, a red VW Beetle and his vehicle pals. Honestly, it got to the point in the mid-70s that a person could tell apart half the HB shows even at gunpoint.

I should point out that despite the title, the Chopper Bunch were not Wheelie's pals; instead they were a group of tough-guy vehicles. Here's the opening:



And just because I like you, here's one of the episodes that aired on the day in the TV Guide I got these listings from. Oh, it's dubbed. In Portuguese. Enjoy!



8 a.m. Emergency +4

This show was right up my alley. I remember watching Emergency all the time and totally digging it--despite having no memory of any actual episodes. This cartoon version added four teens (hence the +4 in the title) who made up an ambulance crew who'd help out Gage and DeSoto. And because it was against federal law not to do so, the kids were saddled with a few wacky pets. If not for cartoons, I never would've known what a mynah bird was, let alone that they could help rescue me from a natural disaster.



8:30 a.m. Run, Joe, Run

Falsely accused of a crime he didn't commit, our hero is on the run from the authorities, going from town to town, helping out those in need. You'd almost think this was a cartoon version of The Fugitive but for the fact that Joe was a German shepherd, accused of attacking his master. No, I'm not kidding. Look at the credits if you don't believe me. As far as I know, Joe was not looking for a three-legged dog who was the real culprit.



9 a.m. Land of the Lost

Probably the coolest show in the lineup, LotL featured the Marshall family, who had the terrible misfortune to--wait, you know what? Watch the opening credits. That'll tell you everything you need to know:



Now that is a damn fine theme song. I miss theme songs that tell you specifically what the show is about. I still don't understand why the lyrics refer to "Marshall, Will, and Holly" if the dad is Rick Marshall. The delightfully cheesy effects made this show an afternoon favorite in syndication as well as a Saturday morning classic.

I would love to hear the Meat Puppets do a cover of this song. Don't know why, but I just would.

9:30 a.m. Sigmund and the Sea Monsters

Back for a second season, this Krofft show featuring everyone's favorite reluctant sea monster gained a new character: Sheldon the Sea Genie (sure, why not?), played by the ever-butch Rip Taylor. Sigmund was still not evil, he still looked like a walking lump of kelp, and the laugh track didn't help.



10 a.m. Star Trek

The voyages of the starship Enterprise continue in animated form for a second if incredibly brief season. With only six new episodes, that meant a lot of reruns from the previous season. But it also had the first appearance of a holodeck on Star Trek, in the episode "The Practical Joker." That's got to count for something, right?

This was a fun show to watch, though it always seemed so serious because of the sparse musical score--compare with the Spock-Kirk fight music in "Amok Time", for example. And you can now buy the DVDs and make a drinking game out of it. Every time there's a close-up shot of a character half framed with another in the background, take a shot. Every time Jimmy Doohan does a voice for a character other than Scotty, wet your finger with the drink of your choice and let it evaporate. Any more than that, and it could mean a hospital trip.



Well, they didn't have a lot of shows that year, but they got some fairly decent ones. Next time, it's CBS' turn to shine. And given that their lineup ran from 8 a.m. to 12:30 p.m., that's a lot of shining.

1974 Saturday morning lineups: Fanriffic!

Saturday morning TV was a big part of my childhood. Getting up far earlier than I would on a school day, I settled in for a full morning of programming. Add to that a bowl or two of Count Chocula or Waffelos, and it's a wonder I was able to dress myself.

Those of you who also woke up early on Saturdays know what I'm talking about; for a few hours, we were in control of the TV (if we were the oldest, of course). It was like being in our own little world. I hesitate to say something schmucky like it being a magical time (especially when I remember some of those shows), but it was a small part of my week I looked forward to.

That said, I thought I'd pore through my meager collection of TV Guides to compile a look at those Saturday mornings of yesteryear. Because it's all about me, I'm starting with the fall of 1974, my first television season of existence. And no, I wasn't watching the cartoons quite yet, but I had to start somewhere, and this seemed like a good start.

With the help of my Sept. 14, 1974, San Francisco Metropolitan area TV Guide, here's the first part of our look at Saturday morning.

I developed an allegiance for ABC early on, as that's the network on which I watched Super Friends, one of my all-time favorites. As such, I'm starting with the ABC Saturday morning lineup, which they called ABC's Funshine Saturday.

ABC's Funshine Saturday



7 a.m. Yogi's Gang

On one level, it makes sense that a forest-dweller would take an interest in the environment. On the other hand, not if it's Yogi Bear, prime pilferer of pic-a-nic baskets. But that's the premise of this well-meaning but dull Hanna-Barbera effort that featured Yogi, Boo-Boo, and the H-B all-stars flying around in an ark on the lookout for somewhere untouched by pollution. They encountered Mr. Smog, Lotta Litter, and other ecology-related villains, most of which are name-checked in the opening credits.

Only 15 episodes were made, and since it started in 1973, these are just repeats. Not exactly a rousing start to a Saturday morning lineup, is it? Judge for yourself:



7:30 a.m. The Bugs Bunny Show

A perennial favorite, though I spent my formative TV-watching years catching the Bugs Bunny-Road Runner Show on CBS. But still, you can't go wrong with Warner Bros. cartoons, especially in the days where they weren't edited to remove violence.

8 a.m. Hong Kong Phooey

There are two things that keep this show about Penrod Pooch, a mild-mannered janitor who is also a martial-arts-wielding canine superhero, from totally sucking: Scatman Crothers, who voiced the title character, and the kickass theme song, also performed by Mr. Crothers. It also tried to introduce the word "fanriffic" into kids' vocabularies, but I never remembered hearing anyone use it.



8:30 a.m. The New Adventures of Gilligan

Even in 1974, everyone had seen Gilligan's Island reruns a bajillion times, so why not make a cartoon of it? Aside from a cartoon version of this particular show being, well, redundant. Jane Webb (a Filmation studios voice staple) provided voices for Mary Ann and Ginger in this incarnation.

The best I could find was this clip of the closing credits, alas.



9 a.m. Devlin

Not only was kung-fu popular in the 70s, but so were motorcycles. Evel Knievel, stuff like that. So naturally, kids were treated to a motorcycle daredevil of our own: Ernie Devlin. Looking at the animation in the intro, I can't say I feel like I really miss seeing it. Eesh. Apparently no one else particularly dug it, as it only ran a few months.

Here's an interesting fact: Devlin's brother was voiced by Micky Dolenz.



9:30 a.m. Super Friends

While I profess a great love for this show, 1974 brought repeats of the first season: the hour-long, incredibly preachy, boring episodes with Wendy, Marvin, and Wonder Dog. But still, without these cartoons (featuring the first and only cartoon appearance of Green Arrow for decades), we wouldn't have had Challenge of the Super Friends a few years later.

Plus, I thought Wendy was cuter than Jayna anyway.

Moving on...



2 p.m. Korg: 70,000 B.C.

Sadly, I don't think I ever caught this live-action show that showed family life circa 70,000 B.C., only a few years after George Burns had hit the vaudeville stages. But hey, it was narrated by Burgess "Time Enough at Last" Meredith, so that gives it a few coolness points with me. And hey, it lasted longer than Cavemen.

Oh, snap.



2:30 p.m. These Are the Days

You've got your Waltons, you've got your Little House on the Prairie, and the folks at Hanna-Barbera. Put them together, and you've got the old-timey fun of These Are the Days, a show about the adventures of the Day family. I managed to miss this one as well, but I can't imagine the little kid version of me would have dug it too much.

But because I care about you, the reader, here are the opening credits. In Spanish. ¡Muy bueno!



Well, that's what ABC was peddling as of fall 1974. A fairly dismal turnout, really. But I say this as someone who missed the first two months of the season, so your mileage may vary.

Tune in next time for either the 1974 CBS or NBC lineup; whichever tickles my fancy.

What is your earliest memory?

Memory is a weird thing. I've been told most of my life that I have an unusual memory. Actually, the word "unusual" comes up an awful lot, but that's another story...

I remember dreams I had when I was a kid (just the most vivid ones), and I remember specific conversations with people. And we all know about all the useless pop culture crap that has taken up permanent residence in my brain.

But the crap of it is that I don't really have an active control over what gets stored and what doesn't. I can try, sure (phone numbers, anniversaries, children's names, etc.), but every now and then I'll see something on TV or in a book or on YouTube, and there's like an explosion of memory. Sometimes it's a little overwhelming.

But I was thinking about it, and I'm curious as to what other people's earliest memories are. With that, if you could go ahead and share your earliest memory in the comments, that would totally rock.

I'll start, since it was my idea.

My earliest memory is being about 2 years old, walking into my parents' bedroom, where their black-and-white TV had a rerun of The Brady Bunch playing. While I was watching that, I remember the distinct sensation of the back of my diaper expanding.

That's about it. Sort of a memory fragment, but that's the earliest I remember without aid from a picture.

Knowing me, there's a very good chance that my last memory will also involve filling my diaper, watching a rerun of The Brady Bunch.

All right, now it's your turn. Join in the fun!

Your daily dose of OMGWTFBBQ!?!

Don't everyone thank me all at once.

A tale of resurrection!

As much as it galls me to say so, I owe this discovery to my brother and a phone call he made to me.

At first, I thought he might be pulling a prank on his older, better-looking (and more modest) brother. This wouldn't exactly be a stretch to think he'd do something like this. But, as I reflected, he knows there are certain things that we don't joke about, and this was one of them.

So after taking care of a few errands, I went to recon the location he provided me. I walked in, trying to look nonchalant, as if I weren't on a mission of dire importance.

I peered down aisle after aisle until I found the one that could provide happiness or torment. I thought for a second that I'd been too late; that I'd missed my chance, but then I saw them. In the distance I heard trumpets and the Hallelujah chorus.

There, before my myopic eyes: Hostess Pudding Pies.


The very same pies that have prompted me to write letter after letter to Hostess, pleading and indirectly threatening (Twinkie the Kid can now walk the streets safely) for the return of my once-loved fattening pastry delight.

I grabbed all four on the shelf and made my way to the cashier, where I paid just under $6 for something I hadn't eaten in nearly two decades.

Yes, I'm that old and pathetic.

I enlisted my wife to document the occasion. Now keep in mind, in a perfect world, they would have been the vanilla pudding pies, but as evidenced by gas prices, the continued fame of Paris Hilton, and my hairline, we don't live in a perfect world.

I cautiously inspected the first Pudding Pie.


All right, so far, so good. But did they taste OK?


Huzzah! All is chocolatey and so sweet I almost needed insulin.

I have yet to see if Hostess has brought back the vanilla pie as well; I'm going to be writing them tomorrow. But this just goes to show you, kids: whine about something long enough, and you'll get it just so you'll shut up.

Nacho cheese Cheetos, anyone?

A Siftin' Easter custom

Happy Easter, yo.

Commercials, just for you

Taking a break from a project I'm working on, so this will be brief.

I know Easter is coming, but just because, here are some 80s commercials from Christmastime.

If you click on the video itself and read the user comments on the YouTube page, you will likely feel the same arrow through your heart as I did in mine when I read the one from a person amazed that ATMs existed in the 80s. In fact, they predate old codgers like myself. Damn kids!

I miss The Office

I can't wait for new episodes of The Office. Who from the show would I like to meet, you ask?



I found out a few weeks ago that Angela was IN MY WORK BUILDING a while back, possibly on a day that I was actually here. I miss everything.

If you can believe your eyes and ears

Just a few things worth checking out:

There's a funny podcast I listen to each day: The 404. Here is a recent episode--make sure you listen all the way through.

And here are a few blogs I've started making a daily habit: List of the Day, which is chock-full of hilarity, and The Aquaman Shrine. Actually, the Shrine is part of Rob's pantheon of awesome bloggitude--you should check them all out.

And for all of you who have written, saying, "Wow, Sparkman, you're pretty funny, but you're not Weekend at Bernie's funny," here:

I can has supervision?

You too can be under divine observation, as long as you are allowed to have scissors.

You know, between this and The Great Rickroll Project of Earlier This Month, my cutting and taping skills are getting quite the workout. I guess you really do end up using things you learn in school later in life.

Denied!!!

Went to McDonald's at lunch and was stunned, nay, flabbergasted, to hear that they didn't have Shamrock Shakes for St. Patrick's Day.

Blasphemy!

Just in time for St. Patrick's Day

No der.

There once was a time when you got a few mustard dogs from Der Wienerschnitzel. Somewhere along the way, they lost the Der. But here's proof that it once was there.

And the winner is...

I was watching an old tape a bit ago, and after the last program (a Looney Tunes special), I let the tape keep going.

I ended up watching the last half of the American Music Awards from 1986, commercials and all.

It was weird seeing the stars they pointed out in the audience. Mr. Mister, Michael Jackson, and Julian Lennon, among others. Prince and Bruce Springsteen weren't there to accept their awards.

And at the end, everyone rushed the stage to sing "We Are the World."

Jeez, Whitney Houston looked so young then...

My favorite part was when the crowd kept applauding Stevie Wonder when we won an award, he jokingly told everyone "Shut up!"

When Brody gets a little older, I'll have to dig this out so he can watch it and wonder what the hell people were thinking with their wardrobe choices.

Woo-hulu

Well, Hulu is now open to the public, and in addition to the TV shows available to watch for free, they've got some movies, too.

So you can watch All Dogs Go to Heaven and All Dogs Go to Heaven 2, but there's also The Big Lebowski, The Jerk, and Three Amigos.

On the TV show front, you can watch The Simpsons, Family Guy, The Office, What's Happening and What's Happening Now. I've also watched a few episodes of Benson.

Not in the background while I'm at work, though. That would be wrong; multitasker or not.

It's not perfect; I can't think of very many situations where I'd want to watch clips of movies or shows rather than the whole thing, so that part is fairly useless for me, but it's another step toward my dream of on-demand TV from a giant pool of programming.

CBS is getting in on the fun, putting up all the episodes of Star Trek online, as well as a few other shows.

I'm hoping more networks get with this program; it seems like an easy way to gauge interest in various programs for DVD release. Sure, I can watch any episode of Star Trek for free on my computer now, but I still prefer watching TV on my TV. I'm weird that way.

Oh, and one more thing I just noticed. You can embed stuff, too:

Just getting this out of my system...

Headlines the NY Post rejected for their Spitzer cover story:

Ho lot of trouble!

Pimp my government

You can lead a horticulture...

New in town, ey, Guv'na?

Spitzer's in the back because he's skeezin' with a whore

Whorible news

No love, no gov

NY: We no love you long time

Upon reading that the reported prostitute in question charged a thousand bucks an hour, this immediately came to mind: What do you get from a $1,000-an-hour whore? Legal representation.


Heyooooooo!!

So I'm in a foul mood...

...partly because I feel awful (my stomach and I are not on speaking terms today), and partly because it occurred to me that it's been almost 2 years since I wrote to Parenting magazine about their no-dads policy.

I wrote to them, and I was told my letter would be published. It wasn't; and not long after I stopped looking, they introduced their tag, "What matters to moms."

Feh.

Being the ever-sensitive pissy sort, I decided I'd try again.

Here's what I wrote.

Hi --

I first wrote in May 2006 about the magazine's momcentric slant. At the time, I was working at home from 2-10 a.m. and watching my then-3-year-old son while my wife was at work.

I got a reply saying that my letter would be published, etc. I never saw it printed, and shortly after giving up on seeing it, I noticed the cover tag, "What matters to moms."

Way to go.

Granted, I presume there have been enough studies showing that your target demographic is moms, but the magazine has become even less inviting to any parent who has the apparent misfortune of having a penis.

I really find the magazine content informative--which is why I still read it--but it's very clear that it's not meant for me or any other father.

An occasional article from a dad in the back of the issue isn't exactly helping, either, especially when it's after yet another article from a mom about how nervous she was to let her husband watch the kids. Because as we all know, we dads think nothing of letting the kids play with chainsaws and rat poison.

Is there any plan to feature dads who are active parts of their children's lives? Or should I just stop my bellyaching and look elsewhere?

Sincerely,

Jeff Sparkman
Mountain House, California
http://siftin.blogspot.com/search/label/parenting
http://dorkdad.blogspot.com

I'll let you know if I hear anything.

Aside from my stomach doing its best impression of the underground pipe system in The Goonies.

A special presentation

Sometimes I see a video and it seems like it was made just for me.



And because that's kinda weak for a blog entry, here's a bonus giggle, courtesy of George "Mr. Smooth" Clooney.

Last night a DJ saved my life

It occurs to me that I may be part of the last generation to listen to AM radio for music.

My station was KFRC 610 AM. And my favorite deejay was Dr. Don Rose.

In fact, Dr. Don was the very first famous person I ever met. I found out he was going to be at the Bay Fair Mall (now the Bayfair Center) in San Leandro one weekend, and I told my parents that I had to go meet him.

True, he wasn't a superhero, but he got to make goofy jokes on the radio AS HIS JOB. For the younger me, that was a dream job.

Well, it still is, I suppose, but I digress.

It's packed away, but I still have the publicity photo he signed for me. I was nervous to meet him, partly because for so long I'd heard him as this booming voice on my radio, as well as hosting various TV shows on one of the local stations. The other part was, as I often say, I was very shy.

I remember being embarrassed at the time by my dad, who was telling him his jokes were all right, but he needed to not repeat them all the time.

I was thinking as we walked out of The Cascades into the rest of the mall, Dad, you don't tell Dr. Don how to be funny! But I didn't say anything, of course.

He struck me as a hell of a nice guy; he didn't act put out in the slightest having to talk to a little kid like me, and he made me feel like I was just as important as everyone else.

Dr. Don died a few years back, alas, but thanks to the Internet, you can still hear him, or in the case below, see him: