Goodbye, productivity

Okay, Batman: Arkham Asylum is awesomesauce, and Guitar Hero 5 is pretty friggin' cool, too. Next week, Beatles: Rock Band comes out, and a week after that (I think), Marvel Ultimate Alliance 2 comes out.

Where does one go to secure a sugar daddy or mommy?

Nerdgasm

Okay, I may have mentioned this before, but 30 years ago, there was a show on NBC called "Whodunnit?", which was a murder-mystery game show.

I remember seeing just a bit of the show--at the time, I was only 4. The part I remembered was Erik Estrada playing a singer who is electrocuted by his microphone and the incredibly cheesy effect used for the electrocution.

If you skip to about 2:30 in the video below, you'll see the few seconds of footage that has been embedded in my brain for the last three decades.

Now that I've seen it again, hopefully that will open up a little portion of brain that I can use to remember something important, like my kids' birthdays, my cell phone number, or the theme song to "Tic Tac Dough."

Summer vacation is almost over

My unplanned blogging sabbatical is almost at an end. Stay tuned.

Two great tastes that go better together

I don't know why this popped into my head, but I started thinking of ideas for movie/children's book mashups and what some of the titles might be. After sharing with a few friends, I got a few more suggestions (noted in the list below). Here's what I came up with so far:

Harold and the Purple Crayon Go To White Castle

The Last House on the Left Where the Sidewalk Ends

Bob, Ted, Beezus and Ramona

Tales From the Crypt of a Fourth-Grade Nothing

Are You There, God? It's Me, Forrest Gump (Karyne)

Ramona the Braveheart

Goodnight Moon Over Parador

Alexander, and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day After Tomorrow

The Secret Garden State (Karyne)

If You Give a Mouse That Roared a Cookie

Regarding Henry Huggins

The Lion, the Witches of Eastwick, and the Wardrobe

Peter Pan's Labyrinth

Scream, Bunnicula, Scream

One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Big Fish

The Cat People in the Hat

Hush Hush, Sweet Charlotte's Web

Charlie and the Chocolat Factory

I Shot Jesse James and the Giant Peach

Stuart Little Shop of Horrors

Enter The Reluctant Dragon

There's Something About Mary Poppins

Bread and Space Jam for Frances

Anne of the Green Berets

Fried Green Eggs and Ham

The Trouble With Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone

Pat the Brown Bunny

Hop on Monterey Pop

Go, Ghost Dog, Go

The Wonderful Wizard of Zardoz

Ramona and Her Father of the Bride

How the West Was Won Once Upon a Potty

Ramona and Her Mother, Jugs, and Speed

The Cricket Over Tiananmen Square

Nowhere to Heidi

Little House on the Prairie Home Companion

The Best Little Whorehouse on the Prairie in Texas

Meet the Swiss Family Robinsons

The Velveteen Rabbit Test

Ten Little Indians in the Cupboard

The Sisterhood of the Traveling Spongebob Squarepants

A Little Princess Bride

The Cat on a Hot Tin Roof Ate My Gymsuit

The Doll's House on Haunted Hill

A Mighty Wind in the Willows

A Rumble Fish Called Wanda

Batman and The Outsiders

That Was Then, This is Apocalypse Now

The Phantom Tollbooth of the Opera

A Wrinkle Somewhere in Time

Pippin Longstocking

The Call of the Wild Bunch

Single White Fang

Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH Are Coming! The Werewolves Are Here!

Where the Wild Things to Do in Denver When You're Dead Are

The Unsinkable Encyclopedia Brown

Journey to the Center of This Island Earth

20,000 Leagues Under the Sea of Love

Ivanho-tep

What Little Women Want

Rebecca of Sunnybrook Funny Farm

You, Me, and Everyone Poops (Sarah)

Bad News Berenstain Bears (Karyne)

Conducting an experiment

While working this afternoon, I had a random brainfart:

Asslol: That person who keeps sending you LOLcats while you're trying to get work done.

So I sent it out on Twitter to get it into circulation. But I don't have that many followers on Twitter, so it only got repeated a little bit.

Well, that wasn't going to work.

Instead of relying on myself with 200-some-odd followers, I decided to ask a pal who had slightly more followers. In less than 20 minutes, it had already been retweeted 13 times.

Interesting.

Which reminds me:

What plane only flies on weekdays, anyway?

I think my brain just asploded.

Brief conversation with my daughter, aged 19 months

We're in the living room, listening to music. Out of nowhere, Ramona unleashes a burp that rattles the glass on the entertainment center.

"Ramona, what do you say?"

"Nice."

Can you tell she's my daughter?

Watch out for The Villain

I got The Villain from Netflix recently to watch with my son. I saw it when I was his age and dug it a lot. Hey, it was a bunch of cartoony gags and Ann-Margret.

Brody wasn't very interested at first, but the more he recognized the Wile E. Coyote-style shenanigans, he paid more attention until after each one, he'd ask, "Now what is he going to do?"

He was so enthralled by the end that he sat next to me on the couch and said, "Let's watch this together." I'm glad he did, because the look on his face when he saw the last gag of the movie (with some very familiar music for him) was priceless. His jaw was agape, his mouth showing both surprise and happiness.

"You are, I was about to say, no longer eligible."

Actual conversation between me and the missus:

Me: "I think you can only get unemployment for 36 weeks."

Her: "Where did you hear that?"

Me, pausing as I realize the source: "Um, 'Superman 3.'"

Her: "You are such a nerd. When did that movie come out?"

Me: "1983."

Kids, this is why you don't come to me for important, useful information.

Living a charmed life

So not only am I writing a cool project that I love, not only am I seeing "Watchmen" tomorrow night on IMAX, but with my dinner tonight, I had...

a Shamrock Shake.

It's been years. And I didn't have to explain it or anything. It was even on the menu board.

Can I get an amen?

1979: The year the drugs kicked in

I've been doing research for a project I'm doing at work, which just launched last week. If I were a shameless self-promotional whore, I'd post a link to it, but we all know better, don't we?

I'm writing about TV shows--specifically those that make you go WTF? While entering the first batch of shows into my spreadsheet (yes, I'm a hopeless nerd), I noticed a disproportionate number of shows launched in 1979.

Part of this could be that 1979 is where my TV watching really started in earnest, or it could just be that the drugs finally took effect, resulting in really odd show premises.

In "Salvage 1," Andy Griffith plays the owner of a salvage company who decides to build a spaceship so he can salvage junk left on the moon.

"Supertrain" also debuted in 1979. Clearly, this was a banner year for crap.

Coincidentally, my brother was born in 1979. You do the math.

At any rate, I'm really jazzed about this project, and I'm hoping to make a trek out to Southern California to visit the Paley Center for Media and check out their library of old shows. I could practically live there, they've got so much stuff I want to see.

The Force is strong with this one

My son got a glowstick from a birthday party he went to over the weekend. He'd never seen one, so I showed him how it worked. My wife cracked the inner chamber, and as it began to glow, I herded him into the bathroom--the only dark place in the house.

It was a shining green by that point, and it reminded me of the crystal in Superman's rocket from the first Superman movie.

"Check it out, Brody. Just like in 'Superman.'"

He looked at it for a second, then took it from me. He began swinging it around.

"VRRRRMMMMMMM! RMMMMMMMMMMSSHHHHH!"

He then said he wanted a green lightsaber. It was one of those proud dork dad moments.

Start your weekend off right

No, I'm still here, honest...

Siftin' Headquarters has been plagued by a number of rotating illnesses, so I haven't had as much time as I'd have liked to work on things. But everything seems to be quieting down, so things should resume fairly normally in the next day or so.

Button, button, who's got the button?

My wife and I went antiquing this weekend. No, we didn't go around pelting the unsuspecting with flour.

I found lots of interesting pop culture items, only a few of which I could actually purchase.

Here are two buttons I got.

The one on the bottom was clearly a promotional item for Swanson, presumably their line of TV dinners.

But the NBT on NBC button, I have no idea. I'm sure someone out there has a clue. Let me know so I'm not up all night puzzling over it.

Oddest question I've seen in a while

I like the Internet. It makes me seem normal by comparison. Check out this Yahoo Answers question. And no, it's not me.

Of Sesame Street and 70s sitcoms

I've been up to my eyeballs in old TV shows lately, and while watching an episode of Three's Company, I was struck by one of those connections that was made in my 4-year-old brain. I finally realized who Mrs. Roper reminded me of when I was a kid.

Now, I wouldn't necessarily make this connection now, but these two will always be linked in my head. And while we're on the topic of Sesame Street, I can't see Snuffleupagus without being reminded of another character from another 70s ABC show.

I think it's the eyes. Snuffy and Al Molinaro have those sad eyes.

Still alive...

My computer's power supply took a dump, and I fixed that, only to find that my keyboard crapped out, too.

So in the meantime, enjoy:


Find more videos like this on Geeks!

In no particular order...

I mentioned a while back that I was working on a list of TV shows that are my must-sees, not necessarily because they are supposed to be particularly good, but because they intrigue me for one reason or another.

1. Turn-On

This hyper version of Laugh-In aired exactly once (Feb. 5, 1969) before being axed like Lizzie Borden's parents. The premise was that it was hosted by a computer that was ostensibly responsible for offering up the scatter-fire comedy sketches, blackouts and gags. Each week's show would have a guest star, and in the only episode that aired, Tim Conway was the unlucky guest.

So poorly received was this show that some ABC affiliates canceled the show midway through. How could I not want to see this?

2. Supertrain

You can learn everything you want about this "Love Boat on a train" NBC flop at the awesome Supertrain Web site.

3. The Ugliest Girl in Town

This 60s show featured love and cross-dressing. Oddly, it didn't catch on and was canceled after a few months. Who'da thunk?

4. Whodunnit?

Okay, technically, I saw this one, but as it was only on in April and May on 1979, I was only 4, so I don't have a total mental record of it. In fact, the only reason I want to see it is because of the only part I remember.

Here's TV.com's summary:

Three contestants competed in this short-lived prime time game show. First, a mystery was presented in two acts. If by after the 2nd act a contestant locks in a suspect and is correct, that player wins $10,000.

Then the interrogation round begins as experts questions the witnesses. Then the contestants can lock in a suspect for $5,000. The suspect is revealed & payoffs are paid. If you're wrong, your consolation prize was a color TV.

All I remember is one episode that featured Erik Estrada. I don't know if he was supposed to be a rock star, but I remember seeing him grab a microphone and getting electrocuted with a cheesy over-the-top electrical effect.

For 30 years that memory has been lodged in my brain. I finally found out that it came from this show only a few years ago. The major problem is that it only had a handful of episodes, and no my knowledge, was never rerun.

I can only hope that some early tech adopter out there had a VCR and taped the show, because that may be my only chance to see it again and expunge it from my memory.

I keep checking the various video sites like YouTube in hopes that someone will upload one of these. I'm sure it's just a matter of time.

After all, misery loves company.