Television Blog

Jay Leno, tonight, had Dr Phil McGraw, and he called himself "Mr Accountability". So, in thinking about it, maybe Dr Phil is to Nancy Reagan as Mr Accountable is to Lenny and Squiggy. Or something like that. Sometimes there is a such a useful difference between red states and blue states. Or is it city and country? Or Out West and Back East? Or maybe sports and entertainment? Or between Disney and the UN?

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Living out west is funny sometimes. I lived there for more than two years, and I loved it, I felt it was a home. I lived in LA, but I never went out to Hollywood or anything like that, it wasn't LA as the Southland, it was more like LA as the neighbor of Hawaii, I was living in a world of ethnic awareness and the Asian combination of being efficient and being laid back, something to do with Buddhism.

Kids in southern California, which is known as the Southland on the news and local talk shows and magazine articles, live in a world of cultural tranquility that is so tranquil as to generate an attitude of not going to college, insofar as one seems not to need it as much compared to growing up Back East. Which doesn't make sense, and college in California is almost free anyway. One should have a car, though, the economy there is designed so that one can afford a car, more than here Back East.

People - or dudes - in California are always talking about Back East, it's almost perfectly ridiculous. My parents and grandparents always told me to "Travel when you're young" and I definitely followed that advice. Back East sentiment has something to do with when it rains in Los Angeles, people slow down to a near halt in driving, not really realizing that traffic on 95, and on 5th Avenue and Broadway between stoplights is going at 65 miles an hour no matter what the rain situation is. It's easy to drive in the rain, as easy as driving in the desert.

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I really like the Conan O'Brien show. Tonight there was a good band, I didn't get the name, reminded me of Funeral Oration's Falling Sickness from a Hopeless Records sampler. It is the same sampler that has Officer Krupke from Schlong's West Side Story cover album. I listened to West Side Story a lot because it was one of the records we had upstairs (as opposed to the Charles Mingus, Charlie Parker and Staple Singers records my dad owned and actually took care of). Barry Manilow, John Denver, West Side Story, a Dick van Dyke musical with "tell me quickly about Hugo and Kim", a Carole King children's record that had a song about "and the lion...ate Pierre...", and some other stuff. "Hello Mrs Garfine, is Charity home from school yet, can I speak to Penelope Ann?...". Bye Bye Birdie, I think was the name of the Dick van Dyke musical. I came home in 1978 with a borrowed copy of The Clash, and "Clash City Rockers" sounded so good, I am not really sure what the rest of my family actually thought of it. As far as Boston is concerned, kids there grow up knowing The Clash and Stiff Little Fingers, or so I have read. I am not sure what people in other cities grow up listening to.

I am definitely looking forward to Conan hosting the Tonight Show at 11:35 in 2010. I am a big Jay Leno fan, so I wasn't too impressed, but of course I take it upon myself to mildy complain to myself if there is something I can't figure out or ignore. One shouldn't be ignorant of what one is mildly irritated by. As a film major I thought I should have a decent answer to the question: "What do you think of Jay stepping down? Do you think Conan will carry the show for NBC (for many years)?" The answer is of course "yes", but I thought about it and the answer is still yes.

The difference between Jay and Conan is so funny. Jay is like a pizza place with pretty good pizza, that is always open. If one has ever visited South Boston and sat at a sidewalk cafe place and drank a latte, the tranquility is supernal, kind of like being at my late Irish grandfather's house, except there is coffee and Guinness. It is a short walk from the USS Constitution in Boston. I really like it there, I should visit again soon. I am so familiar with the Irish ways of doing things, I usually get weird looks from people who take me for solid Irish, when I start talking about China. My theory is that people in Europe have never really had airplanes and computers before, what's the point of staying around the house? In the olden days a carriage ride from here to Hartford must have taken more than 20 hours, enough time to land in Hong Kong, eat dinner and get a decent hotel room. My parents sure wouldn't have let me hang around in our backyard day after day, in our suburban town, so to speak. "Isn't the State Track Meet today?" "No, ma, I thought I would jog near our home instead." The world is varsity, not intramural. Travel when you're young.

I wonder what hosts like Conan think about when they put together the monologue. One supposes there should be a comment on Iraq and Iran. Since we live in the internet age, if I were hosting, I would have staff members find a different website (in the Mideast area) every day and put it up and talk about it. I am looking at these sites anyway here at home. In regard to North Korea, North and South Korean sites are also very interesting. One has to find something to say about these international prospects. One isn't exactly sure why late night talk doesn't use the internet during every show. Change is coming. It sounds like a Carson Daly idea. "Here is the Hwipharam, North Korea's version of the Acura or the Town Car, et cetera." It must be easier to write jokes while reading the internet, compared to writing jokes while reading the paper or watching tv.

Knowing Chinese in 2007 is like owning a car in 1898. The more useless crap one hears about it, the more one is resolute towards the future of the vehicle. "Would you like to buy a horse?" "No thank you."