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Pardon me for being a little incoherent this evening, but I just had to review a couple of hours of radio programming, and it wasn't exactly the kind of stuff I'd choose to enjoy if I wasn't doing it for work. I'd describe them to you, but that would be unfair- that's a separate job for a separate time.

But when I have to do that- it's what I have to do as a Big Time Radio Consultant Guy- it means that I have to be disconnected from the rest of the world. I understand the Astros won, but I didn't watch an inning. There's the Kerry "nuisance" thing, but I haven't had time to write anything about it, and by now, everyone else has weighed in on it- damn you, Speedy Hewitt! Curses, Powerline!- and all I can say is, er, yeah, whatever they said. Or something. And if you're here for more radio ranting, check out the entries below- today, I don't trust myself to say anything, lest I NEVER WORK IN THIS GODFORSAKEN BUSINESS AGAIN.

So I'm dry right now, my brain cells wilted from listening to radio shows from many, many miles away. I'll give y'all this: that bulge in Bush's jacket in the first debate that so many of Our Friends On the Left are jumping up and down over? Receiver of signals from the home planet. Or one of those ridiculous canteen things weekend warrior runners and bikers wear on their backs. Or Dick Cheney's secret hiding place. Or the electroshock panel by which Karl Rove controls every movement, because he's TAKING OVER THE WORLD ha ha ha ha haaaaaaaa...

You know, paranoid pals, it really didn't make a lot of difference. You're working too hard. Everyone is. I am. Just calm... the frick... down.

I will note, however, that while Lileks believes that he's been able to review the new "The Office" specials before anyone else (in Tuesday's Bleat), I in fact did so in a brief note on All Access in January. That we don't archive those columns means I can't PROVE it, but I did, watching copies (widescreen! No pesky commercials!) I was able to obtain in a highly secret manner immediately after the shows aired on BBC One on Christmas and Boxing Day 2003. Ha! So there! (Brent goes on painful dating-service-arranged dates, Dawn visits from Florida, Brent does the nightclub circuit, Gareth is a boss, and Tim and Dawn... well, watch it yourself when it airs later this month on BBC America, but the final episodes wrap the series up and leave the characters the way you'd want them to be left. I love that show.)

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I don't normally remember dreams, but here's what I dreamed this morning:

I was in Providence, Rhode Island. (Incidentally, I have never been in Providence, Rhode Island) I was in an office waiting for a license renewal for a TV station. There were other people in the office, walking back and forth and in and out of doors. I saw no faces- just suits, from the neck down. I did not look up. The doors were 1940's office style, the kind where you'd see "SAM SPADE" stenciled on the glass, backwards; the entire office was 1940's style, with one of those half-wall dividers topped with frosted glass. I was looking at a map of the TV station's coverage in the Television Factbook spread on a desk, but for some reason, instead of one big transmitter, the station was a series of about a dozen tiny transmitters covering about a city block each. More men walked in and out of the room, all clad in suits. I still didn't look up. A cat meowed. It was Ella. I was suddenly in bed next to Fran, the alarm clock read 4:55 am. The dream was over.

What the hell was THAT?

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Hmm...

Debate or Yankees-Red Sox? Debate or... Deba....

Play ball!

Actually, I watched both, alternating between the two. That gave me the unique perspective of watching a Kerry statement followed by a response from Pedro Martinez, but when it was all over, nothing surprised me. The Yankees won, and the debate, well...

Look, let's call it for what it is- if you don't know where these guys stand, you probably shouldn't be voting. It couldn't be more clear what each candidate's about. So why bother with a debate? It's all about the gotcha, the hope and prayer that someone will screw up. And neither guy, regardless of what you think about their policies, screwed up. They didn't scream, didn't loudly sigh, didn't start swearing or telling Bob Schieffer (who really, deeply sucked as a moderator) that he was possessed by the spirit of Ramtha. They just talked, and that's it. I couldn't bother to live-blog it, because that would have meant I'd have to watch every word. And I don't care anymore. I don't need a debate.

Simple: you either like Bush or you don't, either trust Kerry or you don't. Bush is either a lying sack who's squandering tax money on, er, the taxpayers or a tough S.O.B. who's the kind of guy we need to fight terrorism. Kerry's either a patrician wuss who needs approval of the French and his wife to take a pee or he's a war hero who can steer the swift boat of America through these rough whatevers. If you haven't formulated your ideas about this by now- forget about deciding on for whom you'll vote, it's simply about for what these guys stand- you can't possibly be for real, and PLEASE, don't go into the voting booth and try to guess.

It's not like these guys are revealing anything of themselves now, anyway. "I have a plan" isn't cutting it for Kerry, mostly because the details of his plans appear to be in the same vault as Saddam's WMDs right now. And Bush can't stammer enough to hide when he really doesn't have an answer for something. But waiting for Bob Schieffer to ask the questions you or I would ask is a waste of time. Something about the moderator's chair sucks the common sense out of those guys.

But it doesn't matter, as I said, because the debates, sans huge gaffes, are pointless. Without the Big Flub, everyone thinks his or her favorite candidate won and the other guy committed all sorts of mistakes. But there was no Big Flub, just two politicians droning. You'd have been better off watching the Red Sox flail at Jon Lieber pitches. Predictable as well, perhaps, but more entertaining.

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Well, that kinda sucked.

The blackout, that is. I was trying my hardest to get my work done early so I could maybe relax a little, hang out with Fran, watch some TV, sleep, and then...

Darkness. Sudden and without warning, except for the post-blip glow of my computer screen and the UPS warning, a British woman's voice calmly announcing "POWER HAS FAILED." I shut down the computer, fumbled for a flashlight, found the Edison number, called in the outage. Fran left for an appointment and I stayed behind in the darkness, squinting at a 2 1/2 inch LCD TV screen at a fuzzy picture of the Astros-Cardinals game from a transmitter in Tijuana.

Doesn't sound so bad, and it wasn't, except for a couple of things- the work thing, for one, which because I had no computer available had to go on hold, and for another, I'm a reader. I have to read. I read a lot. If I'm not reading on the computer screen, I'm reading a book, a magazine, a comic, a newspaper. When I watch TV, I read, too. I read at dinner, in the theater until the movie starts, at the ballpark during a game. That doesn't make me smarter or more special- it just means that I need words in front of me to keep my mind occupied. Without them, I feel lost. And in the darkness, forced to direct full concentration on the little screen, I couldn't. I shut the thing off, and then, nothing. I fidgeted. The silence- no fans, no buzz of computers and TV receivers and washers and dryers- was so complete and enveloping that it was annoying. I just sat there for about 45 minutes, lost, confused, and then I went and got the flashlight and got a comic- Viz- and I started to read, one panel at a time, carefully moving the narrow beam from panel to panel and then...

CLICKwhirrrrr

Light! The light is on! I can see!

And I'm now way, way behind on work.

Relax? Not me, not ever.

I was SO CLOSE to an early evening, too. F'ing substation outage. F'ing Edison. F.

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I have a new favorite TV show. It's called "Eat Bulaga." I am not kidding.

"Eat Bulaga" is a show from the Philippines that's kinda a game show, kinda a dance show, kinda a comedy show, kinda "Sabado Gigante," kinda unintentionally demented, in a hybrid of (mostly) Tagalog and (some) English, with what appears to be an army of hosts, opening with a bizarre theme song and a dance number (today, with a bunch of vaguely Michael Jackson-ish Filipinos in black outfits), followed by a giveaway involving a number combination ("Let's Vault In"- today's prize being Alicia Keys tickets for her Manila concert). Then there's a full-fledged game show segment, "Laban o Bawi," involving waves of contestants answering quiz questions (three contestants at a time), surrounded by cheerleaders.

Right now, someone is saying that the country led by Jacques Chirac with the slogan "Liberty, Equality, Fraternity" is the United States. Brilliant. This woman in the middle got the question right and moved on to the final round of "Laban o Bawi."

She won 70,000 pesos but could have won a million. She looked disappointed. I wonder why.

And there are people playing along at home, too.

And "Number Woman."

And "Pinoy Henyo," another game...

These folks are the "Bomb Squad," not a terrorist insurgency. Imagine everyone's relief.

Oh, have I mentioned the Sex Bomb Girls? Yeah, those are the dancers.

Yhere's a little of everything on "Eat Bulaga." It's been on for something approaching 24 years at noon in the Philippines, and it's on KSCI-TV in Los Angeles every day at 4 pm.

It's weird, it's cheesy, it's excruciating. And it's not to be missed.

Of course, reasonable minds may differ.

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Not too much time for anything but a brief word on today's moviegoing (too much to do, including preparing for getting our house fumigated): "Team America: World Force" is extremely stupid. It's also hilarious and merciless. And foul and disgusting, but in the very best way. Plus, it's a musical. Sort of. And Michael Moore explodes, which is always a good time. The right wing got exercised about this movie before seeing it, but it's more a good hard slap at both sides, especially the Hollywood liberal elite- I imagine Trey and Matt just got fed up with the mindset here and decided to kick everyone in the teeth (or blow their heads off).

If you must see one movie that equates oral sex with one's patriotic duty this year, make it this one. You won't be sorry.

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