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Donovan McNabb just threw up on the field again. Perhaps it's a delayed reaction to how poorly the Eagles played for most of the first three quarters.
Even if they manage to come back and beat Tampa Bay, there's no excuse for how bad they've been. No excuses.
ShareIt was 21-20 with four seconds left when the Sirius satellite signal cut out as Tampa Bay was setting up for a 61 yard field goal. And the signal didn't return until after the play.
I'm kinda glad, actually, that I didn't have to hear that. I might have put the car in a canyon.
But the Eagles didn't deserve to win, regardless of the comeback. The moronic play at the end of the first half- didn't go for a field goal, didn't throw into the end zone- and the McDougle penalties didn't help. And special teams allowing a 37 yard return on the final kickoff is inexcusable.
If Andy Reid "takes responsibility" at the press conference again, Jeff Lurie should walk in and fire him on the spot. Come to think of it, fire him anyway. Cut McDougle while you're at it. And perhaps it's time to re-evaluate Jim Johnson's genius- clearly, the rest of the league knows what he's up to by now. The only reason I can't say the season's over right now is that the Giants, Cowboys, and Redskins all suck, too, but none of the four teams deserves to be anywhere close to the playoffs.
On the bright side, my Sunday schedule will open up a little more now.
Share"Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip" is on tonight. We won't be watching. We watched the first few episodes of "Studio 60."
We'll never get those hours back.
The reasons we're not going to continue watching the show are numerous- terrible, phony scripting, look-how-smart-I-am references, those wretched show-within-a-show "comedy" sketches that made it apparent that Aaron Sorkin has no sense of humor. But it still takes a lot to get a show removed from the DVR list.
We record a bunch of stuff to watch when we have time. All three "CSI"s make the cut. "South Park" makes it. So does "House," and "Entourage" when it's on (although it teetered close to getting yanked this season). "Desperate Housewives" still makes the list for Fran, as do "Boston Legal" and "Grey's Anatomy." But this season, there's a lot less to watch. I noticed this recently when i sat down, fired up the DVR, and found practically nothing to watch. Last year, there was more on the must-see list. This year, eh. We have Ted Danson's sitcom on the record list- it's not very good, but we started recording it on the off chance it was funny and it's not, but it's not bad enough to delete yet. We haven't had time for the American version of "The Office," and the brilliance of the British original casts a long shadow over it, but maybe we'll start back up with that, even if Steve Carell will never be Ricky Gervais. But there's no real breakout sitcom, no new compelling drama, nothing making us take notice.
Which is why deleting a show is a momentous occasion. It requires a show to be terribly disappointing or truly terrible, and "Studio 60" managed to satisfy both counts. I'm not upset at having that hour back, though. Maybe I'll use it for something radical. Like reading.
ShareIt's been a long, busy day involving many phone calls and much breaking news, so I'm beat, and all I have for you is this trifle:
In the immortal words of Navin Johnson, the new phone book's here! The new phone book's here! Behold, a relic of the stone age:
Does anyone actually use one of these things anymore? Doesn't everyone use the Net, or some 411 app on their cell phones? Maybe not, because when faced with plumbing or other emergencies, the first impulse is still to use the phone book. But otherwise, I can't remember the last time I've used one of these things.
Throw it on the heap of the obsolete with the VCR and the slide rule- they still work, yes, but there are better ways to get the job done. Good thing, too; as my ability to read tiny type diminishes with age, the necessity of doing so to look up a number diminishes, too. Timing is everything.
No, we're not listed.
ShareI used to like rain delays. Back then, they didn't throw it back to the studio right away- they'd have the announcers stall, vamp for a half hour or more, tell baseball stories and jokes and rope in whoever was wandering by in the press box, and for a few fleeting moments it made those guys seem human while the flop sweat beaded up on their foreheads.
They don't do that anymore. Tonight, instead of Joe and Tim and Jeannie and Kevin filling time- you'd even pay to watch Tim McCarver juggling or Joe Buck spinning plates on sticks- Fox gave us something far, far worse.
"The War At Home."
I'd rsther watch the rain. More laughs that way.
ShareThis week's All Access newsletter looks at what that White House talk radio tent mishegas says about the industry. It aint pretty, in my humble and probably misguided opinion:
A bunch of talk radio hosts went to the White House the other day for one of those "Radio Day" things, and I guess that if you're a political talker in an important election year, it would seem like a no-brainer to accept the invitation and attend. If I did a political talk show and I thought it would be a chance to get the President or at least some of the big names- Condi, Rummy, Rove- to sit down for an interview I might have considered it.
But I think it would have been a mistake. Not for a host, personally, that is- hey, it's a free trip to D.C. and you get to talk to Tony Snow- but for the listeners, and for your image. First, the listeners: do they really want to hear Paul McNulty or Stephen Hadley talk up the administration's positions? (Who? Exactly.) Is that entertaining? Because that's a large part of your job. What would make it entertaining is to ask the kind of questions that get you an armed escort off the grounds, but that's not worth the hassle. And if your show's made up of quick interviews with people of whom your listeners have never heard, well, at least they're quick, but as a listener, I'd be outa there the moment I heard "Deputy White House..." If "Deputy" isn't followed immediately by "Fife" or "Dawg," I'm not interested.
Now, the image. There's that perception of talk radio as an "angry white conservative guy" medium that gets its talking points from the Republican National Committee. And I've told reporters who've asked about that the truth: we do get press releases and "talking points" memos from all sides, but in my experience they tend to go right into the trash, because we don't need them. Hosts who don't have an opinion until someone faxes or e-mails them what they should think won't last long in the business. Most hosts do intense show prep and read and watch and hear a lot of news and opinion before they go on the air- they aren't taking "marching orders" from anyone. But then there's an event like this, or that private White House meeting with the top conservative hosts last month, and the spin that shows up in the papers is that it's a gathering of the troops and proof that talk radio must be just a phony political front. AP's story led with Rove "gushing with optimism" to the radio hosts. The Washington Post referred to the event as part of a political strategy. The coverage made talk radio seem like a political tool.
But that's not fair, you say? Some of the hosts have been critical of the White House? Some even asked tough questions? All true, but that's beside the point. Perception may not be everything- and, truthfully, what the newspapers say means less and less with every lost subscriber- but do you really want to be seen as beholden to anyone? Isn't independence from any organization or government or overlord better for how people perceive you, no matter what your politics are? I don't know. Maybe not. But that's how I feel about these things. A one-on-one, no-restrictions interview is one thing, but these invite-only, group-hug staged events don't do anything to make the public feel that talk radio is its own master.
Besides, if your intent is to get the benefit of being shown in close proximity to famous people, you're selling yourself short. You're on the radio. YOU'RE a celebrity. Let the interview subjects come to YOU instead of being herded into a tent. Do TV hosts have to go to "TV Day" at the White House to get interviews? And if you can't get the interviews otherwise, do you really NEED them? (OK, we're back to the entertainment thing again. You get the point.)
I don't intend to be too hard on the hosts who went- hey, if the White House calls, I guess the strongest inclination is to go, and there was the off-chance that Bush himself might stop by (he didn't). But I don't think I'd have gone. Not that they'd have invited me.
But whether you stay home or go to D.C., you still have a show to do, and if you're not hobnobbing with Karl Rove in a tent, you have to do show prep, which is when you'll want to head on over to All Access News-Talk-Sports and the truly independent and somewhat helpful Talk Topics column, where you'll find topic starters, kicker stories, and conversation pieces galore. So far this week, those would include an allegedly foul-mouthed doll, how McDonald's intends to get you to hang out there all day drinking coffee and writing your screenplay like that other place, why cremating a 600 pound guy is fraught with peril, a mascot who allegedly sank his teeth into a rivalry, what not to order at a bar in St. Louis, how much college is really worth, why a particular children's book hero is not an appropriate Halloween costume subject at one school, a better use for TMX Elmo, why Deputy Shaq is in a little bit of trouble, more proof that political campaigns just plain suck, how and w hy some airplane passengers became unwitting subjects of a very dangerous test, and why the Chicken Noodle isn't just a soup anymore. You also get "real news" items and commentary about the elections and court rulings and pelicans swallowing pigeons, so there's that, plus "10 Questions With..." syndicated host Jim Sumpter and the Talent Toolkit with some sites about some holiday that's coming up, and the rest of All Access with the industry's first/fastest/best news coverage, the extensive Industry Directory for finding the names and addresses of everyone in the business, Mediabase charts to find out what's hot on music radio, and interviews with a guy I used to work with and a guy my wife used to work with, neither of whom mention us (not that there was any reason to do so). It's all free, too.
Next week: The insane rantings of someone who ate a lot of leftover Halloween candy. Don't miss it.
ShareI'd comment on the large volume of responses I got to yesterday's newsletter/post, but today is allergy day and I've got that feeling like some furry creature has taken up residence in my sinuses. The winds are blowing and it's hot- they must be Santa Anas, because the brown gunk that usually sits atop the basin and Valley is now hovering over the ocean and Catalina like a crust. Meanwhile, for most of the day, the workmen next door were blasting Jack-FM from San Diego loud enough to shake the windows, and it was hard- very hard- to concentrate while some lame Fleetwood Mac song is vibrating the room. Under these circumstances, I just don't have the brain power and energy to write much more today.
So I won't.
ShareThe Santa Ana Wind-borne allergy headache remains unaffected by the Benadryl thrown at it, and the computer's already shut down for the evening, so, via cell phone, I'm here to blow off another day's postings.
We did go see "Maria Antoinette," the entirety of which boils down to one line muttered by Jason Schwartzman, something to the effect of "We're too young to rule." That's about it, except for the stylishness and the music, which includes Gang of Four, Siouxsie, Bow Wow Wow, and the like, which somehow fits the 18th Century Versailles setting. Yeah, it's "I Was A Teenage Monarch," but in a good way.
And now I have to go and tend to my throbbing sinuses, so please excuse me. Perhaps more Benadryl is in order.
ShareThis page contains all entries posted to PMSimon.com in October 2006. They are listed from oldest to newest.
October 15, 2006 - October 21, 2006 is the previous archive.
October 29, 2006 - November 4, 2006 is the next archive.
Many more can be found on the main index page or by looking through the archives.
