There's Nothing to Watch @ 11:30

[Vidiot's photos]

To tell you the truth I haven't noticed the ongoing WGA strike much the last couple of weeks. New programming is usually a little scarce this time of year anyway with nothing but repeats until after the holidays.

But I often watch The Late Show with David Letterman @ 11:30, and if it's not a work night, follow it with The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson.

Needless to say it's been repeat hell.

However I have found a bit of relief through The Late Show Writers On Strike site.

The site is both a blog on how the strike is progressing as well as some quite funny bits about the strike how it is effecting everyone.

A sample:

Friday, November 30, 2007:
AN INSIDE LOOK AT THE NEGOTIATIONS
BY TOM RUPRECHT

As you may know, the writers and producers were back at the negotiating table this week. While the talks were shrouded in secrecy, a friend of mine on the inside agreed to give me a snippet of what went on.

WGA REPRESENTATIVE: All we're asking for is a small percentage of the billions our work has made for you.

STUDIO REPRESENTATIVE: Go fuck yourself.

MODERATOR: I think we're making some progress.

There are also a whole load of videos. This is my fav:



If you watch the show you'll know that Rupert Jee is usually pretty reserved and maybe even a bit shy, so this video seems (at least to the viewing public) quite out of character.

Have a look I think you'll be both educated and amused - a great combination.

Dogs Love Snow...

This month I'm spending all my work time on the computer. We are migrating 900 of VPL's webpages over to a new site using ExpressionEngine

I'm enjoying it (quite a bit actually [GEEK!]), but after 8 hours of keyboarding the urge to blog ain't there.

So for some filler I bring you dogs! who! love! snow!





Fun fact - Searching for snow dog on YouTube gets you 7,640 results (subject to change)

Ok. get your insulin ready:



Fun fact #2 - searching for dachshund snow on gets you 65 hits. Not enough I say.



And back for a repeat performance - Brat in the snow.




And what do I think about snow?



Although this snow is kinda fun.

(P.S. the new VPL site will be launching in the new year)

A Century In Video - 1913

During the 1913 California State Fair a couple of locomotives were launched towards each other (on the same track) going 90 miles per hour.

I guess they wanted to see what would happen, the best reason to try anything I think.

Well what happened is they broke the trains.



There is a longer version on the Internet Archive courtesy of the Preminger Archives (For some reason I couldn't successfully embed the 2nd video)

I could imagine that if someone was on one of those trains (with a video camera from the future), it would have looked a bit like this:



The only info I can find informs me that this is a BNSF accident due to a switching error. The worst injury was a broken leg. I think the video camera died though.

If you look closely you'll see someone jump from the oncoming train at -24 seconds. I guess that who got the broken leg.

God I'm chipper tonight.

Ok. Fine. Have some cute. Seven minutes, 41 seconds of Cute Knut



Happy?

Fruitcake... NOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

[ gnuf's photos]

I. Do. Not. Like. Fruitcake!

But then, who does?

It surprises me that there is still a viable market for fruitcake. A Google search brings up about 207,000 hits for fruitcake, and not one of the hits on the first page is negative. In fact one of the links is the pro-fruitcake Society for the Protection and Preservation of Fruitcake.

Sigh

I was perusing the newest videos at Will It Blend when I found this one:


[Will It Blend? - Holiday Hassles]


The fruitcake makes quite the mess.

This video is actually just a glorified ad for Bill Me Later and its subsite Operation Fruitcake

Operation Fruitcake doesn't have a lot of material yet, but it looks promising. Only 3 videos up so far. I like this one:

[Operation Fruitcake - Incinerator]


Just out of curiosity I Googled I hate fruitcake and came up with 266,000 hits. However on closer inspection there seems to be a lot of sites along the line of fruitcake for people who hate fruitcake

Here is a genuine fruitcake hater - bless him!

The I Hate Fruitcake Hate Page

While conducting my in-depth reserch for this post I ran across the videos of Marie Rudisill, "Ask the Fruitcake Lady" from the Tonight Show.

I had forgotten about her videos. Here's a classic:

[This LADY loved CAKE and FRUIT]


And to finish, an anti-fruitcake classic:

[Grandma's Killer Fruitcake]


And btw. A YouTube search for fruitcake gets you 694 results.

Colbert Vs. Daily Show...

The writers for The Colbert Report and The Daily Show have not been sitting on their asses during the WGA strike.... Well, actually they have been sitting on their asses, but they've been entertaining and educating us at the same time.

Have a look at these two amusing and informing videos:

From the Daily Show writers:




And from the Colbert Report writers:




Both videos found on the United Hollywood site.

Btw - I wonder if Vancouver's own Judy Rogers has seen the pic @ the top of this page. Maybe she could become pals with Moonves and hope for some trickle down.

Speaking of Moonves, or more specifically his wife Julie Chen. It looks like CBS may bring back Big Brother a bit early to cover their butts during the strike. Isn't it handy when the show's host is married to the network president?