Tuesday, November 27, 2007
The landlord
Today the landlord asked if I had any friends looking for an apartment, because he has two vacancies. I could have answered, "What kind of friends do you think I have?" Yeah, I know about those vacancies, he evicted two people I got along with just fine, but who the landlord thinks were a problem to other tenants. He wants tenants like me. Presumably, that means quiet, middle-aged white guys who would live here because they don't have a whole lot of options. I have complaints:For one, the schlemiel upstairs who can't take a bath without splashing half the water on the floor, staining my ceiling tiles & dripping on to my bathroom floor. I said to the landlord, "I can't very well go up there & teach him how to wash himself."
***
The Tonight Show is reaching way back for repeats, pre-makeover, when Leno was doing the program pretty much the same as Carson did it, with the heavy curtain. He had a more interesting band led by Wynton Marsalis, playing jazz standards during breaks. Marsalis was too cool for the job, didn't laugh loud enough at the boss's lame monologue. Bill Clinton fast food jokes were a staple. In a 1992 appearance, Tom Hanks (looking about 20 years old) told a long, pointless story, but told it well. Since then he's learned (probably at Letterman's suggestion) that it's better to have the show's writers prepare or punch up material. From 1993, a rail-thin, 26 year old Julia Roberts demonstrated how boring she is. They oughta rerun Johnny Carson. Too bad we can't see some of Letterman's totally screwball Late Nights from the 80's. The spirit of those carried over into his first few years at CBS.
"If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be." Thomas Jefferson
***
The Tonight Show is reaching way back for repeats, pre-makeover, when Leno was doing the program pretty much the same as Carson did it, with the heavy curtain. He had a more interesting band led by Wynton Marsalis, playing jazz standards during breaks. Marsalis was too cool for the job, didn't laugh loud enough at the boss's lame monologue. Bill Clinton fast food jokes were a staple. In a 1992 appearance, Tom Hanks (looking about 20 years old) told a long, pointless story, but told it well. Since then he's learned (probably at Letterman's suggestion) that it's better to have the show's writers prepare or punch up material. From 1993, a rail-thin, 26 year old Julia Roberts demonstrated how boring she is. They oughta rerun Johnny Carson. Too bad we can't see some of Letterman's totally screwball Late Nights from the 80's. The spirit of those carried over into his first few years at CBS.
