Hang onto your nuts!

Here we go!

(I meant Beer-Nuts.)

Last month I wrote to you regarding that spanking good program, The Antiques Roadshow. The unfortunate side effect of my little article has been that our Monday night social club has been moved to Tuesdays. Worse than that, conversation around the beer cooler has taken a decidedly fru-fru turn. Last night we were actually discussing the patina on Larry's Beer Cans From Around The Bay Area Collection. Now if the cans actually contained beer (not a possibility around these gents) I would estimate their value, at auction, at around forty-seven dollars. That's with the patina intact, mind you.

Okay. Here's a little "Let Me Step Into My Panties Confession:" I am not going to tell you what to watch this month. I'm disgusted with the lot of you. You don't listen anyway. I have come to realize that regardless of what I say, you will continue to fritter away your evenings watching Freakin' Felicity, Dawson's Septic Tank, Party of Geeks, and Beverly Hills 666. Plus a host of other simplistic adolescent nonsense upon which you will judge your lives and relationships. You know who you are, Buckwheat, so let me just tell you something.

While you've been letting your brain turn to the black stuff in the center of a bird's dropping here's what's been going on: Your wife/husband has been bumping uglies with his/her boss in the supply closet; your kid lost her cherry to a forty-year-old, three-hundred-pound alcoholic seamstress named Phil who she met in a chat room; and most tragic of all, you let your freakin' lawn die. I'll bet you ain't serviced your mower all summer. Too busy watching Buffy The Vampire Slayer with your pants around your ankles.

Something evil is happening to television and it's not all David E. Kelley's fault either. If I was banging Michelle Pfeiffer every night, I'd probably have a chronic case of stupid too. Apparently, David's case has gone chronic, as the non-hit Snoops attests. But some other evil entity has hit upon the fact that for many of you, the last time you had any tangible feelings of popularity amongst your peers was in high school. This mysterious and evil entity we'll call "Satan" has created television shows through which you can vicariously relive those golden days, in spite of the fact that the plot lines are so far removed from your own experiences, you might as well be watching naked clowns wrestle. Why would Satan bother doing this? So the communist Chinese can catch us lazy eyed and slack jawed in front of Dawson's Creek and take over the god damn country, of course. Satan loves the communist Chinese.

Now, I've done a little study here and apparently viewers of Dawson's Creek, Felicity and Beverly Hills 90210 fall into two distinct demographics. Single women with cats and men over thirty who haven't been big shots since high school. There are two smaller demographics; men who wear women's panties and women who hate their butts so much they back out of rooms...wait! I'm sorry. That's people who frequent Starbucks. Basically though, we're talking about the people who are going to bend over for the communist Chinese when they finally do invade. I'd like to see them little suckers try and take our little cul-de-sac. Me and the boys will show 'em the proper use of chop sticks! But I digress.

We're going to do some book learning today. Has every one got a T.V. Guide? Okay, every one pick up your T.V. Guide. By the way, if it's over a day old and hasn't got a beer ring on the cover already, you may stop reading now. Your probably tired of scratching your head and besides, you move your lips when you read and it's distracting. The rest of you open the T.V. Guide and let's look up any week night between the hours of 8:00 PM and 11:00 PM. Skip over the article about Matt Lauer from The Today Show. "How Does Matt Lauer Handle Being So Adorable?" it says. Now that's of vital concern to us poor folks. "How does Matt Lauer handle butt sex with Bryant Gumbel" is more like it. (Opps, substitute Golf for butt sex. That's what I meant to say.) How's the fit on those panties, Matt? Snug enough for ya? Too big? Perhaps toddler size would be more appropriate.

Okay, let's just start flipping through here. Okay! This is what I'm talking about. Who the hell is watching Get Real at 9:00PM on channel 2? "As a rumor floats around Truman High that Meghan is pregnant, Cameron gives Kenny advice on how to get to the next level with Rebecca Peabody." Unless the "next level" is where they model Victoria's Secret lingerie while shooting heroin with naked clowns, I fail to see why anyone over the age of thirteen should give a damn. (Now there's a pitch for a show.) I'd show you how to get to the next level with Rebecca Peabody, Kenny, but you'd spit up your Spaghetti-O's. And how about that title. Get Real. I've often thought there must be a barrel full of names for shows and T.V. movies. Whenever a new one comes out, the producer reaches into the barrel and voila! Let's call it, Not Without My Dog: A Moment Of Truth Movie. Starring Calista (Gesundheit!) Flockhart (God bless you!) as the Scarecrow. "While on a trip to France, a scarecrow's dog is kidnapped by Guamanian terrorists."

Speaking of Calista (Gesundheit!) Flockhart (God bless you!), is anyone still watching Ally McBeal? I admit I watched religiously the first season, sucked in by the bountiful bunch of bodacious babes. But eventually, not even the wondrous bosoms of Lisa Nicole Carson could help me to endure the horror that is Gil Bellows, known to viewers as Billy. I came to loathe Billy to such a degree I would rent The Shawshank Redemption just to see Gil Bellows get shot to death. I suffered him a bit longer when Portia de Rossi joined the cast as Nelle. This woman possesses the most beautiful hair ever to grace the small screen. In fact, of the top 100 greatest television moments, as compiled by yours truly, the first is Neil Freakin' Armstrong walking on the freakin' moon. But the second is the episode of Ally McBeal when Portia de Rossi undid that little bun and let down her hair for the first time. To you gentlemen who witnessed this, I need say no more. I saw some of you at the hospital that night. To the rest of you, I should explain I suffered a rather debilitating erection and ended up in an emergency room ice bath. The loss of blood to my brain damn near killed me.

I don't usually respond that way to flat chested women and I'm of a mind that men who do just haven't owned up to their homosexuality. I'll add to that that they should. More broads for the rest of us. Portia de Rossi is flatter than the cat on my left rear tire, (Sorry about your cat, Larry) and incredibly, it doesn't matter. This is the power of her hair. Of course, bearing in mind what I've said about flat chested women and the men who love them, I wouldn't throw Calista (Gesundheit!) Flockhart (God bless you!) out of bed for eating...well, nothing. Mainly because she'd probably slip through a crack in the floor. Has she signed up to do the next Karen Carpenter bio pic yet? Skin and Bones - The Karen Carpenter Story: A Moment Of Truth Movie. "During her tragic last days, pop sensation Karen Carpenter chases Guamainian terrorists in a desperate search for her kidnapped dog." Starring Calista (Gesundheit) Flockhart (God Bless You!) as The Scarecrow.

I turned off Ally McBeal for the final time when the chronically stupid David E. Kelley paired up my Portia de Rossi romantically with the freakish and effeminate Peter MacNicol, who plays John Cage. It was more than I could stand. It was more than plausibility could stand as well.

Now that Homicide: Life on the Street has gone and joined the tribe called "Great Shows No One Watched That Were Subsequently Canceled," prime time television is a wasteland. In fact, this season there's a program called Wasteland. The plot should involve television programming but more likely, it's about a group of moronic thirty year olds still trying to figure stuff out. Now I can hear what your saying because I've got dog ears and your squeaky panty boy voices do not escape me. Danny! What about The Sopranos? What about Sex In The City? What about the freakin' History Channel? Well, I don't know what about 'em, Johnson, because I haven't got freakin' cable. I've got the same stations you and I grew up with and I pull them from the air for free. Perhaps you grew up with cable television. Well, bully for you and your freakin' silver spoon! When I was a kid we put an open shoe box on the table with plastic army men inside and a radio behind it and that was our freakin television. And we were happy to have it!

I suppose the worst thing about all these stupid shows is that there are those among you that are not satisfied with watching these morons make their lives more complicated than they need to be. You for some reason feel the need for an ever increasing amount of drama in your own lives and so create situations and follow thought processes that match the ridiculousness of television. Thus you are further sucked into the Dark Master's plans for the communist Chinese and your gated community. I realize that was an intellectual stretch for me. That doesn't make it any less true. What I'm saying is, Grow the hell up! There is good television on. There are a very few good shows on television that need your support. You don't have to watch them. Just turn the television on and do something productive. Read a book other than the T.V. Guide. Better yet, mow your lawn! It looks terrible. And don't scalp it for Peter's sakes! Keep it at least two inches until things cool off a bit. Now turn on The Practice. Turn on Sports Night. Turn on Who's Line Is It Anyway? Turn on PBS! I know I wasn't going to tell you what to watch. What can I say. It's my job.

F---Billy!

Daniel J. Barbeau, the man who dares to speak the truth about television, lives quietly in Northern California with an endless supply of TV Guides and a great satellite dish.

Got a problem? Email Danny at filmmonthly@hotmail.com