Ready for the big Season 4 debut tonight? I’m getting ready by watching the “premiere” from last night that was essentially a “Pop-Up Video” version of the Season 3 finale. It’s just one of the many ways that ABC is trying to get viewers back to a show that was once the hottest thing on TV.
I already mentioned the viral campaign but they didn’t stop there. Here’s something called LOST: Missing Pieces that look like little deleted scenes that show a couple plot points or intriguing interactions that hadn’t been shown before. Or maybe they were shot recently specifically for this campaign. I’d guess the latter since newer names appear on the credits like Brian K. Vaughan. Nothing spectacular but there’s a couple of interesting tidbits and head scratchers that might be worth a look.
Let’s talk about LOST, the big premiere, and the questions and answers that are coming at us or not addressed yet. I’ll give ya the usual Sock Point bribe to do so.
Today saw the release of the final issue of Y: The Last Man. For those missing out, this is the story of a world where something wipes out every man on Earth… almost. Yorick Brown’s the only one left. Over the last five years, we’ve seen his efforts to survive, find his girlfriend, and attempt to save humanity from extinction. Soon, the entire run will be available in trade paperback form and can be purchased from your local bookstore. Even if you’re not into comics, I highly suggest you give it a try.
I came across something strange today, or at least I thought it was strange. Maybe you won’t think so, we’ll see. I was at an employment agency today filling out paperwork and taking tests to determine my basic office skills and working knowledge of computer programs. I’ve been through similar stuff before so that didn’t really surprise me. But then I got to a part that did: math problems.
I guess I can see the point of testing basic math skills. Or seeing the problem-solving skills that come through working through an algebra formula. But these were some strange intermediary level problems like 48.6 divided by 18 and 825 times 64. (I know these because I still have the scrap paper they gave me to work on.) Of course, you had to solve these without a calculator. I spent most of the time trying to reacquaint myself with long division and multiple integer multiplication, if that’s what it’s called.
Listen, I’m not applying to be an engineer or programmer or math teacher or anything that would require such knowledge. If my job depends on multiplying large numbers and the power’s out and my cell phone (that has a calculator function built in) is gone and there’s no laptop nearby (with a calculator application installed standard) and there’s no actual calculator around, your business is in so much trouble that knowing the answer ain’t gonna do much.
Am I wrong or is that something every company should test potential employees on?
This is Dana Jacobson, ESPN employee. Maybe it’s Jacobsen. Hard to tell because she wasn’t that big of a deal until recently.
At a roast for co-workers Mike Greenberg and Mike Golic in January 2008, an intoxicated Jacobson cursed the University of Notre Dame. ESPN has released a statement apologizing for any offense given to the Notre Dame Football program while not specifically addressing the remarks that Jacobson made nor releasing any video or transcripts of her remarks.
So she got kicked off the air for a week and apologized this morning before coming back on the air for her regular show. It was a pretty big deal for some people and sports satire sites. There was even a protest for some reason.
So let me get this straight: She got drunk and swore and said immoral things. At a roast. Uh huh. Yeah, how dare she. For those unaware, a roast is “an event in which an individual is subject to publicly bearing insults, praise, outlandish true and untrue stories, racial stereotypes and heartwarming tributes.” Maybe the company shouldn’t be mad at her so much as themselves. Maybe having a big to-do like a Roast isn’t a good idea for a Disney-owned property. And maybe you shouldn’t be surprised that your employees act exactly like every other roaster since roasting was invented. And maybe an odd time like an 8th anniversary isn’t the time to pull out all the stops for such an elaborate event.
Speaking of ESPN, today’s Sock Point will be won through trivia: name the person behind Jason and Randy on the Cheap Seats depth chart.
I talk about so much stuff on this blog, I don’t always have original pictures to compliment the post. For example, I used this guy’s picture of a poster promoting 24 Season 6. If you go there, you can see the blogger seemed a little bummed I talked more about the fact that it was a really cool poster and not so much about the actual photograph. It was a good solid picture but, let’s be honest, I needed it for the subject matter rather than the perspective.
Well, now I’m seeing who’s using my pictures or how people are getting to said pictures thanks to the new Flickr stats. Not too long ago, SportsByBrooks used one of mine. Pretty hilarious considering they had to censor the actual image since it was swear word that made it onto an NFL playoff telecast.
And the picture I put up there? Turns out it’s popular amongst the nerd crowd for seeing the Terminator skeleton. Yep, I’m the one stop shop for nerd info. Can’t wait to see who comes looking for my pictures next.
“Just move the food around and the turkey will reveal itself to you.”
I guess it was bound to happen that this sort of open-ended line would eventually come to pass. That it happened in such a dramatic fashion in a conference championship game… that was impressive. This has been around for most of the week but Maderer sent it to me so he gets a point.
You can send me a YouTube link and if I like it (or need it) enough to put it up here, Sock Point to you.
Feel free to send your suggestions to my gmail account. It’s woodmania. I’d type it out but I don’t need more junk mail. Just your YouTube suggestions.
I’m a big fan of Stephen Colbert’s work. His show is great and I’ve loved his voice overs on Harvey Birdman, Ace & Gary, and, of course, the Venture Brothers. So I was crestfallen when I heard this news: Stephen Colbert blew off the Venture Brothers guys. Apparently, they were trying to get Colbert to come back for his recurring role as Professor Impossible. (Watching Ice Station Impossible now… great stuff.) Not only they were blown off but when they finally received word back from Colbert’s camp, it was some assistant saying:
Stephen has neither the time nor the interest in participating in your project.
Ouch. A simple “no thank you” would have sufficed. This news is a couple weeks old and I was hoping that Stephen, himself, would have done something by now. Even if he doesn’t sign up for another appearance on Venture Brothers, I’d like to think he would have given the show’s producers a better answer than his assistant did.
“It looks more like he’s gonna drink eggs and crap… eggs.”
I clearly have nothing important today. This is just a dumb observation while randomly scrolling through Wikipedia. Press Your Luck Wikipedia entry is really big. I mean, there’s a lot of very important stuff that’s not even half the size of the entry that breaks down the use of the Whammy.
I joined a club this week that I never wanted to be a part of before. I saw those dreaded Red Rings of Death on my console. Yep, my Xbox 360 died. Considering the thing was not built to handle normal operating conditions, it was only a matter of time. And the Best Buy replacement plan that worked so well for Eric no longer works. I guess since Microsoft has issued a “recall” condition for most of the 360s they shoddily built, so I couldn’t just pick up a new one when I dropped it off. Which is too bad because that’s what the deal was when I bought the plan. So, it’s gonna be a while before I get reimbursed for my troubles.
Hopefully, Microsoft has actually gotten around to fixing the problem they probably should have done before they released the next generation of gaming. Otherwise, I’m going to have to get used to shipping my game console back to the manufacturers. Or get a Playstation 3.
