By now you all have heard about this very unsurprising turn of events as Republican soccer mom Sarah Palin's campaign rhetoric regarding her pregnant daughter's shotgun wedding plans just blew up in her face.
The now 18-year-old Bristol Palin and baby daddy 19-year-old Levi Johnston have announced that "some time ago" they decided to break off their engagement and, well, break up altogether.
Memories are still fresh of Sarah Palin on the campaign trail having to face the press as a "family values" mom and deal with her unwed daughter's then-current situation, assuring the masses that the young man intended to marry Bristol after, you know, having knocked her up and everything. Though Palin intended this to reassure conservative voters that right-wing religious values were going to be rigidly adhered to, the speech had "shotgun wedding" written all over it. Few could believe these two teenagers would actually follow through with it, pretty much chuckling that these were basically two kids who made some foolish mistakes like kids do. Problem is, bad timing what with Sarah on the road to the White House and all.
Commentary from the family as of this writing has been sparse, no word from Levi at all, but Bristol says she is "devastated" (contrary to the press reports that this was all decided "some time ago"). I can well imagine, as the prospect of raising her now two-month old daughter with no daddy will impact the religious-family-values / sanctity-of-marriage platform if Sarah Palin runs for anything in 2012.
She'll have to go all grass-roots then with a, "Hey, I'm a regular Joe like you guys with similar family problems," type thing and reassure her religious constituency that anything goes as long as we're not liberal evolutionists or anything.
Since Chris Woods has already sent in his newest "Growing Up Fanboy" column, I decided to go ahead and put up Readers Comments a wee bit early so y'all could hurl some commentary his way. It's a humdinger dealing with his toy collection! QUICK UPDATE UPDATE: Just before I hit the sack Tuesday afternoon, I found ED Tucker's "Retrorama" on MegaCon 2009 posted! Off to a rousing early start this week, folks!
This is probably not a big deal to most of you, but to rabbit-ear TV mavens in the Tampa Bay area on digital-converter boxes, it might be.
Channel 8 "Digital 2" or Channel 8-2 on your remote is where we Tampans found the "Retro Television" station since January. Most of it has been a pleasant surprise, despite only about half the programming hours being devoted to Classic TV, the balance is regular local origination programs and infomercials. Additionally, finding detailed program guides online has been frustratingly elusive, at least for me. I have made a note, however, that depending on the day of the week, I can usually come home from work at sunrise and watch McHale's Navy, Bachelor Father, The Virginian (Sundays-only I think), and Leave it to Beaver.
I discovered while surfing last night (off from work) that between about 1:00am to 3:00am were Alfred Hitchcock Presents and Night Gallery!! I should've made a note exactly what time it was, but I was groggy and didn't think about it. Sorry.
The Hitchcock episode, for which I've forgotten the title, dealt with a leacherous plumber who was into blackmailing the neighborhood ladies. It was amazingly good and holds up really well today despite the dated production values (everything filmed for television at that time was really bright owing to early TV sets' shallow contrast ratios). Hitchcock's bumper spots still tickle the funny bone.
The Night Gallery was a two-for-one. The first 20-minute spot, "The Funeral" starred Joe Flynn and Werner Klemperer as a funeral director and his client, respectively, the latter, a vampire making strange requests for his final burial. The second spot, under 10 minutes, "Nature of the Enemy" starred Joe Campanella as a director at NASA trying to find out what happened to a space crew after they crash-landed on the moon. Hint: Rats!
"The Funeral," written by the always-dependable Richard Matheson, was played mostly for laughs in the delightful creature-feature way, and "Nature of the Enemy," written by Rod Serling, had a wonderfully campy comic-book ending. Seeing Rod Serling introduce the show was additional fanboy bliss.
I got terribly ill this morning and it involved hurling chunks, so my voice is shot at the moment. I'm only telling you this because that will delay the new The World of Nolan video by at least a day, maybe two.
Please consider making a donation to help support Crazed Fanboy! Click on the "donate" link below and give whatever you can. I sincerely thank you for any and all consideration.---Nolan
"
