11/28/04: Things I noticed or thought about while watching VH1 Classic over Thanksgiving weekend*

1. Why was Jack Blades the sole face of Night Ranger?  Whenever you saw an interview with the band, he was the guy doing the talking. And I guess he was a nice-looking, poofy haired 80's dude, and he did sing some of the songs, if I remember correctly. But at least in the "Sister Christian" video, generally considered their artistic and popular peak, the drummer was the guy doing the singing. And yet, even in that video, he barely gets any face time. Which is especially weird because MTV loved a good drummer/singer in the 80's -- look at Henley, look at Collins.  Yet this guy, the Night Ranger drummer/singer, with his short hair and wristbands, remains largely anonymous to this day.  No justice.

2. There was an unmemorable Luther Vandross song that came off the "Ruthless People" soundtrack, and the video featured really awful 80's effects, such as superimposing Luther, badly and unimaginatively, into the movie.  It was pretty appalling, but the most amazing thing is, they gave away the entire movie in the video, including the ending.  I was astonished. Was there no sense of reason in the 80's? Who green-lit this video? Maybe I am especially offended because I was such a fan of "Ruthless People" back in the day. 

3. Say what you want about her, but Toni Tennille would have won "American Idol" if she just came onto the scene today.  The Captain was real creepy, though.  Just sitting there at the piano with his Captain hat, staring lustfully at Tennille. It makes me uncomfortable.

4. Kip Winger is still going strong.

5. Remember that one video from the 80's with the fancy effects, the one you always thought was stylish and cool? It wasn't. 

6. Take one look at The Bangles and you can see why there might have been some jealousy and resentment in that band.

7. What makes VH1 Classic so watchable is the same thing that made MTV so watchable in the early days.  The sense that a strange video might be played at any moment.  Nothing was set in stone. There was reason to watch from one hour to the next because you just never knew for sure what was going to come on. 

8. My submission for worst video of time: The "Freebird/Baby I Love Your Way" medley by somebody called Will to Power.  Incredible.  As bad as the song is, it's topped in badness by the video, featuring a woman who looks like Laura Branigan, but scarier, and some dude whose mullet/moustache combination is so potent it should be resurrected and implemented in the War on Terror. You must see this.

9. Ol' Jackson Browne was sure shameless about putting Darryl Hannah in his videos, huh? At least twice he did that.  I guess if you were dating Darryl Hannah, you wouldn't be trying to hide it, either.

10. The Thompson Twins never did it for me.  Not then, not now.

11. There is a .38 Special video that features two dudes arm-wrestling and another dude playing "Gorf." Remember Gorf? It was like four games in one. It should have been called "Fourf."  OK, I'm sleepy.

12. Another truly awful 80's band: Saga.

Feel free to share your own observations and I will keep you posted as well.

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Does the fact that someone who just took up the game in the last year can make it to the final table make the World Series of Poker a more populist event or just a more lame one? I think it just proves that while there's plenty of skill involved in poker, luck still plays a great part.  I mean, doesn't everybody know the percentages? Strategically, isn't there always a clear path?  So it boils down to three things: bluffing, style, and luck. If you've got the balls/skills to bluff, or if you play erratically enough to keep people off balance, you have a chance to do some damage -- provided you get the cards. I still find it to be a pretty gripping piece of TV, but there's no way these guys are the geniuses they're made out to be.  I'm gonna say that if Pete B. took the next 6-10 months off to master the game, he'd stand a fifty-fifty chance of winning the whole thing next year.

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Played hoops today.  It was fun. I am still good enough to score on people who are either physically disabled or are just taking up the game for the first time.  Actually, I felt pretty darn good out there. The ball was going in most of the time. That's all we can ask. Hopefully, by the time I die they will have perfected the device that allows you to store every event in your memory, even the ones you can't recall on command because they have been compressed to make room for new memories, on a hard drive.  Let's call it MeVo, a contraption that can replay your entire life with the push of a button. I would like to use that thing to compile some lifetime statistics for myself in all varieties of basketball games, from 2 on 2 to any of the stupid leagues I've played in over the years.  The stats I'd like to see most are winning percentage and field goal percentage.  And I'd like to watch those two numbers decline over time.  That's how it goes.

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Finally, we are going to hold off on the next image for the GISG until tomorrow (Monday). The reason being that a lot of you somehow seem to have better things to do on the weekend than look at the ol' bungle. For whatever reason, the hits go way down on the weekends.  I understand how it goes: verbungle's a nice alternative to filling out that TPS report, but it don't beat going fishing or having sex. I can live with that.  The weekends are your time. Sometimes we'll put a little bungle up for the faithful, but most of you only tune in to avoid doing your jobs, so we'll save the GISG for the workweek.

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* Sorry for the shameless 80's nostalgia, and I know there should be more to life than saying, "Remember (insert meaningless mutual memory here)?" But it's a slow week here at the office.