Closed captioning spoils joke, sort of

The first time I watched the Scrubs episode "My Fault," in which J. D.'s girlfriend Danni (Tara Reid) screams her own name during sex, I'm fairly sure I was watching it at medium volume on prime time NBC. (J. D. and the Janitor drop coy references to popular past NBC shows like Seinfeld and Friends). The joke is that Danni has been cheating on J. D. with a guy named Danny.

Just a short while ago I got done watching it on MyTV 20 Detroit at low volume with closed captions. I already know the joke that Danni did not scream her own name during sex. But if I didn't, perhaps the impact of the joke would have been lessened. Before the sex scene, J. D. tells Danni "Nobody cares, Danni." The captioning shows that her name is Danni with an I. Then, in the sex scene, Danni yells "Oh, Danny," with a Y. The joke is perhaps spoiled.

Although I suppose nitpickers would be complaining if the closed captioners had tried to preserve the joke by captioning Danni's scream with an I instead of a Y, or if instead they spelled her name with a Y instead of an I for the entire episode.

Sketchy on Bernero's record for job creation

In advance of tomorrow's primary, Virg Bernero has been airing ads claiming he "created/saved 6,000 jobs." I guess he's hoping voters don't start wondering as to what exactly that means, since creating a job is not the same as saving a job.

It's a very obvious difference, but let me spell it out anyway: to create a job means to cause to come into existence a position with a salary or wages that did not exist before; to save a job means to ensure that a position with a salary or wages that already exists continues to exist.

So, how many jobs did Bernero create and how many did he save? Maybe he only created about a hundred jobs (his campaign staff) and saved about 5,900. You can argue that even if he only created 1 job and saved 5,999 that's still a good thing. But then you have to ask yourself: what exactly does one have to do in order to be able to claim that you saved a job? If I tip my barber, does that mean that I saved his job?

However, note that I'm nitpicking his ad; I'm not saying that you shouldn't vote for Bernero just because I find a nit in his ad. After all, I'm not voting for Pete Hoekstra, even though I believe what he says about cutting taxes and spending—how do I know he's not gonna cut spending on the things I like to use, like roads and libraries?

You vote for whom you want to vote tomorrow. Just vote.

Wrong, Paul Gross!

I never thought I would be nitpicking a weather forecast. But this morning's forecast for metro Detroit from Channel 4's Paul Gross flew in the face of commonsense. He said cloud cover would increaase but that it would not rain at all. Well, around 5 PM, it was clear that he was wrong. It was not a major downpour, but enough to prove the point that where there are dark gray clouds in the sky, rain is usually not far behind. Luckily I did not get too wet on the way between the building and my car.

Thanks for the confusing message, Huntington

Huntington Bank has a new ad on TV to boast that they're the number one SBA lender. In the ad, a manager happily informs his employees of this fact, and that he's had T-shirts made to commemorate their ranking. The employees cheer, but the smile disappears from their faces as one of them points out that the shirt actually says "#1 ABS Lender."

So what you're telling me, Huntington, is that you're the top-ranking lender as measured by the Small Business Administration, but some of your employees don't know how to spell the acronym for "Small Business Administration"? Maybe it was the shirt company that screwed up and switched the letters around. But why didn't the guy take a look at one of the shirts to make sure it said what he wanted it to say?

I do understand that commercials nowadays, with their ambitions to be micro-movies, must present some kind of problem in their narrative. But at least make the problem a problem that your company can solve by the use of your product or service. It makes little sense to introduce a problem that has to be solved by another company. Anyway you slice it, the ad is too distracting from the message. If I was a small business owner in need of a loan, Huntington would not be my first choice.

Tired of Family Guy crap yet?

Maybe we were all too grossed out by the idea of Brian actually eating Stewie's crap to notice something Brian should have realized long before putting his nose to the diaper:

Remember how in "Breaking Out Is Hard to Do" the Griffin household degenerated into a pigsty when Lois went to jail? Peter, Brian, Meg and Chris are sitting on the couch, looking all dirty, when Stewie comes in, pleading for someone to change his diaper. "I can't fit any more in there," the poor baby says and then just falls down face flat on the floor.

Let's not forget that Brian has a long memory. There was an episode in Season 4 or 5 in which Brian got back at Peter for something that happened in Season 3. And if Stewie really is still 1-year-old, shouldn't Brian remember that Stewie survived the ordeal of Lois's incarceration despite so few diaper changes?

It was painful to watch that scene when Brian actually eats Stewie's crap. It felt very wrong. Now that I remembered these scenes from previous episodes, I understand why it felt so wrong for the character.

Just another tame Severe Weather Alert Day

So Channel 4 this morning declared today a "Severe Weather Alert Day" with escalated coverage. Just before noon, there was a brief, light shower, and a tiny rumble of thunder. Then it was just cloudy for a couple of hours and then the sky brightened up. With the day almost over now, it doesn't look like there's gonna be any more rain today, let alone severe thunderstorms and the like.

Rewriting the Simpson family tree over and over again

So the Simpsons are 1/64th Black, according to a recent episode reran last night. Yawn. I see what Bill keeps saying about The Simpsons having become a thoroughly boring show. The problem isn't just that Family Guy did it first (remember Nate Griffin?), but also that in two decades the show has managed to write a lot of the tree.

I remember Grampa Simpson reminiscing that the Simpson family came from "the old country" (he didn't remember which) as immigrants to Ellis Island, and lived on the Statue of Liberty for a brief period. Granted, Grampa Simpson is as reliable a narrator as Peter Griffin, and the immigrant story even if true does not rule out American, Civil War-era ancestors for Bart and Lisa.

There's something else. I can buy Grampa forgetting stuff, but not Lisa. Wasn't there a much earlier episode in which Lisa examined the Simpson family tree looking for an ancestor to be proud of? And wasn't the conclusion of that episode that the Simpson men are boozehounds at best, while the Simpson women are doctors, scientists, activists, etc.? I don't remember the title of that episode, but I would think Lisa Simpson would remember what happened in that episode.