The best hockey commercials EVER, …and how we MIGHT be seeing more of ’em, sooner than we think

The commercials are at the bottom of this post. But if you’ll allow me just a moment, I’ll explain what got me thinking about ’em in the first place.

As a lifelong fan of all things hockey, I’m well aware that it’s the black sheep of the United States professional sports “family”, viewership-wise. To illustrate, the NBA’s playoffs ratings are destroying the NHL’s right now; it’s not even close. Even the NFL draft (the freakin’ draft?!?!?) crushed the Boston/Montreal Game 6 Semifinal in the ratings by a 5-to-1 margin.

And this has been the trend, unfortunately. Heck, the first two games of the 2012 Stanley Cup Finals (both nationally broadcast on NBC, by the way) got soundly thrashed by RERUNS of the following programs: ‘Dogs In The City’, ‘America’s Funniest Home Videos’, ‘Secret Millionaire’, ‘America’s Got Talent’, ‘Grimm’, ‘2 Broke Girls’, …and a rerun of the rerun of ‘America’s Got Talent’.

Yikes.

That’s the difference between getting beat …and getting a beat-down.

And yet, both the league and the sport are positioned for success, perhaps now more than ever before.

Carol Burnett: TV humor today sounds like it was “written by teenage boys in a locker room”

Can’t argue with anything Carol and Tim say here:

First, let me give credit to Piers Morgan, of whom I’m usually highly critical. He conducted a solid interview, and let his guests respond without arguing with them, in and of itself an exceedingly rare occurrence.

But the primary takeaway I had after watching the entire interview was how far modern television has fallen from my youth. As a member of the generation which grew up watching Dick Van Dyke, Carol Burnett, Bob Newhart, et al on TV with my entire family, those shows not only were clever then, they are still clever now.

Good Grief! More Thoughts on Charlie Brown and Culture Wars

by: Godsbooklover

My brother wrote about our mutual favorite holiday special, A Charlie Brown Christmas, a couple of days ago.   Since he’s away for the weekend, I thought I’d throw in my two cents on why I love this program (which is nearly as old as I am) so much…

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He has a round head and a knobby nose, his dog wins more contests than he ever will, and even his friends all call him a loser. He talks through a megaphone but no one listens to him.  And when he chooses a “sincere” Christmas tree, everybody laughs.

I know I’m not eccentric or even unusual in naming A Charlie Brown Christmas as my all-time favorite televised holiday special.  I was probably six or seven when I saw it for the first time.  Having followed the Sunday Peanuts strip since before I could read, the characters felt to me like old friends.  Watching the annual telecast became one of my most-anticipated Christmas rituals.