Tonight on our show out on 53rd Street, we have two guys from Calgary, Alberta, one who will try to set a record for catching a hard-boiled pickled egg in his mouth . . . an egg thrown over 200 feet!
Dave, the competitor that he is, wants to give it a shot. But not quite from 200 feet, though. He has Paul toss him a few hard-boiled eggs which Dave attempts to catch in his mouth. After one or two tosses, BINGO! Dave catches the entire egg in his mouth. A proud Dave then walks to the skyline and spits out his trophy.

The heat in New York and across the country neared 100 degrees these past few days, but could relief be in sight?
Perhaps. Did you see this announcement?
Announcer: “This week, temperatures across the United States reached 100 degrees. Next week, meteorologists expect it to hit 110. The week after that, 120. And the temperature will continue increasing until . . . Al Gore’s demands are met. He wants $50 million, and a night with Shakira. Al Gore --- I’m your God now.”

Good response from the audience . . . and what was that? Was that a shot of Kevin Eubanks laughing? What the heck is going on?

Here’s a sweet story. 94-year-old former baseball player, Buck O’Neil, participated in a minor league All-Star game the other day. It was a wonderful thing to see and we have a highlight clip of his playing left field. We take a look. We see a ball soaring through the sky and coming down for a possible home run. Suddenly, Buck crashes through the wall . . . THROUGH the wall, to make the catch. The guy, Buck, only knows one speed. He’s still getting it done.
The only other guy I ever saw make a catch like that going THROUGH the wall was Herman Munster.

Hey! There’s that Kevin Eubanks again!

The internet is making organ donations easier than ever. I guess you can click on a website and have one delivered. Is that right? I guess so because Dave placed an order just to show how easy it is.
Dave holds up a Harry & David “Organ of the Month Club” basket full of livers.

And now my story about Harry & David. When Dave became a dad, I wanted to get him something to celebrate the event. But what could I get him that he would need? And if he needed it, he could easily get it himself. So I got him a coffee mug from Harry & David with the company name on it: “Harry & David.” I thought it was a clever and inexpensive way of sharing the joy of Dave and his new son, Harry.

Our costume designer Susan Hum suddenly enters. She is holding two soft pillows which she places on the guest chairs. She says to Dave, “I thought the chairs needed some throw pillows.” She pauses, then exits.

Poor poor Christie Brinkley . . . she’s married to a snake. When ex-husband, Billy Joel, heard the news, he rushed over to console Christie. And we have a clip of his drive. Uh oh, the car has gone out of control and crashed into a tree. Oooh, too bad, Billy.
I know, I know, it’s cheap and easy and overdone. . . . just the way I like it.

And I’m not the only one who liked it. Kevin Eubanks liked it, too.

BECAUSE IT’S SUMMER – We do things a little bit different during the summer since everyone is in slow-down mode. Maybe it’s because of the heat. How are things different?
Dave checks in with his assistant, Monty. Has he gotten any messages? Monty answers, “Yeah, you left your wallet at Flashdancers.”
George Clarke has prepared something for us. We see George sing, “And sometimes when I touch, the honesty’s too much, I wanna hold you . . .” Suddenly, George’s pants go flying off. He looks down and says, “Oh, crap!” He then turns and walks off. Dave says that George was so embarrassed about his pants being ripped off, that he turned and walked off as slow as he could. I laughed at George’s exit, too. Maybe he was afraid something would fall out.
Here’s some footage we don’t usually get to use in the summer. We see a bull goring someone; surgical operations’ a lion mauling its prey’ a skateboarder getting slammed in the nuts; and more surgery.
Because it’s summer, how about a poem from heaven. We see Nipsey Russell in a jet pack reciting his mermaid poem, about it being not enough woman to make love to, and too much fish to fry.
And this may be a waste of time, but it’s sure to be fun. The scrim rises and we find our two LATE SHOW models standing alongside a huge fan. Andrea flips the switch and then they dump two huge garbage cans of Styrofoam peanuts in front of it. The peanuts fly all over the theater, the audience getting the brunt of it. We’ll be finding those peanuts in the theater for months.

Back from commercial, we learn that something interesting happened to Rupert recently. We meet Rupert, who is wearing an Alabama Dirt Shirt. The color of the T-shirt was made from Alabama dirt. Where’d he get it? Rupert says a fan sent it to him. Most of Rupert’s T-shirts are free from fans hoping he’ll wear them on the TV. That Rupert’s a regular Henry Rush.
What happened? We take a look. We see footage of Rupert preparing chili as he narrates.
First we see a Merry Melody introduction.
Rupert: “I was trying to come up with the daily special when I decided I would make my famous chili. I mixed all the ingredients in a large chili pot; fresh ground beef, garlic, salt, cumin, chili powder and a dash of Texas Red Hot. I was about to put the chili on the stove when I stopped and thought for a moment. I really wanted this batch to be special, so I looked around for some extra ingredients which would give it that distinct flavor. I grabbed three containers marked lemon, ginger, and plum and added each to my chili. I couldn’t wait for the lunch rush so I could unveil my latest masterpiece. Finally, lunch time. I served bowl after bowl of my special chili to my eager patrons.”
(Cut to a table of customers being served the chili)
“I then waited patiently for the rave reviews to come rolling in.”
(the customers grab at their throats in obvious pain)
“What could have gone wrong? I reached for one of my ingredients and noticed something odd.”
(We see Rupert rubbing clean the container of plum. The more he rubs, the more we see the reveal of Plum to actually be Liquid Plumber)
“Ohh. It’s drain cleaner! Well, if that doesn’t beat all.”
Cut to the table of customers, who look at Rupert and snarl, “Ruuuuppppeeeeerrrrrrrrt!”
We cut to cartoon music and Porky Pig lunging through the big Merry Melodies bass drum and hear Rupert’s voice, “That’s all, losers!”

Hmmm.

Today New York City starting its spraying program against the West Nile Virus mosquitoes. And we thought we would do the same here in the theater. “Turn it on!” Smoke billows out into the audience, making them gag even more than after some of our jokes.

Dave opens the Top Ten list and the audience continues to cough. Paul suggests we use the giant fan to clear out the smoke. Good idea. Paul’s suggestion reminded me of Stan Laurel suggesting the Wooden Soldiers to Ollie. The scrim rises and we once again activate the fan. The place is cleared of smoke. That’s good, but what about the mosquitoes?

Top Ten: Signs There’s Trouble at the New York Times – in a cost-cutting move, the New York Times is reducing its work force and shrinking the size of its pages.
#10. Extensive coverage of recent fighting between the Israelis and the lesbians.
#6. Weather forecast reads, “Look outside, dumbass.”
#3. Headlines fold over to create surprise Mad magazine-type hidden message.

UMA THURMAN: She’s the ex-girlfriend in the new film, My Super Ex-Girlfriend. And she’s the mom of a 4-year-old boy and an 8-year-old girl. She is amazed how well they get along; nothing like her and her siblings growing up. What was it like sending her daughter off to school on her very first day? Uma says it was easier for her daughter than it was for her. I think that’s true with every first child. By the time it gets to the 3rd and 4th child, it’s more a relief than it is stressful.
Is Uma dating? Uma would rather not answer. Dave asks how does one go about getting a first date with Uma Thurman? Uma jokingly says you first need to call her agent, then book some time . . . Uma admits she hasn’t had many first dates. Dave says he hasn’t had many second dates.
“Would you like to catch a hard-boiled egg?”
Out of the blue, Dave asks Uma if she would like to try to catch a hard-boiled egg in her mouth. She agrees. Though she’s unsuccessful, the official scorer put the error on the throw.
We see a clip of Uma’s new film. Uh oh, wrong clip. We see some sort of old “Wonder Woman” clip, an obvious mistake in the tape room. We try again and we see Uma with Luke Wilson. Luke attempts to break up with Uma. Uma, not happy, releases her angst by twisting the blade of a knife in her bare hands. Dang! I would keep her just to help move the furniture.
My Super Ex-Girlfriend – opens Friday at a theater near you.

THE BIG EGG TOSS: Out on 53rd Street is Brad Freeman and Patrick Breault of Calgary, Alberta. Patrick will be tossing; Brad will be catching. They were inspired by something they saw on Ripley’s Believe It Or Not which aired someone catching a pickled egg thrown 180 feet. They will attempt to break that record by catching a pickled egg thrown 250 feet . . . or maybe 200 feet. Whatever . . . either will break the record. We are ready.
Brad prepares his catch, opening his mouth wide. Patrick prepares his throw. Patrick heaves the egg and it flies through the air. 200-plus feel away, Brad awaits. BINGO! I think. How much of the egg has to remain in the catcher’s mouth for it to be determined a catch? Two more times, two more catches. The record is theirs!
Congratulations, Brad and Patrick! You are the new record holders for catching a pickled egg in your mouth thrown on 53rd Street!
I’m told it was actually 250 feet. The angle from which Brad was shot made it appear he was standing right near the “200” foot sign. He wasn’t. That sign was in front of Brad. He was near the 250 sign.

ACT 5: a slow motion replay of the giant fan blowing the Styrofoam peanuts.

MORGAN SPURLOCK: He’s the guy who ate nothing but McDonalds food for months and recorded the changes of his body in the documentary, Super Size Me. It is the 6th highest grossing documentary film of all time. Since doing the film, does he ever go to McDonalds now? Morgan says, “No, not even to pee.”
Now he’s got a show on the FX, 30 Days. The idea is to put someone in an environment that was the opposite of their upbringing, beliefs, religion, or profession. For example, Morgan, a straight guy living with a gay guy for 30 days. Or an atheist living with a Christian. Or Morgan and his girlfriend trying to live on minimum wage. Originally, Morgan was to be THAT person who did all these things but it would have kept him away from his family too long. Now he has others do most of the social experiments. One episode for the upcoming season has a guy who is a legal Cuban immigrant, who just hates illegal immigration, living with a family of illegal Mexican immigrants. In another episode, Morgan spends 30 days in jail. Hey, I like the idea, though I’m always suspicious of a “reality” show where everyone involved is aware of the surrounding cameras. But I like the idea and I’ll give it a look see. The 2nd season premieres July 26th on the FX.

And that was our show for Wednesday July 19, 2006. Wahoo EXTRA!

My minivan is not kaput. It’s outta here. 150,000 miles later and it’s in the dump. Tranny blew. It was becoming too much of a burden so we had to put it down. Next up, the joy of buying a new car. Oh, how I love to haggle.

Christie Brinkley’s husband has been fooling around with a 19-year old, likely putting an end to their marriage. Christie’s first marriage was to French artist, Jean-Francois Allaux. Christie was 19 at the time. I decided to look up information on Jean-Francois Allaux but I found nothing. Why look him up? I was curious to see if HE was married when Christie set her eyes on him back in 1973. I thought, “wouldn’t it be funny if she stole Jean-Francois from his 50+ wife back in ’73 when she was 19.” Anybody know?
Of course I really have no idea, but it might be something interesting to look into. Could this be a case of what goes around, comes around? I hope so. It would make this story so much more interesting.

Upon further searching, I think Jean-Francois was about 25 when he married the 19-year-old Christie Brinkley. Darn. I hope that isn’t right.

Oprah announced the other day that she is NOT a lesbian. Oh, that’s good. That always puts the rumors to rest.

I watched Broken Flowers the other day. I liked the odd offering. I like Bill Murray and I really liked the uncomfortable pauses and silences throughout the movie. Denise was so-so on it. Nothing was quite laugh-out-loud but it kept me interested and I was amused by Bill’s low-key approach to his character. Plus, the locations looked very familiar. A lot of it seemed very upstate New York/Rockland County. For those of you not from here, upstate New York is anything north of New York City. Rockland County is only 20 minutes away, but for city dwellers, it could Syracuse or Tully for all they care. I watched the closing credits for locations and was satisfied to see a mention of Sloatsburg and Grandview, both towns by me.

The worst part of my minivan having to be junked after blowing the tranny . . . . it had ¾ of a tank of gas!

This has been bothering me for a while and I’ve been meaning to expand on it, but I’m impatient so I’ll throw it out here and get back to it in the future. It’s our criminal justice system. When a celeb or a politician or a guy with lots of money gets sentenced for something they did, he or she often gets community service as a punishment. And what constitutes community service? Oh, usually some kind of manual labor in a hospital or around town. And I wonder, how does that make the person feel who does that for a living? The person who cares for sickly veterans, that job is considered punishment for someone who committed a crime? What is that person supposed to tell his kids? “What I do for a living is equivalent to jail time, honey. Celebrities who are punished have to do my job. It’s supposed to humiliate them.” And of course, celebrities who do this charitable work as a punishment are then seen as a great and generous volunteer while they are doing it. Do those who are being aided know the celeb is forced to do it?
So here’s my suggestion . . . anyone sentenced to do community service must wear a large sign that reads they are doing community service because they have to. It is not voluntary. And then afterwards, they have to sit in a lifeguard chair at a busy intersection wearing a dunce cap. Hard-working commuters would find that amusing and satisfying. And that’s what I call community service.