'Bred Crumbs

It's spring! Spring spring spring spring spring! I'm wandering around in short sleeves at dinnertime! Around me, biceps burst forth in full flower as Castro boys shed clothes the way John Ashcroft sheds his skin. Trees and flowers suddenly pack the air with intense fragrance (unfortunately for Robbie's allergies). So blooming is everything that, as we get back to Robbie's building, full of gay couples and college students, a nuclear family materializes out of nowhere – middle-aged dad, mom in glasses, two perfectly manufactured children, one boy and one girl, never seen around here before. Spring is just that powerful.

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I can't imagine how the poster for Anger Management would possibly attract anyone to a theater, but it's definitely attracting the graffiti-prone. Today alone, I saw the white space between Sandler and Nicholson's gaping maws filled with, of course, NO WAR ON IRAQ, but also the more enigmatic DEEP AS OAKLAND.

Were I defacing-inclined, I might go with WHAT WOULD JESUS SHOUT?

(Yes, that is the best I can do. I'm so very sleepy.)

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At the BART station, I saw a teenager with the biggest afro I've ever seen. And remember, I lived through the '70s.

Truly, we must be approaching a golden age of fashion.

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Headline News headline:

Mystery Virus Recovery chances 90%
unless victim has no other big disease

"Yeah, I got that mystery virus, but I survived. Thank God I have cancer!"

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Bush also promised to bring an end to the severe war drought that plagued the nation under Clinton, assuring citizens that the U.S. will engage in at least one Gulf War-level armed conflict in the next four years. ... "We as a people must stand united, banding together to tear this nation in two," Bush said. "Much work lies ahead of us: The gap between the rich and the poor may be wide, be there's much more widening left to do. We must squander our nation's hard-won budget surplus on tax breaks for the wealthiest 15 percent. And, on the foreign front, we must find an enemy and defeat it."

Yep, The Morning News is right: The Onion completely called it, two years ago. I shouldn't be as surprised as I am.

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I can't do anything about the misbegotten war, and I can't do anything about ineffectually obstinate protesters, but dammit, I can do something about spam.

I've scrubbed the site of all mail links and replaced them with links to a little pop-up e-mail form. I've done this because, of course, the address that was listed on the site has been co-opted by spammers, and I'm sick of it. So, within a month, I will automatically delete, unread, all mail sent to the old address, bredcrumbs[at]timbland.com. So if for some reason you are using that specific address for regular or occasional correspondence to me, you'll need to switch. If you're using another address, you're good to go.

The spammers and their foul cronies, meanwhile, get another worthless address on their mailing lists. [insert rude gesture here]

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Something else I can do something about, in a longer-term and less direct way, is the state of TV entertainment.

As I may have mentioned, my favorite show, Farscape. was canceled when the shabby little network that broadcast it in America and provided most of the production money reneged on a two-year renewal halfway through. The last episode aired Friday. And while I'm not holding my breath for the plotted but unfilmed fifth season to find a home, I do expect the story to come back in some other form.

Until then, I'll be keeping my eye on The Viewer Consortium, which was born out of the quest to save Farscape but is casting its net wider, looking for ways that any show loved by millions can get made and seen regardless of the numbers from an antiquated ratings system or the whims of revolving-door network executives. Even if you don't care about Farscape, think about how many shows you loved that got messed over by networks, and maybe lend the Consortium – or its new colleague, TV-Next – some support.

And my thoughts on the finale? It was perfection. It had almost all the Farscape essentials: top-notch acting, writing, and directing; gripping drama both personal and epic; expertly delivered humor; gorgeous imagery; fast-paced, non-linear storytelling (more happened between this episode and the last than happens on other shows); creepy-kinky alien sexual foreplay; and twisted brainscape confrontations – by which I mean, Crichton and Harvey wrestling in bunny suits. The only thing really missing was a bodily fluid as a plot point (though vomiting was mentioned).

Hell, even the "previously on" was brilliant – a furious montage of split-second shots from every past episode. And the cliffhanger ending, which some fans no doubt found excruciating, was absolutely the right touch. Yes, they could have cut the last minute from the ep after the cancellation was announced and ended the series happily and tidily, but that just would not have been Farscape. As for the up-yours-SciFi touch of the TO BE CONTINUED title at the end: I have little doubt that somehow, whether in the theater, a TV movie, an off-network or direct-to-DVD miniseries, or anime, it will be. I eagerly await that next step, and meanwhile revel via repeats, tape, and disk in the four seasons of wonder we were lucky enough to get before the executives realized something smart was escaping their idiot attention.

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