Christian eBuddy Blog

You don’t need a psychoanalyst to detect the latent theme running through the endorsements currently showering Mitt Romney like broken rain gutters pouring down on a concrete toadstool. And that premise is ennui. “Mitt? Really? Yeah. OK. Whatever.” Makes tepid sound like a crazed bellow. With wild enthusiasm as MIA as World Series trophies in the Wrigley Field display case. Within the last 104 years, that is.

Someone should warn NASA because we are approaching stratospheric heights of apathy here. The only thing these highly solicited testimonials have accomplished is given a face to listless. The guy needs industrial strength hip waders to slog through the thigh high lethargy.

George W. Bush carved a precious three seconds out of his busy schedule to make a momentous announcement from the inside of an elevator telling an ABC news crew, “I’m for Mitt Romney” as the doors closed on him. Not that the candidate-in-waiting was particularly lusting after 44′s imprimatur, which some might call the Kiss of Campaign Death. But it effectively does nail down the eminently sought- after spoiled rich kid vote.

Rick Santorum got around to his ringing endorsement 13 paragraphs into a 16 paragraph email sent out to supporters after midnight. The only subterfuge he neglected to employ was to disguise it in semaphoric code. And these are Romney’s big- time Republican buddies. You’d think they were having their teeth pulled with families held at gunpoint on a listing catwalk yawning over an erupting caldera.

It’s been like that ever since the nominee became presumptive. Politicians oozing from the woodwork with the same kind of energetic frenzy fifth grade school girls normally reserve for haggis-flavored ice cream studded with garlic pickle chips.

You got to know this is just the beginning of a series of sluggishly recalcitrant pledges of approbation. Here’s some other passion-challenged tributes we can expect over the coming weeks.

“Mitt Romney. Had to go with somebody, right?”
“Not the brainwashed Romney. That was his dad.”
“Only two of Mitt Romney’s five sons think he’s a soulless Cyborg.”
“May be out of touch with the mainstream but looks pretty good tanning on the embankment.”
“Mitt Romney. Hey, it could be worse.”
“Not the kind of guy who would hold you down and cut your hair, unless you really were asking for it.”
“Pretty down to earth for someone building a 57 room mansion with a car elevator.”
“Will do for America what he did for Bain Capital.”
“Survived the mean streets of Bloomfield Hills.”
“Hardly ever sneaks out at night to kick homeless guys. Anymore.”
“A man who stands by his previous statements, no matter what they are.”
“Mormons are just like Christians, aren’t they?”
“Mitt Romney. Not that bad, when you consider the alternatives.”
“He’s no John McCain.”
“Going to make the world safe for rich people.”
“Mitt Romney. When good things happen to bland people.”
“He’s Oxymormonic!”
“Hasn’t strapped a dog to the roof of his car in over 28 years.”
“Mitt Romney. He’s got gas money.”
“Never ridden a bus in his entire life.”
“Looks more like Gordon Gekko than Michael Douglas ever did.”
“Mitt Romney. A man who feels strongly about both sides of many issues.”

The New York Times says Emmy- nominated comedian and writer Will Durst “is quite possibly the best political satirist working in the country today.” Check out the website: willdurst.com to find out about upcoming standup performances.

Such as… Every Tuesday. Elect to Laugh! The Marsh. San Francisco. themarsh.org.

Thursday night, Conan O’Brien appeared on “The Late Show with David Letterman,” and the two late night hosts wasted no time addressing the denim elephant in the room: Jay Leno. In separate incidents over the last two decades, NBC favored Leno over each former “Late Night” host as the star of “The Tonight Show,” and they spent a good portion of O’Brien’s appearance on the CBS talk show swapping insights about their common ground.

“The longer we sit here, the more uncomfortable it’ll make Jay,” were the first words out of Dave’s mouth after sharing an awkward yet knowing silent moment with Conan.

“You know Jay’s watching right now,” Conan joked. “He’s getting a live feed in a satellite truck right now.” Despite prodding from Letterman, Conan would not bring himself to say anything explicit to slam Leno throughout their interview, but did imply that the relationship between the two has been damaged permanently.

The majority of the first segment of O’Brien’s interview was devoted to discussing the events that led to Conan’s dismissal at “The Tonight Show,” and Letterman’s joy as he watched them go down. During the couple of weeks in January 2010 that negotiations at NBC were up in the air, many felt that Letterman’s Leno-mocking play-by-play was the most entertaining he had been in years.

Calling the NBC about-face as the “Golden Age of Television,” Letterman erupted in a fit of laughter as Conan told him he was glad someone got some enjoyment out of the period.

This marked the first time O’Brien has appeared on Letterman’s show in 13 years, but the two mens’ careers have been inextricably linked. When Letterman jettisoned “Late Night” in 1993 after NBC named Letterman’s pal Leno as Johnny Carson’s “Tonight Show” successor instead of himself, the previously unknown O’Brien stepped in as the new host of the 12:30 show. Letterman’s guest appearances on the struggling show indicated a public vote of confidence to the new program from Dave, and 16 years later, Conan reserved his final thanks on his last episode of “Late Night” for his television forebear Letterman.

In 2009, O’Brien was given “The Tonight Show,” until NBC pulled the plug on the show after only seven months when O’Brien refused to push his show back half an hour to make room for the poorly-performing “Jay Leno Show.” Leno was reinstated as the “Tonight Show” host, where he remains to this day, although the late night market is substantially certainly more crowded now — “Jimmy Kimmel Live” beat “The Tonight Show” in the 18-49 demo last week for the first time ever.

Below, watch a video of Conan’s first appearance on Letterman’s show. They’ve come a long way since Conan was rejected as a staff writer on Letterman’s show after graduating from Harvard.

WATCH:

The amalgamation of science and art can be beautiful. Other times: terrifying. Other times one wonders how an artist is able to find enough free time to make a human butt sculpture express human emotions.

But sometimes an experiment can combine all of those qualities. And herein lies Nobuhiro Takahashi’s robotic butt.

Using rigid urethane skeleton, life-size model pelvis, and a silicon Gluteus Maximus Actuator (GMA), Takahashi has created SHIRI — not to be confused with its female iPhone counterpart, Siri — and it looks very much like a human buttocks.

In the introduction video, which came to us via the wonderful DesignTaxi, a user is shown slapping SHIRI, and also poking at it, thereby making SHIRI “brace,” or get really tense. The video also notes that SHIRI can react to “a user’s touch, stroke, or slap” and can twitch or tense up on its own.

When SHIRI is happy, i.e. after a user has creepily stroked it, it “protrudes,” or inflates.

SHIRI continues a recent tradition of people creating unsettling, romantic robots in Asia. As you might recall, the team at “Lovotics” recently created robots to aid in other romantic practices — including long distance relationships, and replacing your missing lover with a tiny surrogate robot.

A copy of “Rain Man” proved to be something else entirely when June donated some of Chloe’s things during a spring cleaning bout on “Don’t Trust the B—- in Apartment 23” (Wed., 9:30 p.m. ET on ABC). Instead of the modern classic film, the DVD was a sex tape Chloe and James Van Der Beek made during St. Patrick’s Day 2007.

June donated it to her pastor friend, who sold it for thousands of dollars. When James got wind of it, he watched the tape to see what might be getting out there, and was none too pleased with what he saw.

Hoping to improve his performance and get a heads up on the people threatening to release the video, he and Chloe planned to recreate the scene. But they realized they couldn’t, now that they care about one another.

That was June rubbing off positive things on Chloe. The opposite rub came when Chloe convinced June to give casual sex a try. She proved rather horrible at it, but with a little help from her roommate, she at least was able to break it off with the guy she’d never intended to get involved with in the first place.

“Don’t Trust the B—- in Apartment 23″ wraps its short first season next Wednesday at 9:30 p.m. ET. It has already been renewed for Fall 2012, where it will be paired with “Happy Endings” on Tuesday nights.

TV Replay scours the vast television landscape to find the most interesting, amusing, and, on a good day, amazing moments, and delivers them right to your browser.

ABC treated fans of “Cougar Town” (Tue., 8 p.m. ET on ABC) to back-to-back installments of the under-rated show. With the good news already in that the series will continue with a 15-episode commitment on TBS, fans were able to relax and enjoy the fun.

Unfortunately, the hour also came with a price. Ellie wanted so desperately to believe that Stan wasn’t a hellion, that she convinced Jules to let him be in her wedding. But Stan is already tagging the town, among other crazy activities. And in a moment completely out of nowhere, he completely and totally broke Jules’ heart.

He threw Big Carl into the air, destroying the second giant wine glass in the series’ history. Julies threw a memorial service for the shards, and by the end of the hour she’d found yet another replacement in Big Lou, assuring that the wine will never stop pouring.

“Cougar Town” takes a week off before returning for its one hour network finale at 8 p.m. ET on ABC. The show shifts to TBS for its fourth season, expected to premiere in early 2013.

TV Replay scours the vast television landscape to find the most interesting, amusing, and, on a good day, amazing moments, and delivers them right to your browser.