May 24 Anticipating Texas Tornado Thunderstorms Washington Hooters & Kirstie Alley Winning Dancing With The Stars

I'm up early on this 24th day of May, with only one week to go in the month, looking through the bars of my patio prison cell at the glowing cauldron of doom I call a hot tub.

According to the National Weather Service the conditions will be that today's storming could produce tornadoes.

The NWS says, "There's a 60 percent chance of thunderstorms this afternoon. Some of today's storms could be severe as a strong upper-level disturbance comes into the area. The greatest threat will be hail, but the system could also spawn strong winds and tornadoes."

Something in the air is making my eyes slightly burn and water. I would have thought that yesterday's heavy duty storming, with almost 2 inches of rain, would have cleaned up the polluted local air, temporarily.

I was up unusually late last night, I think I was overstimulated by watching Kirstie Alley doing gymnastic routines, straining partner Maks's musculature to the limit, during her freestyle routine on last night's Dancing with the Stars finale.

My first couple hours of trying to sleep last night were interrupted by an amazing series of surreal nightmares. All I remember was waking up startled, over and over again.

Total change of subject from my nightmares to Hooters.

Before I moved to Texas I did not know that Hooters was an actual place with beer, hot wings and girls in hot pants. I thought Hooters was just a joke place that Al Bundy liked on Married With Children.

Well, imagine my surprise, this morning, when reading the Seattle P-I to learn that Washington spawned Hooters at some point in time after I moved to Texas. Apparently the Hooters have not done well in Washington. They have been closing without warning. Washington is now down to only 2 Hooters remaining. To get a Hooters hot wing, and view hot pants, you now have to go to Tacoma or Spokane.

I have yet to have been in a Hooters. I recollect the strip joint connoisseur, who calls himself Gar the Texan, wanting me to go to Hooters with him. I declined. The association in my mind with Al Bundy was just too strong. I'd not thought of it before, but Gar the Texan is very much like Al Bundy. Except for not being a shoe salesman or having a receding hairline.

Time to go swimming now before the incoming electric apocalypse.

Sarah Palin & Barack Obama On Dancing With The Stars

I don't care how well Sarah and Barack dance together, I still want Cloris Leachman to win. Tonight on Dancing With The Stars Cloris will be dancing the Hip Hop. Whatever that is. It's supposed to be rather energetic, possibly taxing the seeming endlessly energetic 82 year old past the limit of what she can endure. Cloris is quite flexible for an older dame which you can see quite clearly in the photo.

Cheryl Burke & Lacey Schwimmer Are Too Fat?

GO TO MY DURANGO TV BLOG FOR MORE DWTS

I was surprised this morning to learn that there are some out there who have even more twisted obesity obsessions than me.

I'm talking about Louis van Amstel and Maksim Chmerkovsky.

Who are they you ask? Well, I've admitted before that I enjoy Dancing With The Stars. As do a lot of other people. Up til last week it'd been the top-rated show in the country til CSI took over the top spot.

Louis van Amstel and Maksim Chmerkovsky are two of the professional dancers. People have been commenting that a couple of the female pro dancers, Cheryl Burke and Lacey Schwimmer, have gotten too chunky. They don't look chunky to me.

But in the latest issue of TV Guide Louis said "People look at this show to be inspired and think, ‘If I just work hard enough, I can look like that.” If they watch someone who’s dancing her butt off and she’s still heavy, they can be discouraged. You have to take that responsibility."

I can't imagine how anyone could look at Cheryl Burke dancing and think geez that tub of lard is such a fattie, even after all that exercise, I'm just not gonna try anymore. It's hopeless. That's Cheryl Burke in the bikini. Does that look fat to you?

Chmerkovsky thinks so. Maks, who is one of my favorites, he's funny, said when he first saw Cheryl Burke and Lacey Schwimmer at the start of the season he told them, "Guys, you know the camera adds 10 pounds, you have to do something about this."

Both Cheryl and Lacey are still in the competition. Maks had to quit when his Olympic volleyball partner, who's name I do not remember, got injured while twirling around the dance floor. Ballroom dancing is a very dangerous sport. Lots of injuries. But, 82 year old Cloris Leachman continues to hang in there, being very funny and getting standing ovations.

Dancing With The Stars & Cloris Leachman

GO TO MY DURANGO TV BLOG FOR MORE DWTS

Well, just as I thought would happen, I didn't make it through very much of last night's Dancing with the Stars. I made it almost through the first dance, that being one with a kid I've never heard of from a TV show I've never seen called Hannah Montana. He was dancing with Julianne Hough. She's won a couple times. She's a young blonde. Together their combined ages were less than 40.

Last night I didn't make it long enough to see the oldest person they've ever had on the show, 82 year old Cloris Leachman, dance with the oldest pro they've had on the show, named, I think, Corky Ballas, he being the dad of another of the pro dancers, that being Mark Ballas.

Cloris and Corky's combined age was something like 143. So, I found out I don't need to watch the show live. It's all been YouTubed. This takes out all the commercials and all the boring stuff that causes me to quit watching.

I've now seen Cloris do her dancing. She is very amusing, as you can see for yourself in the video below. She appears to be in great shape. So does Susan Lucci who is 61 or 62. I'll put the Susan Lucci video below the Cloris one. Dancing with the Stars is on again tonight. And again tomorrow night. As much as I enjoy watching people do stuff I know I can't do, I don't think I'll even try to watch.

2008 Emmy Awards Award For Being Bad TV

I got home a bit before 7. Made a bowl of popcorn and turned on the TV. I tried to watch the Emmy Awards. Sometimes those type shows can be amusing. But it's been years since I've managed to make it through to the end of one of them. Not the Academy Awards, not the Tony Awards and definitely not the Emmy Awards.

I lasted about 10 minutes last night. For the first time the hosts of reality shows were nominated. The 5 reality show hosts were the hosts of the Emmy Awards. This did not go well. Only 2 of them, American Idol's Ryan Seacrest and Dancing with the Star's Tom Bergeron do their hosting thing on a live show. Survivor's Jeff Probst, Project Runway's Heidi Klum and the host of that awful game show, Deal or No Deal, Howie Mandel were the other 3 reality hosts. Jeff Probst was the winner.

The host of the reality show that always wins as best reality show, Phil Keoghan, was not one of the 5 best reality show hosts, even though his show, The Amazing Race, won again as best reality show.

The Emmy Awards reality show hosts seemed to be working without a script. For the majority of them ad-libbing was not a forte. It was painful to watch. And sort of embarrassing. I turned to another channel about a minute after Tom Bergeron and William Shatner decided Heidi Klum was over dressed, so they started taking her clothes off til she was stripped down to hotpants.

Normally I would find such a thing worthy highbrow entertainment. But last night it rubbed me the wrong way. Maybe because it wasn't funny.

Speaking of Tom Bergeron and Dancing with the Stars. Tonight starts the new season of that show. I liked Dancing with the Stars. Til last season when I bailed about 2 weeks in. There just were no amusing characters that I enjoyed watching. But, this season we have 82 year old Cloris Leachman trying to dance. She's funny. Susan Lucci should be amusing. That awful pseudo-celebrity, big-butted Kim Kardashian should be amusing. But, from what I've seen of her on her Keeping Up With The Kardashians reality show, she's really stupid. I don't see how she'll be able to remember the dance moves. Lance Bass of boy band fame might be funny. Rocco DiSpirito, celebrity chef and reality show star, can be funny. He can get sort of intense and temperamental.

I'll let you know if I make it through 2 hours of Dancing with the Stars tonight. Highly unlikely. Unless it's real amusing.

Dancing With The Stars Dancing Again

Yes, I have watched Dancing with the Stars. I find it entertaining. I like watching something where I know no matter how long I practiced I'd not be able to do what these people do.

Usually there is at least one "star" who is very entertaining. The last season of Dancing with the Stars I found no one entertaining. So I quit watching.

The season previous to the last one had Marie Osmond on it. She was very entertaining and provided good drama. Like fainting and deaths in her family.

The new Dancing with the Stars starts September 22 on ABC. As usual several of the "Stars" are stars I've never heard of.

Like Jeffrey Ross. He's a celebrity roaster and a comedian. Or Brooke Burke. Never head of this star. She's an actress. Never heard of a guy named Cody Linley. He's a "Star" on something called Hannah Montana. I've never heard of Warren Sapp. He's a football player. The football players they've had on Dancing with the Stars have been very entertaining, like Jerry Rice and Emmet Smith. If I remember right, Emmitt Smith won. There are two Olympic jocks I've never heard of on this edition of the show, those being Maurice Green and Misty May-Treanor, a sprinter and a volley baller.

And then there are the "Stars" I've heard of. Like Susan Lucci. She's Erica on All My Children. She should be fun to watch. I know who Cloris Leachman is. She's funny. In her 80s now. It embarrasses me to realize I know who Kim Kardashian is. She's on an awful reality show called Keeping Up with the Kardashians. She's also taken her clothes off for Playboy. Lance Bass sang in a boy band and likes boys more than girls. Rocco DiSpirito is a celebrity chef who had a reality show called The Restaurant. Rocco has the potential to provide some good drama. I wonder if his mama is still alive and cooking meatballs? Toni Braxton I know is a singer. Can't name one of her songs, though. I also know who Ted McGinley is. He was on Married With Children. I would bet he'll be one of the first kicked off the show this time.

So, of the 13 dancing "Stars" I have heard of 7 of them. I'm rooting for Cloris for the win. I hope she's paired with the Russian pro named Maks. They'd be funny together.

Hamilton Jordan, Ted Kennedy, American Idol, Dancing with the Stars & Hillary

Once again this morning I was freshly reminded that I am old. I was surprised to learn Jimmy Carter's chief of staff and long time aide, Hamilton Jordan, was dead after a long battle against lymphoma and prostate cancer. He was 63.

When Hamilton Jordan was in the national spotlight he was a young guy, in his early 30s, which is how I still remembered him. The Carter years don't seem all that long ago. But they were.

And then we have Ted Kennedy's Saturday's hospitalization for a suspected stroke turn into him having the worst type of brain cancer, that being malignant glioma, with a very bleak prognosis and limited treatment options. Some are lamenting this being the latest case of the Kennedy curse. I think not. Teddy Kennedy has lived a long life. It is a sad thing though. I hope he bucks the odds.

Moving to the frivolous. Last night I managed to watch pretty much the entire hour of the American Idol semi-finale. I don't care who wins, either David, Archeletta or Cook. I don't think I can make it through the 2 hour finale tonight. I don't think I could make it through it even if I cared who won. Or if I thought it mattered.

Kristi Yamaguchi won Dancing with the Stars last night. I did not watch it, though I sort of like that show. I like watching people do something that I'm pretty sure I could not do, no matter how much training or practice I put in. But there was no way I was going to watch that show's inflated 2 hour finale.

Moving from the ridiculous to the semi-sublime. Hillary beat Obama badly in Kentucky. While Obama beat Hillary not so badly in Oregon. Obama is very near having enough delegates to win the nomination, needing about 77 more. Hillary vowed last night to continue til every possible voter, of the remaining few, has the chance to vote for her.

I wish Hillary as good a luck as she deserves. Same to Ted Kennedy. Lesser so to the 2 finalists on American Idol, I just don't care this year. Did I care other years? I don't remember.