Retro Corner: You're Not Supposed To Be Here

Still shakin it, 13 years later...

Okay, I'm not really sure if "Retro Corner" is going to be a recurring post category; if it is, it's basically going to be "old things I typed that some people might find interesting, about stuff that's old."

So, here, uh... here's something for all you old gamers - a guide to all the secret messages in "Duke Nukem 3D", and all the official add-on episodes! This should be everything; unfortunately, though an official add-on, "Duke!Zone 2" has no secret messages. At all. Not in the episodes, at least; I once considered scouring the massive load of user maps included on the disc, and did find some messages... but of course, trying to look through ALL those levels would be far too unwieldy a task.

(Note that times have changed since the DOS days, and so have graphic capabilities. Versions of Duke 3D circulating around the 'Net today have revised graphics, which means that darkness is rendered rather differently than in 1996. Originally, with the Night Vision Goggles, secret messages on dark walls would show up green - an advantage lost on modern-day versions. So, be sure to set your port of choice to a 'classic' graphics mode in order to see the messages clearly.)

=========================================

EPISODE 1: L.A. MELTDOWN

E1M1: Hollywood Holocaust

• 867-5309 - Above a urinal in the bathroom.
• STRYKER METRONET.COM - Inside the rightmost bathroom stall. This was Allen H. Blum's email address at the time; however, there is no "@" symbol in the Duke Nukem font.

E1M3: Death Row

• BEHIND THE BABE - In the jail cell with the babe and the bed (with a secret tunnel behind it) is a small cavern. Duck inside, and turn on your goggles. (This is a clue to an area later in the level, where a girly poster conceals the path to the exit, Shawshank Redemption-style.)

E1M4: Toxic Dump

• HOW DID YOU GET HERE? - Above the starting point are three platforms. The rightmost platform has a secret door on it; the secret message is inside.

E1M5: The Abyss

• GO WITH THE FLOW - Below the starting point is a locked gate, and right inside the gate is a small, dark cul-de-sac. Inside there, this message can be seen with goggles.
• YOU'RE NOT SUPPOSED TO BE HERE - This message from the Levelord can be seen by finding your way to the volcano, and using the jetpack to get into the tunnel where the shrinker.
• S U Y T - Deep inside the volcano is a secret cave with a dancing girl in it. Look very closely at the right wall inside the cave. (Incidentally, this stands for "Show Us Your Tits"... unfortunately, she won't!)
• DOPEFISH LIVES - On the way to the boss is a long chasm in which you have to jump across pillars. Near the start of the chasm, use the jetpack to float down to the lava. This message (a reference to Apogee's mascot) is at the base of one of the pillars. Incidentally, the N64 version has an alternate message in this area - WOTS YOUR BEEF SPECCY. I found an explanation for this once... some in-joke, but I don't remember exactly what the deal was.
  

EPISODE 2: LUNAR APOCALYPSE

E2M1: Spaceport

• U.S.S. FRAMERATE - Use DNCLIP to go through the window at the start. This message is on the opposite side of the spaceship.

E2M2: Incubator

• 1138 - In the large room near the starting point is a bank of computers with a secret room behind it. In the secret room is a monitor, which holds this message, a reference to the movie "THX 1138."
• 1138 - This number appears again in the bright hallway immediately past the large room, under the large EDF logo.

E2M3: Warp Factor

• BLUM BED CO. - This reference Allen H. Blum is on the back of the bed (closest to the monitors) in the Really Ready Room.

E2M7: Lunar Reactor

• BITE ME - Stand on the toilet in the leftmost bathroom stall, and turn right. The message should be right in front of your face.

E2M8: Dark Side

• JUMP INTO THE MONOLITH - In the room with the monolith (which teleports you to the exit room) is a small box. This message is on the back of it, and is visible with the night-vision goggles.
  

EPISODE 3: SHRAPNEL CITY

E3M1: Raw Meat

• PUSH HER BUTTON - At the end of the first hallway inside the sushi restaurant (pass the girlie poster, which this message is describing), behind the vase, is this message. The goggles needed to view it are right behind the vase.
• PUSH ME - This message, also seen with the goggles, can be seen in the small cabinet in the floating bar.
• NO ONE SHOULD BE HERE - In the room with the exit, DNCLIP through the crack, and walk through the fake Bank Roll. This message from the Levelord is seen where the ATMs should be.

E3M3: Flood Zone

• THE CRACK BELOW - In the first open area of the level, is an underwater crack in the mountainside. At some point, a cave should blow open above the crack. This message is inside, and is visible with goggles.
• ANAAL OOOTHRIC - To the right of the blue key is a little niche with water and steam. This message (visible with goggles) is inside. Incidentally, this phrase means "dragon's breath", and was taken from the movie "Excalibur".

E3M4: L.A. Rumble

• UNDER THE KNIFE - Use your goggles in the dark lobby of the doctor's office.
• YOU'RE NOT SUPPOSED TO BE HERE...EITHER - Use DNCLIP to pass through the window in the final room, and walk around to the air-conditioning fans. This Levelord message is floating in the air above them.

E3M5: Movie Set

• PUSH THE REGISTER NOT THE SNACKS - Use your goggles in the lobby of the subway station.
• JUMP AT THE EARTH - Enter the small spaceship set, and turn around. Look at the dark wall to the right of the entrance with your goggles. (You may need to step back from the wall - if you're too close, the pixellation of the textures seems to obscure this.)

E3M6: Rabid Transit

• TELLTALE FOOTPRINTS - Walk up the stairway covered with babes and explosives, and use your goggles in the cave at the top.

E3M7: Fahrenheit

• BREAK THE BOTTLES - Use your goggles on the dark wall in the apartment.

E3M8: Hotel Hell

• BEHIND THE FOUNTAIN - Use your goggles on the dark corner wall at the end of the second floor hallway.
• CHECK THE VINTAGE - Walk to the end of the secret tunnel above the second floor aquarium, and use your goggles on the wall to the right of the opening that allows you to jump down into the aquarium.
• DUKE WAS HERE 2017 - This message is inside the dilapidated bathroom stall, accessible from the swimming pool. However, the two rows of text were accidentally squished into one, so what's left of this message is an unreadable blob near the ceiling, which can be fixed with Build.
  

EPISODE 4: THE BIRTH [Atomic Edition add-on]

E4M1: It's Impossible

• ARE YOU SMALL OR ARE YOU CHEATING? - In the kitchen is a small, watery tunnel. Use DNCLIP to follow this tunnel around to the other side of the wall, where this message is hidden.
• LOOKING FOR SECRETS? - Type DNSHOWMAP, then look at the map. Outside of the level are two small, inaccessible squares that are side by side. Use DNCLIP to get into them. This message from a mysterious individual named DUV is on a wall in the square that holds the weathergirl graphics.
• C'MON, QUIT CHEATING - This other message from DUV is in the square next door, which holds the "Mission" text.

E4M3: Shop-N-Bag

• RUN YOUR ASS OFF - Use DNCLIP to get into the crawlspace on the left wall, immediately before the crushers that block the path to the exit button.

E4M5: Pigsty

• OPEN J. DREDD - To the right of the blue key is a small, dark alleyway. This message (a clue to the whereabouts of the secret exit) is inside, on the left wall.
• FISH - Go through the red key door, and look closely at the inside of the left arm of the couch. This word can be seen - a reference to the classic detective show, "Fish".
• B MILLER - On the other arm of the couch is this message, a reference to the classic cop comedy "Barney Miller."

E4M10: The Queen

• TAG IS COOL - Again, you'll need to type DNSHOWMAP and examine the map closely. Quite a bit away from the main level is a small, square room that holds Randall Pitchford's signature. Make your way there with DNCLIP. On a wall inside this room is the final message of the Atomic Edition.
  

VACATION DUKEMATCH [Duke Caribbean add-on]

3: Cruise Ship

• SO...COME HERE OFTEN? - Take the elevator up to the little second floor balcony. Above the Wavemistress logo is an inaccessible platform with a large white tower and a small transmitter. Use DNCLIP to climb up there, and look at the back of the tower.
• CHEAT OFTEN? - The right exit from the swimming pool deck takes you down a ramp, where there is a Conchinator and a "Cha-Cha's Galore" poster. Above and to the right of this is another platform with a white tower and small transmitters. Use DNCLIP to go up there - this message is on the tower.
  

LIFE'S A BEACH [Duke Caribbean add-on]

2: Market Melee

• AKNOT! WOT? - After escaping from the jail cell, go around and behind the Duke Nukem bus. There is a small striped barrier that blocks your path. DNCLIP through it, and continue past the wooden cart to find this message.
• BADABOOM - Across from the store with the ice machine in front of it is a small alley with a huge, recessed "Cha Cha's Galore" poster. Enter the small store here, and press the identical poster within. The large poster now opens, revealing a secret area. Inside, go past the Restricted Area signs, to find an open area with a boat. To your right is a gate to the ocean. DNCLIP through this gate, and turn around; the message is floating in mid-air.

4: The Wavemistress

• SO...COME HERE OFTEN? - See 'Cruise Ship'.
• CHEAT OFTEN? - See 'Cruise Ship'.

5: Lost Lagoon

• STOP CHEATING - From the start, follow the river. Before long, up and to your left will be a high platform with a statue on it. Type DNKROZ (or any other cheat that gives you the jetpack) and fly up to that platform. The secret message is in plain view. (Oddly, the "O" in STOP is missing... and there's a Mr. Splashy head to greet you as well!) Incidentally, you may want to check this out before you go to far into the level - once the bridge to this platform appears, the message vanishes.
• DESTROY THE ONE THAT DOES NOT STAND THE SUN - Do messages get any more obvious than this?? To the right of the blue door (which leads to the strange maze), there is a cramped cave that you have to crawl through. Keep following it - at one point, Duke mentions that there is a clue nearby. On the wall in front of the sunglasses (i.e., the night-vision goggles) is this message. (The same message is there whether it's day or night, by the way.)

6: Voodoo Caves

• YOU PROBABLY CHEATED - Past the red door, you must walk across a very deep canyon. Jump from the bridge towards the waterfall - you want to land in the little pond at its base. Dive under, and pop up on the other side. This message from "Bliss" is seen, as well as a couple health items.
  

DUKE IT OUT IN D.C. [Duke It Out In D.C. add-on]

3: Nuked Files

• DECEIVE INVEIGLE OBFUSCATE - Next to the metro station at the very end of the level is a pile of sandbags that can't be crossed. DNCLIP past this, and turn right. The message is on a large, black wall.

10: Top Secret

• PUSH BILL - Well, alright, this one's not hidden per se. After getting the blue key, jump down to the conveyor belt and follow it through the opening on the right. Turn into the red-lit room, which has a crack that lets you peek into one of the last rooms of the level. On the wall in the red room is this message. (Incidentally, this is a hint to a secret back towards the start of the level.)
  

NUCLEAR WINTER [Duke Nuclear Winter add-on]

2: Where It All Began

• 867-5309 - See 'Hollywood Holocaust'.
• STRYKER METRONET.COM - See 'Hollywood Holocaust'.

Saturday Night Live's 35th Anniversary - an educated guess

Though nothing has been said about it yet, something will inevitably happen in October or November of this year: Saturday Night Live's 35th Anniversary Special, following the 15th in 1989 and the 25th in 1999. Much has changed since the last special - Will Ferrell and Cheri Oteri are no longer representatives of "current SNL", Jimmy Fallon went from featured player to cast member to alumni to talk show host, another former cast member passed away, the show began airing in HD, and the TV Funhouse segments disappeared in favor of the SNL Digital Shorts.

Since we still have a few months, I thought I would take this opportunity to make educated predictions about what exactly we'll be seeing in a 35th Anniversary Special...

* The show will be at LEAST three hours long, with a number of excessive commercial breaks
* Monologue by Tom Hanks again (he's done the previous two)
* Monologue and/or performance by Justin Timberlake, who either references "Dick In A Box" or sings a variation of "bring it on in to Omeletteville"
* SNL Digital Shorts montage, including (edited for prime time) "BLEEP In A Box", "Lazy Sunday", "MacGruber", and "BLEEP In My Pants"
* A handful of past hosts and musical guests introducing montages and kissing Lorne's ass for cheap applause, including Steve Martin, whose contributions to SNL are no longer considered relevant, having turned himself into nothing more than "that 'hamburger' guy"
* 70's montage including Mighty Mouse, The Wolverines, Mr. Bill, Cheeseburger, Land Shark, Judy Miller throwing herself into a door, Samurai Deli, and the same clip of Chevy calling Richard Pryor the n-word that's been in both previous specials and every single 'Best of the Classic Years' video
* Rehashed tributes to Gilda Radner and John Belushi
* Early 80's montage that skips the struggling seasons and focuses entirely on 1982-1985, with most clips featuring either Eddie Murphy or the 1984-85 cast (expect to see Synchronized Swimming, Christopher Guest saying "chocolate babies", Mr. Robinson saying "WHO IS IT?!", Buckwheat singing "Fee Tines A Mady", Fernando saying "you look marvelous", Ed Grimley excited over meeting Pat Sajak, possibly a brief clip of "I'm Gumby, dammit", and Tim Kazurinsky being hugged by a chimp)
* A shot of the audience in which Denny Dillon, Gail Matthius and Gilbert Gottfried are visible, just happy to be there and not at all surprised that none of their material has been shown
* Late 80's montage including the Master Thespian saying "acting", Lovitz telling Hartman he stinks, Dana singing about chopping broccoli, and no footage whatsoever of 1985-86
* Early 90's montage including Canteen Boy being groped by Alec Baldwin, Wayne and Garth meeting Madonna, some Operaman clips, Farley eating French fries and shouting at Spade
* Rehashed tributes to Phil Hartman and Chris Farley
* Late 90's montage including Mango, Mary Katherine Gallagher, the Cheerleaders, the Ambiguously Gay Duo, and, you guessed it, Schwetty Balls
* 2000's montage centering entirely around Kristen Wiig, except for a clip of The Barry Gibb Talk Show
* A title card that briefly mentions Charles Rocket's death, and no mention at all of the deaths of Danitra Vance and Michael O'Donoghue
* Sappy slow-motion tribute to the now-retired Don Pardo

That just about covers it. See you in October, suckers! :-P

Dedicated to the Butterfly

If you own at least one Insane Clown Posse CD, you will have probably noticed the strange liner note mentioning how the CD is "dedicated to the Butterfly." If you're a *true* ICP fan (and not, like, one of those people who bought "The Great Milenko" just because all the other kids at school had it), you most likely know what the meaning of this ever-present dedication is; but for those that don't...

It stems from a traumatic event in Violent J's childhood. One day, J and his brother spotted the most beautiful butterfly they had ever seen. They placed it in a jar, intending to set it free the next day after spending the night admiring its beauty. However, when they awoke the next morning, the butterfly was dead - an image that has haunted J ever since. So, it became a tradition to dedicate each of ICP's releases to 'the Butterfly' - J's way of apologizing to the creature he feels he unfairly robbed of life.

I've come to believe that everyone has their own Butterfly... in other words, I believe that inside every single person lies the scarring memory of a small, otherwise insignificant event that managed to leave a lasting negative impression.

I definitely know mine; several years ago, we had a number of contractors replace the siding on our house. One of them discovered a nest of baby bunnies in our front yard that we hadn't noticed. For whatever reason, the bunnies started dying while the contractors were there; before it was too late, my mother decided to try and rescue the last remaining baby. It was very small, enough to fit in the palm of your hand. We made a little makeshift home for it (I think it was a basket, but I can't remember for sure), and named it Momo. The basket was sitting on top of our stereo, which was a horrible idea on someone's part, because Momo jumped out at one point, falling about four feet.

Over the next day, we realized that he must've been gravely injured from the fall; he was no longer very active, and was becoming increasingly cold to the touch. My mother and I rushed to the pet store to buy a sort of small baby bottle so that she could feed him in an effort to nurse him back to health. After she tried for quite some time, she and my dad decided to let him rest while they went grocery shopping. I went with them, because I couldn't bear to be home alone with the bunny if it died. It did, of course, during the time we were at the store.

For whatever reason, this struck a horrendous chord inside me... for someone who usually took the deaths of our pets fairly well, I was extremely upset. The night it happened, I couldn't get to sleep, because I cried for ages, to the point where my mom asked me what the big deal was. To this day, I have no answer for that question. I suppose I just took a lot of pity on this small, defenseless animal, especially after knowing that the rest of his family had died over the last couple days.

So, I guess that Momo was my Butterfly. What most people would look at as a small, insignificant event had a large emotional impact on me that I still can't explain. Just as Violent J hopes that he'll someday be able to face the Butterfly once more in the afterlife, perhaps deep inside of me is the hope that someday in the afterlife, I will see Momo, grown and healthy; and I will be able to apologize for not preventing the abrupt, avoidable end to his short life.

Is anyone else willing to share the story of their own Butterfly?

"Nightflight To Venus" - a musical butchery?

I've come to realize over the course of time that mentioning Boney M. in America doesn't mean a whole lot to people. I was originally introduced to them after receiving a CD of megamixes, one of which blended a dozen or so Boney M. tunes, all of which I'd just assumed were hits here at some point... not true, apparently. (They're mainly known here as "whatever band that was that did a disco version of 'Mary's Boy Child'.")

A handful of their biggest hits ("Rasputin", "Painter Man", "Rivers of Babylon") stemmed from the same LP - 1978's "Nightflight To Venus". For years, all I had of this album was a very poor MP3 copy that I found on Usenet at some point, apparently ripped from the CD. It wasn't until I read a review recently, however, that I found my copy to be incomplete - previous editions were quite different.

Browsing through Wikipedia's pages about Boney M.'s albums, I came to realize that they were apparently *very* anal retentive about their material, issuing several different versions of each album. "Nightflight To Venus" was no exception - the original pressing hailed from Germany, where the group had the most popularity; and this now extremely rare version offered the most material. Over the course of the following three pressings, several songs became shorter and shorter, for reasons I'm unaware of. The worst casualty was the album's opening 13-minute medley of "Nightflight To Venus" and "Rasputin", which was eventually chopped down to nearly half its original length by the time of the 4th pressing - unfortunately, the pressing that formed the basis of the CD.

While the hit "Rasputin" mainly lost a handful of small musical passages with no lyrical changes, the title track was shuffled and hacked several times into a mere collection of edits and brief chunks. Based heavily around Cozy Powell's hit "Dance with the Devil", "Nightflight To Venus" was a drum-heavy intro, with a robotic-voiced tour guide describing the listener's flight to Venus aboard the Starship Boney M. Throughout the course of the seven minute track, he pointed out Moon City ("a boomtown if ever there was"), and detailed the process of making Venus inhabitable to humans. Great concept... though unfortunately, Boney M. seemed to disagree, as much of his dialogue was removed by the final pressing.

Thankfully, there exists a torrent (link below) that compiles variations from the four pressings of the album into a handy 2-CD set. I took the time recently to compare the four different edits of the title track, detailed below... so if you have one of the later pressings or the commercial CD, you may be surprised at how much you're missing... (Note that the changes are not merely lyrical, as the musical mix varied from pressing to pressing as well.)

=================================================

White text denotes lyrics standard to all pressings.
Pink lyrics were exclusive to the 1st pressing (7:11).
Green lyrics appeared in both the 1st and 2nd (5:53) pressings, but were later removed.
Blue lyrics appeared in the 1st, 2nd and 3rd (4:58) pressings, but were removed for the 4th/CD (4:47) pressing.
Gold lyrics appeared in the 1st, 3rd and 4th/CD pressings, but not the 2nd.
Purple lyrics appeared in the 2nd, 3rd and 4th/CD pressings, but not the 1st.

"Ladies and gentlemen, welcome aboard the starship Boney M. for our first passenger flight to Venus.
Ready for countdown.
Ten. (Nightflight to Venus...)
Nine.
Eight.
Seven.
Six. (Nightflight to Venus...)
Five.
Four.
Three.
Two. (Nightflight to Venus...)
One.
Ignition.
Lift-off."

Nightflight to Venus
Way out there in space
Nightflight to Venus
Our new favorite place
Nightflight to Venus
We got the all-clear [OR] All systems are go
Nightflight to Venus
The moment is here [OR] The sky is a-glow
[The verse appears twice in the first pressing only - all other pressings replace the
original latter half with the second half of the otherwise unused second verse.]

(Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey!
Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey!
Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey!
Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey!
Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey!
Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey! Hey!)
[This chant stands alone on pressings 1 and 2, but is mixed under the following
tour guide speech on 3 and 4. Oddly, pressing 2 is missing eight "hey"s.]

Nightflight to Venus!
Nightflight to Venus!
[As the placement of the chant differed, these sung lines appeared before the tour
guide's speech on pressings 1 and 2, but after the speech on 3 and 4.]

"Ladies and gentlemen, we have had a successful take-off on this first nightflight to Venus. Our flying time will be eight hours. You'll be travelling at a speed of 2,183 miles per second - that is, seven and one half million miles per hour. The distance from mother Earth to Venus is 60 million miles at this time."

"To your left, you can see the mountains of the Moon; and right in the center, under a huge plastic bubble, Moon City - a boomtown if ever there was one, because of the huge gold and diamond veins. As for Venus, it took almost ninety years to cool down the planet from its 500 degrees to the current pleasant 75 degrees, and to transform the atmosphere to make it inhabitable for Earth people."

Nightflight to Venus
Way out there in space
Nightflight to Venus
Our new favorite place
Nightflight to Venus
All systems are go
Nightflight to Venus
The sky is a-glow
[This verse went through a few changes - originally, it appeared in full, before losing
its last four lines for pressing 2; pressings 3 and 4 remove this verse completely. As
previously mentioned, the last four lines replaced those of the first verse in pressings 2-4.]

"Captain - unidentified object at eight o'clock. Two million miles away."
"Stand by for emergency maneuver."
"Object coming closer with the speed of light. We have eight more seconds. Object coming closer. We have five more seconds."
"Changing course by 4.6 degrees."
"Order executed."
"That was a close one, ladies and gentlemen. A meteor just passed us on its way to infinity. Well, you can see, even in space, traffic is getting heavier all the time."

"Ladies and gentlemen, in a few minutes, we are going to be landing on Venus. Push the button on your left side. The safety mechanism will do the rest for you. We hope you enjoyed the world's first nightflight to Venus. Have a good time there."

[At this point on all versions, the looped drum beat serves as a transition into "Rasputin,"
eventually accelerating to that song's slightly faster tempo.]

=================================================

Well, that should cover it; incidentally, an extremely truncated 1:30 edit of "Nightflight" (missing ALL vocal sections) was used as an intro for the 12" single of "Rasputin".

As for the torrent mentioned above, it can be downloaded from the Pirate Bay:
http://thepiratebay.org/torrent/3868953/Boney_M._-_Nightflight_To_Venus_Collection_(1978__2CD)

For fans of the album, especially those disappointed by the recent remastered edition (which STILL used the butchered 4th pressing versions), this is essential, first presenting the ultimate cut of the album compiled from several different sources, followed by numerous other variations. Dig that 'marching band trumpets' version of "Rasputin"! :-P

Calling Ann Risley!

Since I realized that, unlike my blogs on other sites, these ones are here for all the world to see, I wanted to transmit a message that hopefully will reach its recipient someday...

Ann Risley, where are you?

I wanted to write this for a while, because in the many years I've spent researching SNL, I've come to the conclusion that if any major castmember has been horribly overlooked, it's Ann Risley.


Hired as part of the unfortunate 1980 cast, Ann's time on "Saturday Night Live" was cut short after only twelve episodes when, during the transition to Dick Ebersol's reign as executive producer, she was replaced by then-current "SCTV" cast member Robin Duke. Sadly, as all twelve of her episodes fell under NBC's lame idea to limit the rerun exposure of episodes that fell below SNL's ever-changing quality standards, Ann's work went unnoticed by most fans who didn't see the shows when they aired live. Even her lone photo in the "SNL: The First Twenty Years" book got cropped off the page... respectful network they are, huh?

The truth is, like several other cast members from that era, Ann showed a lot of potential on the show. Not only was she easily one the best looking women in SNL's history, but she showed split-second comedic timing in the very few sketches were she was given a chance to shine. A good example is "The Toni Tennille Show," from the episode hosted by Ellen Burstyn. This was probably the only sketch were Ann herself had the floor, without being weighed down by other cast members; and her performance is like clockwork. At every cue to do or say something funny, she is right on the mark. It's unfortunate that executive producer Jean Doumanian somehow failed to notice this, often wedging Ann into miscast characters or background roles.

Well, I certainly did notice, and I hope that others reading this will be inspired to track down her episodes and appreciate her work as well. Unfortunately, after SNL, she doesn't seem to have appeared on screen many more times. She currently runs an acting school in Tucson, now going under the name of Anna Risley; and apparently, she doesn't look too fondly upon her brief stint in the late night limelight. I think it's time to change that, and finally give her the credit she deserves.

So, wherever you are, Miss Risley... thank you for brightening those twelve dreary episodes with your talent. You deserved more than what you got from that show, and I hope that fan appreciation will allow you to have a better outlook on the time you spent there.

This Old Song?

I came across this today, and couldn't believe it... the pleasant little instrumental I knew for years as the (former) theme of "This Old House" is actually a Fats Waller recording from the Thirties - AND it has lyrics!

Damn...

Andy Kaufman strikes again?

Just spotted this on Yahoo...

http://cosmos.bcst.yahoo.com/up/player/popup/?rn=4226712&cl=13013043&src=news

California's mysterious ex-school board member Steve Rocco faces up to six months in jail for stealing a ketchup bottle from the school. Are you aware of who they may actually be locking up?

Hint: He died 25 years ago.

For those unaware of Rocco's back story, he emerged out of the blue and ran for a California school board, managing to win despite never making a public appearance. He proved himself to be a nuisance at meetings, being loud, sarcastic, and relentlessly insulting towards his fellow board members. Oh yeah, and he also began a website - http://www.andykaufmanlives.com.

Since his strange emergence, talk began to circulate that Rocco, about whom no background information has been found to this day, was in fact an alter-ego of Andy Kaufman. Not only did online registries show Rocco as the creator of this controversial site that cryptically claimed Kaufman to be alive, but Rocco publicly admitted to its creation.

The name of the registrar was then changed to Stephen Maddox, allegedly the name of a character from an old film about a man who faked his own death. The mysterious "Maddox" began claiming that he himself was Andy Kaufman, living comfortably and privately under a pseudonym. Stephen/Andy *also* claimed that, like Foreign Man and Tony Clifton, Steve Rocco was just another of his characters. (Fans have noted Rocco's facial resemblance to Kaufman, and in a discussion about the topic on The Overnightscape, an online radio show, it was mentioned by a long-time follower of Andy's supposed death hoax that Rocco appeared sans his trademark sunglasses on public access TV in the mid-Nineties, and bore a striking resemblance to Kaufman.)

So is the jailbound Rocco in fact Andy Kaufman, alive and well and stealing ketchup? Only time will tell. If Maddox and Rocco are the same person, then surely, the often updated Andy Kaufman Lives will sit dormant throughout Rocco's up-to-six-month sentence. Then again... perhaps this ridiculous ketchup controversy is just another genius Kaufman prank??