I am downright GIDDY about this!

Wade Robson on "Dancing with the Stars"

AMAZING! I love this type of treatrical and stylized choreography!

"Marie Osmond is about to Foxtrot"

I was watching the season premier of "Dancing with the Stars" last night (one of my many guilty pleasures) and got downright giddy when Sabrina Bryan-- I'd never heard of her either-- did her hip-hip influenced cha-cha-cha. As soon as she hit the final pose, I literally jumped from my couch applauding. It was SO MUCH FUN TO WATCH! I grabbed my cell phone, desperate to speak to someone that I could share the moment with.

I dialed my great friend Darla. The conversation went something like this:

[ring-ring-ring]

Darla: Hello?
Jonathan: Please, please tell me you have given up your "I don't watch those shows" attitude and are watching Dancing with the Stars right now!
Darla: Sweetie, I'm not watching. I don't watch those shows.
Jonathan: Please watch it. I need to talk to someone abotu it, and I KNOW you'd like it.
Darla: I'm sorry... I---
Jonathan: But Marie Osmond is about to do the Foxtrot! How can you to miss that?!
Darla: And you wonder WHY I don't watch those shows...
Jonathan: [sigh] fine, goodbye.
Darla: Goodbye.

I'm not sure, but I think I have humiliated myself. LOL

I LOVE this show. I admit it. I was a snob the first few years and scoffed at it, but I discovered it the night of the great Emmet Smith v. Mario Lopez finale, and never missed it last season.

I cast my votes for Jenny, Marie, and Sabrina.

My prediction for the season (having only seen the women-- the men are on tonight, including Wayne Newton) is Sabrina to WIN!

Come on people -- Wayne NEWTON! This is good television!

Good Thing

Moblog post- Seein' Martha today. Nobody terribly exciting on (biker guys from some TLC show and a lingerie fashion show-- ah-hem), but it's always fascinating to watch the show come together live. I used to go see the Rosie O'Donnell Show whenever I got the chance, and I've been to Letterman a few times.

Remembering Matthew Shepard

I miss "The West Wing." Thank god for Bravo Channel's weekly WW marathon. Not too long ago they finished with the last season and started over at the beginning of season 1. I almost forgot how brilliantly they handled current issues with such "smarts."

Last night I watched an episode that really moved me--as many did. "While President Bartlet (Martin Sheen) and his staff debate the appropriate response to a controversial new sex education study, there are fears that the parents of a murdered gay teenager should be excused from attending the signing of a hate crimes bill because of the father's embarrassment about his son's homosexuality" (excerpt from the online West Wing Episode Guide.) It turns out that the "embarrasment" they were sensing wasn't what it seemed. Rather, the father was angry with the Bartlet administration for doing so little to promote gay rights. They wanted to know why the President felt that their son deserved less than full equal rights. Great twist!

The story mirrored the story of Matthew Shepard who was brutally beaten, tied to a fence in Wyoming, and left alone to die. Melissa Etheridge wrote a song called "Scarecrow," inspired by the description of what Matthew looked like hanging near death-- I sometimes use this song in the class I teach at Hofstra to demonstrate how different forms of the media can be used to teach difficult issues. Here are the lyrics .

Matthew's story received huge media attention for a while, but has faded into obscurity. I made a reference to him the other day, and a younger friend of mine said, "Who?" I was taken aback. PLEASE visit the Matthew Shepard Foundation to learn about the devastating effects of hate crimes on our society.