Here come da judge...

I hate to admit it, but I am a big fan of the Fox Network court TV shows. Judge Mathis, in particular, is one very cool dude. If he hadn't decided to go into law, he could have made a pretty good living as a comic. But this post is not about him.

If any of you watch/have watched any of these shows, I think you'll identify with this. I am sooo tired of muting or switching channels just before it's time for another set of commercials. They have this annoying habit of playing excerpts from the segment that will follow the upcoming commercials. It would be bad enough if they just played 5-10 seconds of it, as it is usually the most interesting/unexpected/outrageous part, but they play as much as 30 seconds or more. Talk about spoiling the story.

If you forget/neglect to mute/switch channels, you may as well get up and clean the bathroom for the next five minutes because the only thing you'll be missing is commercials followed by a few minutes of crap that was too boring to put in the "preview".

If I were a (potential) sponsor, there's no way I'd advertise during those programs. Instead of giving the viewer incentive to stay glued to the TV, I believe it has the opposite effect. If one watches the preview, (s)he is likely to think "I'll run and (insert household chore here) and if I'm not back by the time the commercials are over, I probably won't miss much."

Tomorrow, I'll post about the banal subject of world hunger. Or not.

Classic cars from my childhood

I was inspired by a preview of a new movie called "Sex Drive" to produce articles on some of the cars I grew up with and loved--no...still love, as they live on not only in my memories, but also preserved in stills and video. Indeed, many of them still run and are the stuff car shows are made of.

Enough with the nostalgia. The car that caught my eye in a commercial for the movie was a Pontiac GTO Judge. It's name was derived from a bit in Rowan and Martin's Laugh-in TV Show where Sammy Davis Jr. was a freaked out judge and the catch phrase was "Here come da judge...here come da judge...". Goldie Hawn got her start on that show as a bikini-wearing, body-painted, lovable, dumb blonde. Oops. I can't seem to keep from dredging up the past. But it's so damn interesting.

The GTO Judge made its debut in 1969, when I was 15 (this would explain why I remember Goldie so vividly). It came stock with a 350-horse power, 400 CID (cubic inch displacement) engine or with an optional 455. I think it is a near perfect combination of pretty looks and an undertone of powerful-looking. What do you think?

The year the GTO Judge was introduced (1969), it was surpassed in sales by the Chevrolet Chevelle SS396, a car my older brother owned and which I'll be featuring in my next article on this topic.

To see all posts in this series click here.

Last Kiss music video.

Another car music video.

More music videos.

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