Upset, dismay, or otherwise unenjoyable.
> LOS ANGELES – Bob Barker is heading toward his last showcase, his final “Come on down.” The silver-haired daytime-TV icon is retiring in June, he told The Associated Press Tuesday.
> “I will be 83 years old on December 12,” he said, “and I’ve decided to retire while I’m still young.”
> He’ll hang up his microphone after 35 years as the host of “The Price Is Right” and 50 years overall in television.
[Read more.](http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20061031/ap_en_tv/tv_bob_barker_retires)
Ladies and gentlemen, I come to you with important news.
For a number of people in my generation – plus those generations one above and one below me; people roughly between the ages of 18 and 30 – the impending DVD release of [The Wizard](http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0098663/), the 1989 video game opus was welcome news.
I came across a copy of the DVD today, and I nearly squealed in joy to pick it up. The actual release isn’t scheduled until August 29th, and while the store is notorious for breaking street dates, there’s always a rush to get your hands on something early. But something struck me oddly: why was it only $11.99? I turned the DVD over, and noticed very quickly: *there were no extra features listed on the back*.
I bought it anyhow. Hey, $12 for a piece of my youth is chump change – and besides, there might be features on it and they just didn’t list it.
I inserted the disc when I returned home a short while ago and was greated with this menu:
My jaw dropped. Okay, fine, no special features, but…no scene select?
I clicked Languages with the slightest hint of hope. It was quickly eliminated.
So congratulations, Universal Studios Home Video – you had a chance to do some serious cult-market long-tail sales with this film. People wanted commentaries with Jenny Lewis and Fred Savage, making-of information, **anything**. And you blew it. You didn’t get the star.
And if you don’t believe me and my screenshots, Rotten Tomatoes confirms it.
I cannot love this DVD. It’s so bad – in the exact opposite way of the Power Glove. Fellow gamers, heed this warning well – The Wizard DVD will break your heart.
First: yes, we finally have our power back, as of this morning. The cable, which made its own outage in fear of not getting enough of our attention, is also back. Thanks to everyone who sent us well-wishes, and particular thanks to Jen & Jay for putting us up for the weekend so we could pretend as though we were a part of society.
As the dust begins to clear, and fingers begin to point towards those who should shoulder the blame, [it was only a matter of time](http://ny1.com/ny1/content/index.jsp?stid=1&aid=61233) until Mediocrity reared its ugly head:
> As power is slowly being restored in Northwest Queens, the mayor says embattled Con Edison CEO Kevin Burke should not only keep his job, but that he deserves a pat on the back from New Yorkers, much to the surprise of Queens lawmakers.
> “I think Kevin Burke deserves a thanks from this city. He’s worked as hard as he can every single day since then, as has everybody at Con Ed,” Mayor Michael Bloomberg said at a news conference Monday. “It’s easy to go criticize, but once this happened, Con Ed has been doing everything they can to bring it back.”
> Assemblyman Michael Gianaris and City Councilman Peter Vallone Jr. — who believe Burke should be fired — were visibly stunned by the mayor’s comments.
In a way, Bloomberg is right. It *is* easy to criticize.
It’s easy to criticize a public utility company that gives counts of blacked-out subscribers based on the number of people who call to complain, rather than any real metric.
It’s easy to criticize a CEO that doesn’t apologize until the fifth day of the outage.
It’s easy to criticize workers who have been reported as sleeping on the job, hooting at women, and – in my own personal experience – reading books on Seamanship when they should be fixing the grid.
It’s easy to criticize a governor who refuses to declare a disaster area when over 100,000 people were without power for nearly a week.
It’s easy to criticize a claims program that only allows business claims for food spoilage, thus denying all businesses who don’t deal in perishable goods any immediate relief for their inability to be open.
Beyond all else, it’s easy to criticize a mayor who refuses to hold anyone accountable for the longest blackout in New York City history.