July 2018 – saleintothe90s

Hey everybody,

I uploaded that episode of Daily Show in its entirety from the Vance DeGeneres exploding BBQ sauce story that I posted about Friday night. There’s a lot to unpack here, Dave Chappelle interview, Lewis Black yellin’ ‘bout panties, Y2K scares….

Hey everybody,

(Source: https://player.vimeo.com/)

359. It Came From The Daily Show: Exploding Thermonuclear BBQ Sauce (9/22/1999)

In the early months of Jon Stewart’s tenure on The Daily Show in 1999, the show was trying to shake off its parodying of Dateline NBC. While hip in the mid 90s when the show started with Craig Kilborn as host, was beginning to wane in the late 90s.

One of the final hanger-oners of these Dateline parodies was the “Tales of Survival” field piece, which parodied death-defying stories of survival. Instead of someone being trapped in a crushed car sucking on buttons for sustenance, you had a lady whose cat was stuck in a tree for a week. Or a lady who found herself drenched in Col. Johnson’s Thermo-Nuclear barbecue sauce.

http://www.cc.com/video-clips/l7en4a/the-daily-show-with-jon-stewart-a-tale-of-survival—bbq-sauce-pt–1

http://www.cc.com/video-clips/udjbf7/the-daily-show-with-jon-stewart-a-tale-of-survival—bbq-sauce-pt–2

The clips on comedy central’s website are a nightmare to watch. They’re so herky-jerky. I have the episode from a VHS to DVD copy, but it didn’t rip in time for me to publish this. ~~If I can get the episode to Vimeo, I’ll let you know in this spot right here. So, uh, keep your eyes open for it.~~

It’s up! This episode has a lot to unwrap, Dave Chappelle interview, Y2K hub bug, Lewis Black yellin’, and something I want to write about in the future.

For this segment, Daily Show assigned their most stoic of correspondents: Vance DeGeneres. ‘Dude never cracked a smile on Daily Show for years, and he was dramatic as hell. He was perfect for the assignment.

“Joan was about to experience the Colonel’s wrath. This was the very kitchen it happened in.”

[eats a grape]

“Joan, take us back to that day. We’re you planning on making a delicious barbeque?”

“It was breakfast time! And it was leaking, it had barbeque sauce seeping out of the top and down the sides. So I thought I would put it down the disposal so it wouldn’t smell.”

“So you picked up the bottle, shook it up—”

“No! I just picked it up, and held it over the sink and released the cap.”

(dramatic music)

“You didn’t shake it?”

“No.”

“No shaking involved? You just twisted the cap just a little bit?”

“I released the cap, just barely….”

“Just a bit…”

“…and that’s all it needed”

After just a half-turn of the cap, the Northbrook homemaker found herself covered in the gooey, dark red condiment that had spewed forth like a spring-loaded snake from a phony can of nuts.

It also splattered her kitchen walls and ceiling, and even burned holes in the leaves of an African violet plant 8 feet from ground zero.

The sauce burned her plants, you guys. Her plants. It was potent enough to burn holes in a plant. It also irritated her kids’ hands as they tried to clean up the mess.

She wasn’t alone! A similar situation happened about an hour away when Kathy Jaffer came home to something that smelled like “a really bad restaurant”. Her bottle of Col. Johnson’s Thermo-Nuclear barbecue sauce had exploded too.

Col. Johnson’s Thermo-Nuclear barbecue sauce comes from Chesapeake, Virginia and was bought by the two ladies (who didn’t know each other) at a Ribfest in Illinois. The sauce won first prize for best ribs. 1

I could not find an article on why the bottles popped their tops. Looks like Col. Johnson’s is still in Chesapeake.

1. Chase, John, “Sauce Lives Up To Explosive Reputation,” Chicago Tribune, July 22, 1999. http://articles.chicagotribune.com/1999-07-22/news/9907220380_1_barbecue-sauce-bottle-ground-zero

359. It Came From The Daily Show: Exploding Thermonuclear BBQ Sauce (9/22/1999)

http://www.cc.com/video-clips/l7en4a/the-daily-show-with-jon-stewart-a-tale-of-survival—bbq-sauce-pt–1

http://www.cc.com/video-clips/udjbf7/the-daily-show-with-jon-stewart-a-tale-of-survival—bbq-sauce-pt–2

It’s up! This episode has a lot to unwrap, Dave Chappelle interview, Y2K hub bug, Lewis Black yellin’, and something I want to write about in the future.

“Joan was about to experience the Colonel’s wrath. This was the very kitchen it happened in.”

[eats a grape]

“Joan, take us back to that day. We’re you planning on making a delicious barbeque?”

“It was breakfast time! And it was leaking, it had barbeque sauce seeping out of the top and down the sides. So I thought I would put it down the disposal so it wouldn’t smell.”

“So you picked up the bottle, shook it up—”

“No! I just picked it up, and held it over the sink and released the cap.”

(dramatic music)

“You didn’t shake it?”

“No.”

“No shaking involved? You just twisted the cap just a little bit?”

“I released the cap, just barely….”

“Just a bit…”

“…and that’s all it needed”

After just a half-turn of the cap, the Northbrook homemaker found herself covered in the gooey, dark red condiment that had spewed forth like a spring-loaded snake from a phony can of nuts.

It also splattered her kitchen walls and ceiling, and even burned holes in the leaves of an African violet plant 8 feet from ground zero.

The sauce burned her plants, you guys. Her plants. It was potent enough to burn holes in a plant. It also irritated her kids’ hands as they tried to clean up the mess.

I could not find an article on why the bottles popped their tops. Looks like Col. Johnson’s is still in Chesapeake.

1. Chase, John, “Sauce Lives Up To Explosive Reputation,” Chicago Tribune, July 22, 1999. http://articles.chicagotribune.com/1999-07-22/news/9907220380_1_barbecue-sauce-bottle-ground-zero

359. It Came From The Daily Show: Exploding Thermonuclear BBQ Sauce (9/22/1999)

http://www.cc.com/video-clips/l7en4a/the-daily-show-with-jon-stewart-a-tale-of-survival—bbq-sauce-pt–1

http://www.cc.com/video-clips/udjbf7/the-daily-show-with-jon-stewart-a-tale-of-survival—bbq-sauce-pt–2

It’s up! This episode has a lot to unwrap, Dave Chappelle interview, Y2K hub bug, Lewis Black yellin’, and something I want to write about in the future.

“Joan was about to experience the Colonel’s wrath. This was the very kitchen it happened in.”

[eats a grape]

“Joan, take us back to that day. We’re you planning on making a delicious barbeque?”

“It was breakfast time! And it was leaking, it had barbeque sauce seeping out of the top and down the sides. So I thought I would put it down the disposal so it wouldn’t smell.”

“So you picked up the bottle, shook it up—”

“No! I just picked it up, and held it over the sink and released the cap.”

(dramatic music)

“You didn’t shake it?”

“No.”

“No shaking involved? You just twisted the cap just a little bit?”

“I released the cap, just barely….”

“Just a bit…”

“…and that’s all it needed”

After just a half-turn of the cap, the Northbrook homemaker found herself covered in the gooey, dark red condiment that had spewed forth like a spring-loaded snake from a phony can of nuts.

It also splattered her kitchen walls and ceiling, and even burned holes in the leaves of an African violet plant 8 feet from ground zero.

The sauce burned her plants, you guys. Her plants. It was potent enough to burn holes in a plant. It also irritated her kids’ hands as they tried to clean up the mess.

I could not find an article on why the bottles popped their tops. Looks like Col. Johnson’s is still in Chesapeake.

1. Chase, John, “Sauce Lives Up To Explosive Reputation,” Chicago Tribune, July 22, 1999. http://articles.chicagotribune.com/1999-07-22/news/9907220380_1_barbecue-sauce-bottle-ground-zero

337. 88 Things About 1988, part 4

(Part 3)

26. Sonny Bono becomes mayor of Palm Springs, California.

Sonny Bono, the former musician who teamed up with Cher in the 1970s, became tired of being a second banana, and making appearances on the Love Boat. He opened a restaurant, and had zoning issues with the restaurant’s sign. He also was worried about the economic state of Palm Springs, seeing empty store fronts, and cheap motels moving into town. 1 That’s when his political career began. He later became a Congressman for the Republican party in 1992, until his death in 1998 in a skiing accent.

1. Rosenbaum, Ron, “Solo Bono,” Vanity Fair, February 1988. https://www.vanityfair.com/news/1988/02/sonny-bono-199802

27. Clint Eastwood decides that one mayoral term is enough.

28. The lottery begins in Virginia.

And my mom’s life was never the same again.

(source)

29. The Baltimore Orioles lose the first 21 games of the season

(source)

30. The United States Embassy in the Soviet Union is down down for debuggin’

No, not insects, spy bugs:

Reagan couldn`t be more correct. The history of a highly sensitive U.S. construction project in the heart of the Soviet Union, doomed from the start by inexplicably lax security, should be thoroughly analyzed. Then, unless someone comes up with an as yet undiscovered way to make the bug-ridden embassy secure, it should be demolished and a new one built, whatever the cost.

When it became evident that the building had been turned into a communist spy`s delight, the State Department asked a group of engineers, architects and security experts to assess the situation and decide if some part of the structure could be salvaged.

Their conclusion: Tear the building down and start over.

The enormous increase in the cost of a new embassy is due in part to the kind of precautions that should have been taken in the original construction. The main elements of the building would be fabricated in the U.S. instead of in loosely supervised Soviet surroundings. The material would be shipped under guard to the U.S.S.R. and stored in secure warehouses. Unlike the first building, the replacement would be erected by American workers with special security clearances. 3

The building wouldn’t open until 2000! 4

31. “The Dictator”

Christopher Lloyd was supposed to star in an new sitcom for CBS where he played a dictator that was kicked out of his fictional country and immigrated to the United States (Queens) to run a laundromat? HIs aide was also kicked out of the country and worked at Macy’s.

The show was publicized to air on March 15th. However, the show never aired, and was a victim of the 1988 Writer’s Strike, because only two episodes were written before the strike. 5

Oh yeah, and there’s no copies of the first two episodes anywhere.

32. James Brown was mad that someone used his bathroom so he went on a car chase

Why try to explain? Let’s go directly to the just-the-facts FBI report, recounting what Brown told agents who visited him at the state prison at Columbia, S.C.

“Brown stated that … on a Saturday, date not recalled, he drove his pick up truck to his office” in Augusta, Ga. “When arriving at his office he observed that his bathroom door was open. Thinking that possibly there had been a break-in he went back to his truck in the parking lot, got his shot gun and took it back to his office.

"He then learned that there was a meeting going on somewhere in the office complex and that the attendees of this meeting had been using the bathroom in his office.

"Brown was extremely upset about this and began questioning those in attendance as to the reason for using his facility. During this time Brown had placed his shot gun in the corner of his office in full view. Brown then asked for the return of his keys, received same and then locked the bathroom door.

"He then left his office with the shot gun, placed it in the pick up truck and began driving his truck on I-20 into South Carolina… . He observed that a road block had been set up by two police vehicles in a ‘V’ shape. Brown seeing this drove around the police road block to avoid hitting the police vehicles and continued on. 6

33. The Syringe Tide

Syringes washed up ashore on Beaches in Long Island, New York, New Jersey, and Rhode Island. The source was from the Fresh Kills landfill.

34. “Lunch & Learn Driving Class”

…Across town, the violators who paid $29 to attend the Lunch N Learn at Fine Restaurants class were cutting into London broil and baked potatoes and knocking back glasses of chilled tap water at Thiggy’s, the restaurant at the Lincoln Park Golf Course.

The fine-dining traffic school offers a fringe benefit, movies. Shortly after the chocolate mousse, the students sat back to mull an assortment of stomach-churning videos of car wrecks with titles like ’’Red Asphalt II.” 7

1. Rosenbaum, Ron, “Solo Bono,” Vanity Fair, February 1988. https://www.vanityfair.com/news/1988/02/sonny-bono-199802

2. “Lottery ticket sales are brisk,” Smithfield Times, September 21, 1988.

3. “Reagan Correct: Moscow Embassy Must Be Torn Down And Replaced,” SunSentinel , October 31, 1988.

4. Lally, Kathy, “U.S. Finally Opens Moscow Embassy / Building was delayed 15 years after Russians riddled it with bugs,” SFGate.com, July 8, 2000.

5. Irvin, Richard. Forgotten Laughs: An Episode Guide to 150 TV Sitcoms You Probably Never Saw. Duncan, OK: BearManor Media, 2012.

6. Stephens Joe, “FBI File Recounts James Brown’s Side Of ’88 Police Chase,” Washington Post, April 3, 2007. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/04/02/AR2007040201614.html

7. Bishop, Katherine, “San Francisco Journal; Penalizing Lawbreakers With Laughs and a Meal,” New York Times, July 26, 1988. https://www.nytimes.com/1988/07/26/us/san-francisco-journal-penalizing-lawbreakers-with-laughs-and-a-meal.html

358. “Suicide Towns”

I don’t know how to describe it, but I feel like in my middle school years in the mid 90s, there were so many like, suicidal things? aimed to us teenagers? Every issue of Seventeen there for a while, there was always an article about depression, or suicide, articles about girls who attempted, or families of girls who had killed themselves, or stories about girls who cut themselves. It was like they were warning us, that this might happen to you.

It also felt as though it was cool to not care? That it was “in” to be depressed. Our music was sad.

I guess I wasn’t the only one who felt that way? The above article was about eight girls in New Milford, Connecticut all attempted some sort of suicidal gesture in a five-day period in the early Summer of 1995. There was even a town hall setting meeting at the local high school to discuss it:

A hospital spokeswoman, Gretchen O’Shea-Reynolds, said after tonight’s meeting that officials had not been able to confirm that there had been any suicide pact. Instead, officials talked about the “contagiousness” of suicidal feelings among the girls.

In the high school auditorium, more than 100 parents heard advice on identifying signs of suicidal feelings, and a plea by doctors and school officials to take a larger part in their teen-agers’ lives.

“What’s going on in New Milford is not unique to New Milford,” said Dr. Simon Sobo, chief of psychiatry at New Milford Hospital. “Too many children feel that life is cheap, that they’re not going anywhere.” 2

The epidemic was even more series in the Sheridan, Arkansas area five years earlier:

I mean, a kid killed himself in front of his class, and this was pre Pearl Jam’s “Jeremy” video, so it couldn’t be a copycat. (“Jeremy” happened in 1991, when a boy, Jeremy Wade Delle killed himself in front of his English class. 3) :

Among his teenage peers in Sheridan, Ark., Tommy Smith was a rueful clown. The 17-year-old was known to wear sunglasses and a black trench coat to class and jokingly referred to himself as “Norman Bates” or “Freddy Krueger.” Rhonda Damron, 16, appreciated Tommy’s “weird” ways, and the two had been friends since sixth grade, although they never dated. “He was different,” says Rhonda. “He didn’t believe in trying to be Mr. Popularity.” Still, Rhonda sensed from their twice-weekly phone talks that Tommy’s mordant style was a mask for his insecurity. So when he told her on the phone the night of April 29 that he was going to kill himself, she made him promise to come to school the next day, certain that his threat would prove empty.

Sure enough, after parking his Maverick in the parking lot, Tommy showed up at his American history class wearing a black T-shirt. Teacher Rick Ward was lecturing his class of 24 kids about the Great Depression when Tommy asked if he could speak. Then, says Rhonda, “he got up in front of the class and told them he had two things to say. One was that he loved me.” The other thing, he said, reaching into his blue jeans and pulling out a .22 pistol, ” ‘is this.’ ” “No, Tommy, no,” pleaded the teacher, edging closer. Then Tommy put the muzzle between his eyes and pulled the trigger. 5

In another incident from 1995, two girls cut class one February day in Victorville, California, walked to a ravine, put on a fresh coat of lipstick, and shot each other:

Annette and classmate Jenifer Powell left campus and walked to a trash-littered ravine several blocks away. There, sometime before 1:30 on that rainy afternoon, the girls applied fresh layers of lipstick—then each raised a loaded handgun to her temple and fired. Project Mushroom, as they called their death pact, was complete. 6.

[…]

The mother who found the bodies returned to the spot Thursday afternoon. Giving her name only as Cyndy, she bent in prayer next to her motorcycle and crossed herself.“It wasn’t a pretty sight,” she said. The impact of the high-caliber gun used by Jenifer had “blown away half of the side of her face,” Cyndy said. “If they’d had a clue as to what they would look like, they never would have done it,” she said. Turning to [student] Ralph Vincent, still seated beside the white crosses, she said, “the reason I described it is because I want you kids to know, OK? It was awful. I live just over there. If you need to talk to somebody, you come see me."7.

1. Rosenberg, Debra, and John Leland, “’Generation Depressed’” Newsweek, July 10, 1995. 62.

2. Judson, George, “Town Tries to Comprehend Suicide Attempts of 8 Girls,” New York Times, June 29, 1995. https://www.nytimes.com/1995/06/29/nyregion/town-tries-to-comprehend-suicide-attempts-of-8-girls.html

3. Wenger, Danile, “Pearl Jam’s “Jeremy” and the Intractable Cultural Script of School Shooters,” New Yorker, February 25, 2016. https://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/pearl-jams-jeremy-and-the-intractable-cultural-script-of-school-shooters

4. “Suicides of Four Teen-Agers Stun School in Small Arkansas Town,” New York Times, May 2, 1990. https://www.nytimes.com/1990/05/02/us/suicides-of-four-teen-agers-stun-school-in-small-arkansas-town.html

5. “Lost Too Soon,” People, May 21, 1990. https://people.com/archive/lost-too-soon-vol-33-no-20/

6. Arias, Ron, “The Lost Daughters”, People, September 18, 1995. https://people.com/archive/the-lost-daughters-vol-44-no-12/

7. “Girls’ Suicides Leave Anger, Pain in Desert Community / Teenagers’ friends, kin ask why,” SFGate, February 25, 1995. https://www.sfgate.com/news/article/Girls-Suicides-Leave-Anger-Pain-in-Desert-3044616.php

357. The Last Animaniacs (November 14, 1998)

(aw, I had that scene on a trading card in middle school, and it was later pasted on the cover for my planner in 7th grade in 1996)

For as much Animaniacs I watched from Summer of 1994 to about early to mid ‘96, I didn’t know when the series actually ended.

Probably my first memory of the show was when I was just beginning to lose interest in my Barbies the Summer of 1994. However, one last hurrah with my dolls was when I tried to recreate the episode “Warner Law”, which was a parody of L.A. Law. I don’t remember exactly how I incorporated that into my Barbies, I just remember crowding them around my Barbie Porsche, and sticking a “Warner Law” bumper sticker on the bumper out of an index card.

My second memory of the show was Christmas Eve, 1995. I finally got a Talkboy from Home Alone II, after failing to find one the prior two years. The first thing I recorded on that tape that was included?

Wakko’s burp concert. For some reason that episode was on on Christmas Eve. I kept that tape forever, and it definitely also had Seinfeld clips on it, like Newman going bezerk about the mail never ending. ~~Oh man, its 2:30 in the morning, and I can’t sleep, so that above .gif is making me laugh too much.~~

Oh! I also remember early on, wondering if the three were related to those old Bosco and Honey cartoons that Nickelodeon would show at 7:30 every night back in the early 90s.

Speaking of, I just remembered the episode of Tiny Toons when Babs rescued them, until five seconds ago, I thought that Dot rescued them. In the Tiny Toons redesign (made to make the couple look less blackface) they totally look like descendants of the Warners.

I do remember losing interest in the show, because I didn’t like the sideshows, like the Goodfeathers, Mindy and Buttons, and Rita and Runt. I just wanted the Warner Bros (and sister), Bad Idea Guy, and sometimes Slappy the Squirrel, and very rarely Pinky and the Brain.

Turns out, Animaniacs ended in November 1998, months after its final regular show aired in May. I found a copy on this site, but I don’t know how reliable the site is.

The first thing I notice that instead of the usual theme, there’s this long extended clip show right in the middle of the theme song. Clearly a way to waste time? I know from all those years watching Simpsons, whenever they do an extended theme it’s because they’re short on time.

The episode begins with those dreaded Goodfeathers argue-watching a sunrise. Skipping though that.

“The Scoring Session” is a short where the three piss off a rhino conductor. They came in late (Dot), they interrupted (Yakko), and coming in unprepared (Wakko). Apparently in Animaniacs land, the cast members provide their own score to the cartoons. It’s not very good. Moving on.

I love the little parody of the CBS Special Presentation graphics from the 80s that leads into the three introducing us to the first 99 episodes of Animaniacs.

This was my favorite clip. Why does it look like they were potty training Dr. Scratchnsniff?

This was how the show ended.

I was disappointed in how the show ended, but this is why I started this series. I wanted to see what series finales are deserving of the series, and which ones are not. I wanted to see the kids go on one last adventure! Or get locked in the tower for years again. Maybe when the show is renewed on Hulu in a couple of years, they’ll escape from the tower in the first episode.

Every little rhyme that would be done at the end of the theme song, I never knew they did a “Frasier Crane-y!” one!