Favorite SNL Characters

Someone asked me the other day for my 10 all-time favorite Saturday Night Live characters, and I thought it would make for an interesting post. I'm just an occassional watcher, so I'm sure I'm missing dozens of funny ones. So here they are, in no particular order:

Megan, the host of Wakeup Wakefield
Played by: Maya Rudolph
See her: the 2001 episode hosted by Reese Witherspoon and the 2002 episode hosted by John McCain.
The character: Teenage girl hosts morning show with pal Shelden (Rachel Dratch), seems mostly bored except when it comes to her longtime crush Randy Wayne Goldman (Jimmy Fallon)
Notable quote: “Gretchen, I have a question specifically pertaining to Spanish Club. When you and Randy Goldman kiss, does it taste like peach Jolly Ranchers?"

Harry Caray, the host of Space: The Infinite Frontier
Played by: Will Ferrell
See him: the 1997 episode hosted by Jeff Goldblum.
The character: Basically an impersonation of the famous Chicago Cubs broadcaster hosting an astronomy talk show. If there ever was a better performance by Will Ferrell on SNL, I haven’t seen it.
Noteable quote: “It's a simple question, doctor. Would you eat the moon if it were made of ribs?"

Debbie Downer
Played by: Rachel Dratch
See her: the 2004 episode hosted by Lindsay Lohan, 2004 episode hosted by Ben Affleck.
The character: While others are trying to experience the joys of life, Debbie can’t help but spit out discouraging thoughts. The funniest part is that Dratch can’t get through one of these sketches with a straight face.
Noteable quote: “I guess Roy isn't doing as well as they first thought... He was attacked by his own tiger and suffered devastating injuries."

Matt Foley, Motivational Speaker
Played by: Chris Farley
See him: the 1993 episode hosted by Christina Applegate
The character: Invited by parents to speak to their wayward teens, he’s negative and over the top in every way. Usually ends up breaking something before he’s kicked out of the house.
Noteable quote: “You're gonna be doing a lot of doobie-rolling when you're living in a van down by the river!"

Azrael Abyss, Co-host of Goth Talk
Played by: Chris Kattan
See him: 1997 episode hosted by Rob Lowe, 1997 episode hosted by Jeff Goldblum, 1998 episode hosted by Sarah Michelle Gellar.
The character: Real name is Todd Henderson – he hosts a Goth cable access show in his family’s basement with pal Circe Nightshade (Molly Shannon). His day job is working at Cinnabon, his older brother Glenn (Jim Breuer) is a frequent interloper. The guests are usually revealed to be poseurs.
Noteable quote: “If I had been born in the seventeenth century, I wouldn't have to Turtle Wax the van."

Professors Roger and Virginia Klarven
Played by: Will Ferrell and Rachel Dratch
See them: the 2001 episode hosted by Drew Barrymore and the 2002 episode hosted by Winona Ryder.
The characters: “The Lovers” torment weary traveler Dave (Jimmy Fallon) while he tries to relax in the ha-tub at the prestigious Wellsley Arms hotel. Some of the funniest stuff I’ve ever seen on SNL.
Noteable quote: “At this point in the soak, my lov-ah and I usually crave spiced meats."

Dominican Lou
Played by: Tracy Morgan
See him: 1997 episode hosted by John Goodman
The character: The building super at 1901 Burnside Avenue in the Bronx, he wanted to teach the IBM supercomputer Big Blue to play dominoes so that it could beat his rival Felix.
Noteable quote: There isn’t one that will do Dominican Lou justice – it’s mostly the performance.

Tim Calhoun
Played by: Will Forte
See him: 2002 episode hosted by John McCain
The character: a bizarre political candidate who has lived a much more exciting life than his appearance might suggest, he also has an interesting campaign strategy.
Noteable quote: “I have used a lot of some drugs, and some not at all. But a little bit of cocaine. I’m real sorry about the cocaine.”

Sean Connery
Played by: Darrell Hammond
See him: numerous episodes featuring the recurring “Celebrity Jeopardy” sketch
The character: portrayed as a loveable buffoon, Connery enjoys tormenting Alex Trebek at every turn.
Noteable quote: “I bet if you frisked me, you would have found it.”

(TIE) Bill Clinton (Darrell Hammond), Tim Russert (Darrell Hammond), Mary Katherine Gallagher (Molly Shannon), Ross Perot (Dana Carvey), Janet Reno (Will Ferrell)

Okay, so I admit no one actually asked me for my 10 favorite. But if I waited for someone to ask, I would have never been able to write this.

It Didn't Blow My Doors Off

So I went to see "The Dark Knight" last week - even paid full price. I average about one full price movie per year. After reading all the breathless reviews, I almost expected the movie event of my lifetime. I was curious to see for myself if Heath Ledger's performance was worth the hype. Would he prove to be worthy of a posthumous Oscar? Would it be painful to see him onscreen following his untimely death resulting from an "accidental overdose" of prescription drugs?

(The answer to the second question is no - I personally don't know the guy.)

Looking back, there weren't really that many memorable scenes that left you talking afterwards. The Joker's entrance was good, when he makes the pencil disappear. And the scene where Lucius Fox shuts down Coleman Reese was great - one of the few lighthearted moments of the film. Actually, it may have been the only one. Otherwise, it was mostly just violence.

Michael Caine seemed to be having trouble with his accent - but maybe that's how he wanted it to sound.

I went from not liking Maggie Gyllenhaal to liking her after seeing "Stranger Than Fiction" and now I'm sort of lukewarm again after her portrayal of Rachel Dawes - pretty much as blah as Katie Holmes was in the last one. Maybe the problem is Rachel Dawes - why is Bruce Wayne so hot for her in the first place?

Christian Bale smirked and did the gravelly Batman voice (or maybe it was a voice double) through the whole film. Nothing at all memorable about his performance.

Heath Ledger was good - but I kept waiting for some bit of scintillating acting, which never quite happened. He was evil. He was creepy. He ran around sticking his blade in people's mouths. He was the villian. That was his job and he did it well. Or at least he did it better than Jack Nicholson.

But does he deserve the Oscar? I'll say yes, but mostly because we need more Oscar nominations going to movies people have actually seen.

Don't get me wrong - the movie was entertaining - definitely worth the $7.25. And I might feel more positively about it after a second viewing. (Although I'm not paying $7.25 to see it a second time.) But it didn't quite live up to the hype.

Vinyl Flooring & Me

I've been putting off the vinyl flooring project for awhile. Finally, I decided I was ready to do it. After consulting with my advisors, I decided that I needed to put down some plywood to provide a nice surface. One problem - I lacked the tools to make the precise cuts needed to fit the pieces of floor together and to cut the hole for the toilet. Since we've been renters for so long, I've never had much need for power tools. I thought about borrowing a jigsaw but then realized they were only $30 at Lowe's, so this beauty came home with me.

Here's the bathroom stripped of its flooring. I suppose we could have just slapped the vinyl flooring over the top of this material, but it was not in the best condition.

Here's a closeup of one of the cuts my new jigsaw made for me - what a handy tool to have around. As a side note, I hate the date stamp feature on our camera. If you even breathe on it wrong, it resets to 1/1/02. So that's why the date is so weird. I'm turning the entire feature to "off" and we'll just dispense with knowing what dates the pictures were taken. Actual date was 7/12/08.

And at last - the finished product. There are some slight imperfections and probably some things I would have done differently, but I guess it came out pretty good for my first time. And it only took me working all day from 9 am to 11 pm last Saturday! It's amazing what you can do with the right tools.

Quit While You're Ahead

Pretty much everyone agrees that John Elway went out the right way - his final game was Super Bowl XXXIII, in which he won MVP honors by passing for 300 yards, throwing an 80-yard touchdown pass to Rod Smith, and scoring a touchdown of his own to clinch a 34-19 victory and a second consecutive world championship. A few months later, he retired after a 16-year career.

However, Elway's ending was the exception, not the rule. Check out the endings for these other Hall of Fame quarterbacks:

Warren Moon - He finished up as a reserve quarterback for a mediocre Kansas City Chiefs team, playing in only three games in two seasons.

Troy Aikman and Steve Young - Simply too concussed to continue playing.

Dan Marino - The Dolphins get blasted 62-7 in a divisional playoff game to put the cap on Marino's career.

Terry Bradshaw - Sat out most of the 1983 season after elbow surgery, then reinjured the elbow in his first game back, which was also the last game of his career. At least his last pass went for a touchdown.

Joe Montana - Pushed out the door by the 49ers after winning four Super Bowls, he finished up his career with two decent years in Kansas City. His final game was a playoff loss to Dan Marino and the Dolphins.

Dan Fouts - The Chargers finished his final season with six straight losses while he posted his lowest passer rating in 12 seasons.

Which brings us to Brett Favre. It wouldn't have been a totally bad ending for him - he led a Packers team which wasn't supposed to be that good all the way to the NFC Championship game, and they came up just short of the Super Bowl. So he retires from the NFL, the team moves on, but he changes his mind. He knows the Packers don't want him back, so he asks to be released, but they don't want to let him go, probably for salary cap reasons. So he either creates a quarterback controversy in Green Bay, or goes somewhere else like the Carolina Panthers and hangs on for another year or two, perhaps slightly tainting his Packer legacy. I'm not a fan of Favre or the Packers, but I could imagine how the fans must feel. It would have made me sick to see Elway finishing up his career in another uniform.

I'm not sure how it will end up for Favre, but I'm sure it won't be as good as the ending he already had. But he can rest assured that Peter King and John Madden will always love him no matter what.

Mount Mile High

Today on denverpost.com a reader posed a question to Woody Paige regarding who would be on the Mount Rushmore of Denver athletes. He said it should be John Elway, Joe Sakic, and Todd Helton but was unsure of who would be the fourth member representing the Denver Nuggets. In true Woody fashion, his response made a case for everyone from Amy Van Dyken to Whizzer White but didn't really give a definite answer.

So this knocked around in my head all day when I needed a break from thinking about the various tax returns I was working on. The answer depends on exactly what the question is - does it have to be one person from each of the four major pro teams in Denver, or is it wide open?

I think if you were to leave it wide open, you could very easily end up with Mount Bronco - either Little/Gradishar/Elway/TD or maybe Elway/Shanahan/TD/Sharpe or something along those lines. So I think you'd have to limit it to one per pro sports team.

My choices:

John Elway, representing the Broncos. You can't have a Mount Mile High without Elway. No explanation needed. Sorry, TD.

Joe Sakic, representing the Avalanche. I really am not an authority on the NHL, so I'll just agree with the others. He seems like the logical choice since he's been here so long and won the two Stanley Cups.

Larry Walker, representing the Rockies. I'd have to disagree with choosing Helton, since I have to choose a Rocky to go on the list. It's hard to beat what Walker accomplished in nearly 10 years in Denver: 5 Gold Gloves, 4 All-Star appearances, 3 batting titles, 1 MVP award. But I can see where some would go with Helton since he's spent his whole career here and was on last year's World Series team. If Matt Holliday ends up sticking around, this spot is his for the taking.

Alex English, representing the Nuggets. I guess there's a reason the reader asked the question. It's tough to decide who would represent the Nuggets. Dan Issel would be a pretty good choice, but the Hispanic community probably would be unhappy about it. Woody seemed to lean towards David Thompson, which would also be okay with me given that I'm an NC State guy myself. There's also Fat Lever and maybe even Dikembe Mutombo. But when I think of all-time great Nuggets, I think of Alex English. Maybe that's because his career coincided with my formative years. Anyways, he averaged well over 20 points per game over his 10-year stay in Denver, won two NBA scoring titles, and represented the Nuggets 8 times in the All-Star game. That's good enough for me.

Freedom and Respect

So the big hubub in Denver this week was singer Rene Marie's performance before mayor John Hickenlooper's annual state of the city speech. She was invited to sing "The Star-Spangled Banner" but instead sang "Lift Ev'ry Voice and Sing" to the tune of our national anthem. I was not familiar with the song, but it is apparently "the black national anthem." She had apparently decided beforehand to do this but didn't tell anyone. I don't know that she has really given a sufficient explanation for her action, but has taken the "no apologies" stance. She was quoted in the Rocky Mountain News as saying that she didn't let Denver city officials in on her little plan because it wasn't necessary "for an artist to ask permission to express themselves artistically."

Unless, of course, you were asked to perform a specific song by an elected official.

We're celebrating America today because of our freedoms. We can worship how we choose, criticize the government, and yes, even express ourselves artistically. If Rene Marie wants to sing the black national anthem instead of the regular one because that's how she feels about America, it's okay by me. And I guess if she wants to upstage a city meeting by not doing what she was asked, that's okay too. It's America.

But there's a fine line between protesting and showing disrespect for others. Certainly those in attendance wanted to hear "The Star-Spangled Banner" because it symbolizes their gratitude for this country. And the mayor spent hours preparing a speech that ultimately no one wound up caring about. She had to know people were going to be upset about her "artistic choice."

That's probably my biggest gripe about America today. People have so much contempt for one another if they don't agree politically. I think they should just say, "I disagree, but I respect your opinion." We are all on the same side, after all. So that's my Independence Day Wish.

In conclusion, was Rene Marie wrong in singing an alternative national anthem? No. But was she being incredibly selfish? Yes.


Whitney didn't pull the switcheroo back in '91. Was this the greatest all-time performance of our national anthem? Are there even any other candidates?

Hats Off

Everyone loves bashing politicians, and sometimes with good reason. But I can tell you that running for high-profile public office is something that I would never ever want to do. What other job is there where people dig around through every dark corner of your life and then publicize their findings for the whole world to hear? It must be so maddening for these folks to be out on the campaign trail and people are questioning them about something they said or did 20 years ago. So hats off to those folks for putting themselves out there in order to serve their constituents.

I think my favorite example is the story about Mitt Romney's dog. This is sort of old news by now, but I still want to comment on it. Apparently some 25 years ago, Mitt packed his family up for vacation. He strapped a dog carrier to the top of the car for the family's Irish Setter, Seamus, to ride in. For some reason, the dog cuts loose with a bad case of number two while the family is en route and makes a big mess, so Mitt has to stop and hose it down. And then somehow, this story comes up during his Presidential campaign.

So that produces a big commotion about whether Mitt violated animal cruelty laws and PETA has to weigh in with their two cents as well, and so all these folks think Mitt is unfit for the presidency because a dog crapped on his car a quarter-century ago.

Okay, I agree that maybe Mitt shouldn't have strapped his dog on top of the car for a lengthy drive. But haven't we all done a thing or two, that in hindsight, wasn't a real good idea?

But no matter how bad all the rabble-rousers try to make this seem, Mitt Romney isn't exactly Michael Vick.

I think that people forget that 1983 was a different time than 2008. Back then, every third high school or college team in America had an Indian or some other Native American representation as their mascot. I don't even think most people were buckling up their kids in 1983. I know I spent a considerable amount of time in the 1980s riding in the back of pickup trucks or rolling around in the back of the family station wagon. Darn good thing neither of my parents is on the ballot this November.

I guess maybe I'm a softie, since I've already let Becky and Kirby off the hook. But I don't think how an individual treated an animal 25 years ago has any bearing on whether they would be an effective president, and it doesn't matter if it's Hillary's Shi Tzu or Obama's Doberman or McCain's Cocker Spaniel or Ron Paul's rabid Rottweiler. PETA should stick to whatever it is they usually do, which I believe is taking pictures of celebrities with their clothes off. I'm disappointed that Mitt didn't get the nomination, or we might have been in store for some interesting lines of questioning during the televised debates this fall.