While writing my annual holiday DVD roundup, I noticed that the same "Yearbook Edition" DVD of "Freaks & Geeks" that came out a few years ago is out again -- at a nice hefty $130 price. This reviewer takes it apart pretty well and advises picking up a used copy of the complete series instead.

And it's Tinker Bell!

You think I'm kidding ...

One of the more active Democrats in Congress overseeing the transition to digital television -- scheduled for TV Barn's 10th anniversary, Feb. 17, 2009 -- said on C-SPAN's "The Communicators" that "I don't remember" the new chairman of his committee, Rep. Henry Waxman, "taking an active role" in the subcommittee working on DTV issues.

So that's a bad omen.

The other bad omen, of course, is I just discovered the DTV transition is happening on the 10th anniversary of TV Barn.

Couldn't help but look ruefully at this announcement that Buckeye Cable, the 150,000-subscriber portal serving Toledo-Sandusky, Ohio, is giving its customers all kinds of electronic toys to play with.

Buckeye is owned by not-very-big Block Communications (the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette is its only other major holding). You may recall from this story I wrote a while back, that Buckeye was (and still might be) one of just two cable operators in the country carrying Al Jazeera English. They did it because the area's large Arab-American population asked for it.

So that's what customer service is ...

In a sign that the economy has made people in the media nervous, Oprah Winfrey announced that her annual edition of "Oprah's Favorite Things," scheduled to air next Wednesday, will be toned down in its lavishness compared to previous years. according to the Chicago Sun-Times Oprah Blog.

In another sign that the economy has made people in the media nervous, the Chicago Sun-Times has an Oprah blog.

Seriously, I'm surprised Oprah isn't heaping more prizes than usual on her lucky audience. I mean, times are tough, right? And how many folks who got those HDTV refrigerators you think put them on eBay immediately?

Yes, in these economically challenging times (as the higher-ups keep calling it), we're all pitching in at the paper. Hence, this bylined story about a beloved Kansas City shopping icon's return. Oh, and this one from my symphony beat. We now return you ...

Surprise, surprise ... the FCC is appealing the appeals-court decision that said it couldn't fine CBS stations a pile of money for letting Janet Jackson show her pastie to the world for half a second. An appeals court threw out the agency's indecency ruling last summer.

Next stop, the U.S. Supreme Court, or SCOTUS as people from Scotland call it ... and here's hoping the justices can find the spinal wherewithal to end the idiocy known as FCC v. Pacifica.

Dan Fienberg says it well. Heck, I'm still working my way through the DVD sets.

Good spot by Howard Mortman...who dug up the corresponding video from Letterman's show in 1986.

Conrad Black, the onetime press baron who swindled millions from the Chicago Sun-Times, is sitting in the pokey in Florida. Now he wants his ex-employer to pay for his legal bills related to a clemency plea from President Bush. If Black kept up on the news, he'd know W has issued fewer pardons than any modern POTUS.

This is a great video from the Writers Guild of America which, god bless 'em, is still trying to get reality TV "producers" into its union. Reality "producers," in fact, do as much editorial work on their shows as "CSI" screenwriters or "30 Rock" joke writers do on their shows.

... I just discovered this website and frankly, I could use a little more you-know-what in my day:

I say it here, it comes out there! Only thing is, I underestimated the desperation of Walmart (which has been doing well during the economic downturn) to ensure this is a happy holiday shopping season for its stores and shareholders.

Last week I boldly predicted -- OK, maybe not boldly but slightly recklessly, like making a turn without the blinker on -- that the price on standalone Blu-ray DVD players would come crashing down in time for the holiday selling season. Because if they didn't, most of my readers weighing in on the matter strongly suggested that this would not be a Blu-Ray Christmas for them.

There's no saying what happened to the 465 bodies that were willed to the KU Medical Center whose whereabouts the KUMC now cannot vouch for.

But given the fact that KSHB's Russ Ptacek -- who reported the stomach-turning story on Tuesday night's "NBC Action News" -- blew the lid off the government's use of human cadavers in crash-test-dummy programs since 1981 the preceding evening on "NBC Action News," and given the fact that KUMC sold hundreds of corpses to a shady body broker who is now unable to document where many of them wound up .... well, it invites one to connect the dots, does it not?

The CEO of Hallmark Channel is in Kansas City today for the premiere of "Moonlight and Mistletoe," one of 30 original movies it will air in 2008. Henry Schleiff is a well-liked, personable and chatty media CEO who -- thanks to the location of Hallmark Channel's No. 1 investor -- comes to KC every now and then. It's always fun to talk about the business with Henry before we move on to his talking points about Hallmark and people wanting to watch well-told stories on TV and all that.

This just in from the Self-Evident-Truths Dept. - a new study finds that unhappy people watch more television than not-unhappy people. Although that would explain this.

A reader sent an email to KMBC-9 on Friday after reading about the age and gender discrimination lawsuit filed by three longtime on-air personalities there last week. Like many of you who commented on the original story, this reader took the allegations of these three women seriously -- as might be expected, since Channel 9 has spent 20 years putting these women into promotional ads, showing them to be committed, reliable and all in all, pretty darned trustworthy, at least regarding their ability to tell you what's happening locally.

Well, a response was not long in coming to the email, and it reveals just a glimpse of a TV station under siege as the reaction comes rolling in from outraged viewers.

If you didn't see this commentary by Scott McMillion about my home state, "NewsHour" has been kind enough to post it at my request. McMillion is an editor at Montana Quarterly, which is edited by my high school classmate Nick Ehli (for whom I contributed this MQ story last year).

He really nails it. Montana is a beautiful place, but it has a lot of problems, and having Ted Turner and David Letterman fly in from time to time ain't gonna help with those problems.

I'm guessing this has something to do with the fact that old 29 is going to become new 9. Say what? Yes, as I reported earlier, KMBC got permission to grab 29 when KCWE is done with it so they don't have to be KC's only VHF digital station. You don't really want to be pulling an all-nighter on Feb. 16 to make that switcheroo, so this gives the engineers some breathing room.

November is the month when the biggest networks are supposed to shine, but I guess the memo didn't arrive at the National Geographic Channel.

The cable nonfiction network, which competes with Discovery and History more than ABC and CBS, is throwing seven nights of brand-new blockbuster shows against the wall. And guess what? Most of them stick.

Because a popcorn basket looks so much more irresistible when it's shown in high definition ...

Contrary to official policy, females were forced to take up arms and defend themselves in Iraq, according to "Lioness," airing in much of the country tonight.

Well, it's been a little dramatic around City Hall South these days -- that is to say, Mayor Mark Funkhouser's home -- but Hizzoner will have a chance to refocus a little on Thursday night by talking about a back-to-basics issue that's right up his alley.

He's accepted an invite to appear on KCPT to address the potential looming calamity of Kansas City's aging sewer system.

The city's water infrastructure, which in parts dates back to the Civil War, will require an estimated $4 billion to fix. The good news is, we're hardly alone, and lots of smart people are working on solutions to save the nation's cities from disasters like the great Chicago Flood of 1992.

One of my favorite all-time TV shows was "TV Nation," an unsuccessful effort by Michael Moore in the mid-1990s to bring edgy, topical news-themed stunts to network TV -- and make Crackers, the Corporate Crime Fighting Chicken (above), into a household name. I'm not sure network TV knew what to think; the show spent one summer on NBC and then another on Fox and then disappeared. It created a helluva buzz in certain circles, however, and made possible all that followed in the Moore oeuvre (he wrote a book Adventures in a TV Nation, which led to another book, which led to a movie and another book and another movie ...), so maybe it wasn't unsuccessful after all.

It's a cross-promo thingy; on the same day, NYT puzzle ed Will Shortz has a speaking part on the show. Yep, they're really going after that youth demo.