Perhaps this is one of those things I can only understand after having children, but God help me, I really hate the Today show. After about ten minutes, someone says something that makes me say "And now she'll turn on her brain, and eviscerate that person", and she doesn't, and then the part of my brain that remembers it hates the show crawls off to die a slow death. Thus, six months later I turn it on again.
Flanagan's not nearly harsh enough on the nightly news people. It's not Couric's fault for going after the position; if Flangan's right, Couric's been hamstrung since she took it.
Becks, do you watch the morning shows?
The Today show has gotten far, far worse since the days of yore. The death spiral started around when they added the third hour. We watched it every day when I was growing up and, like Flanagan, I remember it very fondly and it provided stability to my getting ready for school routine growing up. And when my parent left for work and I had to finish getting ready and get out the door on my own, it was like having another grownup there. I never really watched it when I was young but I liked having it on in the background for the comfort factor.
3 - I watched the Today show every morning my entire youth, until I graduated from high school. When I got a job, I started watching it again and did so until about 3 years ago when it just became intolerable. I remember the Today show of my youth very fondly and feel a strong connection to it because it kept me sane for a while as an adult -- for about 2 years after September 11, my morning routine was to wake up and immediately turn on Today just to make sure everytihng was OK and nothing had happened overnight.
In that case, Becks, you probably saw my mom on the Today show. Can't imagine you cared.
Perhaps this is one of those things I can only understand after having children
Congratulations!
5: Oh, sure we know you were watching just in case another plane flew into something ON CAMERA.
I got into a weird habit a few years back when I'd get up and watch "Arthur" cartoons on PBS while I ate cereal and got ready to teach my morning class. Then they shifted the schedule a bit and "Barney" or some other shit was on during the 8am slot and my whole routine broke down.
I used to watch Pokemon when I got out of seminar. But what will we do about the water Pokemon if their environment is poisoned!!!
You know what hasn't changed since I was a little kid who watched TV with my mom? Days of Our Lives. Stefano's schemes are NEVER going to work!
Doesn't "morning glory" mean something else? Mineshaft? Anyone?
Mr. B, are you perchance thinking of one's glory hole? A glory hole is a vase to put some morning glories in.
A glory hole is a hole by which one might peer into a construction site. I don't know why anybody would imply otherwise.
I did some research. I think it's a rarely used reference to men waking up hard. Presumably it's only a reference to when this happens in the morning, and when this is glorious.
I just spent an hour playing pokemon on the gameboy with the kids. The problem is that the gameboy we bought of the neighbor kid doesn't save, so all the leveling up we did doesn't last.
Mr. B was thinking of the phrase "morning wood"
you're all wrong, it's about Glory Wood.
14,16: It looks like "morning glory" is the common term for "morning wood" (Nocturnal Penile Tumescence) in the UK. (See recent thread here for more on this.)
18: Which leads me to reconsider the meaning of the title of that one Oasis album.
19: If you look at the lyrics of the song (quoted in the article I link) it is even more clear. I'm sure the Brit contingent will be here in a few hours to scoff at our provincialism.
18: Which leads me to reconsider the meaning of the title of that one Oasis album.
Don't look back in anger. That's what I always say.
Looking mildly disdainful at the monitor, on the other hand.
re: 23
Well, there is that. Doing that sneery "smell the fart" face.
I loathe morning TV but I have been a stay-at-home mother to a toddler and I thought that was a lovely and subtle piece.
Our engineers are aware of the problem. Normal sneering will be resumed as soon as possible.
Personally I wake up with the switch between BBC World Service and Radio 4 and aim to be out of the shower just when Farming Today starts, out the door by the time John Humphrys clears his throat to read out the headlines.
Television would be too intrusive, but hearing some Yorkshire dairy farmer or Cornwall cheese maker complaining about the latest daft EU stunt or whatever is strangely comforting.
Barack Hussein Obama will make history as the first spam President.
When I lived in California, I'd listen to Today at night before going to bed. At 10PM-12 it works. 1 to 3 isn't so great. I kind of like Farming Today, but I've only listened to it from bed and then gotten up a few minutes after Today has started; that's only when I've been in England.
FWIW, I read that article awhile ago, and thought it was very nicely done, weaving together some navel-gazing with some worthwhile cultural observation. Flanagan isn't an idiot, she's just paid to play one.
I grew up on Today during the Tom Brokaw/Jane Pauley heyday, and it was a pretty good show (Gene Shalit aside) - two fairly serious and accomplished newspeople running a gentle show. Bad Old GF always had it on more or less during the time when CF was watching it, and it had certainly changed tone to be more Regis & Kathy Lee - more pop culture, more explicitly girl-talkie (which is funny, since you might expect a TV show ca. 1980 to be more explicitly for the little lady at home; but of course, in many ways, 1980 was a far more feminist time than 1998).
When I catch any of it now, it's only semi-recognizable: the near-total absence of news content (which I think the CF piece documents?) makes it pretty overwhelmingly fluffy, not to mention achingly consumerist.
I feel as if, basically, what used to be the last 10 minutes of each 30 has taken over the whole show.
I feel as if, basically, what used to be the last 10 minutes of each 30 has taken over the whole show.
I haven't watched it in years, but this is basically how I felt the last time I watched it. I didn't know it with Tom Brokaw, but my parents watched it during the Bryant Gumbel era. (What's he doing now?) A couple of times they'd have a round table end-of-the-year discussion, and you'd find out that Willard Scott wasn't really a buffoon, though I think he was a Republican. I liked Willard Scott when he wasn't doing the weather.
I don't really care for Matt Lauer, though my antipathy for him is not as strong as my dislike of Dateline NBC's Stone Phillips.
I don't understand why people have the TV--a visual device--on during their morning routine. The radio is much better company. They aren't wasting energy on good visuals that you aren't looking at.
Yes, I wake up to Steve Inskeep.
Steve Inskeep kind of bugs me (I mean more than other NPR hosts).
I think that he's got the smug, snide, insidery DC thing going, whereas other NPR hosts are smugly earnest. AB finds him funny, but I think she's a lot less hair trigger than I am about conventional wisdom spouting.
I never watched the show, but I always loved the "... tomorrow, on Today" promos.
In the morning, I turn the Weather Channel on and the sound off. I like to have something to look at, but until I've been awake for an hour or so, I really dislike hearing anyone talk at me.
A glory hole is a hole by which one might peer into a construction site church, of course.
We were a Good Morning America household but now I listen to Morning Edition and then the BBC.