I loved the finale, but then I never expected it to give me the answers to all the questions it created in six long, brilliant years.

My new favourite hobby is watching nerds get really mad about that.

“Leno” is a dirty word in this household, after the events of the past couple of weeks. If you’ve been following the messy tale of the NBC late-night talk show lineup you’ll know what I’m talking about.

If not, Pee-wee Herman explained it briefly a few nights ago on The Tonight Show with Conan O’Brien – a show which ended on Friday.

Tim and I have been downloading his shows like crazy since it all blew up a couple of weeks ago. It has been almost exactly 3 years since we both sat in the audience for his “Late Night” show in New York City, and last night we took a break from packing boxes to watch his last ever show on NBC.

Is this not the classiest man in show business? Who’d have thought that he could somehow wrap up the whole situation with such grace.

I won’t attempt a deep autopsy of this situation, especially as most Australians are largely unaware of Conan and the long history with NBC that ended last week. But if you do happen to know his show, you really need to see this clip from 1998.

Sad, right?

I can’t wait to see him back on the air a year from now, kicking NBC’s butt from another network the way that Letterman did…

I love Lee Lin Ching. She’s probably the most intense newsreader you’ll ever see, and she rocks colourful glasses like nobody else on Earth.

But, uh… what’s this all about?

I know we’re in a drought, but are we all expected to have rain catchment devices installed on our clothing? Did she lose a bet with Mugatu?

Or are they wings?

Is she really a Transformer, who has malfunctioned mid-show?

I have run out of questions. It is time for answers, Lee Lin Ching.

Publicity images have finally emerged from the much anticipated Alice in Wonderland. I can’t even begin to explain how much I am looking forward to seeing what Tim Burton will do with this!

I didn’t think it was possible, but the images have probably doubled my excitement about this movie.

We already know that Burton, Johnny Depp, Helena Bonham-Carter and Danny Elfman are the perfect team, but they’re also perfectly cast for this movie. I guess when you’re Tim Burton, you go looking for a movie that will work with your assets, rather than the other way around.

There are more images at USA Today. Go get excited for March 5, 2010!

I know this has been doing the rounds over the past few days, but I thought I’d share it here in case anyone has missed it. The commercial below was filmed last week at Liverpool St Station, using hidden TV cameras to capture dancing flash mobbers. It must have been incredible to see this in person!

This is one of those times when the high-res version is a must, so head to YouTube and click the “watch in high quality” link below the video.

Part of my 101 Things in 1001 Days challenge.

A few weeks ago I was sent an email inviting me to a taping of Australia’s Got Talent. I don’t know where the email came from, but suspect I’m on some sort of list after attending a TV pilot last year. (That show never aired, incidentally, so I never felt comfortable crossing this item off my list!)

So last night Tim and I went to the National Theatre in St Kilda to see what it was all about. Neither of us had ever seen the show, but we had a pretty good idea of the format from the stuff we’d seen on youtube. I was pretty certain that it was going to be lame, but hey – it’s not every day you see what happens behind the cameras! At the very least it would be one more completed item on my list, and anything else was a bonus.

I’m glad that I didn’t go in with high hopes, because I might have been disappointed. Last night’s taping was for one of the preliminary auditions (although they had clearly been pre-auditioned and shipped in from interstate) so the quality wasn’t terribly high. Also, it took about 3 hours to tape eight or nine 3-minute acts, due to the lengthy breaks they needed between contestants for technical reasons. I am now truly grateful for the magic of editing!

I don’t mean to say that it wasn’t fun, I am really glad I went. It was interesting to note the order in which they taped segments for the show, and to watch the black-shirted crew running around the place doing their jobs. It will be even more interesting to watch when it airs in a few weeks, so that I can compare the tv product to the live experience. Being in the audience gave me a new appreciation for all of the work that goes into this type of program.

(Plus, an old TAFE student of mine was one of the competitors. That was a bit of a surprise!)

I can now confidently say that after attending Talent and a taping of Rove a couple of years ago, the “just because” factor won’t be enough to get me to another taping. I’d like to do this again in the future, but will wait for a show that I’m genuinely interested in before signing up.

Anyway, it remains to be seen whether Australia’s got talent… but I can confirm that Dannii Minogue does. And it looked incredible in that dress!

Saw this ad at [ embodiment ], along with some great commentary about the devices they used to make it such a successful commercial. It definitely sucked me in!

Remember a few weeks ago, when Sarah Silverman was a guest on Jimmy Kimmel’s show? She used the opportunity to announce that she was cheating on him with Matt Damon, and the resulting video became hugely popular on YouTube.

Here’s the clip, in case you missed it:

Jimmy finally responded on his post-Oscars show last night. Some of the cameos in this video are awesome, but I think Brad Pitt and McLovin probably top the list.

As soon as a non-bleeped version appears on YouTube I’ll update this post, but until then it’s mostly “safe for work”.

Part of my 101 Things in 1001 Days challenge.

Last night I treated Tim to a movie at The Rooftop Cinema for Valentines Day. I managed to keep the whole thing a secret right up until we got to the door, which made it extra fun!

The cinema is on the roof of a 6-storey building, and the view was awesome. It was just high enough to make the passing trams look little, but small enough to give us a great view into surrounding skyscrapers. It was the perfect perspective for two people still getting to know their city.

One leg of the L-shaped venue was a small but well-stocked bar (shown in the photo immediately above), and when we arrived it was full of people having their post-work drinks. Many had sprawled into the cinema area around the corner to take advantage of the sunshine and synthetic grass, and there was awesome chilled-out music playing the whole time.

At around 8pm staff herded people away from the screen so that they could begin setting up deck chairs, and by 8:30pm anyone who hadn’t bought a ticket for the movie was sent back to the bar.

We managed to grab terrific seats, and when we sat down we saw that a menu had been clipped to the chair in front of us! The text read:

Howdy. Left your credit card with the bar? If not, go hand it over so you can run a tab during the film and simply text us the seat number, your surname, colour of your card and what you want. And then we bring it to you.

PS: If it’s a crying moment of the film, we might wait until that scene is over and we’ve wiped our eyes.

The menu contained a great selection of drinks, and four food options from the award-winning restaurant/bar Cookie downstairs. Tim had chicken yakitori skewers, and I tried the tofu burger (as part of my new resolve to “try new things”). The price was very reasonable ($8.50 each), and they warmed us up.

The movie began a little after 9pm. We saw Raising Victor Vargas, a movie that I knew absolutely nothing about but seemed to rate really well on Rotten Tomatoes. We both really enjoyed it, and I think I like it even better today than I did last night. It got some horrible reviews on imdb, but whatever. Worth seeing.

Overall, I had a great time and thoroughly recommend this place. Be warned, the cinema only operates from late November until the end of March each year – so check it out soon if you can!

Location: Level 6, 252 Swanston St
Tickets: $18 + BF

Thanks, Dooce!