During the monologue I noticed two things in Dave's delivery, and it may have been only my imagination.
1. Dave opens with a joke about it being a tough day. He says something like, "It was a tough day today, oooh, tough day, tough day." He sounded a lot like Rodney Dangerfield.
2. The final joke about the debates went like this: "The new rules say the candidates can't touch each other. This is a result of the last series of debates . . . where Gore tried to get Bush to dirty-dance." The way Dave delivered the ". . . get Bush to dirty-dance" sounded a lot like a George Miller delivery.

STAR WARS: The Star Wars Trilogy DVD has just been released and the special effects from the original made in 1977 doesn't quite hold up over the years. It seems primitive and dated. We take a look at a clip. Dave's right. I didn't notice it 27 years ago but it's obvious now that the spaceships were nothing but a roast turkey and a kitty cat.

A MESSAGE FROM JOHN KERRY: "Well, guess what America? / I believe / the earth is flat."

Do you really want a President who thinks the world is flat?

It's Thursday and that means it's time for the CBS MAILBAG

LETTER #1: From Donna Kaye of Johnson City, New York
"Hi, Dave! What's you son's favorite bedtime story?"
Dave says he loves to read to little Harry at night. He's really taken a liking to this new book. Dave holds up a large children's book entitled, "The Complete Collection of Stories, Tales, and Fables from CBS News." The yellow book has pictures of bunnies, ducks, farm animals, and Dan Rather right in the middle.

This letter came from Donna Kaye of Johnson City, New York. That's the same town my brother Tim comes from. Hey, Donna, say hello to Tim McIntee!

LETTER #2: From Chris Hurley of Wikes, North Carolina
"Dear Dave, Are you going to spill the beans to Dr. Phil during his two hour show coming up on CBS?"
Dr. Phil had his CBS special Wednesday night. Those of you who watched know Dave wasn't on the program. But since this is Premiere Week, we invited to the show, the Vice-President of CBS Late Night Programming, East Coast, Vinnie Favale, to tell us about the new CBS shows.
FAVALE: "Hey, shut-ins! We here at CBS actually have a couple new shows that don't involve the whoring of the 'CSI' franchise.
(photo of Jason Alexander) For instance, "Listen Up" starring Jason Alexander. Oh boy, I think we're looking at another 'I Love Lucy.'
(Dr. Vegas) There's also 'Dr. Vegas' which stars pretty boy Brat Packer Judd Nelson."
DAVE: "Vinnie, I believe that's Rob Lowe."
FAVALE: "Oh, who the hell cares? Anyway, he plays the doctor at a Las Vegas hotel. So basically every episode is him treating people for the Herp, but the strippers are hot… so Dudes, be humpin' the set!
(photo of "Cold Case") We're also very excited about another new program, 'Cold Case' which focuses on a team of detectives handling crimes that have never been solved."
DAVE: "Excuse me, Vinnie, 'Cold Case' isn't new. It was on CBS last year."
FAVALE: "No 'djoy'? (laughs) I'm more of an NBC man myself. My favorite's 'Will & Grace.' They're even gayer than that hunk on 'Jag.'
DAVE: "Thank you, Vinnie. Anything else?"
FAVALE: "Yes. In addition to finding a replacement for Craig Kilborn, in November we'll be announcing the replacement for David Letterman." (photo of Dave Letterman) (Photo changes to Oprah)
FAVALE: (Beautiful enters and stands along side Vinnie. Vinnie puts his arm around her) "Voila! Anybody needs me, I'll be at Rikers giving Martha a conjugal." (exits)
DAVE: "Vinnie Favale, ladies and gentlemen."

LETTER #3: From Daniel Kuhn of Dumont, New Jersey
"Hey Dave, Have you heard from Oprah lately?"
Sadly, Oprah hasn't called. But speaking of Oprah, did you see what Oprah did last week? She gave away a new car for every person in her audience. We don't have Oprah's money so we decided to give away just one car to one member of our audience. The audience response was filled with glee. Dave grabs a "hopper" from behind the desk and begins to spin it around. Inside are the names of our 461 audience members. After a sufficient number of turns of the hopper, Dave continues to turn for another sufficient number of times. Not until Paul screams for Dave to stop does our host snap back to the present. Dave pulls a name out of the hopper and reads, "Edward . . . . Lee . . . . Kwan." The camera pans the audience while the music swells. We hear a guy scream, "Oh my gosh! I can't believe it! I won! I can't believe it!" The camera stops on the joyous audience member, the same guy we always use when we need an Asian actor. Dave says, "Congratulations, Eddie! There's a brand new Pontiac waiting for you outside. Go ahead and take a look!" An excited Eddie runs out the side door to 53rd Street. He looks east, he looks west. Suddenly we see the brand new Pontiac veer off the road and smashes into poor Eddie Lee Kwan. The Pontiac continues down 53rd Street. Dave laments, "My, wasn't that ugly. You hate to see that. But you know, we're still going to get a lot of press out of it." Dave then adds, "We'll make sure the car goes to his family."

And that was mail. Hey, relax! Don't get yourself all tangled up in a snit. We only did 3 letters tonight. I'm not sure but I think it had something to do with the Jewish holidays.

STUPID HUMAN TRICKS
SHT #1: Ray Sanders of Bryan, Texas: He's a teacher and an assistant band director. Ray came out holding a turkey baster filled with a dark watery substance. Left over Yoo-Hoo from the other day? Perhaps. Ray's trick? He can play the finale to the "William Tell Overture" on the baster. Dave tests the teacher for the originator of the William Tell Overture. Ray knows it's Rossini, "and I'll be transcribing it to the baster." Ray turns the baster upside down and begins to blow into the tip. He plays the different notes by squeezing the bulb which lifts the fluid up the tube. By squeezing and releasing, Ray hits all the notes perfectly. If you closed your eyes, you could almost imagine Rossini writing the piece with this in mind.

SHT #2: Matthew Brandt of Denver, Colorado. Matthew is a mere 10 years old. It's his first time in NYC and is happily missing school to be here. Dave suggests he look into the camera and tell his friends at home, "Hello, losers."
What is Matthew's trick? He can break an egg by bending his fingers backwards. Hmmm. Interesting.
We see Matthew place an egg on the back of his hand. He then grabs the fingers with his other hands and bends them back back way back. OUCH! Matthew is bending his fingers as far back as he can. When the egg finally breaks, it sounds as if it was his bones cracking. OUCH AGAIN!

SHT #3: Mike Milky of Onalaska, Wisconsin - (names are typed phonetically) Mike's a freshman at Winona State University, studying elementary education. Why go to college to learn elementary education? If you were listening when you were a kid you would know it already. What is Mike's trick? He can jump on a pogo stick. With a tennis racquet without the strings, Mike can fit through the racquet and squeeze all the way through till it hits the floor. WOW! Mike begins to pogo. He puts the racquet over his head and shimmies until it is down by his feet. Success.

I think I could do that trick. Except I could never get it over my Irish Scottish-sized head.

And that was tricks.

Back from commercial, I missed how Dave and Paul got into this but Paul was proud to tout his new line of handbags. He promotes his bag line as being Red Carpet Ready!, worthy for any opening, any gala, and gathering which includes paparazzi. Currently, the bags can be found at TJ Maxx and will hopefully expand to other fine establishment. Not only is Paul busy with his gig here at the Late Show and his new bag line, but he's also squiring away the bucks by "hosting" when available. The man's got energy to spare.

TOP TEN: Messages Left On Cat Stevens' Answering Machine.
#6. "I'm calling from CBS News to confirm reports of a cat that can fly a plane."
#4. "I must have the wrong number. I was looking for Steven Katz."

ROB LOWE: He's Dr. Vegas, Friday nights at 10:00 on CBS. I love how the program is promoted on the CBS website. Have you seen the new CBS website? More gray, less blue. And I'm so glad the CBS homepage is still promoting the "CBS at 75" special. In another month, it'll be one year since it has been on. I wonder how long they'll keep up the Kilborn?
From the CBS website:

"DR. VEGAS stars Emmy Award-nominee Rob Lowe and Emmy Award-winner Joe Pantoliano in a drama about an unconventional physician who takes a gamble when he leaves behind the world of emergency medicine to become the in-house doctor at a high-end casino in Las Vegas. From his penthouse office suite, Dr. Billy Grant (Lowe) attends to the round-the-clock medical needs of guests, employees and their families amid the lures of Sin City. The doctor's always in when it comes to catering to the often frivolous medical requests of his good friend and boss, Tommy Danko (Pantoliano), the hotel's general manager."

Rob has two sons and asked if Dave plans on having a theme party for Harry on his first birthday. Dave says he's not into the "theme" birthday parties. Dave didn't have theme parties growing up, and I guess Harry won't either. Dave says, "For the first 8 years of my life all I had to play with was a sharp stick." Rob is happy to hear that . . . about Dave's lack of interest in theme parties, not that all he had to play with was a sharp stick.

Rob tells a story about camping with his kids and their friends and scaring them by dressing up as Big Foot. One kid was so frightened he threw up. Rob's son, who takes Tae Chi, ran up to 'Big Foot', got into his Tae Chi position and kicked Big Foot right in his "personal area." Big Foot wasn't happy. Rob's son yelled, "Get out of here . . . . you . . . .you college student!" He used "college student" as an insult. My father used to do the same. Whenever me or my friends had to do something mechanical around the house, we would eventually screw it up. We had no use for the hand tools. My father, who had been employed at Con Edison since he was 18, would then elbow us out of the way to fix our mistake, with a mumble "Get out of the way. Let me do it . . . . damn college kids."

PAT FARMER'S GAFFE ALERT: Pat is a quite the movie buff and he has this uncanny knack of spotting mistakes, errors, and continuity problems when watching the latest films. Recently, Pat went to see "Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow." We see a clip from the film. After the piece, Pat asks, "Did you see it? In that scene, giant robot birds fly down form the sky down form the sky and invade New York" (laughs) "Come on. There's no such thing a giant robot birds!"

ACT 5: And now it's time for 'What Oprah Gave Away Today.' This morning Oprah went into 7-11 and bought a root beer and some Slim Jims. They cost $2.98, so Oprah gave the guy $3 and told him to keep the pennies. Way to go, Oprah! This has been 'What Oprah Gave Away Today!"

MOS DEF: From his soon to be released CD, "The New Danger," Mos Def performed "Get a Rock." Another song I liked this week! Good week for music. I liked Mos Def's Paul "Bear" Bryant hat.

And that was our show for Thursday, September 23, 2004. Wahoo EXTRA!

Great news! It's rare that I have such fine news to share with you. I was looking out my back door last week admiring the birds feeding at my bird feeder. Then a squirrel climbed up the 9 foot pole and made himself comfortable on the perch. The birds had to satisfy themselves and forage for their seeds from the ground. The squirrel hogged the bird feeder for itself and I grew angrier and angrier as I watched. This has been a problem for quite a while now. For months I've been greasing the pole to prevent the squirrels from climbing. It would work for about a day. The squirrels would try to climb up, get half way, then slide back down. It was fun to watch, but each time they did it they removed some of the grease in the process. By the end of the day they were scampering up the pole, no problem. I knew there must be a way for me to keep the squirrels from climbing the pole. So that afternoon I watched and tried to figure out a way. I don't like the inverted cones I see many people employ on their bird feeder to prevent squirrel. I'm not happy with the visual. I don't like the spinning mechanical feeder now on the market either because it's mechanical . . . and it's green metallic. I don't like that. I only like the wood bird feeders. So how could I keep the squirrels from climbing the pole? I wanted something easy. I wanted something simple. And I knew if I came up with the right idea I could market it and make a bundle of dough. About 15 minutes later it suddenly hit me. It was a brilliant idea and I didn't see how it couldn't work. I jumped in the car and drove to the local 5&10. I bought a slinky for $2.95. I raced back home excited to put my experiment to work. I removed the bird feeder from the pole and dropped the slinky down the pole. I put the bird feeder back on the pole and then attached the top of the slinky to the bottom of the feeder so the slinky hung down. The slinky slung about 7 feet down the 9 foot pole. I then ran back inside the house and waited. Within a few minutes the first squirrel returned. The squirrel ate some seeds off the ground. It walked here and there. It made a few steps closer to the pole. Then it looked up to the bird feeder. The squirrel bent down and jumped onto the pole and began to climb. When it reached the slinky, the squirrel and slinky quickly dropped to the ground. The startled squirrel ran away into the woods. I let out a whoop! I waited for another squirrel to try. Again, a few minutes later another one came, or perhaps it was the same one but now with a new game plan. The squirrel circled the pole, jumped, and again came falling back to earth as the slinky slunk. SUCCESS! The squirrel scurried back into the woods. I quickly ran to the computer to see how I could market my genius idea. My brain raced with the thoughts of owning a yacht, a mansion, a string of poloponies. My heart soon sank when I saw the slinky trick was a common method used my many bird lovers. Page after page on the Google had another story about the slinky/bird feeder trick. Though it is a great idea, it certainly isn't original. My riches will have to come from someplace else. I slowly and sadly walked back to the kitchen window to view my "million dollar" idea. Alas, up in the bird feeder was a squirrel.

Overheard two women talking. One says to the other, "You're not supposed to wear white after Labor Day." And I think, "Damn, I have to change my socks."

Did you hear Twinkies filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection? I'm telling you, this never would have happened if Clinton were still in office.

This date in history: September 23, 1969 - 35 years ago today, as reported in the London Daily Mirror, Beatle Paul McCartney passed away. Truly a sad day. His genius continues to shine all these years later. His death came much too early; a great loss to the world.