KNOW YOUR CURRENT EVENTS - It's America's Fastest Growing Quiz Sensation.
First up: Kaye, from Tucson, Arizona. She's here for her birthday. Is it her best birthday ever? Probably not.
KYCE #1: What was the main reason President Bush selected Bob Gates as his new Secretary of Defense?
Answer: His name was easy to pronounce.
KYCE#2: How will Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi make history in January?
Answer: She will be the first House Speaker to wear high heels and lipstick since Newt Gingrich.

This lipstick and high heels joke sounded familiar to me, so I did a quick check in my logs. I came up with this from August 24, 2006 in a Who Said It? piece -"People should focus more on how I present the news, and less on the lipstick and skirts I choose to wear."
Who said it? Paul says, "Katie Couric."
Nope. Larry King.

It must have gotten a huge laugh back then, too.
For participating, Kay received dinner for 4 at Luchow's.

Next contestant: Brian, from Knoxville, Tennessee. He's a banker. Dave asks, "Are you able to skim?" Brian says the interest rate is about 4 1/2 % right now. Dave says when he was a kid, it was about 6%. This gets applause from the audience Brian is here with his wife, who is here on business. Brian is just tagging along. Oooh! Dave wonders if this is sort of like a 2nd honeymoon. Brian laughs and says, "I guess you can say that." Dave corrects, Yeah, but can YOU say that?"
KYCE #3: Why did the new touch-screen booths frustrate many voters?
Answer: People tried to withdraw money from their checking accounts
KYCE #4: What was significant about Regis Phibin's appearance on "Celebrity Jeopardy"?
Answer: He has not been on every television show in America
For playing, Brian receives dinner for 2 to Mama Leone's.

Next up: Ellen, from Sacramento. She's an aesthetician. I think we've had an aesthetician on the show before, but I can't find it in my files. It's probably because I spelled it different. She suggests that Dave could use a facial and steam. Oh, who can't?
KYCE #5: Name one of the stars still remaining on "Dancing With The Stars"
Answer: Trick question . . . . there are no stars
KYCE #6: Why is Bill Clinton excited about Hillary's re-election to the United States Senate?
Answer: Six more years of senate interns
And for her participation, Ellen received dinner for 2 to Toots Shor's.

And now a peak behind the scenes. During the 3rd KYCE contestant, the first question she was to be asked was a bit off-color involving . . . . well, that's not important. Dave skipped the question and went to the next one without signaling the control room or anything. The Control Room was right on it, scurrying ahead to the next KYCE question in the list. It may have been tightened up during the post-show editing process, but even LIVE it was a splendid job that few not-in-the-know would notice. Me? I was screaming, "He skipped one! He skipped one!" Thankfully, the Control Room was on it. Good job.

And that was Know Your Current Events.

Tonight, we sent Biff to Livermore, California to G&M Farms to find his way through a 6-acre corn maze. If you were to walk it complete, it would run 3 miles. On average, it takes 40 minutes to find one's way out. We send Biff in to the maze, hoping he brought along a compass. We will check back in with him later.

TOP TEN: Signs George W. Bush is Depressed
#9. Barely musters a smile when watching Cheney torture detainees.
#5. No longer pretends he quit drinking
#1. Asked Bubba if he still had the hefty chick's phone number.

BIFF: Back to Biff. He's lost. He's deep into the maze. This isn't good. I think he's booked an early flight out.

KIEFER SUTHERLAND: From the big FOX hit, "24". The new season opens in January. And he's in the music documentary "I Trust You To Kill Me" which premieres on VH-1 Saturday night at 9:00. It's about Kiefer working as a roadie for tonight's band "Rocco DeLuca & the Burden" through Europe. The band is the first band signed by Sutherland's record label, Ironworks. Later in the segment, we see a clip of Kiefer admitting he knows nothing about being a roadie or running a record label.
Believe it or not, Kiefer is a granddad at 39. Kiefer explains he got married when he was young --- 19 --- and the woman he married was a little older. She had an 8-year-old at the time whose dad had died. The dad was a guitarist for the band "Chicago." Well, that 8-year-old is now married and just had a baby boy. Is there a big difference between being a dad and a grandparent? Kiefer explains that as a parent you feel very very responsible for everything your child takes in, whether it's the food they eat, the stuff the drink, or the shows they watch on TV and at the movies. As a grandparent, you just give the grandkids whatever they want; toys, chocolates, presents. And then when things get wild, you can check your watch and say it's time to go.
Dave asks Kiefer how familiar he is with the work of his father, Donald Sutherland. Kiefer admits that at one time he didn't know much about his career. He knew his dad was a famous movie star, but had never seen his movies. And then he decided to rent all the movies he could that starred his father and watch. He watched them back to back to back over a two-day period when he was about 18 years old. Kiefer says he was amazed at his father's versatility, and then became embarrassed for not knowing any of this about his dad. He never knew how good he was. He says he phoned his dad and they had a good talk about his career, and the conversation crossed over to other things. Kiefer's discovery of his dad's film career opened up a lot of dialogue between the two and has brought them closer together. Has his dad given him any advice when it comes to acting? Kiefer says he offered him this advice: "Don't get caught lying." If the scene calls for you to cry, and you can't bring yourself to cry, don't fake it. It'll come through that you are faking. If you can't cry, attack the scene another way. But don't fake it.
"24" - its 5th season starts in January.
"I Trust You To Kill Me" - Saturday at 9:00 on VH-1.

JENNA FISCHER: She's in the NBC hit show, "The Office." I haven't seen "The Office" yet, but I've heard raves about the Emmy Award winning show. I'm familiar with the BBC version, which was absolutely great. I'm told this one on NBC comes close to matching it, and some say it's even better.
Jenna is from Fort Wayne, Indiana. Dave chimes, "Oh, Fort Wayne; the Summit City!" This is news to Jenna. She was born in Fort Wayne but raised in St. Louis, so she gets a pass. In the back of my Late Show notebook, I have a 4-page printout of city nicknames. I've carried it for 6 years now and never had to use it. I carry it because I know one of these days I will need it. So I quickly looked up Summit City. I looked up Fort Wayne. My printout had neither. DOH! 6 years of carrying it and it comes up empty when I needed it. I go to the computer and Google "Fort Wayne" and find, yes indeed, it is the Summit City. It is called the Summit City because it is situated on the highest point on the Continental Divide between the Great Lakes and the Gulf of Mexico.
Growing up, the family would spend a lot of time at their cottage on the Lake of the Ozarks in Missouri. Her dad was an avid fisherman and would organize fishing trips on the lake. Jenna admits to being an animal lover and in the middle of the night would often sneak out and free the minnows her dad had gathered for bait. This would drive him mad. What Jenna finds odd to this day is that although she's an animal lover, one who would free the bait used to catch fish, once the fish were caught, she had no problem eating it.
Was Jenna always interested in show business? She admits to being the creative one in the family and as a kid would often produce stop-motion movies with her Barbie dolls. Her favorite production was "Barbie Party Massacre." In it, Barbie is accidentally killed by Ken . . . or was it an accident really?
Catch Jenna Fischer in "The Office" on NBC, Thursday nights at 8:30.

ACT 5: It's Biff searching for a way out of the corn maze.

ROCCO DELUCA & THE BURDEN: From their CD, "I Trust You To Kill Me," Rocco DeLuca & The Burden performed "Colorful." Hey, they were good. Good Rock 'n' Roll, the way it oughta sound. Nice job.

To close the show, we go out to Biff one more time in the corn maze at G&M Farms in Livermore, California. He still is lost inside the maze. Dave asks Biff if he's scared. Biff scoffs, "It takes a lot more than this to scare me, man."

And that was our show for Thursday, November 9, 2006. Wahoo EXTRA!

Tonight's show ran long. We had to lose something. I don't know what was cut out.

Check out the Google Logo on Saturday. Will the commemorate Veterans Day?

Here's something I don't quite get. The big joke is Kevin Federline did nothing while Britney did all the work. And if the roles were reversed?

A new Wahoo Gazette contest: On what date will newly re-elected United States Senator Hillary Clinton officially announcer her run for the Presidency in the 2008 election?
Closest to the actual date will receive a special Wahoo mention.

I wake up Friday morning and hear on the radio that the Rutgers football team shocked the world with their upset win over the #3-ranked Louisville. I then checked the point spread. It was 6 points. A home underdog always is a good bet. "Shocked the world" was a bit of an overstatement. For one thing, I don't think most of the world knew about the game.

Hey, I forgot to mention this the other day. My 11-year-old daughter Dominique loves Desperate Housewives. Denise usually watches it with her to explain the parts that need explaining and to turn the channels during the parts that need to be turned. But Denise was out Sunday night so I watched it. I hate getting involved in a show, and I was quite sure "Desperate Housewives" wasn't going to hook me, but Sunday's episode was pretty darn good. A hostage situation in a supermarket was very entertaining with a few surprises and twists. And I really enjoyed the performance by the woman who played Roseanne's sister on "Roseanne."
Afterwards, Dominique called it the best "Desperate Housewives" episode ever. She raved over it. And I had to agree. I'm still not hooked on "Desperate", but I will sort of kinda give it another look if it happens to be on.

Next week is Late Show Impressionist Week; and next week here at the Wahoo Gazette we will have something equally as special. I'll make the announcement in tomorrow's Wahoo.

I went to the local football game this past weekend. It was the big Tappan Zee Dutchmen/Pearl River Pirates Orange Bowl game. I figured it would be a nice way to spend a Friday night; watching football without screaming at the TV announcers or cameramen. I could enjoy the game as a fan. I got there halfway through the 2nd quarter. Pearl River punts and the ball is downed at the 2 yard line; a great punt by the Pirate. TZ runs a play for no gain. The next play is good for a gain of 5 yards. It is now 3rd and 5 from the 7 yard line. With the ball on the 7, the Dutchmen of Tappan Zee jump offsides. The ref steps off 5 yards putting the ball back to the 2 yard line. It's 3rd and 10. I immediately say, "That's wrong! That's wrong! It should be halfway to the goal line, not a 5-yard penalty. We (TZ) are inside the 10-yard line!" A 5-yard penalty inside the ten results in a walk-off halfway to the goal line, not a full five yards. The ball should not be at the 2 . . it should be at the 3-and-a-half. But of course, no one else notices. In a crowd of over a thousand, no one else saw this mistake except for me; not the other refs, not the coaches, not the fans. Only me. I was steamed. Why doesn't anybody else notice these things? I'm just a casual fan of the game. It makes no sense. And then after no gain, TZ had to punt from their own endzone with the punter's heels nearly on the endline. Do you think the punter would have appreciated another yard-and-a-half? Of course he would. As it turned out, the overlooked and incorrect placement of the ball did not affect the game, but it gnawed and gnawed at me. It took me 'til the 4th quarter to get over it. No one else complained, so I have to ask myself, "Was I wrong?" Was I? A 5-yard penalty inside the 10 . . . is it a full five or halfway? Any refs out there . . . refs who know the game? Maybe I was wrong and the other thousand people were right. Could be. And why can't I watch a game, any game, without getting all riled up over how it is presented?

Anyway, Pearl River won 7-6. TZ went for the tie with an extra point after they scored a touchdown with 7 minutes left in the 4th quarter. The kick was blocked. Ugh, going for the tie. It's high school. You gotta take a shot at the win.