The commercials were amazing. They really got the look right.

They really got the look right.

They did with the animation, too -- not just the style of animation being dead on for G.I. Joe of that era, but they also added all those little white specks and whatnot that made it look like an old cartoon.

Old school Saturday morning visuals all the way around.

I'm going to miss Raising Hope -- they went out on a loving grace note, at least.

That was really lovely. I'm going to miss the Chances.

Oh, my god, this week's Glee is a Sondheim episode.

The reference to Ben Wyatt's time at Carleton College(in my hometown)in a recent Parks & Rec made me wonder whether the character was based, in part, on a guy I went to high school with.

We turned 18 the year that the voting age dropped to 18, and there was quite a bit of excitement about all of these newly enfranchised young people. My classmate was from an even smaller town nearby and decided to run for mayor of his town as a lark. He won, and was famous for about 15 minutes as America's first 18-year-old mayor.

With very little for the mayor to do in this little bedroom community, his administration was a much quieter disaster than Ben's, and he was politely allowed to serve out his one disappointing term and fade into obscurity.

I wonder if any of the writers actually went to Carleton or lived in the area and happened to read a "Where are they now?" style follow-up?

I remember that guy, Rick, and thought that's who they based Ben's past on when the character was first introduced.

Speaking of Parks and Rec, it was pretty flippin' funny tonight!

I did some digging in my hometown newspaper and found that some 40 years later now "that guy" was given an award for civic service, not by the village where he was elected mayor, but by my little college town. For many years he spearheaded the annual town festival ("Defeat of Jesse James Days"), served on boards, presided over the local historical society, and did everything that needed to be done. He was a regular Leslie Knope, except that he never again worked for the government. Yet the first thing that is ever mentioned about him, including at his award ceremony, is "Weren't you once the teenage mayor?"

Speaking of Leslie Knope and crossing TV-real-life boundaries, the Indiana University alumni magazine continues to slip in the occasional entry about her in the class-notes section for her year of graduation. It seems that she was recently elected to the city council of Pawnee.

Speaking of Parks and Rec, it was pretty flippin' funny tonight!

Yup.

That's so interesting, Rick, I had no idea.