This is something that harkens back to older iterations of my blog. I used to do a feature where I'd write a few jokes based on some of CNN.com's top stories of the moment. I think I'll bring it back so that I'm, at least, updating this blog more frequently.

#1 In Washington DC, today, a man with a rifle was arrested trying to drive in to the White House. He said he had a "special delivery" for the President. If he'd said he had a stimulus package, he might have gotten through!

#8 Gary Becker, ex-mayor of Racine, Wisconsin, plead innocent to charges of child pornography. People close to him had to be suspicious. The campaign stickers were scratch-and-sniff. They found a lot of questionable on his computer. He's got an interesting defense: Yeah, the pictures are of 16-year-old girls, but the pictures are three years old, so it's OK!

#2 The USAIR Flight 1549 crew was on Larry King Live, talking about that amazing water landing from a few weeks back. I'm a little worried because I can't help but think all this attention is a bad thing. Everybody is going to want in. Yesterday, my bus driver yelled "Bird in the Engine" and emergency landed the bus on a parked car at Wilshire and Vermont. When no cameras materialized, he started the bus back up and did the same thing a block later.

One of the things that television and movies fail to get right about Los Angeles is how difficult parking can be in neighborhoods like mine. I frequently spend thirty minutes to an hour looking for a parking space when I make it home from work at night. In movies, parking is never a problem. In real life, even after you have successfully parked, there's still the spectre of street cleaning hanging overhead. Have a late night last night? If you have street cleaning scheduled for 8:00 AM, you'd better be up and moving your car, or you're going to get a ticket. I've received many. Enough that if my car gets ticketed again, it's probably going to get towed.

I watch The Shield, which is set in my area of town. That stash house Vindrell tried to rob last week--the one off Normandie--that area was minutes from my apartment. In The Shield parking is the ONLY complication these guys haven't faced! It's never like "Oh, we robbed an Armenian money train... hey, do you see a spot? Can I fit in there?"

This morning I was watching The Shield, thinking about this, when I realized that the reason I woke up at 7:36 was not to watch The Shield on my Tivo, but to hustle out and move my car from its parking space on a meter in front of the grocery store by 8:00. I realized that at 8:25. I shot out of bed, out of my apartment and took off running, scaring an older woman who probably thought I wanted to snatch her purse.

When this happens, I immediately assume the car has been towed. That's a bad idea because when I get to the area where I mistakenly think I parked my car--every time--and don't see it, I immediately begin making imaginary deductions from by bank account, which makes a real deduction from my ability to keep my food down. Thankfully, the panic lasted only a minute. The car was fine. No ticket. No boot. I got in it and moved it closer to home. Of course, my relaxing morning had come to an end. I love LA.

You may recognize Frank Caliendo. He does a million impressions, but he always looks like... Frank Caliendo. He was a part of the low-rated MadTV sketch comedy show. Now, he's the star of the low-rated Frank TV sketch comedy show. Lately, he's been starring in Dish Network commercials, where he shows off his multitude of impressions. Those commercials lead to the development of this, The Frank Caliendo Drinking Game.

Rules

• Anytime one of Frank's Dish Network ads airs on TV, the game starts.
• You take a shot of your favorite alcoholic beverage the moment you recognize the impression he's doing.
• You take a quick shot whenever his impression makes you laugh.
• You take a drink anytime his impression inspires you to actually watch Frank TV.
• Finally, you take a shot anytime Frank Caliendo's antics pursuade you to order Dish Network.


In the end you're entirely sober, which leaves you in better control of your mental faculties for trying to figure out how in the world anyone ever thought that guy was any funny. Take a shot if you come up with a realistic answer.

Once upon a time, we had tough guys as cops on TV, guys who could take a look at a mug and determine whether or not he committed a crime. That worked for a while until the 80s. Then our cops became a little less skilled, but at least what they had, they'd regained in cool cars. I guess back then a cool car, alone, could intimidate a crook into spilling the beans on a crime. Today, our TV cops have become completely ineffective. They lack toughness, cool cars, and even remedial police skills. They all rely on outside help to solve the simplest cases. It's as if they took the Turner & Hooch theory of police work and expanded it to encompass all investigative tasks. The first line in the penal code is now "you must have an unorthodox helper to keep you from looking completely dumb." Here are the least effective law enforcement agencies, as best as I can determine, from watching TV.


5. The LA Field Office of the FBI

TV Show: Numbers

Why They're Weak: Each week, an entire branch of our nation's premiere investigative force relies on the skills of a mathematician, Charlie Eppes, to help them either solve a crime that's happened or thwart a crime about to happen. Are our G-Men that inept that they have to wait for a guy with a Texas Instruments graphing calculator in order to protect the homeland? Can they not get their own graphing calculators? Actually, Charlie seems to do most of his best work with a chalkboard. Do you remember how long it takes to write something on a chalkboard? I mean, Eppes may be able to figure out the appropriate angle to reduce chalk drag and decrease wrist strain, but all that erasing is still going to take up time while the agents are out in the field with a ticking time bomb. And let's be honest. This is the L.A. field office. Eppes is probably wasting a lot of time writing spec scripts for The Big Bang Theory. Did I mention that Charlie Eppes's older brother runs the LA field office of the FBI? Yep, he's that bad at his job that he has to call up his younger brother to bail him out. EVERY WEEK.

4. The California Bureau of Investigation

TV Show: The Mentalist

Why They're Weak: OK, before the mentalist you'd probably never even heard of the California Bureau of Investigation. They're not exactly cracking open big cases. I think the biggest case they've ever handled was figuring out the Where Are They Now of Ice-T's old band, Body Count (answer: At home watching Law & Order: SVU).

But we'll just go ahead and accept the idea that there is a California Bureau of Investigation and they do worthwhile work. The premise of The Mentalist is that the CBI uses a mentalist, a guy who pretends to read people's minds, to help them solve cases. His name is Patrick Jane. I bet I know his first trick. "I know what you're thinking... Jane? That's a girl's name." It's as if the CBI got a grant from the government to just "try some stuff" and went to the county fair to hire someone. They passed on the tightrope walker because they just didn't have enough aerial cases to justify that and settled on the Mentalist. Basically, he's just a really observant guy. Shouldn't that be part of the job requirement for being in a Bureau of Investigation?

3. The Las Vegas Police Department

TV Show: CSI: Crime Scene Investigation

Why They're Weak: Apparently, the police officers and detectives of Las Vegas don't do police work or solve crimes anymore. Instead, all law enforcement has been turned over to the Crime Scene Unit. Everything from stopping jaywalkers to beating criminals up is now under the jurisdiction of the crime lab. The police officers are just glorified door-openers. In fact, if the crime lab were granted skeleton keys, they'd have no need for the police officers anymore-- except for maybe filing the paperwork after arrests were made. They have one detective, Brass, that they keep around just to laugh at whenever he walks out of the room.

2. Miami-Dade Police Department

TV Show: CSI Miami, Dexter

Why They're Weak: First, See #3. But OK, let's forget about the fact that the CSI is running things in Miami. There's another show set in Miami: Dexter. Dexter is about a vigilante serial killer who works for the police department. That's serial killer number one who operates under the police department's nose. In the first season, we learned that Dexter had a brother who also was a serial killer. The Miami-Dade Police were never able to apprehend Dexter's brother. Dexter did. So that's two serial killers. A few weeks later, Dexter meets another serial murderer who falls in love with him. That's three serial killers in that one little town, just running around offing folks! Come on, CSI: Miami! Can't you stop these killers from killing?

1. Your Local Police Department

TV Show: America's Most Wanted, The First 48, American Justice, Basically any crime show on A&E

Why They're Weak: Local law enforcement can never solve a crime unless at least two decades have passed and at least one TV special has aired. Between Cops and America's Most Wanted, alone, we see that cops are able to separate feuding spouses but are unable to solve any crime that takes detective work unless John Walsh hops in with his weekly telethon.

I'm not trying to be cynical, but every show on A&E seems to showcase the failure of local police. Either in real-time on The First 48 or in overwrought documentary on American Justice. It seems like we should just trade our police forces in and exchange them for a grab bag of students from the local Community College. Maybe there'll be an observant guy, a guy with a calculator, a guy with a fingerprinting kit, and a couple of murderers who can combine forces to form the ultimate crime fighting team. That would be awesome.

To my family,

I'll be the first to acknowledge that this year's family reunion did not go as well as we'd hoped, and since I was responsible for procuring the commemorative T-shirts, all of which had our name misspelled, I am willing to bear my fair share of the blame. It's in this spirit that I have chosen to submit notes on this year's reunion program in hope that future reunions might be the successes we know they can be.

I don't know, however, whether I will be able to attend the next family reunion. I have been investigating the possibility of leaving this family, and the Internet has yielded a number of intriguing opportunities. Through the miracle that is Craigslist, I have found a few families willing to admit me in exchange for a small monthly fee. But who knows? At the next family meeting, we will talk, and hopefully we can agree to terms conducive to my staying on with the family.

'Till then,
Ronald Ailey

P.S. Please find enclosed 1 collection of notes scribbled on a napkin.

Notes on Proposed Ailey Family Reunion Program

11:00 - 4:00 P.M. Introductions
Yes, I'm aware that five hours seems like a long time for introductions, but this is essential. After all, no one knows anyone, and that's how "Uncle Louie" was able to show up, help himself to three servings, and then cause an uproar by asking the teenage girls for their phone numbers. A related note: In this age of diversity, it makes sense to embrace multiculturalism and interconnectedness, but why did no one question the presence of a creepy Serbian man at a largely African-American family event?

4:00 - 5:00 P.M. Dinner
Five hours of introductions will be exhausting; dinner will be a welcome break. If the men are going to BBQ, will it even be lit yet? Why is it so much harder to set fire to charcoal than to an ex-spouse's expensive sportscar?

5:00 - 6:00 Doorprizes
All great efforts and sacrifices deserve rewards. Family Reunion door prizes are like the purple hearts of family life. Is it an insult to give a pre-soaped sponge as a door prize? If not, this could represent a good opportunity to make the best of a failed business venture. Also prizes give people something to look forward to and cut down on time for reflection. Reflection can only lead to unresolved arguments from previous family functions.

6:00 - 7:00 Panel Discussion???
Why do we keep doing this? This year's topic "Second cousins : can you date 'em?" was not productive. Maybe we could replace this activity with a competitive event of some sort.

7:00 - 7:30 Family Valedictorian speech
It's proven wildly unpopular having the family's highest wage-earner deliver a speech/lecture. But it is a tradition, and tradition must fit in somewhere.

7:30 Dismissal
Everyone looks forward to this. I think we'll keep it.

Running Time: Eight and a half hours.

Many have suggested that we shorten future family reunions. How about this?

11:00 - 4:00 Introductions
4:00 Dismissal
Running Time: Five hours.

Note: We can knock off an additional fifteen minutes by eliminating handshakes.