News of the Day -- Wednesday, June 4

Back from a whirlwind trip to New York that included a wonderful wedding, kangaroos in Prospect Park (okay, the Prospect Park Zoo), an actual argument about "Transformers" and a multi-hour traffic jam convoluted enough to make Rube Goldberg cry. But enough about me. On with the news...

+ There's all sorts of wonkiness going on with BBC's Torchwood and its schedule for the coming year. Five episodes shown over five days. Huh. Color me confused....

+ Jenna Fischer was interviewed on NPR's "Fresh Air" yesterday. If you're wondering if you should spend 37 minutes listening or not, just know that "Fischer talks to Fresh Air about her abortive career as a member of an all-girl singing group (which turned out to be a front for a high-priced call-girl ring), and about her very first screen role — in a sex-education film made especially for just-released mental-health patients."

+ Two reviewers at Ain't It Cool have given some enthusiastic thumbs up to Pixar's upcoming, "Wall-E," a film my cranky curmudgeon side is having trouble getting ramped up for. I love robots as much as the next girl, but I feel like something's missing. Probably dinosaurs or monkeys. I'm just demanding that way.

A.M. Update

* Every time I hear or see Seth Green, I think of the scene in Buffy when Oz tells Giles he thinks he should name the zombie cat "Patches." And then I laugh. I don't know why. That's just how it is. Anyway, if you'd like to listen to Seth Green and conjure up your own mental images, he did a nifty interview on NPR yesterday about Robot Chicken and various other projects, none of which, sadly, involve zombie cats named Patches. (And again I laugh.) [NPR]

* Speaking of interviews and speaking of people who know Seth Green, Joss Whedon did an interview this week with The Onion's AV Club in which he talks about a bunch of new projects including an Angel TV movie which led me to go, "Huh? What?" and then kind of jump up and down a little bit. I'm feeling like maybe I misunderstood though because it seems too good to be true. Let me know what you think. [The Onion AV Club]

* Speaking of people who don't know Seth Green, my husband is very excited over news of a World of Warcraft movie. I think he's secretly hoping that his blood elf Hoyt gets asked to participate, but I'm not sure that'll happen. I'm guessing though that there will be sword fights and lots of flying arrows, so it's all good. [Monsters and Critics]

* Speaking of things that have nothing to do with Seth Green at all, a new study came out yesterday saying that while we women prefer the muscled, tough, Rocky-esque gentlemen for our clubbing and concrete pouring needs, we prefer the gentler, less bulge-y gents for marriage and long-term co-habitation. I'm guessing the report was written by a lot of men who are gentler and less bulge-y and who maybe get picked on by the bigger, meaner sports fitness researchers down the hall. Just a guess. [Yahoo "News"]

* And finally, something that has only tangential relation to Seth Green and then only in terms of evolution, a monkey smuggled himself into LaGuardia Airport yesterday sitting quietly, smoking and reading In Flight magazine under some guy's hat. He was discovered when he asked for a moist towelette. Or something. All I know is, it's a cute monkey and I love the BBC caption for the article which states, "The monkey was said to have been well-behaved on the flight." Unlike some of those damn kids always kicking my chair, the reporter thought to himself, shaking his fist in unseen rage. [BBC News]

I'd raise up my lighter but my hand might freeze off

Forget U2. Forget The Police. Forget Foo Fighters, Snow Patrol, even Spinal Tap. I hereby proclaim Nunatek to be the world's greatest band. Friend of the penguin, comrade of the long-dead Captain Scott, foe to global warming, this five-man band hails from Antarctica and is comprised of research scientists studying evolutionary biology, global warming and ass-kicking rock and roll. They'll be performing, via tape delay, at this Saturday's Live Earth concert, fulfilling the organizers' hope of having at least one band perform on each continent.

"You've got to remember, although we've got a very big following within the British Antarctic Survey — and in particular, Rothera station — we may not have the worldwide renown that some of the other acts have," said my new rock star crush Tristan Thorne in a great, tongue-in-cheek interview on NPR yesterday.

Nunatek, which is a Greenlandic word for mountain peaks protruding through ice sheets, will start their concert outside at around three o'clock in the afternoon in dull Antarctic light and a balmy temperature of around 10 degrees below zero Celsius before moving indoors to a venue that Thorne calls "very popular venue known as the 'sledge stall.'" The audience will be filled with hard-core fans, i.e., seventeen members of the Rothera Research Station, all crazed and PhD holding.

Check out their performance the day after the concert at liveearth.msn.com. In the meantime, you can check out a video of the band rehearsing:


Rock on, Tristan. Rock on, Nunatek. Whoooooooo!