If there's one thing that drives me nuts, it's those PBS beg-a-thons! I
turn on the TV to watch NYW, but instead of Norm, I get some all-day Yoga
"special programming". Why in the heck would anyone financially reward PBS
for screwing with the programming half a dozen times a year?!?!

"Nobody provides you with the quality programming that we here at PBS do,
but we need your help to pay for it. And to show you how much we appreciate
your financial committment to support your favorite programs, we're
cancelling all of them while we beg for money. In their place we will run
(and re-run) hours of hack self-help gurus and has-been music acts (mostly
insipid), a few helicopter flyovers of your favorite places (up to 10 full
seconds over your town), and every Ken Burns opus ever filmed. But that's
not the best part. We will interrupt these "special" programs several times
each, not for 3 to 5 minutes at a time the way those horrible commercial
stations do, but for 20 to 25 minutes with people who have no business being
on TV (but are thrilled for the opportunity) and who have absolutely nothing
to say but blather on incessantly nevertheless. Oh, and by the way, you
won't miss a single minute of This Old House or New Yankee Workshop because
at some time toward the end of our pledge drive, but not on their regular
day or time, we'll catch up on all the show's we have preempted by running
five or six episodes back to back (with more pledge breaks, of course). We
won't tell you exactly when that is. You'll have to guess, unless you
subscribe to our Program Guide which you can have for a gift at the $300
level."

Lee


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