Have you ever been tinkering with a computer program or maybe a Web site that you host or something as simple as a blender and realize that it was able to do something you never knew before it could? Like I recently discovered that you can enter a keyword in on TiVo and it will tape every show with that keyword in the title. So now instead of periodically looking for Scooby-Doo movies for my five-year-old, every time something airs that includes the name "Scooby" in the title, it will get taped. Which means my TiVo will be full of only Scooby-Doo content by the end of next week: "Hey, what happened to Lost? Oh, it got erased to make room for Scooby-Doo Meets the Harlem Globetrotters."

Anyway, I recently remembered that I have access to entertainment news wires on my computer, so I'm definitely going to try to utilize these things more. Like just today I find out that the artists behind some of my 1970s pop guilty pleasures just died: l Wilson, who wrote and performed "Show and Tell," and Paul Davis, who counted among his hits "I Go Crazy," "Cool Night," and "'65 Love Affair." So get out those 70s compilations you undoubtedly have in your closet and crank 'em up. Here's hoping that Rupert Holmes isn't next to go.

Like a thirteen-year-old kid who discovers his older brother's stash of dirty magazines, I continue to be amazed. Amazed at the amount of crap available to watch on the Internet. It seems like no matter what I seek out, it's there. Just the other day I had a conversation with some co-workers about Ray Combs, the former Family Feud host who committed suicide about ten years ago. Two minutes later, I'm watching Combs's last show on YouTube, where not only does he hilariously berate the "fast money" contestants ("I thought I was a loser"), but also storms off the set at the end, refusing to partake in the traditional goodbyes with the day's winning family. Fascinating stuff. Also recently I was reading something about Fridays, the 1980s Saturday Night Live rip-off and bingo, not only can you find lots of footage of this never-released-on-DVD show, but you can find the infamous "Diner of the Living Dead" sketch, a piece so disturbing that it required an on-air apology the next week and has apparently never been rerun since.

Anyway, I get into all of this because I did come up with some material that I'd love to see on-line that I can't find, namely a series of paid programs that were around in the late eighties/early nineties that kept me up many a night due to my fascination with awful television. I'm talking about Amazing Discoveries, hosted by the perversely perky Mike Levey, who wore the most garish sweaters this side of Heathcliff Huxtable. Levey reached a minor level of cult celebrity back in the day, even making a memorable appearance on Late Night with David Letterman where he got so excited he picked Paul Shaffer up off of the floor to Paul and Dave's stunned bemusement. Amazing Discoveries was great stuff, as Levey ranted and raved about furniture restorers and memory programs as if they were the second coming. Levey made Billy Mays seem like Eeyore by comparison. I vividly remember sitting up hoping to see particular episodes of this monstrosity. So if anyone has any episodes of this program, particularly any that featured the English sidekick, let me know! And post them on-line, please! Unfortunately, Levey died of cancer in 2003. But his work deserves to live on!

Word has it that Jimmy Fallon is the choice to replace Conan O'Brien in 2009 once O'Brien takes over The Tonight Show. Fallon's choice appears to be confirmation that NBC is set on screwing up its late night schedule as badly as it has it screwed up its primetime schedule. Now obviously I haven't seen Fallon host so I could be dead wrong, but Fallon has never proven himself as a comedian to the extent that Letterman or Leno did before getting their gigs, and he doesn't even come with the impressive writing pedigree that Conan O'Brien did. Again, this is criticizing something sight-unseen, but my gut is that an angered Leno will move to FOX, beat Letterman and O'Brien (people just love that Leno, I don't know why, and why NBC wants to dump him for O'Brien is simply bizarre), and CBS will beat Fallon with the increasingly popular Craig Ferguson. Ferguson is one host that has proven himself better than most expected; perhaps Fallon can likewise surprise.

FHM is out with its list of 100 sexiest women of 2008. You'd think with a list of 100 that you'd hit all the obvious choices, but come on -- where's Kathie Lee Gifford? Where's Whoopi Goldberg? Where's Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi? Excuse me, but the mere mention of Pelosi makes me have to go take a cold shower. See you later.

You gotta love Neil Patrick Harris. Not only is his turn as Barney Stinson on CBS's underrated How I Met Your Mother consistently the funniest thing on network television not part of NBC's Thursday night lineup, but the man speaks the truth. Speaking about Britney Spears's recent guest appearance on HIMYM, he said matter-of-factly, "I'm in the minority that our show does not need stunt casting in order to succeed," adding that he believes the show will suffer if the network begins "Will and Grace-ing us too much."

Harris is spot on with his analysis. Consistent use of high-profile guest stars on shows not named The Love Boat or Fantasy Island can ruin a program, especially sitcoms, which are tough enough to write and edit down to 22 minutes sans commercials without wasting precious air time with star turns that are irrelevant and inconsequential to the "TV world" created by the regular cast members. No show was more egregiously offensive in this regard than the aforementioned Will & Grace, which in effect turned its regular cast into supporting actors overwhelmed by guest appearances by the likes of John Cleese, Minnie Driver, Michael Douglas, Ellen DeGeneres, Rosie O'Donnell, Woody Harrelson, Harry Connick, Jr., Gregory Hines, Glenn Close . . . the list is endless. But certainly W&G was not alone in this crime: See The Cosby Show, which devolved from a smart family comedy to a weekly revolving door for Bill Cosby's musician friends -- hey, there's Stevie Wonder! There's Lena Horne! There's B.B. King! But how do they all know the Huxtables, anyway?

No sitcom was better at using guest stars than Seinfeld, which seemed to operate by one easy but seemingly easily overlooked rule of thumb: No guest star is bigger than the show. Guest appearances from Jon Voight, Marisa Tomei, Bette Midler, Lloyd Bridges, Jon Lovitz, and even David Letterman never upstaged the regular cast. Probably because the guest stars needed the cache of appearing on Seinfeld more than Seinfeld needed the guest stars.

Besides the casting of known guest stars, the casting of unknown guest stars was something else Seinfeld did very well: Remember that Debra Messing, Bryan Cranston, Michael Chiklis, Teri Hatcher, and Jane Leeves -- to name just a few -- basically owe their later success to their appearances on Seinfeld.

While we're on the subject of Seinfeld, a promo I just saw centered solely on the ridiculous plot of Kramer's use of butter for shaving. No mention of guest stars, no tease of a Jerry and Elaine romantic interlude, just the fourth main cast member spreading a dairy product on his face. Now there's a promo department confident in a show. I'm sure Neil Patrick Harris and others from HIMYM would love CBS to have that similar faith.

News out of the Great White North is that the characters of Bob and Doug McKenzie are set to return in an upcoming animated program for Canada's Global Television. If you're under the age of 25, you probably need to be told that Bob and Doug McKenzie, portrayed by Rick Moranis and Dave Thomas, were popular for a while in the early eighties following their creation on the sketch comedy show SCTV. (A reminder: Buy my book!) Moranis and Thomas parlayed the characters into an album and a feature film (Strange Brew) before interest petered out.

If you think it sounds like a stretch to bring long-forgotten sketch comedy characters back for an animated program, I think you'd be right. (Moranis and Thomas have been trying for years to jump-start their most popular creations, from an aborted Strange Brew sequel to countless advertisements, many only seen in Canada.) My love for SCTV means that I have an interest in the project, but I'd be willing to bet I'm one of the few. Of course, if the show is good -- and it is being created and voiced by Moranis and Thomas themselves -- then it may catch on with people who don't know the McKenzie brothers from the Karamazov brothers, and it'll be moot that the characters were last popular during Reagan's first term in office. Me, I think I'd rather see Eugene Levy's Bobby Bittman make a comeback.