Newsday TV Book, November 26-December 2, 1978.

We're full steam ahead into the most wonderful time of the year, now that thanks have been given and silver bells begin to peal in the chilly, muffled distance. Is that a sleigh my wondering eyes see? With a little old driver so lively and quick? No--it's a coked-up comedian flying a damn egg!
Well, that's what I saw back in the late fall of 1978, on Thursday nights before What's Happening!!

In the accompanying article, Robin Williams says he was an only child but not a lonely one, and talks about getting off (on improv, that is--he said it, not me).

[Click pics to enlarge, and sorry for the lousy job I did lightening them...]

I really wish Carol Burton Terry, the TV Line editor, had printed a pic of Fred Porcelli, who played a server on All My Children while he was working as head waiter of the nightclub 21 in real-life. I figured, if this guy is piquing the curiosity of Long Island Newsday readers (well, D.B. of Massapequa, a least--wait, could that have been a 17-year-old Daniel Baldwin? Boy, that would be weird!), he must have been some hot young stud. So I looked Fred up and found, uh, not that.
The pics I found from the show depict--imagine with me--a youngish Burt Mustin in an Oscar Goldman-inspired toupee that snapped on one's head like an oily sealskin bathing cap. (He died in 2012 at age 92.)
Elsewhere in the TVL: more than anyone ever cared to know about Jeff Conaway.

An ad for Nassau Coliseum is up next--or Nassau Veteran's Memorial Coliseum, if you read the fine print--with a repeated typo you can find for yourself. (Listen, lemme alone, I got a just-spayed kitten recovering in my bathroom and a tree to decorate tonight!)

According to the Off Camera column, fledgling SCTV performers found other work, Adrienne Barbeau played a lesbian, and Waltons dropped like flies. Also, CBT blew her Mac Davis punchline with another typo. Come on, Carol. Do better.

This week, Sunday's (and every day's) schedule began with the declaration that WLIW, my beloved hometown Public Television station, would be absent due to transmitter relocation. "Wait," huffed an incredulous nine-year-old me, "so I can only watch Simple Gifts: Six Episodes for Christmas half as many times as I should be able to?!? What a gyp!"
And I know you're going to read the Abbott & Costello listing, so let's just say it together now: The "horror boys"?

Here's Sunday afternoon, pretty much entirely for the March of the Wooden Soldiers airing.

August and April (and Eddie and Eva) appear in the Trivia column, but the star here is a Christmas ad for the ever-sublime seasonal display at Hicks Nurseries in Westbury. And get this: I don't think I've ever scanned this one before!
(I know, it's unfathomable, but get up off the floor, people are looking.)

I nixed some interesting items when planning what to feature from this issue, but now that I look at the NBC TV movie advertisement which made the cut, I'm not sure why I bothered including it. I don't remember the flick, can't say I've even heard of it, and it's not that interesting visually. I guess it was just the uncommonness of a network ad that swayed me. So this one's for all you Crennaphiles out there!

More cool stuff on Wednesday night, as you will see for yourself without comment from me.
(Did I mention that I haven't checked so much as one string of lights yet?)

I think I have more than one Viskupic Connery in my collection. I should really look. Some day.

I'm almost to the end, but I gotta fly, like the down of a thistle! I'll finish the rest after all this bustle dies down! Oy, with the crunching and the bunching! Check back tomorrow!

[THE NEXT DAY, MEANING TODAY]
Okay, I'm back. Here's all day Saturday. At noon, you'll see that ABC was showing "The Winged Colt" as their Weekend Special. You'll see that because, as I recall, they showed it every fucking weekend.

Note the Famous Classic Tales and Children's Animated Classics specials of the afternoon schedule, known to all (meaning me) as being entirely too similar to school, learning, and/or culture, and thus to be avoided at all costs.

I thought of editing the special close-up, putting a photo of Charlie into Maria's place, but really, would it be worth the effort just to amuse myself?

A Very Merry Cricket, now you're talking! Ah crap, it's on a Connecticut station! Fine, a report on the Suffolk County Southwest Sewer District will do...

Too many John Cashman goodies to mention, but his terse review of In Harm's Way had James Ellroy asking, "Whattaya, got a bus to catch?"

A boring page of largely boring ads, but I just can't resist the phrase "Disco on Ice." (And a disco coupon! Such a deal! They shoulda used the tagline,"We put the 'disco' in discounts!")

I want to see every one of the specials listed on the Cable TV Highlights page. I may not watch more than a minute, but I want to see every one.

Finally, I don't often include the Crosswords, but I was compelled to this time, as it hilariously features the unpalatably pickled puss of Alison Arngrim--ah, dammit, I gave the answer away! Sorry! See you next time!

WPIX "Yule Log" Ads from TV Guide, 1967-1983.

I have all these TV Guide ads for WPIX channel 11's classic Yule Log (from the New York Metropolitan edition, duh) in an album on Facebook, but I like having them all here in one DPiMR post. I thought sure I'd done it already, but nope.

I don't recall ever really watching the Yule Log, but we'd have the soundtrack's stereo simulcast (on WPIX-FM 101.9, of course) playing as we opened our presents on the night of Christmas Eve, German-style. The TV was down in the den, so I think I only checked in every so often, just to see the novelty of the commercial-free fireplace, then quickly back upstairs to the revelry. I always found the simulcast preferable to other radio stations on that night--even as a kid, I disliked hearing modern Christmas music. I wanted the old, before-I-was-born stuff!

I have my own YL video, recorded off a Portland, Ore. independent station in 2001. I was living alone in a downtown studio bachelor pad a little bigger than a prison cell, where random folks occasionally popped in using their own key (which was upsetting, but at least they seemed as puzzled as me). After I saw the TV schedule listing for it, I set my VCR to record and my expectations to "low."

I left Long Island in December of 1990, and as it happened, the last airing of the YL was the previous year's (and then it was revived after a twelve-year hiatus, intended as a post-9/11 balm). I doubt I even bothered with so much as a cursory viewing for the last few years I lived there. But when I checked that tape and saw that it was indeed the Yule Log of my childhood... well, that was a nice Christmas morning.

(Don't forget to click on the pics to see them better)

2023 UPDATE: Most recent acquisitions, 1967 and 1969, have been added!

1967, ad and listing. My nostalgia collecting generally begins with 1974, but I sought out earlier TVG issues just to get these ads. When this one arrived in the mail and I opened it to find this terrific full-pager, I was pretty stoked.

1969 (hey, I was born then!), ad and listing.

Here's 1970, with listings and without.

I don't have 1971, so on we go to 1972. The Wikipedia page for the YL says the longest running time was four hours. This ad (and the Newsday listing, coming up after the TVG's) contradicts that.

1973.

There's no ad in the TV Guide for Christmas Eve 1974, so here instead is the program close-up, with listing, from the Newsday TV Book. (At mentioned, more listings in a bit from these local Long Island guides.)
"Continuous until sign-off." I'm not sure why that phrase is so cool, but it is.

The next few years are similar, but different. Running times vary, and the original "11Alive" logo gets added. Here's 1975.

1976.

1977.

1978.

 1979, quite unlike the others (plus separate listings).

1980.

1981.

1982, with the new, angular "11Alive" logo, down to two hours.

1983. I swear every theme in my collection gets worse as it progresses from 70's to 80's, and Yule Log ads are no exception. Progress... humbug!

As teased, here's the Newsday TV Book YL listing for 1972.

The description gets a bit wordier in 1973.

I showed '74 already, so on to the next one I have, 1977.
Sorry about the X's indicating Christmas shows. I got a little over-zealous.

By 1980, the description was thinning out a bit, as cable listings increasingly crowded their way in.

1981, a little leaner still...

1983. Really, Newsday?

1984. Better, I guess.

And the very last issue of my whole collection is for Christmas 1985. There are so many listings for cable programs at this point that three columns only cover an hour-and-a-half. A dozen years earlier, you could have fit a third of your viewing day in the same space.

If I find anything else YL related, you can bet I'll put it here! (Oh right, like this short 1984 promo on my YouTube channel, for instance!) Be sure to share this, old-school New Yorkers dig it! Right?