Due to Matt Lauer's Tuesday night interview with noted airport restroom user Larry Craig, Susie Oh's second defense of her "Singing Bee" title (gameplay, if not outcome, spoiled in over-credits promo!) will be delayed to Oct. 23. There is a certain sense of irony that the special musical guests in that episode are the Village People.

And on this coming Thursday, Fox gives "Lyrics" the night off (the next episode supposedly contains, uh, some heretofore unrevealed game rules) for a full night of Jeff and the kids. Even though the credits mentioned the celeb shows, Mark Thompson just intoned "coming soon" and I would tend to think that they are holding those for November sweeps.

And finally, Million Dollar Mission continues tonight on "DOND" (goodbye, $75K case!)--no indication if it will be over by Wednesday, the last Wednesday episode for six weeks while the psychicfest "Phenomenon," mislabled by the Perfesser as a "game opera" when it's just "Psychic Idol," takes over the 8 p.m. time slot.

So they're now up to...what....*8* million-dollar cases?

It's now laughable.

I lol'd.

ObGameShow: Sen. Craig was a contestant on Showoffs in 1975, but was kicked off because he was tapping his feet to a celebrity inside the giant iso. booth. <ducks>

Wow. That was a long and obscure way to share a painfully not funny remark.

Thursday's "5th" is a repeat from May. And it's just back-up programming in case the ALCS is a sweep - game 5 will be played that night, if there is one.

The celeb episodes of "5th" are scheduled to start 11/1 (the first night of Nov. sweeps) with a two-hour Clay Aiken/Regis Philbin extravaganza. But game 7 of the World Series is also scheduled for 11/1. So if the WS goes the distance, Clay and Reege will be bumped. Tony Hawk is the scheduled celeb on 11/8.

Does anyone think that NBC will air two episodes of "The Singing Bee" in a future week to make up for next week's pre-emption.

I doubt if that's gonna happen unless The Singing Bee gets back-to-back airings one night between now & December in lieu of Clash of the Chiors starting the week before Christmas. Besides, missing one week of the Bee isn't gonna bother anyone except those that are watching at 8 that Tuesday only to see Lauer's interview with Craig wonder where their Bee fix went. Not only that, I had a back-up plan already in place just in case. Looks like the back-up plan will now be front & center that night.

Hmm. The Village People on my birthday eh? If they're gonna sing "YMCA", I MUST ask my nephew to see this since that song came out the year he was born. On second thought, if I do hear it, it probably will dampen my celebration as is.

So laughable they STILL couldn't give away the top prize. NBC don't know the word 'patience'.

I don't think it's so much NBC as it is the contestants, who feel they've got just enough money to pay off their debts and not run into a lot of tax trouble, and bail with a good deal. Nobody's shown any guts to keep the million dollar case in the history of the program.