Paging George Stroumboulopoulos...

TV sucks. Well, TV on ships sucks. Well, TV sucks on this ship. At the best of times, you can get TNT, TSN, TCM, CNN, and a bunch of closed circuit channels with bad quality video taped reruns of Murder She Wrote and Trading Spaces. (Let’s not forget the ship’s shopping channel “Buy diamonds and tanzanite but only from this cruise line’s approved store!” They’re always trying to sell you things.) Certain satellite signals don’t reach us here in Europe, so the only channels we get are TSN and CNN. Most sports bore me to tears, so news wins! I have to say that I find CNN quite interesting here because we get the non-North-American version with fascinating shows like Eye On Africa or Talk Asia. It’s good to know what is going on in the ROTW (rest of the world), and refreshing to get news with a perhaps-only-slightly-less American perspective. (Once a half hour, I can see a weather update for Yangon, Kuala Lumpur or Islamabad.) Plus, all the broadcasters speak English with a really classy accent. It’s like everyone is Christiane Amanpour. And we still get Wolf Blitzer and that hunky Anderson Cooper (Is he single? He comes from money, you know). The downside is that we still get Larry King.

I know, I know. Don’t be too hard on Ol’ Lar. I mean, Kathy Griffin likes him, so he can’t be that bad. (I always wondered if I was cool enough to be one of “her gays”. Yawn). And he’s fine when he interviews someone like Britney Spears’ bodyguard, or the finalists from American Idol, or a bunch of people who believe in UFOs. But he was granted an exclusive interview with Ingrid Betancourt. She’s a remarkable woman who was a Columbian presidential contender when six and a half years ago, she was kidnapped and has been held captive since. The Columbian government had secret agents infiltrate the guerrilla camps, and was able to set her and 14 other people free. There are still hundreds being held captive. The video of her and her fellow captives in the helicopter when they realize they’ve been set free is one of the most emotional and real things I have ever seen. She was reunited in France with her children and her husband. She is incredibly brave, well spoken, composed, and despite having spent close to 7 years where death was a daily possibility, she seems tremendously sane. I’m pretty much in tears just writing this.

Larry King? Did alarm bells not sound in anyone’s head? Didn’t someone realize that he was the most utterly inappropriate person to do this interview? Was Mary Hart unavailable? What about Elizabeth Hasselbeck? So I take a deep breath and ready myself. How bad could it be? After a remarkably glib introduction, the first question Larry asks is “How are you doing?” Fair enough. She answers that she is just trying to hang on, that it’s been very difficult readjusting and that she’s exhausted. And she seems exhausted. Physically, mentally and morally. She is doing this interview out of duty because she believes that she should do everything in her power to get the others freed. She truly is a remarkable person. So what does Larry reply? Larry replies, NO JOKE, Larry replies:

“Well, you look terrific!”


?


??


Did he…really say…that?


Yes, ladies and gentlemen, he did indeed. Because as Billy Crystal told us oh so many years ago on SNL “It’s better to rook good than to feel good. And Dahling. Yooou roooook Mahvelous!” OMFG! Where’s Dr. Kevorkian when you need him?


Too much? Did I cross the line? Whatever. If I’m ever kidnapped and held captive for 6 years and miraculously rescued, I’m getting George Stroumboulopoulos to interview me. And chances are, wherever I’m being held, the TV will be better than here.