Taking the Fun Out of It

This a test first post to the Harold Night Blog.  How's it look?

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I woke up depressed this morning.  I wasn't sure why.  I hadn't watched the last Conan show yet.  I had a fun night out at the theatre the night before.  But for some reason there was just a cloud.  Now that it has lifted a bit, I wonder if in the back of my head I wasn't just a little bit sad because I was recognizing that this whole late night mess that I have been so invested in (translation: obsessed with) was over.  What else is going to be there to get me through my day to day?

I proceeded to wake up, grab some breakfast and watch Conan's last show on Tivo.  It was amazing.  Moving.  Everything I wanted it to be.  And as I watched his look back over tonight show highlights, my thoughts started to shift a bit.

"Tonight, we're going to have fun on television."

Conan has been one of my biggest inspirations for a long, long time.  As I watched the clips from the tonight show my mind went back to my thoughts seeing his last 'Late Night'.  Conan made it.  My generation is going to have their own Tonight Show.   Years from now my kids can stay up past their bed time and watch Conan's last tonight show and not really get what all the fuss is about.  And I also thought about how inspired I was by his first Tonight show.  His first bit running coast to coast was amazing.  This is it.  This is what we're going to get for years to come. 

But then I realized that I didn't watch.  I'd catch Tonight shows every now and again (mainly when on the road as a security blanket) but I didn't watch regularly.  And It wasn't because I didn't like the show or didn't love Conan - I still got that feeling of inspiration and ownership whenever I caught Conan's tonight show.  But the fact of the matter was, I wasn't there.  And when it became apparent that my generation's Tonight show was going to be stolen from us, I didn't miss a show.  And I loved every minute of it.  But it was too late. 

Amazingly, Conan himself was able to make me feel better within the same show.

"Nobody in life gets exactly what they thought they were going to get.  But if you work really hard and you're kind, amazing things will happen"

Wow.  (Related, why the hell doesn't NBC have this clip up line?)  Really puts shit in perspective doesn't it?  I'm in the amazing position where I also have opportunities to share some of my creative energy, work with people I love and respect, and entertain people (far, far fewer people).  Sometimes it is really really hard to do.  I have to make sacrifices and rarely get to take the easy path.  But in the inevitable moments where I consider giving up or giving in I'll think back to this and realize how much of a gift it is that I have the opportunity to (try) to make people laugh and support other amazing creative people big and small.

So thanks again Conan for being an inspiration.  And I'll be supporting you wherever you end up.

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I've been pretty obsessed with the whole NBC late night train wreck lately.  Really fun placing bets on how it plays out.  My current take is that Conan stays, but ends up forced out in the next few years anyway.  I don't really see a winning move for Coco.  This goes against recent rumors, but that's what makes predicting this so fun.

Anyway, stumbled across an Entertainment Weekly blog post that has a thoughtful analysis of the situation predicting that the proposed NBC schedule may actually be an advantage for NBC.  Interesting.  The only thing I disagree with there is that Ferguson could take over for Letterman when he decides to retire. My prediction is that CBS goes after a big name new to network late night - maybe poaching someone from the Comedy Central news shows.

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