I noticed the big networks didnt show two of the last places, Hawaii, and Samoa. Anyway, I did get to see the coverage on PBS. I also was dissappointed that I didnt catch the coverage of the Philippines, but, I digress…
I don’t remember exactly when, but it was after NYE in Paris (which was AWESOME! I think of all the NYE events, that one was the best), and I think before London, ABC going over which places the new year has hit so far. They were showing clips of several different places when the moment hit, and at one point their camera set on some place within the building. Just a guy walking by a desk on which rested a notebook computer. Then for the next minute and a half, we were watching that desk. They fixed it and went on without comment, but that was just really annoying since I hadn’t been watching all day and wanted to see the highlights.
Yeah, what I saw of ABC’s coverage sucked. I’d planned to watch CBS because they were going to cover the D.C. festivities - big name stars, the Prez lighting the “fuse” to cross the reflecting pool to the Washington monument and lighting up the monument from bottom to top, then fireworks-- cool, I thought, gotta be better than watching the NY ball drop. Girlfriend invites me to her small gathering, so just in case, I set my VCR to tape 3 hrs on CBS. Sure enough, she has ABC on. Drinking and gabbing in the kitchen and watching a small t.v. in there where there was no cable hookup and the picture was lousy. Peter Jennings trying mightily to fill the time - talking heads, Barry Manilow. Then midnight comes and ABC shows two small insets - the NY ball and the D.C. monument from miles away and you could hardly see it. I’da been real pissed if I’d been sober.
When midnight came to L.A., instead of sticking with the network coverage they went local, and we saw a “celebration” from the Hollywood sign. The mayor was supposed to pull a switch to start a light show at midnight, but Jay Leno overpowered him and pulled it more than ten seconds early, all the while exclaiming, “This is the cheesiest thing.” So I think Los Angeles can claim to have had the most anticlimactic celebration of any major city (though I can’t really blame that on ABC.)
Cat, I have to agree that midnight in LA was completely anticlimatic, if not boring…but…sigh…I have to defend Jay Leno. It isn’t that I particularly care to defend his honor or anything–I just saw it differently.
In the last two minutes or so, the camera cut to Jay and the Mayor, who explained that they have been given the honor to pull the lever at 14 seconds on the clock (apparently to give time to essentially run the cheesy graphics before the Hollywood sign lit). At 30 seconds, he said “15 seconds to go, are you ready?” The two of them were horsing around a bit and they missed their mark. Jay realized it first and pulled the lever (both of them had their hands on it) down at 13 seconds (or maybe it was 12, I dunno). The mayor did figure out about a half second after Jay and pulled down, too.
The “cheesiest” comment came after the ridiculous animated graphic and the lights on the Hollywood sign. That I remember because I thought it was damn funny, and damn accurate. It was absolutely sad in comparison to Times Square and various other celebrations around the world.
It really sucked that we were stuck with local news channels. What a letdown.
Ah, well. It’s 2000. Whoo.
I used to think the world was against me. Now I know better: Some of the smaller countries are neutral.
Actually, Ruffian, that does make me feel better about the whole thing. I didn’t get that they were supposed to set it off early and whose bright idea was that?) But that it wasn’t as bad as it looked was something of a comfort (though I thought the “cheesy” remark was out of place, meself.)
So I still can’t stand Jay Leno, but now I shall go back to my old reasons
Our local station pulled away at 11:59 to a split screen of the Times Square ball drop and our local ball drop. The newscaster said he wanted to give us “the best of both worlds”. The pathetic part being the station is based out of Charleston, West Virginia. Needless to say the Charleston celebration was somewhat less than the celebration at Times Square.
I thought the PBS coverage was pretty cheesy toward the end. I liked their coverage of the Presidents speech “… Thank You…,” and a cut to a test pattern. The hour long Jordanian Baptism was humorous: A dozen old men scaring the hell out of a little girl. Why did they keep cutting back to that?
Brickbats go to ABC for choosing a flaming “blast radius” effect to repeat over and over on their banner screens. Geez, fellas, we want to think sunrise, not H-bomb.
I was watching CNN most of the time… you mean Barbara Walters was too drunk to get dressed properly too?
