Each week, Jonathan Ross presents music and celebrity chat on his BBC television show “Friday Night with Jonathan Ross.” In this entertaining video clip,  quirky Oscar-winning Hollywood anti-hero Christopher Walken reads a few lines from Lady Gaga’s hit song “Pokerface.”

I suppose we should be thankful he didn’t request “more cowbell!”

Click here to see Lady Gaga perform Pokerface. (more…)

It doesn’t matter whether you’re with the Chin or Coco, this entire situation has become an embarrassing mess for NBC, and EV-erybody has been talking about it.

Here it is in a nutshell:
Several, many, some, years ago, NBC made plans for Jay Leno to retire from his job as host of “The Tonight Show” and lined up Conan O’Brien to take his place. Conan took Lenos place in June 2009, and soon after NBC gave Leno a different show at an earlier time, put Conan (who was lovingly nicknamed “Coco” by some) into Leno’s old spot, and gave Conan’s old spot to Jimmy Fallon.

Just this week, NBC decided this arrangement isn’t working for them, so they’ve decided to muck with the lineup a little more. They want to give Leno a half-hour spot at 11:30, bump Conan back to 12:05, and move Jimmy Fallon later behind them.

According to Mashable,  Conan put The Tonight Show up for sale at Craigslist  though the listing titled “4 SALE: BARELY-USED LATE NIGHT TALK SHOW,” has been removed (thank goodness for screen captures, or this wouldn’t have been quite so funny). Over at Twitter, #teamconan is topping trending topics, and even the little Reddit Alien was sporting Conan’s hairstyle for a few days this week.

Jimmy Kimmel attempted to explain the situation by cutting a pie into pieces,  Rosie O’Donnell said she thinks Jay Leno “should walk away”  and  David Letterman has offered up his own suggestion as well–watch the video below to hear his take on it.

What do you think about all of this? Personally, I’m with Coco.  Please share your opinions with us at twitter.com!

The soldiers of the 101st Airborne, 159th Aviation Brigade found a newborn puppy on an Afghanistan battlefield — so they rescued the puppy, and made her a part of their brigade.

“It obviously had been abandoned. There was no mother around… It was very, very young, so if they would have left it there, it would have never made it,” said Teri Lemmons, mother of Army Cpl. Michael Lemmons.

Unfortunately, when the time came for the soldiers to return home, military law prevented the soldiers from bringing their beloved pet back with them on military planes. The cost of shipping the dog was more than $2500. Faced with the possibility of leaving her behind, the soldiers got creative.

The touching story was broadcast on the ABC News with Charles Gibson last week. Watch the video below to see how this shaggy dog story ends.

A friend gave me a link to this blog TheDailyOcean.blogspot.com; written by Santa Monica resident Sara Bayles, her plan is to spend 20 minutes collecting trash from her local beach each day and record her efforts online for 365 non-consecutive days. At each visit, she takes a photograph of what the beach looked like that day, a photo of the trash she collected, and she also includes a photo of something beautiful.

She keeps a running tally of each day’s collection: So far, only 70 days into her project, she estimates she has collected more than 325 pounds of trash. Sara says her goal is to raise awareness, and add some inspiration to help change the world.

Sara started the project back in May and since then, has blogged her nearly daily efforts to clean up beach trash, 20 minutes at a time. Sometimes she goes alone, sometimes she collects with her husband Garen, but just this weekend she collected trash as part of 350.org’s  “Day for International Climate Action” in a giant beach cleanup project co-hosted with GreenLaGirl Siel,

Sara says her inspiration for this project came when she “realized I could treat everyday like a beach clean-up day, instead of waiting for an organization like Surfrider to host one.” She does belong to Surfrider, and says she believes membership in organizations like theirs is important, but ever since she moved closer to the beach, she “decided to do something to help protect our oceans as often as I could.” (more…)

Art teacher Sheri Lowe was alone in her Houston classroom with 10-year-old Kyle Forbes when she began choking on an apple. Kyle quickly ran to her rescue and administered the Heimlich Maneuver, a technique he learned in Cub Scouts. “I knew what to do immediately!” says the enthusiastic young man.

As a child with autism, Kyle is used to feeling like an outsider, but this experience has transformed him into a hero: “I was like a superhero and everybody was cheering me.”

Have a wonderful weekend, and let’s all be thankful for marvelous feats from unexpected heroes!

There’s very little that can be said about this video, except:

• Watch it in high-def;
• Enlarge it to full screen;
• Turn up the volume to enjoy the amazing vocals.

All a capella vocals are performed by Sam Tsui, a junior at Yale Univesity and award-winning soloist for the Duke’s Men of Yale. The vocal “beat box” percussion, arrangement, and production are accomplished by his friend Kurt Schneider.

For more info on Sam Tsui and his amazing a capella vocals, visit www.myspace.com/SamTsui.

For more info on Kurt, including contact info for obtaining an SATB copy of the arrangement, visit www.myspace.com/KurtHugo.

If this video leaves you gasping to watch more, don’t miss his rendition of “Don’t Stop Believing” by Journey. You can watch it here at youtube.com

I was home alone late one night nearly 20 years ago, killing time with MTV on in the background when this video from the Indigo Girls began playing.   I had never heard of the duo, and had no idea who they were, but I loved the concept of the video, and the message of the song.

Titled “Galileo,” the song references the circle of reincarnation, making light of the possibility that our day-to-day circumstances could somehow be linked to our previous lives… a fear of flying caused by a previous life’s plane crash, or making compensation in this life to right wrongs we committed in the past, basically “serving time for mistakes made by another in another lifetime.”

I went on a quest to find out more about the band and discovered the Indigo Girls,  an American folk rock duo consisting of Amy Ray and Emily Saliers. Since then I’ve become a lifetime fan of their music and thoughtful lyrics that tell moving and important stories. When I need to find consolation, I listen to their songs to help me identify what’s in my heart.

Beyond the themes of their music, they are also very politically active. According to their page at Wikipedia,  they have championed the causes of the environment, gay rights, the rights of Native Americans, and the National Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty. For many years they incorporated a recycling and public outreach program into their road tours by including Greenpeace representative Stephanie Fairbanks in their road crew. They helped Winona LaDuke establish Honor the Earth, an organization dedicated to creating support and education for native environmental issues. Amy and Emily have also appeared at the annual SOA Watch rallies, the March for Women’s Lives, and several other rallies and protests.

They’ve just recently released a new album, titled “Poseidon and the Bitter Bug” and are touring this summer across the United States and Europe in support of it. As part of their tour, the Indigo Girls have partnered with Rock for a Remedy and are collecting food for people and pets at each venue; these donations then make their way to neighboring families who are struggling keep food on the table.

I hope you will enjoy their music as much as I have. Normally, I embed the music video player directly into our Friday posts, but embedding has been disabled on all the Indigo Girls music videos I can find at YouTube.com. Please click to watch the Indigo Girls perform Galileo and maybe discover other Indigo Girls music as well. You can also find them on Facebook.

Have a great weekend,
Brandy

We discovered this video when @PieceofGreen tweeted about it at Twitter.com. We followed the link to treehugger.com.

They said: “Although he passed away before his time, Heath Ledger left an impressive legacy behind–but it’s not just his top-tier acting work that should be remembered.” As one of his last activities Ledger  directed the animated anti-whaling music video for Modest Mouse’s song “King Rat.” Unfortunately, he didn’t live to see the project completed, but the finished video can be viewed via YouTube by clicking the window below.

The video starts innocently enough with a lovely tune and carefree images of whales piloting a boat to sea. As the intensity of the music grows, so do the images, until its simple, satirical animation makes clear the hideous violence committed on whaling boats. shivver

Also, according to Treehugger.com, if you download the video on iTunes during August, the proceeds will go to the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society — the infamous anti-whaling group.

More on Whaling at Treehugger.com:
Whale Hunting Ban Effective
Whale-Watching Report: Whales are More Valuable Alive than Dead

Rumors abound that “Pirates of the Caribbean” co-stars Kiera Knightly and Orlando Bloom will be pairing up once again: This time to star in “The Fever Returns,” a remake of 1977 cult dance classic “Saturday Night Fever.” Apparently the film will be reset from Brooklyn to London, and it’s still unclear whether the movie will be a remake, or a sequel to the original film.

In the meantime, if you didn’t learn to do the hustle thirty years ago, here is a tutorial, so you can be ready for the disco dance craze the new film is likely to inspire.

Join the folks participating in Nike’s special “Supernatural” training program at Bear Butte Running Camp — with bare butts. And yes, you do get to see them.

“It’s more than just a high-altitutde training camp. It’s about natural running. Or as we like to call it: super natural running,” explains nude camp director Dave Olds, a real-life running coach from Los Angeles. The  commercial also includes real-life Nike endorsers Lauren Fleshman, Nick Symmonds, and Kara and Adam Goucher.

The camp’s philosophy is clear:
“At Bear Butte Running Camp, we take a less-is-more approach to training. We strip away the boundaries and comforts of modern society in order to embrace the inherent benefits of natural running, and use those benefits to become faster, stronger, better athletes….

To enhance personal and athletic growth, campers must be willing to shed, at least while at Bear Butte, urban conveniences not found in the great outdoors (i.e., cellphones, television, mp3 players, shorts).”

The two-minute video is intended to promote the Nike Free 5.0  running shoe. Find out more at http://insidenikerunning.nike.com