A foot and a half wide and much less than an inch deep

I can't remember which river it is, but there's a river out West that's said to be a mile wide and an inch deep. I think the same river may be the one that is also said to be too thick to drink and too thin to plow. I'm too lazy to look it up, and also I want to get to writing about the most pressing and important question of the age.

How on earth did someone as stupid and shallow as Barbara Walters become a national celebrity?

I almost never watch such shows; but last night I happened to watch Walters' show about the most fascinating people of the year. And I actually found it to be interesting in a mindless sort of way. Barbara's looking her age, which is not surprising for she must be in her eighties; but the picks her producers made for her were actually fairly interesting people.

And I even learned something. I learned that Tina Fey, the woman who has recently become famous for imitating Sarah Palin on Saturday Night Live, is actually a whole lot more than a talented mimic. She's a highly accomplished actress, comedian, producer and writer, a majorly smart and talented and goal oriented powerhouse woman. I drew all of that from a few little snippets that the idiot Barbara's warders included in a little video they put on before the great Barbara asked Tina Fey three or four questions.

So, just now I googled Tina Fey and I filled in what Barbara didn't have time to get into because her most pressing task, the most interesting thing she could find to ask Tina Fey about had to do with the very trivial fact that she did a job any one of a hundred or a thousand mimics could have done in imitating Sarah Palin.

Barbara had the chance to ask questions of a highly successful, multidimensional, woman who rose to become head writer of Saturday Night Live, perhaps the most prestigious and demanding writing job in show business, and she was interested in nothing but having her exhibit her talent as a parrot.

I've seen a lot of dumb things in my life. Hell, I've even done one or two, or maybe a few, pretty darn dumb things in my life. But I've never seen or done anything that even remotely approaches the sort of brain dead stupidity that Barbara Walters exhibited with those three or four questions.

The woman is a valley girl in a more conservative dress. She's not as wide as that river out west, but she makes up for it by being a lot more shallow.