The second season of Bravo's interior design show Top Design begins tonight at 10 p.m. Hosted by India Hicks, the show also features designers Todd Oldham (sure, he designs sofas for La-Z-Boy, but he still has a pretty good aesthetic) and Jonathan Adler, alongside Margaret Russell, editor-in-chief at Elle Decor. Sounds like they've followed the Project Runway/Top Chef formula here, but clearly Bravo has made it work for them.

For more info on the coming season of Bravo's Top Design, click here.

Yesterday, I browsed the women's page of the New York Times -- from August 4, 1901 -- where the very latest "Gowns Worn by Visitors to Our Town" were detailed. Mrs. E. Reeves Merritt, for example, wore " a simple white pique gown" with a skirt that cleared the floor and "was absolutely plain, without even an applied flounce." Mrs. Robert Ralston Crowsby, meanwhile, was spotted "shopping in a deep blue muslin thickly sprinkled with tiny white polka dots," and Mrs. Hildreth K. Bloodgood "was seen in town in a chic frock of denim."

And then, after the fashion update and other important news was breathlessly revealed (the young Duchess of Marlborough -- the former Consuelo Vanderbilt -- now had the "bearing of a matron twice her age," and anyone ignorant of her identity "would probably say that she was a woman with a tragedy in her life"), came his report on "The Colorado Countess":

For the sleep-deprived, one of the benefits of being awake at 4 a.m. Saturday morning is being able to catch a rerun of Gunsmoke on TVLand. But that wasn't Miss Kitty on the screen this weekend.

No, it was the fourth installment of You've Got the Look, a train wreck of a reality series with one-time supermodel Kim Alexis in the Heidi Klum role, and a host of 35-plus would-be fashion models throwing themselves under the train. On week one, the wannabes got cut down to ten contenders. On week two, the 63-year-old took a dive -- as did the sad mother who missed her boys almost as much as she missed her shag haircut. On week three, it was the tough, tattooed bodybuilder.

Maybe it’s just that competitive reality shows have hit the tipping point. Maybe it’s that being a “star” on HGTV is sort of like being the quickest runner at fat camp. Maybe it’s that fast design isn’t usually good design. Whatever the reason, HGTV’s reality show Design Star needs to fall, and soon.

HGTV has built a programming niche all its own over the years, even though Discovery and DYI and other cable nets have tried with varying levels of success to capitalize on it. And most of the shows are decent junk-food programming both for home design-fans and the design-challenged. It further helps those of us in Colorado that HGTV produces a lot of its stuff locally, through High Noon productions—which means that Denver gets far more than its fair share of local nods on shows like My First Place, Dream House, What You Get for the Money and the like.

If you somehow accidentally missed last night's episode of 30 Rock (and no, there is no valid excuse for missing the funniest show on TV), then you simply must visit www.nbc.com pronto to catch up.

While 30 Rock regularly shines with genius, last night's one-two punch of a Project Runway reference followed by a hilarious send-up of the film Amadeus was truly not to be missed.

Quick story: some friends of mine and I were at Six Flags Magic Mountain out in California. It was the late 80s, and we were freshmen in college, on our first road trip. We had, as college freshmen tend to have, plans and dreams. (More the latter than the former, but still.) Magic Mountain, at that time, had a late-night show they did over a small pond they called Mirror Lake—it was a fireworks show. And it was great. Stirring. The explosives, the red-white-and blue, the patriotic music and, honestly, the times in which we were living all came together in this perfect combination. When it was over, we sat there for a minute or so, and then one of my friends turned to me and said "Damn, I want to go join the Army now." And if the Army had had a recruiting station outside Mirror Lake? We might have enlisted, plans and dreams be damned. It was that powerful.

This is some painful déjà vu. Was it not enough that it's nearly 20 years later, and we still have a Bush in the White House? Do we really need to revisit American Gladiators?

NBC apparently thinks so. The peacock network resorted to bringing back this product of the Reagan-era into its prime-time line-up last Monday night. The reason why is clear: it's unscripted and cheap to produce. And during these dark times for television (thanks, Writer's Strike!), unscripted shows mean fresh shows. Sort of.

But really, American Gladiators? Did we have to sink so far, so fast?

Television has just gotten bigger. The 150" plasma Panasonic was unveiled this week at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. It's approximately eight feet by eleven feet, which means that it's pretty much your living room wall. And if you buy one, you're contractually obligated to change your name to Guy Montag, and start burning away the danger of the written word.

Well, they’re back. And two, at least, are bushy.

David Letterman and Conan O’Brien returned to the air Wednesday night, each sporting a strike-beard, which apparently is a thing. Why, exactly, I don’t know. On Conan, it actually worked—it lent him a sort of gravitas, sort of a young Obi-Wan thing. The beard aged poor Dave about twenty years. He said it himself: “I know what you’re thinking: Dave looks like a missing hiker.” Or, perhaps, the grizzled old insane guy who lives in the woods who finds that hiker.

Here’s the question: should, in fact, old acquaintance be forgot? Has the venerable New Year’s Rockin’ Eve run its course?

This isn’t so much about Dick Clark, or whether he’s ready for the pasture. He’s not. He never will be. Despite a massive stroke in 2004, which caused him to miss the first NYRE telecast since the show’s inception in 1972, Dick Clark has been back behind the desk (though perhaps in pre-taped segments) in years since. When he returned in 2005, he said of his stroke, “It’s been a long, hard fight. My speech isn’t perfect, but it’s getting there.” And it’s still not perfect; it’s still getting there. But the guy has earned the spotlight, earned his continued time behind the mike for however long he wants it. And as I said, this isn’t about Dick Clark.