Karaoke For Jesus and Cuckoo for K-Sly.

You know, I really love traveling to the far reaches of my television dial, where I can find all sorts of offbeat programming we don't normally watch.

Like last night, when I flipped through EWTN (you know, the Catholic channel) during their "Life on the Rock" show. First of all, even if you're not Catholic, you've gotta love a talk/variety show hosted by a monk in full traditional monk-style regalia. But to make it even better, last night Father Francis Mary's guest was musical parodist Nick Alexander, who performs popular songs karaoke-style with new lyrics he's penned about the finer points of Catholic teaching. He did two numbers, the oddly S&M-tinged "Repent" (his version of Aretha Franklin's "Respect" with the killer line "R-E-P-E-N-T/Get down on your knees for me") and my favorite, "We Want to Stand United" (a version of Billy Joel's "We Didn't Start the Fire" about various medieval theological debates, including the Arian Heresy and Nicene Creed). And just check out the track listings on his site. Now, THAT'S entertainment!

Then we followed up Nick's dynamic performance by discovering on one of the local channels a show called "Dance 360", which is sort of a modern hip-hop version of one of my favorite childhood guilty pleasures, "Dance Fever." The runner-up (thankfully he didn't win) was a guy whose specialty seemed to be an endless number of variations on The Robot. It's fellows like him who give us white guys a bad name. Anyway, in addition to the dancing, the best part was the fabulous DJ K-Sly.

Mmmm... K-Sly...