(EW) Conan O’Brien started his first night as host of The Tonight Show with a show that looked as though its budget might have been able to help out General Motors significantly. The opening bit — a long, amusing run across the country from Manhattan to his new studio in Los Angeles — showed that O’Brien used his time preparing to replace Jay Leno wisely. Also that he’s thinking big.

Was all this funny? Sure. But I also have to say, I laughed just as much at the Choco-taco joke he shared with his announcer, the clearly-overjoyed Andy Richter. And first-guest Will Ferrell got off a few good moments, such as lambasting his fellow Tony Award nominee Liza Minelli as “a Communist.” And inaugural music guest Pearl Jam sounded good to me.

All in all, a large-scale, impressive debut. But we all know that success in late-night depends on the long haul — Conan knows this as well as anyone. So now I want to see how he follows up his glitzy debut.

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Bears fans have made a killing by re-selling their permanent seat licenses at Soldier Field — and Chicago taxpayers deserve a cut of the action, Mayor Daley said today.

Days after the Bears protested the tax grab and five fans filed a class-action lawsuit that seeks to block it, Daley defended the decision to retroactively apply Chicago’s 9 percent amusement tax to roughly 2,700 permanent seat license holders who obtained the licenses from the original owners but did not pay the tax.

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Every Friday night during the spring and summer, there’s a place in Rolling Meadows where you can step back in time. In the parking lot of Meijer’s at Golf and Algonquin roads, the members and guests of the Rolling Meadows Cruisers meet to show off their classic cars, swap stories and admire each other’s work. Gawkers are more than welcome.

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Patti Blagojevich

Viewers may be saying “Get me out of here!” after the premiere of NBC’s “I’m a Celebrity … Get Me Out of Here!”

The nightly competition show originates from the Costa Rican jungle, with semi-famous people competing for food, supplies and money for their favorite charities.

No one was eliminated, depriving viewers of that small measure of gratification.

“The only thing that’s certain is, YOU are in control of their lives,” co-host Damien Fahey told the audience at the top of the show. Promises, promises.

And despite the promise of spontaneity from the show’s live segments, most of the seemingly endless two hours was pretaped and carefully edited.

Actor Stephen Baldwin, pro wrestler Torrie Wilson and former Illinois first lady Patti Blagojevich are among the show’s 11 contenders.

So are lovey-dovey newlyweds Spencer and Heidi Pratt (stars of MTV’s “The Hills”), who furnished most of the limited entertainment value while sending the irritation level off the charts.

Heidi, skilled at channeling a second-rate version of Paris Hilton, kept the howlers coming. Peering into a tree, she wondered aloud, “Is that a REAL monkey?”

And during one of her meltdowns over rustic camp conditions, she declared, “This is just almost borderline real torture. Like I would do to al Qaeda.”

Meanwhile, hubby Spencer displayed his specialty for sarcasm, with intermittent temper tantrums thrown in for good measure.

With numbing regularity, the couple bailed out, then reconsidered, returning to the camp and the competition. But after coming back on one occasion and finding the others had plundered their belongings in their absence, Spencer went ballistic.

“Where does it end?! Where does it end?!” he railed, temporarily unhinged.

But the Pratts are just two people. There’s little hope they can save this show. Nor can former “American Idol” contestant Sanjaya Malakar, or former NBA pro and TV personality John Salley.

Nor can the show’s dinky challenges, to judge from the debut. They were too inconsequential to describe.

The show’s most novel participant is Patti Blagojevich, whose husband, ousted Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich, had planned to be on the show until a judge ruled he couldn’t leave the U.S. He has pleaded not guilty to federal fraud charges, and in the best sequence of “I’m a Celebrity,” his wife filled in as his advocate.

Spencer broached the delicate subject, which he called “this big elephant in the room,” by asking, “Why is your husband facing jail time? What happened?”

“I can’t really get into it too much,” she replied, “except that they made hoopla out of something that wasn’t even true…”

Her husband “was fighting special interests down in that entrenched state capitol,” she continued. “You make these huge enemies. … They didn’t like that he went around them, see?”

“Just so you know,” said Spencer, unexpectedly nice, “when I met him, I was like, this is who I would have voted for the president of the United States of America.”

Chiming in with more support, one-time supermodel Janice Dickinson told her, “You need to set the record straight, and we’re glad you did.”

Then Patti clasped hands with Spencer and Heidi, who led them in prayer: “I pray that the truth will be revealed. I pray that he will triumph …”

Wacky, all right. But “I’m a Celebrity” looks like a dud anyway. Can the show get better, airing night after night the next four weeks? Maybe NBC should say its prayers.
Story on: CBSNEWS.COM

With all the new dry shampoos on the market, is washing your hair in the shower becoming a thing of the past? How necessary is it, really?

Dry shampoo can be a godsend if you’re very busy or very blond. When applied sparingly, it can also give hair a much-needed pick-me-up after a long day at work, but it is not a substitute for proper soap-and-water shampoo. “A stopgap, not an equivalent,” one tester said…at the same time admitting that she would turn to dry shampoos on frenzied mornings in the future. But until Frederic Fekkai figures out how to bottle the invigorating rush of a hot shower on a dreary morning, I’m sticking to my old routine.

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