It's from the heart, really…

A blessed Christmas to Lino and all of his fans everywhere.

Predicting the Predictions

Yesterday our friends at CatholicGuyShow.com made their 2011 predictions for various members of the TCGS crew, as well as the show itself. While we're not so audacious as to make our own predictions, we thought it might be fun to give our take on what they think will happen. So here are our comments on those predictions, with an indication of whether or not we think they'll occur. We rate the predictions on the following self-explanatory scale:

SOLID "YES" ⇔ LEAN "YES" ⇔ NEUTRAL⇔ LEAN "NO" ⇔ SOLID "NO"

Lou Ruggieri

1. The Assistant producer title is dropped, and Lou becomes co-producer with Maureen.
   
   SOLID "NO" — As much weight has Lou pulls on the show, we've seen in years past that promotions happen at a glacial pace at The Catholic Channel. Not gonna happen this year, no matter how deserving it may be.


2. After years of waiting, Lou will get married by the end of the year.
   
   LEAN "NO" — We think that there's a good possibility that he'll get engaged sometime in 2011, but Lou strikes us as a man who doesn't rush into anything. Even if he does get engaged, expect the engagement to last beyond the end of the year.


3. Lou will get 1,000 friends on Facebook. And he'll join Twitter.
   
   NEUTRAL — We think the 1,000 friends on Facebook is certainly doable. But there's no way he's going to find time for Twitter in his busy schedule.

Maureen McMurray

1. Maureen will start down the path of confirmation.
   
   SOLID "NO" — We really hate to be so negative about something like this, but Maureen's been on the show for a total of three years now, and her "God-O-Meter" hasn't really moved enough during that time to predict that she'll start RCIA next year. Besides, what would we do if the show did away with Are You Smarter Than A Bad Catholic?


2. Maureen will book a guest that becomes a show regular.
   
   LEAN "NO" — While we don't think it's impossible, the show already has four regulars: Kayla Riley, Mark Hart, Father Rob Keighron and Father Jim Chern. Is there really room for another… and more importantly, would Lino want another regular?


3. Maureen and her husband Danny will conceive a child.
   
   LEAN "YES" — Believe it or not, we can actually see this one happening. Aside from the obvious joy of the occasion, it would certainly provide a lot of material for the show.

Lino Rulli

1. Lino's autobiography will crack the top 50 best-selling NY Times list.
   
   SOLID "NO" — For a couple of reasons. First of all, the NYT best-seller lists only display the top 35 books, so even if Lino theoretically got in just behind that point, his book wouldn't get listed. Secondly, the number of books that Lino would need to sell to reach the list would be staggering… it's impossible for us to get an exact figure because those kinds of numbers are not commonly released, but we estimate that he would have to sell a couple hundred thousand books in one week to reach the best-seller list. We see that happening in the span of a month or two, but not in one week.


2. Lino will dabble in TV work, and be featured in a program that can be seen nationally.
   
   NEUTRAL — Lino dabbling in TV work is almost a given. But him being featured on a nationally-televised program is far from a given. We think there's just enough anti-Catholic bias in the mainstream media for Lino not to get a fair shake here.
   
   
3. Even if its not discussed on air, Lino will become engaged.

SOLID "NO" — First of all, there's no way that this won't get mentioned on air if it actually does happen… but will it? As with Lou, we just don't see events of that type happening that fast. Lino would do well to take his time if he gets in a serious relationship.

Father Jim

1. Father Jim will never, ever defeat Lino in Who's More Catholic.
   
   NEUTRAL — If they were still playing under the old rules where callers cast all of the votes, then this would be a SOLID "NO"… all you need to do is flash back to July and August of 2009 (when Father Jim won four weeks in a row) to know that it's doable. But now with Lou and Maureen casting the votes (and the callers relegated to breaking ties between them), there's not as much anti-Lino bias to fuel decisions that would favor Father Jim. That's not to say that Father Jim couldn't win a game on his own… some of those 2009 games he won were real stinkers on Lino's part, and nothing precludes Lino from having another similarly bad game next year. It's just going to be a lot harder… Lino is very good at this game.

Father Rob

1. Father Rob will bring alcohol to the studio at some point this year. Drinking with a priest on-air will ensue.
   
   LEAN "NO" — As much as this would fit Father Rob's character, we think that he has just enough common sense to know that doing something like that would be a bad idea for everyone involved.

The Catholic Guy Show

1. The show will broadcast on location to a west coast city for a week.
   
   NEUTRAL — Not for an entire week, no. It could happen for a few days, though… and if you consider Alaska the "west coast", then it's already confirmed to happen this coming June, when Lino will broadcast from the Great White North in a prelude to his friend Goob's wedding.


2. The show will not add a new everyday on-air personality.
   
   SOLID "YES" — No need to fix what isn't broken. The only possible exception would be if a new intern joins the crew for the summer, but that would only be a temporary situation.


3. The show will get a two-year renewal, due to Lino's engagement.
   
   LEAN "YES" — He'll renew the show, but not necessarily for two years, and definitely not because he'll be engaged (see our answer to that question above). Has everyone so quickly forgotten that his 40th birthday is just a scant 300+ days away? His contract expires in September and his birthday is in October, so we think there's no way that he won't stay on past the end of his contract to celebrate the big four-oh on the air in grand Catholic Guy style. Beyond that we can't really say. Our prediction: he'll re-up for a year, but no more.

Contributing to the delinquency of four minors

At the end of the first hour of today's show, Lino apologized for something he wasn't even sure he did. On Saturday, Greg Willits took his four boys over to his in-law's house to pick up his daughter from their care. Upon returning to his van where the boys were waiting (and listening to the rebroadcast of Thursday's TCGS), he opened the door to hear Lino posing the question of being with "a prostitute smoking crack cocaine" in response to Father Rob complaining that him getting nabbed by a red light camera was a case of entrapment. Either unable to remember the incident or not believing that it could've actually happened, Lino and crew didn't want to waste time trying to find audio that might not exist. Well, we don't consider it a waste of time at all... and we just happened to find it right here:

LinoRulli.net: going the extra mile for Lino fans everywhere.

Christmas parodies a dueling

Did ya catch Gus Lloyd's appearance on today's Catholic Guy Show? Well if you didn't, you missed a solid 15 minutes of good memories... including excerpts from their Christmas songs mocking each other that they put out two years ago. But who needs excerpts when you can listen to the whole thing? When we launched this site nearly two years ago we made both songs into music videos, and we re-present them now in their entirety for your viewing/listening pleasure!

First up is Gus' parody, The Catholic Guy Who Stole Christmas:

Not to be outdone, Lino put out a whole album mocking Gus entitled A Catholic Guy Christmas:

That Notre Dame Catholic Channel problem

Our friend dustin over at CatholicGuyShow.com posted a very well written piece this morning lamenting the intrusion of Notre Dame sports programming on the regular programming of The Catholic Channel. We couldn't agree more with his comments... Father Leo really got hosed when his new Advent show, Smoking Stirring The Pot, got unceremoniously bumped in favor of a basketball game. To the channel's credit, at least they aired it at 10:00pm ET after the game had ended. (And to Greg and Jennifer Willits' credit, it aired earlier today in place of the last two hours of their own show.)

But this brings up another problem that we've been pondering for some time: where's the promotion for shows like this? Sure, Lino, the Willits and some of the other hosts have been telling us that it was coming... but other than that, how do you find out about stuff like this? Maybe there have been commercials for the show on the channel... but we certainly haven't heard them. What about the Catholic Channel web site? Well, Edward Cardinal Egan's Advent-themed show is highlighted at the top of the page... but what about Father Leo's show? Nothing. Nada.

Well, maybe it's on the Programming Schedule page, you might think. So we looked... and what we found wasn't pretty. Not only was it not there, parts of the schedule grid were badly out of date. Daily Mass weekdays at 8:00am? Hasn't been that way since August... of last year. Weekend programming? With the two new shows airing during Advent, the schedule hasn't been changed one bit to reflect the inclusion of those shows. In fact, we tried to listen to the Sunday replay of The Catholic Guy Show because we were hoping to hear the parts of Wednesday's show that we missed because we were traveling for Thanksgiving. What did we hear at 4:00pm ET? The Busted Halo Show. A great show, but not what we were looking for.

This is just a symptom of a bigger problem: poor promotion of The Catholic Channel's seasonal shows... and to a lesser extent, their shows in general. During Christmas and Easter the Channel usually posts a page showing the schedule of programming for those days (Masses, music programs, etc.), but the schedules that were posted both last Easter and last Christmas had huge gaps where we couldn't figure out what was on the Channel at certain hours. What good is that? Why even bother airing anything if you can't figure out what's on at a certain time?

Also, there are two separate official sites for The Catholic Channel: one on Sirius.com (which www.thecatholicchannel.org redirects to), and one on XMRadio.com. The XM site is generally more descriptive... and its program schedule a bit more accurate... than on the Sirius site, but still doesn't reflect the two new Advent-themed shows and the moving around of other shows to accommodate them. C'mon, guys... how hard can it be to maintain one or both of these things on a regular basis so that it's accurate?

And don't get us started on some of the promos being broadcast on the Channel nowadays... Lino already took time on his show to lambast the current Fully Alive promo that's been broadcast for weeks without change. For goodness' sake, dig some old promos out of the archive and slap them on the Channel if you have to... just for the sake of keeping things fresh. Surely the Popcaks must have discussed some promo-worthy things on their show in recent days.

That's enough ranting for today about this... we'll see if anything changes if/when the Christmas programming schedule gets posted. But we're not counting on it. You'd think after four years of existence that The Catholic Channel would have stuff like this figured out by now.

Va, Va, Va, VOOM!

Check out this photo that Lino posted on his Facebook page of his new man-purse. Just think of all the expensive Product he can stash in that thing!

Give your fan clubs a freakin' break!

In the first hour of today's show, Lino took the opportunity to bash the good folks over at CatholicGuyShow.com for not bothering to post timely updates to their site despite the presence of his new daily poll, thereby making him look bad. In the manner of a four-year-old, he threatened to move the poll over to his own site at CatholicGuy.com... in essence, to "take his poll and go home".

Already in a fighting mood, Lino then turned his attention to our pithy little site for the first time in 15 months, chastising us for our new 40th Birthday countdown on our homepage. Apparently we're just being "mean" fans for reminding him how old he is, despite the fact that he's milked his advancement towards 40 for all it's worth since the show started four years ago.

Give us a break, Lino! The fact that you've got two web sites devoted to you speaks to how highly some of us regard you. Add to that a Facebook page where you've maxed out your friend quota, and a fan site Twitter feed that has more followers than your own, and that equals one hell of a hard-core fan base. Just because we don't post every day doesn't mean we don't care... we just do the best we can within our own personal circumstances.

Are we overreacting? Possibly. But at the very least it gave us a good excuse to post something so that Lino can't complain how out-of-date his fan club sites are.

Our Birthday present to Lino: a new look for LinoRulli.net

Today Lino celebrates his last birthday in his 30s... and to commemorate this auspicious occasion, we at LinoRulli.net decided to give ourselves a bit of a makeover!

What's new and improved:

• We've expanded the width of the site from two columns to three to take better advantage of browser space and to keep important things like podcasts closer to the top.
• We've brightened things up a bit so that the site doesn't look quite as dark and sinister as it used to.
• We're sporting a "Countdown to 40" counter at the top of the page... nice and big so that you can't miss it even if you tried. Lino only has a year left until he turns 40, so now's the perfect time to start counting down!

We still have a good bit of tweaking to do to things like spacing, font sizes and colors, etc... but since the site was inching towards its second birthday without a major refresh, we felt that this was the perfect time to unveil it. In the longer term we plan to move the site from Blogger to a customized host using Wordpress to give us more flexibility with some new features and design ideas that we want to implement, but until we're ready to make it happen this update will keep things fresh for the time being. Now if only we had time to actually post stuff...

LinoTracker™, ready for duty!

UPDATE 10/23 @ 10:00am ET: No exploding fireballs today... Lino has safely arrived in Rome, and no flight attendants went rogue before the plane parked at the gate. Don't believe us? Lino already posted it on Facebook. This is LinoTracker™, over and out.

LinoRulli.net and our proud sponsors (of which there are none) are pleased to bring you once again: LinoTracker™, Lino's flight track information for you enjoyment and entertainment. Unlike the last trip to Italy where a whole bunch of TCGS pilgrims were on board, this time we have no qualms telling you that with LinoTracker™ you can pinpoint the exact moment when Lino's plane explodes in an enormous fireball.

So without further ado, here is Lino's flight tracking information. And the flight's already been delayed by 25 minutes. Bon Voyage!

CatholicGuyShow.com: Where Lino Rulli Gus Lloyd is #1!

What more can we say? It's pure genius. Mosey on over to CatholicGuyShow.com and read all the cool stuff about The Catholic Channel's morning man and his awesome show, Seize The Day. It'd be even cooler if they kept the site that way the whole week Lino's in Italy... but that's probably asking for a bit too much. :)

Oh, and check back with us later this evening... the LinoTracker™ will be back online! Lino's flight takes off at 9:45pm ET, and we'll tweet y'all (twitter.com/LinoRulliDotNet) when it's ready to go so that you can get another chance to tell your kin what you were doing at the exact moment that Lino's plane exploded in an enormous fireball.

Lino's Proclamation of Greatness

Lino already posted a photo of it, but we'll save you the eye strain and repeat the text here for easier viewing:

WHEREAS, Lino Rulli was born and raised in the Twin Cities and won three Emmy awards while living and working in Minneapolis; and

WHEREAS, at his alma mater, Hill Murray High School, Rulli lettered in theater all four years and has the letterman jacket to prove it; and

WHEREAS, Rulli failed to get a single date after Minnesota Monthly named him one of Minnesota's most eligible bachelors; and

WHEREAS, people all over North America listen to rulli, "The Catholic Guy", on Sirius/XM Satellite Radio; and

WHEREAS, The New York Times said Rulli's show "achieves the queasy unpredictability of the Howard Stern Show"; and

WHEREAS, Rulli has, on three occasions, broadcast from the hallowed studios of Vatican Radio; that's three more than any other American radio show in history; and

WHEREAS, because of Rulli, big-nosed children around the world can now aspire to mediocre careers in broadcasting; and

WHEREAS, Rulli is insecure and really needs this proclamation to feel good about himself.

NOW, THEREFORE, I, R.T. RYBAK, Mayor of the City of Minneapolis do hereby proclaim September 29, 2010 as:

LINO RULLI DAY IN THE CITY OF MINNEAPOLIS

Another original composition by Mama Rulli

As heard on today's TCGS, here are the lyrics to the original Gina Rulli composition That's Our Lino (sung to the tune of That's Amore):

When at home or on the go, listen to the Catholic Guy Show...
That's our Lino!
Where you learn more about God through your computer or iPod...
That's our Lino!

He helps you pray when you want to say
That your life needs some saving!
He makes you think you are on the blink
For some grace you are craving...
Start behaving!

When you hear what is good and do things like you should...
That's our Lino! (That's our Lino!)
When you grow with the Lord, and in religion you're not bored...
That's our guy!

So stay tuned on these days as he gets a little praise...
For Lino Rulli Day,
In Minneapolis and St. Paul where it started for us all...
And for Lino!

Our own Lino!
Catholic Guy Lino!

"Lino Watch" is dead… all hail "LinoRulli.net"!

We've been saying for months on end that changes were coming to this site… and we've been making and breaking so many promises on this count that we're sounding like a broken record. The reason: we wanted to roll out all the good stuff we had planned at once so that we could make a big impact. But at the rate we've been going, Lino's contract will have expired by the time we actually got everything together for a coordinated launch.

So rather than let this site get any more stale than it already is, we're going to roll out our changes a little bit at a time. And what better day is there to get started than today's one-year anniversary of Lino's announcement that he's staying put after retiring the day before! It was the day that new life was breathed into The Catholic Guy Show… so let's breathe some new life into this site. Our first change: "Lino Watch" is dead.

When we launched 20 months ago we chose the "Lino Watch" moniker because we weren't creative enough to come up with anything better. But being the edgy and sarcastic new-kid-on-the-block, the term suited us just fine. Of course that was during a time when TCGS had a distinctly different persona than it does now; nowadays the show is more… well, sophisticated than it was in the past (as much as TCGS can be sophisticated). As much investment as we've made in the "Lino Watch" name, it reflects a show that really no longer exists.

Hence, as of today we're retiring the "Lino Watch" brand, and from this point on will just call ourselves by our web address: LinoRulli.net. It's perfect, really… no more dual names to go by, and it's got Lino's name written all over it, anyway. Our old slogan ("We like Lino Rulli… just not as much") is gone too, despite the fact that it was Lino himself who gave it to us. That was the unhappy and conflicted Lino, a markedly different person than he is today.

Consequently, our Twitter channel has changed names as well: twitter.com/LinoRulliDotNet. For those who follow us, no action is required… if you were a follower of LinoWatch, you are now a follower of LinoRulliDotNet.

While our new name brings us into the present, our site is still stuck way in the past. That's the next thing that changes. While we won't make the mistake of setting a hard date for a relaunch again (because we'll never be able to keep it), the redesign is about 75% complete. So we can say with some confidence that it'll happen soon.

Lino's 3.53 seconds of fame

We're a little late to the party, but boy did we bring you a treat. As you've no doubt heard by now, Lino got a microphone shoved in his face on CNN yesterday and he chose to use it. But why sit through the whole minute plus of boring video to get to the good stuff when we can bring you all 3.53 seconds of Lino the way it was meant to be seen? Click on the image above and enjoy Lino on national television!

Pilgrimage Watch 2010-11

Lino just posted more information about upcoming pilgrimages on his Facebook page. No details per se, but a good bit of long-term info to chew on:

Since the last pilgrimage was a big success and people want more...save your money... Here's what we're working on: Greece/Turkey in May 2011. Italy in Oct 2011. A NY Pilgrimage in late fall this year. And maybe a "Lino's Ark" cruise to the Bahamas in December/January. Any other suggestions?

You heard him… suggest things! Leave a comment for Lino on his Facebook page.

Sometimes the best-laid plans…

It's been a double overbid kind of day. Yet again we're going to have to delay the site re-launch that was supposed to happen today. Just too much going on with our day jobs to deal with the complexity of it all right now. We think now we're going to shoot for a launch right before the one-year anniversary of Lino's quitting the show/staying with the show drama… that would be August 16th. So for the eight of you who actually read this blog… hang in there!

Two interns in love? That's old news…

When the news of semi-romance between TCGS intern Krista and Busted Halo intern Buzz hit the show a few weeks ago, Lino did all but announce that they were engaged. Come Monday he'll have a real engagement to announce on the air… of the happy couple pictured above. Alicia Jensen (TCGS Ambassador) and dustin Faber (CatholicGuyShow.com founder and #1 Celtics fan) have announced their intent to administer the Sacrament of Marriage to each other. We at Lino Watch salute and congratulate the happy couple!

This actually works out great for us, too… we were supposed to relaunch LinoRulli.net on Monday and have been pondering whether to pull the switch or not. Now this gives us the perfect excuse to wait another week! So come back and check the new "us" out on Monday, August 2nd.

BREAKING NEWS — Lino's next pilgrimage to be in Greece and Turkey

Lino announced his next pilgrimage at the very end of today's final broadcast from Vatican Radio. Destination: Greece and Turkey. Dates are not set yet, but it looks like they're aiming for Spring of 2011. Should be fun!

Sign up for the mailing list at TheCatholicTraveler.com to stay in the loop about this newest TCGS extravaganza!

Lost minutes? How about a whole lost hour?

If you'll kindly flip your 2010 calendar back to February and March, you might remember that the last 15 minutes of several select TCGS installments got interrupted for Notre Dame basketball. We as a public service brought you the audio from those "lost minutes" once it was replayed during the overnight broadcast.

Okay, now flip back to July and today's "live" broadcast from Vatican Radio… or make that yesterday's, as Tuesday's first hour was played due to technical difficulties back in New York. The powers that be managed to solve the problem in time to play the last two hours of Wednesday's show in their normal time slot, so logic would assume that they'd broadcast that lost first hour during the overnight replay. And we were going to be good little Lino Watchers and write a summary of that hour for those of you who couldn't listen overnight.

No such luck. They replayed today's third hour, followed by the second hour, then the third hour again in its normal time slot. Which begs the question… what happened to that elusive first hour of Wednesday's broadcast? Did the technical folks in NYC get their signals crossed, or is that whole hour of TCGS… <gulp> just plain gone? Forever?!

If the latter is the case, that would explain why Lino got steamed on Twitter earlier today. We would be, too, if we spent a whole hour recording a show for nothing.

Catholic News Service has a slow day today

Why, you ask? They picked up the pilgrimage and ran it as a front-page feature story today. Will wonders never cease. What's next... a five part series in L'Osservatore Romano about TCGS' broadcasts from Vatican Radio?

Is it "Live", or is it Memorex?

As the crew broadcasts from Vatican Radio this week, Lino no doubt will be promoting the "Live" broadcasts of TCGS from the microphone that Pope John Paul II once used. From the Merriam-Webster online dictionary, comes this definition of "live" when used as an adjective:

8b: broadcast directly at the time of production (a live radio program)

So when you listen to Lino's "Live" pre-recorded shows this week, you can rest easy knowing that Lino is once again stretching the boundaries of the English language in order to make TCGS look good. Happy listening!

It's the big 5-0 for one Gus Lloyd

While Lino continues counting down to 40 in the beautiful city of Florence, we at Lino Watch are changing the subject a bit and would like to turn our attention to a milestone for another Catholic Channel host. That's right: our man Gus Lloyd of Seize the Day turns 50-years-old today. From all of us at Lino Watch, we hope you have a fantastic day with your family and friends, and we thank you for all the memorable moments between you and Lino over the years... from Spring Break Broke 2008 to The Catholic Guy Who Stole Christmas to the Little Drummer Boy Duet, and everything in between.

Wanna send Gus some birthday well-wishes? Drop him a note on his Facebook page! And don't forget, Lino's countdown to 40 is still ticking... only 466 days to go!

It's LinoTracker™ Time

UPDATE 7/10 @ 4:00am ET: Lino and his flock have made it safely to Rome, arriving about an hour-and-a-half later than originally scheduled. Let the pilgrimage begin! This is LinoTracker™, over and out.

UPDATE @ 7:30pm ET: After a two hour plus delay, Lino and friends are finally in the air heading to Rome. Hey, that's running on-time in Italy! Track their flight progress here, and view their takeoff here.

Once again, your friends at Lino Watch are proud to present LinoTracker™, Lino's flight track information for you enjoyment and entertainment. Normally we'd be telling you how you can track the moment when Lino's plane explodes in an enormous fireball, but doing that this time would be a bit crass since everyone who's going on the pilgrimage with Lino is also on this flight. So we have nothing but best wishes for all pilgrims for a safe and relaxing journey to Rome... and yes, that even includes Lino.

Still, that doesn't mean that we can't have a little fun with their journey... as of 1:00pm ET their flight is already delayed by 40 minutes. Let the good times roll!

Gonzo

The Azzuri. The defending World Cup Champs. Lino's pride and joy.

They're boarding a plane for Italy as we type this, losing 3-2 to Slovakia in the World Cup.

Let us now hold a moment of silence. Lino will likely hold a similar moment on today's show... and then launch into the pity party of a lifetime.

Ciao, Italia.

Smack talk, Italian style

The Azzuri. The defending FIFA World Cup champions. The team Lino supports above all others. They're not doing too well in this year's World Cup, having played to 1-1 draws against both Paraguay and New Zealand. In a totally expected development, Lino had a two minute-long pity party about the Azzuri's sad state of affairs during yesterday's World Cup Update on TCGS. What we didn't expect were the comments our man Gus Lloyd made about the Italians on yesterday's Seize The Day... and let's just say that he wasn't holding anything back. Which is exactly why we're proud to showcase his comments on this site:

There is one good thing the Italian team can take out of all of this... they're not the French team.

Rumors of this site's demise have been greatly exaggerated

Yep, we're still here. And there was much groaning out in Lino Land.

We know you've got questions, so here are some sorry attempts at answers…

Q: Your last posting was on May 6th. Your last posting that required any semblance of thought was way back on April 22nd. Where the hell have you guys been?

A: This is where we've been the past 10 days:
St. Simon's Island, one of the barrier islands along the Georgia coast. Great places to eat, sandy beaches, laid-back atmosphere, and not a glob of crude oil in sight. The Lino Watch crew needed some time off… pontificating about Lino week after week is a tough job. So we bummed a condo off a friend-of-a-friend of ours over Memorial Day week, and away we went, lock-in or no lock-in.

Q: Okay, that explains where you were the past couple of weeks. What about before that, you jerks?

A: Whoa... take it easy, Sparky! Here's the deal: us Lino Watchers are family-oriented people. Which means kids. Which in the month of May meant a bunch of end-of-school activities that gave parents of said kids no free time to do anything as meaningful as blogging about Lino. Also, kids tend to attract illness like a rib roast attracts flies, which meant more time sticking thermometers in places last month and less time listening to TCGS. And to top it all off, said kids had birthdays in May. You can see where we're going with this.

Q: Okay, so now you're back. While you've been gone Lino's regaled us with stories about Peru, the show's gotten a new intern, they prank-called Greg Willits at 2:45 in the morning during the lock-in show, the folks at CatholicGuyShow.com have been busy giving us inside stuff that you guys could never possibly give us, and Lino's been promoting the bejeezus out of them. Why don't you just give it up?

A: Geez, you'd think Lino was asking these questions. Look, we know that Lino Watch hasn't exactly kept up with the evolution of TCGS over the past few months. In all honesty, we recognized back in December that we couldn't keep Lino Watch in the same format for much longer, or else it would slide into irrelevancy. Unfortunately that's exactly what's happened. We've created and recreated plans to take Lino Watch in different directions, and you may have seen us allude to coming changes several times on the site this year. And each time we tried to pull those changes off… well, life got in the way. That's about the best explanation we can give.

We still have big plans for the site, and we still feel that we can be a relevant source for things related to Lino and TCGS. Our friends at CatholicGuyShow.com have a big advantage in that department right now, what with Lino and the crew promoting them and giving them access to lots of good stuff (and it's really good stuff, too). But as we said on our first day online, we're here to complement other fan sites and not to compete with them. So while there'll be some content overlap between our sites, what you'll find on this site in the (hopefully) near future will be unique enough to warrant a visit now and again.

Q: We've heard this "big plan" schtick before. What's your plan this time?

A: Now that the frantic month of May is behind us, we can start concentrating on Lino Watch a bit more. July is looking like a very good target right now. Lino will be conducting his pilgrimage to Italy with the listeners from July 9-18, followed by a week of shows from Vatican Radio the week of July 19th, resulting in 2+ weeks of best-of's and pre-recorded shows... the perfect opportunity to get our collective act together. So our goal now is to roll out the new-and-improved site sometime between Friday, July 9th and Monday, July 26th… Lino's first stateside broadcast after his return from Italy. That gives us 4-7 weeks to figure this whole thing out.

Q: What about the site in the meantime?

A: It'll probably be pretty lean between now and mid-July. We'll post a bit more just to make sure people know that the site isn't dead, but unless something interesting comes up in Lino Land, we'll be laying a bit low for a while.

Q: Are you telling us absolutely everything?!

A: Not exactly… we're also out of coffee.

Rest assured, course corrections are in progress.

It's a loooooooong way down…

Lino and Brett, live from Peru. Image courtesy of stolen from Lino's Facebook page.

Mama Rulli, Poet Laureate

We admit that we're just now getting around to this, but it's worth it even if it's coming a few days late. On Monday's show, Lino's Mom called in and hosted the show for a large portion of the first hour in an effort to keep Lino from using his tattered voice (which ultimately did not succeed because he felt the need to respond to almost anything his Mom said). The highlight of her time on the air was a series of limericks she composed to honor Lino, the crew, and the show's recurring guests… à la the limericks Mark Hart composed about the rosarian mysteries back in February to fulfill his football picks penance. Without further ado, here is the TCGS poet laureate's newest compositions:

Lino Rulli

On the show, there's the Catholic Guy,
Who's humor is not very wry,
He's clever with banter,
But at Church… not the Cantor,
He's as sweet as banana cream pie.

Maureen McMurray

On the show there's a girl called Maureen,
Who's a fair and fine Irish Colleen,
She's such a good sport,
With the guys in her court,
She sure tunes up this Catholic machine.

Lou Ruggieri

On the show there's a cute guy called Lou,
Who holds the hours together like glue,
He does great sound effects,
He helps avoid any wrecks,
In all, he's the ace of the crew.

Father Jim Chern

On the show there's great Father Jim Chern,
Who enjoys all the jokes he can earn,
He's cheery and good,
And from an Italian 'hood.
I love, when in the games, it's his turn.

Father Rob Keighron

On the show there's so young Father Rob,
Who's ready to laugh or to sob,
He's smart and sincere,
Like scotch or a beer,
He's part of the Catholic Guy mob.

Kayla

On the show there's a sharp gal called Kayla,
Who makes every show into a gala,
Her music sure rocked,
Even if she gets mocked,
…and there's no other word to rhyme.

Anthony Buono from Ave Maria Singles

On the show there's a dating coach, Anthony Buono,
Who calls into the show on the phone-o,

(at which point Lino points out that Anthony always appears in studio, and Lino's Mom abruptly stops reading)

Is this Pulitzer Prize-winning stuff, or what?

"Most of the Shows Are Better"

In his first song parody since last year's Very Stupid Chicken, and in honor of producer Maureen McMurray's 31st birthday today, Lino went out of his way to record this special ditty, based (extremely loosely) on Even the Nights Are Better by Air Supply. Missed it on today's show? Here ya go!

Happy Birthday, Mo!

Extra, extra! Podcasts! Get your TCGS Podcasts from iTunes!

As much as we would like to take credit for this, it's not our doing. Nevertheless, Lino and crew have now made available free weekly podcasts of The Catholic Guy Show at the iTunes Music Store! So go over there and check it out. Don't have iTunes? Download it now! Don't want iTunes? You can still download the podcasts by going to this website, or you can simply click on the podcasts in the box on the right!

Filling out our TCGS census form

Lino's Census of The Catholic Guy Show from last Tuesday was one of the best segments we've heard in a while... and our friends at CatholicGuyShow.com took it to the next level by putting up an online form where you can can contribute to the census! Not one to shirk our civic duty, we at Lino Watch feel it necessary to fill out the form as well. Our one problem is that the survey is not as flexible as we need it to be to truly capture the kind of information we wish to provide. So listed below are our answers to the Catholic Guy Show Census 2010:

1. Are you a cradle Catholic or convert? If neither, what is your religion/denomination?

   We're so cradle Catholic that each and every one of us stopped going to Mass right after we were confirmed. That's the way it's supposed to work, right?
   

2. Do you PRIMARILY listen to TCGS in an automobile, a home system or online?

   The online form only lets us choose one option… our answer is a mixture of the above and then some. To pay our bills, it's necessary for us to moonlight with a second job during the day three days a week. Our employer bans all streaming audio from their computer network, and we don't sit close enough to a window to get a signal from the sky, so our computer back at Lino Watch HQ is rigged to record the show from the Internet while we're moonlighting. We catch the last hour of the show live in our windowless van as we drive back to Lino Watch HQ from our second job, and then we listen to the recording of the first two hours at the next available opportunity (usually while we're moonlighting the next day). On other days we listen to the beginning of the show live, then record the rest and listen to it later if karaoke time gets in the way. It's an interesting experience.
   

3. How long have you been listening to TCGS?

   We've been proud Lino Watchers since Day One: December 4, 2006.

4. What time of day do you usually begin listening to TCGS? And how long is your average listening time?

   Because of the way we're forced to do it, we could be listening at any time of the day. We catch either the first hour or the last hour live, and listen to the rest the next day, the next week... heck, we've still got some shows from last July that are on our to-do list. As for how long we listen, it could be as little as one segment, or as much as three full shows in one day. And those are some loooooooong days, let us tell you.
   

5. What is your favorite devotional prayer?

   Believe it or not, we really don't have one. We're such good Catholics.

6. What is your area of residence (City, State/Providence, Country)? What is your family's country of origin?

   First of all, to the CatholicGuyShow.com folks... providence?? Did you perhaps mean province? We're not trying to be nitpicky... we just don't want Lino's Canadian fans to feel like they're second-class listeners.

   As for our domicile, let's put it this way. We live close enough to the hosts of another Catholic Channel show that we could drive over and say "Hi" whenever we want (although we don't), but rural enough that our Catholic parish is the only one within a 30 mile radius of our HQ. Oh, and our family's country of origin? You can't go wrong when your staffers share the same heritage as the Holy Father.
   

7. What is your favorite segment on TCGS? Why do you enjoy it so much?

   We have two answers, one for the present time and one for the past. But all of our favorites share one critical component… they're all competitions where Lino sits in judgment over either the rules or the contestants' answers. That in and of itself makes for some side-splitting moments.

   If we're talking about current segments, it's a tie between Catholic Password and Scathergories. Going into the past, our favorites were Beat The Catholic Guy (how many of you remember that one?) and Who's More Catholic (a classic segment that Lino torpedoed in spectacular fashion back in October).

8. Who was your favorite guest, all-time, on TCGS?

   That's easy… who's the guest that makes Lino squirm the most AND is entertaining in her own right? That would be none other than Lino's Mom!

9. Who is your favorite member of TCGS?

   • Lino Rulli
   • Lou Ruggieri
   • Maureen McMurray
   • Fr. Rob Keighron
   • Fr. Jim Chern

   What, no past members are eligible? No Tom Falcone? No Christine Lloyd? Not even that unnamed and unceremoniously canned former producer that Lino has never quite stopped taking subtle on-air shots at?

   Well, given that, voting for Lino as favorite crew member is kind of like voting for the Eucharist as favorite Sacrament or the Virgin Mary as favorite Saint. So taking him out of the equation, our vote goes to the steady technical hand of the show who's not afraid to speak his mind even when he disagrees with Lino... Assistant Producer Lou Ruggieri.

10. When did you last go to confession?

    Listing each Lino Watch staffer's last confession date would take too much space, but because we're all sorry excuses for Catholics, we can safely say that the last time we remember going to confession was right before our Confirmations. We'll let you figure it out from there.

It… is… ALIVE!

And per his posting on Facebook, he's as self-absorbed as ever…

Lino Rulli is back from Brazil. Its so nice to be home. I was really tired of sitting on the beach, drinking, eating great food, and staring at beautiful women…

Welcome back, Lino! Sorry to hear that your plane didn't explode in an enormous fireball.

Seize The Schmutz

There's just nothing like taking a backhanded swipe at Lino while he isn't here to defend himself. Case in point: on this morning's Seize The Day, our pal Gus Lloyd was asking callers if they thought he was a little obsessive-compulsive because he vacuums his house… every day. Allie from Michigan called in and agreed with that assessment, and then offered an idea of how he could put his condition to good use:

Setting sail for the "River of January"

UPDATE @ 11:00am ET: No exploding fireballs today. Lino's flight to Rio arrived safe and sound @ 6:19am ET this morning. And with his self-imposed communications blackout now in effect, that's going to be the last we hear from Lino for a while. Time to break out some recordings of Seize The Day to keep us from getting bored for the next week.

Boy, Brazil is a long way from the United States… 4,746 miles from Atlanta to Rio de Janeiro, and it takes over 8½ hours to fly there. And we're giving you the opportunity to track Lino as he flies there… at least as far as the Caribbean. Once he gets over South America we'll have no way of knowing if his plane has exploded in an enormous fireball or not until he either gets there or we see it on the news. His flight departs at 8:45pm ET and is scheduled to arrive at 6:25am ET on Sunday, so set your alarm clocks!

Can Lino beat the clock?

UPDATE @ 4:00pm ET: Well, it looks like Lino didn't beat the clock, as we're listening to a best-of that originally aired on February 5th. Is there a possibility that he'll break in live? Who knows... we'll let you know if it happens.

UPDATE @ 3:15pm ET: The plane we think Lino is on just landed a few minutes ago at LaGuardia. Can he make it out of the airport and into Manhattan in 45 minutes? Our take: he's too loyal to his fans not to go on the air today... even if he ends up being a little bit late... and he would never waste an opportunity to let us know just how hard he worked to get back in the studio. We are watching Facebook and Twitter for any hints from Lino, but ultimately you'll just have to tune in at 4:00pm ET today to find out what really happens.

UPDATE @ 1:45pm ET: This isn't looking good, folks. The radar image above was taken at 1:15pm ET, and it shows that a whole mess of bad weather had just finished moving over Hartsfield-Jackson Airport in Atlanta. As we post this he is (supposedly) in-flight, estimated to arrive in NYC a little after 3:00pm ET.

Oh boy, more flying fun for Lino. He informs us on his Facebook page that his original flight to New York City has been canceled. There's only one Delta flight that'll get him back in town in time to do the show, and you can track it right here. Will he make it? Is he even on that flight? We'll find out soon enough... but the drama is just killing us!

Delta might not be ready when you are

UPDATE @ 1:30pm ET: Call us prophetic... we threw out the drive time between Atlanta and Chattanooga in our last update, and boy did we nail it. Lino's now having to drive the rest of the way because he couldn't get another flight to Chattanooga. Fortunately for him, the rain is gone, and there are no traffic problems on I-75 to slow him down... yet. But he should watch his speed... with the budget crisis our fine state is in right now we're sure that the Georgia State Patrol will be out there trying to get Lino to help make up some of that deficit, if you know what we mean.

UPDATE @ 12:30pm ET: Well, his flight from New York finally landed in Atlanta, but about 45 minutes too late for him to make his connection to Chattanooga. Hopefully the friendly folks at Delta will be able to rebook him on a later flight. We have no idea which one, so here are the tracking links for the next two flights to Choo-Choo town:

• Delta 5417, departing at 1:05pm ET – our money is on this flight
• Delta 5177, departing at 1:57pm ET
  

Oh BTW, in a worst-case scenario (read: no room on any of the other flights), the drive time between Atlanta and Chattanooga is 2 hours and change. Just thought we'd throw that one out there.

In the Lino Watch tradition, we are happy to bring you tracking information for Lino's flights to Chattanooga today for his speech at the Catholic Charities dinner tonight. We're not 100% sure that he's on these particular flights, but it's our best guess based on what he's said on air this week. We are praying that Lino's flights to Tennessee will not explode in an enormous fireball and that he'll give a great speech tonight. We're not saying anything about his flights back, though. :)

Given that, though, Lino's already in trouble... the 8:00am flight from LaGuardia to Atlanta (the one we think he's on) took off about two hours late, which means that he'll miss his connecting flight to Chattanooga. We'll keep you posted.

• Track Lino's flight from New York to Atlanta (scheduled to depart @ 8:00am ET)
  
• Track Lino's flight from Atlanta to Chattanooga (scheduled to depart @ 11:40am ET)
  

Tomfoolery + Skullduggery =Thievery of a chalice

UPDATE 3/10/2010: The thief has been caught, and Father Rob's chalice has been returned!

In case you didn't get to tune in for the first hour of Thursday's show, the above news clip from NY1 (the audio of which was played on the show) should tell you all you need to know. Some ne'er-do-wells (as Gus Lloyd likes to call them) made off with the chalice Fr. Rob received from his family at his ordination. Value: $10,000. And they were picky, too... five stored chalices, and they selected only his to pilfer.

But just when you thought that the human race was beyond hope, the listeners of TCGS prove that theory wrong. While insurance will cover replacement of the original chalice, an effort is underway to buy Fr. Rob a second chalice that will memorialize both his old chalice and the listeners of TCGS, and Fr. Rob will use that chalice at Masses on Thursdays... the day he normally drops by the studio. Interested in making a donation? E-mail Lino directly at lino@thecatholicchannel.org.

"Mysterious" Limericks

As read by Mark Hart "The Bible Geek" on his prior two appearances on TCGS, here for your reading pleasure is the text of the limericks he composed to fulfill his penance for choosing the Colts over the Saints in the Super Bowl:

Joyful Mysteries

The Joyful Mysteries proclaim very good News,
To each of us sinners with one life to lose.
With the birth of the Son,
The battle's been won,
All hail the King of the Jews!

Luminous Mysteries

The Luminous Mysteries all shed some light,
Into various moments of Christ's Earthly might.
Though Father Rob sits and mopes,
They're good enough for the Pope,
Praying these Mysteries is both helpful and right.

Sorrowful Mysteries

The Sorrowful Mysteries offer us a cross made of wood,
And walk us to Calvary, where Mary stood.
As the skies turned gray,
And the Disciples ran astray,
Three days later we'd call Friday "Good".

Glorious Mysteries

The Glorious Mysteries announce victory for all,
Defeating death brought forth life, and also a call.
Live not for your glory,
Let God write your story,
Through Christ, God has set straight the Fall.

Lost minutes… forever lost

Sorry, folks… with deepest apologies, we won't be able to provide you with the pre-empted minutes from Wednesday's show as we had promised. Technical difficulties with the Internet prevented us from recording the overnight replay and caused us to utter things that will require a subsequent trip to our parish's upcoming penance service. If this show ever gets rebroadcast as a best-of, rest assured that we'll post the missing minutes. Better late than never, we say. Good night and sleep tight.

O MySpace, MySpace, wherefore art thou MySpace?

From Lino's Facebook status earlier today:

Lino Rulli just remembered I had a myspace account. I can't remember my username or password, though so I didn't log in. It felt very lonely there. I actually saw a digital tumbleweed go by. Very, very sad.

Here's a look at said digital tumbleweed:

Last login was nearly six months ago. And for those wondering, the "fine meat" catchphrase was an item that started just before Lent in 2007! But what's even more interesting is this little gem elsewhere on the page:

You can't blame Lino... who uses MySpace nowadays when Facebook and Twitter do it so much better? Still, it's a bit sad... being Lino listeners from day one, we still fondly recall every time he promoted his MySpace page on the show. Like this one from 2007:

Lost minutes taste better than bacon

Good morning, TCGS fans! What would you like for breakfast? Bacon? Eggs? Perhaps you're a bit southern and would like a nice heaping bowl of grits? Well we've got something better than any of that... the 10¾ "exclusive" minutes of Lino's show you missed yesterday because Notre Dame wanted to play a little 5-on-5. So you get lost minutes and ND beat Pittsburgh yesterday... everybody wins at Lino Watch!

We'll put up a synopsis later... we're busy devising more ways to not like Lino as much.

Minutes! Get your lost 11 minutes right here!

As the father of the Prodigal Son said, "He was lost and has been found." Same goes for TCGS! Listen to the last 11 minutes of the show that got pre-empted by the Notre Dame-Seton Hall basketball game last night. (And for what it's worth, Seton Hall won 90-87.)

Highlights:

• Lino starts showing Fr. Rob pics of the online girls he likes most, then stops b/c he thinks it's too creepy.
• Checks in with callers:
• Bad Connection Bob (who we haven't heard from in a while) takes too long to bring up the pregame audio when Lino asks for it.
• Chris in Chicago brings up the audio, but it sounds like a Xerox commercial.
• Kim in San Diego talks about how she never gets to listen to the show live b/c of work, reveals that her fiance doesn't like talk radio. Then asks about the legitimacy of having her upcoming Catholic wedding in the woods (Fr. Rob says: usually no). Ultimately reveals that her fiance originally wanted a pirate-themed wedding, but that now her wedding will be in the cathedral in Vegas, and Lino tries to bum an invite to the wedding to meet her single Catholic friends.
  

One reconciliation that will never happen…

In the first hour of Monday's show, Lino was talking about the reconciliation of sorts that occurred between Jay Leno and David Letterman as they filmed a 15 second Super Bowl spot for The Late Show. The question was then posed: what reconciliation would you like to see? Not one to shy away from a challenge, Lino Watch would like to see the above trio reunite… if for no other reason than to see if it can actually be done without them inflicting bodily harm on each another. We personally think that a reconciliation of Catholics, Baptists and Evangelicals stands a better chance of success.

Available: One funny Italian Catholic guy

Attention all single Italian Catholic women! There's a new profile that went up today on Ave Maria Singles. And another one on Catholic Singles. And still another on Catholic Match (although this one's only open to site members). A rather dashing fellow (large proboscis notwithstanding) who works in radio/TV. Word on the street is that he likes pizza, football, and lots of travel. Sound like the man of your dreams? Inquire at Ave Maria Singles, Catholic Singles or Catholic Match today!

Who needs 10½ minutes of Lino when you've got Notre Dame basketball!

Once again, Lino & Co. get shafted by the University of Notre Dame, as the last 10½ minutes of yesterday's show got pre-empted for the ND basketball pregame show. But never fear, live listeners… we sacrificed a good night's sleep to record and bring you what you missed. Enjoy!

Some highlights:

• Lino & crew mock their pre-emption (gee, what'd you expect?)
• They attempt to find a listener who has the pregame on the radio to hear what it sounds like. They find one, but the pregame is in commercial.
• They repeat their previous announcement of a live late night lock-in show, date TBD.
• They go through e-mails and calls about Lino and online dating.

One more note: looking at the men's basketball schedule for Notre Dame, there are four more games that will cut off the last segment of TCGS: February 11th, 17th & 24th, and March 3rd. Lino Watch is committed to bringing you the recordings of the missed segments of all of these shows so that you can stay in bed when 2:45am ET rolls around.

Conference championship picks recap:Pickin' on off the old man

Let's give credit where credit is due. How many 40-year-olds have you ever seen play quarterback like Brett Favre has played this season? Good grief, he's only two years older than Lino! We can only wish we remain that athletic when we get to that age.

That being said, any quarterback can only take so much during a game, and Favre finally hit his limit when he threw the ball (and the game) right to the Saints at the end of the 4th quarter. Then New Orleans wins the OT coin toss and kicks a 40 yard field goal to send Favre home for the winter. It's not going to be a matter of if Lino talks about this game, but rather how long he'll talk about it. We predict that at least one whole hour will be devoted to this.

Oh yeah... the Colts won against the Jets, too.

So, here's how the picks ended up:

LINO: A gutsy move being the only one who picked the Vikings to win it. It almost made you a winner this week. Almost.

MAUREEN: Don't laugh at her pick... the Jets were in that game faaaaar longer than we thought they'd ever be. Unfortunately for her, the game lasts 60 minutes, not 30.

FATHER ROB KEIGHRON: And unfortunately for Father Rob, Maureen made his picks for him, which mirrored her own. That almost shouldn't count. Almost... shoulda been around to make your own picks instead of leaving it to Lino & Co.

LOU & MARK HART: Both went the safe route with the No. 1 seeds, and it paid off. Barely, but it did.

So Lou and Mark both went 2-for-2, with their tie to be broken at some point in the future, likely next week right before the Super Bowl picks are made. One more round of picks to go, folks. See ya in about 10 days or so.

Phoning it in on MLK day

No live TCGS today due to the MLK holiday, which is completely expected and plenty fine with us. But today's classic best-of orginated way back on... January 14th. Yep, last Thursday. It's so fresh, we can even give you the show rundown:

• Hour 1
• Opening thoughts: Fr. Rob's bowling league, ex-seminarian brother; dressing up for a fancy dinner.
  
• Question: Is dressing up for Mass important?
• Hour 2
• Football picks
• Scathergories (Catholic version of Scattergories)
• Hour 3
• More info about Mardi Gras broadcast in New Orleans
• The World Beyond Lino
• Original Rembrandt found in bathroom at CUA
  
• Jay Leno/Conan O'Brien saga
• Haiti disaster
• Random Thankfulness
• Coaxing Fr. Rob to come to New Orleans
• Father Dave

The TCGS crew: doing their usual bang-up job giving us "best-of's" we really can look forward to.

And to top it all off, there is a LIVE Notre Dame basketball game tonight @ 7:00pm ET, which likely means that the last 15 minutes of the "best-of" will be pre-empted. So don't expect to hear the last couple of bullets from the rundown above. Gotta love it!

Football picks update: Divisional playoffs

UPDATE 1/17 @ 4:05PM ET: Did you see what the old man did to the Cowboys today? Did you lose count of how many times Tony Romo turned over the ball? We certainly did. Congratulations to Lino, who wins this week's picks contest by going 3-for-3 with one game to play. He also wins his side bet with Lou, who must now call him "boss" during one entire show. Full recap of this weekend later tonight or early tomorrow.

UPDATE 1/16 @ 11:15pm ET: With the Ravens loss to the Colts, Maureen joins the losers bracket. This leaves Lino & Lou to fight it out for supremacy this week, and since they both picked the Chargers to win their game, it all comes down to the Cowboys-Vikings matchup: Lino can win as long as Brett Favre & Co. win against the Cowboys tomorrow. Should the Cowboys win, Lino & Lou will end up tied, winner TBD later.

Raise your hand if any of you thought that the Saints didn't have a prayer after the Cardinals' 70-yard touchdown run on the game's first play. Yeah, we thought so. 45 points later the Saints emerge victorious and Kurt Warner's gonna need some serious painkillers after getting hit like that.

What does that mean for the football picks contest? Well, based on everyone's picks:

1. Father Rob and Mark Hart are officially declared losers... there's no way they can win or tie. (And they couldn't win individually anyway since they both had identical picks.)
2. Lou cannot win this week. He can still end up in a tie with Lino when all is said and done, but only if his beloved Cowboys win tomorrow.
3. Lino and Maureen are the only two players left who can win outright. But Maureen can only win if the Ravens win tonight; otherwise she joins the loser's bracket.

So right now Lino is in the driver's seat: statistically he has a 75% chance of either winning or tying. Lou is next with a 38% chance, followed by Maureen with a 25% chance. We'll update again tonight after the Ravens-Colts game ends.

Football picks update: Wild-card playoffs

UPDATE 1/16 @ 8:45pm ET: With Arizona's OT win over the Packers, Lou, Maureen and Mark Hart each end up going 2-for-4. Tiebreaker will take place sometime later this week (ostensibly on Thursday). Lino and Father Rob end up going 1-for-4. It could've been much worse for the gambling Father... had Green Bay pulled out an overtime win, the contest's winningest contestant would've gone an embarassing 0-for-4 this week. Still, one correct pick is embarassing enough.

Two of this weekend's four games are in the books, and while we can't tell you who won this week's picks contest, we can tell you who won't win this week. Here's how: there are two games left, which means that there are four possible combinations of winners. So we added up how everyone would do under each scenario, and the results show that there's no possible way that either Lino or Father Rob can win at this point. So they are declared losers for this week.

As for the others… since everybody picked the Patriots to win their game on Sunday, the contest can only end two ways:

• If Green Bay wins: Lou wins this week outright
  
• If Arizona wins: Lou, Maureen & Mark Hart go to a tiebreaker later in the week

The Green Bay/Arizona game is the later of the two, so it'll be 8:00pm ET or so before we learn the final outcome. Until tomorrow…

You can miss a lot in 11 minutes

Well, Notre Dame basketball struck again during a live broadcast of TCGS… only this time Lino prepped us for it. (And so did Elaine over at CatholicGuyShow.com… let's give credit where credit is due.) So yet again, 11 minutes of TCGS got cut out of the live broadcast.

Now something tells us that not a lot of you got up at 2:43am ET to catch those final minutes during the overnight replay. Not to worry… Lino Watch has you covered! We braved the bogeyman to record those last few minutes and bring them to you in the audio slideshow below. (We started about 30 seconds before the actual point where it went to BB.) And boy, did you miss some good stuff! We're going to spoil it below the slideshow, so read on if you don't have time to listen. But if you want to hear it from the big-nosed horse's mouth first, STOP READING NOW!

Don't say we didn't warn you. Here goes:

• True to Catholic radio, basketball cut in about 35-40 seconds earlier than Lino and crew had anticipated, so you missed their countdown (at which point the show went to commercial for 2½ minutes).
• Coming back from the break, Lino made a big announcement geared toward the overnight listeners: sometime in the next couple of months, Lino and crew will do a LIVE broadcast from 12:00am - 3:00am ET. Now THAT's a great idea!
• Bad Connection Bob, longtime friend of TCGS, had a novel plan: he called into the show and asked to be put on hold so that he could listen to the minutes that weren't airing live. The man is smart… we like that.
• To end the show, Lino talked about a study from (Lil') Wayne State University that concluded that people whose names begin with 'A' outlive those whose names begin with 'D'. Of course Lino (née Angelo) compared himself to Bob Dunning. First names, last names… it's all the same thing.
  

So enjoy the last few minutes, and tune in again at 4:00pm ET to hear Lino tease us about it to no end!

Don't say that we never cross-promote

Full credit for the following priceless gem goes to our friend dustin at CatholicGuyShow.com, and we're shamelessly duplicating it here. We wish we had this kind of talent:

Discuss and enjoy the full-size version on the Lino Fans Facebook site!

Our first post for 2010: random thoughts

• Last week's best-of's:
  
  • The good: if they had to go with recent best-of's, these were the ones to go with. Fr. Jim's birthday and Mama Rulli's visit perfectly bookended the crown jewels: the Vegas trip.
  • The bad: while those were good best-of's, we're still hungering for more classic fare. How about some Boring Catholic Radio? Beat The Catholic Guy? The St. Baldrick's head-shaving extravaganza? Even a rebroadcast of the first episode in 2006? We think that new listeners would enjoy hearing things the way they were, and us old-timers would enjoy hearing them again.

• Week 16's football picks: In case you missed it, Mark Hart challenged Fr. Rob for football pick supremacy during Week 16… and lost. His 'punishment'? To evangelize the masses at the local Wal-Mart. Can't wait to hear how this panned out on Thursday.

• Lino Roast revisited: Lino's final show of 2009 saw a welcome replay of the Lino Rulli Roast from the previous day that got interrupted by Notre Dame basketball. What wasn't welcome was the editing of said roast that took place… the 'minor editing' that Lino implied included taking out all of Bob Dunning's material. We guess he just wasn't deemed all that funny. And then after the replay during the second hour was finished, they played it again during the last half of the third hour as an excuse for Lino and Lou to take off early. C'mon… at the very least you could've run a best-of instead of the same stuff from the last hour!

• Pilgrimage to Italy: Boy, that sucker sold out at light speed. You can still get on the stand-by list, though: http://www.thecatholictraveler.com/

• 2009 revisited: Y'all see the year-end stuff we promised? We don't either. We got lazy and decided to take the rest of 2009 off along with Lino. Don't worry… you'll see this stuff in the next couple of weeks.