Hogwarts

In "You Nerd", I pointed out that Richard talks about Harry Potter and Hala can't care less. A few years back, around the release of Book 5, and the first paragraph was read out on what I think was still Biz News, and after Richard read the excerpt, he asked Hala if she follows the series. When she said no, he said he would "give (her) a copy".
I bring this up for two reasons: one, book 6 is coming out, and I wonder if he followed through on trying to get Hala to read this ridiculously brilliant series. The second: the other day, Richard wore his striped tie that when I saw it, I was like, "Gryffindor?" Now, I actually asked Liz/Tina/Hala'sbiggestfan for a still of Richard's tie, thinking it was new. She followed through, but I was stupid enough to not check her photobucket account first ()

Check it out:

unorthodox

first: the Orthodox Easter celebrations. How funny was that? My mom even noted that only Hala can make a simple report sound even more off-beat than it already is.

But: ItME. and Quest. Was a little unhappy that the explosions in Cairo interrupted the replay of Quest on our Saturday night, but I'd seen it already that morning anyway. And Hala speaking Arabic! Yes, we've heard her do so before, but she did it quite a lot this time.

Inside the Middle East. Hala and Robyn (Curnow, to the uninitiated) in the same half-hour. Nice. I wonder how much of a homecoming Hala's visit to Aleppo is. The road trip feel of her segment? Priceless. It's so nice to see Hala out of the studio. She's so lively and vibrant, and reveals how personable she can be instead of being one of the best talking heads ever.
But who else loved how she almost slipped at the tail end of the show? As she was telling us to email at mideast@cnn.com, i don't know who else saw it, but she definitely took a semi-stumble.

And, Quest. Stephen Colbert once said that nothing takes the fun out of comedy than trying to analyze it, but Richard did a pretty good job of analyzing it and still managing to keep it funny.

I take it back. THIS was the best weekend ever. (Labor Day holiday included) I got Hala, Richard, Robyn, Liz George (c/o MainSail), The Daily Show, Andrea and Questy doing CNN Today, and Max Foster!

happy happy joy joy and



now if only Richard and Hala could co-anchor again...