A List Of Things Thrown Five Minutes Ago

IT MADE MY PANTS ALARM GO OFF: To cope with the bad news that "Boston Legal" will not be returning until "the fall," and in a to be determined timeslot (please, Mondays at 10, where there's literally nothing worth watching on right now), and in a display of nostalgia, I picked up "Doogie Howser, M.D." on DVD this afternoon. I'd remembered that Steven Bochco had been involved, but had forgotten that David E. Kelley co-created. (Though when one thinks about it, the show has all the hallmarks of Kelley's quirk.) Leaving aside the ludicrous premise about a boy genius doctor, what you have is a comedy series with surprising pathos and insight into the practice of medicine, coupled with actually, pretty good acting all around. It's also particularly appropriate this weekend, where James B. Sikking (Douglas Howser, Sr.) makes his return to movie screens in "Fever Pitch,"which I hadn't realized has a sufficiently interesting supporting cast (Lenny Clarke, Ione Skye, and Marissa Jaret Winokur, in addition to Sikking) that I'm actually tempted to go see it. (In another bizarre twist, a mustachioed Neil Flynn, now known as "The Janitor" on "Scrubs," "Doogie"s clearest progeny, shows up in the "Doogie" pilot as a cop who doesn't trust Doogie to save an accident victim.)