There’s been a lot of hubbub about Mad Men‘s use of the Beatles’ “Tomorrow Never Knows” on the show; Producer Matthew Weiner and Co. paid $250,000 for the usage. Yes, that’s a crazy-stupid lot of money. But then again, it shows just how much the Tibetan Book of the Dead — upon which the song was based — and its influence were part of the mid-late 60′s zeitgeist. In fact, this was the show’s second reference to the Tibetan Book of the Dead in two weeks. (Earlier, the show depicted ad-exec Roger Sterling, his wife, and other well-to-do New Yorkers taking an LSD trip under the guidance of none other than Dr. Timothy Leary, whose book The Psychedelic Experience quickly gained fame as an acid-trip roadmap, based on the TBotD.

But as the LA Times‘ Show Tracker blog points out, this was not the first time the song had appeared on TV. It actually showed up in an animated Beatles cartoon, which you can watch here, below. But do check out Show Tracker for more.

Two weeks ago on 30 Rock (one of the big Thursday NBC comedies), main character Liz Lemon meditated. This week, on Parks and Recreation (another big Thursday NBC comedy), Ron Swanson, played brilliantly as always by Nick Offerman, did not meditate. Repeat: Did not.

Yes, the “Don’t Tread on Me”-government-hating government worker did go to a meditation center, in a rare moment of deference to his health-nut pseudo-boss Chris (Rob Lowe), who sometimes goes in for spiritual or even New Agey stuff. But Ron’s only along to get chummy enough with Chris that he can keep his plum job of being paid to do as little as possible.

So what did Ron do in there if he wasn’t meditating? Chris may think that a post-sit Ron “radiates mindfulness” but as Ron himself puts it:
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The scifi/futurism site io9 is reporting on the coming premiere of Phoo Action, “a new BBC pilot adapted by Doctor Who director Euros Lyn from a semi-forgotten strip by Tank Girl co-creator Jamie Hewlett. Influenced by the sixties Batman TV show, the odd Buddhist-futurist series just might be the next cult hit or, if nothing else, an interesting televisual oddity.” Here’s the trailer:
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And for more, be sure to check out io9′s post.

That incredible sentence is just one of several uttered in Thursday night’s episode of 30 Rock, in which none other than Liz Lemon herself takes up meditation.

Does she stick with it? Well… maybe.

But that’s almost beside the point. Why? Well… why not read about the whole episode in this writeup I’ve just published on Shambhala SunSpace?

Did you see this thing? I thought it was pretty painful. But click here to see for yourself if you haven’t yet. That is, if you don’t mind potentially squandering a few minutes of precious life.

I often think about the luck I’ve had in getting to speak to the comedian, Mike DeStefano. Mike had been around a long time, then went on NBC’s Last Comic Standing — and almost won.

I got to speak to him a couple of times, one of which was for an audio interview for Shambhala SunSpace. It’s good stuff and I do recommend you checking it out. But if you really want a concise taste of who Mike was, check out this new piece, “Uneasy Rider,” culled from the WTF Podcast for “These American Lives,” a NYT piece curated by Ira Glass about people who died in 2011.

Mike was hilarious, and a beautiful, fearless guy.

(Thanks to the great Sam DeWitt for the heads-up on this one.)

Photp by Kristin Dos Santos (w/permission)

Thanks to friend Konchog Norbu for the heads-up on this one — it’s hardly news, but it’s kinda cool when celebs go public with their interest in dharma. Seems David Duchovny (of Californication, X-Files, and Larry Sanders-crush fame) just did a retreat at what sounds to be Zen Mountain Monastery, and he’s told Perez Hilton’s pet-gossip site (yes, you read that right) TeddyHilton.com about the experience.

Again, not news, but at least Duchovny’s not looking for star treatment. “I’m a beginner,” he says, “I’ve only been meditating for a little while. You pay a fee to go for this weekend and what I didn’t know is that even though you pay a fee they put you to work immediately. You go there and first you bus some tables after you eat and they had me working in the garden everyday for an hour-and-a-half. It was fun, I was shoveling horse shit out there. You pay money and then you shovel horse shit!”

Zen, life…. Sounds like Duchovny is getting the basic gist of it.

More here.

Thanks to friend Konchog Norbu for pointing out this Mercedes-Benz ad from a couple years back. I kinda thought I’d posted it here, but no.

Nice find via Brad Warner’s Facebook page: James Coburn tries to teach Animal to meditate. Or at least to relax, relax, relax.

Considering that meditation has played an ongoing and meaningful role in the Occupy protests — note for example the related coverage my colleagues and I have been posting on the Shambhala Sun blog — it will be interesting to see how Buddhists respond to this Conan segment from Thursday night, in which Triumph the Insult Comic Dog takes on Occupy Wall Street and a meditator gets in his line of fire. …You’ve been warned. But will you laugh anyway?