Pardon our absence last week, but we were on vacation along with, apparently, every other nerd in the world down at Comic-Con. We have a lot of local reality contestants to catch up with!

First and foremost, the dread "Pirate Master" was cancelled by CBS, although they will be putting up the remaining episodes on their Web site. So far we haven't felt compelled to actually watch those. We'll probably wait until the final episode is posted and then share the results with you. (Unless a reader would like to spoil us--please!--and let us know if Nessa is still around.) Also, in a bit of bizarre reality, Cheryl Kosewicz, a former "Pirate Master" contestant, killed herself a week after the show was cancelled. Obviously, the show was cursed. By pirates.

Mateen Kemet was voted off the lot, which leaves nothing but a bunch of white, male directors left making crappy Ford commercials movies "On the Lot." Just like the real Hollywood!

The final local contestant on "Last Comic Standing" was Arj Barker, and he didn't make it to the next round, despite, once again, being one of the funnier comedians on the show. Here's a brief bit (not from the show) in which he talks about how conceited Google is.