This morning, I learned an important lesson from Full House.  Okay, it was a lesson I already knew, but there’s nothing like a Danny Tanner lecture to hit home a point.  Turning the spotlight away from himself (he had kissed DJ’s Spanish teacher!), he asked DJ what had started this whole mess to begin with.  Accustomed to most things coming easily, DJ was frustrated that she wasn’t good at Spanish and was looking for an easy way out.  Danny convinced her that even if, in the end, she didn’t get that A, he’d be proud of her so long as she tried her hardest. 

Cut to my piano lesson tonight.  I started taking lessons from my friend Joel about a month ago.  I had taken lessons from eighth through twelfth grade, but A. didn’t try very hard to begin with and B. didn’t keep up with it.  Knowing my present skills, Joel flipped through one of my books, stopping at a page with pencil markings and incredulously asking, “You played this?!”  Oh, man.  Danny Tanner sounded in my head (funny how his words seemed to echo louder than anything my mom ever said —- sorry, mom).  “What if you had practiced more often?  What if you had kept it up all these years?  What if you hadn’t given up?”  If only I had heard Danny Tanner all those years ago.  Of course, I was six when the episode first aired…

And if only ABC had taken the words of the patriarch of their own TGIF show to heart, maybe we’d still have Pushing Daisies.  I don’t know why, but I’ve been missing Pushing Daisies lately.  Maybe it’s because Kristin Chenoweth is so present now, not only in the theatre world, but also the mainstream.  If you didn’t watch Pushing Daisies, you missed out.  It was quirky and whimsical, yet dark and poignant.  It also, unfortunately, was a victim of the writer’s strike and its own network.  The advertising campaign was terrible, and I think the only reason I first watched it was because I didn’t have cable — limited options.  But, man did I love it.  And the critics loved it too!  Cheno won an Emmy!  But ABC gave up.  It was an expensive show to produce, which I get, but they didn’t give it time to find or keep an audience.  And I think if they had given it one more season, the shine of Glee would have rubbed off on it.  The shows were different enough not to be any sort of copy, but, I think, had enough in common to cross audiences.  Pushing Daisies, I miss you.  Danny Tanner wouldn’t have given up on you. 

Clearly Fox, Comedy Central, and MTV have taken a page out of Danny Tanner’s playbook.  Networks I’m sure he didn’t want his angel girls watching took long-time canceled shows and put them back on the air.  We all know Fox renewed Family Guy in 2005 after four years off the air, and it’s still on.  Futurama, which was also on Fox, has recently been brought back by Comedy Central.  And today, MTV announced Mike Judge would be making new episodes of Beavis and Butthead.  Perhaps since Daria was a spin-off, we can hope for new episodes of our favorite apathetic teen?!  That would probably be too much to ask for.  But, in the Tanner household, there’s always optimism.  And that’s why I know Danny Tanner would be proud of me.  Because I may not be as good as I used to be at piano, but I got back on that horse.  Just like Michelle probably did after she fell off of one, got amnesia, and then gained back her memory in the special two part series finale.

Now, if only Danny Tanner could have convinced Tyra to stick with her singing career: