Sketches

Mitt Romney 's victory lap the day after the Illinois Republican primary has been erased by an Etch-A-Sketch, leaving the candidate to deal with a new wave of online mockery aimed at Romney's perceived tendency to adjust his views. On Tuesday night, Romney won a convincing percentage of the Illinois electorate, giving momentum to his campaign's claim that he is the inevitable nominee. On Wednesday morning, he landed the endorsement of former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush . But Romney campaign aide Eric Fehrnstrom, speaking on CNN's "Starting Point with Soledad O'Brien," obliterated the positive vibes with his response to a question on whether the campaign was worried that some of its more conservative positions would alienate moderate voters in the general election.

It was the elephant in the room, but Mitt Romney never paid it any mind. In his first campaign event since winning Tuesday's Illinois primary, the former Massachusetts governor talked about his endorsement from former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, his wedding anniversary, and what he hopes will be the general election fight with President Obama. Never mentioned was a childhood toy that has suddenly come to represent, in the minds of his critics and GOP rivals, at least, the insincerity of his conservative beliefs.

With Mitt Romney's presidential campaign, it seems it's always two steps forward, one step back. Romney won a double-digit victory Tuesday in the Illinois primary, and followed it up with a major endorsement this morning from former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush. But one of Romney's spokesmen also offered fresh ammunition to GOP critics of the former Massachusetts governor who see him as an inauthentic conservative, by suggesting in a television interview that the candidate would steer toward the political center as soon as he clinches the nomination.

Mitt Romney

Seeking to quickly move on after one of his spokesman blotted out what should have been a banner day for his presidential campaign, Mitt Romney promised wary conservatives that he would not change course if he becomes the Republican nominee. Speaking to reporters after a town hall meeting in Arbutus, Md., Romney clarified an aide's statement that he would view the start of the general election campaign like an Etch-A-Sketch, suggesting that he could adjust positions he took in a primary campaign dominated by conservatives to please a more centrist electorate in November.

When Kristen Wiig says that she and her writing partner, Annie Mumolo, knew next to nothing about what they were doing when they tackled the Oscar-nominated script for "Bridesmaids," it's tempting to chalk the outcome up to beginner's luck. As Wiig tells it, it all began when producer Judd Apatow asked whether she had any movie ideas of her own after she'd appeared in his hit comedy "Knocked Up. " Says Wiig: "We knocked out a first draft in six days and handed it to him, and we were like, 'We're done!

Gov. Jerry Brown laid out an ambitious proposal Thursday to curb public-employee pension costs and improve the health of state and local pension funds. The proposal, which would replace the pensions of new state and local workers with a combination of a smaller pension, a savings plan and Social Security benefits, seeks to create a statewide standard for public-employee retirement benefits. Doing so would protect future governments from the sort of mistakes that state and local officials made about a decade ago, when they adopted richer pension-benefit formulas that are now straining their budgets.

As a stand-alone CBS comedy series, "The Honeymooners" — starring Jackie Gleason as blustery bus driver Ralph Kramden; Audrey Meadows as his no-nonsense wife, Alice; Art Carney as his clueless friend, Norton; and Joyce Randolph as Norton's wife, Trixie — lasted only one season, 1955-56. Gleason, though, had introduced "The Honeymooners" as a recurring sketch in 1951 on the DuMont's network's "Cavalcade of Stars" and when he went to CBS to do "The Jackie Gleason Show" in 1952, he took the characters with him. Sketches from 1952-55 and 1956-57 are featured on MPI's new 15-disc "The Honeymooners Lost Episodes: The Complete Restored Series.

Pardon me for appearing so tuned in, which I'm not, but there is this feature now on Facebook that connects people who grew up in the same hometown. "You know you're from Terre Haute if ... " is the set up, and Facebook members take turns reminiscing about things only natives of Terre Haute would know — pizza joints, favorite teachers, malt shops, many of them long gone. I've seen set-ups for my hometown in Illinois. I've seen them for Beverly Hills. Not only does the feature stir up fond memories, it'll impress you with the little nostalgic threads that others remember as well.