Technically Incorrect

He started with a rose between his teeth. He ended by spitting the thorns shoved into his mouth by the "Dancing with the Stars" judges right back at them.

Was Woz's sperm-infested Argentine tango any better than his worm-infested samba? Perhaps. In the same way that a poke in the eye with a short stick is better than a poke in the eye with a long one.

Hindered by an endearing lack of coordination, Woz succumbed to the same problem that had plagued him in rehearsals. He was unable to deliver the tango's nasty part.

His facial expression was that of a bank manager who suddenly finds himself unemployed and, to support his family, joins the Chippendales.

His professional partner, Karina Smirnoff, vigorously risked vim, limb, and, who knows, happiness in her forthcoming marriage by allowing Woz to lift her, contort her and support her with all the certainty of a 14-year-old on a date with Gisele Bundchen.

Asked to describe the dance, one judge, Carrie-Ann Inaba, said: "long."

"Argentines are good at polo and tango. I've tried them both now."

(Credit: CC Velofille)

The judges are in a difficult position. They know that the more they criticize Woz, the more likely he is to get more votes from the geeks, the freaks, the sensitive, the misbegotten, and the forgotten. (Most of America, indeed.)

But Bruno Tonioli, the most evocative of the Gang of Three, told Woz he loved him before declaring that the only part of the gutters of Buenos Aires that Woz had picked up was the stench.

Woz, who earlier had declared that "the geeks shall inherit the Earth" (a perilous thought for the geeks and the Earth, perhaps), shot back that he had just three words: "I'm still standing."

The judges gave him two more points than last week--12 out of 30. Yes, it was again the worst score. But was he really the worst on the night? It was close.

Former Playboy model and currently, oh, who knows, Holly Madison managed to fall off her stool and dance the rest of the way like a wounded gazelle in a horse box.

Former clown and "Jackass" jackass Steve-O, whose stupendous partner, Lacey Schwimmer, is tragically saddled with his physical deficiencies, wandered around the dance floor as if his severe indigestion had prevented him from finding a handkerchief that he dropped a couple of hours before.

Two couples will be sent home Tuesday night. And it is extremely possible that, with insane numbers of votes cast by utterly demented fans, Woz and Karina will live to fight another death.

Is this entertainment? Well, perhaps. But, underlying it all, there seems to be a deep desire on the part of Woz to hijack the proceedings by proving his Act of the Impossibles can actually win the show.

ABC won't let that happen, of course. However, the love-hate dance may still have a couple of weeks left in it.

Once upon a time, Debbie did Dallas. Monday, Steve Wozniak is fully intending to hump a little Hollywood. Yes, unbridled, uninhibited, unimaginable sex. In the form of the Argentine tango.

His e-mails to his Facebook Support Group have become so detailed, so intimate, that at times, I find myself wondering what it would be like if Woz grabbed me by the digits and whisked me onto the dance floor.

I imagine that his grip might be a little sweaty and uncertain. I also imagine that I would be wishing he were his professional partner, Karina Smirnoff.

However, Woz is determined to be the sexiest entertainer since Ru Paul. (Well, for some.)

In rehearsals for his Argentine tango, he has struggled to find the right eyebrow furrow. You see, the Argentine tango is a love-hate thing. And Woz is struggling with the hate part. You'd think that he would just imagine the judges.

He's also begun to play his dance music while he sleeps. This would lead me to suggest that he succeeded in popping down to his local Apple store, where the nice chaps at the Genius Bar soothed his iTunes back to life, though Woz has not revealed whether his MacBook did, indeed, lose some bits.

Don't think different. Think irrepressibly horny geek.

(Credit: CC Zabara Tango)

Perhaps to dial up the sexiness, so that you will dial up the voting lines, Woz has revealed a sexy joke that is keeping him and Karina in erotic stitches. (Oh, most of you have surely experienced erotic stitches once in your lives.)

It's the one about "the guy who checks into a hotel and asks for his porn channel to be disabled. The clerk tells him that their porn channel is normal and calls him a sick bastard."

Whatever gets you in the mood to tango, I say. And Woz is preparing to create a very special mood on Monday. With the help of Karina's fiance (the man who had to dance with the eliminated Denise Richards), Woz and his partner have concocted a move that seems to suggest that he is lifting up her dress with his foot.

"It's way out of character for this dance, but I can't help it," Wozniak wrote. "I'm sort of treating the judges like voyeurs at a peep show, ha ha ha."

Please, if you have never watched this show, nor ever considered voting for anyone in it, surely the moment has come for you to lay down your inhibitions and watch one of tech's most celebrated figures perform some peep for the peeps.

Then, why not do your technological duty and vote? (the Votewoz Twitter group now numbers more than 92,000).

Woz's Facebook Support Group would like to remind you (as my subjective objectivity forces me to remain impartial) that you can register lots of different e-mail addresses with ABC. This means you can call in 10 votes and e-mail at least 10 votes. If you're clever. Which all of you are.

Perhaps you, too, upon voting, will suddenly imagine that Woz's slightly sweaty hand is reaching out to you, while he whispers: "Let's tango, sugarplum."

(I will, because it is now my moral duty, be watching the show at 8pmPST- it's on at 7pm in the Central Sexuality Zone- and offering my views as soon after the dancing as my excitement allows me to form words. In advance, may I admit that I will, occasionally, be flipping channels to see how the Golden State Warriors are doing against The Grizzlies)

I know that most of you are, by now, so into "Dancing with the Stars" that you are being accused of ADD. Attention to Dancing Disorder.

So please pay attention, because I have an announcement to make. Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak's iTunes has crashed. And it is affecting his rehearsals significantly.

I know that you will all want to join me at the heart of the problem. So here is Woz's own description from his latest e-mail to his Facebook Support Group: "it quits with horrible error messages...odd, since I'd had no crashes of any kind...I hope my MacBook Pro SSD is not losing bits."

I know that some may lose a bit or two at the thought of Woz wandering down to his local Apple Store to get his iTunes fixed. But that is precisely what he intends to do at some point Thursday.

"I think the judges have something to do with these error messages."

(Credit: Cc Dnak)

Here's why this is so important. Woz and his partner, the patient, pouting Karina Smirnoff, will be dancing the Argentine tango next Monday. And the tune to which they will be enacting their PG-13 sex ritual is not one that is familiar to Woz. Buddy Holly wasn't really a tango man.

This means that Woz needs to give it extra listens so that he can capture its rhythms and dark subtleties, and so that he can prepare his body for the moment when Karina wraps one of her legs around him and whispers sweet everythings into his ear, shoulder, or wherever her head ends up.

I don't know which Apple store Woz will choose, but I hope that every Apple employee in the LA area is on red alert.

It's not every day you can participate in helping a tech legend tango his way to the peak of entertainment.

I am fairly confident in thinking that Steve Wozniak has never slept with Charlie Sheen.

Perhaps it was this small, imperfectly-formed thought embedded in people's minds that saved the Apple co-founder on "Dancing with the Stars" and condemned Denise Richards, the former Mrs. Sheen, to elimination. People's predilections are often based on such fickle suppositions--especially when it comes to voting up to 13 times.

Perhaps, though, it was also the tech industry that lifted Woz up on an emotional sedan chair and carried his beaten body to yet another week of competition.

In the elimination show, the world was even spared a reprise of Woz's less than sambadextrous dance. And worm. He wasn't even in the dance-off.

If you are wondering why, then you must be one of the few techies who didn't participate in what could have been one of the greatest get-out-the-vote campaigns since Reese Witherspoon fluttered her eyelids in "Election."

The votewoz Twitter group, which now numbers over 62,000 committed lunatechs, clearly had an effect. The derisory marks offered by the judges meant that Woz needed far more viewers' votes than last week, in a system that is so honest it has never required a visit from United Nations observers.

Woz got the votes. Even though, as I wrote in an earlier post, Woz's survival may signal the arrival of the Sargeant Effect, where more and more viewers vote for the contestant whom the judges most deride, just for the fun of it.

When ABC's Tom Bergeron announced Woz's survival, his partner, the delectable and slightly dangerous Karina Smirnoff screamed with an ecstasy never, ever heard in pornographic circles.

Is it possible that Fake Steve Jobs voted 13 times for Real Steve Wozniak?

(Credit: CC Mark Coggins)

And when Woz was asked whether he was surprised, he said: "I don't think I've ever been so surprised by anything in my life except maybe for when I got served with divorce papers."

I am not sure how many times he has actually been served with divorce papers by another party but am beginning to suspect he has started using jokes written by another party.

First, there was a passable Smirnoff vodka joke (rooted, some feel, in a picture caption on Technically Incorrect) and now a more than acceptable divorce jape.

You might have to take the rest of the day off work when I tell you that next week, contestants will have to take on one of two new dances: the Argentine tango and the quite wonderful lindy hop.

Please pray to whomever or whatever you believe in that Woz gets the hop. He can make an entertaining mockery out of that one.

Whereas it would be far harder to give the Woz treatment to a drippingly sexual creation such as the Argentine tango. Oh, and did I mention two couples will be voted off next week?

Now we'll really see how powerful the tech community is in its commitment to high art and, of course, forcing the world to see things the techie way.

It's been a tense 24 hours for those who love high-class entertainment.

But Steve Wozniak has finally decided that, hamstring be damnedstring, he will samba with his professional partner, Karina Smirnoff, on tonight's "Dancing with the Stars."

In a typically emotional e-mail to his Facebook Support Group, Woz revealed that he was wincing when he walked. This is much more painful than mincing.

However, Karina, the wily, sophisticated, slightly moody Russian, has modified their samba routine so that Woz's strained hamstring can take the strain.

However, the artist's heightened consciousness of subterfuge and conspiracy that so richly decorated Woz's e-mails of last week has not entirely disappeared.

He said: "(Karina) was of the opinion that if I withdrew from 'Dancing With The Stars,' rumors would fly that I was using this injury as an excuse. She has danced with pulled hamstrings many times. I can tell you from how this one felt that it's not the same for a 20-year-old as it is for a 58-year-old."

There are, indeed, few things more poisonous to a man's reputation than flying rumors. Ask any ABC producer.

"Madam, would you like to see my samba?"

(Credit: CC Eric Rhoads)

Woz is extremely concerned that he is behind the other couples in rehearsal time: "We lost nearly two days of rehearsal due to my inability to do anything, not to mention hospitals and MRIs and more over two days. So rehearsalwise, we are behind everyone else, but we are feeling confident that we can do something of value tomorrow. You'll have to see."

I fear I may be saying this for the last time, but the tech world has singularly failed to support the Woz in his quest for toe-twinkling greatness.

The fact that he was in the bottom two last week, coupled with the fact that he himself declared the voting to be scrupulously accurate (having suggested previously that it might actually resemble a four-dollar bill), tells me that Woz's disciples are sitting on their hands, burying their heads in World of Warcraft, and refusing to dial and click.

While the great man said he is very tired and would prefer people not to e-mail and call him, he is desperate to be the round mound of rebound of this week's show (airing at 8 p.m. EST and PST, and 7 p.m. in the central desert).

Would it really hurt for you all to vote for him, say, 13 times? For all lovers of high-class entertainment, if nothing else.

I will, of course, be glued to the action tonight and describing it as soon after the performance as my joie de vivre allows.

I wonder if Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak and the producers of ABC's "Dancing with the Stars" will meet for coffee and a slice of cake before next week's show.

Earlier on Tuesday, Woz had declared that he was being set up by those cynical Hollywood producer types.

He said that if he was in the bottom two, it would be "an outright lie." And he was convinced that the fix was in for him and his partner, Karina Smirnoff, to be in the dance-off (and win it) in order to boost ratings.

You will be stunned beyond your pajamas to hear that he was, indeed, in the bottom two. And that, yes, he was in the dance-off. And that yes, he won it, leaving a distraught Go-Go girl, Belinda Carlisle, to wonder whether her hip action really had been worse than Woz's fumbling, bumbling, and stumbling legs, arms, torso, and enthusiasm.

Now here's the truly weird thing. When you've set up a conspiracy theory that appears to come true, perhaps the last thing you might be expected to do is apologize to the alleged conspirators. Yet that is precisely what Woz did.

In his latest letter to his dancing Facebook diocese, he said, "Yesterday, I wrote my suspicions of the secret 'Dancing With The Stars' audience vote tabulations. I wrote that the producers were liars, simply because I truly believed in that possibility, not because I had a shred of evidence. I hurt a lot of honest people."

But, Woz, Woz, your conspiracy theory appears to have played out exactly as you predicted!

He was having none of it: "The top people of this show, (the) ones responsible for counting audience votes and keeping them honest, told me all the specific details of where their numbers came from."

Aha. Those wily coyotes of the production world appealed to his sense of numeracy. And then they knew the way to his heart. They showed him their machines.

"I will not upset ABC again. I will not upset ABC again...."

(Credit: CC Eric Rhoads)

"I was offered an opportunity to see the equipment they use also. You can tell when things are extremely on the level. You can also see why the exact totals cannot be released. That would make it harder to detect fraud."

Fraud? Did someone mention fraud? Oh, yes, Woz did.

"One main way that they detect fraud is, when the phone-in votes and text votes and Internet votes don't follow each other, percentage-wise. There are other things they look for as well that IT experts would detect as signals of something wrong," he explained.

The appeal to his IT experts' chops seems to have done the trick.

"Conrad (Green) and the other producers are not liars," Woz said. "They are extremely honest people, in my mind...In this case, they are certainly more honorable and honest than myself."

The self-critical salsa didn't stop there: "I was around some swarming emotions yesterday. Now I feel like a heel who stuck his shoe in his mouth, no puns intended."

I don't know about you, but I feel like a large pinot noir.

Here's what we can conclude: One, the supposed geek vote did not materialize in large numbers. If it had, he would not have been in the bottom two. (Because now we know the vote tally is absolutely, totally, unimpeachably honest.)

Two, the folks at ABC and the Woz are putting flowers in their hair and singing of peace, love, and understanding. Conspiracy theories are dead, and next week, the Apple co-founder will dance his lungs beyond their capacity again.

Who knows, perhaps he will be the next Bachelor too? That's an ABC show, isn't it?

Everyone says Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak is a nice man. He's Polish, of course.

However, in an e-mail to his Facebook Support Group, posted at 6 a.m. PST Tuesday, the Woz appears to be getting very, very ratty. And the rodent that he's smelling is the ABC production team of "Dancing with the Stars."

He is suspicious that the true voting numbers, both from telephone and online voting, are never revealed. This leads him to believe that he may be forced into the two-couple dance-off, just to boost ratings.

"The producers play games to get viewers and don't disclose the numbers. If they disclosed the numbers, it would be less of a game, but still suspect. If tomorrow, they claim I'm in the bottom 2 dance teams, including viewer votes, I believe that it's an outright lie," he said.

He has begun to make his accusations in ABC interviews too.

"I called it fake about 20 times today on camera," he said. "Each time in the same sentence as whatever comment they wanted about doing a dance-off tomorrow. That way, they couldn't edit it easily to say what they wanted. They kept trying to get me to say what I'd do if I was in the dance-off without using the word fake."

Woz, with saintly background.

(Credit: CC Jeff Dlouhy)

He even accuses producers of getting him to say things that are simply untrue: "They will have some small video tomorrow of me saying things that I strongly told them I don't believe. They will also shoot me in a one-hour rehearsal tomorrow with my partner, but I'll keep calling the idea of my being in the bottom 2, after audience participation, a lie."

Although he is not clear about all the sources of his suspicions, his accusations are extremely open: "I'm sure they want me in this dance-off to get higher Tuesday ratings, and they have preplanned it so that I win. If my leg acts up tomorrow, they will either have to announce another pair as being the lowest or send me home, and I don't think they will give me up."

Well, at least he thinks he's going to win, even though his performance Monday night still didn't reach the standards he might wish for himself.

Seemingly straining to be nice, he admitted that he is straining to be nice: "It's hard to get all this out politely, challenging the truthfulness of reporting of our dance team positions. But I am who I am, and I speak my mind and hate these unethical twists. I'm not after any Hollywood existence."

He continued: "I have vowed to all my friends that I will not change in that way; I won't go over the line. I'm here to help others appreciate dancing. But that doesn't mean I have to compromise my ethics very much."

It is heartening to see the word "ethics" being used in association with reality television. Especially on the day when a supposed "American Idol" insider declared that the top-four retinue (there are still 11 hopefuls left in the competition) has already been decided.

You just can't miss "Dancing with the Stars" tonight, can you? 9 p.m. PST and EST. And 8 p.m. in the the Central Ethical Zone. What will the Woz say and do next?

It is very hard to imagine Steve Wozniak with his tails between his legs.

But I feared that it would happen several times during a quickstep that was more of a frenetic step on his second performance for "Dancing with the Stars."

Dancing on a fractured left foot, he threw himself into his Buddy Holly-inspired "Oh, Boy" routine with all the gusto of a drunken chef who had stumbled into trials for the San Francisco 49ers. As he did, the Apple co-founder's tails (yes, as in formal wear) flapped like the arms of a virgin roller-coaster rider.

Would he ever stop? Would he crash into the audience? Or would his tails flap between his legs, curl themselves around a calf or two, and bring him down like an Italian government?

Unlike an Italian government, he managed to get to the end of his term, but not before a wide-eyed, panting grimace halfway through that must have caused at least one paramedic to grip tightly on his stretcher handle.

The judges tried to be kinder than they were last week. Two suggested that it didn't matter how he danced; he was simply entertaining (yes, he had the geeky glasses, pink shirt, plaid pants, and no sign of swim trunks), and many would be grateful for that.

However, Bruno Tonioli, the judge who last week suggested that the Woz danced "like a Teletubby going mad at a gay pride parade," this week had more prepared remarks. (You don't think they're spontaneous, do you?)

"You remind me of Wall-E," he said. "A bit rusty around the edges, in need of spare parts, but resilient and incredibly charming."

A translation might have been, "Look, your dancing is bloody awful, but we know you've come here to entertain, and we appreciate your incredibly geeky way of trying. And if we say mean things, we fear you might hack into our iPhoto, find our most cherished and private images, and expose us."

"Steve Wozniak was just like me? He's my hero."

(Credit: CC KhE Dara)

The Woz is in danger of trying a little too hard. His orphanlike eagerness to please is overwhelming his ability to control his body and actually trace the steps that have been laid out by his professional partner, Karina Smirnoff.

Watching him dance is a little like watching a movie that you know is bad, but that, when it's over, you feel bizarrely charitable toward. You know, like "Deuce Bigalow, Male Gigolo."

And his hair was fabulous. Truly. It was as if James Dean had come down from heaven and teased it himself. And the black Chucks on which he hopped around seemed the perfect shock absorbers for his attempt at causing a seismic event in the Hollywood area.

The scores bounced up the Richter scale a little. The judges offered him 17 points--not entirely ugly, but not so cute, either. So adding his meager 13 from last week, it means he reached a respectable 30 out of 60. Well, respectable except for the fact that it put him in last place. (The viewers'--or even techy non-viewers'--vote will have a heavy influence)

Tuesday night sees the bottom two couples eliminated. I have a feeling Steve Wozniak will not be in that elimination. This means more weeks of dancing. And more weeks to find the spare parts and shake off the rust.

Oh, boy. I hope we don't need Wall-E to clean up the mess in the end.

Dancing with the Astaires, it isn't.

But Monday's "Dancing with the Stars" will see the next step in Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak's hop to be hip. And it will be a quickstep. Or at least as quick as the Woz can muster.

In his latest detailed outpouring of sweat-by-syllable to his Facebook Support Group, Wozniak lays bare the pain and gain.

His fractured foot is responding well. He went four days without Aspirin and only took an Aleve on Saturday night in order to appease his aching, breaking body.

Typing many, many words with a sore shoulder, the Woz wrote, "As the day progresses, I need longer and longer rests to have a body that can get through what seems like a short dance. But I can do my best when I've had a long rest, and that's the case before the dress rehearsal and the real live routine, so I will definitely have the strength then."

He might have strength, but I am worried about his possible costume choices. He appears to be lobbying to wear Buddy Holly's glasses during his quickstep. Oh, and plaid pants and Keds.

And did I mention that halfway through his latest message to the masses, his swim trunks started to sag? "Please get me a ticket to Saga, Japan" might be your first thought, but wait.

Put a beard on him (and a little more weight), and he's a dead ringer for Steve.

(Credit: CC Marestra)

"Three times, in a jumping part near the end, the heavy microphone on my swim trunks started pulling them down, under my shirt," Wozniak confessed. "Each of those times, the chance of my pants falling in front of a video camera took my entire focus, and even if my pants wouldn't likely fall off, I either forgot the coming steps, or I just stopped to avoid embarrassment."

Avoiding embarrassment is a noble goal. So I think that the swim trunks will be beneath the plaid pants. I think.

But hang on: "During our practice on the real stage, there was one time that my swim trunks started falling on their own, without even a microphone," he said. "Maybe my body, like my hips, are rearranging themselves."

Before you decide to rearrange yourselves to foreign lands, or, indeed, anywhere that doesn't receive ABC television on a Monday, please consider this: the reality (yes, let's talk reality show reality) is that the Woz should probably survive this week's exertions. As the Woz reveals, rodeo rider Ty Murray, husband of Jewel, is not very happy.

And the likes of Belinda Carlisle, David Alan Grier, and even former Hugh Hefner girlfriend Holly Madison do not necessarily have a huge constituency among those who watch this Baroque little show. In addition, Steve-O (of "Jackass" and rehab) and Gilles Marini (naked bloke from "Sex and the City") are both injured.

And, well, you're all going to vote, aren't you? Even though the Woz's Facebook Support Group still numbers barely more than 2,000, there seem to be more than 17,000 tech souls whose hearts and fingers are all a-Twitter at the thought of voting for him.

You don't need to watch the show (airing on Monday at 8 p.m. EST and PST, and 7 p.m. in the early-to-bed Midwest) to actually vote. You can find all the details here. And, what fun, you can vote 13 times.

So even if you loathe this show more than you loathe chewing the bark of a sycamore, even if you look down upon it as the most superficial tripe since James Joyce, think of this as a scientific experiment. Can the tech-savvy beat the underhumans at, well, something that is, in essence, a technological exercise?

Or think of it as cryogenics. Yes, you can be one among the millions who brought Buddy Holly back to life.

(I will, naturally, be writing about the Woz's quickstep, as soon after the performance as I am able to place my fingers to my Apple computer--as opposed to my Adam's apple.)