"When Ozzy is conscious, the quirky, fried patriarch tends to mumble between expletives in a way that only his family, and possibly chemically altered viewers, can understand.

Enter the Media Access Group (MAG). A division of Boston PBS station WGBH-TV, it's one of the country's largest providers of closed-captioning for the hearing-impaired.

'Many among MAG's 150-person staff caught "Obsournes' ' March 5 debut, but few could decipher what the heavy-mental, er, -metal star was saying, says Mary Watkins, outreach director of the 30-year-old organization.

'We love the show, but we had trouble understanding Ozzy's mumbles between bleeps. So we beat down MTV's door until they decided to choose us.' " [AZ Central, via Daypop Top 40]

Yegads - why didn't I think of this before now! One cool thing that I just discovered about Digital Video Recorders (DVRs) is that they record the closed-caption feed, too, so when I watch the final episode of this season's Osbournes, I'll be able to read what Ozzy is saying!