Thursday, June 04, 2015

Preface To Start: Lowered Expectations


This morning I was on the radio for three hours.  The show went to outer space & vanished into the ether because the temporary set-up at the temporary studio doesn't have a way (that I could find*) for me to record the show.  The webstream is currently down, so I couldn't record it from home, either.  This concerns me, because I require a recording of the show to put on my website for anyone who might want to listen to my show at some other time than crazy early on Saturday mornings in the Eastern Time Zone.

I stumbled around the temporary space - marveling, truly, at the great RFL volunteers who moved a radio station lock, stock, & music library across the UK campus - & also getting the stinkeye from the wary custodial staff, who apparently work all night - which is something I sort of remember from my days at the University of Texas, except it seems to me the staff there usually went home around 3am - anyway I have lost my train of thought - let me look at this paragraph again to see what I might have wanted to say - oh yeah - I stumbled around the place looking for some way to record the show, trying not to forget that I was also programming a radio show.  Nothing.  I could find nothing.

At which point, I had a few reactions.  They were, as follows:

1) Fuck this! If I can't share my radio show, I'll only do a half-assed one**.
2) Well, I guess I can do the show, & then re-record it at home afterwards.
3) If I have to re-record the show, I will, but I'm going to make sure the show that airs is as good as I can do.

This happened over the course of seconds, but, irritatingly, it happened over & over all the morning long.  I had been awake, at 3am, for around twenty hours, & there was a good chance that many things that were happening to me were some form of sleep-deprivation-induced hallucination.  Actually, I think I had one of those on the way home, in the car, but luckily I was at a traffic light.  I closed my eyes for a second.  The world looked different when I opened them.

Even now, after a few hours of sleep, it seems to me that I am viewing the world through a kind of murky film.  But I have seven animals who are constitutionally incapable of respecting my wishes.  So I slept what little they'd let me.  I wish I never gave up caffeine!

Where was I?  Oh yeah.  So - here's what looks like will happen Saturday morning:

1) I'll be on the air from 6am to 9am.  6am to 7am will be a freeform show.  I will revive my old show Sugar Substitute for the summer.
2) Self Help Radio will be on the air from 7am to 9am.  There's a very good chance the internet stream will be down, so I will just be doing the show for the Lexington community, who, I'm sure, wake up on Saturdays around 9am.  Damn it!
3) If I can't find another way to record it, I'll re-record my airbreaks for you.  So it'll be as shabby as a podcast, but will more or less be the same show that aired that very morning.

Sound good?  No?  Sound tolerable?  No?

I know!

* It might have had one, but never underestimate how dumb I am.  I'll ask before Saturday.
** Well, more half-assed than usual.

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