Self Help Radio 111018: Moments

(Original image - entitled "Those Fleeting Moments" - from here.)

Finally! At long last! Much-anticipated! Much-missed! Much-what? You didn't notice the show hadn't happened yesterday? Oh. Well, it's happening today. In case you cared. You don't? That's obvious. I'm just going to go ahead &... Ah, you're gone.

Here is the show that should have dropped (as the kids say) yesterday at noon but I hadn't even picked it up by then (as the kids don't say). Isn't it ironic that a show about moments missed its moment & that there were moments when I didn't even know I'd get it done? You'd think it might be a momentous undertaking, & maybe it felt that way, but only momentarily. As it is, it's more of the same old thing. Just a bunch of moments collected in a radio show type frame.

The show is now available for you to pay attention to you for a moment or two at Self Help Radio dot net.  Pay attention to password/username information.  The songs I play & the weirdoes I talk to are noted below.

Celebrate the moments of your life, or something.

Self Help Radio Moments Show

"The Moment" Indurain _What You Get For Being Naive_
"Another Moment Follows" Cloudberry Jam _Providing The Atmosphere_
"Moments Are Moments" The Saint Valentine State _Between Two Waves: The Second Wave_

introductions/definitions

"This Moment" Lewis Black _Anticipation_
"Love The Moment" The Bartlebees _From Path Of Pain To Jewels Of Glory_
"The Moment" Boyracer _Happenstance_
"The Unguarded Moment" The Church _Of Skins & Heart_
"A Thrill A Moment" Kim Weston _The Complete Motown Singles, Vol. 5: 1965_

interview with the Rev Dr Howard Gently

"Moments In Love" The Art Of Noise _Moments In Love_
"Assertive Moments" Ronderlin _The Great Investigation_
"Moment Of Silence" George Carlin _When Will Jesus Bring The Pork Chops?_
"In A Moment Of Madness" The Flower Pot Men _Let's Go To San Francisco_
"Left Of The Moment" The Blood Group _Everything Forgotten Gathers At The Ceiling_

interview with Jeffrey & Beyond

"At Any Moment" Wax Idols _American Tragic_
"After The Moment" Craft Spells _Idle Labor_
"Most Metal Moment" Adam Newman _Not For Horses_
"Magic Moments" Table Table _Messthetics # 104 (D.I.Y. '77-81 South Wales I)_
"Momentz (feat. De La Soul)" Gorillaz _Humanz_

idioms!

"A Few Precious Moments" George Jackson _Leavin' Your Homework Undone: In The Studio With George Jackson 1968-1971_
"My Whole World Ended (The Moment You Left Me)" The Spinners _2nd Time Around_
"Stolen Moments" Mary Jane Hooper & Richie Matta _Eddie Bo's Funky Funky New Orleans_
"A Fearful Moment" Mekons & Robbie Fulks _Jura_
"It Only Takes A Moment" Jeffrey Lewis & Los Bolts _Manhattan_

conclusion & goodbye

"Hybrid Moments" PINS _Too Little Too Late_
"It Takes A Moment" Deep Sea Diver _Secrets_
"Live In The Moment" Teenage Fanclub _Here_
"Fleeting Moments" Pocketbooks _Rough Trade Shops: Indiepop 09_
"The Moment's Gone" The Arrogants _Nobody's Cool

Whither Moments?

(Image from here.)

Some thoughts about this week's (late) episode of Self Help Radio:

1) My apologies, I can't believe I needed an extra day to put it together.
2) Really, I hope I get it done tomorrow!
3) Maybe its moment has passed.
4) It's going to be one of those shows where there are just so many songs that fit the theme that I couldn't play all of them in such a short time & you're gonna be like why didn't he play that song it would've been perfect.
5) It's really why I tend to prefer more restrictive themes.
6) But someone asked me to do this theme.
7) At least it seemed like they were asking me.
8) & I didn't ask their permission to mention their name.
9) So now I'm talking about them like they're plural.
10) Which in a different context but not at this moment might be insulting.
11) So this obviously shabby show will be for them.
12) Tomorrow - Saturday - at noon.
13) At Self Help Radio dot net.
14) For many moments to come.

Give Me A Moment!

Argh, this week has utterly crushed me.

As I've explained/complained about before, the combination of working on the show for the KNON Pledge Drive + the obsession with the election + spending the day with my wife & her doctors has given me, well, today to work on this week's Self Help Radio.  A show, by the way, about moments.

There's no way, not even working twenty-four straight hours, that I could have the show done by noon tomorrow.  Maybe if I could do it live, but I don't do that that way these days, & even then, gosh would it be shabby as fuck.

Not that it won't be shabby as fuck anyway, but I can guarantee a slightly less shabby show if I take a moment to work on it rather than rushing to get it done.

Here's hoping you understand.  This week's Self Help Radio will happen Saturday at noon instead of Friday at noon.  You might say it was waiting to pick its moment.  But really, I was overwhelmed when I'm normally just plain whelmed.  I thank you for your understanding.

Preface To Moments: It Should've Been More Of A Moment

But I'm glad it's over.

The wife took muscle relaxants (she's recovering from surgery) & passed out on the sofa.  I drank beer with whiskey chasers & paced nervously about the room.  I texted with a couple of people but mainly just freaked out a little before ultimately deciding I was happy with the House change & stumbling into bed.

It wasn't a great week - my first Fall Pledge Drive show was a bust - although I did have nice people in the studio with me, that was good.  But not much money was raised.  I made a coffee cake for my helpers, & stuck around while KNON staff wandered in, & they ate some too.  In this way I distract from my appalling on-air performance.

& now, oh shit!  I have a Self Help Radio to put together!  Let's see how that turns out.  These moments of my life, are they just weird, separate parts or do they make some kind of whole?  I wonder.

Another Stressful Night

Like you, I know a bunch of people who don't vote.  They'll often quote George Carlin.  Or Morrissey, who sings this in "World Peace Is None Of Your Business": "Each time you vote you support the process."  I understand that way of thinking.  & yet...

It baffles me, ultimately.  The system is corrupt, & the "winner-take-all" attitude is maddening.  If I were a politician - & this is why I'm not - I would attempt to find out what my constituents wanted, & vote that way.  You may think this naïve, or dishonest, but when I've worked at stations to craft policy, my proposals were often voted down, & I labored ahead anyway.  But that's not how politics works in this country, & even if it were more like that at some point, it's gotten worse.

When I was twenty, I was able to vote for President for the first time.  I guess that means I've voted in eight presidential elections.  (For the record, my candidate has won just three of those times.  I didn't vote for Clinton in 1996, but I didn't vote for anyone for President that year.)  (Well, I should say, my candidate won five of those times - but the popular vote, not the electoral college.)

This morning, on the Tuesday Morning Blend, I begged for money for the station, but I also begged for people to vote.  Here's the thing: if you find it difficult to vote, then vote for people who will make it easier.  As long as one party believes that, even if they win by one vote, they can enact whatever agenda they want, there's going to be troubles voting.  Because that one party doesn't want people who don't agree with them to vote.

It wasn't a good show & there was way too much ineffectual begging for money, but you can listen to it here if you're at all bored.  I will be drinking whiskey & hoping against hope that America surprises me tonight.  I have lived too long to think the good guys will finally win.

Or at least who I think the good guys are.  The people passionately defending candidates I find reprehensible find me passionately defending my candidates reprehensible.  One of my wife's students became more politically aware this year & discovered to his shock & horror that his mother was conservative.  So it goes.

Sigh.

Does Nothing Stop?

Yikes!  The KNON Pledge Drive is happening as we speak!  As well, tomorrow is Election Day!  So I'll have to beg for money on the air while I am begging for folks to vote!

In honor of the day, the Tuesday Morning Blend will be a bit Self Help Radio-like & the entire show will be about elections & voting.  I hope you can listen.  Where can you listen?  When can you listen?

At 89.3 fm in Dallas & Fort Worth.  Online everywhere at knon.org.

But I'd rather you voted.  Especially if the last two years have scared the shit out of you.