What? More Jazz?

Yes, it's Saturday again, so it's time for another of my rotating Saturday shows. There are only three, of course, but wouldn't it be awesome if I had a giant Price-Is-Right-ish wheel I spun on Saturday morning that had a dozen different genres & I had to make a radio show that day using only that genre? That would be fun! I shouldn't even think about it.

No, today is my jazz show, now in its third episode, it's called "Tags & Tricks," & today features mostly modern stuff from the likes of Cecil Taylor, Sun Ra, & more. You can listen to it at selfhelpradio.net. It might make you hipper.

Okay, it won't make you hipper.

I shouldn't say such things.

Fire Blimp!

He let himself get depressed only when he had had one too many. That was the point of no return. Or maybe, let's say, it was the point of the farthest the boomerang would go until it came back. It went too far. That was the point. At the edge of its limits, where it might actually be free, then, then, it could be honest.

He knew he'd return to her despite the honesty of the drink. He had taken college psychology, he paid attention, he knew which of his feelings were bullshit & which were real. He also knew he had had some kind of dumbass economical attitude about his relationship, which was, "I have invested this much, it would be ridiculous to squander such an investment with fill-in-the-blank." His equation, of course, was never divided by the circumstance, which was: "I am unhappy all the time."

At what point might she cross the line, do something so incredibly perverse & selfish to make him fall, like a broken boomerang, where it was thrown? He thought about that often. He actually daydreamed about it. He wondered if she were even that calculating, or if her own innate selfishness would eventually reach that event horizon.

It would free him. It would make the decision for him.

Or would it?

Drag Yourself To Self Help Radio

The show about dragging - including being in drag, taking drags from all sorts of smokeable items, & drag racing on the main drag - was not only a drag, but may drag you down with it. If you find yourself curious or you're feeling otherwise reckless, you can listen to the show at selfhelpradio.net. You don't need to cast a dragnet over the area to find it. It has done no wrong. It will come if you want it.

There's also a new episode of Sugar Substitute, which is not any less of a drag, although there's a lot of birthday wishes to Buddy Holly. Just so you know.

Whither Drag?

Because drag has a ton of meanings! It can mean at least seven different things. (At last count.) & each of the things it means, altogether, weigh two thousand pounds. Really! It can be a verb or a noun or even a part of speech that hasn't maybe been invented yet. The possibilities are endless. Or the possibilities can take ninety minutes. Whichever comes first. Or goes last. Or goes to last, coming in first. That's how remarkable that word is.

My cat thinks I don't know that he sleeps on my desk in front of my computer when I'm not home but I know he does because he leaves hair everywhere. He thinks he's so smart. Now I have tiny black cat hairs on my keyboard. & since I like to lick my fingers when I type, now they're all over my mouth, too.

I know, the show is happening soon! Like, later tonight soon! I don't go to sleep on Mondays because I don't think I'd wake up on Tuesday mornings in time for the show. That's kind of a drag. But the show isn't. Except, you know, this week.

So listen tomorrow morning for Sugar Substitute at 3am & Self Help Radio yawning at 4:30 am! You can listen on the air in Lexington at 88.1 fm or you can listen online at wrfl.fm. I edit out all the embarrassing parts (like when I say "booger") when I put the show up at selfhelpradio.net, so listening live is the only way to know what really happened.

Must I always have to drag you to my radio shows? Arggh!

Preface To Drag: How Do We Know You Don't Always Do Your Shows In Ladies' Clothes?

Short answer: you can't. Though I might sound weird if I'm wearing a miniskirt. Or crinkle more if I am wearing something fancy.

I've actually been in drag before. I played Lady Macbeth in a video for my twelfth grade class. I played her as if she were a Southern Belle. I refused to wear a bra. My sister wanted to let me borrow one of her bras, but I couldn't do it, couldn't wear one of her bras. I did wear one of her ugly dresses, though.

I don't know if I've dressed as a woman since then, although one summer when I was home from college, I was bored & I put on a lot of my sister's make-up. Interestingly, my father - who was of course then alive - came over & saw me all made-up, playing my nephew's video games. I'm sure it just confirmed his opinion that I was one queer kid, but I was actually embarrassed. I wouldn't have been embarrassed with anyone else, I don't believe.

Drag has more meaning than that one, you know.

More Information About Robots & Electronic Music

Robots are not afraid of words unless they have been programmed to be. Robots do not use things such as band-aids or bandages. Robots are often defined by their differences to humans. Robots can become quite vain.

I had a lovely brunch today & then made today's episode of Dickenbock Electronics, which features new music from Ital Tek, ISAN, Solvent, & more. It was a very nice show & the robots now all love me. Don't you want the robots to love you? Is that too much to ask?

Please enjoy the show at selfhelpradio.net. The robots who hang out there won't hassle you if you say you're there for the music. Just don't mention if you have any integrated circuits on you. You have been warned.

Cartoon Of Movies Of Movie Cartoonists

Sometimes I write things that don't make any sense. Okay, I always write things that don't make any sense. But some of these things seem to begin with purpose, then peter out. For example, this, below. I don't know what I was intending & it's not exactly a parody or satire. Maybe I wrote it with sympathy for the unheralded writers & artists of Disney. Who know? It certainly falls apart soon enough.

-----

Scene: Hollywood, California. A bungalow on a movie lot. Time: then. Date: now.

A thick pile of night-black cat hair rises up to talk. It's Frisky Feline, star of stage & screen!

Frisky Feline introduces the short documentary film. He's smoking a cigarette on a long diamond-encrusted holder, to signify the wealth he's made in the movies. It's a stark contrast to the terrible working conditions the cartoonists who created him had to slave in!

Scene switches to: a sweatshop in Santa Barbara. Cigar smoke fills the air.

Rows & rows of middle-aged white men in their shirtsleeves lean over their drawing boards, allowed only a pipe or a cigar to calm their grumbling guts. Standing over them, wearing a double-breasted suit, is the Overseer. He wields the pen that signs the checks. He has a giggling blonde tattooed on each arm - but these poor cartoonists will never see.

Scene switches to: wealthy voice-over artists on their palatial estates in the Hollywood hills, getting foreign massages & other bizarre treatments while explaining how they rewrote scripts to suit their talents.

-----

Just to let you know. I have scraps of things like this everywhere. I think people who really write - songs, poems, stories, etc. - save their scraps & find ways to use their ideas in other ways. I just save them. Then I look at them occasionally & go "What the fuck?"

Revenge Of The Obscure Radio Show!

Actually, that should say, "Revenge, this week's theme on that obscure radio show." The obscure radio show is of course Self Help Radio, which you've never heard of & why should you? It's really not that good.

However, if you have some time to kill & you'd like to hear lots of songs about revenge, this radio show would fit your bill. You can listen to it & other eminently time-wasting shows at selfhelpradio.net. It's all very normal.

As normal as revenge.

Whither Revenge?

It's funny you should ask that. I was having a conversation with someone tonight - let's just say it was my mother, since she's 82 & more or less inoffensive - & she was talking about a friend with whom she's estranged & the desperate need she seems to feel to do something to "pay them back" for a perceived wrong. This wrong, it turns out, is simply disagreeing with her. My mother (hypothetically) can't abide the fact that this friend disagrees with her on how she (my mother, but not really) feels her friend should be living her life.

How would this revenge she desires take place? A sarcastic card seemed to be the weapon of choice. I asked my mother (it wasn't really my mother), "Do you want to stay friends with this person?" She said, yes. But she was angry at her. I said, "Do you think this card you would send with mean stuff written in it would make her realize that you were right & she was wrong, or do you think it would make her not want to speak to you ever again." My mother (who is not the person I am really talking about, I swear) said she thought it would continue the feud. "I guess I'd rather be her friend than hurt her," she said.

I'll bet you she sends the mean card anyway. People are like that.

Oh, & yes, Self Help Radio is on very early Tuesday morning at 4:30 am. You won't be up for it, this I know, & I don't expect you to be, though you can of course hear it live on the 88.1 fm frequency in all of Lexington as well as online at wrfl.fm if you are. If you're like me & I certainly hope you're not that unfortunate, you will wait to hear it some time on Tuesday at selfhelpradio.net. You can download it in secrecy & if anyone asks, just tell them it's porn. That's not as embarrassing.

Preface To Revenge: Why Do You Do Me Wrong?

Revenge is a dish best served over easy.

Seriously, after a day like this, that's all I've got.

Plus, the wife never fills the water bowl. We've got like six animals & I'm always finding the water bowl empty. That's kinda cruel, don't you think? Maybe not Michael Vick cruel, but still. She's not going to win any awards.

Is this mic on? What? Where am I? What have I done?

One ought to be more magnanimous, that's all I meant. You know?

Zeke Heads 'Em Off At The Pass

Yessirree rattler, that fictional so-&-so Zeke Moonshine came in outta the prairie today to rustle up some fine ol' country & blues tunes for the second installment of his immodestly-titled series "The Zeke Moonshine Show." He wants you to know that no buffalo were harmed in the recording of this show. He also thinks it may be more sanitary if we provide him with a spittoon during his sessions.

You can listen to his musical adventures at selfhelpradio.net. Before he & his faithful steed Camouflage went off into the sunset, he promised to be back some day, & that then - & only then - would he pay us back what he owes us.

One of our engineers woke up & said, "Who was that backwards-masked man?"

Cats With Asthma & Other Rhyming Memes

She said something not-nice to the flamingo. The flamingo did not hear her.

She decided to try a different approach. The flamingo appeared to be ignoring her.

She wanted to make more noise. But there was a dozen dozing wasps in the nearby trees.

She knew a couple of the wasps, socially. The others might be more disagreeable.

She did however need to mildly insult the flamingo. After all it had said about her.

She had heard from a farmer that the flamingo gossiped about her. It wasn't the first time she had heard this.

She hadn't expected the flamingo to be hard-of-hearing. Nor meaner than a box of hot nails.

She knew she should never become friends with a flamingo. The wasps she knew, for example, had warned her.

She had thought of an excellent put-down with which to insult the flamingo. But the flamingo did not hear her.

She decided to say it louder. This time the flamingo heard her.

She expected the flamingo to lose its temper. But it just said, "Same to you."

She accepted the impasse. Over in the nearby trees, some wasps snickered.

It Was A Pleasure Then

Well, it was. Although I didn't play that song. Which I wanted to, but it's eight minutes long. So I chose to play long Roxy Music & Phil Ochs songs instead.

Yes, Self Help Radio's first "normal" slot of the fall was a pleasurable show all about pleasure. I pleasured myself during the entire show. Wait. Did I really say that?

You can listen to the show at selfhelpradio.net. It is my pleasure to offer such pleasure to you.

Thanks for listening!

Whither Pleasure?

It is a PLEASURE to do radio.

It is a PLEASURE to be on WRFL.

It is a PLEASURE to be able to do as ridiculous show as Self Help Radio.

It is a PLEASURE to be on the air every Tuesday morning from 3 to 6am!

It is a PLEASURE to split that time between Sugar Substitute & Self Help Radio!

It is a PLEASURE to know you're listening. If you're listening. Won't you listen?

Preface To Pleasure: Early Morning Beginnings

As you well know, I am beginning anew at a new radio station, the wonderful WRFL, which is at 88.1 on the fm dial in Lexington. Since I am beginning anew, I urged the powers-that-be (who happens to be a very nice fellow named Matt) to treat me no different from any of the newcomers to the station. He obliged.

So Self Help Radio will have to air sometime during my first official timeslot on WRFL: 3 - 6 am. AM. Ante meridian. In the morning!

I have of course done early morning shows before. I started at KVRX at 5 to 7am, & subbed many early morning slots. During breaks between school, I often did large blocks - midnight to nine am, for example - & loved almost every minute of it. The big issue here isn't the time - I'm happy to do radio even when no one is listening - but when to put Self Help Radio?

Self Help Radio from 3 to 4:30 am would start off the block like I normally do. But surely more people would be listening as they wake from 4:30 to 6 am? Certainly! Okay then!

Because I am a new deejay I am required to fulfill certain charting obligations of the station, so I'll do Sugar Substitute (which is a pop show) from 3 to 4:30 & then Self Help Radio from 4:30 to 6. I know it's early - even in different time zones - so of course I'll understand if you can wake to listen to it live. I'll still archive the shows on selfhelpradio.net. You're off the hook.

& thanks for listening to me work this through in my head.

Um, Zeke?

Well, don't that beat all. I ain't heard nothin' from Zeke Moonshine all week long. I'm a-guessin' he ain't gone deliver his show what he promised to deliver this week. Dad burn the sidewinder! It almost makes me wanna throw away my whiskey!

Actually, it's not Zeke's fault, it's mine. Zeke is, after all, fictional. I am also but perhaps less so. I've been subbing shows at WRFL all week & just didn't have the time to commit to doing Zeke's show. I'll do it next Saturday, I promise.

I will be subbing another WRFL show (which you can listen to online) tomorrow night (Sunday) from 8 to 10, just playing tune & having fun. & Self Help Radio's season starts Tuesday!

Doing lots of radio makes me happy but sleepy.

I Have To Get To Bed...

It's been a long week. & it's not over yet.

But you can hear last night's episode of Self Help Radio (all about beds) at selfhelpradio.net. Best if listened to in... Well, you know.

It's That Time Tonight Again!

Yes, Self Help Radio - with this week's theme being "beds" - airs at midnight tonight (Lexington time) on the wonderful WRFL 88.1 fm. It may be the last time I'm on at that time - or at all for the semester, as the new schedule starts on Monday & I am not sure if Self Help Radio has a place on it.

Do listen! Do call!

(Or if you can't, you know, the show'll be on selfhelpradio.net. No worries.)

Whither Beds?

Truly what is central to every home you have is a bed. It's time, you say, to lie down. What is more natural than a bed? Nor comfy?

Each & every scientists know that beds are absolutely central to the room in which they reside, which you would call a bed-room. Could you keep couch or love seat therein? Perhaps a futon. "Futon" is another language for "bed."

Never never order a bed out of a box nor catalog! Always always to the store to perhaps lie upon nor be supine on proper bed showcase room. Bring ones or ones which you would always share bed, if handy. Testable!

Would you as a human being (no offense) imagine there are lots of songs about bed? You would be corrected! What is more natural & central to your private music collection than a song about beds? Everyone knows the words!

Perhaps you relax on a bed right now. Who shall stop you if you? Just please do not tear the mattress. There are penalties as far as Interpol or whatever the United Nations is now called.

Let's not let the future legislate the beds of tomorrow! Your own blankets are your own, you must not share. You know what is central to your pillows is your head firmly nor gently placed there upon it. It is all right to sleep.

Truly there are beds & their songs are ones you may even hear in the night as you want to sleep!

Preface To Beds: Queen Sized Or King Sized?

The bed I brought to Austin with me was basically a kind of army cot, with a thin foam mattress, on a green metal frame. I don't remember if I made the bed every morning before I went to class. Probably. I was pretending to be grown up.

The bed I had in my post-college days was a decent-sized mattress I kept on the floor. I pretty much only gave that up once I started shacking up with the woman I would marry. Although I do believe I did have a box spring under the mattress. I used to keep that bed in my living room, & used the bedroom for storage.

Here's a list of all the types of bed sizes possible (I suppose): Twin, Single, Double, Full, Queen, King, California King, Western King, Eastern King. California King? Why not just call it the Schwartzenegger?

The woman I married takes beds very, very seriously. I don't think I would mind, even in my advanced years, sleeping on a mattress on the floor. For one thing, it removes a potential hiding place for cats. Cats love to hide. They love to hide under beds. I know, it's cruel, to not give cats their hiding places, but I have spent precious hours looking for cats who spitefully did not want to be found. Sometimes, you know, to give them medicine.

I didn't ask how much the current bed I sleep in costs. I didn't pay for it. I also don't know what size it is. It's big enough to comfortably sleep two humans, three dogs, & three cats. If they don't hog the bed. Which they do. & who gets to sleep on a small sliver of bed, nearly falling off, at the edge? You guessed it.

That wouldn't happen with a mattress on the floor!