Preface To Feeling Good: Feeling Bad

It's true, I feel awful today. I'm not sick, I pulled a muscle in my back, underneath my right shoulder, a muscle which the wife calls a "rhomboid" even though you know & I know a rhomboid is "a parallelogram in which adjacent sides are of unequal lengths & angles are oblique." How could a geometric figure - a two-dimensional one at that - be causing me pain in my back? Is she calling me two-dimensional? Or just my poor old back?

I understand this is one of the consequences of getting old. You overextend & spend the next few days smelling like Ben Gay. It reminds me of a Louis CK bit...





I am waiting for the wife to come home so I can spend the day whining in bed.

What? I have to be one hundred percent for the radio show. Otherwise I'm complaining to YOU for ninety minutes. You see.

Self Help 101: Putting Off Talking About Procrastination

Note: This is a series of awkwardly written articles by the maker of Self Help Radio about popular self-help topics because he's getting all self-help-y after many years of mocking self-help with the title of his radio show. People, it's bad.

In daily life, as in weekly life, we as people have things to do. This is as true now as it was yesterday, & in fact the process is cumulative, so now we have more things to do today than we did yesterday, especially if we didn't do anything yesterday except try to catch up on television shows we forgot we had saved in our DVR & now because of that we missed last night's Community god damn it.

Scientists & late-night talk show hosts call this process "procrastination," & while there is no "amateur crastination," nor are we to believe there are people who are "anti-crastination," the definition we have come to know & love is "the act of postponing, delaying or putting off, especially out of habitual carelessness or laziness." It is certainly an ugly definition, especially for people such as me, whose carelessness is not in the slightest habitual, & whose laziness can be excused by a note from my doctor.

The thing is, I don't want to talk about procrastination right now. I'm just not ready. I thought I was ready but then I had a long conversation with my cats about cheese that took up the entire morning. (By the way, my cats, who love cheese, are especially critical of my veganism, although at least two of them approve of Daiya, which is a vegan cheese & not a weird feline martial arts regimen.)

I also don't think you want to talk about procrastination right now. It's too personal, isn't it? It hits home. If we have to talk about procrastination, we might as well also talk about our mothers, & no one wants to do that, not even our mothers. No, there are more important topics in the self-help realm than procrastination, & sure we might think it's vaguely amusing that we're procrastinating about procrastination, we certainly didn't plan it that way. It's just that there are other things we're planning to do before we get around to this.

What other things? I'm glad you asked!

1) I was thinking of getting a label gun. They probably have really fancy ones now. I bet there's a bored college graduate at my local Office Place who'd love to stare blankly at me at this very moment while trying to remember if they stock label guns or not.

2) Do you remember how excited I was about that book I recently bought? I'm still pretty excited about it. If I get some time this afternoon I can totally read it. I don't remember what it is, of course, but it's sitting on the top of the bookshelf so I can get it down & crack it open. That's what.

3) We're out of pickles. That's just not acceptable.

4) I remember there were some links to cute things on the web I need to look at. They are in fact adding cute things all the time. Sometimes, when I am staring at a cute thing, I can hit "refresh" on my browser & suddenly there are more cute things. & you want to keep hitting "refresh." You want to.

5) If I must, yard work. The leaves that have not already blown into the neighbor's yard, I understand, are mine to rake.

If it's all the same to you, we can talk about procrastination another time. When? I'll get back to you. Let's just say: when you & I simply have nothing else better to do.

A Joke A Day A Week, Episode Twenty-One

I've mentioned before that the A Joke A Day people don't want to single out any person as the average "stupid person" in the stupid person joke. At the University Of Texas, & even when I was growing up, the default stupid person was an Aggie, the nickname of a student at Texas A&M, a university situated in a parking lot called College Station, Texas. A&M stands for Agricultural & Mechanical, as the name of the school used to be the Agricultural & Mechanical College of Texas. "Aggie" is short for Agricultural. It's actually a little more affectionate than "Longhorn," which is what I suppose students at the University Of Texas are called.

By the way, "Aggie" is used as a diminutive for many other schools in the US, but I am referring to Texas A&M students. I don't know if Aggies from, let's say, UC-Davis in California get as bad a rap.

On the world stage, it seems the nationality most singled out for rampant stupidity is the Polish. I married a woman whose parents are Polish, & she seems to have embraced this stereotype in a charmingly self-effacing way. But I'm sure there are others who hate jokes about their heritage.

Anyway, the A Joke A Day people don't want to insult Aggies or Poles & so have invented a "non-existent" person called an "Antartian" who, they say, is "someone who lives in ignorance when knowledge is available. He persists in error without correction, & represents us all when we make a really big mistake. The person who has always been used as the stereotype for stupidity."

(Don't believe me? They define it here. Apparently they don't mind offending folks with big front teeth & who have jaundice.)

This week's A Joke A Day had sample Antartian joke. You can fit your own preferred stereotype in to make it more flavorful for you. I confess I found it kinda funny.

An Antartian named Babbette finds herself in dire trouble. Her business has gone bust and she's in serious financial trouble. She's so desperate that she decides to ask God for help. She begins to pray... "God, please help me. I've lost my business and if I don't get some money, I'm going to lose my house as well. Please let me win the lotto."

Lotto night comes and somebody else wins it. Babbette again prays..."God, please let me win the lotto! I've lost my business, my house and I'm going to lose my car as well."

Lotto night comes and Babbette still has no luck.

Once again, she prays..."My God, why have you forsaken me?? I've lost my business, my house and my car. My children are starving. I don't often ask you for help and I have always been a good servant to you. PLEASE just let me win the lotto this one time so I can get my life back in order."

Suddenly there is a blinding flash of light as the heavens open and Babbette is confronted by the voice of God Himself: "Babbette, meet Me halfway on this. Buy a ticket."

The rest of the week was filled with jokes that have been passed around the internet for twenty years & seemed as tired as a fourteen-year-old hound dog. Oh, also this bon mot: You know you're really drunk if you can't lie on the floor without holding on.

Ha ha ha it's funny because it's zzzzzzzzzz.

Inside The Outside Show

Self Help Radio broadcasting from outside! Well, not outside. I promised my mom I wouldn't do a radio show in the cold. & it wasn't really cold. It was windy, though. I didn't want leaves blowing into my face. I promised my mom. So I did do a show about outside inside. But I had a window open!

Also, like most Self Help Radio shows, it looks better on the outside. Sorry about that.

One side of the outside is right here while another side of the outside is over here. What's in each side is listed below. Also: let's just say this show is best enjoyed outside. Why not?

(one side)

"Everybody, Come Outside!" Pomegranates _Everybody, Come Outside!_
"Go Outside" Cults _Cults_
"You Outside" Dave Justin _Circus Days Vol. 6_

"Wenn's Draußen Grün Wird" Manfred Krug _Ein Hauch Von Frühling_
"On The Outside Looking In" Flanagan & Allen _Underneath The Arches: 24 Favourite Songs_
"Join The World Outside" Carol & Sherry _The Girls Of Rare Rockin' Records_
"Outside World" XTC _Drums & Wires_
"Outside Inside" Markley _A Group_
"Inside, Outside, Upside Down" Sonny Childe _Inside, Outside, Upside Down_

"Baby, It's Cold Outside (with Homer & Jethro)" June Carter _Keep On The Sunny Side_
"It's Cold Outside" The Choir _Box Of Trash: Pebbles Box_
"Baby It's Cold Outside" Pezband _Poptopia! Power Pop Classics Of The '70s_

(another side)

"Come Outside" Mike Sarne _Hey! Look What I Found, Vol. 3_
"Wake Up, Jimmy (Something's Happening Outside)" Montage _Montage_

"I'm On The Outside Looking In" Eddie Holland _The Complete Motown Singles: 1963_
"Outside City Limits" Cashelles _Here's A Song! (You Might Have Missed) Vol. 8_
"Outside Of Memphis" DeDe Turner Happening _Eccentric Soul: The Young Disciples_
"Outside The Record Hop (Trying To Get In)" The Five Du-Tones _Chicago Twine Time_
"Outside Of A Small Circle Of Friends" Phil Ochs _Pleasures Of The Harbor_

"Outsider" The Ramones _Subterranean Jungle_
"Outside My Door" Can _Monster Movie_
"Inside Outside" Good Idea _Quagmire, Vol. 6_
"Outside Chance" The Turtles _Nuggets: Original Artyfacts From The First Psychedelic Era, Vol. 2_
"Inside The Outside" Love & Rockets _Seventh Dream Of Teenage Heaven_

Whither Outside?

How much time do you spend outside? If you're most Americans (& I don't imagine you are), you spend less than two hours a day outside. (I'm supposing this is on average.) By way of comparison, the average American between the ages of 18 & 35 spends twice as much time on his or her computer every day, & a little more than that watching the TV. (Some youngsters, of course, now watch the TV on their computer. Are pollsters aware of that?)

I confess I am the average American & I spend around two hours a day outside, usually walking the dogs. But on bad weather days I don't go outside at all. But this episode of Self Help Radio will change all that! I'm sure of it.

Self Help Radio's paean to "outside" airs tomorrow morning from 7:30 to 9am on 88.1 fm WRFL in Lexington. Not in Lexington? You can listen online at wrfl dot fm. Not awake at that time? Listen later tomorrow at self help radio dot net.

I may even be doing the show outside!

Preface To Outside: Baby, It's Cold Inside

It is getting cold outside here in Kentucky, where the trees have almost dropped all their leaves on my lawn. Soon enough it'll be full-blown winter, which very rarely happened in Texas, & of course when it did, everyone in Texas freaked out. Here in Kentucky, drivers just double-down on their already horrible driving.

But does it follow that if it's cold outside, it should also be cold inside? It does if you live with cheapskates! Yes, my animals, who also pay the rent, take advantage of my lack of fur to keep the home even cooler in the winter than they do in the summer. (In the summer, they're hot, you know, since they're covered in fur.)

There's a lot of taunting - they call me "thumbs," mocking my hands, which they really envy - & one very cold December night they got me drunk & convinced me that I needed to shave all my hair off to make way for my "winter fur." Never never never trust a giggly beagle with a razor.

My animals are assholes.

Self Help 101: The Stinky Personality Syndrome

Note: This is a series of awkwardly written articles by the maker of Self Help Radio about popular self-help topics because he's getting all self-help-y after many years of mocking self-help with the title of his radio show. People, it's bad.

You've met the people I'm going to talk about. The geneticists. The people who know who B.F. Skinner is. The people who watched Star Trek & think DNA is magical. They're all the same. They say, "You are who you are." They say, "The environment is at best a mitigating factor because you are born to be the person you were born as to be." They say, "It doesn't matter if your mother locked you in a closet for the first eleven years of your life, you were destined to be a mediocre deejay." (No relation.)

But to this we can say hogwash! We can change, & not just our hair, our jobs, & our opinion about sports teams. We can change our stinky personalities. We can. I swear.

By change I may mean "tweak." But surely something is better than nothing, right?

At the outset we must admit that it's not easy. Despite how delicious antidepressants are, they cannot change your personality. So stop calling your ex. Seriously. No, change is difficult & I will understand right now if you'd prefer to just order a pizza because sometimes a pizza is better than your life. Most of the time. Pizza is just so good.

Here are a few tips I've read about over the years which I am absolutely certain will help change your personality or your money back. Please allow four to six weeks for delivery:

1) Be more positive. Remember, a positive is noted by a "plus" sign. "Plus" signs are good. An A+ is better than an A. A-Positive blood is preferred by vampires over regular old A. The positive side of a C cell battery delivers a more sensual shock to the tongue when licked. Get rid of your electrons & make yourself more positive. & like attracts like!

2) People like passion. Get excited by things, but make sure it's not in a creepy way. If you're excited by something & it seems to other people that's you're drunk, that's creepy. Also, too much passion may be mistaken for religious fervor, & religious fervor costs you ten percent of your income at the door. Just saying.

3) Keep a stiff upper lip. That's an idiom for "be brave." When I was first developing this course, the attendees thought I meant for them to inject botox into their upper lips. I didn't mean that then & I don't mean that now. But they were quite brave in the way they recovered almost twenty percent of the use of their upper lips.

4) Choose the one emotional trait you'd like to improve & stick with it. Take, for example, serenity. Aren't serene people a little annoying? Wouldn't you like to just give them a shove & push them over? Just knock them on their ass. They look really surprised. You won't be able to stop laughing. & when they get back up, knock them over again. It's just as funny the second time. The third time, though, not so much.

Just a quick note: many people have written me letters since I first started writing this that there are some people they've met who don't have a stinky personality. To that I also say hogwash! Those you have met, obviously, are people who have no personality at all.

A Joke A Day A Week, Episode Twenty

Wow! Twenty of these! & the hits keep coming.

I have mentioned before how the folks at the A Joke A Day mailing list pride themselves on not being offensive. Humor is, after all, a very safe thing. Just ask Lenny Bruce.

I'm not sure how one who has or has had a loved one stricken with this devastating condition might feel about this particular "joke," from Saturday:

What’s the good part about Alzheimer’s diseased [sic]?
You keep meeting new friends.

This illustrates, to me, the fundamental problem with the A Joke A Day philosophy: "Score big at your next gathering, cocktail or sales appointment with politically-correct jokes. The best & freshest clean jokes in the world! A Joke a Day guarantees to keep all jokes & humor clean." (Emphasis mine.)

Should jokes be "politically correct"? Should they be "clean"? She these things trump editing & spell-checking? (Apparently the last is a "yes.")

Is making fun of a horrible affliction in which people watch their loved ones turn into strangers, people whom they knew as smart & funny & insightful, suddenly forgetting everything, even them, sometimes wandering off, sometimes angry & frightened, is making fun of that "politically correct"?

The dumbshits at the A Joke A Day mailing list have backed themselves into a corner. They want every joke to be as "clean" as a bon mot from Miss Manners, but humor isn't like that. A lot of what is funny is funny because it's outrageous, &/or contains painful truths that people don't usually articulate.

The occasional offensive joke slipped past the A Joke A Day nimrods reveals, I think, the philosophical bankruptcy of the entire enterprise - & it demonstrates in stark relief why most of the A Joke A Day jokes are not, in fact, jokes after all.

Inbox padding, I suppose, but jokes? Nah.

The Show One Wears Like A Shirt

At long last, come to radio, a hard-hitting, potentially insightful, oftentimes pedantic look at those scourges of our upper bodies: shirts! Have you felt oppressed by your shirt? How about your socks? Well, don't think about your socks - this show is about shirts! Is it possible your deejay did not wear a shirt during this show? How about you? Would you be brave enough to listen to a show about shirts shirtlessly? This is your future we are talking about, friend.

This show was made of a cotton/polyester blend, & washing instructions are on the tag. The shirt is on display at the Self Help Radio website. The front of the show can be scrutinized here, & the back of the show can be admired here. The designs of the shirt are listed below.

Only you can decide how you feel about the tyranny of the shirt.

(front)

"Shirt" The Bonzo Dog Doo Dah Band _Tadpoles_
"Shirt Scene" Marc Riley & The Creepers _Shadow Figure 12"_
"Cambric Shirt" Bruce Hutton _Roll Back The Carpet_

"I Love My Shirt" Donovan _Pied Piper_
"Keep Your Shirt On John (with Hal Lone Pine)" Betty Cody _The Successful Hillbilly Era Of Betty Cody_
"Blue Jeans & A Boy's Shirt" Glen Glenn _Glen Rocks_
"Your Shirt Tail's Out" Hot Lips Page _1946-1950_
"The Boy In The Butterfly Shirt" Damien Youth _Strangest Hits Vol. 2_
"Brown Shirt" Yeah Yeah Noh _When I Am A Big Girl_

"T-Shirt Weather" The Lucksmiths _Where Were We?_
"Let's Make T-Shirts" State Broadcasters _The Ship & The Iceberg_
"No One Notices Your Brand New T-Shirt" Raymond & Maria _No One Notices Your Brand New T-Shirt_

(back)

"Rubinoos T-Shirt" Hormones In Abundance _Hit Music Only_
"Nurse's T-Shirt, Kid's T-Shirt" Todd Barry _From Heaven_

"The Little Shirt My Mother Made For Me" Marty Robbins _Just Me & My Guitar_
"Green Shirt" Elvis Costello _Armed Forces_
"Blue Shirt" The Colours _Behind The Banana Curtain_
"The Hairshirt" REM _Green_
"Brother Bill (The Last Clean Shirt)" T-Bone Walker _Very Rare_

"The Boy In The Paisley Shirt" Television Personalities _They Could Have Been Bigger Than The Beatles_
"Me & My Paisley Shirt" Me & Dean Martin _The Sound Of Leamington Spa, Volume 3_
"Paisley Shirt" Baby Doll Lounge _Welcome To The Wetherbeat Scene 1988 - 1991_
"Favourite Shirts (Boy Meets Girl)" Haircut 100 _Favourite Shirts (Boy Meets Girl)_
"Shirt" Menomena _I Am the Fun Blame Monster! B-Sides!_

Whither Shirts?

I am exhausted. But I can keep my shirt on. We had a housewarming party last night - we bought a new house in August - & when I say "we" I mean my cats & my wife - but it's only recently become cold enough to need a housewarming - & as I write this I'm not even done with this week's show. I know.

There will be lots of songs about shirts & some frank shirt talk tomorrow, from 7:30 to 9am on WRFL Lexington, 88.1 fm. If you're not in town, or you're somehow shirtless, you can listen to the show on wrfl dot fm. & I'll have the short washed & pressed in time to wear it later in the day at self help radio dot net.

I know, why a show about shirts? Well, why not?

Preface To Shirts: If I Have To Be Skins, I'm Going Home

"Shirts versus Skins (or Shirts & Skins)," says the Wikipedia, "is a common form of denoting team affiliations in an informal sports game; typically when played on a public court or park. The practice involves the members of one team wearing shirts while the other does not. This is used in the absence of uniforms."

There's also apparently a band called Shirts Vs. Skins, though I've never heard their music.

I also happened to find this poll which "explores male shirtlessness in sports particularly in team sports or other group sports where guys are only involved," & that sounds a little gay.

I never thought of it as gay when I was a kid, but I hated shirts vs. skins games, & don't remember ever taking my shirt off when a shirts vs. skins game was played so I either a) didn't play in those games or b) managed to weasel my way onto the shirts team (which was also probably the losing team, full of guys too self-conscious to take their shirts off) (how awful was it that we were self-conscious at an early age) so I didn't have to take my shirt off.

The weird thing is, I'm pretty sure we had shirts vs. skins games in middle school gym class. I think perhaps the coaches who taught P.E. would choose the teams so that the fat kids & the deformed kids & whoever else didn't want to take their shirts off were put into the same team. I don't remember having any mean P.E. teachers in middle school. The really mean apparently taught in high school.

Self Help 101: Self-Reinvention

Note: This is a series of awkwardly written articles by the maker of Self Help Radio about popular self-help topics because he's getting all self-help-y after many years of mocking self-help with the title of his radio show. People, it's bad.

You are unhappy. So what? So am I. What do I care? But what if I do care? Can I speak to you in generalities that may soothe your inner turmoil with only slightly concealed condescension? Is that what you want? All right then!

Imagine you have a nice house, or any permanent place to stay at all. & maybe a relationship although you're pretty sure your so-called "partner" has cheated on you, even once with someone who works at a bike shop. A bike shop! Do you spend a lot of time daydreaming about being someone else, like someone whose antipsychotic drugs work most of the time & who can afford a semi-automatic weapon?

Whoa there Gloomy Gus! What if you're actually projecting into the world your own unhappiness? Wouldn't you just continue to be sad, even after you got a nice Walther P99 & figured out how to load it? Of course you would. Because it's not the world you hate: it's yourself. It's time for what we in the self-help trade call "re-invention."

Here are five ways to re-invent yourself that I just made up but which totally sound like they'd work:

1) Start talking in an English accent. Don't be all goofy & attempt to say things like British people would - like "telly" for "television" or "biscuits" for "food" - but instead use the limited vocabulary you've always had. It's not an affectation; it's a re-invention. (This could work with other accents, too, although an Australian accent would be annoying.)

2) Think like a jogger. This is handy because it doesn't require you to act like a jogger, which involves running & sweating & long hours wasted running & sweating. What does it mean to think like a jogger? I don't know, I'm not a jogger. But some joggers seem to have it all together.

3) Realize that you are powerless over your addiction, that your life had become unmanageable. Oh, no, wait, that's the first step of the 12 Step Program. Sorry about that.

4) If you find yourself often fleeing in terror, see if there are other emotions in which you can flee instead. Fleeing in amusement, for example, is easier on your heart & might actually be charming. Fleeing in hatred might have saved your last relationship, or at the very least prolonged it long enough so you'd have a date for your cousin's wedding.

5) Try a new salad dressing. What could it hurt?

As you can imagine, there are many web sites & books on self-re-invention. None of them work but mine. I know, some of them say the same thing on their jackets, but who are you going to believe, some person who's taken the time to write a whole book full of ways to re-invent yourself they've made up or someone who has a show called Self Help Radio?

I thought so.

A Joke A Day A Week, Episode Nineteen

This week's A Joke A Day a week was no better nor worse than usual, but it did do something that surprised me: it baffled me.

Seriously. Under the category of "one-liners," Tuesday's A Joke A Day said simply this:

Wife is the knife which cuts the life but there is no life without a wife.

This isn't a matter of not understanding because it's about a subject I could care less about (see "golf jokes"). This is apparently a "one-liner" that is trying both to be clever ("wife" rhymes with "life" & "knife") & misogynistic (is the life the knife-wife is cutting your own?) but also perhaps profound (everyone comes from a mother, I think it's trying to say).

But what the fuck does it mean? Do wives ruin husbands' lives more than husbands ruin the lives of their wives? How many battered men shelters are there out there? & how long has it been since it was required for a woman to be married to have a child?

Not to mention that "wife" not only implies heterosexual marriage. The crafty fellow who tossed off this bon mot doesn't seem to be aware of the gains made in both gay rights & women's rights in the last forty years.

I know, I'm thinking about this too much. I'm not just thinking, you know, that it's impossible to imagine someone finding this funny - I'm thinking it's impossible to imagine someone even understanding it.

Happy Halloween!

Do you want to know the difference between a graveyard & a cemetery? Do you wonder what significance graveyards & cemeteries have for human beings? Do you want to hear what someone thinks are the three most haunted burial grounds in the United States? Dude, you should totally listen to this show! I talk about all of those things!

Happy Halloween to you from Self Help Radio, which explores graveyards (not literally but musically) on today's holiday show. The show is available at the Self Help Radio website, conveniently divided into two equally scary parts: part one in a freshly dug grave, & part two in a spooky crypt. Not to give anything away, but some of the scary sounds that you'll hear are listed below.

Also! If you want more Halloween music, I still have last year's show (about haunted houses) as well as a sub show I did (about zombies) on the website. You can find them at the top of the archive page. Enjoy at your own risk.

Happy Halloween!

(part one)

"The Graveyard Shift" The Ghouls _Dracula's Deuce_
"My Baby Digs Graves" The Easter Monkeys _Splendor Of Sorrow_
"The Cemetery" Architecture In Helsinki _In Case We Die_

"Goin' To A Graveyard" The Fuzztones _Monster A-Go-Go_
"Murder In The Graveyard" Screaming Lord Sutch _Rock & Horror_
"The Grave.. & Beyond" Zombina & The Skeletones _Taste The Blood Of Zombina & The Skeletones_
"Dead Man's Grave" The Sapphires _The Sapphires_
"Cemetry Gates" The Smiths _The Queen Is Dead_
"Graveyard Rock" Tarantula Ghoul _Horror Hop_

"Old People In The Cemetery" Of Montreal _Aldhils Arboretum_
"Rockin' In The Graveyard" Jackie Morningstar _Rockin' Bones: 1950's Punk & Rockabilly_
"Graveyard" Jeffrey Lewis _It's The Ones Who've Cracked That The Light Shines Through_

(part two)

"Mass Graves" George Carlin _Will Jesus Bring The Pork Chops?_
"Gravedigger Rock" The Polecats _Rockabilly Guys: The Best Of The Polecats_

"Gravedigging Blues" Beat Happening _Black Candy_
"The Graveyard Rock" Rodd Keith _I Died Today_
"Monster Mash" The Bonzo Dog Doo Dah Band _Cornology_
"Graveyard Girl" M83 _Saturdays = Youth_
"Graveyard Girlfriend" The Groovie Ghoulies _Re-Animation Festival_

"In My Grave" The Spectors _Beat Is Murder: Cockfights & Catfights 1992-1996_
"Graveyard" Leroy Bowman _The Ultimate 50's & 60's Rockin' Horror Disc: Blood Curdling Rock & Roll_
"Please Mr. Gravedigger" David Bowie _London Boy_
"Graveyard Groove" The Revillos _Attack Of The Giant Revillos_
"Pet Sematary" The Ramones _Brain Drain_
"Found Love In A Graveyard" Veronica Falls _Veronica Falls_

Whither Graveyards?

I'm running out of Halloween show ideas! I don't think there are many songs about pumpkins!

I was actually going to do the show on curses this year when, like an idea that was only in my peripheral vision, I thought about graveyards a couple of months ago. I was also thinking of doing a show on Japanese monster movies, & might have gone that way if I hadn't already thought of graveyards in the interim.

This is not very interesting, I know, but perhaps you have an idea I haven't had. It's a little weird to be asking for help on a theme that won't be explored for literally a year (even before I've done the show about graveyards!) but there you are. Perhaps next year I'll do a show entirely made up of themes from horror films. Or maybe I can find enough songs about pumpkins by then.

In any event, tomorrow! At 7:30 am! In Lexington! Is Self Help Radio's 2011 Halloween show! About graveyards! It'll be as scary as anything at 7:30 am is! Listen live on the 88.1 fm frequency *or* online at the WRFL website, whichever is most handy. I'll archive the show later at self help radio dot net.

& remember, you can still listen to last year's shows about zombies & haunted houses! Perfectly spooky listening for your Halloween night!

Preface To Halloween 2011 - Graveyards!: My Life Is A Boneyard

Self Help Radio prides itself on not repeating itself, like other radio shows do. I understand that the point of radio is repetition, & that more people would perhaps listen to Self Help Radio (arguable) if it played the same thing over & over, like most popular radio shows do. Alas, it is not in my constitution.

I do love to do "annual" shows, like Halloween, which is coming up this week. But while I like doing a Halloween show, I also want to hone in on some aspect of Halloween rather than being generic. Also, I don't want to repeat myself. I do try to come up with an interesting, holiday-related theme on the topic. How have I done so far?

In 2003, it was just "Halloween."
In 2004, I didn't do a Halloween show. Long story.
In 2005, the show was about vampires.
In 2006, the show was about monsters.
In 2007, the show was about zombies.
In 2008, the show was about witches.
In 2009, the show was about werewolves.
In 2010, the show was about haunted houses.

(Speaking of not repeating myself, I did reprise the zombie show for a WRFL sub last year, & you can hear the show here if you're so inclined. I justify the repetition by saying "it wasn't a Self Help Radio show." Also, if you'd like to hear last year's show about haunted houses, it's also still available for the listening to.)

This year's show, as you perhaps have read in the post's subject line, is about graveyards. I have ideas for other future Halloween themes, like voodoo & curses, but the graveyard theme hit me at the last minute. Clearly I need to listen closely to cliched Halloween songs to tease out Halloween details I have been heretofore ignoring.

The Competition

Self Help Radio is not a self-help radio show. Oftentimes when people come to the web site or especially to the Facebook page(*), they expect a generic "self-help" page, & are probably confused when it's not, as the Wikipedia describes it, "a self-guided improvement— economically, intellectually, or emotionally — often with a substantial psychological basis." In fact, many have suggested (or none have) that no one has ever been helped by Self Help Radio.

Yet there are actual self-help radio shows, & perhaps Self Help Radio should consider them the competition. What are these shows? Should Self Help Radio be worried?

If you use Google to search for "self-help radio" (leaving the dash in, which Self Help Radio doesn't), the second result(**) is Self Dev Radio (obviously they didn't want or couldn't afford the selfhelpradio.com address, which sits idle), a site that appears to be internet-only, & which boasts that it "broadcast(s) inspirational interviews, self-development features & smooth music 24/7!" Going to the web site will let you immediately hear some of that "smooth music," plus the loud, confident voice of a fellow telling you what you're also reading on the site. In case you can't read. Or something.

Next is the motherlode: a list of links relating to "self-help" on Blog Talk Radio. Here is a treasure trove (if this is your kind of treasure) of links to shows with titles like "Finding Happiness Within," "Message From The Oneness," "Fate Versus Destiny," "Healing Wisdom: Attract The Perfect Partner For You," "Motivation, Exercise & ADD," & "Instinct Combat Shooting."

Hey. Combat shooting can be a form of self-help. Don't balk!

Up next is Self Improvement Talk Radio, another riff on the more familiar "self-help" phrase. It appears to be not a list of shows, but a promotional page for a particular self-help guru, Dr. Anne Marie Evers, who is Canadian & who also has a certificate (that could be Canadian for BA? (***)) in therapeutic touch. (The Wikipedia is kinder to this quackery than it ought to be.)

Dr. Evers is not a medical doctor, & her own site tells you she is an "ordained minister," so perhaps her doctorate is in theology, since her credentials only mention "certificates" & not actual degrees. She does give affirmations, which Self Help Radio does not, & how could it compete with a list like this?

1. I am the DREAMER.
2. I am the DREAM.
3. I am the Dream Activator, Dream Supporter or the Dream Stealer.
4. I am the recepient of the DREAM, the benefactor of the DREAM.
5. I am the creator, sustainer/preserver/manifestor of the DREAM.
6. I and I alone am responsible and accountable for the DREAM.

Dream Stealer?

Finally, there is Achievement Radio Dot Com, which seems like a pretty good achievement, until you click the link & oh no! "AchievementRadio.com Is No Longer An Active Website."

Perhaps they needed to practice more of what they preached.

(*) Many people have "liked" the Facebook page, thinking they are liking generic "self-help radio." Most soon realize the error of their ways.

(**) After "Self Help Radio." Surprisingly!

(***) It's not.

A Joke A Day A Week, Episode Eighteen

Never accuse the arguably fine folks of A Joke A Day of a lack of topicality. Oh sure, there are plenty of non-offensive insults about imaginary people to tell, & naturally men hate the women they marry once they are no longer attracted to them, & of course there are literally thousands if not millions of puns already beaten to death in the English language, all a treasure trove of repetition for the staff of A Joke A Day to share with its subscribers, people noted for a distinct lack of an actual sense of humor.

But this week, sensing the foul mood of the country, the brave editor (or randomizing computer) (pretty much the same thing at the A Joke A Day headquarters) green-lit & sent out a joke that captures the foul feeling a vast majority of America has about its richest class.

It's true! At long last - with no further ado - I give you the A Joke A Day Solidarity With Occupy Wall Street joke:

One day in New York City, a banker was driving his new Jaguar down the streets. He parked it and opened the door to get out. Suddenly a taxi went by and ripped the door off. The driver reported this to a nearby police officer. The officer saw the whole thing and said "You bankers are so involved in your possessions. You didn't even notice that your arm was ripped off as well" The banker stared at where his arm used to be and said "OH NO! My new Rolex is gone too!"

Now if only someone with good jokes would occupy A Joke A Day.

Self Help Radio Bus Tours, Ltd.

Ah, buses. How I have ridden you over the years. Er. Well, that didn't sound right. I just. I want to show my appreciation for buses, is all. You used to take me home when I was in college, &, thankfully, you'd take me back to college again. You took me to work every day for over a decade, & you were often late, so that I could smoke another cigarette, back when I smoked, & stare impatiently for you down the street. I read books on you, I listened to hours of music while staring out your windows. I used to travel on buses to get to Self Help Radio, back when the show was in Austin. I met the woman I married while waiting at a bus stop.

Here is the Self Help Radio show about buses! No fare required. Also, you can play it as loud as you want. The map is at self help radio dot net, but the show is on two different routes, though - route one goes in this direction while route two goes in this direction. The stops on each route are listed below.

Thanks for riding the bus with me!

(part one)

"Waiting For The Bus" Violent Femmes _Add It Up (1981-1983)_
"Buses" Shark & Me _The Rubble Collection, Vol. 5_
"Take A Bus" Stix & Stonz _Soft Sounds For Gentle People Vol. 5 (Far-Out Treasures From California & Beyond, 1966-1969)_

"Another One Rides The Bus" Weird Al Yankovic _"Weird Al" Yankovic_
"You're Crazy For Taking The Bus" Jonathan Richman _Jonathan Goes Country_
"Roll Bus Roll" Jeffrey Lewis & The Junkyard _Em Are I_
"Love On A Greyhound Bus (Lucy Ann Polk, vocals)" Kay Kyser & His Orchestra _The Ultimate Collection (1939-1947)_
"Us On A Bus" Fats Waller _1935-1936_

"Bus Stop" Graham Gouldman _The Graham Gouldman Thing_
"Bus Stop" She _Wants A Piece Of You_
"Bustop" Lida Husik _The Return Of Red Emma_
"Girl At The Bus Stop" BMX Bandits _The Totally Groovy Live Experiment!_

(part two)

"Bumpin' Bus Stop, Pt. 1" Playboys _Funk Spectrum II: Real Funk For Real People_

"Double Dutch Bus" Frankie Smith _Double Dutch Bus_
"Funky Driver On A Funky Bus, Pt. 1" Charles Leonard _Bay Area Funk_
"Bus Drivers School" Bob Newhart _The Button-Down Mind Strikes Back!_

"The Magic Bus" The Who _Meaty Beaty Big & Bouncy_
"This Bus Won't Go To War" Firesign Theatre _Fighting Clowns_
"Busstop" The Mad Scene _A Trip Thru Monsterland_
"Red Bus" The Minders _Hooray For Tuesday_
"Bus" The Figgs _Low-Fi At Society High_
"On The Bus" The Holloways _No Smoke, No Mirrors_

Whither Buses?

Doesn't "buses" look funny? It should be "busses." But NO! says the spellcheck. (The spellcheck also doesn't like "spellcheck.")

Frankly, it's surprising that Self Help Radio hasn't done a show about buses before. For the longest time - from the time my car died in the summer after high school (1986) until the time my girlfriend - whom I would later marry - totaled her car in December of 2004, I did not own a car. If I needed to go places far, I rode a Greyhound bus - until I was old enough to rent cars.

In town, though, I rode buses everywhere. I took a bus daily to & from work. I took a bus to my radio show when the KOOP studios were in downtown Austin. I sometimes took buses to rock shows & then, as the shows ended after the buses stopped running, I would often just walk home.

I met the woman I would later marry at a bus stop. Maybe that's why I haven't done a bus show before. It would have to be a very good show. Buses have been good to me.

How good will the show be? I don't know. Listen tomorrow morning (it's a Monday) from 7:30 to 9am on 88.1 fm WRFL Lexington. You can listen online at WRFL dot fm. Or if you're stuck on a bus & can't tune it in, you can listen later at self help radio dot net.

At the bus stop where I met my wife, on a hot August afternoon in Austin, Texas, we were forced to share a tiny shrub for shade. The last time I was in town we drove by - & that shrub is now a giant tree.