Self Help Radio 100314: Thrills

What a thrilling show!  What a show full of thrills!  A show for thrill junkies & thrillseekers!  You'll be thrilled!  I'm certainly thrilled!  Or am I over-selling this?  Are songs about thrills - even when thrills are gone - intrinsically thrilling?  I think thrills are in the eye of the be-thrilled.  If that's a word?

The show is now available for listening at the Self Help Radio website.  In addition to lots of music, which is listed below, there are interviews with actual thrillseekers as well as an on-the-street report by Marge Most.  It's as thrilling as I could make it, anyway.

Thanks for listening!

(part one)

"Thrills" The Jean-Paul Sartre Experience _The Size Of Food_
"Cheap Thrills" The Mothers Of Invention _Cruising With Ruben & The Jets_

"The Thrill Is Gone" Rudy Vallee & His Connecticut Yankees _They Called It Crooning_
"The Thrill Is Gone" Roy Hawkins _Bay Area Blues Blasters_
"The Thrill Is Gone" Clydie King _Brown Sugar_
"Thrills & Chills" Helene Smith _Eccentric Soul: The Deep City Label_

"Simply Thrilled Honey" Orange Juice _Coals To Newcastle_
"My Biggest Thrill" The Mighty Lemon Drops _Happy Head_
"Life Without A Thrill" Brideshead _Some People Have All The Fun_
"The Thrill Was All Mine" The Cherry Orchard _This World Is Such A Groovy Place_
"Less Than Thrilled" Love Is All _Two Thousand & Ten Injuries_

"You're My Thrill" Billie Holiday _The Definitive Collection_
"Baby You Thrill Me" Amos Milburn _The R&B Years: 1954_
"I'll Thrill You" Shirley & Lee _Shirley & Lee Rock!_

(part two)

"Thrill Me" Camille Howard with Roy Milton & His Solid Senders _The R&B Hits: 1947_
"Thrill Of Your Love" Elvis Presley _From Nashville To Memphis: The Essential 60s Masters_
"You Thrill Me (Through & Through)" The Everly Brothers _The Price Of Fame_

"Thrill Of The New" St. Christopher _Bacharach_
"The Thrill Of It All" Bauer _Can't Stop Singing_
"Thrill" Daniel Johnston _Rejected Unknown_
"The Thrill Of Thirty Seconds" Skint & Demoralised _Love, & Other Catastrophes_

"Thriller!" Pere Ubu _Dub Housing_
"The Thrill Of It All" Hey! Hello! _Hey! Hello!_
"Thrill Me" The Undertones _Get What You Need_

"The Thrill Of It All" Roxy Music _Country Life_
"You Still Thrill Me, Babe" Webster's New Word _You Still Thrill Me, Babe_

Whither Thrills?

A long time ago, attempting to make Self Help Radio into a better show, I started trying to imitate the Firesign Theatre - not their high concept albums, but their radio shows on community radio in the late 60s/early 70s.  They were mainly improvised, & very very funny.  Since I was doing the show myself, & since I'm not terribly funny, I forewent improvisation, but I attempted to copy a couple of Firesignish things.  One of them was fake ads.  I'd read them out in those days - I didn't always have a lot of time for editing, & wasn't that good at it, & also didn't have a decent mic at home.

I stopped doing that once I started doing shows outside of Texas.  I don't know why - I had more time to try to be funny, & could have gotten better equipment.  But I started doing it again this year, & every show now has at least four attempts at me being funny: two fake ad spots, two "others," sometimes skits, sometimes other stuff.  Are they funny?  Oh, probably not.

I also started this year something I've wanted to do for a long time: have the same people on regularly as "experts" - but pretending to be different people.  I have asked my funniest friends if it's something they'd like to do, & most of them (not all of them) have said sure!  One of them, my friend David, can be awfully convincing.  On the RFL Facebook page, a fellow asked people who don't listen to my show about bullfighting in Kentucky - I think this person didn't know it was all grade-A David Fruchter horse-hockey.  That's how good he is.

Anyway, I had a point, & it was this: I didn't want to do the same characters over & over.  I said to myself, "Every skit or voice that I do on the show should be unique."  It actually makes me think that the reason I stopped doing that is because it can be pretty exhausting.  Listening to comedians talk on Marc Maron's podcast, one learns that some of these people spend years honing a character.  & I, an untrained, mostly unfunny dumbass on a little radio show, was poo-pooing that?  What a douche.

I'm thinking about this not because it has anything to do with this week's show, which is about thrills (& of course this blog post is completely unthrilling), except one thing: there's a recurring character appearing on the show.  I have changed my mind, & I repeat people.  He's a "poet" called Archibald Von Poesy, & his main characteristic is that his "poems" all rhyme, but each line rhymes.  So the rhyme scheme would be AAAAAAA etc.  He returns to the show tomorrow.  I have no idea if anyone likes him or thinks he's funny.  I find him easy to slip into.

Actually, there are two recurring characters: disgruntled reporter Marge Most shows up again.

Again, there's no real reason for me to mention any of this.  But the show is on tomorrow from 7 to 9am on 88.1 fm WRFL Lexington, online at wrfl fot fm, & of course I'll put it up as soon as I can afterwards on the SHR website.  I also live tweet it, so you can follow along on my twitter thing if you're so inclined.

Oy this is so the opposite of thrilling.  I hope the show is better!

Not To Put Too Fine A Point On It

You might think that I am trying to somehow curry favor with the fine, funny comedians over at Superego because I keep talking about the time that they followed & then didn't follow me on Twitter, but really, if I talk about them, it's because they are awesome & however much I yell about them, I hope it means more people discover them.

Which is why I was ecstatic that there was a new Superego podcast released today.  & it's so good & it's so funny.  Holy shit, I wish I could be as funny as these people.  Please, go download it & listen, & seek out their old episodes, & pay them lots of money, & turn them into superstars, & have them replace everything that's considered famous or good in our popular media, because it will be a better world, a funnier world, a smarter world.

If the superegos behind Superego would create & produce the new Fall television schedule, there would be fewer failures, & more exciting dramas.  Shunt McGuppin as a crime-solving country music singer?  Holy shit, I'm there for seven or more seasons!  Also, I'm buying the DVDs, & then, later, spending money I don't have on Blu-Ray versions of episodes I already own!

Seriously, though - these folks are giant comedic talents & you need to listen to them.  Go to their website. You'll be glad you did.

(I said that last bit in a Wilford Brimley voice.  Could you tell?)

Moments On Twitter, Part II

I understand that the people I like & admire are nowhere near as famous as the people most humans like & admire.  For example, if I had tweeted something & some huge pop star were to favorite it or retweet it, I'd think it was nice, but not really care much about it.  (I generally assume that the super famous have people who handle their social media for them anyway.)  So when something happens that makes me happy on Twitter, it's bound to be musicians or comedians or writers that I wish were as famous as the nameless, faceless, usually blonde pop stars that teens look up to & music writers waste time writing about.

I mentioned last week how happy I was for the brief moment - oh so brief! - that the comedy geniuses at Superego followed Self Help Radio on Twitter.  (I'm @SelfHelpRadio, by the way.  If you want to follow me.)  Today something equally exciting happened to me.

One of my favorite bands in the world is My Favorite, who are sort of defunct.  The main songwriter, Michael Grace Jr., has an entertaining Twitter feed that I follow, & occasionally briefly interact with.  (On Friday we agreed on the greatness of the Psychedelic Furs' Talk Talk Talk for example.)  (By the way, Grace's follow-up band to My Favorite, the also-now-defunct Secret History, is amazing too.)

Today, as I was reading that this day in history was the day that James Dean died, at the age of 24, in a car accident, I was reminded of a lyric from the My Favorite song, "James Dean (Awaiting Ambulance)."  I looked around for pictures of Dean & then tweeted something to Michael Grace, Jr.  Below is the tweet & his response.

As you can imagine, it made me very, very happy.

In the way a retweet from [insert whoever has the number one single in the United States right now] never would.

Do I Have To Write In The Blog Today?

I have nothing to say today.  Just a bunch of dumb questions.

Can you italicize words in Blogger blog titles?

Why would anyone - anyone - "like" a corporation on Facebook or follow one on Twitter?

Is there any point in arguing anything with anyone anymore?

I just finished reading the book Idiot America by Charles Pierce, but I can't remember buying it.  Am I getting old?  Did you recommend it to me?  Did you give it to me?

Is there an online game that's fun to play in the same way early video games were fun to play which you also don't have to play with other (real) people?  (Also free?)

What do you do when your wife finally gets bored of you?

Self Help Radio 092614: Scenes

& now! A behind-the-scenes look at Self Help Radio!

Hunh.  It's pretty much as expected: a dude playing songs from CD & a computer, occasionally pulling a microphone down & talking to it.  The programmer's booth sort of clean, but also sort of grimy.  Complete lack of charisma evident in the deejay - & furthermore, he has a face for radio.  Well.  That was exciting.

But hey!  This week's show (which was about scenes) is now available at the Self Help Radio website!  You don't have to make a scene or anything.  All the songs I played are listed below.

As always, thanks for listening!

(part one)

"That Is The Scene" Baskervilles _Baskervilles_
"At The Scene" The Dave Clark Five _The Best Of The Dave Clark Five_
"Street Scene" Leon Mitchison _Cold Heat: Heavy Funk Rarities, Vol. 1: 1968-1974_

"The Breaking Up Scene" Honeybus _She Flies Like A Bird: The Anthology_
"Same Old Scene" Roxy Music _The Thrill Of It All_
"Crush The Scene" Tullycraft _The Singles_
"Making The Nature Scene" Sonic Youth _Confusion Is Sex_

"Hey Scenesters!" The Cribs _New Fellas_
"That Girl, That Scene" Frankie & The Heartstrings _The Days Run Away_
"This Scene Is Happening" Liquid Faeries _La-Di-Da...  So Far..._
"Hipsters, Scenesters, Teenstars & Fakers" Amy Linton & Stewart Anderson _Knowing We Was Right From Da Start_

"Freak Scene" Dinosaur Jr _Bug_
"Shirt Scene" Marc Riley With The Creepers _Shadow Figure 12"_
"Queen Of The Scene" Go-Kart Mozart _On The Hot Dog Streets_

(part two)

"Scenes" Tania Rivas _Scenes_
"The Recognition Scene" The Mountain Goats _Sweden_
"Leave The Scene Behind" The Wave Pictures _Instant Coffee Baby_

"No. 1 Hippie On The Village Scene" The Fifth Estate _Ding! Dong! The Witch Is Back!_
"The Contemporary Scene" Mood Six _A Matter Of!_
"Scream (Till You Make The Scene)" Stephin Merritt _Obscurities_
"Fight Scene" The Kamalas _The Kamalas_

"Music Scene" The Fall _Live At The Witch Trails_
"What's That Scene" Male Bonding _Endless Now_
"On The Scene" The Friggs _Rock Candy_
"Domestic Scene" The Radio Dept. _Clinging To A Scheme_

"The Crying Scene" Aztec Camera _Stray_
"I Want A New Scene" Mitch Easter _Dynamico_
"This Scene Is Dead" We Are Scientists _With Love & Squalor_

Whither Scenes?

I feel like I've told this story before.  I've never been part of any "scene."  At best, I've been involved at some radio stations but never with the well-liked group at the center.  I did what work I could, but mostly I worked alone, & that's still true.

Never part of the scene, never one of the cool kids.

In actuality, I would never have been part of any of the cliques in high school because not only was I a fat nerd, but also I naturally gravitated toward loner status.  So I didn't even really have any nerd friends.  It's no surprise that the only people I am in communication with from my high school is a fellow who moved to Austin after ninth grade (where we reconnected in my college years) & a friend who was in the grade above me, another loner who I rarely saw at school.  My best friend in high school went to a different school in a different city; we met because of (nerds) our comic book collections.

(My loner status did keep the bullies away from me.  Attached to nothing & no-one, I wasn't much fun to pick on.)

Flash forward to sometime in 1994 or 1995.  A pretty girl who did a show at my first radio station, & who was obviously well-liked, was chatting with me about another girl at the radio station, who was involved in management, but was unattractive & overweight.  The unattractive girl had just started dating someone, a kind of clumsy, & yes, overweight, fellow, who was not well-liked.  I didn't know either of them very well.

The pretty girl said to me, "Isn't it hilarious that they're dating each other?"

I didn't get the joke.  Was something wrong with either or both of them?

"No," she said.  "She's so awful & he's so awful.  & they're dating!"

I asked for more clarification, & the pretty girl got more specific: she was referring to their weight & their general unattractiveness.  & then something hit me.

"Oh no!" I said out loud.  "I've become one of the cool kids!"

The pretty girl didn't know what I meant, so I explained: I used to be the sort of person that people like her talked about behind my back, & now I was talking about people like me behind their backs!

She quickly backpedaled, & tried to explain that she meant that they were not nice people, or kind people, or anything besides their physical unattractiveness, but I was lost in a kind of daze.  I never thought that I'd be on the other side of that world.

& I really never would - the pretty girl & I never became friends, & in fact, while I remember her first name (& not her last name), she probably doesn't remember me at all.  & she wasn't part of a scene, anyway, so this story is only peripherally related to the show this week.

Which is on tomorrow from 7am till 9am.  You can hear it live in Lexington at 88.1 on the fm dial, & live anywhere at wrfl dot fm on the computer dial.  I'll put the show up later that day on the Self Help Radio website like I do, in case you're not up early.  Because the sleeping-in scene is the one I wish I belonged to these days.

Spleen Venting

The spleen is an organ.  It's on the left side of your body, protected by the ribs.  It's about as big as your fist.  I've read that it's "soft & red."  Let me ask my wife, the anatomist.  "What color is the spleen?" U ask here.  She says it's "burgundy-pinkish."  Then she adds, "It's a little purple."

The Word Detective talks about the phrase "vent one's spleen" here.  He explains, "The spleen’s job is to act as a sort of filter for the blood, but in medieval times, when each bodily organ was thought to be the home of one emotion or another, the spleen was regarded as the seat of melancholy. There was apparently a brief period later on when the spleen was suspected, improbably, of supplying humor & good cheer, but by the late 16th century it was decided that the spleen was the source of rage and ill-temper. Thus 'spleen' has for several centuries been a metaphor for 'anger,' 'resentment' & general crankiness."

I wish this blog had a more personal slant to it - I suppose it could - but maybe I'm not the entirely confessional type that I used to be, both on my radio show & on the internet.  (I used to write crazy confessional stuff on the usenet.)  I recently had an interaction with a local business that didn't quite make my blood boil, but irked me enough to write them about.

I'll speak in generalities.  I had a bad experience at the local business.  I contacted the local business by email that night, explaining the situation.  In the email, I didn't ask for anything.  I simply told the story of the shabby treatment I received & mentioned that I shopped there a lot.

I waited a week for a response.  The response from the local business, while containing something of an apology, completely belittled my experience while insisting that my email could in fact be a "teaching moment" for its employees.

I wrote back & told them that I wouldn't be patronizing the local business anymore.

It's so interesting - a franchise of a corporation would have written the most slavishly apologetic response possible.  They would have detailed the employee code of conduct & let me know how the employee involved in my bad experience would be disciplined.  They would have responded to my email within a business day & would have attempted some kind of recompense for my experience.

But this local business?  The best they could manage was a tepid apology & a shrug of the shoulders in a response as warm as a form letter.  It was astonishing.

You know, I've had issues with places before - I did go into detail on this very blog about a horrible experience with an airline a few years back.  But for some reason, I don't think much would be accomplished with venting my spleen about this local business in this manner.  I don't think it will change anything & I suppose I'm not as angry - I just feel that I shouldn't help support the place any more.

The biggest surprise is that my wife used to really love the place.  But apparently she's had bad experiences there, too.  She remarkably has agreed with my - well, it sounds like a boycott, but really it's just an ignoring - of the place.

Sorry to be vague.  Not enough spleen to vent, I guess.

Moments On Twitter

I've recently started "live tweeting" my show, which means (& who knows if I'm even using the phrase "live tweet" correctly) that I say on Twitter what I am playing when I do my show as I am playing it.  Usually it's with the hashtag "nowplaying" & I mention RFL's Twitter account (< a href="http://www.twitter.com/WRFL">@WRFL
) & the web page, where you can listen live: Superego.  They're crazy funny, & sharp as hell, as their bits are all improvised.  Well, after I played it, I got a note that they were following my Twitter account!  Gosh!  The proof is above.
They did soon think better of it, however, & unfollowed me almost right away, & I can't blame them, I'm nothing compared to them.  But it was fun to think they noticed me for a second!

Two of the Superegotists (do they call themselves that?) did favorite my tweet later.  That was nice.

Go listen to their podcast!  There's a new one right now, & it's great!  gosuperego.com!

Dead & Dying Businesses

I am strangely moved & fascinated by businesses that no longer exist - specifically ones that were seemingly ubiquitous in my childhood.  One of those was a small five-&-dime store called TG&Y.  From the time I was about 9 till the time I was about 14, my family lived in an apartment complex right next to a shopping center called Ridgewood (you can see the current businesses that occupy the place here.  To say that I was in a store or walking through the parking lot of the shopping center most days of that time would not be an exaggeration - a branch of the public library was there, as was a Minyard's supermarket, & a dollar movie theater.  & one of the stores closest to us - & frankly, easiest to shoplift from - was the TG&Y.

I can almost walk through it in my mind.  If I walked in today, I would know exactly where the toy section was.  I bought - or my mother bought for me - many Star Wars figures & accessories there.  & I stole a few more.

After we moved, I didn't find myself at that shopping center very often, & soon enough both the Minyard's & the TG&Y were gone.  The Wikipedia has a handy list of "defunct retail companies of the United States, & the sad story of TG&Y's demise can be read at the link above.  A surprise - Minyard's is not on there!  Apparently there are 13 stores left in the Dallas area!

I guess nothing lasts forever.  Even giant mainstays like K-Mart & Sears are disappearing, & luckily there are those chronicling their demise.  I am not sad about a business dying - but it does affect me in a strange way, like I have recently watched an empty office building bulldozed in my neighborhood.  There are a few photos of it somewhere on my Tumblr blog.  I wish I could've gotten some of the photos on this website featuring "dead & dying K-Mart stores."

There's a K-Mart nearby - maybe I'll go have a look around.  But I better hurry!  It looks like they're going the way of the ol' TG&Y.

Self Help Radio 091914: One Way

I had a radio show yesterday (sorry, I went out of town & couldn't post this immediately afterwards) with the theme "one way."  I still don't know how or why that became the theme.  But I think it turned out pretty well.  I talked to a self-help guru who believes he's discovered the one way to happiness, & I talked to a doctor who believes he's found the one way to men's health, & I talked to two civil engineers who believe that Lexington would benefit from the city having only one way streets.  All this, plus music, including a new song Tania & Juan wrote for the show, plus a report from our man in Hollywood, Mark Miller.  I guess the show went one way, & I'm glad it did.

Listen to it now!  Self Help Radio Dot Net!  The songs I played are listed below!  I think I'm going the wrong way!  Oh no!

Thanks for listening!

(part one)

"One Way" Tania & Juan _One Way_
"One Way Love" Allison Weiss _Say What You Mean_
"One Way Or Another" Blondie _Eat To The Beat_

"(I'm Walking Down) A One Way Street" Guy Mitchell _The Very Best Of Guy Mitchell_
"One Way Street" Miki Smith _Trouble Doll_
"Walking Up A One Way Street" Willie Tee _Teasin' You_
"One Way Street" Sharon Tandy _You Gotta Believe It's... Sharon Tandy_
"One Way Street" The Dirty Burds _Hellbound Honeys, Vol. 1_

"One Way Ticket Home" Phil Ochs _Greatest Hits_
"One Way Ticket" Bobby Crown & The Kapers _Rockabilly Rarities, Vol. 1_
"One Way Ticket" The Nerves _One Way Ticket_
"One Way Trigger" The Strokes _Comedown Machine_

"Love Can't Be A One Way Deal" The Rev-Lons _Boy Trouble: Garpax Girls_
"One Way Love" The Innocents _One Way Love 7"_

(part two)

"One Way Love" The Damned _Don't Cry Wolf 7"_
"One Way Love" The Undertones _The Undertones_
"One Way Love" The James Hunter Six _Minute By Minute_

"One Way Out" Elmore James _The Sky Is Crying: The History Of Elmore James_
"One Way Out" Martha & The Vandellas _Watchout!_
"One Way Bus" New Birth _New Birth_
"One Way" Mighty Mighty _A Band From Birmingham_

"One Way Mind" John Cunningham _Becket House_
"One Way Or The Other" Chumbawamba _Readymades_
"One Way Track" Bill Nelson _Noise Candy, Vol. 1: Old Man Future Blows The Blues_
"One Way Spit" Debris _Soul Jazz Records Presents PUNK 45: Sick On You! One Way Spit! After The Love & Before The Revolution, Vol. 3: Proto-Punk 1969-77_

"One Way Kisses" The 4 Knights _Jivin' & Smoothin'_
"One Way Rider" Johnny Cash & June Carter Cash _Rockabilly Blues_

Whither One Way?

Who knows?  The show is happening tomorrow morning from 7 to 9am on 88.1 fm WRFL, & you can listen online at werful dot fm.  I'll also live tweet like I do nowadays on my the SHR Twitter account.

But I might not be able to put the show up on the Self Help Radio website because I'm going up to Cincinnati for Oktoberfest Zinzinnati.  Specifically, the wife wants to see the Running Of The Wieners.  Because they're hounds & they're cute.

I have to ask, though - why do they hold Oktoberfest in September?  Is that just common here?  I guess I never paid attention to Oktoberfest when in Texas.  But just checking, it turns out that Fredericksburg has its Oktoberfest in October.

So maybe it has something to do with climate.  Anyway, I apologize for not getting the show up in time.  If only they had Oktoberfest in October…

Preface To One Way: No, I'm NOT Running Out Of Themes!

Why would you think that?  Is it because of that Bob Dylan show?  He would never do a show with a theme like "one way"!  He picked general themes like "cars" or "homes" or "family" or "Bob Dylan"!  Why can't Self Help Radio be like that?  Why not do a show about something that's tangible, that's a thing, that makes some kind of sense, that there are songs that we will know about & you will have to play?

Seriously, dude.  "One Way"?  All I can think about is that Blondie song.  That's it.

What just happened?  I started out with one voice & ended up with another.  I think I liked the complainer's voice better than my own explainer voice.  Anyway, it doesn't matter - no one really cares what theme I pick & very rarely is anyone excited by a theme.  Which is cool - I don't mind the anonymity.

One thing that does happen from time-to-time is that a person will call & say, "I hear you're looking for songs about [today's theme]."  I am happy when someone makes suggestions or requests a song, but it's weird to think that they'd be listening to a radio show & think, "That deejay is doing a show about [whatever subject], but of course they wouldn't have brought enough music about [whatever subject] to fill their allotted two hours, but, luckily, hey!  Me to the rescue!"

I'm never insulted or anything, but I wonder if that's happened enough to the average RFL listener that they've heard a deejay say, "I wanted to do a show about [something], but I don't have enough songs!"

It's possible.  It's just not something I'd ever do!

I didn't get a chance to do this two posts ago...

One of my favorite boring bookkeeping events passed & I barely noted it: the 1900th post on this blog!

You're not paying attention anyway, but I like to do this:

I started this blog on September 12, 2006.  Holy fuck, that's eight years ago!

I reached 100 posts on Match 7, 2007.
I reached 200 posts on August 13, 2007.
I reached 300 posts on January 11, 2008.
I reached 400 posts on May 29, 2008.
I reached 500 posts on October 19, 2008.
I reached 600 posts on April 2, 2009.
I reached 700 posts on October 4. 2009.
I reached 800 posts on May 2, 2010.
I reached 900 posts on July 30, 2010.
I reached 1000 posts on January 4, 2011.
I reached 1100 posts on May 30, 2011.
I reached 1200 posts on October 23, 2011.
I reached 1300 posts on Mach 3, 2012.
I reached 1400 posts on July 30, 2012.
I reached 1500 posts on December 23, 2012.
I reached 1600 posts on April 23, 2013.
I reached 1700 posts on November 22, 2013.
I reached 1800 posts on April 21, 2014.
I reached 1900 posts on September 12, 2014.

If you stumble through this blog - & please don't, it's embarrassing for me - you'll find that I do a celebratory "anniversary post" most of the time.  But you'll notice it's usually wrong - the blog entry entitled "The Legendary 1000th Post," for example, happened on December 14, 2010 (when it was a not-very-legendary 994th post), instead of six posts later.  There's a reason for that: I'm dumb.

Blogger very handily tells you the number of posts you've published.  It also notes when you start a post (a "draft") & then saves it if you don't finish or if you forget about it.

I'm not a "draft" writing kind of guy.  I wish I were - boy, I'd love to be able to rewrite some of my crap to make it better - but if I write something, & don't finish it, & close the window on the computer, I'll probably not return to it.  I'll almost certainly open another window & write something new.

I obviously have done this several times on this blog.  For a long time, I had six or so drafts in my draft folder, which Blogger counted toward my total.  I deleted them.  Most of them were blank pages anyway.  Now I can just go look at every hundredth post from the beginning, but back then - well, I'm dumb.  I trusted the number & I counted backwards.

Let me repeat that: I counted backwards.

I am fascinated about the time periods represented here.  From October 2002 to May 2008, Self Help Radio was on KOOP in Austin.  From May 2008 till June 2009, it existed as a podcast.  From July 2009 to June 2010, it was on WMUL in Huntington.  From August 2010 till present (excepting Spring of this year) it has been on WRFL in Lexington.  So that total is:

KOOP: five years, eight months
WMUL: eleven months
WRFL: three years, eleven months
Podcast: one year, seven months (at different times)

Does that add up to eleven years, eleven months?  Because that's hold long I've been doing Self Help Radio!

(Actually, it adds up to 12 years, one month, because I counted a couple of months, like May of 2008 & January of this year, when I have half in one place, half another.)

(I'm still celebrating my twelve anniversary next month.)

High School Daze

A friend with whom went to high school had a birthday today & we texted back & forth all up & down memory lane.  I made a joke about high school, which led us to reminiscing about those awful days.  We went to a school called South Garland High in Garland, Texas.  Our school team was the colonels, we had a modified Confederate flag as our flag (as seen above), & our slogan was "the South shall rise again!"  After my graduation, a friend attended but didn't go to South Garland asked me, "Does your school know the South lost the war?"

For both my birthday friend & myself, this seemed normal (as normal as anything in high school), but my friend didn't remember something specific I recalled: there was a giant mural in the cafeteria of a Southern plantation.  Since he couldn't bring it to mind, I looked around for evidence online.

I found, archived at the University of North Texas, a book called "School Spirit or School Hate: The
Confederate Battle Flag, Texas High Schools, and Memory, 1953-2002" by
Perry Dirickson, which, you may notice, kind of rhymes with my name.  You can see the pages I'm about to quote here.

I warn you: the book is badly written.  I have copied it verbatim, but did feel the need to note when there were egregious grammar mistakes.  Some of the commentary feels forced & awkward, but the historical part of it is eye-opening.

At South Garland High School, the students chose the Colonels & the Confederate flag because of the Civil War centennial.  The school opened in the fall of 1964.  The year before, students who would attend the school voted for the Colonels as mascot & adopted an Old South theme.  South Garland was located at the southern edge of Garland's residential area at the time.  There were few houses; mostly cotton fields surrounded the school.  This added to the Old South feel of the school.  South Garland High School released the first edition of the school newspaper on Friday, October 2, 1964, with the name "Plantation News."  In the paper, the cartoon "Colonel's Plantation" ran, displaying the paternalism implied by the school's mascot.  The cartoon presented three characters: the Colonel, Rastus, & Liza.  Liza & Rastus were portrayed as poor whites in tattered clothing whom [sic] used broken English.  The Colonel dressed in an all-white suit with a black tie & spoke impeccable English.  This reinforced the romantic view of the Old South & the class superiority implied by the mascot name of Colonels.

Other traditions reinforced the Old South theme.  The students named the drill team, Southern Belles.  The cheering section, underclassmen drill team members, named itself the Dixie Darlings, & the fight song played to the tune of "Dixie."  Another tradition that the students tried to initiate, although it did not last, was a fundraiser to earn money for student activities.  The fundraiser was a slave auction. The slaves were members of the drill team who sold themselves to male students for a day for whatever the buy [sic] wanted, such as washing his car.  The girls dressed in sackcloth, wore their hair in dog-ears, donned a beanie or cowboy hat, & wore no make-up with mismatched shoes.  The Clothes [sic] worn by the "slaves" were eerily similar to the clothes of actual slaves.  To add to the Old South theme, the school painted a plantation mural in the cafeteria with a generic white-columned mansion surrounded by fields of cotton devoid of any black slaves working the fields.  The omission of workers in the mural portrayed an understanding the workers in the field were black slaves. By leaving them out, the administration was saying in a nice way that black slaves were not important & as an extension, blacks were not important as well.

South Garland students not only developed traditions based on the Old South, they also adopted the Confederate flag as their school's symbol & school flag.  Before 1967, the school used a Confederate battle flag as its school flag.  In the fall of 1967, the 1966 seniors presented the school a gift, the South Garland flag, which was the official Colonel flag.  The flag's design included the school's crest in the flag's center as well as "S" & "G" for South Garland on the outer part of the flag.  The school called its crest the "libertas," liberty in Latin, the Garland family motto,  The "libertas" had the colonel's head on top of a shield with crossed sabers.  On the shield, the Garland family crest appeared in the upper left quadrant.  The Confederate flag was in the upper right corner.  In the lower left quadrant, the golden bugle symbolized class "spirit [sic] de corps" & aggressiveness in the future.  The torch of knowledge centered by live oak & olive branches borrowed from the Great Seal of the State of Texas.  The "S" for South was to the left of the "lbertas" & the "G" to the right.  This would remain the South Garland flag until 1991. The South Garland students viewed the flag as their flag.  The design of the flag incorporated the Confederate battle flag, but the students saw the banner as their flag & claimed pointed [sic] out that this standard was not the Confederate battle flag.  The flag's inclusion of the South Garland High's crest & the "S" & "G" separated it from the association with the Confederate battle flag in the minds of students.

I remember in the 1990s my family members griping about how the NAACP was going to sue the school & replace the flag.  ("It's not racist, it's tradition!")  It turns out the school district did it themselves (although doubtless there were some who may well have filed a lawsuit).  According to Wikipedia, "the Garland Independent School Board voted 6 to 1 at its August 1, 1991, meeting, to discontinue use of the altered Confederate flag as the school flag & to also change the color of the mascot's uniform from gray to blue & red."  The mural, presumably, is still there.  The Wikipedia adds, "Today many students still use the Confederate flag to symbolize the school's 'southern culture' with little to no backlash from students or parents. However, South Garland High School & the GISD refuse to recognize the flag. The school still uses the song 'Dixie' as the school's fight song to this day."

My friend, who I hope doesn't mind me sharing this, texted something about those years that may explain why we weren't as horrified when we were students as I imagine you are reading this.  He said, "I just recall high school as being sort of frightening & overwhelming at times & mind-numbingly tedious at other times.  I had no cultural reference points or socialization to prepare me for it."

Me neither.

Self Help Radio 091214: Magazines

Stop the presses!  A radio show about magazines?!?  This will take a special double issue!

Actually, it's mainly the same old thing - lots of songs about magazines, me talking too much, but also interviews with a Harvard professor & a special announcement from my spiritual advisor, the Rev. Dr. Howard Gently.  It's too much!  You'll need a subscription!

Please listen now at the Self Help Radio website.  Pay attention to username/password stuff.  What I played is below.

PS This is the 1900th posting on this dumb blog.  No big deal.

Thanks for listening!

(part one)

"Magazines" Teresa Brewer _The Ultimate Collection_
"Movie Magazines" The Four Cal-Quettes _Movie Magazines_
"Little Girl In A Magazine" Jerry Channing _Little Girl In A Magazine_

"Magazine Woman" Gary Walker & The Rain _Magazine Woman_
"Magazine Lady" Spider John Koerner & Willie Murphy _Forever Changing: The Golden Age Of Elektra Records 1963-1973_
"Letters To Magazines" Paul F. Tompkins _Impersonal_
"Girl In A Magazine" The Brains _The Brains_

"Cover Of The Rolling Stone" R. Stevie Moore _Great Test Hits_
"Dream Magazine" Svensk _Piccadilly Sunshine # 1: British Pop Psych & Other Flavours 1965-1970_
"Grit Magazine" Thee American Revolution _Buddha Electrostorm_
"People Who Read People Magazine" Kinky Friedman _Under The Double Ego_

"Centerfold" J. Geils Band _Freeze Frame_
"Skingloss Magazine" Superego _Superego, Volume 3, Episode 12_
"Magazines" Tania & Juan _Magazine_

(part two)

"Letter To A Fanzine" Great Plains _Length Of Growth 1981-1989_
"Teen Magazines" Kyle Hall _Feelin' Weird_
"Magazine Theory" Darren Hanlon _Early Days_

"Girl In A Magazine" J Church _Camels, Spilled Corona, & The Sound Of Mariachi Bands_
"Star Magazine" Gigantaur _Gigantaur E.P._
"Resolve (The Complete New Testament In The Form Of A Teen Magazine)" Eugene Mirman _En Garde, Society!_

"Surfing Magazines" The Go-Betweens _The Friends Of Rachel Worth_
"Dirty Magazines" Jonas Crenshaw _Colossal Failure_
"Magazines" The Hold Steady _Stay Positive_
"Magazine" The Proper Ornaments _Wooden Head_

"Magazine" Yeh Deadlies _Magazine 7"_
"Autograph Magazine" Todd Barry _Falling Off The Bone_
"I Dreamed You In Magazines" Fred Thomas _Kuma_

Whither Magazines?

This was a hard show to put together - there aren't really all that many songs about magazines!  I am glad at this point that I spend a little bit of time listening to new stuff that people put on their Bandcamp pages.  I'm happy to preview their stuff & support them & am glad it's so easy there.

(By the way, isn't it amazing how much simpler those guys made it vs. how hard it used to be to listen to stuff on Myspace?  No wonder the latter place is a ghost town.)

I should have enough music to fill the show plus I have a couple of interviews.  It's always fun to be challenged for a show - two hours is sometimes a lot of time to fill for a particular theme!

The show will be on tomorrow morning from 7 to 9 am on 88.1 fm in Lexington.  You can listen to the show & follow along at the WRFL web site & also I have gotten into the habit of live tweeting what I'm playing on my Twitter page.

Later that day, I'll put the show up in its entirety on the Self Help Radio web site.

I hope you listen!

Preface To Magazines: Unsubscribe

I don't subscribe to many magazines anymore.  Just one, actually.  My wife has a subscription to a gossip-style magazine, but it was a gift from a friend, who hoped it would help her catch up on popular culture.  It doesn't.  She looks at the pictures & then asks me, "Who is this?  Why is this person in this magazine?"

I used to subscribe to a particular music magazine - it's probably the best one out there, although I don't know anymore - it's been a few years, since I left Austin in fact - & I enjoyed reading it, but it was weird - every feature article extolled the featured artist in such a way that I felt, if I didn't like the artist, that something was wrong with me.  Also, every third issue had a Beatle or the Beatles on the cover.  That was like saying to me, "You're old.  That's why you get this magazine."

I also used to subscribe to a left-wing/progressive news magazine.  I felt very guilty unsubscribing, because I think they do good work.  I just couldn't read it anymore.  Every story was a story of corruption & defeat.  Every truth unearthed just showed that the bad people had all the money, controlled everything, & were going to destroy the world, their comfort existing at the expense of everyone else.  The people who run the magazine however maintain a crazy optimism, in spite of the overwhelming evidence that it doesn't fucking matter - the bad people are winning.  Again, I admire their work, their courage, their spirit - it just got to be too much for me to read the depressing stories of defeat, with that little paragraph of hope at the end.  Poor, tortured hope.

The magazine I currently subscribe to is a little more cynical, but I still don't read most of it anymore.  I can't exactly say why.  I like the magazine.  It's just piling up on the table by the front door, though.

I always wanted to make my own magazine - or any kind of zine, really - but as I get older, I find I have less & less to say.  This blog, of course, is evidence of that.

A Song From Under The Floorboards

One of my silly rules about my show is that the theme can't be reflected by the name of the band or the album a song is from - so that means that my show this week, about magazines, won't feature any songs by Magazine, who unwisely chose not to write a song about magazines.  (Maybe their name is in reference to a different kind of magazine?)  But that doesn't stop me from playing them on this blog - here's one of their best songs performed live:

Yawp

I need to make a list of important lessons one stumbles upon in life that end up making life better.  The funny thing about lessons - teaching, really - is that if you're not interested in what's being taught, or you're not interested in whoever's trying to teach you, you're probably not going to learn.

I'm sure this is rudimentary pedagogy, but I am thinking also that if one comes from an environment where learning isn't valued - where the value is instead on some sense or kind of authority - that also hurts the process of learning.

& I'm not necessarily talking about facts here, although sometimes one's attitude can affect how one absorbs facts.  One of my relatives, for example, once said, "Why are they always talking about the Civil War? It happened a long time ago. It doesn't have anything to do with us now."  Believing that, obviously, makes one less inclined to learn about the Civil War.

What I'm talking about is this: I remember, it must've been early in my college career, this moment when I found out how powerful it was to say, "I don't know."

Admitting that I didn't know something wasn't a mark of weakness; it instead seemed a sign of confidence & self-knowledge.

& it did have something to do with the people - I was around people who were different from my family.

My family, in general, knows a lot of stuff.  As much as your average family that knows stuff.  But my family believes it knows more stuff than it actually knows.  What's more, it has developed a kind of behavioral mechanism - related, somewhat, to stubbornness, also a family trait - which will assert with terrifying confidence that what any member of the family says, even though you know it's wrong, is in fact right.

Here's an example.  Once I was at my sister's house, listening to the band Squeeze.  (This was a long time ago.)  She said, "I like this song, but I like the original."  I told her it was the original.  She said it wasn't.  I showed her the album, which listed the band members, & then the LP, which listed the writing credits.  She shrugged.  She said, "Someone else did a version of this, & it's better."

This was pretty soon after the album had been released.  But no amount of evidence could convince her that what she knew was right was incorrect.

It didn't just have to happen in arguments.  It could just be a reaction.  My little brother might say to me, "You didn't know that!" & I would respond, almost reflexively, "I did so!"

Yes, I developed that mechanism, too.  It came in handy, many times - there are times when, with sheer force of will, you can convince someone they're wrong.  Or at the very least throw what they believe into doubt.  I remember a long argument about evolution where I completely misunderstood the basics & yet a smarter friend, who was studying biology, couldn't convince me.  I'm not sure she left the argument as firmly convinced as she began it.  (Later on, I apologized for being so stupid about the whole deal.)

But at some point, I remember the pressure being off in regard to subjects & things about which I honestly had no knowledge, just by saying, "No, I don't know that."  It will let the person have the pleasure of discussing something they do in fact know many things about, or it will reveal that they didn't really know much either.

& what follows that lesson is this one: you don't have to have an opinion about everything.

Oh god!  What a liberating concept!