PMSimon.com

If you read the papers today, or especially if you peruse the newspaper trade web sites like Romanesko or E&P, the only story that matters today is Deep Throat. Deep throat's identity, his heroism, who knew what... it's as if nothing else, not the landslides in Laguna or Saddam's lawyer's entreaties to get the charges over with or the Dutch rejecting the EU constitution, nothing else matters.

This, of course, is true only if your life revolves around journalism, especially past journalism. The rest of us don't care.

Mark Felt is, of course, not a hero, nor is he a villian. He's exactly the kind of guy on which countless reporters in countless cases have relied- the backgrounder, the guy you go to not for an on-the-record quote or direct information but rather for confirmation that you're on the right track or off on a wild goose chase. You call your guy and you say "I have this and I have that- I know you can't confirm but am I in the right ballpark?" And he says yes or no or you're warm or cold, or sometimes he tells you who to ask or where to look. That's valuable, and it can be critical, but the difference between the run-of-the-mill anonymous background advisor and Mark Felt is that he got a snappy, risque name and was involved in one of the age's biggest stories. If Woodward and Bernstein hadn't called him "Deep Throat," if they hadn't chosen to write the story as if it was a Tom Clancy potboiler instead of a political investigation, nobody would care much about Mark Felt now. But he was "Deep Throat," hiding in shadows in parking garages, mumbling tips to Dustin Hoffman and Robert Redford- and it's a huge story.

But it's a huge story only to the media itself. (In fact, it's not even the most important media story, in the long run, that broke today; the ad spending figures showing newspapers struggling and the fact that the allegedly impartial Columbia Journalism Review is being "advised" by Victor Navasky are more relevant today) It's an amusing, mildly interesting story among many others to the general public. It ain't earthshaking. Knowing who Deep Throat was isn't essential to most people's lives.

And the 49ers tape is far more entertaining.

 Share

Oh, it just doesn't get any better than this. One radio host blasting another on the same station, open warfare. And, even better, it's Angelo Cataldi vs. Howard Eskin, which is self-explanatory to anyone in Philadelphia.

I learned long ago not to burn bridges, not to take disputes that should remain private to the public level, to let slights and insults go because they're not worth the battle. But this is SO entertaining.

I wish I could hear what they're doing on the air- convenient, isn't it, that this is happening in the Spring ratings book?- but WIP won't be streaming for a few more weeks. Hope they're still ripping each other by then.

 Share

I am not trendy. I am resolutely boring- I've worn the same style and brand of jeans for 30 years, the same kind of sneakers for almost 40 years. I never caught the reality TV wave, I'm not much for hip-hop, I drive a freakin' Volvo.

I ordered an iPod.

I kinda had to. My entire industry, radio, is rushing headlong into podcasting. Besides, I listen to a lot of shows on the computer- with podcasts, downloads, and Replay Radio recording, I'll be able to take the shows with me. It was time, and if that means I've joined the sheep, well, baaaaa.

It should show up next week, although probably not before I head to New York. Review then.

 Share

WCBS-FM in New York and WJMK in Chicago have dumped Oldies, and I don't think I have to tell you what the new format is in both cases.

Hello, Jack. 80s pop and Phil Collins records, because "we play what we want."

Look, for all I know, this could work. But the way this is spreading is striking me as Jammin' Oldies all over again. Remember that? If not, here's a history lesson: a few years ago, a station in L.A. decided to try a brand of oldies that was flavored with old soul and R&B hits, aimed at the Latino listeners who grew up with a similar mix of music on the old KRLA. There was talk that it would be called "Lowrider Oldies," but they ended up calling it "Mega 100.3, Jammin' Oldies." And it was initially a hit.

So far, so good, except that the radio industry tends not to think before wanting to jump on what it senses might be a trend. And, lo and behold, within a short time, "Jammin' Oldies" was everywhere. It popped up in virtually every market, many with the same logo style as the L.A. version, with the same imaging and sweepers and promotions. And... it tanked. And the L.A. station eventually went away, too.

The reason it didn't work everywhere should have been obvious- the music mix was a specific type for a specific audience. If you grew up listening to KRLA in El Monte or East L.A., you heard "Gimme Little Sign" and "I'm Your Puppet" all the freakin' time. If you didn't grow up at that time and place, you didn't. So if you were a listener in, say, Tampa, you heard the less familiar songs and thought "I don't remember this one" and hit the button to see what the "regular" Oldies station was playing. This should have been obvious to anyone, but radio programmers plunged headlong into the format without regard to its appropriateness for the market. It was more important to them to grab the format before someone else in the market took it than to consider whether it made sense at all.

Lesson learned? Ah, no. Jack-FM hasn't yet proven a long-term consistent hit. It's done well in Vancouver, had some nice gains in Dallas (although it's leveled off), but it's way too early to gauge whether the initial gains will be long-lasting, and you can see some declines after initial pops in some other markets. Doesn't mean it'll fail, doesn't mean it'll work. It means it's too early to tell. But Infinity's blowing up two of its long-running Oldies stations to throw it on, partly because it's perceived that Oldies is about to buy the farm- the audience is aging, the revenues are projected to decline- and a lot because if they didn't do it, they feared, someone else would, and if it's a real hit, that would be like taking LaRue Martin with the first pick of the NBA draft (look it up).

From the press release:

"New York deserves a radio station that is equally as eclectic as its listener's personalities and attitudes," said Chad Brown, Vice President and General Manager, WCBS-FM. "JACK FM promises to be unlike anything currently heard in the market. Others have tried to imitate the JACK format, but time and again it has been proven that the success of the format is achieved by fully committing to its objectives and delivering a completely new and unique product. We look forward to changing the landscape of the New York radio market."

Focus on this:

"time and again it has been proven that the success of the format is achieved by fully committing to its objectives and delivering a completely new and unique product."

And then this:

Among the many different artists that will be heard on the station, include Aerosmith, Duran Duran, No Doubt, Lenny Kravitz, the Eagles, Tom Petty, Bruce Springsteen and REM.

Completely new and unique?

Yeah, real adventurous. I'm glad I got an iPod.

 Share

Ladies and gentlemen, live from today's Palos Verdes Peninsula Street Fair, it's the Palos Verdes Fun Club!

Let's get a little closer and feel the mirth...

(I couldn't get closer, because when the two sad-looking people at the booth saw me taking pictures with my camera, they started to mug for the shot. You don't need to see that.)

Ah, yes, two glum mopes sulking in a booth on an overcast afternoon, with plain signs advertising dance events tacked around them. Just the kind of "fun" everyone needs. But if it gets to be too much, around the corner, this booth had the answer:

This guy was hawking rubberband guns. When just shooting 'em with your fingers isn't painful enough, just load some Staples specials onto one of these babies and watch the fun spread! Also the welts.

For the fainter of heart:

I didn't hang around to see exactly how these things shoot marshmallows, but it's safe to say they don't do much damage. Maybe some powdered sugar burns.

This year's street fair was busy but even less eventful or worthwhile than last year's- it seemed like a lot fewer booths spread out over an even larger area, and the booths had absolutaly nothing worth buying. There were several chiropractor booths, although none were handing out those crooked pens, and more than the usual number of homemade soap vendors. That was about it. There was entertainment of the expected sort- a jazz band, an old-folks' band, a clown on stilts- but it was all dispirited and oddly unpleasant and very much out of place. This isn't a down-home, friendly area. It's rich, cold, distant, inhibited. Kinda like the Fun Club. Maybe I should join them after all.

 Share

Collect them all!

Happy Sunday, Homies.

 Share

The other day, I was randomly punching up stations on my Walkman while running and I came across a show on the Air America station in Santa Barbara. I guess it was a network weekend show, and they were interviewing Eric Bogosian, so I stopped and listened for a few minutes. After some general platitudes, they announced that Mr. Bogosian would read a passage from his 1998 book "Pounding Nails in the Floor with my Forehead," and after joking that he called the book by that title to make people introducing him say the phrase, he launched into what appeared to be a monologue representing the thoughts of a typical suburban man after patronizing a supermarket. I don't have the script in front of me, so I can only paraphrase; the gist was that the man, agitated before shopping, was now serene, because, essentially, he is a shallow American male mollified by consumerism. He has been anesthetized to everything because he has been enveloped in the warm embrace of capitalism. I'm sure Bogosian thinks that this is really what the suburbanites he hates are thinking, and I imagine the book, and the stage version, have gotten knowing nods from the hipsters in Manhattan over the years.

I turned off the station, and I thought about the monologue, and I concluded this: people like Bogosian like to think they're the tolerant, wise members of society, but they are without a clue. It manifests itself in many ways: the orgy over the revelation of "Deep Throat," the assumption, voiced by Janeane Garofalo in an oft-played promo on Air America, that anyone who voted for Bush is either evil or stupid, the Thomas Frank "What's the Matter With Kansas" assumption that middle America is so stupid that they vote against their self-interest. Eric Bogosian knows what you're thinking, America. So do Garrison Keillor and countless NPR favorites. You are stupid. You are evil, although inadvertently so, because you're so stupid. You don't even know that Howard Dean is GOOD for you, because he will take your income and give it to people who need it more than you. Don't you know that you don't deserve what you have? Don't you know that it's in your best interest to have less so that someone in OUR cities can have more? WE can afford high taxes on OUR income- what's YOUR problem? And don't you know that war is never the answer- that if someone hits you, you apologize and wait until they go away? What is WRONG with you?

What's wrong with us is this: we are too busy earning a living and putting food on the table and gas in the tank to attend performance art pieces and monologues and readings. We really DO go to Wal-Mart and Target and Ralphs instead of taking our meals at some out-of-the-way Vietnamese place near Sunset that has a special menu all in Vietnamese that they keep behind the counter and only give to the right people. And we're too busy to contemplate what buying bread and milk and Cheerios has to do with anything other than eating. Do we not care about or understand the import of Bush, war, peak oil, Third World debt? No, we care, we read the paper, but if our conclusions differ from some actor-playwright-performance artist's views, something's "the matter with" us. And that's how they get their tin ear for the "red states"- instead of trying to understand what it's like to really have to work and shop and take care of life, they make condescending assumptions. Maybe it's true that we hate what we do not understand; no wonder Bogosian and Dean and Garofalo are so free with the invective. (You can say the same about the Ann Coulters of the world, and you'd be right, too)

More power to the Eric Bogosians and NPR people and Air America hosts who sit around mulling the stupidity of Americans- it's nice they have the time to do that. The rest of us are busy actually living our lives, and they do not know what that means.

 Share

I've been saying for a while now that terrestrial radio ought to be developing programming that cannot be duplicated by satellite, by streaming, by iPods. By that, I mean they should be signing up entertaining talk radio hosts and not be afraid to do- gasp!- new forms of talk and even talk on FM.

The industry's response: radio stations that are actually PROUD to say they're JUST LIKE AN iPOD, but an iPod for which THEY, not YOU, pick the music.

Once again, free advice for broadcasters: talk. Do good talk radio. Find talented, charismatic people- they're out here- and sign them to exclusive contracts. Do poltical talk, pop culture talk, sports talk, comedy talk, sex talk, kid's talk, health talk, money talk, tech talk, talk about cars and animals and home improvement. And if someone else beats you to a talk category, find better hosts and local hosts and go head-to-head. Anyone can duplicate whatever music format you can devise. Nobody can clone a good host.

So why wouldn't you do what nobody can duplicate?

Time's a-wastin'.

And, oddly enough, I took a break and found that the Notorious Mr. Wachs wrote similar sentiments in a far more entertaining way. That's two people thinking this way. Anyone else?

 Share

Things I hate about travel:

Packing.

Driving to the airport.

Parking at the airport.

Getting the suitcases to the check-in.

The check-in line.

The security line.

Getting through security.

Waiting for the flight.

Boarding the flight.

Taking off.

The flight.

Landing.

Getting off the plane.

Getting to the baggage carousel.

Waiting at the baggage carousel.

Getting to the taxi stand.

Waiting for a cab.

The cab.

The cab ride.

Checking in at the hotel.

The hotel.

Getting around town.

Checking out.

Everything about the flight in reverse.

Things I like about travel:

Coming home.

But you don't get to that part without the first part.

 Share

Drive to airport: fast.

Parking: easy.

Check-in: fairly swift.

Security: efficient, fast.

Boarding: rapid.

Flight: mostly smooth. One big wing dip, landing a little rough, otherwise incident-free.

Baggage claim: almost immediate.

Cab stand: no line.

Drive to city: minor traffic.

Hotel check-in: instantaneous.

Room: Spacious, nice view.

Okay, then, never mind yesterday's piece. Except for one thing: it is hot here. Very hot. Nineties and humid hot. I sweated clear through my shirt several times. And all over the city, I saw guys in dark suits without a sweat stain in sight. I've been away too long- I can't take anything other than 70 and dry.

 Share

One thing about travel for someone like me is that you end up feeling out of touch. Normally, I'm at the computer all day, checking and reading countless news sites, whereas on the road, I'm doing other things and the couple-times-a-day check doesn't do the job. I did brush through the Daily News, Post, and Newsday today, but there wasn't time to really pay much attention, let alone to read the Times.

And now I know the value of the free papers. Several big cities have free, thin, short-story wire-service-filled tabloids; in New York, they're Metro and Newsday's amNew York, and they take maybe 5 minutes to breeze through, but they cover the main news points. They don't go in-depth, but if you don't have the TIME to read a long think piece, you might as well go with the freebies. And, yes, they're free. The Daily News is 50 cents, the Post and Newsday a quarter each, Metro and amNY are free. Quick calculation: don't have time for a full paper, shorter one's free... hmm....

(OK, the freebies don't have big comics sections. But you can see "Get Fuzzy" on the Net, too. ANd they DO have TV grids. No sports agate, but you can look that stuff up on the Net as well)

This afternoon, I got handed another free paper on the street, but this one was from the New York Times, which bought into Metro and is also distributing a weekly classified section for free. I took it- it's 12 pages, mostly classifieds with a couple of articles and a few display ads. I'm not sure what the point of it is supposed to be- there's nothing in it that's worth a second glance, and there's very little ad volume. But newspapers are kinda desperate these days. The Times MarketPlace weekly seems like someone wracked his or her brain to come up with a product to compete with the freebies and this is all that came up.

I'm a long-term, confirmed newspaper addict, but when I missed picking up the News and Post on Wednesday, I didn't miss them. I got them today and barely read them. I don't know if you can use me as a valid sample, but if someone like me didn't miss the print papers, who will?

 Share

"You wouldn't come back east?"

No, I won't. Not interested.

"Not even for the right job?"

Nope. I like my job, and I don't have to move.

"But it's New York! You wouldn't come back to New York?"

So far this week: over 90 degrees and humid. Sweating through my clothes in seconds flat. Constant sirens and honking, all night long. The aroma of baked urine and unwashed humanity. "101.1 Jack-FM." Yankee and Met fans. Aggressive panhandlers. Nah, I don't think so.

"But aren't there things you love here?"

My sister. My friends. The pizza. The bagels. The deli. The tabloids. Newsstands and bookstores everywhere. Throw in Philly down the road with the Phils/Eagles/Sixers and cheesesteaks/pretzels/water ice and summer afternoons in tree-shaded yards with good friends. But on the whole, I'd rather be in Palos Verdes. Even though there are TWO "Jack-FMs" there.

 Share

An Artiste speaks:

"Reality television meets news and war ... tanks going into Baghdad with splashes of Viagra commercials in between. I was just so confused about what was going on. It comes from that standpoint," Green Day front man Billie Joe Armstrong said in an Associated Press interview.

It's actually quite simple, Billie Joe. The part where it says "News"? News. The part where it says "Survivor: Palau" or "The Apprentice"? Reality TV. The part where it's a Viagra commercial? A commercial. Nothing "confusing" about it.

You're welcome.

 Share

The E train is New York writ small. Early Saturday morning, steam rising from the standing muck between the tracks, a woman in running shorts wearing a race number paced nervously waiting for the northbound train. A trannie tottered along balancing a Dunkin Donuts coffee and a newspaper. An Asian woman checked her daughter's scalp for nits while her two sons yelped and slid and jumped all over the train. Tourists with furrowed brows studied maps, a guy returning from the night shift caught some Zs before stumbling off at Canal Street, rubbing his eyes.

And at the end, the PATH station and the realization that you're there, and even though you've seen it before, seen it several times before, looked and stared and even rode the PATH train right through the hole, you have to look. And it's still a hole, and it's bogged down in arguments over design and timing and that's New York, too.

I hate this place. I love this place.

 Share

I mean, I just got off the plane, practically.

Observations from the Talkers convention tomorrow, including second-hand observations of the Al Franken cocktail party debacle, the World's Most Pointless Opening Panel Ever, good times seeing good people, bad times observing odd people, and other worthless off-the-top-of-my-head crap. You can't wait, I know. But you will.

 Share

The annual "New Media Seminar" that Talkers Magazine puts on in New York goes the same way every year: a bunch of useless panels with too many participants, a couple of good presentations, and some cocktail parties with skimpy bars and lousy food where you basically network away for a couple of hours until the hotel employees unceremoniously shoo everyone out of the room. This year's event was pretty much according to form, although I missed what was apparently the "highlight" of the whole thing: while I was having dinner with some talk radio folks across town, Al Franken evidently took the occasion of his receiving the "Free Speech Award," whatever that is, at the opening cocktail party to talk and talk and talk and talk and talk and talk and talk and talk and talk and talk and talk and talk and talk and talk and talk and talk and talk and talk and talk and talk and talk and talk and talk and talk and talk and so on and attack conservative talkers by name for whatever evils he thinks they've done, and after 20 minutes of the tirade people started to leave and the Talkers publisher tried to ease him off the stage and Al took offense and kept going. See, I'd PAY to see that. But I didn't see it (I DID pay for it, I guess). Brian Maloney has several accounts on his blog- check it out here.

That's the kind of thing the Talkers convention's all about: people acting self-important and all-knowing while others roll their eyes and look for beer. I fit in the latter category; I'm thankful that I was not alone.

Saturday's lineup:

1. Alan Colmes starts with his usual "I'm a liberal working for Fox" jokes.

2. A panel of hosts talks about Deep Throat and racial divisions and other bad talk radio topics. Look, the audience is made up of people who are IN talk radio- why are we sitting in a theater on a sweltering Saturday morning listening to a live version of BAD talk radio? Was there a good reason for people who hear this crap on their own stations every single day to have to sit through an incoherent babblefest in which even G. Gordon Liddy was reduced to silence while people like Jerry Doyle and Karen Hunter argued about, well, who the hell knows what they were arguing about? And why did they let it go on for several minutes past the allotted time? (Franken told his story about Rush getting his facts wrong on the minimum wage. I've seen him tell the same story several times now. Al, just focus on your own show, dude- you're only giving your competition more publicity)

3. Walter Sabo gave his usual strong presentation which can be summed up in one phrase: radio people have no idea how to get positive publicity. He's right. At All Access, I get several press releases a day from XM and Sirius. I get very, very few from regular radio stations. I don't mind- I like to actually report rather than just rewrite press releases- but if stations and hosts don't alert the media about what they're doing, how are we supposed to know about it? We can't listen to every station 24/7.

4. "The Future of Talk Media" might have been a good panel, but I'd gone out to buy popcorn- the thing's in a movie theater- and I missed most of it. I would feel guilty if some other parties who shall remain nameless didn't go one step further and duck into the 11 am showing of "Cinderella Man" instead of bothering with the seminar.

5. Dr. Laura was supposed to talk about "Reinventing Yourself and Your Show," but instead she talked about herself and told stories. Thanks for sharing.

6. Holland Cooke talked about "Talk, Beyond Radio," and I missed most of it because I'd ducked out after Laura to talk to some folks and timed it wrong. It was probably a good one, too, because he's always forward-looking, but I blew it. Sorry, Holland. Here's a link.

7. Lunch. Took one look at the crappy spread and headed out with the new CJAD Montreal PD, Mike Bendixen, to find beer and better food and a waterside table to watch the boats in the World Financial Center Marina. Found it, and thus avoided the "Freedom of Speech Luncheon" that always features Blanquita Cullum, who is one of the big shots at this convention. I could not identify a single station on which Blanquita Cullum appears. I don't doubt she's out there, but I have no idea where.

8. "Balancing Local and National Talk." Walked in a little late to hear a nationally syndicated host talking about how there's variety because when you have a hot topic like (and here he said something like Deep Throat or the Senate filibuster), you can find three or four people talking about it on different stations. I wanted to scream "YEAH, AND THAT'S WHAT'S WRONG WITH THE F'ING TALK RADIO BUSINESS!" Other than the news media and the old fart political wonk geeks obsessed with Watergate and partisan politics, WHO THE HELL CARES who Deep Throat was or whether the Senate filibuster survived? And who wants to hear deadly boring talk hosts blather about it with "regular callers"? How about talking about stuff that matters to your listeners? I'm not sure what "balancing local and national talk" means, anyway- you just get the best talk available, and sometimes it's local and sometimes it's national. In some markets, there's so much to talk about on a local level that you can do without syndication; in others, there isn't. There's no formula. Me, I like local talk, because when you talk about local, relatable, identifiable issues, you'll win. But that costs money. Tell the GM that and see where it gets you.

9. Jack Swanson hits a home run with his "secrets to successful talk radio," basically advising stations to be professional and big and actually celebrate success and have fun. Jack has done this in San Francisco at KGO and has been insanely successful. Naturally, few stations emulate KGO.

10. "Is FM Talk Coming?" Even the panel and moderator agreed that the whole premise of this question is stupid- it's already here and successful, so why is there a debate? Maybe because despite over a decade of huge revenues, a lot of radio people still think talk is for AM. You know where I stand on this- talk and personality radio is the only strategic advantage broadcast stations can wield against satellite and streaming and podcasts- and the panel agreed. But even though Eric Johnson, who is the current and highly successful programmer at the station I helped start, New Jersey 101.5, name-checked me as a founder of the format, I sat there anonymously watching Mancow and a producer at KLSX (another station I helped into the format) and Russ Rollins of WTKS (another station I helped into the format) and John Mainelli discussed the merits of FM talk and I wanted to yell WHY DOESN'T ANYONE ASK ME? I HELPED INVENT THE F'ING THING! DO I NOT MATTER ANYMORE? Well, yeah, I guess I don't. Sigh.

11. "Programming a News/Talk Radio Station." I was still happy for the name check but extremely bummed thinking about how little credit I get- woe is me- and how I'm in a room where maybe 50% of the people have no idea I exist (nor interest in same) and I cut in and out of consciousness, briefly jolted by a name check of All Access (not sure if it was Bill White or Jack Landreth or Randall Bloomquist or David Bernstein who said it, but thanks, whoever did), lulled back into unconsciousness by Sean Hannity's lavish praise for the Talkers folks (hey, they're competition!), and only roused at the end with the promise of free beer at the cocktail party.

12. Good: cocktail party equals free beer. Bad: Bud Light and other less-than-palatable brews. Good: Saw some good folks I generally don't get to see in person much, and some who I only know from e-mails- so THAT'S what Kevin LaRue and Kristen Bechtold and Tom Becka and McGraw Milhaven and John Carney (the Midwest in da house) look like in person!- and it was very nice, and Randi Rhodes was as concise and witty and entertaining as, apparently, her fellow network host was not at the previous evening's party, and nearly redeemed the evening until I went outside, still debating whether to hop the 7 train to Shea and see the Mets-Angels game, and promptly got drenched by a thunderstorm on the way to the E train station. No game for me- wet and humid, no thanks, and thus I missed an epic game with a big Mets comeback and Cliff Floyd's game-winner-that-wasn't foul homer followed immediately by a game-winner-that-was fair ball over the right-center wall. I got out of town Sunday morning before the Puerto Rico Day parade could block my crosstown break for JFK.

That was the trip, and I left thinking talk radio is still a weird business. So much of the seminar seems to be pushing the idea that there are problems with the industry that you forget that it's one of the few things about commercial terrestrial radio that has a bright future. It's obvious that there should be, and probably WILL be, more talk radio, maybe even lots more local talk, more liberal talk, more conservative talk, more lifestyle and sports and women's and tech and business and pop culture talk. Instead of a parade of Guys in Suits, these things should leave you charged up about talk radio's future. I don't think the people in attendance want to hear Stephanie Miller and Tony Snow arguing about Gitmo. I think they want to hear about the future, get a pep talk, leave with a clearer view of what's happening, what's coming, what can be.

Or they want to see Al Franken get dragged from the stage with a giant vaudeville hook. I can dream, can't I?

 Share

The great thing about the return of Phil Jackson to the Lakers is that the fans are going nuts with anticipation, the L.A. media is acting like the team's been saved, and the team still sucks. The cap means they can't sign anyone good; they'll have essentially the same sorry collection of stiffs surrounding Kobe and Odom that missed the playoffs this season, and other teams will have improved. Same suck, more expensive coach.

I cannot wait until a year from now, when the Lakers are nursing the wounds of another lottery finish and everyone in L.A. tries to claim that they told you so.

 Share

It's Mutant Week here at pmsimon.com! Chapter one was the Talkers convention. Today, we're checking the local mutant community.

I have no idea what I was thinking when I said yes to Fran's suggestion that we drop by the new local Wal-Mart to pick up a few things we needed. A quick word of explanation: we have been shopping at the Wal-Marts in Long Beach for several years, but on Wednesday- that would be today- they opened a new store in Torrance, which is closer to our home. For some reason, my brain told me that the store was open yesterday, but today was the Grand Opening. And we scooted over there after dinner and...

Mob scene.

First problem: traffic. The store's address is on Normandie, but there's no entrance off Normandie. You have to turn onto 190th Street, then turn again at the next light into the sole entrance. And there is no green arrow light to turn left from Normandie northbound to 190th westbound, so when I realized we were about 25 cars back and only two cars, at best, were turning left at each green, I decided to go past 190th, do a u-turn, and do an end-around. It worked, although I got some gray hairs from the maneuver.

We had to park in a different time zone.

There was another logjam at the front door. Carts were all taken, and there appeared to be one narrow door working. We squeezed into the place and then, after dodging several carts wielded by dazed-looking madres, I took a look around.

Three observations:

1. This place is nice and big, as Wal-Marts go.
2. This place is packed with shoppers.
3. Boy, are these people huge.

Look, we're not what you'd call waifish, but we were surrounded by huge people. Not even morbidly obese folks- that I can understand, there are medical conditions involved. No, we're talking 300 pound women in stretch clothings with flesh sticking out from over the waistband of sorely taxed spandex capris. We're talking men who made Peter Griffin of Quahog, RI look reasonably in shape. Maybe this whole anti-obesity thing has merit; if people look like this in California, God help the rest of the nation. Maybe there SHOULD be some sort of anti-junk-food law. They definitely should issue licenses to wear tight-fitting spandex.

And then, unfortunately, another observation:

4. These people smell.

Yes, they sell deodorant at Wal-Mart. Apparently, the folks who turned out for the Grand Opening feel no need to check out those particular bargains. I had to squeeze by a youngish, upper-middle-class couple arguing over by the pocket t's and the guy's stench- sweat and pee- nearly knocked me over. I'm still reeling. It was like that all over the store.

I'm not sure why everyone was there. We've had Wal-Mart a short drive away for years, and we have Target, too, which, frankly, isn't all that different. The Torrance Target recently remodeled, and it's pretty nice. I'm sure it was empty tonight. People were clogging every single aisle in the new Wal-Mart. But why? There were no sales- Wal-Mart prices are Wal-Mart prices, they're pretty much the same every day (hence the slogan "everyday low prices"). The good denizens of Torrance were cleaning the place out as if they'd never seen anything like it.

We bumper-carted our way through the place, and then we saw the checkout lines. The one closest to us backed halfway through the store. Other lines were similar, and carts were filled to the brim. I closed my eyes, pushed my way through Juniors and Petites, I think, and ended up on a relatively short line. We would have gotten through faster, but a woman in front of us had to go through her entire wallet to find a credit or debit card that would work. You know, if I'm Wal-Mart, after the second card didn't go through, I'd have a manager quietly take her aside, tell her that it would be best if she left, and then boot her out the door- if she's carrying a wallet full of overdrawn or maxed-out cards, she shouldn't be paying with anything but cash.

We finally got the hell out of there, with one more minor glitch: evidently, they've put anti-theft devices on the carts that mean you can't roll them past a certain point, but they made that point before you actually ran out of parking lot, so, if you, like we did, park in the outer reaches of the lot, you can't wheel your cart to your car. Nice planning. We carried the packages to the car and escaped.

Lessons learned:

1. Do not go to a Wal-Mart on opening day.
2. People are huge and smelly.
3. I shouldn't be leaving the house. What was I thinking?

And you don't get this kind of analysis from the Huffington Post.

 Share

Have you been watching the NBA Finals? I know, not too many people are doing that, but it's been remarkable for one thing and one thing only.

I think most people, when they're being paid to do something, show up to do their best. Their pride kicks in, they try. Even if they don't really succeed, they try. It's the anti-embarrassment switch that flips on. You do your best so nobody will think you suck.

Apparently, that switch is absent among NBA players. In the first four games, one or the other team has not shown up at all. Tonight, the Spurs looked much as they did in game three- confused, slow, lackluster, frustrated. And at some point, they seemed to stop trying. Even Tim Duncan sulked and pouted and looked defeated... in the third quarter, still within a reasonable deficit, still capable of making it a game. They didn't bother, just as they didn't bother in the previous game and Detroit didn't bother in San Antonio. San Antonio turned the ball over 16 times and had only one steal themselves; adding insult to 31-point-loss injury, they even let Darko hit a hook shot. Darko scored! You gotta be kidding.

These teams were touted as the ultimate defensive giants, these games touted as taut defensive struggles. The only struggle is to keep from switching to "Baby Hit Me One More Time." And if the Spurs don't think it's time to step it up and actually play like these games mean anything, why should I be wasting time watching it?

Whatever. Only a couple more games left, guys, then your tee time awaits. They're working hard to avert a lockout, but I don't know if they should bother- the players appear to be locking themselves out right now.

 Share

Promised an iPod review. Here it is.

Love it.

Got a 30 GB iPod Photo, and I'm using it to hear recorded radio, podcasts, and music. So far, so good- good sound, light, easy to use, syncs fine, and the click wheel's easy once you get the hang of it. I'm really enjoying using the thing while running to catch up on shows I can't hear live, and for once there's no signal dropout (where I run, the San Diego FMs drop out after a mile, then there's nothing but Santa Barbara for a mile, then L.A. kicks in; if it's recorded, voila- no dropouts). I feared I wouldn't use it much; instead, I'm using it all the time, in the car, at the gym, everywhere. And yes, podcasts mainly suck, but there are good ones- I like hearing Leo LaPorte's extra-tech-y podcasts, the Philadelphia Daily News podcast's pretty decent, and more "regular radio shows" are going with the podcasts, so it can only get better. Will it replace other forms of radio? Dunno about that, but it's been working for my purposes.

I'll check back in with an update in a month or so. In the meantime, it's been worth the expense so far.

 Share

Because I'm too lazy to actually write, here are some blurry pictures from my cell phone that I hadn't gotten around to doing anything with...

First, Madison Square Park, New York, the Shake Shack, on a boiling hot late afternoon:

The view from my hotel room looking down at Duffy Square, New York- and if you look closely at the reflection in the window, you can see the back of my phone case, the lens, and even my hand (they're all giant):

Here's the lobby of Sirius Satellite Radio. That's some school trip sitting in the waiting area, the TV panels that flash welcomes to all visiting celebrities (the Wayans Bros. were there when I was; I never get that kind of reception) are hanging on the left, and those signs on the glass say "future home of Howard Stern":

And this is what the Talkers convention looked like from way in the back, in a standard multiplex theater across from Ground Zero:

Now, if my phone only took DECENT pictures... but it's a Treo 600, and it doesn't. And I was too lazy to tote my actual cameras around.

 Share

This is the second Father's Day without my father. No, I'm not going to whine and furiously tug on your tender heartstrings again. Go look up last year's if you need that. I still miss him, I wish he was here, and I even thought about what I'd have gotten him if he was alive (probably an iPod stocked with every Frank Sinatra record ever). But this year I have more pleasant, loving thoughts and fewer self-pitying ones.

That's been interesting, because I'm in a relatively unique position now, having no father and not being a father, either. This is the way it's gonna be from here on out, I suppose, and it's odd, because it doesn't bother me that I'll never get the Father's Day treatment. In fact, this morning, I forgot all about Father's Day when we decided to have lunch out at a restaurant, only to discover that the place was jammed with Father's Day revelers, many of whom appeared to be the same people we encountered the other day at the Wal-Mart grand opening. As a result, we chose not to partake of the Father's Day brunch, which looked as if it had been attacked by people unused to serving themselves, or for whom utensil use has always been optional. Around us, large tables with several generations of Torrance families were doing what families do on Father's Day: while the kids ran around flinging handfuls of flan, the parents fought over who should pay for what. "Okay, let's see, we should pay for me and Roger and the kids... wait, who's paying for Mom? I'm not paying for Mom. Hey, there are five margaritas on here, I only had three- who had the other two? I'm not paying for that...." Happy Father's Day, Dad! Got a $20.?

That's the strange thing about Father's Day- until the kid reaches, oh, about 35, Dad ends up paying for the gifts to himself. Really, do teenagers pay for those ties or shirts? Nope, it comes from allowance, or Mom slips the kid some cash that came from Dad's salary, or the kid uses the Visa card the bill for which comes to Dad. This makes no sense. Want a real Father's Day? Let Dad buy what he wants, not a shirt or a tie but maybe a set of golf clubs or a hooker. If he has to pay, at least let him make the choice.

Actually, that would be a great business, the Perfect Father's Day Gift. Set up a charter bus trip, sell tickets: golf and hookers. Dad gets up early, gets on the bus, it goes to Vegas for golf, maybe some gambling, and then out to a legal prostitution house for what Every Dad Really Wants. Mom gets a day off, the kids don't have to shop very hard, and Dad... you know.

You tell me that wouldn't be a rip-roaring success. Not that I'd ever partake. I'm not a father, remember?

 Share

Ache. Left arm, achy- I was lifting this afternoon and my right arm was fine, but the left arm gave me trouble. Time to take a break for a day.

Ache. The breezes are blowing the gunk in the air right between my eyes. Sinuses hurt.

Ache. Trouble with people. Try to do a good deed, and, as the saying goes, no good deed goes unpunished. Irreperable damage. Aggravation, the kind that just grabs the muscles in your chest and squeezes them together.

Life is not pain free. I got that a long time ago. You can take ibuprofen for the arm ache, you can take Benadryl for the sinus ache. For the rest, I guess you can take beer. Or you can finish the day's work, turn the computer off, walk away, and figure that tomorrow will be better. And maybe it will be.

 Share

Computer's acting up. Hafta take care of that. I have some thoughts on radio, but they'll have to wait... Sorry...

 Share

I could tell you how "I Wanna Be a Hilton" is quite possibly the most pointless television program ever, but that's way too easy- you need not be a professional wiseass to be able to appreciate the irony of a woman who couldn't even properly raise her own daughters trying to teach other people how to be refined upper-crust rich people- but I'd rather tell you about my new Replacement Radio.

I haven't listened to live radio for days now. I may not go back to it again. Instead, I'm getting to listen to radio shows from all over the world at my convenience- radio on demand. Stern, from the beginning, but skipping over the interminable stop sets and the boring porn star talk. Atlanta's Regular Guys teaching teenage liberal Jeff Shapiro how to be conservative and unleashing Church Chick and Gay Karaoke Satan on him. Don and Mike in Washington celebrating Mike's birthday or discussing how Don almost fell off of his roof in a lame-ass attempt to readjust his antenna to get that NBC Weather Plus channel on WRC's digital channel. Detroit's Deminski and Doyle, who I humbly admit to have discovered and hired for their first radio gig together in New Jersey, chatting with callers about what they'd save first from their houses in a fire. The incredible Tommy Mischke, mesmerizingly weird and brilliant and purveyor of dead-air pauses that would make Jim Rome green with envy. There's Leo LaPorte and friends' weekly This Week in Tech- TWiT- with actual useful computer and tech talk as well as musings about the mysterious black American Express card and the merits of plasma vs. LCD. A college student in the UK prissily reviewing classic British TV DVDs, a couple of guys babbling about HDTV in Orange County, the BBC Radio Five Live sports team talking about the week in soccer and cricket, some TV Guide editors gossiping about TV and movies, a popular Minneapolis morning show... between stuff I record and stuff I get through podcasts, I have more content than I have time to hear. But I can save it, listen when I want, listen in the car or while running or at the gym or anywhere.

I do it with a iPod, of course, but any MP3 player will do. And I like it. There are shows I can hear live that I miss and will surely listen to again (come on, John, you've been away, I'll be back), but this Radio On Demand concept works for me. I get to hear more, get to hear the kind of talk I prefer (hint: very little politics), and when all else fails, I can listen to better music than I can get on local radio. This blows away my Walkman and my car stereo. And, sure, most of what I hear is from traditional stations, but a lot of it is from stations I can't get in L.A., and it's not on someone else's schedule. This rules.

Is this going to replace regular radio? Probably not. I don't really care whether it does. All I know is that it works for me. If you like hearing shows from all over the place and want to hear them on your own time instead of missing stuff because you're not in your car at the right time, this setup's great. Don't know whether this really is a harbinger of the future of broadcasting, but it doesn't matter- I'm having fun.

 Share

I have discovered the location of the gates of Hell. They're right about here.

I know this because we were driving down to Trader Joe's at lunchtime and we were talking about some pop song we dislike- I believe the conversation was Stefani-related, referring to S--t being bananas, B-A-N-A-N-A-S- and I made the fateful decision to put the top 40 station on, considering that we really are out of touch with the music the little whippersnappers like. And it was while we drove north on Crenshaw, down the Hill towards Torrance, when proof of our crossing over came on the radio.

This.

Looking at Jessica Simpson is perfectly acceptable, but for God's sake KEEP THE SOUND MUTED. "These Boots are Made for Walking"? From the soundtrack to- excuse me while I clear the bile from my esophagus- "The Dukes of Hazzard"? Yep, it's Hell all right.

The Hell just kept on coming, too, including an unbelievably lame mashup of Jay-Z and Nena predicated simply on the presence of the number 99 in both songs- I like my songs one at a time, thanks- but I never really recovered from "Boots." Look, some songs are not made for remaking. They shouldn't be croaked at a karaoke bar, they shouldn't be updated for the 21st Century, they shouldn't be touched, not because they exhibit greatness, but because they just can't be done any better than the first time. Nancy Sinatra? Lee Hazelwood? Perfect execution the first time out. Jessica Simpson doesn't sing it "better," because it's not the kind of song to sing "better." And the famous sleazeball descending bass isn't improved with a couple of cornball country doodles and fiddles thrown in because, remember, she's Daisy Duke and it's Hazzard County.

But she sure is purty in a disturbingly slutty, unsanitary way. If you want to ruin the soft-core ambiance, just imagine Joe Simpson with a big leering grin watching the part where she washes the General Lee in next-to-nothing.

You're welcome.

 Share

As my friend Joe astutely noted, when a town uses the Supreme Court's eminent domain ruling to justify taking property for a commercial developer who then turns around and builds a (larger, more valuable) private home on the property, there will be even greater outrage. If the Very Rich and Famous Developer and TV Personality who owns the golf course down the street decides he wants my neighborhood to build an even more outlandishly huge oceanside mansion than he's building right next to the course, can he go to my town and turn the screws until they do what he wants? Yup, and now there's pretty much no recourse- it's up to the town to make that call.

Considering how the left and right seem to be equally appalled by the ruling, I was a little baffled as to who, other than municipal leaders and the five majority Supreme Court voters, would support it. And then it hit me:

Renters. Long-term renters, renters who have no hope of owning a house.

You have to have a healthy dislike for people with private property to think that a town should be able to scoop someone's property up for the flimsiest of reasons, or just because a private developer says so. You'd think it would be hard to find anyone who'd be OK with that, but maybe not.

If you're really into the class warfare game, this is perfect, the rich eating the rich. But this has to be hella confusing to the kind of property-owning liberal who talks a great anti-rich-folks game and would otherwise love that property owners are being nailed with this. They're in the same crosshairs. Then again, as Mr. Costello observed (surely with a nudge from his sometime writing partner Mr. McCartney), it was indeed a millionaire who said "imagine no possessions." Can't have it both ways. But, at least in the early going, it seems that most liberals and most conservatives are united in their revulsion.

Some of the homeowners in New London who brought the suit are threatening to stay put, which could lead to a Tiananmen Square-style incident, the developer's bulldozers poised and the homeowners refusing to move. If you support the ruling, you have to ask yourself which side you'd be on.

 Share