PMSimon.com

I have been in one ragingly bad mood for a week or so. Part of it is sleep deprivation- thanks, Ella- and part of it is overwork and part of it is plain ol' stress. Plus, my knees are acting up. However, I did, finally, after over a month, get back to the gym this afternoon. I will be feeling it tomorrow. But I needed it- you lay off for even a few days and all the muscle turns into tapioca, and I've been away from the weights way longer than that.

The gym was crowded today- more teenagers than usual for a midday. (No, not because of the boycott- they were all spiky-haired Asian hipster dudes, a couple in frighteningly tight wifebeater T's, a look that I would imagine would be quite popular in some circles but doesn't really fit at a suburban, utilitarian Y) I managed to get all the desired exercises in, and now I'm home, aching, in dire need of ibuprofen, wondering why I put myself through this torture.

Of course, I know why. You don't get to look like this by just sitting around the house. You need plenty of chocolate, too. And THAT'S why I needed to hit the gym today. It had better work.

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Sometimes, when I write stuff for pay, I agonize over every word, edit and re-edit and read it out loud and rewrite and do the whole thing over and over and over until it's in some useable form, and I send it off and get no reaction.

And other times, I wait until the last minute, dash off something as an afterthought, ship it out thinking "that'll have to do," and it gets huge response.

You'd think I'd learn something from experience.

This week's All Access newsletter took about five times as long to write as last week's. Last week's received a ton of response, 99% favorable, most wildly so. This week's... well, it hasn't gone out yet. Maybe it'll be an exception to the rule. But when your best-received work is the stuff you crank out at the last minute- the stuff I sold for TV use was all written at the very last minute, and one sketch that made it to production was written longhand on a legal pad while sitting a few rows behind the goal at a Kings-Flyers game at the Forum the night before deadline- it should be considered a lesson: just crank it out, don't edit, don't even think about it. Just write, baby.

Or maybe the lesson is this: as long as the check clears, it doesn't matter. But I care too much to believe that.

Actually, I think the lesson is this: it's late, you're rambling, go to bed.

But this is apparently when I do my best work....

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Every muscle in my body hurts right now. I made it through a workout at the gym, but I'm feeling it now. And I have absolutely no energy- I couldn't get energized enough to drive up to the stadium for the Dodger game tonight. I couldn't even get energized enough to walk to the car to drive anywhere. I don't even have the energy to write at the moment, or scan anything.

Gonna go sleep it off now.

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What have we learned from today's events at the Susquehanna radio stations, where several employees discovered that they won't be around when Cumulus officially takes over?

It's simple: if you work in radio today, your job is to make more money for your employer than if you weren't around. It's not good enough to be great at your job. It doesn't matter if you're horrible at your job. What matters is your salary, and whether the corporate guys think that the station can run without you. (Hint: it can) Quality is not job one. Pleasing Wall Street and continuing to enable the bosses to drive matching expensive sports cars- that's job one, and the sooner you understand that, the happier you'll be.

And the sooner you'll look for a job in another industry, but that's a separate issue.

(Really, I wish y'all the best of luck finding a new job in radio. Can't help you much, but I wish you luck...)

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I keep hearing that Wadsworth Mansion song on both Sirius and XM oldies channels, so I had to look it up.

Number 7?!?

It was a top 10 hit? I swear, I remember listening to the radio in 1970. I listened to WABC obsessively, WABC and WFIL and at night WKBW and WLS and Super CFL and The Big 8 CKLW and anything else I could pull in on our little transistor in the brown case. Wadsworth Mansion? "Sweet Mary"? Rings no bell at all. I remember all sorts of obscurities, but that one just slipped right on by.

Number 7? Impossible. But there it is.

I'm slipping. I should know that one. And I was PD of an oldies station once upon a time. I feel such shame.

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Dear Abby, or Ann, or whoever's answering that stuff these days:

I am a longtime radio professional who's worked on a lot of high-profile shows and stations, and I've been privileged enough to be responsible for the development of several talk shows. Unfortunately, I've rarely received full credit for my work; I've been kept in the background, and while the hosts of these shows are quick to recognize my contributions in private, when a reporter comes calling, they rarely recall my name. Since I, and they, know what I've done, I've let it pass, for the most part, but I admit it can become annoying.

Today, I received a copy of a trade magazine with a major cover story on a show that briefly existed over a decade ago and was way ahead of its time. It was a show that came about because I needed to replace a departing show and decided that it would be interesting to pair two of my solo hosts, who were constantly sniping at each other off the air. I thought it might be amusing at worst and great radio at best to take these two prodigiously talented personalities and put them on the same show. When I mentioned it to our consultant, he gave me some wise advice on how to broach the subject, and it worked. The show did well and went into syndication in less than a year. The article chronicles the story of the show, interviewing the hosts and including all the people deemed to have contributed to the show's success.

Except one.

Oh, I do get mentioned, but in passing, with the wrong title and as if I had nothing to do with the show. Program directors with whom the team never worked get the same number of mentions. I definitely don't get credit for helping create the show, helping guide it, talking each host down from the ledge when nerves got frayed. Oh, well, that's show biz.

But here's the larger problem. I help a lot of people in the business. I've helped people get jobs, get publicity, advance their careers. I don't get paid for that, and I don't seek payment- it's just kinda what I do. But I tend not to get credit for it, and in some cases even thanks. (Some do return the favor, and it's nice. Most don't.) And now I'm questioning whether this is all worth it. Am I wasting my time? Is there some kind of karmic thing involved here? Why, O Lord, why?

Signed,

Bruised Ego in California

Dear Bruised,

P.S.: Them's the breaks, loser.

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Every time, it's the same thing.

It's a movie theater. How hard is it not to talk in a movie theater? How hard is it not to talk LOUD in a movie theater?

This time, it was two older women, a pair of yentas who refused to stop chatting through the commercials, the trailers, and, finally, after the movie started, they STILL continued to talk. I asked them to quiet down during the credits- "shh, the movie's started"- but they kept going, so I gave it a little more force.

"Excuse me, but the movie's started. Will you PLEASE SHUT UP?"

"Hmmph," they responded. One sarcastically said "oh, he might miss some dialogue," as if the absence of dialogue is a signal for the audience to start chattering again.

"Shut the f up," I cheerily repeated, only I didn't say "f." And they kept it down, but not totally off, prompting a woman sitting in front of them to move her seat halfway through the movie.

We all know that young audiences can't distinguish between being at a theater in public and watching a DVD at home. But now it's 60-ish women on a Saturday matinee excursion sans husbands (and no wonder the husbands weren't with them). Nobody will just shut the hell up anymore.

That was the first movie we'd seen in the theater for several months. It'll be the last for a while. We can't be alone on this.

(The movie? "Thank You For Smoking." Entertaining except for one horrible miscasting: Katie Holmes, who can't pull off the sexy-but-hardbitten-ace-reporter/maneater at all. And she looks terrible, too, almost a young, thin Peter Lorre-in-drag. But I'll bet the studio thought she'd bring in the kids)

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Tony's bored. No kidding.

A little movement tonight, continuing in the two-character-focus mode. Tonight's featured players: Christopher and Paulie.

While everyone else sat on the bench spitting sunflower shells, Christopher found out his girlfriend is pregnant, got married, shot a biker while stealing cases of wine with Tony on a road trip, fell off the wagon with booze, fell off the wagon with heroin, and had a flashback about Adrianna, whose mother still thinks he killed her.

Meanwhile, Paulie was having a hard time running the annual street fair, had some religious trouble with the statue of the saint and its (withheld) gold hat, cursed at and then, by episode's end, sort-of reconciled with his mother (the one who raised him, not her sister the nun and Paulie's real mother), screwed up by cheaping out on hiring a lousy carny ride operator who had an accident and hurt ridegoers including Janice Soprano, and had difficulty with a prostate cancer scare.

And Tony, after the fun of the impromptu wine holdup, essentially told Dr. Melfi he's feeling bored.

Looming issues: the feds looking at Adriana's "disappearance," Paulie's prostate, Tony and Phil Leotardo cutting Johnny Sack out of a deal, Bobby Baccala's weakness, Christopher's descent into alcohol and drugs. Forgotten issues: everything else. Another episode bogged down in subpolts, but at least we're a few inches forward.

The preview of next week's episode looks weak- Johnny Sack's attorney suggests cutting a deal with the feds, some more Bobby-Janice-Tony stuff- but last week's preview of this week's episode was very misleading, promising a lot more action than we got. Even paulie wasn't as entertaining as we'd been led to believe he'd be. So you can't tell anything from that.

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Mom would have been 72 today. Or 74. Or... well, we never really knew how old she was. She never admitted to any age. She wouldn't let us see her driver's license, and we assumed that she'd probably shaved a couple of years off her age to ease matters when she emigrated to the U.S. after the war.

She had an accent that I can stil hear in my mind. I can still see her face, too- a regal beauty, somehow finding herself transplanted from the somewhat backwards, old-school eastern Europe before the war to hiding in Germany while the government looked for her and the Russians marched by to free her to the radically different modernity of suburban New Jersey. She spoke Yiddish to her aunt and friends, assuming that my sister and I wouldn't understand, although we learned enough to figure out what she was saying. She feigned confusion with the language when she didn't want to have to deal with something, but she was a lot smarter than she wanted people to think. And she had the survivor's mentality, insecure, as if she expected the Nazis to find her in the Jersey wilderness- she would have nightmares that Germany would reunite, and when it did, she was not pleased.

I've written a lot about how much I owe my father, but that's not to sell my mother short. She managed our family, she took care of all of us, and she gave us all the love she could, which was plenty. I regret that she never got to come out here to California- we moved a year after she was gone. She'd have liked it here.

Mom, happy birthday. You always used to tell me I shouldn't do anything for your birthday. Sorry- I couldn't resist. Never could.

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No time for a full post tonight, which is just as well because I'm still seething from last week's slight. (I'm usually above this, put it was egregious enough to even be remarked upon by people who don't read this blog but know all the parties involved and the facts, so I might be justified) Better shut up before I write something I'll regret (like I haven't before)....

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It occurred to me that not everyone who reads this thing receives the weekly newsletter thing I send out through All Access. For those who don't, then, here's an edited version (omitting the All Access promo stuff) of this week's letter:

Let's see if you can guess what rubbed me the wrong way about this quote by Whoopi Goldberg from this morning's All Access Net News item about her new morning radio show:

Let's close on a positive note and welcome Whoopi to the radio hosts' club. If she does succeed in bringing more listeners to terrestrial radio, that's good for everyone, right? And maybe she'll need some expert guidance to help her do a better show. I'm in the book, Whoopster. My rate's negotiable.

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And one more thing about the Whoopi Goldberg radio show: it's easy to say what Howard Stern said ("it will FAIL"), but the best comment I've heard about it came from the Regular Guys' Larry Wachs on 96 Rock/Atlanta, whose reaction was:

"She's the antidote to Phil Hendrie!"

Perfect.

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The spammers have backed off using those random "names" like Vocations C. Tellingly on their e-mail. Replacing those are random words in the subject line.

As a public service to anyone looking for a suitable band name, here are just a few of the spam subject lines in my mailbox today:

simper prophecy
Midwestern fingernail
deputy avoidable
godparent freakout
coloring sympathetic
parking brake
bite stomp
persona siamese thoriate
olive oil casualness
hyphen contribute
witch hunt aperitif
attractive apostle
resemble fiberglass
motorboat nymphomaniac
pasteurized resplendent
respiration ailment
grumble pose
mineral plaid
intervene beaker
reconcile pollutant
squeeze butcher
bruise exasperating
monarchy oil well
bid credibility
faucet bilaterally
outburst experimentally
replacement levelheaded
pleasantry damage
cistern vulture
crane merriment
palm asleep
preexisting willing

I'm partial to "witch hunt aperitif" myself.

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Whaddya do when you're tired, you've had a long day of work and doctors and errands, and you sit down to write at the end of the day and you just... don't... care?

Say hello to my little friend:

(I know, catblogging is so three years ago. But it's Ella the World's Most Famous Cat. Who doesn't love Ella the World's Most Famous Cat? And that bluish thing behind her on the ledge in front of the fireplace is our gargoyle. He doesn't have a name)

(Her eyes DO have pupils, by the way. She's not possessed. Although when she's running around like a maniac at 2 am or demanding attention at 3 am, I might see that a different way)

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My reaction to the Star and Buc Wild case is the same that I had in the KTRS Dave Lenihan case: why didn't anyone hit the dump button?

Life doesn't come with a rewind button. You usually don't get a chance to do anything over. But radio gives hosts a second chance: you get to erase something after it's said but before it airs. It's anywhere between seven seconds and lots more than that. And in that time, if someone, say, blurts out an obscenity, or you say something you immediately regret saying, or you have any question at all as to whether what just got said or played might bring down the wrath of the FCC or your wife or anyone else, you just hit a button and everything jumps ahead and you're live for a few seconds, and that previous mistaken seven seconds are gone, history, erased. Nobody listening on the air will hear it. Simple. Beautiful.

And unused in some cases. In Star's case, there were people in the building sitting by that delay button, or should have been. Whoever it was didn't bother hitting it, same as the KTRS case, when a board op and producer heard the poor guy stumble and, instead of telling him to shut up and hitting the button so it could all go away, just sat there frozen. In both cases, salvation was one pressed button away. It's like you're on a ship, someone goes overboard, and all you have to do is throw down a lifesaver, yet you just stand and watch the poor schmuck drown. In Lenihan's case, it was an accident; in Star's case, it was self-inflicted. In Lenihan's case, the guy just had a brain fart; in Star's case, there was a host the staff was afraid to cross, behaving as if he was some sort of untouchable O.G. tough guy, or at least a Howard Stern wannabe thinking that if Howard could wish cancer on his enemies, it would be even MORE outrageous to threaten a 4 year old child with rape.

But nobody pushed the button. Nobody.

I would fire anyone within 6 feet of the delay who heard the shows and didn't hit the dump button. There's no excuse. Howard Stern used to complain about "Dead Air Dave" and Tom Chiusano spending all morning listening and hitting the button, but that's pretty much what any talk station and any station with edgy, controversial hosts needs to do. CBS has Al Dukes looming over the dump button for Opie and Anthony and has local guys doing the same at other stations, even for shows that aren't that controversial. Whatever Howard may think, if you're the license holder, you have to do that, unless you're hell bent on spending millions in legal fees. It's not fair and not right, perhaps, that the puritanical FCC and Congress are causing this, but they are and it's necessary. But in Star's situation, having a "Dead Air Dave" or Al Dukes watching for stuff that'll get everyone in trouble would have saved the guy's career. What's more offensive, having your bosses censor you on occasion or getting fired and arrested for what wasn't censored?

One stupid button would have saved Star's ass. One button. If he deserves rebuke, so does everyone else who sat on their hands when they could have saved him from himself.

(By the way, how weaselly is it for Star to "apologize" through his attorney? If you're sincere, do it yourself, tough guy. If you don't mean it, don't do it, period. But this "have my lawyer issue an apology" thing... some gangsta.)

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Two reasons why it might not have been the best idea to go to Costco today:

1. It's the day before Mother's Day.

2. It's Saturday.

Those two events would normally mean this would be retailing's Perfect Storm: last-minute holiday shopping (Costco's big on floral arrangements for Dear Ol' Mom) and the busiest shopping day of the week. And, indeed, the place was packed with the especially clueless- lane blockers, dawdlers, the hard-of-steering- and the parking lot was jammed. But we managed to find a space quickly enough, maneuver through the crowds to grab what we needed, and somehow even get to a checkout lane with only one person in front of us.

We survived the Costco calamity. I'm so proud.

Later, I saw the coverage of disgraced radio personality Star doing the perp walk in New York, preening and mugging for the cameras and calling himself the new Lenny Bruce. Funny, but I seem to recall Lenny Bruce being persecuted for telling jokes about sex and using "four-letter words," not threatening to "go R. Kelly" on a 4 year old child. But it's nice to see that Star is following the Howard Stern playbook right to the letter. It's always good to pay tribute to your influences. Too bad he's no Howard Stern, and no Lenny Bruce.

Prediction: community service, donation to child abuse prevention organization, court-ordered "heartfelt apology." And he'll be doing radio again in two years.

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The Vito-in-New England subplot is mercifully over and the Vito-Back-In New Jersey subplot is just beginning. Oh, joy.

Tony is dealing with his sibling rivalry issues again, this time after Janice confronted him about his emasculation of Bobby and Bobby's subsequent mugging while collecting from a Newark bookie. He solved it by making Janice owe him for a good deed (muscling Johnny Sack into selling his house out from under his wife to Janice at a discount). He also solved his Carmela problem by lying to push her into selling the Montville house she was having problems with. OK, so Tony'll get laid a little more. Great.

Most of the episode was Vito-centric, with plenty of gay kissing and bed sequences, plus Vito/Vince helping rescue a pastor and a tender dinner after which Vito, bored with working construction and longing for the Jersey lifestyle (and who doesn't?), hit the road, managing to rear-end (cough) a guy's truck on a back road (and how did Vito go from I-95 to some ice-slicked country road? Was he obligated to do so under the no-freeways rule of Hollywood?) and shoot the guy when he insisted on calling the cops. Good news: the interminable Vito-being-gay-in-New-Hampshire subplot's over. Bad news: according to the coming attractions, we're in for a load of where's-Vito subplot. Enough Vito.

Johnny Sack copped a plea- 15 years, lotsa money- which appalled his fellow mobsters, to whom admitting he was in the Mob is a short step away from being a rat. A sub-subplot involving Tony trying to muscle a pair of New Orleans brothers-in-law (one being William Katt!) into cashing Johnny out of their business was fairly useless. Maybe they're setting up something that'll loom larger in subsequent episodes, but it's more likely that they'll forget it. Meanwhile, the feds are rounding up Johnny Sack's assets, which is how they got Christopher into this week's episode with minutes to spare- he'd bought his car from Johnny Sack's wife and the marshals seized it off the street. (Moral: park in the garage) Oh, and Paulie has prostate cancer. That was HIS only scene.

The episode dealt with a lot of stuff but really seems only to be wrapping or advancing subplots. For an episode with a lot going on, there seemed to be not much forward momentum. I'm still waiting for a breakout episode this season.

Next week: everybody's looking for Vito. Where's Vito? Has anyone seen Vito? Got Vito? O Vito, Where Art Thou? If he's looking for a hiding place, may I suggest "Big Love"? Nobody'll see him there.

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Uh oh.

Sprint (and Verizon) finally announced the release of the Treo 700p. I'm still using my old, tired 600, and it's time- long past time- for an upgrade. The 700p is getting some gripes from Treo 650 users as not enough of an upgrade, the same complaint I had about the 650 when it came out- $600. ought to buy more than they were offering. What the 700p has to offer is this: EVDO. More memory, although still not enough- half of it is taken up with resident programs. Bluetooth, but not upgraded from the 650. 320x320 screen, same as the 650 and much better than the 600 (or, for that matter, the 700w- more on that later).

What's wrong with it? Can't do WiFi. Can't run SlingPlayer Mobile- that's Windows Mobile only. Crappy camera (still better than the 600, though). Limited streaming video/audio. It's still bulky, with not the best battery life. And, worst, it's burdened with the same old Palm OS Garnet that's pretty much outlived its usefulness as an operating system.

I really, really, REALLY want EVDO- high(er) speed Internet access. But if I can't use the SlingBox with it, what's the point? And I can't tell whether the phone with EVDO plus the new iteration of the Blazer browser will render the All Access administration pages in any kind of useful manner, anyway (the 600's Blazer, or AvantGo or Opera Mini, for that matter, can't). And I have yet to find an SSH-compliant FTP program for the Palm OS, nor a text editor that will allow me to edit and save non-.doc or .txt files with the correct extension (no .html, no .inc, no .asp). That's what's blocking me from leaving the laptop home and doing everything on the phone.

But there's the Treo 700w, too. That's the Windows Mobile Treo, currently a Verizon-only item. Sprint, according to Engadget Mobile, will launch it this Summer. If WM 5.0 apps like Pocket Explorer and Word will do what I need them to do, and we know it runs SlingPlayer, that's a slam dunk. But here's the thing: I have yet to find a single cell phone store that not only carries the 700w (or the Sprint PPC-6700), but has one all loaded up, provisioned, and WORKING on the network. All I want to do is fire it up and see if the All Access pages (and the JavaScript parts) work, if Word lets me save a doc as something other than a .doc file, if it, in short, does what I want it to do. Is that too much to ask? Yep. And forget about testing it to see if it's a decent cellphone- they won't let you do that, either. How many industries expect you to buy their products without trying them to see if they work well?

Still, I'm ready. Before the year's out, I WILL buy a new phone. The gadget geek within me demands it.

Maybe...

Or...

Or even...

What to buy? Decisions...

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I was browsing through my old baseball cards trying to bust through a mild case of writer's block- more writer's fatigue, since I've been cranking out so much copy my head's swimming- and found a few for guys who, well, not sure what happened to them. Like this guy:

Promising pitcher, still a rookie- a couple of cups of coffee up and down from Tulsa in '65 and '66. Didn't talk much. But, you know, you can always use a lefty on the staff.

I remember this guy as a wildman:

He was on the Mets in '69 and '70 and threw bullets, but you never knew where the ball was gonna go. They dumped him off on the Angels- got Jim Fregosi, so you can't argue with that kind of deal.

This guy was already a star:

This was in '67, and he was a sure bet for future success. A few years later, so was the catcher just arriving in the Bronx:

And who would have thought, looking at this 1973 rookie card of NL third baseman, that I'd someday be proud to own an authentic, near-mint John Hilton card?

Not sure what happened to the other guys. But I think folks in Boston know what happened to one of these guys:

These are samples of my good stuff. The real fun stuff's in a box in storage, the more obscure guys nobody else remembers. The stars are easy; it's the Fred Wenz types, the Danny Comers and Don Minchers and Lowell Palmers that really bring back the memories. If I'm still blocked, one of these days, I'll drag that box out and scan away.

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Might as well not duplicate effort, because I still have work to do and it's late, so here's part of the weekly "The Letter" newsletter you'd have gotten if (hint, hint) you'd signed up for AllAccess.com:

Last week's big radio news about the Star and Buc Wild incident in New York reminded me how difficult it can be to pull off "controversial" radio. It's hard to defend what Star said under any circumstances, and I can't- and won't- do that. But over the years, I've witnessed- or been involved in- controversies that got people suspended, fired, run out of town on a rail, practically drawn and quartered, and it always raises the same reaction from me:

5. Don't Be Afraid. Yeah, with all that, if you have something to say that might be trouble but you truly believe is worth doing, do it. It's easier to live with yourself that way. Besides, you'll eventually find another job. Which reminds me that if you're on satellite radio, it's a different story. But most of you aren't on satellite radio.

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You're a fan of 70's-80's baseball? Well, check this out: this was the roster insert for the game program for the Richmond Braves-Tidewater Tides International League game of September 2, 1976.

My dad and I were there at Met Park in Norfolk, in an intermittent driving rainstorm, mostly standing against the press box wall behind home plate, watching the last game of the season. And there were more future major leaguers than I remembered: Richmond was managed by Jack McKeon and had an awkward catcher named Dale Murphy that they were talking about converting to another position. Jim Brazeale was at first and destined to bounce back up to the Atlanta roster. Reggie Sanders had the 16 homers and 70 RBIs, but was on his way down- he had a cup with Detroit the year before, but never played in the majors again. (The Reggie Sanders of the 90s was a different guy. And this Chico Ruiz wasn't the same as the one that stole home in 1964, although this one played a little bit in the majors, too) Barry Bonnell, Brian Asselstine, Preston Hanna, Billy Champion, Bob Beall, Norm Angelini, Al Autry (one game, one win!), Rick Camp, Mickey Mahler, Jamie Easterly- there were a LOT of mediocre-and-less major leaguers on that roster. On the Tides, John Stearns, Benny Ayala, Jim Dwyer, Jackson Todd, Brock Pemberton, Billy Baldwin, Mark DeJohn... and, of course, Bill Dancy, who didn't make it as a player but has a job with which I might be familiar.

That's what I love about minor league ball- there's always a chance you'll see someone you'll someday be able to say you got to see before he was a star. 30 years ago, standing in the rain in Norfolk watching these guys play out the string, I wondered if it was worth it. No hall-of-famers on the field, but, yeah, it was worth it.

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Here's one for those of you in Atlanta who will undoubtedly recognize these three guys, two of whom joined the Braves that year, pictured in the Braves' 1976 yearbook:

Photographer: "Okay, guys, let's do an action shot. Let's get you holding some mics."

Ernie: "But we're eating lunch."

Photographer: "That's okay, just grab whatever you have. A spoon will do."

Skip: "As long as we don't step on downed power lines!"

Pete: "Mel Ott once used a spoon to hit a game-winning three run homer in the Polo Grounds. And Monty Stratton replaced the leg he lost with a carving knife to pitch three more seasons in..."

Skip: "Veriiiiiizon Wireless!"

Ernie: "That hasn't even been invented yet."

Skip: "You're almost as much of a dork as your son."

Okay, I'll leave the imaginary Skip Caray banter to Larry Wachs, who does it far better than I. But how 'bout that 1976 look? Skip's rocking the same hair as the next door neighbor on "That 70's Show" and the same clothes, too- leisure suit and tinted glasses, ready to hit Buckhead hard. Pete, who was 31 at the time, is caught between a more conservative look- corduroy sports jacket, tie, discount glasses- and Mod (longish combover, epic shirt collar). And Ernie evidently raided Lindsey Nelson's closet for that jacket. The guys also seem to be looking in three different directions.

Skip and Pete are still on the job, 30 years later. Not bad.

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Ladies and gentlemen, the winner of the Unfortunate Name Award for 2006:

Seriously, dude, you could have saved yourself a lot of abuse by going with "Richard Morris."

(Dick is a retired TRW guy who runs the local community theater, meaning that he brings a succession of Z-list ex-sitcom-star talent to do road-show versions of plays (Eddie "The Big Ragu" Mekka in "Art." Really.) and lots of musical/cabaret showcases mostly appealing to the very elderly, and rents it out. Good for you, Mr. Moe)

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HBO aired a lovely travel special on Paris in place of the regularly scheduled "Sopranos" episode tonight. Your travel guides: Carmela Soprano and Rosalie Aprile.

OK, so it was a plot device. While Carm and Ro wandered through the City of Bad Attitudes agog, the scenes were intercut with Tony at the Bada Bing and Tony getting oral favors while driving- Paris culture good, Jersey culture bad. Okay, we get it. Plus, Adrianna made another dream appearance. Significant? So far, those dead-folks-reappearing moments haven't amounted to anything, but in the preview for the last episode of this cycle (two weeks from now- come ON!), Carm is suggesting that an investigation into Ade's whereabouts might be a good idea. Oh, and there was a priceless throwaway when Ro marveled that the young dude she'd picked up is from Belleville- "they got Belleville over here!" Yeah, but they don't got Nutley.

Anoter subplot: losing a son. Tony admitted to Dr. Expressionless that he sometimes hates A.J., sighing that he's lost control over the kid, then later laid down the law by telling the now-unemployed wayward son that he's going to work in construction, and broke the kid's truck window for good measure, because he's Tony and because he can. (Meadow made a brief appearance to announce that she's following Finn to L.A.; that's fine, since she hasn't been much more than a shrill bit player this season)

But the most important subplot for the future, one can assume, is the end of Vito (courtesy of an unamused Phil Leotardo) and the beginning of a mob feud after one of Johnny Sack's guys wouldn't stop with the jokes. Tony didn't want a war- when they're involved, he said, the guys aren't earning- but he may have one. That is, if the writers don't weasel out- the previews for the final episode indicate Phil has the same concerns Tony has. We're dropping bodies at the rate of one or two a week lately, and they'd better not ease up now.

Overall, not a horrible episode. The plot gets advanced, you got Vito getting a cue stick up the butt and a jokester getting a knife to the gut, you got Phil Leotardo becoming more of a powder keg, and you got the insufferable A.J. getting kicked around a little by Tone. Plus you got lots of Parisian scenery and the end of the previously-thought-to-be-endless Vito Saga. Bonus: a bad old dirty joke with the punchline "I'm not talking to you!" as part of a pig-related theme (Carm snaps a picture of a neon pig in Paris, Tony's at Satriale's). Not the best episode ever, but we'll take it.

No Paulie, though. A little Sil, one Bobby walk-on, a brief glimpse of Christopher, blessedly no Janice, but you gotta have some Paulie every week.

Next week's a season-padding repeat of the last three episodes. Don't need that. Last episode of this run's the following week, and because it wasn't shot as a final anything- they have more episodes being held for January- it may not bring this cycle to a satisfying close. Or maybe it will. We have time to speculate.

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An old fart radio guy has written a guest column for the New York Daily News that's called "Radio Filth Starts in Corporate Suites" but might as well be titled "I Need A Law So I Can Get A Job." After ripping the "lowlifes" like Star for being evil and horrible, he writes:

But, as repugnant as they are, these morally bankrupt millionaires can't be held solely responsible for taking the money and running (off at the mouth). The lion's share of blame must be placed at the feet of the broadcast industry itself.

The crux of the issue was captured in an editorial cartoon in these pages on the morning after the most recent jaw-dropping debasement. Two fat cat executives at Clear Channel Radio are having a private conversation. A computer screen in the background reveals a graph depicting soaring profits. Suit No. 1 says, "There's a lot of publicity about our hip-hop deejay threatening a little girl with sexual violence." Suit No. 2 responds, "So we can increase our ad rates?"

I know these guys. I worked for them. They would look the other way at any kind of perversion that helped them squeeze a quarter of extra profit between last quarter and this quarter. It's in their interest. But that is not what the framers of the Constitution had in mind, nor is it what the founders of Federal Communications Commission meant by the phrase "public interest."

All right, I wouldn't go with the "perversion" rhetoric- the Star thing isn't exactly representative of the kind of programming you'll generally find on radio. (And the cartoon's "truth" is undercut by the fact that Clear Channel fired Star) But Old Fart has a culprit in mind:

Here's the problem: Unregulated, uncontrolled radio makes so much money doing its worst that it simply can't afford to do its best. Since 1996, an orgy of consolidation has helped fuel a 34% decline in the number of owners, a 90% rise in the cost of advertising rates, and - not coincidentally - a rise in the number of indecent broadcasts.

"Not coincidentally"? The only measure of indecent broadcasting is whatever the FCC decides to prosecute. We've gone through stretches of heavy-handed regulation and stretches of hands-off treatment. How can O.F. say that it's worse now? Because nobody can prove it either way.

And rates were going up regardless of consolidation. In fact, they may still be too low. The driving factor there isn't consolidation, it's what the market- ad agencies- will bear. O.F.'s head would explode if he saw the rates newspapers, TV, and outdoor get.

And the public is complicit.

Ah, here comes the real trouble.

In the face of these trends, too many of us have turned down the volume on our own voices, settling for a kind of radio that, for the most part, replicates the industry view of what it should be.

In other words, the general public LIKES the "perversion." It's the PUBLIC's fault! If only they knew that they COULD be listening to obscure James Taylor album cuts introduced by O.F. himself- now, THAT'S radio!

It doesn't help that the FCC continues to be populated primarily by appointees sympathetic to the broadcasting industry and often employed by the broadcasting industry when they step down. Conflict of interest, anyone?

Michael Copps and Jonathan Adelstein, sympathetic? And Mr. Sympathetic, Kevin Martin, is the one, with Copps, leading the charge to screw broadcasters over indecency.

Rampant deregulation has created this mess - and only reregulation can get us out of it.

The liberal's answer to the public just not buying what they're selling- MAKE them buy it.

Proponents of the status quo claim that market forces can effectively regulate radio. But local radio run from the corporate suites of a few huge conglomerates inevitably plays to the lowest common denominator at the expense of those elements of society that advertisers aren't interested in reaching, most notably the poor and the elderly.

O.F.'s station is noncommercial. If there's a need for that programming, why isn't HIS station doing it instead of indulging old hippies? (And who said poor people don't like what's on commercial radio? Are elderly people only served by Glenn Miller records? Don't AM talk radio stations tend to have large audiences over the age of 65? They don't count?)

But not just the poor and the elderly. Consider this: at this writing, New York City, the supposed broadcasting capital of the world, does not have a full-time country, jazz or oldies radio station. That's serving the public?

Country hasn't worked in New York for years. Is a station supposed to lose a fortune so someone can hear a Dierks Bentley record? Jazz IS on the air- WBGO, one of the nation's premier noncommercial stations and a proponent of "real" jazz. Oldies left because the audience was shrinking. It's an option for a failing station, but, really, why is he defining "public interest" as "playing the same old Beatles, Beach Boys, and Motown records in tight rotation"? There's no full-time Gregorian Chant station, either- why not? Where's the Polka station? There are people not being served! It's big business' fault!

If we aim our fire at one loose cannon like deejay Star, we will fail to see the real problem: an insatiable media conglomerate swallowing up anything with a transmitter pulse in its path, with the implicit blessing of the governmental organ charged with protecting the public interest. Couple this with a sleeping, yawning, apathetic, politically inactive populace, and you get exactly the kind of radio you deserve: greedy, monopolistic, homogenized, irrelevant and - yes - obscene.

Translation: WHY CAN'T I GET A JOB ON THOSE GREEDY, MONOPOLIZED, HOMOGENIZED, IRRELEVANT AND- YES- OBSCENE STATIONS? WHY WON'T THEY HIRE ME? WHY DOESN'T THE PUBLIC LOVE ME?

Yes, terrestrial radio has major problems, and I will bow to few in my disdain for what bean counters, sales weasels, and clueless programmers have done to the medium. In fact, the trend towards cheap music formats and deemphasizing personality is likely to turn generations of listeners away from the medium. But this guy gets it very, very wrong, because he thinks that what the public NEEDS is what the public DOESN'T WANT. His style of radio's fallen out of favor, so he wants regulation to bring it back, assuming that the only reason he's not spinning Bruce records on WNEW anymore is ownership consolidation. It's more complicated than that, and he HAS to know it. But what kind of brilliant radio is he doing that ought to be all over the dial? From a New York Times appreciation of his show in 2004, here's a sampler:

After 40 years Mr. Fornatale's themes can be almost academically dense. Recent shows have included a tribute to great inventions on the 214th anniversary of the founding of the United States Patent Office.

The themes can also be on the facile side. An annual "Color Radio" show has the Beatles' "Yellow Submarine," Joni Mitchell's "Blue," Love's "Orange Skies" and so on.

A tribute to patents and a show about colors. Yes, yes, we need a law to bring that back.

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You know those headaches that start right between your eyes and wrap around your forehead to your temples and radiate through your cheekbones? Whaddya call 'em, you know, them sinus headache deals?

Yeah, like that. Got one now.

Gotta go.

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OK, no surprise, Taylor Hicks won "American Idol."

Biiiiiig deal.

Only saw a few minutes- turned it on to see the eventual winner and several other male contestants energetically performing the most horrific cover of "Don't Stop" I have EVER heard. Caught a few seconds of some bad "Brokeback" parody, a few seconds of a smug Prince, and the end, when Hicks and McPhee sang a cracked-voice bad-karaoke "I've Had The Time Of My Life" before Ryan (World's Luckiest Human) Seacrest announced the winner.

Prediction for the winner: game show host or "Access Hollywood" correspondent. Congratulations, kid!

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Who knew? The guy who writes and draws "Dilbert" is a Chomskyite appeasal weasel!

Check it out here and here and here and, finally, here, where he concludes that, basically, aid to Israel is worthless. Basically, he first thought that if the U.S. were to simply stop supporting Israel, the terrorists would stop hating us and leave us alone. When it was pointed out to him that the terrorists would probably still hate and want to kill us, he amended that ("my point was...") to argue that it would appeal to the vaunted "Muslim street," and the general population of Muslim countries would love us so much that they'd turn in the terrorists (this argument's working like a charm in Iraq, ain't it?). And when that didn't fly, he challenged anyone to come up with "the reason" the U.S. should support Israel.

Um, for the fact that they're our ally, they provide us intelligence, and they're the closest thing to a democratic Western society in that region? Not good enough for Adams, who would rather give it- seriously- to Russia (which proved, of course, how loyal an ally they are many times over in the past five years) or to the homeless (because we all know that throwing money at THAT problem works! Just ask San Francisco!).

He ought to stick to rewriting the same strip over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over. (Look, the Pointy-Haired Boss is an idiot! Ha ha!)

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The Memorial Day weekend means the beginning of Summer almost everywhere else in North America. Here in Southern California, it's the beginning of... what? June is generally overcast, hazy, and dim enough to prompt the sobriquet "June Gloom." July and August are warm, but, really, not a lot different from now.

I miss that feeling I used to get back in New Jersey or Pennsylvania, the relief that the weather was turning warm and sunny and beachy. Back east, we'd be planning a drive to the beach, a barbecue, outdoor stuff. Out here, we'll probably do what we'd do on any other weekend- movies, shopping, hanging out. That's when I get that little twinge- hey, maybe going back East wouldn't be so bad after all.

And then I remember November through March, and that's when I remember why we moved here and why we won't go back. It's better here.

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Popliteal tendinitis.

Popliteal tendinitis. Popliteal tendinitis. Popliteal tendinitis.

Damn.

That's what I've been dealing with lately, leaving me limping and unable to do my usual running. This morning was spectacular- perfect temperature, perfect sun, perfect humidity, perfect everything for running- and I knew within seconds after getting out of bed that I couldn't run. I can walk, I can bend my knee all the way, I can straighten it and do anything normally except when I turn the leg at an angle or try to run on it. And this, not to put too fine a point on it, sucks.

So, this morning, while it was gloriously, perfectly Southern California gorgeous outside, I ended up on the elliptical cross-trainer at the Y, thrown off after just a half hour because some yenta was waiting for an open machine with a TV (and she ended up using it for LESS THAN FIVE MINUTES), sweating inside a cinder block dungeon.

I think I've made it clear that 2006 sucks. I've been given no evidence to contradict that opinion thus far.

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You here? It's Sunday and it's a three day weekend. Go do something outside.

Really, go. I'm not here. Back to normal tomorrow (you have Monday off, I don't...).

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Two years now.

Memorial Day this year has a special significance for me because it's the second anniversary of my dad's death from mesothelioma. I thought time would dull the pain, and it has, but only a little. I got the call two years ago today, and it still stings.

I still sometimes pick up the phone with the intent to call him, to talk about the NBA playoffs or how his tennis game was today or to make plans to see him or to get him out here to visit, but he won't be there. I was looking at a map of Palm Desert and remembered when he visited and we went to the Marriott resort and played tennis and swam in the desert heat, and I thought how great it would be for him to come out again, and then I remembered why he can't. Two years already, and it's still, in some ways, as if he was still around and there's hope. But he isn't, and there isn't, and I know that. And there's so much to tell him, so much to share with him, and I wish every day that I could do that, but that's not how it works. Time doesn't make that any more acceptable.

So how are we going to remember him today? Well, there was nothing he enjoyed more for a holiday meal than a nice big juicy steak, so that's what we're gonna have for dinner today. Maybe he'll join us somehow. I'm buying, dad. Get the porterhouse.

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By popular demand- the previous photo got a huge response- here it is, another photo from the Many Moods of Harry Christopher "Skip" Caray, Jr., this one a sample from the 1970 Atlanta Hawks game program, when Mr. Veriiiiiiiizon Wireless was a sprightly 32:

This was before he got that '76 perm, or stepped on a downed power line. The sideburns suggest a hint of with-it, the glasses reach back to 1963. Truly, Skip Caray is a man for all ages.

Meanwhile, in honor of the Stanley Cup playoffs, here's another entry in my efforts to post ephemera from various sports franchises and leagues that ain't no more, a couple of pages from the game programs of the Jersey Knights, the World Hockey Association franchise that moved from New York (as the Raiders and Golden Blades) to Cherry Hill, near Philadelphia, midway through the 1973-74 season, then to San Diego (as the Mariners) after their temporary stay in South Jersey purgatory. The Wikipedia article's wrong: they were the Jersey Knights, never the New Jersey Knights. Here's the roster page from their next-to-last home game, March 25, 1974 against the team that's now in the finals, the Edmonton Oilers:

Harry Howell was player/coach, graying and seemingly a hundred years old to me at the time. (He was 41, and that, now, seems young enough) The star was Andre LaCroix, a former Flyer who was a star for most of the WHA's brief history. They played at Cherry Hill Arena, your basic small ice arena with only enough locker room space for one team (the visitors changed at the hotel) and chicken-wire above the boards rather than plexiglass. This ad for a hair place has photographic evidence of the chicken wire:

That jersey was actually the New York Raiders jersey from the season before, with the word "Raiders" removed and the Knights logo glued on in its place. The next season, in San Diego, the team wore the same jerseys with "SAN DIEGO" diagonally across for practice. (The home jerseys were white with orange and blue trim; the road jerseys were orange with white and blue trim) The Cherry Hill Arena later was renamed the Centrum and hosted minor league hockey (the Jersey Aces) before being torn down; it's now the site of a shopping center (the Centrum Shoppes).

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Here's the non-commercial-pitch part of today's hastily-written, under-thought-out "The Letter From All Access News-Talk-Sports" newsletter, in which I dash off a few things off the top of my head for the talk show folks out there:

There's an article in today's New York Post headlined "25 Things Every New Yorker Should Know." It's one of those "service articles" with hints on how to do stuff like make an egg cream (don't they have people to do that for you?) and get past bouncers and co-op boards. While the article isn't that great ("how to people-watch like a pro"? Uh, sit on a bench and stare?), you can use the concept for your own market or for other purposes.

I could come up with a lot more, but, frankly, I'm far too busy and important for such a task. (And lazy. Mostly lazy.) But feel free to add to it- maybe in an upcoming Letter, I'll compile some of the best and we'll have a REAL list.

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