It Was 30 Years Ago At The Big Win Nine-Ten

Sometime, in the last week, or two, was my 30th anniversary on Baton Rouge radio. I'm not sure of the exact date, that's why I said it was sometime in the last week, or two. I know that it was sometime in mid-to-late June.

How about a story from those days gone by.

It was one of my first nights, on the air, at WLCS. Back in those days, the radio station was not remote controlled, that is to say, usually the disc jockey was on the air from the downtown studio and another person was on duty at the transmitter location. For WLCS, that was on Groom Road, in Baker.

However, to save money, the overnight show was done from the transmitter building. I did that one night a week (a guy named David Glenn did it 6 nights a week). I worked a regular 8-hour shift as a transmitter-watcher the rest of the time.

As I've described here, before, the building was just a blockhouse in the middle of a cow pasture. Sometimes it got kind of warm, in there, and you would open doors and windows. Such was the case this, particular, night. I was in the middle of a top-of-the-hour newscast when a horse walked right into the little studio! He stared at me, but before the 'cast was over, he let out a loud horse-noise. You know, that thing they do that sounds like you are flapping your lips together? Then he turned around and clomped out. I know you could have heard it on-air. Absolutely true story.

That field, BTW, is a Wal Mart, now.

Quote Of The Day - Thursday

"The Swiss have an interesting army. Five hundred years without a war. Pretty impressive. Also pretty lucky for them. Ever see that little Swiss Army knife they have to fight with? Not much of a weapon there. Corkscrews. Bottle openers. 'Come on, buddy, let's go. You get past me, the guy in back of me, he's got a spoon. Back off. I've got the toe clippers right here.'" – Jerry Seinfeld

"War Of The Worlds" (Click for the official website)

I don't know about you, but I really look forward to movies from a handful of directors. Steven Spielberg is very high on that short-list and, as of today, his latest feature is a redux of the 1953 sci-fi thriller "War Of The Worlds."

Tom Cruise ("Risky Business"; "Minority Report") stars as Ray Ferrier, divorced-father with two children, a teenage boy, with a bit of an attitude, and a daughter still very much in the single-digits. Justin Chatwin ("Taken" TV) is the teenager, Robbie, and Dakota Fanning ("The Cat In The Hat") is Rachel.

The film opens with Cruise, as Ray Ferrier, a longshorman in New York City, getting home late, as usual, to find his ex-wife and her new beau waiting to drop-off the two children. That's where the story takes it's turn.

A very strange lightening storm strikes and, shortly after, all hell breaks loose.

It turns out that these bad guys (they never say from where they hail) have had their ships buried here for a very, very long time. Now they are using powerful lightening blasts to get their personnel in them. They rise up from deep below in a special effects bonanza.

And... they are ticked-off. Really ticked-off.

Daddy-Ray must protect kids from, as he observes, extermination. We don't know why they want us dead, but they do and it is made very clear that they are fully capable of carrying out their plan. However, there is something that they did not expect to find.

Overall, I liked the movie. It has lots and lots of tension. You know something is about to happen. Lots of action and some truly frightening, as in not for the squemish, depictions of mass death. If the movie lacks a little something it is in it's story and the story is a simple one. A single-dad trying to protect himself, and his children, one of which has a bit of an epiphany at a key point in the story. I thought that side-story was kind of cool.

The film's best "acting" may come from Tim Robbins ("Mystic River"; "The Shawshank Redemption") as Ogilvy. Cruise and company meet him, hiding in a basement, trying to stay alive. He sums it up by saying that it is no more a war than humans against maggots, or something like that.

Lot's of Spielbergian signatures. Camera angles, shadows, etc. John Williams ("E.T."; "Close Encounters Of The Third Kind") does the score and is up to his usual high standard.
It is not Steven Spielberg's best work, but I'll take any Spielberg movie over most anyone else's any day. I enjoyed it and was glad that I saw it on the big screen.

Rated PG-13 for violence and scenes of mass death. NOT for young children.

Quote Of The Day - Wednesday

My friend Jim Lewis sent this one to me...

"Some people are like Slinkies... Not really good for anything, but they still bring a smile to your face when you push them down a flight of stairs." - Unknown (If you know who said this, let me know)

Aruba Girl, Time To Move On

I can not tell you how tired I am, of hearing about the girl that is missing in Aruba. The networks have bitten off more than they can chew, with this one. They started it and now they do not know how to get out of it. There are hundreds of missing people, around this country, why do they not talk about them? If your child went missing would they spend so much time trying to find them? Texas search teams, etc.

I thought so.

Quote Of The Day - Tuesday

"A study in the Washington Post says that women have better verbal skills than men. I just want to say to the authors of that study: Duh." – Conan O'Brien

Quote Of The Day - Friday

"Ever wonder if illiterate people get the full effect of alphabet soup?" – John Mendoza

Quote Of The Day - Thursday

"In elementary school, in case of fire you have to line up quietly in a single file line from smallest to tallest. What is the logic? Do tall people burn slower?" – Warren Hutcherson

New WJBO Studio

New WJBO Master Control Room under construction. That's WJBO's Clarence Buggs behind the glass.

New Master Control Room computer bank

Quote Of The Day - Wednesday

"I've been doing the Fonda workout: the Peter Fonda workout. That's where I wake up, take a hit of acid, smoke a joint, and run to my sister's house and ask her for money." – Kevin Meaney

100 Years, 100 Movie Quotes (Click)

From, "I'm king of the world!" to "Frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn." The American Film Institute is out with their list of 100 Years, 100 Movie Quotes. Pierce Brosnan hosted the 3-hour show on Tuesday night on CBS. Did your favorite make the list? When you visit the site, be sure to check out the full list of 400 nominees. One of my new favorites, "Where's Padme?" from "Star Wars Episode III: Revenge Of The Sith."

Have You Seen A Good Movie, Lately?

I took Marie and Josh to see "Batman Begins" on Sunday and really enjoyed it. Of course, I am a Batman fan from way back and I was very interested to see how the movie would explain the story of how he came to be. The story did a good job of explaining that with Liam Neeson and the mysterious League Of Shadows.

Remember the line in the first Michael Keaton "Batman" movie. Jack Nicholson said it, as The Joker, "Where does he get all those wonderful toys?" Now we know that it was Luscious Fox, played by Morgan Freeman.

Also look for a good turn from Michael Caine as the trusty Wayne butler Alfred.

On DVD, check out "Beyond The Sea," written, directed, and starring Kevin Spacey as Bobby Darin. Spacey did all his own singing and certainly looks like Darin. The movie is a sort of love letter to Bobby, who died while undergoing heart surgery in 1973. It does not dwell, heavily, on Darin's shortcomings, but it does give you some insight into his life, both as a child and as an adult, including his marriage to Sandra Dee (Kate Bosworth).

I have always been a fan of Darin's, but I never knew that, late in his life, he became a big-time protester of the war in Viet Nam and wrote a number of protest songs.

I highly recommend both.

Quote Of The Day - Tuesday

"I planted some bird seed. A bird came up. Now I don't know what to feed it." – Steven Wright

Under Construction

My morning view.
That's Matt peering over the monitor.

Our new on-air studio is presently under construction. I will post some progress-pictures as I take them.

The Lovely Marie (& Me)

Wonder what The Lovely Marie looks like?
Wonder no more.

Posting Pics

Yay, I learned how to post pics on my blog.
Too cool for school.

Quote Of The Day - Saturday

"If you ever see me getting beaten by the police, put down the video camera and come help me." – Bobcat Goldthwait

Quote Of The Day - Friday

"I planted some bird seed. A bird came up. Now I don't know what to feed it." – Steven Wright

Quote Of The Day - Thursday

"USA Today has come out with a new survey: Apparently three out of four people make up 75 percent of the population." – David Letterman

Quote Of The Day - Wednesday

Lots of websites, and blogs, have quotes of the day, so I thought I would add mine.

Here is the very first one....

"I worry that the person who thought up Muzak may be thinking up something else." – Lily Tomlin

Happy Flag Day (Click for the Betsy Ross homepage)

First of all, happy Flag Day.

Second of all, I got an email from one of my listeners going on-and-on about the origin of the 21-gun salute, and about why the Flag is folded the way that it is.

All of it is false. What makes it worse is that whoever wrote it, originally, obviously spent a lot of time on it, but, certainly knew that it was false. Idiot and moron come to mind, how about you?

Folks, we have SO MUCH to make us proud to be Americans, let us just stick to the facts.

The internet is a wonderful thing, it makes it very easy to check on origins and facts, if you know how to use it.

Click here for the story about the 21-gun salute, and here for the story about the origin of folding the Flag.

Let's be careful out there and let Ol' Glory proudly fly!

Michael Jackson Verdict

I am sure that we have all heard, by now. Michael Jackson, not guilty on all counts. ALL counts. Even the lesser ones.

The jury could have decided to convict him on any one, or all, of the counts. He was found guilty of none.

Sure, the jokes will fly about not being able to get a conviction in California, but it makes you think. That jury could have gone either way, they chose not guilty.

Call Jackson a freak, weirdo, wacko... whatever you want. That is not why he was on trial. Make jokes, if you must. Being a nut is not against the law, nor should it be. Our country was founded by oddballs. People that went against the norm, whatever "the norm" is. We could, all, cite many examples.

The bottom-line, if you must have a bottom-line, is...

Tonight, like you, Michael Jackson is, still, a free American.

It's HOT! (Click for Baton Rouge forecast)

Just for the benefit of those that do not get to experience our wonderful, warm Louisiana summers, it's damn hot today!

As I write this it is nearly 7pm on Monday evening and my thermometer says it is 91 degrees, with nearly 50% humidity.

Oh, and did I mention that summer really hasn't started yet? We are still sizzlin' through spring.

So Sorry

Reference: Senate Resolution 39.

Personally, I think the United States should apologize for nearly 5,000 lynchings in our nation during the post-Civil War years that ended in 1960.

Wasn’t murder already against the law? Yes, sort of.

You would only go to jail, for murder, if you were convicted. Back in those days, many district attornies, sheriffs and chiefs of police, simply refused to make arrests or prosecute those that were responsible. If they were prosecuted the all-white juries that sat in judgement proclaimed them not guilty. Only now are we prosecuting some of those who may be guilty of these insidious crimes.

It was a case where the Federal Government had to step in. The States made murder a crime, but they were not effectively prosecuting anyone. The Feds made it a crime to deny the Civil Rights of “Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness.”

The US Senate failed to enact legislation to make lynching a Federal Crime some 200 times. Eventually, that would change.

If the States had been doing their jobs, the Feds would not have had to make new Federal laws dealing with things that the States should have been taking care of already.

Someone actually called my show, this morning, and announced that lynching, in certain circumstances, might not be such a bad idea. Sir, have you ever actually read The Constitution.

Senator Landrieu is right. It is time for the USA to issue such an apology. Today is the day. The question is…. Are we mature enough to mean it?

Kev.

My Friend, Duffy (Click for link)

I am afraid that I must, again, acknoweldge the passing of an old friend.

Many of you will remember "Duffy" Spears. He worked, with me, at Z-98, here in Baton Rouge, back in the '80s, and early 90s. That was the days of Michael Adams, Scotty Drake and J.J. Stone. Before that he had been at Kajun 103 using the name Jeff Davis.

I can not think of the first "Gulf War" and not think of Duffy. He knew all about the various weapons and armaments that were used (and this was in the days before any of us knew about the internet) and always had a comment on the CNN coverage. In those days, remember, we only had CNN as the 24-hour news channel. Duffy, Scotty Drake, and I kept up with all the goings-on and would watch the coverage on the newsroom TV, when we had nothing else to do. Sometimes we washed the station van.

That was the same TV that we used to watch Corey and Kianna and all of the other Body Shaping girls.

I remember visiting Duff, when he lived in an apartment off of Stumberg Lane. He always had a bottle of Jack Daniels and his trusty .45 nearby.

Duffy moved away, to Florida, years ago, but I will always remember his wry smile and quick, sometimes biting, wit.

Once upon a time, Duffy, J.J., Scotty and I took the station van to an LSU - Texas A. and M. football game. We lost a very drunk Duffy somewhere in the 3rd quarter, only to find him much later, as he was walking down Nicholson Drive, headed back to the radio station, on Government Street. What a night that was.
Duffy died from cancer in Beaumont, Texas on Wednesday, May 25th, 2005. He was buried, in Beaumont, the following Sunday. Click the link, at the top of this writing, for Duffy's obituary.

See 'ya dude.

Kev.

Medical (And otherwise) Marijuana

The wonderful Federal Government has done it again. It has gone against the wishes of the masses and, with it's iron fist, ruled that states do not have the right to make their own laws about medical marijuana. That is when the vile weed is used to treat people with nasty diseases, and other conditions, sometimes terminal. Many patients report that smoking a little doobie, now and then, makes them feel better.

Your friendly, neighborhood Federal Government does not care.

The problem is... we brought this on ourselves. People were getting busted for illegal pot and the penalties varied from state-to-state. We demanded that there be some sort of unification of the laws. The Federal Government did just that.

Now we are stuck.

The Feds will have to unmake the law, that is allow the states to rule, again. It will not be an easy sell. The Federal Government loves to take power. They rarely give it back. I can see it now, any state that does not comply with the Federal Laws against marijuana use, for whatever reason, will lose millions of dollars in Federal highway money.

Have you had enough, yet?

Be careful, or I'll have you thinking like a Libertarian!

Power To The People!

Kev.

No Smoking

Everyone repeat after me...

"We Do Not Need A Law Banning Smoking In Bars And Restaurants!!!" - Kevin Meeks, 2005