Listening to the Radio.
It's strange how disconnected I can get from the rest of society during the summer. During my long commutes to and from work I have plenty of time to listen to the radio and keep abreast of the national news stories. But when I have off from work I rarely hear what's happening except through word-of-mouth. I am not in the habit of watching the news on television- aside from the occasional tune-in to the PBS News Hour. I don't even make it a point to visit my favorite political portal sites on the net. And when I take vacations the situation is compounded even further because I am usually more interested in leaving the day-to-day stuff behind. I get focused on whatever agenda I have for my trip.
So making a seven-hour drive home today gave me a rare opportunity to plug back into the grid. I was making my return solo, and I didn't want to mess around with the CDs I had remembered to pack- so I just ended up firing up the radio and using the scan function. Every once in awhile I need to jar my memory and remind myself why I never listen to commercial radio. There are so very few options on the FM dial, especially when you hit the rural areas of Pennsylvania. Of course there are the ubiquitous country stations. I usually have very little patience for that. It's often sappy sentimentality or knee-jerk reactionary ditties about good homespun values. I find it a bit insulting when these folks presume that they represent some core of practical morality that's absent in the rest of the nation. Yeah, right... I know you love the USA. Yeah, right... you face up to life's challenges with a hard-earned wisdom you always ignored when you saw it in your daddy. Blah, blah, blah.
Turn the dial again and you can find the ubiquitous classic rock stations. You get to hear the wacky shock-jock wannabe tell bad jokes while promising to "rock your ride" home from work. It's the Stones, Led Zeppelin, CCR... maybe some Bowie... and the fifty other bands these stations have been playing in the 30+ years since they were actually fresh. Or you'll find the contemporary R+B format, with all the dance tunes that were hot in the big-city clubs three years ago. Perhaps you'll stumble on "Lite Rock" with Elton John, Fleetwood Mac and Dan Fogelberg. God help you if you try listening to "modern rock". I heard three different songs on three different staions that were playing simultaneously and all of them sounded like the same generic emo band. Hey really... I like it for about a song and a half. These options are what makes that scan button so alluring. It's like trying to pan for gold in the Monongahela River. You know there's no treasure there, but it's just so vast a space you might be able to find something of interest or novelty.
Unfortunately you can't get "National Public Radio" everywhere in the nation. But periodically you might stumble on it, especially if you are within an hour of a worthwhile city. Don't get excited- that doesn't give it much coverage. Anyway I did catch snippets of actual news here and there along the way. I was happy to finally hear about the indictments in the Brian Wells murder/bank robbing. I wrote a post about this strange, unsolved crime months ago. Since then I have been anxiously waiting for the details. Yesterday and today brought updates from the prosecutor. It seems that Marjorie Diehl-Armstrong, and a co-conspirator named Kenneth Barnes, have been charged with felonies in the case. I suspected they would lower the boom on Diehl-Armstrong, but I was very surprised that they believe that Wells was actually in on the plan. That's about the extent of new information released to the press, so I'm once again forced to call upon my patience until the entire story is unveiled.
Predictably there was also a lot about the continuing campaign the Bush administration has been perpetually waging against Constitutional law tradition, the American people, and the rest of the nation's "elected representatives". Today it was the "revelation" that the Bush people have instructed former aides not to cooperate with a Congressional investigatory committee. And that's just a hint of the flagrant disregard these criminals have in store for us. Apparently they have told former Bush-lawyer (and failed Supreme Court nominee) Harriet Myers to outright ignore her subpoena to appear in front of Congress.
Of course this whole mess tempts me to leave my radio off forever. But would that make me a "good American"?
So making a seven-hour drive home today gave me a rare opportunity to plug back into the grid. I was making my return solo, and I didn't want to mess around with the CDs I had remembered to pack- so I just ended up firing up the radio and using the scan function. Every once in awhile I need to jar my memory and remind myself why I never listen to commercial radio. There are so very few options on the FM dial, especially when you hit the rural areas of Pennsylvania. Of course there are the ubiquitous country stations. I usually have very little patience for that. It's often sappy sentimentality or knee-jerk reactionary ditties about good homespun values. I find it a bit insulting when these folks presume that they represent some core of practical morality that's absent in the rest of the nation. Yeah, right... I know you love the USA. Yeah, right... you face up to life's challenges with a hard-earned wisdom you always ignored when you saw it in your daddy. Blah, blah, blah.
Turn the dial again and you can find the ubiquitous classic rock stations. You get to hear the wacky shock-jock wannabe tell bad jokes while promising to "rock your ride" home from work. It's the Stones, Led Zeppelin, CCR... maybe some Bowie... and the fifty other bands these stations have been playing in the 30+ years since they were actually fresh. Or you'll find the contemporary R+B format, with all the dance tunes that were hot in the big-city clubs three years ago. Perhaps you'll stumble on "Lite Rock" with Elton John, Fleetwood Mac and Dan Fogelberg. God help you if you try listening to "modern rock". I heard three different songs on three different staions that were playing simultaneously and all of them sounded like the same generic emo band. Hey really... I like it for about a song and a half. These options are what makes that scan button so alluring. It's like trying to pan for gold in the Monongahela River. You know there's no treasure there, but it's just so vast a space you might be able to find something of interest or novelty.
Unfortunately you can't get "National Public Radio" everywhere in the nation. But periodically you might stumble on it, especially if you are within an hour of a worthwhile city. Don't get excited- that doesn't give it much coverage. Anyway I did catch snippets of actual news here and there along the way. I was happy to finally hear about the indictments in the Brian Wells murder/bank robbing. I wrote a post about this strange, unsolved crime months ago. Since then I have been anxiously waiting for the details. Yesterday and today brought updates from the prosecutor. It seems that Marjorie Diehl-Armstrong, and a co-conspirator named Kenneth Barnes, have been charged with felonies in the case. I suspected they would lower the boom on Diehl-Armstrong, but I was very surprised that they believe that Wells was actually in on the plan. That's about the extent of new information released to the press, so I'm once again forced to call upon my patience until the entire story is unveiled.
Predictably there was also a lot about the continuing campaign the Bush administration has been perpetually waging against Constitutional law tradition, the American people, and the rest of the nation's "elected representatives". Today it was the "revelation" that the Bush people have instructed former aides not to cooperate with a Congressional investigatory committee. And that's just a hint of the flagrant disregard these criminals have in store for us. Apparently they have told former Bush-lawyer (and failed Supreme Court nominee) Harriet Myers to outright ignore her subpoena to appear in front of Congress.
Of course this whole mess tempts me to leave my radio off forever. But would that make me a "good American"?
Labels: Brian Wells, George W. Bush, Hack Radio, Marjorie Diehl-Armstrong, Monoculture, Travel
posted by Merge Divide at 11:01 PM
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