Good day and welcome back true believers. What brings the Salty Dog to his keyboard today? Is it this mess that happened last week with the "Government Shutdown"? Is it the Yankees losing 2 out of 3 to the hated Red Sox? Is it "you got your chocolate on my peanut butter"? Nay nay! What brings me out today is local outrage. For those of you who do not live in (or have not visited) the greater Hampton Roads, Virginia area...you may not be familiar with the topic of today's blog, but I believe that many of you can empathize.
The local "alternative rock" radio station here in the 757 has the most popular set of DJs. Their names are Mike Powers and Bob Fresh (Frantz). They host a show called, strangely enough, the Mike and Bob Show. This show was the most popular "afternoon drive time" show in the entire area. They were young enough to be in touch with the "club crowd", yet old enough to be in touch with the over 30 crowd (which includes your friend and humble narrator). They could fill 4 hours of radio without skipping a beat. They had interns that became famous around town..their producer was known to all by name...their program director was a local celebrity. The show was so popular, the station did away with a nationally syndicated show (ManCoward) and moved the boys to the mornings to take down the local juggernaut in that time slot. A mission that they not only accepted, but took on with zeal. No question as to what happened...they buried their competition. For ten years this crew ruled the airwaves in this area. Until Friday.....
96X has decided (once again) that they need a format change. Even though they have tried this in the past and failed miserably...they are going to Top 40 (douche bag radio). I am sure that MD is out there somewhere on the left coast laughing at the station, yet crying for Mike and Bob. Too many good people have fallen under the mighty machine that is Sinclair Communications. MD, Fan of the Game, Manny, and now the Bread Winning Brothers...Mike and Bob. This is the radio equivalent of Sony deciding to abandon the Playstation and go to a cartridge based gaming system. Do you remember the Punk Show on Sunday nights? MD and Justin playing your punk requests (damn you Justin and your Mr. Coffee!!) for 3 hours...that was awesome...alternative even. Or the Fan of the Game and his Debacle. These were quality shows, and great people....kind of like the Mike and Bob show. Quality show...and great people.
I understand that I may be biased since I know all of the people that I have mentioned in the blog, but look around...take a poll...these were all great shows and better people. For a radio station to take a proven formula and throw it (and the people who made the station famous) away is unspeakable. So for all of you that loved 96X and even more...loved the Mike and Bob Show...let yourselves be heard! Get on your Twitter accounts and use the hash tag #boycottsinclair. Send your letters...yes I said "LETTERS" to the address below. Let Mr. Sinclair know that he is making a huge mistake...tell him how much the Mike and Bob Show means to you. Hell, tell him that nobody wants to listen to douche bag radio...bring back the alternative! And let me know when he starts to listen, because I will be listening to Backspin....all XM all the time from this point forward. Until I hear from Mike or Bob telling me that they are back on the air, I am boycotting 96X. Until next time kiddies...Stay Salty
-Salty Dog
Send your letters to:
Bob Sinclair Sr
5th Floor
999 waterside drive
Norfolk VA 23510
Monday, April 11, 2011
Monday, March 21, 2011
Team America
Welcome back kiddies...it has been a little while since I have put fingers to keyboard...but I am back. I can already tell that this blog is going to be met with resistance, but hey...that gives us more to discuss. As you all know, I am a patriotic individual. I am not running around protesting and demonstrating for every cause that involves the military or the state of the Union, but I do believe strongly that we are the greatest country in the world...or at least I used to.
I have been overwhelmed by all of the "Donate to Japan" hype over the last two weeks. Do I have a problem with Japan or the Japanese people? Nay nay...they suffered a terrible tragedy. Do I have a problem turning on my computer and seeing Facebook pushing for me to give them money? Or logging on to play a game of Call of Duty Black Ops and having my PS3 tell me to donate? Yes. Everyone in the country knows that Japan just had its ass kicked by Mother Nature. Everyone also knows how to Google "Red Cross" and find out how to get a hold of them. The news from Japan was so important that everyone stopped talking about Charlie Sheen for a whole week! (Hey Charlie...looks like you're "Duh, Losing") I get it...just like I got Haiti, just like I got Iraq, Libya, Afghanistan...the list goes on. Where were all of these countries during the cleanup of Hurricane Katrina? Where are all of these countries in helping US? Hell, where are WE when it comes to helping us?
I Googled "Donations for Japan" and came up with 11,300,000 hits in less than .2 seconds. I then Googled "help feed the homeless in America" and came up with 966,000 hits in the same amount of time. I have friends that served their country in time of war that are now without homes of their own. They cannot find jobs, they have to fight to keep food in their stomachs....yet we are sending money to other countries to help them? This is a crock of shit. These same Veterans are not receiving the medical care that they were promised when they were sent "home" from military service. I will not even get into the topic of monetary compensation....I will just stay with the basic human necessities that they are not getting. Where are the American people when it comes to homeless Vets...hell homeless Americans! We don't want to deal with our problems at home, we want to have telethons and celebrity spokespeople for other countries. We are made to feel bad if we don't give money to the AMERICAN Red Cross to go spend on other people.
Don't get me wrong, I am a Humanist by nature. I think everyone deserves to have the basic things in life. I am not asking that my fellow former military members deserve more than anyone else in this world, but they do deserve the same things. Am I pushing for Socialism or Communism? Nay nay...these men and women need to work for what they get. But if you give your life to the country, to do with it what it will...then you deserve to be taken care of when something bad happens. We have people fighting wars so that our gas prices will go down. Nineteen year old men and women dying because we feel the need to gas up our 4x4 trucks with cheaper gas. What are we doing for them? Sending them into war with protective equipment from WWII. The weapons and tactics have changed slightly since the last "Big War", our equipment should reflect that.
All I am saying is that we need to clean our yard before we start poking our heads over the fence and pointing out/correcting the flaws of our neighbors. Team America: World Police. How about we turn this back into a place that we are proud to say "we take care of our own"? Once we are good...THEN we can go help the rest of the world. Let's stop helping our neighbors plant roses when we have a lawn full of crab grass. Let's get the homeless fed, our Vets the care they deserve, and your friend and humble narrator a better disability percentage. I am kidding on that last part...but you get the message. Until next time...Stay Salty!
-Salty Dog
I have been overwhelmed by all of the "Donate to Japan" hype over the last two weeks. Do I have a problem with Japan or the Japanese people? Nay nay...they suffered a terrible tragedy. Do I have a problem turning on my computer and seeing Facebook pushing for me to give them money? Or logging on to play a game of Call of Duty Black Ops and having my PS3 tell me to donate? Yes. Everyone in the country knows that Japan just had its ass kicked by Mother Nature. Everyone also knows how to Google "Red Cross" and find out how to get a hold of them. The news from Japan was so important that everyone stopped talking about Charlie Sheen for a whole week! (Hey Charlie...looks like you're "Duh, Losing") I get it...just like I got Haiti, just like I got Iraq, Libya, Afghanistan...the list goes on. Where were all of these countries during the cleanup of Hurricane Katrina? Where are all of these countries in helping US? Hell, where are WE when it comes to helping us?
I Googled "Donations for Japan" and came up with 11,300,000 hits in less than .2 seconds. I then Googled "help feed the homeless in America" and came up with 966,000 hits in the same amount of time. I have friends that served their country in time of war that are now without homes of their own. They cannot find jobs, they have to fight to keep food in their stomachs....yet we are sending money to other countries to help them? This is a crock of shit. These same Veterans are not receiving the medical care that they were promised when they were sent "home" from military service. I will not even get into the topic of monetary compensation....I will just stay with the basic human necessities that they are not getting. Where are the American people when it comes to homeless Vets...hell homeless Americans! We don't want to deal with our problems at home, we want to have telethons and celebrity spokespeople for other countries. We are made to feel bad if we don't give money to the AMERICAN Red Cross to go spend on other people.
Don't get me wrong, I am a Humanist by nature. I think everyone deserves to have the basic things in life. I am not asking that my fellow former military members deserve more than anyone else in this world, but they do deserve the same things. Am I pushing for Socialism or Communism? Nay nay...these men and women need to work for what they get. But if you give your life to the country, to do with it what it will...then you deserve to be taken care of when something bad happens. We have people fighting wars so that our gas prices will go down. Nineteen year old men and women dying because we feel the need to gas up our 4x4 trucks with cheaper gas. What are we doing for them? Sending them into war with protective equipment from WWII. The weapons and tactics have changed slightly since the last "Big War", our equipment should reflect that.
All I am saying is that we need to clean our yard before we start poking our heads over the fence and pointing out/correcting the flaws of our neighbors. Team America: World Police. How about we turn this back into a place that we are proud to say "we take care of our own"? Once we are good...THEN we can go help the rest of the world. Let's stop helping our neighbors plant roses when we have a lawn full of crab grass. Let's get the homeless fed, our Vets the care they deserve, and your friend and humble narrator a better disability percentage. I am kidding on that last part...but you get the message. Until next time...Stay Salty!
-Salty Dog
Tuesday, February 22, 2011
Whatever Happened To Predictability?
The milkman, the paperboy, and evening TV.....welcome back true believers! I apologize for my recent absence to the two or three of you that read this regularly. I have been taking care of some things around the house of late and neglecting my ranting...I mean writing. What brings me back to the keyboard this time? Something that has been bothering me for a few years, but only recently become a major source of irritation.
I was listening to my favorite radio program (wow, doesn't that make me sound old???) this morning. That would be the very popular Mike and Bob Show on 96X (www.96x.fm for those that would like to listen from 0600-0900 Monday through Friday). Anyway...Mike and Bob were giving away tickets for something or other, and in order to win said tickets you had to win an on air game. The game they were playing today was Television Theme Song Name That Tune. This is when I knew that I had to write.
While watching your television tonight, I want you to pick a show...any show...and sing the theme song. You can't do it? Is it because you are getting old and your memory is failing you? I say, "Nay, nay". The thing is, there ARE no theme songs to television shows anymore. I remember growing up and watching shows with great theme songs. Songs so good that they were played on the radio! Believe it or Not (from the Greatest American Hero) by Mike Post happens to reside in my 45 collection. (For all of you younger readers, the collection refers to a small piece of vinyl that plays music when rotated at 45 RPM). I knew the words to every theme song from every show that I watched, and recognized hundreds more! When I heard "In 1972, a crack commando unit was sent to prison by a military court for a crime they didn't commit..." I knew it was time for the A-Team. "Hey where ya goin, not exactly knowin, who says you have to call just one place home..." BJ and the Bear was coming on! Cheers, MASH, Diff'rent Strokes, The Facts of Life, all the great shows of our past had quality theme songs that you could sing along to (assuming you knew the words to Suicide Is Painless).
The shows of today have no theme songs. Take the very popular "Glee"...a show all about singing. What is it's theme song? One word...GLEE! Law and Order...another hugely popular series...what do they have? Dum Dum! (no, not the little lolly pops). There are some very good shows out there today that I can only assume will fail miserably due to the fact that they have no theme song. I am not only here to complain, I am here to take a poll. What is your favorite all time theme song from a television show? As your friend and humble narrator, I will go first. Hands down, no questions asked..my favorite theme song of all time has to be The Jeffersons. To this day, anytime someone mentions "moving up" I have to follow with "to the East side. To a de-luxe apartment in the skyyyy".
Long gone are the songs that take up the first one to three minutes of a television show. Bring on more commercial breaks instead. I am thinking of sending this blog to some of the networks and asking them why? Why have they taken away my favorite part of television in the interest of more advertising? Then again, I guess I need to look no further than my favorite music producer, and least favorite rapper Puff Diddy Daddy Farty Licky for the answer....it's all about the benjamins baby. Until next time...Stay Salty.
-Salty Dog
I was listening to my favorite radio program (wow, doesn't that make me sound old???) this morning. That would be the very popular Mike and Bob Show on 96X (www.96x.fm for those that would like to listen from 0600-0900 Monday through Friday). Anyway...Mike and Bob were giving away tickets for something or other, and in order to win said tickets you had to win an on air game. The game they were playing today was Television Theme Song Name That Tune. This is when I knew that I had to write.
While watching your television tonight, I want you to pick a show...any show...and sing the theme song. You can't do it? Is it because you are getting old and your memory is failing you? I say, "Nay, nay". The thing is, there ARE no theme songs to television shows anymore. I remember growing up and watching shows with great theme songs. Songs so good that they were played on the radio! Believe it or Not (from the Greatest American Hero) by Mike Post happens to reside in my 45 collection. (For all of you younger readers, the collection refers to a small piece of vinyl that plays music when rotated at 45 RPM). I knew the words to every theme song from every show that I watched, and recognized hundreds more! When I heard "In 1972, a crack commando unit was sent to prison by a military court for a crime they didn't commit..." I knew it was time for the A-Team. "Hey where ya goin, not exactly knowin, who says you have to call just one place home..." BJ and the Bear was coming on! Cheers, MASH, Diff'rent Strokes, The Facts of Life, all the great shows of our past had quality theme songs that you could sing along to (assuming you knew the words to Suicide Is Painless).
The shows of today have no theme songs. Take the very popular "Glee"...a show all about singing. What is it's theme song? One word...GLEE! Law and Order...another hugely popular series...what do they have? Dum Dum! (no, not the little lolly pops). There are some very good shows out there today that I can only assume will fail miserably due to the fact that they have no theme song. I am not only here to complain, I am here to take a poll. What is your favorite all time theme song from a television show? As your friend and humble narrator, I will go first. Hands down, no questions asked..my favorite theme song of all time has to be The Jeffersons. To this day, anytime someone mentions "moving up" I have to follow with "to the East side. To a de-luxe apartment in the skyyyy".
Long gone are the songs that take up the first one to three minutes of a television show. Bring on more commercial breaks instead. I am thinking of sending this blog to some of the networks and asking them why? Why have they taken away my favorite part of television in the interest of more advertising? Then again, I guess I need to look no further than my favorite music producer, and least favorite rapper Puff Diddy Daddy Farty Licky for the answer....it's all about the benjamins baby. Until next time...Stay Salty.
-Salty Dog
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