Podcast 492

Dramatic Distractions. Had a conversation with a friend awhile back and he said, “All these people and they’re shows. They’re asleep”. Didn’t think too much about it for almost a year, and today it popped into my head. To say that I love my shows is an understatement. So for this podcast I made a partial list of some of the series shows I have watched, or am watching on Netflix, iTunes, Hulu. It was a bit of a surprise. I didn’t even make a complete list and it’s way too long! Someone will hear this and think, “This guy does nothing but watch TV Shows”. Well. Uh. No. At least I didn’t think so until I actually made a list. Then I thought, am I that unusual? A lot of us watch these shows. Add to that screen time on FB, Instagram, Twitter and especially You Tube and you have the makings of a real distraction. And this AFTER I’ve scanned and read a huge portion of the news. I talk a lot about how people are watching the political news shows, and listening to talk radio and political podcasts as entertainment. Seldom do I talk about the escapism inherent in watching hour after hour of television drama, which. Is. So. Satisfying. The Walking Dead and the new Don’t Fear the Walking Dead. Ray Donovan. The Affair, Breaking Bad, Mad Men, Boardwalk Empire, The Wire, The Sopranos, Sons Of Anarchy, Justified, House of Cards. Mister White isn’t a meth dealer, he’s a TV drama producer in Hollywood! Do this shows influence our thinking about society? Or, are they just a guilty pleasure. By the way, who has time to read East of Eden, or In Cold Blood when these shows are being pumped out. It may be time for a news cleanse, as well as a drama cleanse. Then we get to a discussion of the delights available on You Tube. Endless Illuminati Conspiracy videos, horribly done but immensely entertaining horoscopes and tarot card readers. Finally, FaceBook has become nothing but posts and shares of dogs that can’t catch videos, cute kid videos, mom’s doing yoga videos, Bernie Sanders Memes, Ted Cruz Meme’s, and other nonsense. Who has time to work? Yeah, maybe it’s time we looked at this. Sponsored by Brush Studio In The West End, Saint Louis Park and by Hydrus Performance.

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Podcast 488

Sick Of Politics. Yeah. Sorry. Sick Of Politics. I’m not the only one. When it’s above 70 degrees and sunny for an entire weekend in the upper midwest, no one wants to talk about whether or not the delegate selection process in Georgia and Colorado is messed up. In Minnesota and Wisconsin, people headed up to the lake to put the dock in, raked their lawns, washed their cars, sat on the deck blinking in the sun, and were amazed, tantalized and thrilled with late May weather in Mid April. I certainly remember mid April tax return mailings when it was snowing, or 30 degrees and raining. Aside from the ‘bring on more of this global warming’ jokes, it is pretty amazing to be able to get a sunburn around here at this time of year. Meanwhile, the cable news jockeys continue to drone away about what this one said about that one, whether the primary process should be scrapped for something else – don’t ask – and how the byzantine ‘state delegate selection process’ is flawed, as though anyone ever gave a damn before this ridiculous election cycle. God! Bring back the smoke filled rooms, cigar chomping, pinkie ring wearing, bourbon drinking ‘operators’. What would happen if we woke up tomorrow and suddenly there wasn’t anymore 24 hour cable news, talk radio, Facebook or Twitter? What would we think about? Is it possible we might discover what we have been thinking about below the crust of all this 24 hour news cycle generated angst and frustration? How would that sit with you? What do you think about when you’re not receiving or transmitting? A late night live podcast from the deck of the broadcast bunker, complete with planes, sirens and a very large mosquito. Mosquito’s already? And so it begins. Sponsored by Ryan Plumbing and Heating of Saint Paul and Hydrus Performance.

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Podcast 484

The Fort. Boys need independence and Freedom. This is the story of my quest for independence and freedom in the form of my own ‘fort’. The Fort. A place where I could go with my friends. To dream. To Talk. To Plan. You know, boy stuff. As adults we spend a lot of time thinking about what we want, or need, or those moments in life when we could have been better, the mistakes we’ve made as well as the hard won victories. Sometimes, though, it doesn’t take much to experience true bliss. It’s also a story of manifesting the things we desire most in our lives. The story of an stubbornly independent boy, with this idea of a ‘fort’, who spent months scavenging lumber from all over town, and started building without any idea of where he was going or how to get there. And, a story about a father who did not share the same temperament as his son. A father who’s personality was introverted, a man who valued action over words. A story of a father and son who didn’t have very much in common but came together one summer to build something great; The coolest fort in town, by far. Dreams and acting individually can get you pretty far down the road, but that summer my father taught me how to accept help, how to work together, to create something far more than I could have by myself. It’s also the story of how that perfect moment fades as we reach adolescence. Sometimes when we look back, we realize that there was a perfect moment back there when we had much more than we realized at the time. Then again, maybe I did realize it. Sponsored by Brush Studio at The West End in Saint Louis Park, Minnesota and by Hydrus.

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