Day 12 as Morrissey’s personal assistant

UPDATE 3.2.18 – below

Brought him his dry cleaning. He looked at the tackiest shirt, his ‘dearest’ and freaked. He said “you call this a 60/30/10 collar starch”. Then, he threw his warm tea at me. Then he fired me, and began crying… again. Don’t be concerned about the collar. I am pretty sure there is no such thing as a 60/30/10 anything. Neither did the dry cleaner. He asked if I wanted light, heavy, or medium starch. Then, he yelled ‘and that is for the shirt. You don’t starch a collar, dumb ass.”   To be fair, that angry little Asian man did NOT throw hot tea at me… so we have no beef.

The tea was tepid. I learned that one quick. Doesn’t Morrissey like his tea hot? One would assume so. However, I have never seen him drink a sip. Usually, I come in every morning with his comically long chai/coffee/tea drink order, and whatever errands he gave me the night before. Inevitably, I screwed up one of these tasks so horribly that the only choice he has is to throw boiling chai in my face and proceed to cry.

It’s kinda ironic if you think about it. The one thing I actually do screw up every day is getting him a tepid tea. Before he gets to the tea, though, he is usually so upset about something else. One day, he may get to the tepid tea. He will of course be very disappointed. He will likely then throw said tea in my face and … well… you know.

So, I have learned to wear a shirt I don’t care about into the office (its’ a dirt walled basement under a closed down amusement park. Says it helps him connect with his sadness hole… seriously… used those words verbatim) and I bring a couple changes of clothing.

I know what it sounds like, but it’s a pretty great job.   I get paid a ton, and don’t have to do much. He doesn’t trust me to do anything for him. However, he has had such insanely high turnover in personal assistants that he just wants someone who won’t leave him. Those words exactly, its in our contract.  The contract?  It’s a thing of beauty, you should see it.  It’s 15 pages of things like ‘promises not to be mean to me’.  What it doesn’t have?  A confidentiality clause.  Guess he wrote it himself.  The last lawyer left here in huff, years ago.  Covered in boiling hot tea, of course.

Uh oh, silence from the other room. This means he has stopped crying, and coming my way. Have to go, talk soon!

Update 3.2.18

Today he stormed in and told me to cancel the whole tour.  We call that Wednesdays around here.  Anyhow, I explained to him we don’t have a tour booked.  As he stormed out, he yelled “Well then, Trevor… book a tour, and then cancel it.  Do you fucking job, Trevor!”  I wish I could report to you that he wasn’t crying at the time, but I think we all know the answer to that.

*** my name is not Trevor.  Not even close.  not like a dare mention that to him.  What a Trevor!

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Friday Fives – future edition

What is the future of radio?

Tough to say, as I have already left radio far, far behind. The current offerings of radio left me nothing, so I left them. Before I go on a rant (and believe me, I will!) let me be specific when I say I left radio behind. I stopped listening to radio years ago, and then I broke the antenna on my truck. Never fixed it. Don’t have radio in my truck, and I don’t need it.

Radio offers this – on the music side, you have many choices. However, they are all owned by one company.   ALL of them… in EVERY market… are owned by Clear Channel. Clear Channel has a play list of about 20 songs that they rotate. If you drive for more than an hour, you get repeats. A LOT. Because of Clear Channel, I can’t enjoy Dave Matthews, Jack Johnson, or Blues Traveler anymore. They saturated the shit out of those bands, like they do all their bands.  I am sad.  I love music.  I have 9 different Dave Matthews discs.  Now, I can barely stand the band, and it is their fault.

The country stations do the same thing, as they have the same owner. Now, I love the Zac Brown Band. Even though I hate country, he is awesome. I keep the radio on in the barn on country. Actually, the cat changed it to country from KBCO… twice. True story. Anyhow, every time I go into the barn they are playing Zac Brown. What Clear Channel is doing to bands is what happened to Hootie, and what happened to the Spin Doctors.

On the other side you have talk radio. Lots of Jeebus stuff, which does me no good. I am an atheist. There is political talk radio, which does me nothing. Either it’s right wing, and infuriates me, or is left wing and I just agree mostly. No value there. Gimme something down the middle that is thoughtful. Actually, NPR is great, but I listen to all those programs as podcasts so I can do it on my own time.

So… back to your question… what is the future of radio?  What am I, the Sage?  If you were from Denver, you’d be laughing your ass off right now.

I dunno, but I can’t tell you whatever it is now isn’t the solution. Clear Channel I Heart Media is bent on just destroying everything.   Did you know the eliminated local DJs? Specifically, if you are listening to a radio station anywhere in the Southwest, you aren’t hearing a local DJ. All of the radio talent for the Southwest is done from Denver. When Uncle Creepy tells you the news and weather for Salt Lake city, it means there is a song playing in Denver covering him. In Phoenix, it is commercials. Now he puts on a record in Salt Lake City and he magically appears as Uncle Nasty in the Denver market. Yes, a single DJ is working in 3 to 4 cities simultaneously. It is called ‘voice-tracking’.

My only hope for you is they are at least sharing the amazing DJ Bret Saunders from kbco. He is the greatest, ever. Sweet and warm and funny and thoughtful and knowledgeable. I wish he had a podcast so I could hear just him and not his shit radio station playing the latest white hipster drivel.  I miss listening to him, with the busted radio and all.  I often ask my wifey, who listens to BCO every morning on the way to work ‘how is Bret these days?  I miss him!’. Even more, I miss the Sage!  I wish I could tell you this was conspiracy nonsense… about how your DJ doesn’t exist… but it’s true. It is the business model called ‘voice-tracking’. Really, it is. Click here.

Explained here by the Wall St Journal

a practice called “voice-tracking,” Clear Channel pipes popular out-of-town personalities from bigger markets to smaller ones, customizing their programs to make it sound as if the DJs are actually local residents.

Oh, and this.  I have met Brett several times, and he is absolutely as wonderful as you think he would be.  I am lucky to live in Denver, where the Clear Channel  I heart media ‘mothership’ is.  All of our talent is actually here, so they do local events in person.

side note, Clear Channel changed their name.  I got something to say on that.  Let’s just step outside for this conversation.

Geesh, this is getting long winded.  Let’s stop for a word from our sponsor

 What is the future of network television?

I feel bad for network television. They are getting swept under by cable. Why, and how? Cable is willing to be way more risqué than the networks. They all go by the exact same rules. Well, I am talking about basic cable here. Like networks, neither can swear or show nudity… until after 10 pm. The networks are trying to hold on to a modicum of decency by not lowering themselves to the base programming of its basic cable cousins. Yet… what they do show is entirely fucked up. Every show is a homicide show about dead hookers. How is that taking the high road compared to breaking bad?

What is the future of bookstores? 

Moot question, they are already gone

What is the future of music stores?

Moot question, they are already gone

 What is the future of alternate fuels?

Well, it is the only solution. We can’t keep funding terrorist muslim states, AND polluting our environment at the same time. Alternative fuels eliminates both those problems. How goddamn hard is that for people to understand?

Validation!

Ok, good news.  I am not crazy.  I am not just saying that because a Facebook quiz was able to validate my lucidity.  Nope!  I am sober as a judge.  See, when I grew up, there used to be crazy people, all kinds.  Not anymore, everyone just has a disorder.  Don’t believe me?

People used to have ‘road rage’.  And… we used to call them ‘assholes’.  No more.  They simply have ‘Intermittent Explosive Disorder’.  I told you about this back in June of ’06.

Wait, there’s more!  Did you know that there are people who cut off their limbs?  Yes, perfectly good limbs getting cut off my their owners.  Nutjob?  Wack case?  David Caruso?  Nope… another disorder.  I wrote about several of these over the years.  It was a series I call ‘ a good smackin’.  My bitch was this this > personal accountability is gone.  We are a society of victims.

Me?  Not a victim.  I rose above our blame culture to take accountability!  I was courageous enough to point out what a bunch of sally’s you all were.  Really, I was a hero in this arena.  That is, until last Friday.  You know if you have read more than one post from me, or spent more than one week with me, I hate mornings.  Secretly, I thought it was me being lazy.  I think my family thinks that too.  I know my wife thinks so.  Well, now I got a disorder too.

That may be because evening people show increased motor cortex and spinal cord excitability in the evening, about 9 p.m., meaning they had maximal central nervous system drive at that time, Lagerquist said.

Morning people, on the other hand, never achieve this level of central nervous system drive because the excitability of the motor cortex does not coincide with the excitability of the spinal cord. In other words, these two measures never peak at the same time, he said. Early birds’ brains were most excitable at 9 a.m. and slowly decreased throughout the day.

See, what this means is that you peak at 9 am.  That’s it, you are done for the day.  Each passing minute after 9 am, you become even dumber.  Impressive.  Insightful.  Explains a lot, don’t it?

Yet, with me…  nearly every second you encounter me… I am getting better.  As the day grows on, I am getting smarter and stronger every minute.  You might be thinking my awesomeness can barely be contained, and you would be correct.  It’s fun being correct, isn’t it?  You should try it more often.  I wake up every day and remind myself how great it is being right.  American, I am your gift… and you are welcome.

What I really need is a disorder name.  Everyone gets one.  People with Road Rage have Intermittant Explosive Disorder.  Your kid isn’t a hyper spaz, she just has adhd.   Your brother didn’t chop his arm off after eating way too much acid, he has Apotemnophilia.  You may not be a lazy good for nothing emotional waste of space…  scientists say you may just be a ‘teenager’.

See, once I get a name for my disorder… I am then a protected class.  What does that mean?  It means if you wake me up I will sue your ass!  I also think it means I can come into work whenever I feel like it, racist.

The good news is that I will clearly not beat your ass.  Apparently, you are fierce like a lion at 9 am.  Me?  Not so much.  Come 9 pm, though, I am outside your house and ready to box.  You better not be in bed, pussy!