Monday, March 02, 2009

Dangle's Talk Radio Debut

I made an ass out of myself on talk radio the other day. It started when I agreed to do some work for my wife, who is over-extended and overworked, I myself being under-extended and underworked. I'm in semi-retirement. She’s designing a “making of” coffee table book for a super-famous filmmaker and his huge licensing and franchise operation. I don’t know if she has a NDA, but she might: suffice it to say it’s a book that will cater to geeks. So I was sitting there making type corrections. Looking at the page printouts and typing in new captions, changing fonts here and there, and adding periods and commas. It’s what I used to do in the old days with a knife and fast hands; now I'm working in InDesign. I clicked in to Air America for some diversion...

I’m such a spoiled brat that I’m really not used to drudgery. My hands are soft like a Lord Fauntleroy who's never done a hard day’s work in his life. The idea that somebody would ever hire me is laughable, yet I’m an internationally acclaimed artist, successful entrepreneur, marketing genius, and roustabout man about town.

And this is drudgerous work, believe me. Making corrections to book text, your back and neck starts to seize up right away. And since there are a gazillion tiny corrections, you get into the mindset of: One more! One more! One more! Just one more page before I pee!

But it was also boring. Boring but demanding enough that your mind can’t wander to women, sex fantasies, or what’s happening on your facebook page. Finally, out of sheer boredom I clicked Air America and streamed it, the Ron Kuby Show. Next to Lionel, who I refuse to listen to, Ron Kuby is fast becoming the most annoying of the Air America hosts, a position once held by Randi Rhodes. Randi Rhodes was at least vitriolic and did her research, Ron Kuby’s show is what Howard Stern would be if Stern was a long-winded defense lawyer. Kuby and his twenty-something producers make wisecracks and guffaw heartily at their own jokes, and they tease the host for wearing a ponytail. But, on this day Kuby was entertaining and I was loving every second of it.

Anyway, as my shoulders fused into a mass of aching tissue, Ron Kuby was talking about the cartoon. After apparently going on for days about the chimp cartoon––and taking your calls––he was finally left with talking about Al Sharpton’s protests outside the office of the NY Post. He didn’t approve, even though he’s known Sharpton for fifteen years. Kuby and his cohorts started talking about what the protesters were chanting. Nobody knew what to chant. This was the best they had:

“Hey Ho, racist chimp cartoons have got to go!”


Kuby, to his credit, had a point. That’s a terrible chant. So they started trying to come up with one, and theirs sucked even worse, they didn’t even rhyme. So, being who I am, I started reeling off amazing chants. These aren’t all masterpieces, but this is the extraordinary quality of chants I came up with in fifteen seconds:

Murdoch, Murdock he’s our man, The Post is like a garbage can!

The cartoon you ran really stank, let’s make Murdoch walk the plank!

You chimped us in that bad cartoon, let’s send Murdoch to the moon!

To read The Post you might need glasses, Murdoch you can kiss our asses!

The New York Post will hurt your liver, let’s throw Murdoch in the river!

The Post cartoons really blow, we don’t like your minstrel show!



I don’t know why, but I decided to call in to the Ron Kuby Show to share a chant. I never do this, but I was desperate for distraction. It went like this:

“Hello, do you have something you want to say to Ron Kuby?”

“Yes.”

“What’s your name and city?”

“Lloyd from Oakland.”

“What do you want to say to Ron?

“I have a chant.”

“A what?”

“A chant, you know for that Al Sharpton thing you’ve been talking about for the past hour.”

“Oh, a chant. What is it?”

“I want to say it to Ron.”

“Yes, but you’ve got to tell me first or you can’t be on the show.”


So I did. Then they put me on hold. I turned down my computer and listened to the show on my cell phone, my brain basking in those tumor-producing waves. Ron switched topics to a detailed discussion of harnessing wind power and the legalities of trading carbon credits with a look toward how consumers may benefit. I was bored again, and with my phone up to my ear I wasn’t even working on the type corrections. Suddenly I hear––

“Lloyd from Oakland, you’re on with Ron Kuby!”

“Uh, I have a chant.”

“You have a what?”

“A chant, is there something wrong with my phone?”

The producers and Kuby would all talk at once and then suddenly there would be silence.

“You wanna hear it?”

“Yes, let’s hear it.”

“You should’ve dumped that chimp cartoon, Murdoch is the real baboon.”

“What?!” Kuby said. One of the producers had been interjecting something and he missed the chant.

“You should’ve dumped that chimp cartoon, Murdoch is the real baboon.”

Kuby: “Murdoch is a baboon? Eh...

Producer: “You what the chimp cartoon.”

Lloyd: “Oh fuck it.”

1 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

hehehe - this made me laugh, at many different levels! My favorite visual was you with the Lord Flauntory hands (I added the haircut as well, for my own amusement!), drudging along doing the scut work of your wife, internationally acclaimed artist, coming up with babboon chants.

Priceless!

5:11 PM  

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