Observations and Ramblings from a Cranky Old Guy

This is a (pretty much mostly) true story of the stupidest person I have ever met.

One could say he’s as dumb as a box of rocks, but that would insult the rocks.

Shakespeare would say it is “a tale told by an idiot,” I say it is a tale told ABOUT an idiot.

Forrest Gump once said “I’m not a smart man,” I believe Forrest was quoting THIS d-bag.

Ever have a work supervisor SO incompetent, SO out of their league, SO much of a waste of space you blame their parents for the one night of passion that made this glob of poo?

This tells how a dedicated group of co workers decided, as Popeye the Sailor did, “that’s all we can stands, we can’t stands no more!”

Ever read the book or see the movie “Private Parts” by Howard Stern?

In it, his constant thorn in his side was a Program Director named “Pig Vomit.”

For our purposes, legally, let’s just call our protagonist “Piggy”.

It was a suburb of Cleveland in the early 80’s.

Piggy’s father, the General Manager (aka Boss Hogg), was a long-time old broadcaster known as “The Polka King of Cleveland (no, Piggy’s father was NOT Frankie Yankovic).

Piggy was “Operations Manager” (Normally that would be “Program Director”, but Piggy said “Hey I don’t have any programs to direct…yeah okay, Mensa smart this one is)

We were hired collectively to, like WKRP, turn a Beautiful Music station into a Top 40 Giant.

The irony is, WKRP did it right compared to this Mistake on the Lake broadcast disaster,

The station had a “B” in the call-letters, which (actually) stood for Piggy’s sow mamma, Bea.

The station logo, a cartoon bee, looked EXACTLY like the Honey Nuts Cheerios Bee, until the cereal people were notified and a cease and desist order was sent (wonder who may have done that, huh huh huh).

As far as the music this Top 40 station played, per Piggy it was to be whiter than the picket fence Tom Sawyer painted.

At the time, the HOTTEST album in the WORLD was “Thriller,” we never touched playing the song “Billie Jean” till the station consultant forced Piggy too.

He would grumble about the song “The Girl is Mine”, saying Paul McCartney needs to get back to playing with “his own people.”

His personal feelings weren’t limited to just music. At the time, I was the Morning Guy, and had to read my own news stories.

Like I did the day after the 1984 Ohio Democratic Presidential Primary (won that year by the Reverend Jesse Jackson), he comes in and rips up my copy saying “Jesse Jackson is a minority candidate in more ways than one.”

According to legend, one of our News People got in trouble (at maybe was fired) for talking about a proposed memorial to the Kent State Massacre (see CSNY)

In the opinion of Piggy and Boss Hogg, the National Guard was right to shoot those kids.

Honest to f#c#ing God!

These stories are JUST the BARE tip of the iceberg, it would drive most people insane.

Between Piggy and Boss Hogg we all drank a lot, and toked a lot, and talked a lot , and plotted, and planned a lot.

Every Friday night, it not the other six nights of the week.

A little drink, a little toke, a little talk, a little drink, a little toke, a little plot and plan, rinse and repeat.

Ever see the movie “FM,” where the staff rebelled?

That was us, in a subtle fashion.

It would take volumes more to tell everything we did to bond together, the point is, we did.

We kept our collective souls sane, all for one, and one for all.

A true family that decades later remains strong.

In time, Boss Hogg retired, Piggy remained, but in this case, it was not a case of “meet the new boss” rather “NOT the same as the old boss” (sorry Mister Townsend)!

Piggy got sent to the slaughterhouse, and we were drunk for a week.

A few years ago, after over 30 years, we got back together to celebrate the greatest family I ever worked with.

Fittingly, for dinner, we had pork chops.

Be hearing you