Towers of Power
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Remember when Y-93 did the “Cash Call” contest?
Anyway, back to the cash call. I was poking around in the storage room as I often do, and I forget what I was even looking for. Among the things I found, however, was this old tape from my high school days. Appropriately labeled, this tape contains a recording of when I won the Cash Call on Y-93 one morning during my sophomore year.
The way it worked was: they’d pick a dollar amount, always with 93 cents, and announce it periodically throughout the day. Then at 5:30 or so they’d pick a random number from the residential section of the phone book. If you were the lucky recipient of a call and could tell them the correct amount, you’d win it! They’d do the same thing through the evening with a winning call made early in the morning. That’s when Bob called me. He woke me up, but I was a faithful winner and blurted out the correct amount.
One other thing they would do is record the call and use it to promote the next Cash Call in a promo later in the day. I had a boom box ( in those days we called ’em “ghetto blasters” ) handy and was able to record the promo of the call that Bruce Elscott played in the afternoon. Wanna listen?
I actually did pretty well on Y-93 contests. I won tickets, a promo copy of the Miami Vice Soundtrack on vinyl, the aforementioned Cash Call, etc. The winning stopped when I joined the Meyer Broadcasting team in 1990, though. I’m not sure if they were even doing the Cash Call at that point, but I was ineligible for any of the contests on any of the stations.
I still see Bob Beck, Loren Gray, and my other radio friends Brian ( “B-Man” ) and Crystal Reeves every now and then. Bob’s an avid motorcyclist, by the way, and the only guy I know who’s had a run-in with a buffalo with his Harley and lived. It’s fun to refer back to the good old days of the Meyer empire…but I think we’re all doing pretty well for ourselves these days too. And the $109.93? I did what any 15 year old kid would do: I spent most of it on my girlfriend and wasted the rest.
EDIT: I forgot to mention my “other” radio friends – Jason Hulm, Phil Parker, Mark Armstrong, Sid Hardt, Al Gustin… since I was in the mindset of “DJs” I overlooked these guys. Not that there’s anything wrong with being “just” a DJ. Oh heck, now I’ve dug myself ANOTHER hole… I love all you guys, okay? I’m just kinda scatterbrained, I guess.
🙂
A sudden a-ha! Planet Da Da
The sudden “a-ha!” came last night when I walked past a distribution box for the Dakota Beacon magazine and noticed that my favorite father & son moment was portrayed on the cover. This photo was taken one evening when little PJ and I parked ourselves on the hill behind the University of Mary and watched the sunset unfold. I had set up the camera behind us with a timer, and was able to catch a few shots of this quality time with my boy.
Helpful guys have given me advice on fatherhood since long before I actually became a dad. I’ve filed it all upstairs, and so far I haven’t had any bad advice. All the corny things that guys have told me about “once they’re born, you’re never the same” or “they’ll change you…they’re a ton of work, but they’re worth every bit of it” have been absolutely true. Advice like this came from clients, casual acquaintances, close friends, and family. Apparently the guys I know take fatherhood seriously enough that they only dispense the best of their knowledge to a father-to-be. I’m forever grateful for their help.
The one piece of advice that touched me the most came from the Beacon’s publisher, Steve Cates. He lost a son in a car crash a while back and told me that there isn’t anything he wouldn’t give to have more time with his son. He told me to cherish every moment with my boy (I only had one at that time) and always make time for him. That really left an impression with me, and I’ve done my best to make sure that I don’t deprive my boys of time with Daddy. It’s so easy for a guy like me to work my tail off on something that “needs to get done” and let time sneak past. Thanks to Steve’s guidance, I’m on guard for that sort of thing.
So far this morning I’ve been back and forth between my two boys. I got to cuddle with Jonathan this morning while his big brother was still asleep, and then after I fed PJ his scrambled eggs I wrestled him over to the couch to watch a few minutes of cartoons. Then I showed him my aquarium screen saver and gave him my big keyring to play with, and he scampered off to explore the house with mommy. Now I’m calming down a fussy two-month-old Jonathan, and just got him relaxed in the crib. Yeah…it IS hard work, but the most rewarding job a guy could have.
PJ’s only one year old and already has his first magazine cover! I’ll have to make sure to give it to his mommy to put in his scrapbook. Cover photo or not, I’m just joyful to have a father-son moment like that eternally preserved in one of my favorite photos ever.
Pioneer owl
Scheels Sports sticks to their guns…or lack thereof
Don’t let the title of this post fool you; I’m not actually mad at Scheels. I am a little inconvenienced, though. They’re the local dealer for Panther Arms, the manufacturer of the rifle I want to buy. I looked on the website, picked out a particular model, then marched down to Scheels to put in my order. Denied.
Scheels has long had a policy against “assault weapons” including AR-15 variants, but has since softened a little. Nevertheless, they’re only willing to stock or sell certain DPMS models…and the one that I’ve got in mind has a collapsible stock. Not gonna happen, at least not at Scheels.
They’ve got every right to sell or not sell whatever they want, so I’m not upset about it. Just the opposite, actually; I’m happy to see that someone has a set of principles and is willing to stand up for them, even if it costs them a lot of money. In the mean time, I’ve just got to find another dealer. Scheels just lost a pretty expensive sale, though! Even though I’m not mad I’ll probably buy the optics for this weapon elsewhere, then declare the matter settled.
Near miss…not
Bismarck-Mandan’s most dangerous game of Jenga
The ubiquitous leaf
You may recall my post from last March comparing the new Kirkwood Bank & Trust logo to the already established Lending Tree logo. If I was an executive at Kirkwood, I’d be a little ticked. Corporate identity is not cheap. They probably paid tens of thousands of dollars for that little piece of foliage. Besides, what does Kirkwood Bank have to do with trees?
Now we see this: two adjacent signs, each sporting leaves. Granted, with a name like Aspen, a leaf is a no-brainer. When placed next to the Kirkwood logo, though, it reminds me of that funny similarity between Kirkwood and Lending Tree.
My annoying watermark obscures it, but ironically I noticed later that there’s a THIRD leaf logo hiding in this shot: the Country Suites hotel sign in the background also sports foliage! TRIFECTA.
Have you seen any other local businesses with leaves in their logos?
An angle you might not get from the local news
I saw this article yesterday talking about how Kildeer Mountain Manufacturing (“Manufactuing” according to KX News) is looking forward to “sharing the award” of a big defense contract with U.S. Senator Byron Dorgan.
According to this press release, KMM’s “director of business development” is one Kristin Hedger, who tried a horribly misleading campaign against Secretary of State Al Jaeger last election cycle.
According to this post on the official ND Dem-NPL blog, Kristin Hedger offered as proof of her ND citizenship: “a letter from the North Dakota Tax Department and also the form that shows she lists North Dakota for tax withholding during her time working in Senator Byron Dorgan’s office, starting in May 2001.”
Is there something the Hedger family and Dorgan should be disclosing?
That local landmark to which I referred over the weekend
The location of this elevator, for those of you with a GPS, is 46°50.429″ minutes North by 101°30.460″ West. Here are some other photos from the morning, featuring one of the reddest skies I’ve seen.
I hadn’t planned on going out for pictures this particular morning, but I’m glad I did. I got to the location at exactly the right time, neither too early or too late. Once it was over, I pointed the truck back to the house to play with my boys. What a remarkable morning!