Of the many things that have recently floated to the surface in the cleaning and packing are stacks and stacks of cassette tapes from my years in radio. I broadcast for eight years, what seems like a lifetime ago. When I consolidated the tapes in the cleaning of the garage it turned into one impressive box full of old material.
I’ve been hanging onto them because I’ve promised myself (for years, now) that I’d one day listen to them and digitize the good stuff. Somewhere in all those many tapes there has to be two or three good air checks. The world needs, I figure, dated jokes, aging soundbites and hard news leads delivered in a young man’s voice.
Mostly I keep the tapes to keep me humble. Putting one in and pressing play would crack me up, or make me grimace, for hours.
While I learned early on I was no disc jockey, thank goodness, I did turn into a strong news anchor and sports reporter. I had another dip into that memory today, when I had dinner with my radio mentor Chadd Scott. He taught me a lot, because he learned from a great one, who learned from two greats. We learned a lot together because when we worked together Chadd and I found ourselves in a position where the bosses left us alone to make mistakes. We created more successes than failures, though.
He’s in town from Atlanta for SEC Media Days. Since he made the trip, we’d asked him to pick us up a bookshelf from Ikea. He drug it across the state line, crammed into his car with his colleague and intern. I think he made his intern go fetch the bookshelf from the store, which would be the silliest thing I’ve ever had an intern do.
My own internship at ACES, once upon a long time ago, was an excellent experience. There were three communication specialists and me doing the job of six or eight people. I built web pages, produced television, practiced photography and dark room skills, wrote for newspapers, cut audio for radio and more. The least consequential thing I ever did was to collate photo copies, and that was a necessary thing for my projects. My internship was so useful I’ve always been conscientious to help interns have the opportunity to receive a similar experience.
And now some young man has been sent to Ikea to pick up a bookshelf in my name.
We had dinner with Chadd and Chuck Oliver and others tonight. We talked Internet, where just maybe I returned the favor and gave Chadd a little practiced advice.They are working on a big project, one I’m looking forward to seeing this fall.
The Yankee and I each enjoyed a frosty for dessert. I recorded two voiceovers. (Anybody need voice work? I used to be in radio, you know … ) We watched a bit of television and packed more. We’ve only a week more of this to go!
