27 July 2008

I heard it on the radio

This morning I awoke at the ridiculously unrewarding hour of 5-something in the AM in order to have enough time to pack my bags for the trip to Dallas, since I spent most of yesterday fiddling about with the idea of possibly getting off my ass and doing something productive. Ha. Productive? Me? Not even my cough was productive... no phlegm, just a raspy dry annoyance (probably from all the dust in my place, for which I blame stupid space rocks for entering our atmosphere uninvited and then burning up and depositing themselves all over my stuff. Forget building a wall to keep the Mexicans out – let's build one to keep those space rocks out! As long as the space rocks keep coming in, we need the Mexicans here – who else is going to clean up all that friggin' dust?*) As for the rest of me, that was trapped in the tractor beam of the sofa for a good portion of the day. Business as usual.

When the radio went off this morning to inform me that it was time to quit procrastinating I expected the usual mix of schmaltzy pop and hip-hop and whatever other crap the station I have the radio set to usually blares out in the mornings. I used to wake up to National Public Radio, but hearing how the world was coming to an end every morning got to be a little depressing, especially when they kept backing it up with hard evidence. It's not easy to get out of bed when the Apocalypse is imminent.

But this morning, the usual schmaltz was replaced by a different kind of schmaltz... schmaltzier schmaltz. Apparently they farm the radio station out on Sunday mornings to some churchy people who play a mix of ultra-crap pop music and Christian-centric tunes.

And that's fine. Some people have no musical taste whatsoever – me being one of them – and maybe listening to some bouncy extremely rhyme-happy poorly metered song about Jesus and how we pleases when we squeezes treeses (or some damned thing) interspersed among the tuneless "heaven will be so nice" dirges makes their lives somehow that much more fulfilled. I don't care for most of that stuff - all lips, no soul - but good for them! That's the spirit! (The Holy Spirit, actually.) Besides, what do I care what they play? I only listen to the radio as a means of dragging me (kicking and screaming) from a peaceful slumber into the harsh light of day. And through most of that process, the thing is on snooze.

What I found interesting about this switch in programming wasn't the programming itself, but rather the advertising that was in rotation for this audience of crap Jesus-music-listening folk. First, there were the credit report ads in which the fellow sings about having to drive around in a hooptie because he didn't know his credit was whack, and the one where he is dressed as a pirate singing to tourists because someone stole his identity and apparently this was the only identity left in the lost and found bin.

And then there were the public service announcements about how crystal meth is bad and you really need to get some help. (Crystal anything is bad, really. It's impossible to keep clean! Talk about your dust magnets... and even when you do get it sort of clean, there's spotting. Yeah. Avoid crystal, unless you've got some Mexicans.) The one I remember was about some lady who "just tried it once" and was hooked (because seriously, it's one of the most addictive things known to man, unless you count pistachios) and she was going down a terrible path to hell until her little daughter said, "I miss you, mommy," prompting her to get the help she needed and give up the meth forever. Very touching, if a tad unrealistic. The teeth rotting out of her head she could live with, but her daughter getting all Lifetime Movie of the Week on her ass was too much to bear.

But I digress. During the week the ads for all the sinners are for weight loss, hair removal, spa treatments, and edible bouquet arrangements. The ads for the saved are for whack credit and drug addiction.

I'm just saying. Draw your own conclusions.

I'm out.

Disclaimer: I loved Mexico when I lived there, and I loved the Mexicans (except the shitty ones), and I mean no more disrespect to them than I did to the Dutch when I wrote about them that one time. Bear in mind that being Mexican does not automatically make a person a good housekeeper. In fact, the one lady who cleaned my house down there only did a fair to middling job of it most of the time - but what the hell do you want for $15 a week? She did keep the crystal sparkling, though, bless her heart.

The Last Five:
I heard it on the radio - 27 July 2008
Happiness is... - 26 July 2008
Do bears shit in the woods? - 21 July 2008
Politics schmoliticks - 14 July 2008
words and pictures - 14 July 2008

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