The Last Day

...4:27 pm March 23 2007



It was an early morning yesterday
I was up before the dawn
And I really have enjoyed my stay
But I must be moving on

Like a king without a castle
Like a queen without a throne
Im an early morning lover
And I must be moving on

Now I believe in what you say
Is the undisputed truth
But I have to have things my own way
To keep me in my youth

Like a ship without an achor
Like a slave without a chain
Just the thought of those sweet ladies
Sends a shiver through my veins

And I will go on shining
Shining like brand new
Ill never look behind me
My troubles will be few

Goodbye strange its been nice
Hope you find your paradise
Tried to see your point of view
Hope your dreams will all come true
Goodbye mary, goodbye jane
Will we ever meet again
Feel no sorrow, feel no shame
Come tomorrow, feel no pain

Now some they do and some they dont
And some you just cant tell
And some they will and some they wont
With some its just as well

You can laugh at my behavior
Thatll never bother me
Say the devil is my savior
But I dont pay no heed

And I will go on shining
Shining like brand new
Ill never look behind me
My troubles will be few
Goodbye stranger its been nice etc...


Someone here wanted to know the song I have played most in my life...that is an interesting question, there is no real way to know but it's probably one of these three..."LaGrange" by ZZ Top, "More Than A feeling" by Boston or "Black Dog" by Led Zeppelin. Those are the ones that stand out top of mind. I'll put my money on ZZ.

..6:03 pm March 23 2007
The last hour starts with "Night Moves" by Bob Seger

...Aint it funny how the night moves
When you just dont seem to have as much to lose
Strange how the night moves...
..6:07 pm March 23 2007
...When it all gets too heavy
Thats when they come and go
With only one thing in common
They got the fire down below

It happens out in vegas happens in moline
On the blue blood streets of boston
Up in berkeley and out in queens
And it went on yesterday and its going on tonight
Somewhere theres somebody aint treatin somebody right

One of my favorite Seger songs, just because it talks about "Moline".

..6:22pm March 23 2007
...Ah but sooner or later you sleep in your own space
Either way it's O.K. you wake up with yourself...My Life from Billy Joel, not one of my personal faves, but it gets the point across.

...6:26 pm March 23 2007
..."A bottle of white, a bottle of red
Perhaps a bottle of rose instead
Well get a table near the street
In our old familiar place You and I - face to face"
...his masterpiece really, and an honor to have it be one of the last three.

Whoa, time for some commercials, be right back....

...6:40 pm March 23 2007

...."Im stranded in the jungle
Taking all the heat they was giving
The night is dark but the sidewalks bright
And lined with the light of the living
From a tenement window a transistor blasts
Turn around the corner things got real quiet real fast..."

What a poet. If he was a film maker, he'd be Scorcese, Speilberg, and Coppola all rolled into one.


...6:44, the last one, the last day, ever.
...."The girls comb their hair in rearview mirrors
And the boys try to look so hard
The amusement park rises bold and stark
Kids are huddled on the beach in a mist
I wanna die with you wendy on the streets tonight
In an everlasting kiss..."

It can all be boiled down to one 5 minute exhaustive ride. A song that features not one or two but three mind blowing, screaming orgasms. It's a song that changed my life and the one that will go down in my own made up history as the end.

"Thank you and Goodnight Nashville, and goodnight Mr. and Mrs. America, wherever you are."

Skyline Number 10

Seoul, South Korea. Any place with seoul is OK with me. I used to play football in Soule Bowl, but it had no seoul. I don't think it's a Muscle Seoul, but OK, it's still skyline number 10.

A Whimper Rather Than A Bang

When I was younger, I thought it would be cool to die on the air.
(AP)"Local radio personality Randy Raley was found dead on the air today. His death was called into the front desk of the station by one of his numerous and rabid fans who heard him say..."grffffhtyuiffdd" as his last words. His passing leaves a huge void in the radio landscape and his funeral will be broadcast on the local CBS affiliate pre-empting the Cardinals home opener."
As much as that would be cool, it ain't gonna end like that. I am now one day out from the end of a career as I know it. How will it end? With a whimper and not a bang, that's for sure. What will be the last song, ever? I'd like to play the "Abbey Road" medley starting at "Mean Mr. Mustard" and finishing with "The End". It will most likely be "Born To Run" (a song that doesn't test well, so we are not playing it). I will say "thanks for listening" and then that's it. I will hope to have it saved for posterity. I will do stage announcements for Eddie Money on Saturday night, fill up the tank and head back.


And then a new life starts on Monday morning.

I look damn fine in a three piece suit, too.

March Madness Commercials

When it comes to watching march madness on TV, the only bad part about it is the excessive commercials. Now, in a few days, I will realize how wonderful thoses spots are, but my problem most of the times is not the frequency, but the quality. Some, I don't even understand how the particular ad campaign got started and who signed off on them. Here are five of those campaigns. Really, really bad ideas, especailly the esurance ones.

Web Spiders On Drugs

This video is very very funny. I used it on the air when I was allowed to do stuff like that. You'll need sound.

This Is So True...

Recently, I was diagnosed with A. A. A. D. D.
Age Activated Attention Deficit Disorder.

This is how it manifests: I decide to water my garden.
As I turn on the hose in the driveway, I look over at my car and decide my car needs washing.
As I start toward the garage, I notice that there is mail on the porch table that I brought up from the mailbox earlier. I decide to go through the mail before I wash the car.I lay my car keys down on the table, put the junk mail in the garbage can under the table, and notice that the can is full. So, I decide to put the bills back on the table and take out the garbage first.
But then I think, since I'm going to be near the mailbox when I take out the garbage anyway, I may as well pay the bills first.
I take my checkbook off the table, and see that there is only one check left.
My extra checks are in my desk in the study, so I go inside the house to my desk, where I find the can of Coke that I had been drinking. I'm going to look for my checks, but first I need to push the Coke aside so that I don't accidentally knock it over. I realize the Coke is getting warm, and I decide I should put it in the refrigerator to keep it cold.
As I head toward the kitchen with the Coke, a vase of flowers on the counter catches my eye--they need to be watered. I set the Coke down on the counter, and I discover my reading glasses that I've been searching for all morning.
I decide I better put them back on my desk, but first I'm going to water the flowers.
I set the glasses back down on the counter, fill a container with water, and suddenly I spot the TV remote. Someone left it on the kitchen table.
I realize that tonight when we go to watch TV, I will be looking for the remote, but I won't remember that it's on the kitchen table, so I decide to put it back in the den where it belongs, but first I'll water the flowers.
I pour some water in the flowers, but quite a bit of it spills on the floor.
So, I set the remote back down on the table, get some towels and wipe up the spill.
Then I head down the hall trying to remember what I was planning to do.
At the end of the day:the driveway is flooded,the car isn't washed,the bills aren't
paid,there is a warm can of Coke sitting on the counter,there is still only one check in my check book,I can't find the remote,I can't find my glasses,and I don't remember what I did with the car keys.
Then, when I try to figure out why nothing got done today, I'm really baffled, because I know I was busy all day long, and I'm really tired.
I realize this is a serious problem, and I'll try to get some help for it, but first I'll check my e-mail.
Do me a favor, will you? Forward this message to everyone you know,
because I don't remember who I have sent it to.

Don't laugh -- if this isn't you yet, your day is coming!

Great Joke

When I was married 25 years, I took a look at my wife one day and said, "Honey, 25 years ago, we had a cheap apartment, a cheap car, slept on a sofa bed and watched a 10 inch black and white TV, but I got to sleep every night with a hot 25 year old blonde.
Now, we have a nice house, nice car, big bed and a plasma TV, but I'm sleeping with a 50 year old woman. It seems to me that you are not holding up your side of things."
My wife is a very reasonable woman. She told me to go out and find a hot 25 year old blonde, and she would make sure that I would once again be living in a cheap apartment, driving a cheap car, sleeping on a sofa bed, watching a black and white TV.

Aren't older women great? They really know how to solve your mid-life crisis

God Bless YouTube

This video features 'Dickey Betts and Great Southern' with friends Elvin Bishop,
Charlie Daniels, and Bonnie Bramlett doing 'Southbound' on the 'Midnight Special' 5/12/78.
Video isn't the greatest, audio isn't either, but what fun this must have been.



And this version of one of my all time favorites is awesome. Both of the Caldwell brothers were alive. I think this version just cooks. RIP Toy and Tommy Caldwell, your version of Marshall Tucker was never surpassed.

EXTRA ADDED BONUS;; The Marshall Tucker Band on The Tomorrow Show with Tom Snyder. That's not Tommy Caldwell on bass, so I would say 1980 or so...

Shelly Grafman

There is a movement on the St. Louis media website (to your upper right)to get Shelly Grafman's name on the "St. Louis Walk of Fame". How fitting. Shelly was the guy responsible for running of KSHE from 1967-1984. Here is a copy on an email that I sent Mike Anderson, who runs that site:

Mike,

I first heard KSHE in 1972 while visiting cousins who lived in St. Charles. I knew right then that this was a trailblazing station because where I lived, they didn't play that kind of music on the radio. KSHE is responsible for most of my musical taste and I can't thank Shelly Grafman (and the people he hired)enough for what they brought to my life. While listening to his station in St. Louis, he forced me to go exploring when it came to great unheard artists. The first time I heard Bruce Springsteen was on KSHE, the same for Jackson Browne, Robert Palmer, etc. After finishing radio school in the Quad Cities in 1976, we were all asked where we would like to be in ten years. My answer was "doing afternoons at KSHE". Through the grace of God and John Beck, I made it with a year to spare. I met Mr. Grafman a couple of times and he told me once he really liked what I did. That comment means as much to me today as it did then.

KSHE was (and is) revered all over the country as how radio should be done. Mr. Grafman had his hands all over that station and if anyone deserves their place in the St. Louis walk of fame, it's Shelly Grafman.

Let me know when the ceremony is.



Sincerely,

Randy Raley

The Top Ten Closet Stoners In TV History

This list leaves out Shaggy however. Very funny.

10 Dangerous Jobs

America's Most Dangerous Jobs

By Laura Morsch, CareerBuilder.com

For many of us, the most dangerous part of the workday is the commute -- followed closely by teetering on stiletto heels.

Nationwide, most employees have a miniscule chance of being killed at work. There were just four fatal occupational injuries per 100,000 workers in the United States in 2005, according to preliminary data from the U.S. Department of Labor's Bureau of Labor Statistics.

That, of course, is just the average. For some workers -- soldiers in combat, for example -- every day is a life-threatening one. But on the domestic front, the most dangerous jobs are less obvious.

Statistically speaking, farmers -- with a fatality rate of 41.1 -- are more than twice as likely to die on the job than police officers (18.2) and nearly four times more likely to be killed at work than firefighters (11.5).

The Most Life-Threatening Jobs
According to BLS data, the following jobs had some of the highest fatality rates for 2005:

Fishers and related fishing workers
Fatality rate (per 100,000 workers): 118.4
Average salary: $29,000 per year

Logging workers
Fatality rate (per 100,000 workers): 92.9
Average salary: $31,290 per year

Aircraft pilots and flight engineers
Fatality rate (per 100,000 workers): 66.9
Average salary: $135,040

Structural iron and steel workers
Fatality rate (per 100,000 workers): 55.6
Average salary: $43,540

Refuse and recyclable material collectors
Fatality rate (per 100,000 workers): 43.8
Average salary: $30,160

Farmers and ranchers
Fatality rate (per 100,000 workers): 41.1
Average salary: $39,720

Electrical power-line installers and repairers
Fatality rate (per 100,000 workers): 32.7
Average salary: $49,200

Truck drivers
Fatality rate (per 100,000 workers): 29.1
Average salary: $35,460 (for heavy or tractor-trailer drivers)

Miscellaneous agricultural workers
Fatality rate (per 100,000 workers): 23.2
Average salary: $24,140

Construction laborers
Fatality rate (per 100,000 workers): 22.7
Average salary: $29,050

The Most Injury-Prone Jobs
Although employees are statistically unlikely to die on the job, illnesses and injuries are a far greater threat. In 2005, the rate of nonfatal injuries and illnesses was 4.6 per 100 workers.

The manufacturing industry accounted for more than 20 percent of the nation's reported nonfatal occupational injuries last year, with complaints ranging from sprains to gashes. Sixteen percent of workplace injuries were reported by workers in the healthcare sector.

The following industries saw the highest workplace injury rates for 2005:


Beet sugar manufacturing: 16.6 injuries per 100 workers


Truck trailer manufacturing: 15.7 injuries per 100 workers


Iron foundries: 15.2 injuries per 100 workers


Prefabricated wood building manufacturing: 13.9 injuries per 100 workers


Framing contractors: 13.3 injuries per 100 workers

Jobs That Could Make You Sick
Considering the nature of their work, it's not surprising that healthcare workers reported 19 percent of the 242,500 new occupational illnesses in the private sector for 2005. But manufacturing workers actually get sick from work most often, accounting for 39 percent of reported injuries.

The following industries had the highest reported illness rates:


Light truck and utility vehicle manufacturing: 701.5 illnesses per 10,000 workers


Animal slaughtering, except poultry: 478.8 illnesses per 10,000 workers


Automobile manufacturing: 320.6 illnesses per 10,000 workers


Cut stock, resawing lumber and planning: 276.4 illnesses per 10,000 workers


Motor vehicle air-conditioning manufacturing: 235 illnesses per 10,000 workers


Laura Morsch is a writer for CareerBuilder.com. She researches and writes about job search strategy, career management, hiring trends and workplace issues.

The Best Professions

12 Jobs That Will Never Disappear

By Candace Corner, CareerBuilder.com writer

While we haven't quite reached the age of flying cars, we've certainly made significant strides in civilization. Gone are the heydays of goldsmiths and wheelwrights, but an element of those jobs live on in one form or another. With advancements in technology and science, so come changes in jobs working with them.

And while there are certainly more than 12 occupations that will stand the test of time -- like artist and politician -- check out this list of jobs that have staying power:

1. Doctor
Why it's everlasting: While humans pride themselves on being the most intelligent of species, we still have a mortality rate, and we still get bumped, bruised and diseased along the way. We will always need people to investigate and treat our medical conditions.
What it pays: The median annual salary is $120,000.

2. Teacher
Why it's everlasting: There will always be a need for education, and there will always be a need for people to do the educating.
What it pays: The median annual earnings of kindergarten, elementary, middle, and secondary school teachers ranged from $41,400 to $45,920.

3. Mortician
Why it's everlasting: Unless a solution for mortality is found and available to everyone, there will always be a need for someone to care after the deceased.
What it pays: The median annual salary is $37,000.

4. Waste Disposal Manager
Why it's everlasting: Humans create a lot of waste, biologically and otherwise. We'll always need people to maintain and relocate our messes.
What it pays: The median annual salary is $35,000.

5. Scientist
Why it's everlasting: Humans will always ponder our surroundings and how it all works. We need people to dedicate their lives to the cause and effects of ourselves and our environments to deal with changes.
What it pays: The median salary for a research scientist (biotechnology) is $70,000. The median annual salary for a environmental scientist is $42,000.

6. Tax Collector
Why it's everlasting: As the old saying goes, "In this world nothing is certain but death and taxes." For all reported income, there will always be a form of collection to aid government programs.
What it pays: The median annual salary is $38,000.

7. Barber
Why it's everlasting: People will always need to have their hair cut and groomed.
What it pays: The median annual salary is $21,200.

8. Soldier
Why it's everlasting: Even if world peace were a reality, there would still be a fear of future wars based on history.
What it pays: The basic pay for enlisted personnel is an annual income of $14,137. The position also includes paid housing, food allowances, healthcare at little to no cost for the soldier and their family, extended vacation/leave, education stipends and additional incentives.

9. Religious Leader
Why it's everlasting: As people continue to ponder the meaning of their own existence, a majority find a need for people to assist them with a form of spiritual guidance.
What it pays: The median annual salary is $34,000.

10. Law Enforcement Officer
Why it's everlasting: If we are dependant upon a system that governs, we will also be dependant upon people to enforce the rules of that system.
What it pays: The median annual earnings at government state and local levels are $38,236. The median annual earnings for companies are $62,700.

11. Farmer
Why it's everlasting: One of the basic human needs is food and, even though farming is increasingly consolidated, there will still be a need for someone to grow it.
What it pays: The average net cash farm business income is last reported at $15,603. Government subsidies and additional incomes or cost reductions are not included in this figure. Incomes for ranchers and farmers vary with the weather, price of farm equipment and factors that involve the quality and quantity of the product.

12. Construction Worker
Why it's everlasting: In the same way we'll always need food, we'll always need a form of shelter to protect us from the elements. We will always need construction workers to build and repair our buildings.
What it pays: The median annual salary is $35,000.


* Salary sources: Bureau of Labor Statistics, Payscale.com, the Department of Defense, GoArmy.com and About.com.




Candace Corner is a writer for CareerBuilder.com.

Skyline Number 11

Sao Paulo, Brazil. Population...a lot.

Two Submitted Skylines

Blog viewer (and "Crack The Sky" fan) Beth has submitted these fine skylines for our perusal:


Oui, the Parisian skyline is quite sublime.



...and this would be Tampa Bay, a fine city.

Now, How Old Do You Feel?

Tournament Tidbits

It's the time to grab a big old container of salted nuts in the shell, a Cherry Coke Zero and enjoy the tournament, the greatest sports spectacle in America. The lesson from the weekend? Practice those free throws, son. Xavier would have upset Ohio State if the guy would have hit his last free throw. It would have put Xavier up by four with less than 10 seconds to play. I have Kansas to win it all and I am still sticking to that, they look great. I am so happy that Duke and Maryland are gone. Last year, Gerry Williams from Maryland read the riot act to anyone who would listen about being better than any mid major schoool last year, but when Missouri State tried to schedule a game with them, he wouldn't do it. Nice job, Butler. There is a reason that Gerry Williams won't play anyone from a mid major. He loses. I hope Butler takes down Florida, but I am pretty sure that won't happen. My sentimental favorite? SIU. My favorite teacher in high school went there and I drive through Carbondale weekly. So, the kiss of death is now on the Salukis.

Post 636...40,000

You crazy, wacky kids on crack. 40,000 hits in a little over two years. Pretty bleak reflection on society isn't it? Hey, it's crap, but at least it's my crap..and now it's your crap. No tagbacks.