Tuesday, 2/10

Well, one of them COULD be a real sport, right?

Last night's TV piece was my latest flight of Yooper fancy, in which I (hopefully) accomplished two goals—making people chuckle a little, and ragging on a certain news anchor for not yet eating a pasty.

The second of those is, actually, quite easy. The first one's a little harder, and with any luck I at least came close.

I haven't really watched any of the Olympics yet, although I did see a clip of Lindsey Vonn's horrific crash, an experience that I really don't wanna repeat. But I know how many people really get into the Games, especially with a Yooper like Nick Baumgartner trying to get another gold, so I figured I would put my own unique spin on a couple of events that SHOULD be in the Winter Olympics but aren't.

Much, I'm sure, to the loss of the rest of the world.

Did I succeed? Well, that's not up to me to decide. It IS, however, something you can determine by checking it out for yourself--

This is one of those bits that just came to me in a flash of inspiration, as when I was walking home from TV last Monday night the phrase “Six Pack Speed Skating” popped into my head. By the time I finished dinner, I had most of the gags; the spot itself was fully written by Wednesday, and when I came back to it Sunday to put graphics together it still held up.

I wish all of my TV bits were that easy, you know?

Anyway, I suppose I should wrap this up. If nothing else, I should start drafting a letter to the International Olympic Committee. I'm pretty sure they'll be as excited by “Six Pack Speed Skating” as the rest of us, right?

8-)

(jim@wmqt.com)

Monday, 2/6

Who knew I was so hardcore, huh?

First of all, hope you had a great weekend. I enjoyed mine, as for the first weekend in a lot of weekends I didn't have much to do. I talked to my dad (the birthday boy; more on that in a bit), I took care of some chores, and Loraine and I headed over to the Fit Strip for a little outdoor winter exercise.

Look what I came back with--

It's not what it looks like. I mean, yes, it IS a cross country ski pole that's obviously broken in half, and if I wanted to leave you with the impression that I had a massive accident while head through the woods, I could use that as evidence, right? But, alas, I'm not that hardcore. I mean, I DID break the pole while skiing, but it wasn't while being hardcore.

It was while I was trying to move a tree out of my way.

As you know, we've had an intense winter up here, so intense that all around Marquette's Fit Strip there are trees & branches that have been blown down, and frozen in place. I came across one while heading around the woods on Sunday, and figured I would be a good community citizen and try to move it. I'm sure someone smarter than me would have figured this out, but it's REALLY hard to move a frozen tree while on cross country skis. So I tried using one of my poles are leverage, and voila...

I ended my skiing with one working pole. Oops.

I did eventually get the giant tree branch out of my path, and used my one working pole to get back to civilization. I'm guessing I won't be doing too much skiing until I get the pole replaced, although I do have an old pole from an old set somewhere on our basement. Maybe I'll try using the one I still have with the old one, and see how it works.

Although if I come across more tree branches on the ground, I'll know better than to use one of those poles to move it.

8-)

*****

I had mentioned that it was Chicky-Poo's birthday on Saturday. What he doesn't know is that the kids on “High School Bowl” wanted to say something to him!

(jim@wmqt.com)

Friday, 2/6

Well, you'll be happy to know I made it through a “normal” week okay.

At the beginning of this week I mentioned how this was my first “normal” week in, like, forever. I wondered how I would handle it, and you know what?

I think I handled it quite well. I got everything done I wanted to get done; I even got a head start on next week's TV piece. So I made the most of a “normal” week. And that's a good thing, because next week?

Anything BUT normal.

But before we even think about that, I have something I need to announce. I could not let this day go by without wishing a “happy birthday” tomorrow to my favorite old guy in the whole world. That's right; tomorrow it's Chicky-Poo's birthday.

When I mailed my dad's birthday card a couple of days ago and actually addressed it to “Chicky-Poo Koski”, someone asked how I had gotten into the habit of referring to him as “Chicky-Poo” instead of something normal like “Dad” or “Father” or “Sir” or “You know, that guy”. And in all honesty, I have no idea whatsoever. I don't even know when it started. I just know that one day, probably as a joke, I must have called him “Chicky-Poo” and, for some strange reason, it got stuck in my brain. I started referring to him in that manner. Not all the time, and certainly not when I'm actually having a conversation with him, but I address his mail to him that way, I refer to him that way when he wants me to tell Loraine something, and when talking to my Mom on the phone, I'll ask her to tell “Chicky-Poo” I said 'Hi”.

I know; great son, right?

Anyway it's Chicky-Poo's (excuse me, my dad's) birthday tomorrow, and I couldn't let the day go by without making sure that everyone else knew it was his big day, too. Since he's in Florida, I'm guessing he'll either be playing pickleball or going for a long bike ride (or both). So have a great day tomorrow, DAD. Enjoy the weather, and enjoy all the attention for a few hours!

Love,

(jim@wmqt.com)

Thursday, 2/5

You know what? I'm thinking it might be a pretty accurate description.

Over the past few months, as you well know, I've been putting out all kinds of content—these things every day, my TV-19 work every week, 12 “Pieces of the Past” videos, and a whole bunch more. I was speaking with someone who's seen most of it, and whether or not they intended to, they gave me a compliment that, as I think about it, describes what I seem to be these days.

They told me I'm a great “Two Minute Storyteller”.

It's a strange sobriquet, but you know what? It fits perfectly. The TV pieces I do every week? 2 minutes. These things, if you were to read them out loud? About 2 minutes. The history videos? Some are 90 seconds, some are a bit longer, so that averages to (around) two(ish) minutes.

I've never actually even considered it, but I do seem to have a talent for getting a point across in two minutes. I guess I really AM a “Two Minute Storyteller”.

It's funny, because I'm guessing that if you were to go back in time (which, as we know from yesterday, is pretty much impossible) and ask the younger me what title they would end up with, I can pretty much guarantee the younger me would NOT have guessed “Two Minute Storyteller”. In fact, I'm pretty sure the younger me would either laugh the laugh of the ironic at that suggestion, or just shake his head, make a sarcastic comment, and walk away.

But you know what? The younger me would have been quite shortsighted in that reaction.

I'd be curious to know if I've always, deep down, been a “Two Minute Storyteller”, or if it's a talent I've developed over the years, thanks to the type of work I've done (like writing these for 20+ years). Maybe it's a chicken or egg thing, or maybe there's just something in my brain that suited to short spurts of lucidity. I guess it doesn't matter; all I know is that it's a title that I never knew I had, but it's one that I'll proudly carry for the rest of my life.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I'll have to see if I can come up with a business card that says “Jim Koski: Two Minute Storyteller” on it.

8-)

(jim@wmqt.com)

Wednesday, 2/4

It's probably the closest I'll ever come to fulfilling an impossible dream.

I think I've written in here before about a fanciful dream I have that was actually inspired by a real dream, a dream from a couple of years ago where I was walking through downtown Marquette with a camera. That's something I actually do quite a bit in real life, but in that dream I was walking through the downtown Marquette of the 1930s with my 21 megapixel Nikon DSLR, taking pictures (and hi-def video) of a Marquette long-gone, of buildings no longer there and businesses consigned to history.

It was an amazing dream. Sadly, I know a little bit too much about physics (and the impossibility of time travel) to know that it's a dream that will never come true.

Or...so I thought.

When I was doing prep work for the season of “Pieces of the Past” that we just finished, I came across a treasure trove of photos of Marquette of 1929. They were taken by Robert S Platt, a sociologist working for the American Geographic Society. He was working on an article for the AGS's magazine, and spent a week in Marquette that summer just taking pictures. Now, aside from being a sociologist, Platt also had an amazing eye for photography, shooting some of the iconic pictures of Marquette of almost 100 years ago.

He shot many of the same things I shot in my dream, and that I would like to shoot if I could break every law of nature and head back in time.

I used a few of his pictures in various videos, and then saved the lion's share—some of his best work—for the final episode of the season. I also made them into the last segment of mine during “Legends & Lore III” at Kaufman last month, and I still have people coming up to me to talk about a particular shot of Platt's that has stuck with them.

So, while I know that I'll never ever be able to go back in time and take those pictures and videos, I'm thankful that someone at the time actually did.

And because of that, I will forever be in awe of Robert S. Platt.

(jim@wmqt.com) 

Tuesday, 2/3

Today, whaddya say we have a little fun with numbers?

The first number is 45. In a rare instance of something the predates even me (and that's saying something these days), Q107-WMQT became Q107-WMQT 45 years ago this past Sunday (the 1^st). In a move that I'm pretty sure was borrowed from “WKRP in Cincinnati” an elevator music station flipped things on its head one afternoon, when the elevator music stopped and the rock music began, hosted by a very..unique individual named “Marcus Marquette” (in reality, station co-owner Bob Olson). The older people of Marquette County (including, if I remember correctly, my grandfather) weren't too happy, but a station was born.

And it's been around ever since.

A couple of years later, the rock music left and the station switched to pop music, where it's pretty much been ever since. I've been lucky enough to be the steward of it for over three decades now, and I'm always humbled when I think about the awesome staying power of this place. Very few stations are able to become “:legacy” stations—ones that multiple generations of a family grow up listening to—but this is one of them. Credit for that goes to Joe Blake and Marcus Marquette's alter ego, Bob Olson, as well as Tom Mogush, who picked up the baton from them, and passed it along to the people now entrusted with the legacy, the KBIC.

Of course, to celebrate the milestone we have a contest all this month, our “Hot Rockin' Flame Throwing 45^th Birthday Bash”, in which we're giving almost $2,500 in prizes to one lucky listener. So if you feel like it, listen for your chance to qualify.

It's our birthday, but you might walk away with the gifts. After all, that's one thing at which we've excelled the past 45 years.

And, hopefully, will excel at for the next four and a half decades.

*****

The other number I mentioned at the beginning of this? Well, that would be 18.6.

Why? The reason is right here--

(jim@wmqt.com)

Monday, 2/2

This is going to be a weird week. After tonight, I don't have anything out of the ordinary going on.

As we all know, I've had an amazingly hectic past few weeks, with multiple episodes of “High School Bowl”, my weekly TV 19 appearances, a big History Center show at Kaufman, and the Noquemanon all pecking away at my time, my voice, and my sanity. Well, after I share a few numbers and make fun of Kevin tonight, I then have a week—a week—of nothing out of the ordinary.

Unless, of course, you consider radio as “out of the ordinary”.

I'm not quite sure how I'll handle it; after all, I've spent the past couple of weeks preparing for and then rushing from one thing to another that a few days of down time, a few days when there will be absolutely nothing pressing on my schedule, will seem strange. I can see myself waking up in the middle of the night, thinking that I forgot to do something or have a deadline to meet.

When that happens, I just hope I'll be able to get back to sleep.

How did all this happen? Well, after doing three episodes in the past ten days there will be no “High School Bowl” tapings until next Friday (the 13^th!), thanks to the schedules of the remaining schools in the competition. There's no big sporting event that requires my participation, and after dropping the last episode of “Pieces of the Past” last week I now have no official History Center duties for the next couple of months, when I have a new walking tour on the schedule.

See? It's gonna be a weird week, isn't it?

It's actually coming at a pretty good time, although between you & me it would have been better if it wasn't the beginning of February. In fact, can you imagine what I could do with a free week in, say, July, when there's actually no snow on the ground?

That would be magnificent. But seeing as how I could tell the strain on my voice was growing after shooting “High School Bowl” last Friday, I'll take what I can get.

Because, as we all know, nature abhors a vacuum, which means that before I know it, something—or many somethings—will soon be filling up my schedule and I'll be once again rushing from place to place wondering (as I did several times in the past few weeks) where I am and what day of the week it is.

(jim@wmqt.com)