Driving, The Radio, and Other Vacation-y Things

So, if I spill a secret onto this blog, it has to be kept a secret and not shared with the Women's Basketball team... The weekend of February 19th (I think it was then...), I, Madison Way, faked sick, skipped basketball practice, and drove to Columbia, South Carolina. I never lie or play hooky, so my adrenaline was pumping as I called a senior manager (coughing very convincingly, might I add) to explain my absence the next morning.

What began as a hyped-up drive dragged into a 5.5 hour drive of listening to "S&M", "Hold It Against Me", "Tonight" and other club-intended songs. As we left Chapel Hill, my friend and I were pleased to hear these songs, but as we continued down the highway toward Charlotte, our music slipped into some type of religious music. Quickly, we turned the dial to the pop station to find that they were playing the same, sexed up, club songs. By this time, it was around 11:30 at night so we forgave the song choices that were beginning to annoy us and continued down the road.

As we entered South Carolina, we were surprised to find that there was not a change in the annoying pop songs playing on the radio. Perhaps a love for sexual songs was felt across the southeast. While the number of country stations increased and the ads that took more airtime than music changed from North to South Carolina businesses, nothing had changed.

Perhaps in a day and age when Kiss FM didn't rule the air and Ryan Seacrest wasn't coming out of car speakers across the nation, a change could be noticed as one travels from state to state, but truth is, there isn't any diversity in the radio, just a repeat of Enrique, Rihanna, and Britney, and that's probably how things will stay.

A Trip Through Insanity

After flipping through what seems like hundreds of possible radio shows to listen to, I fell upon "A Trip Through Insanity" on The Story with Dick Gordon, a collection of stories in which rape, gospel, and post offices are discussed. I chose this podcast mainly because the story of Pippin Ross (an NPR reporter who was raped on the job and was later arrested on drunk driving charges) was interesting to me. Listening to Pippin was almost painful. Because the podcast was purely audio, the intensity of Pippin's choked-up, sobbing stories of rape were uncomfortable to listen to. This discomfort creates a sympathy for Pippin that stretches out to the inmates that she describes as having "Precious-personas." Before listening to this section of this podcast, I had never sympathized with inmates, but Pippin's soothing, radio-made voice and heart-felt descriptions of the women she met in jail make jail seem like a home for women trapped in the mishaps of their past.

Another reason why I chose this podcast was because of the section on post offices. I am heading to Albuquerque this weekend for the NCAA tournament so this section about southwestern post office stories intrigued me. All the stories were cute and simple, however I did not see their connection to the rest of the post office and I felt like I had wasted time by listening to it.

The final section is on performing gospel in the Subway. I was slightly bored with this selection and wished the trains in the background had been edited out. That being said, the story was inspirational and gave me a better understanding of the homeless citizens of New York. This story also was interesting in the way it showed how pride can deter you from pursuing something that could be enjoyable.

Overall, I liked the radio show. I wish it had more scandalous stories (a la 48 Hours Investigates or 20/20), but I found the show easy to listen to. Not only this, but I found that I could listen to the radio and do other things at the same time. This reminded me of the New York Times statement that Radio was easier to multitask with than TV. So true. Right after I wrote this, I watched an episode of Glee only to realize I never published this...