All The Good Names Were Taken

Well, last night, I was on the air. I did an interview for WGN Radio, and to my credit, I wasn't terrible.

Sigh. That's my new benchmark: I wasn't terrible.

The producer said I was good the next day. Maybe. All I know is that I wasn't terrible.

The first time I was ever on radio, I was terrible. And the second time, and the third and so on. Somehow, several years ago when I worked at a newspaper, I was asked to come in every week to a radio station to talk about what was going on in the city. The radio producer liked my column and thought my humor might translate well to her medium. Yeah. I hear she was demoted to working the night shift soon after that decision.

I did get better, but my big mistake when I first went on the air was starting off with a long, terrified pause. The DJs stared at me, as if they could see the future, and it involved them getting fired for having brought me into the studio. But then I started talking, and stammering, and then words and sentences came out, and awful as I was, they kept me coming in for about a year, amused, I think, at my amateur radio style. Or maybe they just liked that I was a ham and was pretty much up for anything. My hightlight, or lowlight, was when I went on location with the DJs, and they had a professional wrestler with them. I was talked into letting the wrestler try a few holds on me. I figured because it was radio, he'd go easy on me. Instead, he ended up flipping me into the air, so that listeners could hear a grown man scream like a little girl.

Then they heard the thud and agonizing moan, which I'm told made great radio. I wouldn't know, having lost conciousness about then.

Last year, I was asked to do a radio interview for another station, in relation to a parenting magazine column I write, and there must have been some growth in my radio skills, because I did the interview and actually--as opposed to my year-long stint--didn't hear any criticism from my friends and family.

And then last night, I spoke about travel getaways in the Midwest, in relation to a story that I have coming up soon at Entrepreneur.com. And, as noted, it went pretty well.

So now that I've given you my radio history, I thought I'd offer a few tips on being interviewed on the radio. Here goes...

1. Don't think of it as an interview. Think of it as a conversation. Granted, that's a little hard, because if you're in the studio, that microphone is right there, as are the DJs, but, still, just talk to them like you talk to your friends--friends who have superior voices compared to yours.

2. If you're doing the interview on the telephone, feel free to have some notes right there on the computer. Nobody's going to know, unless you accidentally lose your place when you're scrolling down with the mouse. (But I recovered.)

3. If you're representing something bigger than yourself--a business, your boss, whatever--be sure to try and mention that something at the start and end of the interview. I practically trampled over the DJ's words at the end when I said, "And be sure to check out our article on Entrepreneur.com." I'm sure he appreciated that like he appreciates tooth decay, but it's important to know who signs your checks.

This has actually been up for a few days, but I just learned about it. My most recent story is on Entrepreneur.com, and so if anyone would like to check it out, the first link is the entire article, the second link is part one of the article (but shorter and with photos, sort of a slide show) and the third link is part two of the article (but again, shorter and with photos, again something of a slide show).

http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/0,4621,328625,00.html
http://www.entrepreneur.com/slideshows/marketingstunts
http://www.entrepreneur.com/slideshows/marketingstunts

So it's Friday night, and I'm headed to a drive-through beverage stop, you know, one of those places where you can pick up cold pop, beer, pretzels and so on. Around here, they're often called pony kegs. Anyway, as I'm entering the driveway, I suddenly think, "Wait, did I bring my debit card?" I stop in the darkness of the parking lot for a moment, out of view of the person on duty, and I check my wallet, nod, and I drive into his establishment.

He looks a little stricken. I sort of realize that he probably wondered what I was doing, for those few minutes, in the darkness, not driving into his pony keg.

I explain that I was checking to see if I had money, and I wave my debit card at him, and I apologize for possibly seeming a little odd, for not driving right up into his pony keg.

It doesn't matter.

It doesn't matter that I'm 36 years old, wearing my glasses, a perfectly nice Oxford shirt, that I'm driving a very middle-class looking car, and that I'm pretty sure I don't look like a thug. This clean cut young man, maybe about 20, is clearly keeping his distance from me. I tell him that I need some Coca-Cola and some diet pop, and he gets it for me, and as he starts to relax, he explains that he thought I might have been about to rob him.

I have to admit, I'm almost flattered, since I've never been the sort of person to induce fear into anyone. At least I don't think so. I was one of those kids in middle school who was routinely picked on by bullies.

I apologize again, and he half-apologizes by saying, "It's a shame that I would think you might be out to rob me, but it's the world we live in."

I agree, and that's when the guy adds: "I've never been robbed, but we're always a little wary. That's why we have a lot of ammunition in the back."

"Oh, well, that's great," I say.

"Yeah, I won't show that to you, but I will show you this," he says, whipping out a baseball bat from behind the counter.

Part of me is wondering if he's being friendly, sending a message, or both. Either way, I'm definitely not planning on a second career as a robber.

Definitely not, because suddenly he's talking about nunchuks, and then showing me a police baton. Both weapons seem to materialize out of thin air. Now I'm the one who is a little worried.

And then he shows me his knife, one with a long gleaming blade.

I nod, and we make some more small talk as I sign the credit card receipt. I glance at my signature. It's a little shaky.

And the funny thing is, I think he was really just making his own small talk more than sending me a message. Because he seemed to look a little alarmed, once he realized how alarmed I looked.

In any case, I didn't stick around for long. I sped off, leaving him behind with his beverages and his survival weapons. I was a little stunned that he would show a customer his security methods, but I don't blame him for having them. In that any car could just drive up, stick a gun out, grab some money and speed away, he probably does feel more than a little vulnerable. And suddenly, so do I.

It's the world we live in.

1978, for some reason, is the year I think of, when I decide to take a look at the time I live in and be grateful for it.

There are plenty of reasons to think 2006 isn't a glorious time. Just watch the news and wonder if in a few weeks or months, you might be on the camera, shell-shocked and talking about the carnage you've recently witnessed.

But purely from a business standpoint, I'm deliriously happy.

I was eight years old in 1978, so, yes, I was around then, but every so often, I think about what my life would be like if I were a freelance journalist, working in 1978. I'd have no computer, no Internet, no email, no fax (oh, that's right, I got rid of my fax; if I knew how to do it, I'd link you to one of my first posts, where I talked about that) -- anyway, you get the picture. While 1978 wasn't the dark ages, its technology was a bit lacking.

I began successfully freelancing in 1993 (unsuccessful attempts were as early as the mid-1980s), and I'll always look back fondly at those days, because I didn't yet have email or the Internet, and I didn't yet have a fax machine. I have actual memories of driving to the library and doing research for hours on various articles, and seeing as I lived in Los Angeles and often drove to the Beverly Hills Public Library, I loved it. It made my job seem more glamorous, which I needed, given that I lived in a one-room apartment with a bed coming out of the wall, and months earlier had been poor enough that all I could afford to eat was peanut butter sandwiches.

At any rate, I've thought a lot about those times, and I'll sometimes choose a year like 1950 or 1980, but generally I always fall back on 1978, and I think about what my career would be like, if I were researching and interviewing and writing articles with 1978 technology, and I'm pretty convinced I couldn't do what I do. I wouldn't have written articles any faster in 1978, but the technology has obviously sped up research. What might have taken two days in 1978--for instance, searching something in an obscure book or aging newspaper at the library--is something I might accomplish in 20 seconds these days.

But there's something else that I've got going for me, that I might have not had in 1978. Even though they were the post-hippie, Disco years, I've always had the sense that the business community was more uptight back then, an extension of the workforce in the 1950s. And yesterday, I couldn't help think how lucky I am, to be in 2006, when my two daughters came into my office and started talking to me about a birthday party they were about to go attend.

"Ssh," I whispered to the girls. "I'm doing an interview."

Lorelei, my two-year-old who always wants to lend me a hand, asked, "Help?"

"Well, no, you can't help me do this interview," I said, hearing a chuckle on the other end. Fortunately, the businessman I was interviewing had a child of his own, and he works from his home, too. He couldn't have been more understanding, which was decent of him, given that we were in the middle of talking about a sensitive topic--insects had raided a food product that he and his business partner make. They caught the problem before their product was manufactured, and thus there was no danger of their customers eating it. But it was a dicey topic for him to be discussing, and here were my girls, raiding my office.

And he didn't care.

And I don't think most people would, these days.

But I'm not so sure the reception the business community would have given a work-at-home dad in 1978.

And so I'm glad to be working in 2006.

Now you know.

Not that anybody asked.

I should do a blog about the importance of a to-do list. On the days I write one, I generally am not only more productive, I feel more productive because I can look back at the list and see what I've accomplished. Today, I felt like I was too busy for a to-do list, and I actually did get an amazing amount accomplished, but I can hardly remember what I did...

Anyway, since it was a productive day, I thought I'd go for an unprecedented (I think) third day in a row and update my business blog, still wondering what I should write about. And so I started looking to see who else out there has a blog. Maybe, after all, it's my imagination and not all that many businesses and business writers have blogs...

So I did a quick look.

On Google.

I typed in "business blog."

And came up with 5 million listings.

Over 5 million actually. Obviously, some of these listings simply mention "business blog" in, say, a newspaper article. But still.

There's everything out there from www.blogbusinessworld.com to www.thesmallbusinessblog.com to a business blog consulting blog. And I should mention that the magazine I frequently write for, Entrepreneur, has their own business blog at www.entrepreneur.com

So now I'm wondering... if so many people are writing business blogs, not to mention the blogs about every other subject under the sun, if everybody is writing a blog... is there anyone left who just reads blogs?

Still trying to figure out how to make my business blog relevant or at least entertaining. That said, one amusing thing happened to me today. Or at least I'm trying to be amused by it. I was supposed to interview someone at 1 p.m., a business owner, and I was on the conference call, right on time. At 1:03, though, the media relations person came onto the call, and she informed me that the CEO had been called away on an "emergency," and that he wouldn't be able to do the interview for another week or two.

This was rather troubling, since I had told my editor I'd be interviewing him today, and turning in the story a few hours later.

I figured we could probably wait a couple days, though, and I asked if I could email him a few questions, and get his thoughts for the article that way.

She hedged, saying she wasn't sure if he'd be able to email me this week, and so suddenly I'm thinking that this emergency must be pretty bad. Perhaps he's broken up over the death in a family, and he just can't focus on emailing anybody. Maybe he's been told he has three months to live, and he doesn't want to waste any of his time doing a phone or email interview (hey, I wouldn't either). But, no, I eventually get the media relations person to admit that the emergency has to do with a business merger, and apparently, since this is a good merger, it doesn't sound like much of an emergency either.

"So what about the email?" I ask again. "Could I email him a few questions, and get him in the article that way."

"Well, he really won't have access to email until July 24th."

"Is he stranded on a deserted island?" I want to ask that, but I don't. In fact, I know someone who is traveling to Antarctica in December, and even he will be able to email people from there. Instead, I gamely accept her answer, which would have worked on me in 1995, when email was still somewhat a novelty.

I suddenly feel sorry for the public relations person. "I don't want to burn any bridges," she says, maybe realizing how lame her client's dodge sounds.

"You haven't," I say, and she hasn't, though I feel a little burned. It's not that he bailed on the interview and made me wind up disappointing my editor, who expected five profiles for this article, instead of four. It was the lingering smell of that reason for a CEO of a multimillion dollar company not being able to reply to a few of my questions.

No email? I haven't heard such an improbable excuse since my junior year in high school, when I asked a girl to the prom, and she told me she was going to be busy watering the lawn. What really hurt was that she lived in a high-rise apartment. But I think I'm getting off my point... Did I have a point? Will I ever have one? Stay tuned...

I admit it. This business blog isn't going well. The will is there, but the energy, so far, hasn't been. Almost every night I've been churning out parenting anecdotes on my parenting blog without any problems, but in that case, my inspiration comes all too easily: two young girls who are constantly giving me material.

Now, in theory, I should be getting material every day for the business blog, but somehow I'm just too drained, after a day of writing about business issues, to blog about business issues. Still, I want this blog to work.

So what's my point? Nothing. I just decided, however, that I'm going to spend the rest of this week talking about my struggle to come up with a relevant interesting blog. And maybe that'll be relevant and interesting to all... 9... of my regular readers?... and 9 is probably too generous... and maybe writing about my effort to try to make the blog relevant will help me to come up with inspiration. And if not, eventually, I'm sure I'll have the good sense to put this blog out of its misery.

That's all for now. More tomorrow.