Author: Andy Labis

By:

The Dude on the Right
Let
me repeat the title of the blog!  Spring has come!  Spring has come! 
Hallelujah!  Spring has come!

Finally, after months and months of snow,
cold, more snow, and a sneaky 60 degree day in January sparking warnings of
"Here comes Global Warming!", it almost looks like Spring has sprung here in
Chicagoland.  Sure, this is a time when, depending on the direction of the
wind, Chicago proper can still find itself almost in winter temperatures, but
out here in the suburbs, and with a southwest wind, all of us were enjoying
temperatures in the 60’s, just like a day in January, with a lot of sun. 
It’s the kind of day that reminds me of college, when a day like this,
especially if it were a weekday, would cause many of us to venture through the
roof hatch of the fraternity house and blow off classes, enjoying a welcome day
of sun, an evening of coolness, and beverages provided by the father of one of
the brothers.  And although this day reminded me of camaraderie on a roof,
I took to enjoying it in other ways, namely being stuck indoors for a couple of
hours watching a just okay movie called

"Leatherheads," but making a point to enjoy the day with a walk in my
favorite forest preserve,

Springbrook Prairie, mostly because it’s my closest forest preserve with a
great walking trail, and  later sparking up the Weber for a nice steak. 
The sparking up the Weber of the story will probably wait for my

weekend wrap-up with Stu on Monday because of a Home Depot experience, but
my walk made me wonder:

Why are they setting the Springbrook Prairie on fire,
and why didn’t I bring my real camera gear?

As
I am wont to do sometimes, especially when the weather warms up, I like to pop
in the headphones, fire up my iPod (which, I’m sorry, doesn’t seem to have
"random" but seems to have its own musical preference for the day because I only
own one Smashing Pumpkins CD, "Siamese Dream," and with 13 songs it is about
.205% of the music on my iPod, but Mr iPod decided it was in a "Smashing
Pumpkins" mood, playing 3 songs from the CD in one hour, and not even "Disarm"
which is actually why I bought the CD in the first place, and I’m sorry, I
digress, back to fire).  So I start-up my iPod, start my walk, and see
smoke in the air.  Yup, it is time for the prairie folks to do controlled
burns, and as I am continuing my walk I wonder why.  I mean, come on, this
prairie preserve is pretty big, yet for some reason the forest preserve powers
that be seem to burn part of it every year?  My desire for finding out why
will have to come later, when I get home, but as I’m walking, in the distance is
a pack, a group, oh hell, a bunch of deer.  They seem confused, they are
grouped outside of the fire zone, seeming to look at each other saying "What the
hell is going on?" 
And
then the moment of wishing I had my camera gear came because even though I tried
to snap a picture of the deer with my camera phone it came out like crap, so it
isn’t here.  The deer were jumping, scrambling, and looking for a place to
get away from the smoke and fire, and with my real camera, well, I might have
had a nice shot.  Instead I’ve got these few photos of the work the forest
preserve is doing to make a meandering creek, how the prairie is still in "We’re
just getting over the winter" mode, and lots of smoke over the prairie, complete
with the edge of my finger.

Missing a great picture of the frolicking deer
aside, it was great to finally get back to the forest preserve this year because
as much as movies are sometimes an escape from reality, there are portions of
the trail when you can look and not see civilization, except, of course, today,
when they were setting it on fire.

I did do some looking as to why they do
these controlled burns, and as much as a

Minneapolis site seems to have the best explanation,

the site for the Forest Preserve District of DuPage County, which owns the
Springbrook Prairie, does state “The District uses prescription burns, in part,
to remove invasive, nonnative vegetation. This improves conditions for native
species, which possess a natural advantage, having evolved to coexist with
fire.”  Now I just wonder how I can evolve to coexist with fire. 
Wouldn’t that be cool?

Sometimes I wish God had made a place as perfect as
Chicago on a high 60/low 70 degree day.  Oh wait, I think he did, it’s
called San Diego (Big Cooter, it might be time to plan, for us, you’re 5th year
wedding anniversary party), but you know what, at least our prairie fires are
controlled, usually.

That’s it for this one! 
I’m The Dude on the Right!!  L8R!!!

By:

The Dude on the Right

Another year. Another Cubs’ Home Opener. Another day of crappy weather.

Alright, fine, in the history of Home Openers, today’s weather wasn’t that
crappy, but a couple of rain delays didn’t help the mood, again working to
convince me that I need to stop going to Opening Day for the Chicago Cubs, that
is, until next year.  And even though my Mondays are usually set aside for
podcasts, I’m not in the mood to talk mostly because I will probably do bad
things like pronounce Fukudome wrong, or get into a tirade about the help a
member of the County Sheriff’s department gets when his car overheats (fine,
maybe it was on fire, but from the vapor escaping under the hood at the time it
didn’t look like a fire, but it was enough to warrant two State troopers, a
Chicago roller closing an entrance ramp, a couple of IDOT trucks, and an
emergency vehicle, all of which caused a traffic delay that caused me to have to
risk my car in a lot near Wrigley Field, paying more to park than for my ticket,
and I better get off of this subject right now before I really get myself in
trouble.  See, I don’t need to talk to get into a tirade!).

So today I’m not podcasting, I’m actually writing about how my horoscope was
sort of correct, when, as I read it this morning it stated: 
"Something weird will catch your eye today. You will find yourself attracted to
this weird thing like a magnet is attracted to a refrigerator door."  The
surprising thing is that there wasn’t one thing weird (at least in my eyes),
catching my eyes today, but rather two.

One is simple, and it occurred with where we were sitting, but quickly I
noticed three dudettes paying attention to the game and filling in their
scorecards, and I think what surprised me most was that these dudettes weren’t
tween girls being taught how to pay attention to baseball by their fathers, and
they weren’t blue-haired dudettes, carefully paying attention to every play. 
Nope, these dudettes were college-age (at least I’m assuming because they looked
like college girls, and were drinking beer), and they seemed to want to make
sure their scorecards were filled in properly, especially the one sitting behind
us, who got slightly confused when the Milwaukee Brewers had their pitcher bat
in the 8th spot, and conferred with my buddy, The Dude on the Left, for the
correct scoring of the inning.  Baseball chicks, old style.  Gotta
love it!

The other weird thing that really caught my eye, and had me obsessing about
it, was that today there was the unveiling of the Ernie Banks’ statue outside of
Wrigley Field, and as I saw the presentation on the TV at Sluggers, there,
engraved on the side of the base of the statue, was the saying "Lets play two." 
I didn’t see an apostrophe and then I  began obsessing on if it should be
"Lets" or "Let’s," and wondering if maybe I just missed seeing the apostrophe. 
So, after the game, while we were walking around the ballpark and in front of the
statue, I made the effort to confirm what I saw, and engraved on the statue base
was "Lets play two," at least I think so, unless I was hallucinating.  Now
I am obsessed if "Lets" should be "Let’s," or "Lets" is okay as "Lets."  My
damn horoscope was right.

And on a third note, other than Fukudome hitting that three-run homer to tie
the game, the other most entertaining part about the game was watching the
ground’s crew, their attempt at rolling up the tarp after the second rain-delay
(it was very funny to watch, and I think they might need a little more Spring
training), and their creating what looked like Egyptian hieroglyphics on the
dirt in the infield.  Both The Dude on the Left and I think their has to
be a more efficient way to accomplish what they attempted to do, and could be
done complete with maybe some sponsoring from a company like ChemLawn.

Another Chicago Cubs home opener.  Another loss.  At least it
didn’t snow.  And who are these baseball scorecard keeping dudettes? 
It’s another year of baseball!  Let’s play two!  Or should that be
"Lets play two!"  Who cares, it just means Spring is hear, at least sort
of!

That’s it for this one! 
I’m The Dude on the Right!!  L8R!!!

By:

The Dude on the Right
I was debating on whether to blog about going to the Cubs’ Home Opener tomorrow,
or satellite radio. Sure, the two topics are at the opposite ends of the
spectrum, and since I’m not really looking forward to the ballgame because of
the weather I suppose, later this week, I’ll write about another Cubs’ Home
Opener with crappy weather. That leaves this blog to wondering if I’m nuts
questioning why there has been such opposition to the Sirius-XM merger, even
after the Justice Department gave the initial go-ahead. This comes about after
reading

a story about how 11 state attorneys general want the FCC to put restrictions
upon letting the two companies merge.

The story I read references the
restrictions of making the merged Sirius sell interoperable radios, an a la
carte basis of paying for channels, and the most bizarre, divesting some radio
spectrum to allow another competitor into the business, and my wondering comes
from my own experience the last time I drove home to the middle of Ohio from my
dude-pad near Chicago and because even though I’m a Sirius subscriber, the
satellite folks were in competition during the entire day, as they always are.

My trip home began on a Thursday, at about 1PM, which for me means that I was
done listening to the West Coast feed of The Howard Stern Show. I listen to the
West Coast feed because in the mornings, prior to the 8AM start time, I jump
between Steve Dahl and Jonathan Brandmeier, depending on what they are talking
about, and even after 8, if Howard isn’t on something that interests me, I’m now
bouncing between the three of them. Mornings aside, on my drive, from 1PM to
2PM, I found myself listening to the Stern Wrap-Up Show, leaving me to 2PM where
now that Dahl is in the mornings, I’m listening to Roe Conn on the AM dial of my
car because I enjoy him more than anything "talk" on Sirius in the afternoon.
The problem is that, during the day, the WLS signal only gets me to about the
Ohio-Indiana border while driving, leaving me this time with the competition
decision of music on some of the Sirius channels or my own music on my iPhone,
but you know what, this time I was in the mood for my own music so I put my
iPhone into its car dock and listened to my music for the rest of the trip. In
the span of the thirteen hours, starting when I woke up, my choices went from
two radio personalities I enjoy on my FM dial, to listening to my satellite
radio, to listening to music on my iPhone, and then arriving in my homestead
driveway and saying "Hello, Mom!"

I guess, at some issue, restricting the merger is supposed to protect
consumers and preserve competition, as the article states, but as far as
competition, maybe it’s just because I’m lucky that I live in a city with such a
great AM/FM radio spectrum (most of which you can actually get streaming on the
internet), and I own an iPod-style product, so for me the competition is already
there. And as far as protecting the consumer, satellite radio is not a
necessity, for anyone, so if there is an issue of protecting consumers I would
think Sirius, as an entity designed to hopefully make money some day, knows the
price points that people will be willing to pay for their service. Trust me, as
much as I like Howard Stern, if suddenly, after the merger, they say getting
Howard will cost me forty bucks a month it will be "Goodbye Sirius, hello
podcasts!"

But what I find most bizarre is the request of giving up some radio spectrum
so someone else can become a competitor in the business. My question is "Why?"
After seeing how Sirius and XM have had a hell of a time becoming profitable in
competition, who in their right mind would think "Hey, there’s some satellite
radio spectrum available! I can program radio better than the already
established Sirius. Do you see how popular that Hannah Montana chick is? It will
be all Hannah Montana, all of the time, from space! Let’s build a satellite!"
Instead, if you really want to protect the consumers, I’m thinking you would
leave Sirius with the spectrum satellite radio was envisioned with so they could
expand services for the consumer, like the video-in-car system they are rolling
out, and incorporating the real-time traffic on your navigation system XM has.
And you know what, if they are a smart company, they will develop ways to use
the extra spectrum, at a reasonable price, so that consumers win, and the
company wins.

I was happy to finally read the Justice Department approved the merger, but
surprised to read nearly a dozen attorneys generals now want restrictions. Maybe
they don’t have the competition I have in my radio listening because their
normal radio sucks, they don’t have an iPod with their own music (Dudes, and
maybe dudettes, my 81 year old mom has an iPod), or maybe they don’t realize
people are paying for programming, not necessity.

I will say I like the idea of a la carte pricing, but as far as competition,
it’s already there. And far as protecting the consumer I would like to think
Sirius’ mission statement isn’t "Let’s screw over the customer and drive this
company into the ground." I’m thinking, right now, their mission statement
should be "We will do everything we can to get Howard Stern, and hell, if this
merger gets approved, even Oprah and Opie & Anthony, signed on for five more
years after their current contracts are up. Hopefully they won’t want too much
of a raise."

People generally need electricity – they "pay" for satellite radio, and will
only pay when they find it beneficial and doesn’t cost too much. Attorneys
general, maybe you should be worrying about gas prices, about your housing
markets (especially you, Mr. Ohio), not something I will, or will not, pay for.

Sorry this blog is so long – I get long-winded sometimes, especially when I
don’t want the government messing up something I enjoy, like choosing between my
local radio personalities, my satellite radio, and my own music preferences. 
And damn it, there’s a part of me that would like the option to listen to the
Oprah channel.

That’s it for this one! 
I’m The Dude on the Right!!  L8R!!!