I scare myself sometimes

The following is an email I wrote to the local radio station "98.7 FM." I'm weird, I know.

"I join with you in lamenting the dearth of good morning DJ's you have experienced in the past couple years. I moved to the Orange County area about two years ago and I chose your station as one of the few that actually played some decent music and didn't totally annoy me. However, your morning DJ's have always been less than impressive.

The first that I recall was that Valentine guy. I noticed very quickly how big of an idiot he was, and it was difficult to listen to his stupidity for more than a few minutes at a time. I'm glad you got rid of him.

Then there was Lisa Fox flying solo for the past while. Not entertaining at all. She was FAR too cheerful to be a morning DJ. No one is in the mood to listen to a care-bear as they're waking up in the morning. We're grumpy. We need someone witty and somewhat cynical that we can relate with. Someone that will make us laugh. That was not Lisa Fox, and I'm glad you moved her to a different shift.

But her replacement? Are you kidding me? OZOMATLI?? It's already cliche enough to bring bands in for studio performances and interviews. But to have them actually RUN your morning program? And they're a band whose music you don't even play. How pathetic is that? Every time the music stops and they chime in with their little "Ozomatli in the Morning" catch phrase, I am forced to change the station to one of the three other radio stations I find marginally palatable: KROQ, Jack, or some indie station. I honestly can't listen to them for more than a few seconds without getting really perturbed. I'm already grumpy. I just woke up and am in no mood to be barraged with the inexperienced and awkward radio banter of 2nd-rate musicians who sound like they have, maybe, a 200-word vocabulary. I don't care about what party they went to over the weekend. I don't care about whose "crib" they hung out at or which real celebrities they got to see. They're trying way too hard and it's painfully obvious. The solo Lisa Fox was WAY better than these tools.

My suggestion is to just get some college communications majors to come in and do your morning show as interns. I'm sure they'd be more than happy to do it and you might actually get people that are slightly entertaining and don't have to resort to half-assed ghetto speak to sound cool. They also might not sound like toolboxes every time they open their mouths. Oh, and you won't even have to pay them. Worst case scenario is still a huge step up from your current crew.

If they suck then just get rid of them and play music. You could probably do a traffic report every couple songs and make people a lot happier. I'm honestly more entertained by traffic reports (even if I'm not commuting that day) than I am by your current DJ's talking about the penthouse suite they'll be chilling at this friday, trying in vain to convince me they're cool or interesting."