10:15 PM - 5:00 AM, Monday - Tuesday, July 31st - August 1st, 1995: SHOW 29 Harvey for three hours is just too much. I get paid an extra hour, but it's not worth the $5.50 an hour. Actually $4.44 after taxes. That's insane. Almost $100 in taxes in two weeks. god, that, after taxes, leaves me clearing $177.60 a week if I work 40 Hrs. If I got 40 hours a week all year like this, I'd still only clear $9,235.20 and gross 11,440.00. There is nothing good about these numbers. Ahh well, I think I get a raise in 1996. I hope. Back to brain dead. His first hour was horrendous. How can he not be able to figure out the system by now. I've said over, and over, and over, and over again end your sentances before a break with WTVN so I know when to hit the buttons, but he's always like: "And we're going to a break, uh, yes, right.....uhm, now." For christ sake if you just end with the numbers our 1-800 number ends with 610 WTVN!!!! But no, he says the numbers in the middle of other people talking. Carmen and I are going nuts! Oh, and Carmen tells me Cannon is on from 11:00 - 2:00 the rest of the week. Fuckin' shit. ANYWAY, Harvey's last two hours were OK, but if he doesn't figure out how to read and remember how to give me an out cue...and they're giving talk time to him!?! The man is radio illiterate, and he will not learn. If he would just turn the station on for a couple hours, like I did, he'd see how it works. Anyway, I got on the air and talked about me losing my contestment of a ticket earlier in the day. I didn't play music until 4:40. I played a song during the trivia hour to get people's names, but otherwise it was all talk. The first hour was my best ever. Had, a clerk at the court house call in, a lawyer called in, they all said I got screwed, and that I should've pleaded Not Guilty, and taken it to another trial. I won't explain the whole thing, but I got ripped because of a mathematical error on the judge's part that I believed, while I was up there, and when I got the real fine, I couldn't go back and bitch. Oh well, it provided for one helluva good radio hour.   8:30 AM, Tuesday, August 1st, 1995: I call Bill to set up a meeting this Thursday...and he heard the hour. He loved it, said it was my finest hour. I then asked him if I could have a Beatles hour before the trivia and he said yes if I could incorporate the callers. Oh yes. I'm going to cart up all the backwards masking the Beatles did and have a ball. I'll make it like a "everything you wanted to know about the Beatles, but were afraid to ask" Hopefully some Die-Hard fans will call up. I am pumped.   11:45 PM - 5:15 AM, Tuesday - Wednesday, August 1st - 2nd, 1995: SHOW 30 What was to be the best show of my life, turned out to be the worst night I could ever imagine. Now that's a little extreme, but it was baaaaad. First of all I went in over 2 hours early to prepare. Had some spectacular things on cart. #9, Abbey Road, end of Pepper, all of it. What wasn't on cart I was just going to use a CD: "I buried Paul", chair squeeking in Pepper, lots of cool stuff. I'm all ready, and find out I can't change the time mode on our CD players and therefore I can't que up the CD. It all fell apart. My articulation was atrocious and I was lost. I had my script typed out, and once that was screwed up all hell broke loose. I got to one of the carts and it was good enough on merit of the subject itself, but I sounded soooo amaturish and listening to the tapes later... Then my dad calls and makes fun of me on the air (not knowing I was on the air) and that was bad. Overall the entire studio was just a mess, shit everywhere, callers out the ass. So at the news I relax and Tom calls, from Hilliard, my favorite caller, and we have a good talk, and I tell him how shitty things have been. Then George the News guy flags me down. I thought I had missed his cue, and I was on, so I pot down the ABC News by habit and hit my song. All that was wrong was ABC News was on (sigh), and now all 3 are going, he's goin' nuts...finally I see what happened and turned everything off. I felt soooo bad. I tried to apologize, and of course Bower's there, the guy I fucked up before, I just felt like such a novice today. I said I owed him breakfast. I'm so pissed. Later, a black guy called and said 2 drug dealers were holding his brother hostage and he needed $100 get him back. It was MUCH more complicated than that, and I believed him. He had called the police and they wouldn't help 'cause no one was hurt, and he didn't want the dealers to think he had called the police on him. Oh well, if Rodney Simmons is in the obituaries I'll feel bad, otherwise it was a scam for $100. So the night ended. The worst night I'll hopefully ever have. I never want to think about this again.   12:45 AM - 5:00 AM, Thursday, August 3rd, 1995: SHOW 31 A fairly normal evening, until the scandal hit. Carmen warned me that Cannon was goin' nuts because he couldn't find his Tecumseh tickets. The ones I gave away on Monday and on Tuesday. Well Cannon stays later after his shift and is in the producers room on the computer. At 2:45 I walk in and say: "So whatcha studyin'?" "It's a letter to Bill White....PERSONAL." He didn't yell personal, it was actually quite monotone and quiet, but the sting was loud, "sorry..." and I walked out. So Cannon's pissed at me. At the time I didn't equate the missing tickets and me, then I realized after he was gone. He calls later and out 'n' out asks me. I explained the story, and the fact that I was given permission by Jan, and that Bill said those were the "prizes for that time slot". He seemed understanding. Anyway, I'm meeting Bill later today. Hopefully I can get some support from Bill & Jan...(maybe Bobby and Marsha will come too). Sorry, I can only think of Jan one way...the middle child. The night itself was very routine. Burgundie was with me because she still can't sleep too well. I think she was the saving grace from Cannon confronting me in person. Uh....let this be funny 2 years from now.   11:10 AM, Thursday, August 3rd, 1995: Bill called me back today and when I said: "Hello" he said: "What do you want" He says that every time, but for a guy who I consider "Mr. Happy", it always throws me off. When you're sitting there, you know, but on the phone it's erie. I'll find out at 3:00 if he's really pissed or not.   3:00 PM, Thursday, August 3rd, 1995: Meeting #7. (I want Bill to be pissed at me. Please Bill, yell at me. Just once, just once say: "Goddammit Adam, if you do this one more time you're outta here." Maybe not that, but can ya just frown? A grunt maybe, yes.....a grooaan. If he did that, I would feel better. Now don't get me too wrong, he is serious, and in fact he said: "Now Adam, I'm gonna have to give this speech to you, someone gave it to me..." Here it is, the moment I've dreamt of....He is gonna lay down the law, tell me to shape up, tell me that Beatles hour was hell.........no.....he didn't, he tells me that I am sooo far advanced for my age that I need to be careful when I go back to school. to "keep it in check". That I've learned more in 2 months than I'll ever learn in college. That was it. You know Mr. Happy, I would expect a little more from you. :-)   So obviously things went well. By the time Jan was there it was a funny joke. "Let's make fun of Cannon Day"...but REALLY harsh. They said he was a big baby, and I did nothing wrong, and proceeded to give me more prizes to give away at my leisure. It was almost too much. I wanted it to be funny 2 years from now, not later that day. I felt bad about them making fun of Cannon. I understand why he'd be so hurt that Jan or Bill would say: "It's OK to go in his desk to get his prizes" I felt bad doing it. So I tried to cut the Cannon roast short. I got 2 WTVN T-shirts to wear at the fair. That is going to be awesome. I will be doing live 1 minute feeds from the fair. Isn't that awesome! I also found out I am on until next weekend, and get this: I will work from 12-9, and then be at the fair at 11-6. Holy shit. I'll do it for the money. Then on August the 14th, I'm going camping for 5 glorious days...I hope. So everything is cool, in fact it made me look great but stepped on Cannon's feelings. I'm gonna write him a letter. Oh, and Bill said not to have guests in the studio with me. He understood about Burgundie because of the break-in, but as the boss he felt he should say that. Once again, Mr. Happy layin' down the law. Ya know, I respect him more that way. It's like he is so great at his job that I knows the best way to get through to people. Cannon told me that he's seen him pissed before. Funny enough, Cannon is the reason that this "no guest" rule is in effect. I guess he brought someone in, and somethin' got fucked up, and there was a lawsuit. That's amazing.   1:30 AM - 5:45 AM, Friday, August 4th, 1995: SHOW 32 Carmen told me that Cannon got chewed out. Of course on the air he says: "Adam Kontras is up next. Yeah Adam went into my desk, and when I talked to the boss, I was the one that got chewed out." WHAT THE HELL. I was pissed. I went in there and apologized and he said it's all over, no need. He said: "Bill was pissed because he's trying to mold someone who has a lot of basic talent, and you're yellin' at him about this?!?!" Cannon said some other things about how he's a disorganized wreck, but I couldn't quite believe he would say that about himself in all honesty...although he is. I said it's still shitty they said I could go into your desk, I felt bad about it to begin with. He agreed and said the only thing that really pissed him off is that they didn't tell him. Understood. The night was very smooth.I was smokin' on trivia. Later on I gave away prizes for stumpin' me twice in a row, no one could! I was kickin' ass. A lot of people call me and say that they went to the library, or they went and bought books on the Beatles. They say they're really getting into them because of me. That's the best thing I think could come of this.   10:45 PM - 12:30 AM, Friday - Saturday, August 4th - 5th, 1995: So I get there and prepare and Chris Joos comes in and simultaneously, it's like: "What are you doin' here?" Mike told me wrong, they didn't need me on Saturday. The streak ends at 14. Great. I get to go home. Of course I fall asleep at about 2:00 and get up at 10:00 totally screwing up my schedule. Oh well, I'll sleep today. I've got 6 hours on the air, 3 hours running the board, then 3 hours at the fair. I'm gonna be wasted. I am pissed that the overnight streak is broken.   11:15 AM - 6:30 AM, Saturday - Sunday, August 5th - 6th, 1995: SHOW 33 The first thing I find out when I get there is that the Reds Game was cancelled, and that there's a double header starting at 12:02 tomorrow. There goes my gig at the fair. Oh well. The night was slow at first, which really I like. I like to get into the groove for awhile until 3:00 which carries callers well into the 5:00 hour. No mistakes, nice and easy. Trivia was fun, but I got killed. Then Jack comes in at 6:00!!!! He informs me that he's doing this for 1 more week. Oh, great, another 3 hours of work I get to lose. Well, I'm at home, and it's 7:00, so that's nice. And I get the whole day to myself with Burg. Happy, Happy, Joy, Joy.   11:15 PM - 5:00 AM, Sunday - Monday, August 6th - 7th, 1995: SHOW 34 Look out, 2 full shifts in a row. You know, I'm really gonna be goin' through withdrawal when this is over. Oh well. Had a theme tonight of "Brushes with celebrity". Spawned some good calls. Trivia was alright, 5-5. Made no major mistakes, even turned on George's mic because he forgot. People tell me that they're gonna meet me at the fair, and I'm just plain worried. I can pass for 23 maybe....but people guess late 20's, usually 30+. Oh well, I'll take my earrings out and look older. BC is back from vacation and I was the first to welcome him.