Saturday May 30th, 2009 - Chicago, IL

   Slight change of plans today. I came back from the UFO Conference in Galena, IL to be live in studio with Jerry’s Kidders this morning on WGN. I could have done a phoner but it’s much better when we’re all in the studio and can see each other. The energy is better.

   We really are like a band playing. Everyone has a role and that’s what’s so fun about it. We’re learning those roles well and we bounce back and forth and there is a synergy with all of us when it works correctly. Today we had a nice flow going and everyone nailed it.

   It’s fun to see the people laugh outside the studio on Michigan Avenue. We’re in a glass fishbowl and lots of people are walking around at that time. They look in at us like apes at the zoo and when we wave at them they love it. We do too because we’re used to crowds.

   We added a new angle to the mix today by putting musical sound cues at the end of our news stories. Personally I hated it but I didn’t hate the fact that we’re trying something. If we didn’t we’d never get better so I played along and didn’t say I didn’t like it until later.

   This whole thing is a work in progress and we all know it. Putting music cues at the end of our jokes sounded good on paper and we may be able to do it occasionally in the future but not after every story like we did today. It was too much and we all knew it but nobody listening had any clue so that’s the good thing. Nobody knows we were experimenting.

   That’s another part of why this is such an attractive project. Nobody was angry but after the show we had an in depth meeting of how we can make the show better. We all agree a more slickly produced show would probably sound better but we also never want to let go of our back and forth banter off the cuff. There’s a fine line and we want to tiptoe on it.

   We’re still only a few weeks into this on WGN so we’re still growing anyway but that’s not an excuse for not wanting to improve this whole project from top to bottom. All of us believe in it and we genuinely enjoy hanging out not only in studio but at lunch afterward.

   I heard some unsettling news that Bill Leff lost his job over at WLS. Bill is one of a few guys I know who have done both comedy and radio and done it well. I respect Bill both as a comic and a radio personality and I hate to see him lose his gig. I know he has a family.

   Things like this make no sense to me. If the station is losing money in piles how does it help to fire Bill Leff? It doesn’t. Bill is a pro and deserves to be on the air somewhere. He was on the Roe Conn show. I don’t know Roe but I haven’t heard he’s a tyrant. I’d bet it’s not a clash of personalities between them but just a budget cut that really isn’t necessary.

   There are a lot of nervous people in the radio business and Jerry is one of them. He’s on the air on weekends but not nearly at the salary he was making at WLS. He’s also got kids to feed and he can’t feed them on the fun we have with the Kidders on Saturday morning. Radio should be fun and it totally can be but when the ax drops the laughs fade far away.