Contra Keillor

My chief pleasure for the past, oh, eighteen years, or so, was being a good student. (Like many people at institutes of "higher" "education", I suspect I am better suited to be a student than to go into any sort of useful career. But I am attempting to correct this by means of honest employment, if music can be called honest employment.) Now that this is no longer an option, I find one must savor life's little pleasures, like discovering a new, good, artist while listening to Pandora. Or the lime yogurt, served in a waffle cone, at Arthur's. Or the luxury of an off switch when I hear Garrison Keillor, that old windbag, on the radio.

Do not misunderstand me: I think Minnesotans and Lutherans owe a debt of gratitude to Mr Keillor for all those years of good PR. I was once a great fan of A Prairie Home Companion, and I still tune in to it regularly. But invariably I will turn it off within a few minutes. Sometimes there may be good musical guests on the program, but the rest is quite dispensable. Oh! Another quaint anecdote about Wobegonians! Oh! Another sketch based on puns! Oh! He's singing again. Really it is Keillor's singing that is the worst. It is emblematic of the sort of sentimental self-indulgence that has come to define the program, which has been coasting — I think — for years, now. I rather hope they don't find a new host to replace Keillor when he finally quits milking the cash-cow that is public radio in a few years.