Data Dump

I've been terribly delinquent in getting up new blasts, but I do have an excuse:  Last Tuesday's storms were unkind to our shack out on the plains, and after a couple of visits from contractors and adjusters, the fine folks at Amica have offered to replace our sod roofing.  Those interruptions mean longer work hours and fewer MTC hours.  

I keep notes on things to write about.  I look at them and think yeah, that would work for a short piece, and then they get stale and I don't do it.  So to atone for my lack of output recently, I'm going to unload a ton of stuff on you in the hope that it will provoke a rainbow of well-considered reactions in the thread to follow.  Numbered for your convenience.

[By the way:  The guy who comments three or four times per thread making obvious reference to T.C. (and sometimes Jake) without naming him (them) – I'm going to start deleting you.  You got something specific, let's have it.]

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            (1)   Let's say that Craig "Junior" Miller decided to go on the bicycle racing tour, whatever it's called, for a couple years.  Let's further say – and this may be more far-fetched – that Gordon could be persuaded to stop baiting Mike Doocy.  Would you listen to the George-Mike-Gordon Musers with regularity?  I would.

            (2)  I'm going to lose what modest credibility I have with some of you, but I am listening to those Reagor-Dykes ads with greater respect these days.  There may be some genius going on there.  That crappy production, the corny "keeping it real" theme, and Bart's non-sequitur giving-it-to-you-on-the-level ad copy ("I've never found Amelia Earhart, I've never published a paper on quantum loop gravity, but I'll make you a deal on a great car") – awful.  But he kind of won me over when he started pleading.  "Hey," he says, "don't hate me before you get to know me."  I don't like leasing my Conestogas (sorry, AutoFlex and D&M) and am unlikely to buy a used model, but if I did I might give old Bart a whirl.

            (3)  Over Drydock (I told you some of this stuff was stale), I heard Jake talking about someone, didn't catch the first part of his discussion so I don't know who he was talking about.  But the words out of his mouth made me laugh:   "The biggest thing for me was I learned about ego.  I couldn't believe anyone could be that brash that early in their career."  I didn't detect an ironic inflection in his remark.

            (4)  Why can't we have Intentional Grounding all year long?

            (5)  Award for Brain-Freeze Commercial Koan/Tautological Phrase of the Year goes to the following utterance from one of the blind pitch-guys on a Non-24 ad:  "If you're like me, you're not alone."

 

(6)  I do wonder about The Fan sometimes.  It was near the end of the Niffle year (at least for the Cowboys), I was switching back and forth between Norm/Donnie and the Fan post-game.   In contrast to Ticket callers, they took call after call from fans who were positively thrilled about the Cowboys' prospects for 2016.  Gavin shared their optimism.  When Jesse Holley tried to make a point about the Pokes' uncreative play-calling, Brad Sham (who joins the show for a segment) shot him down.  Aside from what seems like unsupportable Cowboys boosterism, however, it's not a bad show.   I've always thought Holley was quite good on it.

(7)  Is "Not a Podcast" a dig at "It's Just Banter?"   Let's help Justin and Machine think of a better name for what's a pretty good weekend show.

(8)  The muddy signal stayed muddy for a long time.  I don't know if I've just gotten used to it, but has it gotten a little sharper lately?   Someone dropped a comment not long ago, perhaps copied from Reddit, about some repairs being made.

(9)  Yes, I do like Not a Podcast.  Like it quite a lot.  And while I'm usually hands-off with the JV as they work to make names for themselves, I must say this – less Machine.  A couple of weeks ago I had to punch out when Justin was doing some news or something – in any event, it was a Justin segment – and the poor guy couldn't get a single sentence out without Machine derailing the point.

(10)  Corby did a story on 69 yo CBS newsman Steve Kroft's extramarital romps with the (rather attractive, and also married) Harvard Law School-educated NYC attorney Lisan Goines, dramatically illustrated with texts, in one of which he advised her, J-J Taylor-style, that instead of working he would "rather be eating your pudding."  What was strange about Corby's report is that this all took place a year ago, and there was nothing new on the story.  I wouldn't be mentioning this, except for Corby's closing remark, which made me laugh out loud on my drive home:  "I hope that when I'm 69 I'm not involved in a pudding scandal."

Lisan Goines, Esq.

            (11)  Did I hear George Dunham say that if you buy two PowerBall tickets instead of one, you do not double your chances of winning?  Yes, I did.  

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Thanks for staying strong with MTC.  Hits still solid despite my recent neglect.  Will try to do better.  

ThePlainsman1310@gmail.com

@Plainsman1310

Three Ads

Before I get to the three ads:

(1)  If anyone knows whether the Ticket Chicks will be broadcasting today and when , please let us know ASAP.  Norm and Donovan will presumably be doing the post-game into the evening, so unclear if they will be on this week.

(2)  PREGAME NOTE:  The station has been promoting the Cowboys Pre-Game Plus  that is sometimes broadcast before the official Sturm + Phillips pregame show.  Not sure who is doing it this year, but I recall it as very worthwhile last year.

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Ad One:  Reagor Dykes Auto Group

Unquestionably the worst-produced ads to have appeared on The Ticket since I started listening in 2004. Bart Reagor sounds like he is recording his lines in a cavernous bathroom at old Texas Stadium about 20 feet away from the mic, while the person he is supposedly having a conversation with -- the guy with the kid who plays baseball, and the female high school graduate who sounds like she's about nine with a room-temp IQ (one "Ashley") -- are more or less conventionally recorded.

But the main question is: what the hell is the Reagor Dykes Auto Group?  If you go to this website (www.rddirectauto.com), it appears to be a series of Toyota-Ford-Lincoln-Mitsubishi dealerships in West Texas.  What is unusually "direct" about that, I don't know, but whatever it is, it appears to be a subsidiary of the "auto group" itself, which on this website (http://www.reagordykesautogroup.com/) touts itself as being able to get you "any car you want," and lists the various locations and capabilities.  

In other words, it's a series of new-car dealerships and, astonishingly, you can also get used cars there, and, wonder of wonders, they offer leasing.  How they materialize cars that you "want" that they don't have on their lot is unexplained, but my car-buying experience has persuaded me that any dealer can get pretty much any car in the same way that the car leasing companies (D&M, AutoFlex) are able to.

By the way -- is Ashley, who gets the BMW for her graduation present, a good endorsement interview?  She may be headed for a career in quantum physics but sounds dumb as a stump and a member of a slice of society where everyone who graduates from high school gets a car. (She learned about this "great dealership" -- the name of which she has obviously forgotten or can't pronounce -- from her friends who got their cars there.)

Awful.

Ad Two:  The Blind Guy

Now there is a strange spot.   This guy comes on.  He sounds AA.  He says we can't see him because we're listening to him on the radio, and he says he can't see us because he's totally blind.  Well, maybe so, but he also can't see us because he's speaking to us on the radio and, additionally, because he recorded this thing a way long time ago.  He couldn't see us if he were Superman.   But let's put aside these logical issues and ask ourselves, as we did with RDAG, what the hell this ad is about.

There is one mention of the affliction that the guy is suffering from:  "924".

But that is not correct, as I discovered as I tried to find out what this is all about.  

It's not "924" -- it's "non-24."   Here:  (http://www.non-24.com/)  It is a circadian sleep disorder, which the AA guy mentions in the ad.    It barely mentions anything else, but gives a phone number -- not a website, no brand name of any medicine, just a phone number -- to call.    Why so coy, I have no idea.  Obviously, someone is flogging a drug, and the drug is manufactured by Vanda Pharmaceuticals.  This ad feels like a setup, something to pique our interest in this poor guy's condition, and we'll soon hear another set of ads that resolve this mystery.

Ad Three:  Danny and the North Texas Field Office of the Order of Gentlemen

First time I heard this ad I didn't immediately associate it with Danny because he nowhere identifies himself.  Second time I heard it I caught an inflection and thought -- whoa, this is Danny playing it straight for Gentleman Jack.

Is there another ad done by a Ticket personality where, somewhere along the line, the speaker doesn't identify himself?  The Texas Land & Cattle ads don't identify the speakers at the outset, but Corby-Mike-Danny each speak one another's names.  There are probably a bunch of ads done by hosts where the host doesn't identify himself, but I can't think of any right now.  

Danny could be a professional voice -- he's got a couple of pronunciations to standardize (the one I catch is "min" for "men"), but this JG ad showcases nicely how good he can sound in a not-deliberately-over-the-top type of ad (Texas Land/Cattle).  

[Someone is probably going to write me and say "that's not Danny," but I'm pretty sure it is -- and, of course, he's been flogging GJ in the Whiskey War ads with Corby, who's wielding Woodford Reserve.]

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ThePlainsman1310@gmail.com

@Plainsman1310