Entries from December, 2011

9 years ago I started a weblog when I was 16. I was an angry, impulsive, unfiltered kid with the power of the internet. The site was one of the most popular blogs on blogger.com. I was mentioned on Fox News. I was so popular that when you googled image searched my town, my picture was from my About page (which mentioned my home town) was always in in the first three top results. I was hood famous.

The site was so popular and successful that I decided this was what I wanted to do with my life. I wanted to use the special prism I see life through to entertain people. But my new plan was not to progress as a writer. My new plan would be… Radio.

Inspired by my obsession with talk radio, I wanted to do what I was doing online on the radio, minus all the “fucks.” It was time to get my shit together. Fast forward – I went to school and quickly got a job at my local radio station. At the time, I didn’t know that getting a radio job was like winning the lottery. Radio jobs do not exist. One time while visiting CBS Radio in Tampa, FL – the Program Director, a very nice 20-something year veteran at the station told me you get a radio job when someone dies. I was quite fortunate.

I started in commercial production. I was very good. Then I started doing weekends on the air. I was really, really good – quite a natural. But this wasn’t what I expected. I was never allowed to give my opinion and for good reason. The station I was on the air was a Hot AC – basically Adult Top 40. Music for Moms without the rap. I couldn’t make fun of the President or say “fuck”. But I had a stage to own music and say funny stuff. I was a host and it was pretty cool. I got to be the class clown again.

I love music and I’ve always loved radio – so even though I didn’t get into radio for this, it was still my passion. I eventually became the Afternoon Drive host and was later promoted to Program Director. At a local station, the PD is in charge. I am the General Manager’s right hand man. I was running the radio station. I did this for five years.

Somewhere along the line, as you can read in the post before this, I ended the blog. A lot had changed since I started writing when I was a 16 year old kid, living at home, never leaving his room, sitting around in his boxers all day. I had two babies. I was married. I bought a house. I suffered a great loss in my family. I didn’t have time to give a shit about this stuff anymore. Plus, I was a local celebrity and public figure. I couldn’t write the stuff I was writing anymore. So I closed up the shop.

But all good things eventually come to an end. I was working in Citrus County, Florida. Shit-rus County as many people call it. 10.5% unemployment. A radio station’s primary function is not music. It is to suck as much money out of every local business as possible. Sometimes when you drive around this place it seems like there are more empty storefronts than occupied. It was beginning to look like a ghost town.

The radio station was hemorrhaging money in the tens of thousands of dollars monthly. The GM sure as shit wasn’t going to fire himself so the second highest paid guy was going to get fucked and that was me. I spent 5 years turning a sloppy small town piece of shit local radio station into something that now sounded as good as any major market station. I literally changed everything and made a product you could actually proudly offer to clients.

Now that my work, my contributions and my extremely high standards were firmly in place, the guillotine would be dropped on the guy with the biggest paycheck. I won’t lie, it sucked. I’m not going to get into the long, boring and dramatic story but I was betrayed by people I trusted, people I considered friends and mentors. But I will not waste another word on my former employers. I’ll still be the cool motherfucker that I am while that place goes down in flames. I didn’t need that place, they needed me. I’ll leave it at that.

So now here I am – back in the saddle. I’ve got a lot of good stuff baking in the oven and I’ve got the time, the attitude and the passion to write again. I have changed so much in this 5 year absence. Isn’t it crazy how much kids change you?

I’ve grown sharper, more focused and I actually have 5 years of professional writing experience. I’m not an underwear blogger anymore. I’m the real deal and it’s time to rock this motherfucker once again.