Keillor Bows To The Pressure

[Senator Gothman (D-OR)]

Score another one for Tommy Wonderful:

http://www.aarp.org/politics-society/newsmakers/info-03-2011/garrison-keillor-announces-retirement.html

Garrison Keillor Announces Retirement
Beloved (sic) radio host talks about leaving the limelight

Radio host Garrison Keillor, 68, told the AARP Bulletin that he's planning to retire in the spring of 2013. But the host of A Prairie Home Companion says that he must find his replacement first. Keillor created his show in 1974 in Minnesota. It is now broadcast on 590 public radio stations across the country and is heard by over 4 million people each week.

In an interview with the Bulletin's online books column, The Author Speaks, Keillor discussed his latest project, an anthology of poems titled Good Poems: American Places, elaborated on his love of poetry, his impressions of America, his legacy, dreams for the future — and on his views on stepping down from the limelight.

"When I was younger, I was all in favor of it, and now that I'm at that age, I'm not sure," he explained. "I sure don't want to make a fool of myself and be singing romantic duets with 25-year-old women when I'm 75. But on the other hand, it's so much fun. And in radio, the lighting is right."

AARP - where the news comes first!

[Pidgeon]

Maybe now he'll have the time to give America more of this:

[JonFromMaplewood]

I can't imagine why he announced it in the AARP Bulletin and not the AV Club.

[Christina]

Yay! Tiny Village!

[fish]

Radio host Garrison Keillor, 68, told the AARP Bulletin that he's planning to retire in the spring of 2013. But the host of A Prairie Home Companion says that he must find his replacement first.

Let the campaigns for protege begin! 

[wood and iron]

I once read his novel Love Me because I picked it up for 3 bucks at Ollie's. I don't remember a word of it except the book smelled of lutefisk and Bengay.

[cavorting with nudists]

I remember when my parents started listening to him back in the--it must have been the eighties, right? Couldn't have been the seventies, don't think.  I had to explain to them diplomatically several times over the ensuing years why I couldn't stand him (I grew up in a pissant little Midwestern burg and never had ANY use for that "Small Town Folks are the Real Deal" shtick).  At least my mother had the grace to quote a Ladies-Club acquaintance who referred to it as "that wretched program," though I think she thought this was a big-city gal who was putting on airs.  I've thought of it as "that wretched program" ever since.

[Gilly]

I never saw Prairie Home as "small town folks are the real deal". It definitely celebrates small town living, but at the same time it's making fun of the people who live there. Keillor is from Anoka, a fairly large suburb still hanging on to their main street and that's pretty much what Prairie Home is all about. The core audience isn't small town folk, it's suburbanites who still want to hang on to a memory of main street and small town living and laugh about the eccentricities that went along with it. I'm not a huge fan, but I totally get the appeal.

[GroverJefferson]

Let's leave Tom our suggestions for taking over the show with#PrairieHomeTompanion on Twitter.  Get those suits at NPR to take a look over at Joe Lunchpail through their monocles for once!

[GroverJefferson]

Whoops!

The man himself has already designated #ScharplingKeibler as the tag for all ideas.

Serves me right, trying to start my own clever hashtag revolution.

[Pidgeon]

#kidwobegon