No Show Tonight. 12/26/06.

[Tom Scharpling]

I have family stuff to take care of.

And I seriously need to re-evaluate the show.

Be back next week.

Tom.

[TheAce]

  Well, I guess I'll just call Pc Richards tonight and listen to thier theme music for three hours.

[Chris L]

And I seriously need to re-evaluate the show.

So you'll be secluded at the "ranch" in Crawford, then?  At least you'll be thinking harder than that other guy. 

[Fido]

It's not a bad time for reevalution of the show, or for reevaluation of anything, for that matter.  I was moved to write this note because some of us loyal FOTs like the show the way it is, but for the idiotic calls that the show has been receiving for a while now.  We know it's not your fault. 

And what I would like to throw out there is that -- while I love the Best Show chat -- I'll be glad to give it up, I'll morph into an air-worthy character that I can assume and display on the Best Show. Don't let the Goshen Kids or other pesky little twerps disrupting the flow of The Best Show.  I'll do whatever it takes to keep the Best Show rolling on down the rails -- it's the best thing I have to listen to anywhere and my Tuesdays are pretty much built around tuning into FMU in the evenings.  I know it sounds like I don't have a life, but actually I do.  It's just that Tom and The Best Show are a pretty big part of it.

I still say that the good guys won in 2006 and the Best Show is in great shape.  2007 will only be better. 

[Laurie]

Remember the Goshen calls of Summer? I wound up enjoying those, because Tom turned them around and did like Tim Gunn suggested. He made it work. And Fred, I love that creepy junkie. "That trippy Sex Pistols song" still makes me laugh.

I have a suggestion, though. If one of the jerks from the Funny Voice Brigade or someone like Pete calls in, maybe Mike should only push through callers that can recite the FOT Creed and Pledge. Just a thought. I'd hate to miss gems like Mary B, but if it saves the show...

[Tim K in DC]

What about caller ID?

My father does a show on an a.m. station in Newport, and there have been a number of times where he's had me fill in for him because he was heading out of town. He does a music program that doesn't take calls over the air, but there is a long-running afternoon call-in program called Open Forum and they get some shitty callers from time to time. One time when I was subbing (probably like 10 years ago now) I noticed a list of phone numbers sitting by the phone in the control room, so I asked the engineer about it. He told me that the station "finally" was convinced to invest in caller ID so they could weed out at least some of the frequent conversation killers. The list, which at the time had about two dozen numbers on it, is pretty hilarious, i.e.:

8-5555 - Flo Schmoe
6-1234 - Drunk
5-1111 - Betty Something (drunk)
4-2222 - Senile, Rambler
5-3333 - Retarded
3-5552 - Joe Shmoe
5-1111 - Irish guy
5-9999 - Crazy
5-8888 - Right wing nut
4-9999 - Lawyer
4-8877 - Drunk?
etc.

With cell phones and ID blockers, I'm sure you can't catch them all, but it might be a small step in weeding out some of the riff raff.

I know I don't want to see the show go down because of a few douchebags.

[Richard_From_CHI]

The current sad lot of trolls makes me miss Mr. T. and Kid Kansas.

The show is what the show is. I've listened to probably every show that is archived and sometimes the callers are good and some times the callers are lame, the trajectory is cyclical. I'm not sure what Tom views as being problematic unless he is getting bored.