# Most annoying public radio personality? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [November 16, 2001, 9:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-annoying-public-radio-personality/93824 "2001-11-16T21:52:27Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![BoBettie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4af34b/32.png) [@BoBettie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BoBettie)\ **Post date:** [December 1, 2001, 10:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-annoying-public-radio-personality/93824/61 "2001-12-01T22:14:53Z")
I’m not sure how long Carl Castle has been on NPR, but I am reasonably sure I used to hear him as a kid. At any rate, these days he sounds like he has a mouthful of marbles. Did he have a stroke or something? Whenever I hear him, I think “mouthbreater”. Juan Williams. Pompus ass. 'Nuff said. Terry Gross- ACK! I loathe her interview style, and her emotions always seem so forced. “ha.ha.ha.” ??? Zette ---
**Author:** ![pesch](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pesch/32/4925_2.png) [@pesch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pesch)\ **Post date:** [December 1, 2001, 10:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-annoying-public-radio-personality/93824/62 "2001-12-01T22:58:25Z")
Y’all reminded me of another one. Bend over, **Dick Estell** He’s the Radio Reader, and every day for years, he inflicted his peculiar folksy reading style on us through South Carolina Public Radio. He’s terrible. Good tonal quality, but it all sounds like he rushed into the studio at the last minute, took a final swig off the whiskey bottle, and plunges in. His summaries of the previous texts are terrible, he stumbles to censor curse words, and, worse of all, **reads Danielle Steel and John Greshim novels**. **GAAAAAAAHHHHHHH** ---
**Author:** ![Leifsmama](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/a698b9/32.png) [@Leifsmama](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leifsmama)\ **Post date:** [December 1, 2001, 11:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-annoying-public-radio-personality/93824/63 "2001-12-01T23:26:18Z")
There’s a NPR station out of Kilgore College in East Texas that I used to listen to. The AM guy Manny Almanza is so irritating. It sounds like he speaks English with an accent, but has been trained to not use it. If that’s the case, he needs to go back in for more training. Everything he says in over emphasized and halting, that is, except for names. So glad that he’s the music guy instead of the news guy. ---
**Author:** ![El\_Gui](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/35a633/32.png) [@El\_Gui](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/El_Gui)\ **Post date:** [December 2, 2001, 1:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-annoying-public-radio-personality/93824/64 "2001-12-02T01:11:11Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Zette \* > \*\*I’m not sure how long Carl Castle has been on NPR, but I am reasonably sure I used to hear him as a kid. At any rate, these days he sounds like he has a mouthful of marbles. Did he have a stroke or something? Whenever I hear him, I think “mouthbreater”. > > . . . > > Zette \*\* I have been listening to NPR for a couple of years during my morning drives to work and it wasn’t until very recently that I began noticing this also. It’s one of those little things that once you notice you can never again ignore. It kind of grosses me out. ---
**Author:** ![Torgo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/94ad74/32.png) [@Torgo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Torgo)\ **Post date:** [December 2, 2001, 1:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-annoying-public-radio-personality/93824/65 "2001-12-02T01:50:46Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by City Gent \* > \*\*Terry Gross (Fresh Air) is a really lousy interviewer. > \*\* I _cringed_ when she asked an unamused John Fogerty to pronounce the words “burning” and “turning.” ---
**Author:** ![elmwood](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/elmwood/32/3060_2.png) [@elmwood](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elmwood)\ **Post date:** [December 2, 2001, 2:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-annoying-public-radio-personality/93824/66 "2001-12-02T02:10:57Z")
1. His name isn’t on the NPR Web site, and I can’t think of it offhand, but he’s on _All Things Considered_ every few days. He’s a Hispanic poet who usually offers some commentary about Hispanic-American issues. Nothing wrong with that, of course, but he goes out of his way to sound **extremely** Spanish, like a extra strength Ricardo Montalban. He almost sounds like he’s parodying old-school NPR style … you know, “DAHN-YEHL ORR-TAAG-GAH, president of NEEEK-KAAHL-LAAHG-GUH-WAAH, announced today in MAAHN-NAAH-GWAH that the SAAHN-DAH-NEEEES-STA Party would be …” 2. Any male local NPR announcer. No matter where you go, they all sound exactly the same – a bit nasal, a bit too soothing, with either the slightest hint of a British accent or a “creative theater and arts guy” inflection. Do the Amarillo, Texas or Macon, Georgia NPR stations have “theater guy” announcers? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/most-annoying-public-radio-personality/93824.md?page=3)