No, WLOL, I have no sense of humor in the morning

The BBQ Pit
1

I’ve never been happy with April Fools Day as a holiday, too often people take it as an excuse for mean spirited humor intended to hurt.

I’ve always had a bit of a chip on my shoulder about being lied to anyway.

This morning, after feeding my furry kids, I heard something which startled my sleep fogged brain. My radio station was playing an announcement from the Minnesota Department of Revenue, alerting me to a new tax and what I needed to do to comply with that tax.

I was supposed to bring my furry children to designated offices to be weighed, and identified so that my portion of the Minnesota Pet tax could be properly levied by April 2nd. And if I did not comply in doing this, my pets were subject to seizure and either destruction or being sold for cosmetic/medical testing purposes. They said that they would be sending agents out to perform spot checks for compliance.

The announcement didn’t have an “April Fools!” ending, just a contact number that I wasn’t awake enough to write down.

Now this had all the hallmarks of being an obvious spoof. A tax I had never heard of being first announced on a radio station, with only 2 days to comply. The very concept that they would have enough agents to actually make like storm troopers coming into your home to seize your pets is totally ludicrous. But would this be the first time a state’s department of revenue did something ludicrous?

So, after finding nothing at the Minnesota DOR’s web site and nothing on WLOLFM.com web site, I called them. I wasn’t greeted with a cheerful “April Fools” when I asked about what I’d heard, but she did have the contact number for me, immediately at hand without having to look it up.

So I call the number. I still don’t get a cheerful “April Fools” when I call, I get a recording “Welcome to the Department of Minnesota’s tax line, if you are calling with questions about the new Minnesota Pet tax, please hold and the first available agent will be with you shortly.” And then there is actually a short pause.

Then the morning show DJ’s voice comes on to tell you that you’ve been had.

WLOL you are lower than a festering boil on the belly of a rabid nazi groundhog.
[ul]
[li] While I may have been able to recognize this as a joke early on, how many people do you think might not have?[/li][li]What is your point of making me jump through all these hoops to verify this is all a joke? How many people hung up in fear when asked to hold?[/li][li]Where do you get off threatening my KIDS![/li][/ul]

OK, so it’s not War of the worlds and this is not going to cause people to run from their homes in panic.

This does not make it ok with me.

So I’ve sent them a letter, a bit milder than this one.

And I’ve changed my radio station.

I am going to be watching other local media sources with interest to see if there is any backlash for this one.

-Doug

2

Typical morning moron show stuff. Yuck.

Tell Bulletin Board your story, dublos. More people read that section than anything but the comics. Lotsa sympathetic local pet owners.

Besides, nobody reads that other paper. :smiley:

jayjay (former Twin Citian)

3

We Do too :slight_smile: Though yes, the Bulliten Board is the first part of the Pioneer Press I turn to. I’ll see if I can come up with an appropriately pithy rant that’s short enough to fit in their column.

Thanks jayjay

-Doug

4

Our local radio station pulled an asinine stunt where they pretended Brittney Spears was in the studio by using a taped interveiew she did and splicing in the DJ’s voice. It was all fun and games until hundreds of people showed up at the studio and caused a huge rucus when they found out she wasn’t really there. One woman dropped dead of a heart attack during the excitment right in front of her children. It was a huge PR mess for the station, since they just basically were lying to their listeners. Not funny at all, in my opinion.

I listen to NPR, since radio personalities irk me so bad. I have some close friends that work in the industry, but I tell them that I’ll never listen to their shows until they make them for people with IQ’s over 75.

Zette

5

Sometimes it’s not all the radio station’s fault. We’re having a scandal right now over a Canadian Alliance MP who just got in trouble for having HIS AIDE call a radio station posing as him during an interview.

Jeez. Hasn’t this guy ever heard of, you know, cancelling? If my MP can cancel for a DEBATE during a freaking ELECTION, I’m sure this guy could have blown off a radio show.

6

To what?

Twin Cities morning radio leaves much to be desired. I usually wake up to KQRS, but there are some bits they do that just sicken me (“The Chucker,” for example.) And, Tom Barnard’s bullying of Terri Traen combined with his pre-adolescent obsession with butt/poop humor often become just too pathetic to tolerate. Then there’s the yuk-a-minute repartee of John Hines and his pals on the country station.

Talk radio isn’t much better. The all-news station has semi-illiterates reading the copy, and on another station you can find Dr. Laura–the only person I know that can induce the gag reflex over the airwaves. Oh yes, Minnesota Public Radio…By Commies, For Commies (but Send Us Your Filthy, Capitalist Dollars).

Is it any wonder why I’m pissed off by the time I get to work sometimes?

7

(hijack)
I’m also in the Twin Cities (St Paul), but I’m a college kid, so I just listen to radio K, the pretentious college rock station. By the way–what happened to the Link 105? I miss listening to Love Line every night. . .
(hijack)
But yah–that’s a pretty jerk-y stunt. And that Brittney Spears thing is also quite deplorable.

8

Rysdad

For my apartment radio (always on as background noise) I switched it to Cities 97.

Morning drive, I’m usually tuned to KQRS, with the same reservations you’ve got. Cities 97 tends to be a little mellow for my liking, but they do give me a pretty good mix. For a while I was happy with 104.1 before it became pointless, and was getting tired of the revolving door of morning DJs even before they changed format.

ThisYearsGirl where on the dial is Radio K?

-Doug

9

It’s the gem of the AM dial–770.
It goes off pretty early though–around 8 or 9 pm.

10

Ergh and Ugh. Morning radio leaves so much to be desired. Even if my sense of humor did run to lame scatalogical pranks, I still couldn’t listen to it because I have my kid in the car and their language leaves much to be desired. Hello, am I the only person who drives their kid to daycare or school or on errands in the morning?

The DJs around Detroit are also stupid–I’ve heard them NOT know some of the most basic information about artists that even I, pop culture ignoramus, have a handle on.

My options therefore are lame easy-listening “adult contemporary” stuff, or NPR. It’s NPR for me. I always enjoy pulling into the parking structure on Wednesdays and looking to the left and right to see people listening to the Frank DeFord segment before they shut off their cars.

11

No, you’re not. The worst thing about KQRS (mentioned by Rysdad above) is that I can’t even listen to the station during the day (when they actually play music) with my kid in the car because you never know when they will run a disgusting promo for Tommy Barn(y)ard’s disgusting show.

The worst thing about Twin Cities radio is that KQRS is so popular, so all the other stations want to copy. They don’t just copy the moronic morning show, either. KQRS plays a “Classic Rock” format with a lot of Led Zeppelin and other oldish stuff. They’ve had this format for years. Recently, though, just about every station that played new or alternative music has switched to some sort of “oldies” format–“80’s mix”, “The Seventies!”, “We Play More Music–from the 70’s and 80’s!”. Ugh. Not much past 1989. (That’s what happened to Zone 105, ThisYearsGirl :(.) KQ actually does play new music sometimes (at least, I think they still do), and they are just about the only place if you don’t happen to appreciate Britney Spears and 'NSync.

For morning radio, with the kid in the car, I choose between NPR and Radio Disney. (Hey, they sometimes play Weird Al in between “Who Let the Dogs Out?” and “Hampsterdance”.) Radio was more entertaining when I lived in Bozeman, Montana than it is here in this “major metropolitan area.” :rolleyes: (Of course, that was 1989…hmmm…we may have something here…)

12

NOOOOOOOOOOOO!

My son has a Weird Al CD, and if I never hear Dare to be Stupid again…well, you know.

13

Ah yes, “The Chucker,” I can’t stand it when they do that bit.
I’ve pretty much quit listening to KQ, stick primarily to the local St. Cloud stations.
I think that I’m going to make a tape of the stuff that I like and just play that in the car, that way the song that is going to be stuck in my head all day will be of my own choosing.

14

You “knew” it was only a joke, but you rang anyway, then got pissed off when what you knew all along showed itself to be true.

Did I miss something?

15

I got more of a sense of “I know this might be a joke, but what if it’s not? The furry kids are too important to ignore this completely. I need to get to the bottom of it and make sure it’s a joke.”

And then when the station gives him a separate number to call (the direct-dial to the DJ booth, though of course dublos wouldn’t know what the number actually was), with an official-sounding recording…well, I’d definitely still be confused.

So, no, he didn’t “know” it was a joke. He thought it could be but had to make sure. The virtual habitrail the station made him go through to get to the April Fool would make me pretty bad-natured for the morning too.

16

That was a very mean and stupid trick.

Didja ever try Minnesota Public Radio? Their morning show is never mean or crass. I don’t always like the music on the show (I would actually prefer their regular programming), but it is better than any other morning show I have heard.

How many furry children do you have, by the way?

17

Wow, Minneapolis radio.

I used to listen to 104.1 The Point, until it became 80s disco without warning.

I then switched to Zone 105, until it became 80s retro without warning.

Now I’m listening to KS 95, which is the closest I can get to alternative rock that is reliable and not full of N*Sync.

However, earlier today my roommate and I were heading out for lunch when we heard what was obviously a prank - someone from the radio was calling someone about their Final Four tickets, and said that one of the seats was now obstructed. Sorry, sir, yes, obstructed, there’s a pole in front. Well, one of the seats is still good. Why not put your girlfriend in the blocked seat? Or maybe she can sell hot dogs; we’ll sell her a $20 uniform and she can sell hot dogs. Yeah, her hands will smell like weiners, but you’re used to that, right? The man is clearly livid and threatens bodily harm, until the DJ lets slip that the man’s fiancee was behind this.

Stuff like that is why I tend to listen to MPR these days.

18

I used to listen to KQRS in the morning till I got fed up with the meanness.

I changed to MPR because it’s much gentler on the ears and mind, and because it’s so much more interesting than fart jokes.

Robin

19

Well, Jayjay got the gist of it, my furry kids are just that, my kids. This “joke” was to threaten them in the most mean spirited manner possible.

What continued to steam me as an after reaction was the final step in the habbitrail… when I called the number given, it didn’t just immediately say “April Fools!”, instead it gave an offical sounding intro and please wait for the next available agent.

Now how many people might have made it that far, and then hung up in a panic because it just struck them that this might be real, and they might have caller ID?

How many people might have then taken rash action to protect their furry kids from this?

As I said in my header… for some things I have absolutely no sense of humor.

Spider Woman

Thanks for your concern, and yes, sometimes I do listen to MPR, but for the most part in the morning, I want music that’s gonna get my blood flowing.
Though yes, MPR is what replaced WLOL on my presets.

I have two furry kids sharing my apartment with me. If you follow the WWW link, you should be brought to a photo album with pictures of the cute little kids.

-Doug

20

One of our local stations does pranks, some of which are quite malicious. They called this guy up and asked to speak to his girlfriend, he asked who it was and was told it was the guy she went out with the night before. They kept making the guy madder and madder, talking about how he gave her a ‘special ride’ in his cab, etc. The guy they called said to stay away from his girlfriend, that he was going to kick his ass, etc. The pranksters said fine, he’s coming over right now to pick up his girlfriend and he doubted he was man enough to do anything to stop him.

After hanging up, they called a local taxi company and had them send a cab out to this guy’s house, and told them to have the driver knock on the front door when he got there.

Found out the next day that the cab driver got beat up.