30x40: Week of 7/7 Progress

THE FIRST WEEK OF MEASURING my progress in the 30x40 challenge has concluded. Though I didn't lose the pound I'd hoped to drop, I did overcome the birthday–July 4th week of celebratory consumption, and I met most of the goals I set for myself this past week. If you're willing to sit through a shitload of solipsistic fitness minutiae, read on.

Last weekend, I wrote these goals on the whiteboard on my front door:

• Perfect gym attendance from 7/7 through 7/12
• 7/8: Begin tracking meals and calories
• Weigh self daily
• Improve dinner choices
• Fish oil every day
• TARGET WEIGHT 7/12: 227
• Blog progress + KEEP WRITING!

Here's how I did:

Gym attendance: The only day on which I didn't go was Monday, 7/7. I had that day off, and I was slated to volunteer down at WFMU with a shipment of Marathon prizes. My plan had been to wake up very early, then either hit the gym and cruise down to Jersey City at leisure, or head straight down to Hoboken, walk around Manhattan for a few early-morning hours, then PATH to Exchange Place and nearby WFMU.

As it turned out, Sunday night ran past my usual bedtime, and the combination of the late, large meal at my parents', and the next day being a day off, led me to stay up longer than I'd planned. I slept fitfully due to the heat, and when I arose, dawn was a grim smear of sun wanly struggling through thick haze. I ditched both plans to catch up on sleep and set my sights on the last train to Hoboken. Walking to that train through the soupy air was a challenge. I'd gained a couple of fat pounds between my birthday and July 4th, and I felt them in my breathing and pace, which — when I'd been a regular NYC commuter and did this walk twice a day — was more peppy. FMU's volunteer room was very stuffy, so hitting the gym upon my return to a nightmarishly hot apartment was out of the question.

For the rest of the week, I was on target. The Monday skip pushed my workout schedule forward, so I got muscle workouts in on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday, with a night visit for 40 minutes of cardio on Thursday. The heat during the week peaked on Wednesday, and once again it took some time for my apartment that night to cool down to a sleep-friendly level. So I bumped the Thursday morning cardio to the evening. Today will be the second half of the total two-day muscle routine that is usually scheduled for Friday. I'll go in the late afternoon when the foot traffic is thinner and I have a couple of healthful meals in me. Flexibility and consistency trump guilt when these sorts of diversions occur, and my failure in the past was to let such diversions discourage me long enough for progress to unravel.

Tracking meals and calories: Easier than last time. When I ate at home, I entered the information right into Excel, relying on several pre-typed lines of caloric and nutritional info to speed the job. Because I bring my meals to work, on two mornings, I was able to cue up the info for those meals even before leaving the apartment. The rest of the days, I kept notes at work.

Wednesday and Friday nights, and Friday afternoon, involved meals not so easy to parse into their component elements. My mom invited me over for stir-fry Wednesday night, from which I knew I'd be taking home leftovers, which became Friday's lunch. In both cases, I made note in my Excel chart of the food I'd eaten, but — as will be the case for Sunday night dinners — didn't knock myself out trying to match calories and nutrients to the food. Ditto with the wonderfully generous spread Dave and Julia offered their guests last night. No way I'm missing that. It was enough to know what I'd eaten, and to keep myself accountable to what I'd need to do the next day at the gym to counteract the off-program eating. This way there's no looking back and saying, "Why did I feel so slow and fat Thursday morning?" The answer is right there on the weekly menu and the exercise log.

I learned that I was going to have to eat more, if you can believe it. I mentioned earlier this week only hitting 1477 out of the planned 2200 calories. I think the first two days of planned eating cost me some muscle, because my weight bottomed out at 225.5 on 7/11/08, to rebound to 228 after a weightlifting day and considerably more protein. Those seeking to control body fat by mixing cardiovascular exercise and weight training are best served by not starving themselves. Muscles need clean protein, though the challenge is to get enough of it while controlling bad fats. That will be one of next week's goals.

Weigh self daily: No problem there. Also thinking about adding a weekly waist:hip ratio measure to assess body fat. Perhaps another good goal for next week.

Improve dinner choices: Much better this time around. Sunday night dinner had the benefit of putting two roast chicken breast halves in my fridge, so I had clean protein for dinner two nights of the week, which I paired with broccoli and salad. I also made chili Thursday night for next week and beyond, for which I wrote down the nutritional values so I can make a quick entry on the chart for each measured serving I pull out of the freezer. Might pair them with brown rice, but I have to find one that reheats well; I'd make four servings' worth and store it in the fridge to apportion over the week.

I'm also thinking of grilling meat at my parents' house Sunday afternoons and using them over the week for dinner. I do have a Foreman grill, but even with the specially designed sponges, cleaning it is a bitch, and nothing matches real charcoal grilling. (Though I admit I'm a wood man.) If I can get over there earlier, grill three or four nights' worth of lean meat (maybe even throw this in marinade on Saturday), I'd preplan a big chunk of the week's dinner choices and only have to worry about the veggies.

Fish oil every day: Missed two days. It's tougher to remember this one, because I take the capsule right before bed (unlike my vitamins, which go down with the morning smoothie), and I store them in the freezer (a tip: by the time they melt, they're past the point of repeating on you and giving you "fish burps"). Will put up a reminder next to my alarm clock.

Target weight: 227: At 228 this morning, down from 232.5 last Monday, I give myself partial credit for at least dropping the extra fat I'd gained the week prior. I just need to monitor the good protein, especially on weight-training days, to keep my body from cannibalizing itself. The goal is to lose .57 lb./week. My scale is only sensitive to the half-pound, so if I'm really somewhere between 228 and 227.5 right now, and I watch the food numbers and keep hitting the gym on schedule, perhaps I will meet that goal come next Saturday. Anything extra will be a bonus unless, as with early this week, it's traceable to low calories or protein in particular.

Log progress and keep writing: Res ipsa loquitur.

Record Fair Part II: Normal Vital Signs

I AM HAPPY TO report that I did not die in my sleep Saturday night. Far from it. I in fact woke up on time, at 5:00 a.m. for my second round of volunteer shifts at the WFMU Record and CD Fair. The extra hour of slumber did a lot of good in helping my feet, which were sore from the miles of walking I did around the Metropolitan Pavilion. Those miles and the aches were both for a good cause, one I was sad to have cut short when I left Saturday with a racing heartbeat and a couple of other frightening symptoms that hit out of the blue.

Said symptoms were absent as I got myself cleaned up and out the door Sunday morning. My pulse was still as unremarkable as it was when I had gone to bed the night before. With the thought that caffeine overdose actually was the cause of the palpitations, I started the day with a simple can of Diet Coke and a bagel with cream cheese, and I resolved not to repeat my cholesterol-bomb of a breakfast when I got to the venue. I knew I'd be sampling the Two Boots Pizza later that day anyway, as well as a few Oreos from the A/V Lounge, so the junk food would come in its own time. No sense in pushing things.

Sunday proved to be a full day, if my heart didn't start driving me nuts again. Another security shift until 10 or so, then working the ticket booth for the opening rush through lunch. From there, I actually didn't recall what I had scheduled next. All I knew is that I was eager to put in a full day of helping out my favorite radio station and make up the couple of hours I had lost by leaving early Saturday. I had flirted with sticking around Sunday night to help the station staff with breaking down and loading out their gear. I figured I'd play it by ear.

One thing I love about volunteering for WFMU is that no matter whom you work with on various station tasks, you've got something in common: a love for fine radio. I've nearly always found this was a gateway to finding interesting folks with whom to chat on topics in addition to the freeform station of the nation. My partner at the ticket both on Sunday was a man who'd recently completed computer science schooling and was now doing layout on a local Ukrainian newspaper. This sparked a discussion of Quark, InDesign, the idiosyncracies of editors, and the like. I shared a good conversation, if not a similar design background, with the guy with whom I worked at the flexi-disc museum.

An additional aspect of working a public venue like this was the chance to meet listeners, collectors, and flat-out fans of hawt rekkids. Many folks who examined the stunning collection of flexi-discs commented on their own interest in the format, the records they'd had either as children or collectors, and the specifics of some of the rarer or stranger finds hanging on the wall. Two people actually came by to offer their own discs to the curator, MAC, who hosts WFMU's Antique Phonograph Hour. MAC himself came by late in the day to begin disassembling the discs and to not only thank me and the other volunteer for keeping watch, but to offer us a beer from the concession stand! This is typical of the FMU staff and DJs who work the fair: They are tremendously grateful for the work the volunteers put in to make this a success. I can report that we volunteers are in turn grateful for the staff for giving us a chance to help keep the station we love on the air.

From the ticket booth, I moved to the A/V Lounge, to make free coffee for the slow-awakening record fair attendees and to screen films for folks who might want to take a break from the rush of having so many wonderful opportunities to trade greenbacks for vinyl. I've worked the Lounge before, and it's been a real education for me, as I've mentioned before. This time around, we had You're Gonna Miss Me, a chilling documentary about stricken psych-rock genius Roky Erickson, which was produced by the same company that released the beautiful and heartbreaking Nomi Song. I caught part of a Neil Young documentary as well before I had to start my next shift. I only got as far as the early 80s, when Young released Trans, a Krautrock/Kraftwerk-inspired disc that was about as far from something like Freedom or Harvest as you can imagine. (FMU used to run a compilation disc of videos between feature films in the Lounge, which contained a blistering rendition of "Hey Hey, My My (Into the Black)" done about 50% faster than usual with Devo on backing instros and vocals. One of the most fiery performances I've ever seen.) I would have liked to hear "Keep On Rockin' in the Free World," a sonic boot in the balls of the Reagan/Bush era that has lost none of its nutcrunching impact since its release.

Throughout the day, from the uneventful drive in, across my shifts, I had no physical problems at all. Even my feet were hanging in there after my security shift and a couple of hours sitting on a stool while selling tickets. The previous day's symptoms seemed like an extended, overlaid dream. So when DJ and volunteer director Scott asked if I could help out with load-out, I said yes, as long as I could grab a half hour beforehand to get some food to pull my Popeye act and refuel.

This I did. At 6:30, I slid out to Sixth Avenue for a Chicago Burger at New York Burger Co. (another side benefit, in addition to the Chipotle next door, of attending SVA). The first "early" night of Standard Time was falling, the air was cool, a vendor was clearing his tables of paperbacks at the end of his workday, and the streets were alive with New Yorkers heading to a thousand different errands. I felt a strong pang of longing. I hadn't been in the city since my classes wrapped up, and even then, not at night, as I had occasionally been while still working there. I looked up at the old architecture, the office buildings that had seen a multitude of thriving and dying businesses over their lifetimes; the brownstones and apartment blocks perched over bodegas and bars; folks walking dogs, heading to dinner or delivering it via cycle; or just enjoying a mid-autumn night before the work week began. As much trouble as it sometimes was to get in and out of Manhattan, as much as I love my current commute, and as little as that job held for me even the day before I was told I'd have to leave, losing daily access to NYC remains my only lasting regret of the layoff. But at least I have events like the WFMU Record Fair to pull me back in for a day with Big Apple sidewalks under my feet.

Re-energized as much by the city as the food, I returned to the Pavilion. Some kind volunteer, or perhaps the station's staff, had bought several pies for those who made the show run, and I grabbed a sweet, drippy slice of blueberry. I then spent the last hour of my day there disassembling, removing, and packing FMU's gear as best I could. Not being as practiced a hand at the ritual, I put myself at the disposal of anyone who seemed to need a second pair of hands.

By 8:00, I was finally feeling tired. I bade everyone a fond farewell and motored home, still sound of heart, if feeling a little heartache for leaving behind the night-cloaked streets of the city. They're only a train ride away, especially now that the line I used to take during the week has begun weekend service.

Aside from wearing sneakers on Monday to give my feet an easier return to office footwear, I suffered no ill effects the next day. I still stand by my too-much-caffeine theory for Saturday's odd cardiac hilarity. Should it recur, I'll take off for the doc like a shot. For now, I'm looking forward to this and the next few weeks, when FMU DJs begin playing their Record Fair finds, and weird and wonderful music will waft from my speakers and headphones like the rich scent of fertile, freshly turned earth.

Picture Discs, Palpitations, and Petty Theft

I JUST HAD A day that went from fun to frightening to ridiculous. At least I get another hour of sleep tonight to put it past me.

Today was my first of two days of volunteer work at the WFMU Record and CD Fair. I had booked just about the entire day, beginning with the earliest shift, the security patrol. Record dealers are admitted at 7 a.m. on the Saturday and Sunday of the fair to set up their displays in the 3 hours preceding general admission. At night, the hall is locked up, so dealers leave their wares on the tables, to avoid dragging them back home, to storage rentals, or motel rooms (we get dealers from up and down the Eastern Seaboard). However, the FMU staff realized not so long after starting the fair that, if left unwatched, early-arriving dealers will uncover their fellow dealers' record crates and burrow through them like packs of curious primates. With records worth up to three figures in some of these crates, theft is a very real worry.

So the early-Saturday and early-Sunday security volunteer shift was born. My job today (and tomorrow, if I make it in) was to walk the Metropolitan Pavilion floor while the record dealers carted in their gear; to ensure that nobody's crates were rifled through unless that table's dealer was present; and to ensure that anyone walking around was wearing either a WFMU volunteer sticker or a dealer badge, was an FMU staffer, or worked for the Metro Pavilion. (Oh, and also to discipline the occasional indoor smoker.)

I therefore arose today at 5:00 for my drive into Chelsea. I got out of the house at ten to six, but I was a little worried about a report of the 495 helix being closed down for work and traffic to NYC being routed onto local streets. This still left the Holland Tunnel as an alternative to the Lincoln, which — after spotting a huge mass of cars stopped on 495 after getting off of 3 — I reached via the back route through a just-awakening Union City. I still hit the fair at just after 7:00, a bagel with cream cheese, a Diet Coke, and half a Trader Joe's green drink (one of those Naked/Bolthouse Farms clones) under my belt.

The security shift went very smoothly. Nearly all the dealers were wearing their badges, and I didn't have to guide anyone away from untended crates. The only knock is that it's a little tiring, because one is walking around more or less constantly for 2½ hours. I did grab a break at 9:00 for my annual descent into misguided food, a bacon, egg, and cheese sandwich with coffee. Where would NYC be without this delicious but deadly breakfast combo? I never eat this sort of thing except at the Record Fair. The FMU Special Events Coordinator, Mike, not only joined me in this but sprung for it like the mensch that he is. This sort of camaraderie is what erases the fatigue of a slow-motion marathon around the joint as the dealers attack their fellows' crates with pirahña-like ferocity.

As admission time neared, I switched over to cash box duty at the ticket booth. I deliberately chose a second shift that would allow me to sit for a while and give my dogs a rest. The Record Fair is very popular among the collecting community, and due to sympathetic mentions in the NYC area news, and our ads in the Voice and the New York Press (complete with discount admission coupon), our casual foot traffic is thick. So when we threw open the doors, a mass of cold, vinyl-hungry folks was already lined up down the block. The swift blur of making change for what felt like hundreds of music lovers was a sharp contrast to my quiet pacing around the hall some hours before.

One o'clock rolled around surprisingly swiftly, and I was relieved shortly before the hour to take on my third shift, at the WFMU dollar-record tables. FMU has three main points of sale at the fair: cheapo cutout vinyl at a buck a record, more expensive commercial or collectible records and CDs, and station-branded items from the prize lists of past fundraising Marathons. All proceeds from these sales directly fund WFMU (as does the admission fee). Before reaching my post, I hooked into the Audiovisual Lounge (where we show movies for tired shoppers) to grab some free coffee and an Oreo. I wasn't lunch hungry just yet, but I wanted to get my next daily dose of caffeine on schedule.

The dollar record crates were seething with people flipping through them, half of them dealers, occasionally yanking out an album to inspect the track listing or the grooves themselves, then either sliding it back in to flip through some more or placing them on growing piles of must-haves. Space was tight among the crates, with folks queuing up behind the searchers, anxiously seeing their chance to belly up and mine out a hidden treasure. As these quests tended to take some time, I was actually far less busy here than at the front door, so I finally decided to skip out and grab lunch. Two Boots Pizza has the food concession at the fair, but to my discontent they were out of plain slices. I recalled the proximity of a Chipotle Fresh Mexican joint, so out I went with visions of lime-spiced chips and a steak burrito dancing in my head. These I got, along with a Diet Coke.

About an hour after downing this, I noticed my pulse was up. I could feel it in my lips and chest. It felt like I had just finished some moderate exercise. I found this odd, then alarming after it didn't settle down for several minutes. I excused myself from my post and took my pulse with some difficulty (a nurse I'm not). Somewhere around 90. I finished out my shift, then wandered over to Volunteer Director Scott to see if he still needed anyone for the final shift of the day. He said they could use a second person to watch over the exhibit of flexi-discs we had in one corner (you know those plastic records you used to get in magazines or on cereal boxes? Imagine these in every size, color, and product-shilling capacity across something like 120 square feet of wall.). I agreed, figuring this spell of tachycardia would either pass or not, and that I could leave early if so.

A brief pair of flashbacks. That morning, when I got out of my car in Chelsea, I did the usual pocket-pat many men do to ensure we have our gear. My keys, cellphone, and dough were present, but I had left my wallet at home. I had driven all the way into NYC without my license, to say nothing of my healthcare cards, AAA ID, or my credit or ATM cards. I had a couple of hundred in cash, so life in Manhattan or return therefrom wouldn't be hindered by being broke. But unless you've done this, you can't imagine how naked I felt for a moment.

Now keep in mind, I also parked quite close to the entrance of the hall, the streets being fairly uncluttered save for some digging down the street. My parking luck calls to mind George Costanza's "fortune" at finding a spot right in front of the hospital, only to have a jumper crash through the roof of his car. In my case, after I heard a number of emergency vehicles close to the hall, I wandered outside to see my car surrounded by cones and blocked in by Office of Emergency Management and Con Ed trucks, and a rush of water flowing under my vehicle and down the street. According to my Web research, the contractor struck a water main. I checked on my car a couple of times in the next hour, and when I watched the various trucks move out of the way to let another trapped car escape, and they gratefully let me back my car into the space thus vacated, I relaxed a little . . . until I tried to restart the car to adjust it again and the key wouldn't turn in the lock. I tried it a couple of times, then figured, between my stint at the fair, the time the city agencies would need to fix the leak, and the need to get back in to keep working the door, I wasn't going anywhere at the moment, I decided not to think about it.

Or did I? Between my wallet being a state away, and my car possibly being stuck, I already may have been on edge.

Not that I felt it for the bulk of the day. Which is why, when I took a seat next to the flexi-disc museum, and felt very conscious of my breathing, and a fullness in my chest, in addition to the continuing tachycardia, I started to worry. Naturally, like anyone near middle age with a spare tire, I began ticking off the symptoms of heart attacks. No pain in my chest, just that fullness. No sweating or chills. No pain anywhere else, especially not radiating through my jaw or arms. Of course, merely thinking about this list was making me jumpier, and I didn't need to find a vessel to know that my heart was still thumping away.

There was an alternative. Panic attacks run in my family. Though I don't believe the syndrome was popularly called "panic disorder" in the 1980s as much as it is today, both my mother and her father were treated for the symptoms I was experiencing. Their cases were much more severe, and they both received tranquilizer prescriptions . . . but not before both of them thought they were having heart attacks and had to wear tape-recorder-sized heart monitors to screen out possible cardiac causes.

I took a couple of breaks to air out my head in the chill November afternoon. Both times, I felt a little less panicky, though my pulse rate didn't drop much. I could breathe more easily, and my palms stopped the bit of sweating they were doing. I wasn't dizzy or nauseated or anything, and I didn't have the sort of sense of impending doom that both panic-disorder and infarct victims report.

What I was now consciously nervous about was my health cards being a state away and the reaction my parents might have to calling home about this. The license I was willing to gamble on not being pulled over while returning home, the money cards I didn't give a shit about, but the health card was quite different. In my slow slide into middle age, I've taken to bringing my health card with my driver's license to the gym. It's a second form of ID at minimum, and it reduces possible hassles at the hospital, to say nothing of its billing department. After hearing the process of determining a patient's insurance status as a wallet autopsy, I need that card to bypass red tape for me when I can't do it myself.

As for my parents, especially my still panic-vulnerable mother . . . all I'll say is that when my father's had to go into the hospital now and again, she's been a nervous wreck. The reaction to my admission might be a second admission that night. Not that I'd keep myself out of the hospital for that reason, but it would be something else weighing on me while riding in an ambulance or sitting in the ER.

The symptoms returned both times I resumed my duties, passing through thick masses of shoppers, dealers, and taggers-along in an increasingly hot and loud event hall. By 5:30, I decided to terminate this final, optional shift. I checked in with FMU staff (not giving the exact reasons why) and went straight to Duane Reade for a bottle of St. Joseph's baby aspirin. I flashed back to childhood sick days as I chewed up and dry-swallowed two on the return walk to the car. If this was the Big One, I at least wanted to open my vessels up just a bit before it hit in full force.

My condition was lessening by the time I reached my car, which was now unblocked. The key turned easily in the lock this time. I eased past the watery wound in the street, and, after consulting traffic radio, proceeded directly to the Lincoln Tunnel, Jersey, and home. My heartbeat, respiration, and chest pressure resolved themselves by the time I was through the tunnel, replaced by far more reasonable tiredness (from the early waking time, the dearth of sleep from the previous week, and the aftereffect of so much goddamn adrenaline in my system).

The ride back to my apartment took just under an hour, not too bad for that time of night. I felt for a pulse when I got out of the car, and took my difficulty in even locating it as a good sign. My lungs filled easily with refreshing autumn-night air. I wasn't dizzy, in pain, or sensing impending doom. Truthfully, I was beginning to wonder what the hell had gotten into me. I've been in big crowds — casinos, sports stadiums, packed trains, Lollapalooza — without panic before.

Could it have been the two coffees? I don't drink much more than a cup every 6 to 8 weeks or so. My usual caffeine dose is three cans of Diet Coke a day, at 34 or so mg of caffeine per can. Between 6 a.m. and 2 p.m., I had had probably about 30 oz. of coffee, containing around 500 mg, in addition to a 20-oz. Diet Coke in the morning and a large Chipotle cup of the shit with lunch. My symptoms were not dissimilar to those of what the dubious slough of Wikipedia dubs caffeine intoxication.

Either way, I was feeling much better, if concerned, as I entered my building's vestibule. I looked instinctively for mail and any packages, especially as I anticipated a replacement box of dishwashing soap from the folks at Seventh Generation.

What I found was a shipping box, opened, lined with packing material, from Seventh Generation, with my name as addressee.

This failed to register for a minute, then I picked up the nearly empty box, reinspected it, and came to the inescapable conclusion that someone had stolen my dishwashing soap. Even setting aside the possibility that the thief had no idea what Seventh Generation was, you'd think they would have left the box there upon discovering that the contents had no value beyond the kitchen, that it wasn't a blank hard drive or car stereo. No. They took it anyway.

The day had taken a hard turn into the ludicrous. But at least I wasn't dying, or at least not yet.

I knocked on the door of the resident manager to begin the reporting procedure. No reply. With the town municipal building in eyesight of my complex, I saw no reason not to file the police report right then. Hell, mail tampering is a Federal crime. So it was that I spent the next 15 minutes or so reporting the theft of my dishwashing soap.

As I suspected, there was little the police could immediately do. I figured this was most useful in getting the act on record, or adding it to an existing record, so a pattern would develop of any thefts in the building. Years ago, some fucking nutcase stole dozens of parcels over time from the vestibule. Rumor and truth may be mingling in my memory, but I recall reading a blotter report in the local paper describing the cops finding no utilities and lots of garbage in the perp's apartment, in addition to a dead letter office's worth of jacked FedEx and UPS boxes. But this person and our complex parted permanently thereafter.

The vestibule where parcels are dropped is not being a locked door. This could have been done by a passerby instead of a resident. After I heard about the nutcase, I had all Amazon and other gear sent to my workplace or my parents' house. Foolishly, I thought a box from Seventh Generation, marked as such obviously or not, that made sifty noises when inverted, would be safe. I was wrong.

With the theft on record, I returned home, still feeling good, not even feeling my blood pressure rise as something this intrusive and thoughtless might otherwise evoke, and tried the resident manager again. Nothing; no light in the peephole or from under the door. I will try again tomorrow and follow up by contacting the management company directly. The vestibule has a camera, which is rumored not to be hooked up to anything (it was billed as being closed circuit and accessible through our TVs, so the typically elderly residents here could scope callers, but this was bullshit), so either someone knew this and stole my soap anyway, or somehow didn't see it and was possibly captured on videotape. I should call the cops tomorrow to note the presence of the camera, if there's any chance this was recorded. I may have been out some soap, but the last thief got someone's golf club, not a cheap item. With the holidays coming, so will all manner of gifts, and if these packages don't arrive with a signature due, who knows how many will go missing?

So that's my day. I reported the same info to FedEx, probably only to the effect of getting Seventh Generation a refund on their postage and maybe a settlement claim (it wasn't their fault at all, and not really FedEx's fault, that this package was intercepted). I spent a little time on WebMD checking panic and MI symptoms and generally feeling asymptomatic, if, as I said, somewhat tired. That "somewhat" has become "very," and I will head to bed soon. I've rested my tender feet and had a protein shake with a banana, a cup of frozen blueberries, the rest of the green drink, and a scoop of whey, just to have something simple and healthful on my stomach, and it's been digesting without controversy while I've been writing.

If I feel jumpy at all when I awaken, I will regretfully call and email the gang at FMU to let them know why I've opted out. Nothing, not even the freeform station of the nation, is more important than my cardiac health. If I go, and there is any recurrence at all, I will jet. (My wallet is already under my keys so it doesn't stay behind tomorrow, whether I go to Chelsea or Valley Hospital.) I am very much looking forward to a longer sleep tonight, but even more to waking up tomorrow and setting the bizarre physiological and criminal-justice events of today completely behind me. I'll settle just for the waking-up part.

Calm Before the Record Fair Storm

BY THIS TIME TOMORROW, I will be finishing one of my two days' commitment to volunteer at the WFMU Record and CD Fair, possibly quite tired, but most likely quite happy. As in recent years, I'll be pitching in to help the radio station raise money at this event, one of the two major ways it raises money to keep independent, listener-supported music on the air and the Net. It will be a fun weekend, but a long one, and I'm just a little afraid that by Sunday night, I'm gonna feel like I didn't have any time to myself. Both of my groups of shifts start at 7:00 a.m., so I've got to drag my carcass out of bed at around 5:00 to get ready and down to Chelsea. Heading off now will aid that quest, as will hitting the hay at a reasonable hour on Saturday night, when I eventually escape from New York (har). The past couple of days were more sleep deprived than usual, particularly last night, though for the good cause of winning some poker money. Money can't buy sleep, though, and I am going to turn in early to recover some of my lost slumber. No sense trying to drive into New York City and pirouetting off the 495 helix while in a swoon.

101.1 CBS-FM (Mostly) Returns

NEW YORK METRO AREA fans of oldies-format radio suffered for two years after the unceremonious dumping of WCBS 101.1's on-air personalities and playlist for the vile JACK FM format. For months, the station didn't even feature DJs. They touted it as being like a very cool iPod on shuffle play, calling upon the biggest playlist in the Tri-State Area. They even had the balls to call themselves a "freeform" station. To all this puffery I took great exception: The coolest shuffle-locked iPod, and the hugest playlist, in this area both belong to THE freeform station of the nation, the Fun 91, WFMU. Gagging at the concept of a playlist that could include both Black Sabbath and Jessica Simpson, I removed 101.1 from my car stereo, and many area pizzerias, barbershops, garages, and beauty salons likewise tuned out of the station that had provided their audio background for so long.

In the aftermath, I had to concede that CBS has invited its demise by straying from its core playlist. In an attempt to stay hip, they had added Eighties hits into the mix. Make no mistake, I am a huge fan of Eighties music, but it doesn't belong in the CBS lineup. Think of the first third of Goodfellas. Recall American Graffiti. That's what CBS-FM should sound like. You want to hear things like "Blueberry Hill," "Charlie Brown," "Big Girls Don't Cry," "Shout," and of course, "Then He Kissed Me." The sort of music you'd expect to hear while buzzing the Mekong Delta, mourning Jack Kennedy, or chatting with the Fonz.

These hits were instead replaced by noncontextual audio hangnails like "Abracadabra," "We Built This City (On Rock and Roll)," and a depressing bucket of soundalike retro crap from Billy Joel: "Keeping the Faith," "Uptown Girl," and "We Didn't Start the Fire." I didn't want to hear a listing of the era in which CBS's playlist first got airtime; I wanted to hear the era's actual fucking songs! So when the station, listing and vulnerable, was picked off by a nimble competitor, I had to believe it was complicit in its own decline. Still, I missed what it once had been.

Fast forward two years. The only place I heard anything like CBS's old format was out in Las Vegas, on a Clear Channel station of all things. As we gritted our teeth through the recent heat wave, however, rumors surfaced that the JACK was about to be aced. The news went forth: WCBS-FM would return to its oldies format! Based on the radio spots, it sounded like they were setting the clock back to 2005, because they intended to include Eighties music.

So it was with some trepidation that I kicked on the JACKless CBS FM on Thursday morning, hoping to hear something like "Sugar Sugar," "Oh What a Night," or even the staple "Rock Around the Clock."

Instead, what do I get?

"Abracadabra."

Oy, it's gonna be a long road back from the JACK.

Exhaustion Physical and Mental

I AM TIRED. No, not the lassitude of a recumbent emperor who has lost interest in the scrambles of his courtiers. I'm talking a molecular weariness in mind and body. A reckoning surely is at hand, most likely with my bed.

It's been a series of late nights. Saturday, the excellent Ratatosk hosted a boardgame night. Another member of the game gang and Amy joined us for dinner, and then the evening turned to saving the world in a harrowing round of Arkham Horror. Despite our best efforts, too many gates opened amid the misty hills and shadowed gambrels of this mythical Lovecraftian town, and Azathoth, the blind idiot god seething at the center of the universe, impinged upon our dimension and cast Earth into a doom of shrieking madness.

Midnight coffee and cookies took the edge off.

I arose late on Sunday. I had gotten Hellboy from the video store, and about halfway through, my friend M. called. She has been sending me pages of her graduate thesis to proofread, and she is under severe time and work pressure with final projects for two other classes competing for her attention. She explained how she was running into problems with some of the older art she had color corrected some time ago. I'm less skilled than she is at Photoshop (don't tell my future employers that), but more important than my technical help was my just listening. I told her how cohesive her work thus far had been, how I was able to understand her hypothesis, and that the prototype she had commissioned would put her far ahead of her competition in the class. I encouraged M. to take a moment to write down her remaining tasks. She reported having trouble focusing from lack of sleep and the stress, but I know she works well from a hard list, so I advocated drawing one up. She apologized several times for interrupting the film, but I wanted to make sure she knew she was doing solid work. She was an excellent supervisor and coworker when we were one cube apart, so letting her know how much she rocks is the least I could do.

I was surprised to see the time when I hung up. I left the DVD for Monday night and hit the hay. I had plans for the morning. M. was going to slide me some more proof PDFs to review. I had a date at WFMU to help get the Marathon mailing out. I actually reviewed one PDF before sleeping, then finished a couple more as the morning sun streamed through my window.

I took the train to Hoboken for the first time since March 30. I had forgotten how much individual train tickets cost. On past FMU visits, I merely used my monthly train pass on NJ Transit and the light rail system in Hudson County. I hung onto the receipts in case my taxes this year actually get itemized. (Normally I don't have enough individual charges to warrant it.)

I always enjoy pitching in at WFMU. I donate to the fundraising Marathon each year, but work often prevents me from donating my labors. Considering I'm much more free for the short term, I answered Volunteer Director Scott Williams's call for help in getting the massive mound of Marathon swag out the door. I appreciated the chance to help, and the opportunity to get the hell out of this apartment for a day.

I couldn't have picked a more beautiful one. It felt like late spring out, in stark contrast to the Monday prior, when the nor'easter was still ravaging the area. With my date at FMU not until 10:30, I got to Jersey City early and took a stroll through the lower leg of the new financial district. I sat on a riverside bench next to the massive Goldman Sachs tower and read the Wall Street Journal as Manhattan ground to full life in the distance. It was tough to concentrate on the paper with such a peerless view.

Work at WFMU was actually more physical than I had anticipated. The mailing comprised bumper stickers, T-shirts, and prizes (mostly CDs) given as mid-show prizes to lucky pledgers. It was the T-shirts that did me in. I learned how to fold a shirt properly, which required me to reach in ways I don't ordinarily reach. By the end of the evening, my lower back was surprisingly sore. The walk back to the train was more of a shuffle. Embarrassing.

I watched the second half of Hellboy after I ate dinner, and then chatted a little more with M. From the previous two days, my bedtime was artificially late, so I wasn't tired by the time I hung up. I read for a while, then finally dropped off.

I forced myself to get up at a normal time, because I had two teleconferences with the career counseling folks. One of them, on interviewing, was actually one of the best ones I've listened in on so far. The other, on starting one's own business, was like listening to a timeshare huckster. Good or less-than-good, both took time, and by 4:00 I was feeling drained.

But the fun wasn't over! Tuesday and Wednesday are gym days, so I got my arse in gear and trekked over. My back wasn't sore any more from yesterday — a good thing, because back muscles get hit today. Hit them I did. I pushed on all fronts, especially my back and biceps, and left the gym feeling like I'd emerged from a spin-dryer. Awesome.

I think I've got just enough oomph to get the DVD back to the store and do some laundry while watching Sunday's Sopranos. After that, I will drop like a dynamited chimney.

Iron Trumps Prozac

I RETURNED FROM A day of volunteering at the WFMU Fundraising Marathon earlier tonight feeling oddly empty and depressed. This was a surprise to me, and I spent some time trying to figure out why. After all, my time spent helping WFMU toward its goal of being the finest listener-supported freeform radio station in America is some of the most cheerfully donated effort I give.

I wondered it if was because I was largely stationary all day. Even at work, I do get up and walk around a fair amount, if only to round the corner to enter my supervisor's cube. I drink a ton of water over the course of the day, and the men's room is a good minute's walk from my desk, so the legs get stretched that way too. On that point, I also realized I was considerably less hydrated. A dry brain is a slow brain. Still, this explanation didn't satisfy me.

Perhaps it was because it was a fairly long day. My shift lasted 10 hours, minus food breaks. Around 3:00 p.m., despite the high-energy fundraising efforts of the hosts, my energy was sagging. The food I ate over the course of the shift was fairly starchy, if good; we were favored with homemade quiche, salad, and banana cream pudding for lunch, and the JM in the AM crew left behind a rich trove of bagels, babka, and to-die-for hamantashen (Purim having been this weekend). Some protein, but a lot of simple carbs. Maybe I was just plunging after a sugar high.

Still, that doesn't explain my mopey feelings of being single, which are now 2 for 2 in returning on Tuesdays. Last week, I had a long talk with my supervisor about this, that, and the other thing (not about that specifically, though relationships did come up), which took my mind off things. For this thought to return, though, perhaps requires keeping my mind on it, to determine why I'm suddenly so upset about being single. I have more or less given up believing there is anyone left for me out there. My supervisor said some months ago, however, that I should be careful I don't end up regretting never having tried, once all of my friends have paired up. That thought momentarily returns to shake my belief that I will be single forever, but never enough to lead me to undertake any change in that field,

In this spirit, I did nothing about it when I came home. All I knew is that I was sad, going on miserable, for no clear reason and to no good purpose. I didn't want to eat or go food shopping in this state, because I know I tend to buy absolute crap in this emotional state.

Instead, I went to the gym.

I had written up a new exercise routine for myself that I had found online, and I wanted to give it a try this morning. Inability to sleep last night (perhaps a precursor to today's depression?) ruined my attempt to wake up early enough to put it to the test today. Tonight, however, was a different story. If I don't give a shit about getting to work on time anymore, getting a long night's sleep after some nutritious exercise ought not to concern me.

So I put on a T-shirt and sweatpants — the wind being viciously sharp — and trekked over to the gym. I found it fairly depopulated, which suited me, as I had a fairly large number of exercises to cover. I took my time with them, trying to feel my way toward good form and finding the right resistance. Halfway through I was no longer thinking of any potential woes, instead relishing the endorphins and getting a good pump on.

By the time I returned home, I was much improved in mood, anticipating my next visit to see what I can accomplish next time, and thinking of how to correct my current diet to enhance my healing and growth. My future may or may not include a girlfriend or spouse. I know for a fact that it will include me. I would rather it be a me without the extra weight, and with a better immune system, stronger bones, a quicker stride, and more defined muscles. I am the only one who can guarantee this future. It's up to me to secure it.

Partitioning Resources

IN DISCUSSING THE UPCOMING WFMU fundraising Marathon with my mother yesterday, she inquired how much I planned to give. I gave her the figure I tend to write in the pledge-amount box each year, and she reacted with surprise. "Don't give that much! You're going to be out of a job!" she said.

It is advice I intend to ignore. My check to WFMU is the one check I enjoy writing all year. The amount for my annual pledge will be equivalent to what my parents pay for 4 months of cable TV service and AOL. They get a million channels they never even watch. By contrast, I listen to WFMU constantly. I don't usually place my pledge money in such terms, but dollar for dollar, I get unparalleled value.

Although nobody truly wants to be without a steady employment income, I have never been in as good shape as I am now to weather joblessness. Last year, I ruminated about reshuffling my 401(k) money into my current employer's account and redistributing it for better diversification. I did both. I also put my smallish cash hoard to work with fixed-income investments to earn a bit more than the cent per month my checking account pulls in. I was already maxing out my contribution to the 401(k) fund before I got the layoff news. Once that hit, I opened a new Excel table in my finance file to track my spending and eliminate any waste. I found there was little and minimized the rest. I am in no debt, I have a functional car, and I don't intend to move just yet.

At this point, I envision being at the job until the bitter end, taking my severance and retention bonus, and concentrating on the job hunt at home, where I won't be bailing water out of the sinking ship with my boss and craving the train ride home. Unemployment will offset my COBRA, and I'll bank as much of the severance as I can until I snag a job. Our mutual nightmare is that they ask us to stay later, say through April. (I have a couple of plans in mind to thwart this, most notably approaching those who would make such a decision and telling them, on March 15, I wish to sign the severance agreement then and there.) They've already tried to send my boss to the outsourcing firm in India so she can attempt to unfuck their problems firsthand. She refused, to her eternal credit, having her March and April occupied more with her graduate thesis than any desire to extricate the department from the quagmire it's already in. Dipping into unemployment is worth my escaping the dead-end, head-against-brick-wall frustration of training these fools in the basics of typesetting and print preflighting.

The last thing I am worried about is running through my savings during my job hunt. My parents are sweet people, and justly worry about my welfare, but as expenditures go, my investment in WFMU's future is an investment in my own present. From few aspects in my life do I derive as much enjoyment as I do from its programming, its voluminous archives, and its exemplary, widely linked blog. What money I devote to this cause comes back to me manifold. Unless I become a successful freelancer, nothing so directly "pays" me. That's a potential point of overlap; in describing my Wednesday visit to the station to volunteer, my boss and I agreed that contact with such a diverse pool of talented minds could also provide business opportunities. You never know who might need some Photoshop work or proofreading done.

I simply need to pick a direction and move there with power and confidence. If I can weather downturns in said confidence, especially once I'm out from under the cloud hanging over the tattered remnants of my department, I will eventually find something worth doing that generates income, both retirement and fluid. Regardless of when that happens, WFMU is welcome to a chunk of it in just a couple of weeks.

Schizohedron Bullet Points! for 11/1/06

• WFMU RECORD FAIR BECKONS: Much like last year, I am lending a hand at the WFMU Record and Tape Fair, which should be a beacon of crate-digging and impulse buying for all fans of obscure vinyl and music oddities. All proceeds from table rental, admission, and sales from the cheapo record and FMU swag tables directly and 100% benefit the freeform station of the nation, WFMU 91.1. Get on out there and support one of the last places on the dial where noncommercial radio is still practiced and the wonder of the medium still holds sway.
  

• DICKED OUT OF A DOLLAR: Lovely for my bank to charge me a dollar for an unplanned use of a nonnetwork ATM, which by coincidence is more than I earned in interest on my checking account last month. I called the branch to try and get it revoked, but the assistant manager claimed that they were powerless to strike the charge barring mechanical failure of the nearest network ATM forcing me to another bank. I will move up the ladder and write them a note on their website, once my blood cools, to see if they will listen to calm reason. I can only imagine they spend considerably more than a buck a head to attract, sign up, and retain new depositors. Can't say I'll ever use any of their other financial services, though, regardless of whether my apostasy is forgiven. Yeah, maybe it's just a buck, but to them it's a rounding error and a fraction of the budget they allot for lobby candy for the tots . . . and why should I be a sheep and let them take it without a fight?
  

• TREASURE THIS TREASURY: Now, you want a satisfying financial experience — and no less, from a Federal Government website? Hit up the TreasuryDirect portal. The Treasury has been selling bonds online for some time, but until recently I hadn't seen their redesigned site. It is an attractive, easily navigable, ultra-secure interface through which you can handle all of your Federal fixed-income transactions. It is now as simple to buy the regularly auctioned Treasury bonds, bills, and notes, and the more traditional savings bonds, as it is to buy goodies from Amazon.com. Even more usefully, one can send paper bonds in for book-entry conversion, in my case saving me the effort of redeeming a bunch of savings bonds over the next few years . . . and also sparing me contact with the chiseling schmucks at my bank each time one comes due.
  

• HOCKEY SHOCKER: For the first time since around 1983, and only the second time in my life, I am going to a hockey game! My friend Jen sent up a signal flare for interest in an upcoming New Jersey Devils game, and she got quite a response, including yours truly. With the collapse of the Jets franchise, the mighty Felix hasn't been buying his father's season tickets, one of which I would occasionally grab if available . . . so my attendance at fall and winter sporting events has dropped to nil. The only remaining decision is whether I will be stomped for wearing my San Jose Sharks CHAINSAW jersey to the rink. I could always bring along a chainsaw in case anyone gets saucy. . . .
  

• POKER OCTOBER SURPRISE: Just when my faith in my poker abilities was beginning to waver, in the midst of a choppy late summer track record at the usual game, I was proud to rack up an October of straight wins. Of particular notice was a sweet win at the Showboat — a trip report that deserves a post here — that indicated to me I can still swim in the casino poker pool. I made many good reads at the local game that saved me money and that I would not have made a year ago. I consider our game to be of above-average skill, so when I — by no means the best player at that table — am able to string Ws across the month, I feel like I have actually learned just a little more about this crazy game.
  

• IF YOU BAN IT, THEY WILL COME: In a cowardly parliamentary trick, Congress tacked an anti–Internet gambling rider onto a safe ports act, which passed and was subsequently signed by Dear Leader on — fitting in the eyes of its critics — Friday, Oct. 13. I was never a dedicated or deep online poker player in the 6 months that I navigated the felt seas of the Full Tilt shark lagoon, barely clearing any of the incentive bonus with my low-limit and sporadic play. I yanked my funds months ago for the July Vegas trip and never reloaded. I barely thought about playing online until this push by the Congressional morality class over the late summer. Now that the mode of funding a poker account has been criminalized, I do think about playing, and somewhat miss it. So what has happened is exactly what transpired with the passage of the Volstead Act: Outlaw something, and folks will get curious about it. A piece in today's Wall Street Journal indicated that players are already sniffing about for ways around the funding ban. So are some of the guys in my game. I guarantee that if I rented the shuttered store across the street from my building, painted over the windows, bought three poker tables, hired and trained dealers, iced and greased the local cops and Mob, and put the word out, I could run games 7 nights a week with a waiting list out the door. To Congress I say, as we sarcastically say to the table sucker when he or she hits well: Nice hand.

Phone Slave for a Day, WFMU-Style

MY IMMUNE SYSTEM HAS granted me some writing time. Whether due to changing up my gym routine, not getting enough sleep, or being cheek by jowl with pathogen-bearing volunteers in the phone room at the 2006 WFMU Marathon, I picked up some sort of low-grade cold. I woke up feeling battered — not feverish, but run down. Going to work, what with the trains and the idiots at the job who never take a sick day, would only expose me to something worse. So I bailed. I will reassess tomorrow, but I suspect one day at home might be just the tonic.

A cold is a small price to pay for assisting the greatest radio station on the air. Though the annual Record Fair draws in some operating capital, it is through the two-week Marathon that WFMU earns the bulk of the money it uses to stay on the air and pay its skeleton staff. WFMU accepts no governmental or corporate grant money, airs no commercials, and runs no ads on its website or its fantastic blog. WFMU is one of the few remaining independent, listener-supported stations on the American radio dial. In this age of acquisition and consolidation, when scores of frequencies have been sold to Clear Channel, Christian broadcasters, and right-wing hate factories, WFMU is a wan, glimmering reminder of the potential radio had way back in the Twenties and Thirties to be an enriching and educating force even as it entertained.

What other radio station is going to allow its listeners to come down, get on the phone bank, and take calls from fellow fanatics pledging money to keep such a wonderful institution on the air? How many stations can boast that most of their on-air talent got their start as listeners to the station, then as volunteers, and finally as fill-in, late-night DJs, sending their music collections and personalities emanating across the slumbering expanses of New Jersey and New York City? These, dear readers, are the DJs you hear on the station today. Passionate, maybe even obsessive, but always well informed about their music and the people who made it. When you listen, you hear actual people, not soulless playlists and the cheap stink of payola.

Yesterday, I was privileged to work the phones for a full day. WFMU's building is in the suddenly fashionable Paulus Hook district of Jersey City, hard by Exchange Place and the looming, Isengard-like bulk of the Goldman Sachs tower. This used to be the backyard of the old Colgate factory, with its distinctive giant clock facing lower Manhattan, and backed by old shipping and industry buildings. Most of these are now either gone or resurgent as condo complexes. WFMU, originally based in East Orange near the now-dead Upsala College, moved down to Jersey City in August 1998, in the midst of a great wave of residential and commercial construction. It was a time of revolution for WFMU as well, for this was when it was taking its first baby steps into Internet broadcasting, a prescient move that would expand the reach of this humble 1400-watt station across the globe. (I remember the first time I wrote a pledge card for someone in Sacramento, and then for a Scandinavian listener, and feeling amazed and awed.)

The move my company made to Chelsea has vastly simplified my weekday access to the WFMU building. Previously, I would have to drive down, or buy a round-trip train ticket and then a light-rail pass to navigate from the Hoboken terminal to Montgomery Street. Now, armed with a monthly train ticket, I can just hop on the train and use the pass for free light-rail travel. (Of course, the light rail has to cooperate; for the morning trip, we were delayed while they cleared out a broken-down train. Still works better than the Springfield monorail. Or the Vegas one.) It felt nice to get into Hoboken, and then make a right toward the light-rail station instead of the left down to the PATH tubes leading to work. (Ironically, at the time I thought it felt like a sick day, seeing the outside world during daytime on a weekday while watching folks go to work or school. Funny, so does today!)

Being at WFMU during Marathon time, or in the weeks just before or after, is like arriving at headquarters for a third-party political group or an underground newspaper. Volunteers stuffing envelopes, packing prizes, cooking food for the troops, or answering phones. In the broadcast room, a DJ and his co-host keep the money flowing by playing favorites from the DJ's show, offering giveaways for pledges, spinning tracks from the DJ premium (most DJs offer a mix CD of the sort of music he or she plays, or even the live acts that have performed on his or her show, for a certain pledge level), and thanking those folks who have called or emailed with their financial support. And through it all, you will see a station staff member checking in, bringing in new volunteers at the end of a shift, monitoring the ever-growing pledge total, or putting out some fire. (Again, in what capacity can you ever imagine meeting the manager of your big-city Top 40 station, to say nothing of getting him or her to reply to your email?) Everyone's in it together, pulling this wonderful radio station over a mountain of financial need, like the steamship in Fitzcarraldo.

At this point, there are only a few days left before the end of the Marathon, at which point individual DJ solicitation gives way to the Hoof & Mouth Sinphonia. In an orgiastic and booze-soaked release of two weeks' worth of financial stress, musically capable and vocally incapable DJs serenade the final hours of the Marathon on Sunday night by taking turns in front of the mike and singing a favorite or ironic song. If all goes well, the fundraising goal will be met sometime in its midst, and it will become a real celebration. Past Hoof & Mouth hits are being posted on the aforementioned WFMU blog. Not unlike the Oscars or the Super Bowl, it makes for a long Sunday night of entertainment, though unlike the Super Bowl, every bet you put down on this one is a winner, and unlike the Oscars, the room doesn't have to be specially reinforced to hold 2,000 raging egos.

A Million Vinyl Discs Descend on Manhattan

THIS IS WHAT USUALLY happens with my blog ideas. I get them while washing the dishes, or in the shower, or loading a dishwasher, or performing some other mundane daily battle against household entropy, and when I finally sit down, they've skeedaddled under the couch . . . possibly because that is one of the few places I won't clean. Still, a broomhandle — or a broomhandled Mauser — can come in handy for flushing them out, and, having done so, I can now proceed.

This weekend I have devoted to volunteering at the mighty WFMU Record and CD Fair, which began last night and ends tomorrow. For those who haven't clicked on my radio links, WFMU is a listener-supported freeform station broadcasting on the air in the New York City and northern New Jersey area at 91.1, in the New Hope, NY region and the Catskills at 90.1 in its WXHD guise, and live to anyone with an Internet connection in a variety of formats. DJs on WFMU program their own shows without station-mandated playlists or corporate interference, and 100% of the funding for operating the station and paying its tiny staff comes from the listeners, via an annual fundraising marathon, station music benefits, and the Record Fair.

Even if the New York radio market wasn't a listener-hostile stew of least-common-denominator pop tripe and management contempt for the listener, WFMU's blend of diverse programming and personalities, plus its informational shows, would still soundly kick ass. The man who taught me my trade as a typesetter and editor turned me on to this station on September 14, 1992. Yes, I remember the date, for it was momentous. It was my first day of work, and Chris indicated the radio on his desk and said, "I listen to this weird college station. If it ever bugs you, let me know and I'll change the channel." Rather than being bugged, I was immediately hooked. I remember, from my early days as a listener, a polka record that actually was recorded somewhere other than Poland, and the first two movements of Carl Orff's Carmina Burana performed on banjo. Six months later, I first contributed to the Marathon.

It wasn't until 1994 that I began listening to WFMU outside work. It's not the strongest radio signal on the air, and pulling in the waves from my workplace and home required either one of the more advanced antennas, or a certain amount of aerial-manipulation kabuki as one strove to isolate the region of best reception. This was just before the Web was widely available, to say nothing of reliable streaming audio or home broadband connections. But the immersion of listening at home and while working led me inevitably to the next step: volunteering.

Online WFMU playlists don't reach far back into the 1990s, if at all, so the exact date in 1997 (if I even have the right year) would have to be confirmed by whoever could tell me what day Kristin Hersh played live on Andy Waltzer's show. WFMU was still housed at the Springdale Avenue location in East Orange, its previous owner, Upsala College, a few years dead, the move to Jersey City about a year away. The station relies on a small army of volunteers, some sporadic, a few permanent and helping daily in some way, to keep the freeform flag flying. In my case, I spent an entirely pleasant day processing Marathon credit card payments and cull duplicate entries from the contributor database. The staff was very friendly and happy to have a listener in and helping out. My first stint at the Marathon, taking phone pledges, soon followed, as did my first duty as a Record Fair volunteer.

These days, I help out in the Fair's A/V Lounge. At the Metropolitan Pavilion, there is a side room that for the first couple of fairs went unused. Then someone at the station had the brilliant idea of showing music-oriented video programming in there, with the added attraction of free coffee. The thought was that folks might want to take a break from the mass mosh that goes on at the record dealers' tables, grab a cup of free joe, and watch some video rarities or a documentary. We've had some excellent programming in the past: You Think You Really Know Me: The Gary Wilson Story, a documentary about Joe Broussard and his massive collection of vintage 78s, and the Ramones doc End of the Century. The lounge was packed for that last one.

The other major area I work is security. That sounds more ominous than it is. The dealers begin loading in or arriving as early as 7 a.m. (the doors open at 10 a.m.). I walk around the hall, making sure everyone has their dealer tag, and ensuring nobody goes rummaging through absent dealers' wares. As I was one of the first folks to respond to the request to get there so absurdly early on a weekend, I became one of the go-to guys for this particular volunteer shift.

I enjoy the contrast over the course of the day. When I begin, the hall is virtually empty, with tens of thousands of vinyl records, CDs, 8-tracks, and cassettes slumbering under draped bedsheets on the dealers' tables. I walk around as the dealers stream in, sometimes spotting colleagues they haven't seen since the last local record show, or even since the last WFMU Record Fair. Sometimes several dealers will swarm over one guy's table, burrowing through his stacks to find rarities to snag and offer from their own table to the public, or simply to complete a personal cache of wax. By 8:30, it's getting plenty populated with dealers. Tables are deployed, milk crates are brimming with offerings, TVs for displaying sale videos are running, and small home record players are sometimes poised on top of the racks, for discerning buyers to assess the worth of a find. By 10:30, you wouldn't recognize the place, as the public has poured in and is now digging lustily into the crates, waving singles at dealers, and slumping under the weight of a dozen new acquisitions. By this time, I have shifted to the A/V lounge, where these folks might revive themselves with fresh caffeine and Nabisco-based brain sugar.

I have another shift tomorrow, so I have to hit the hay soon. The only down side to the whole affair is that, with this occurring on a weekend, my work week is destined to go straight downhill after this. Nothing at work can compare with the satisfaction I get from helping out this fantastic radio station.