Schnauzer Logic Podcast

Episode 84 (and 83) are Online!!!

2011-12-01T16:50:00.000-08:00

sonovista, my friends! we're not sure exactly how it happened, but there are two (2) new episodes of Schnauzer Logic online - the first (episode 83) was recorded the week before thanksgiving and features john dekoven and sheri in the studio, with our two guests, writer/comedian Pete Grossman, and our old friend, Ken Turetzky.

the second episode was recorded yesterday and again features john and sheri in studio with parviz (PARVIZ!!!) on the phone and a great interview with a very funny comedian jeff applebaum.

i don't know when there wlll be show notes for either episode since boyana has decided to move to scotland to pursue her education (so much for priorities!)

but you can download the episodes from the usual places (hint, itunes) or listen in the side podcast pickle player or even just click on the players below:

Episode 84 - November 30, 2011

Episode 83 - November 16, 2011

and that's what we got for now - we have fun doing these shows and will try to continue to get together every week or so - as always, you can call into the show at 408-335-4755 and leave a message (or get through to the studio when we're recording) - and you can listen to the studio audio live (or a random archive of past shows) by clicking on one of the player icons to the right.

we always appreciate your support and only ask that you
show up
pay attention
tell the truth
and don't be attached to the outcome.

namaste
robin

Schnauzer Logic Episode 83 Being Recorded Today

2011-11-16T14:57:00.000-08:00

sonovista, my friends! once you've recovered from the shock and awe of the headline, please click on one of the 4 little icons to the right under Live Audio/Archive Stream (mp3, windows media, real audio and quicktime streaming) between 4:30pm and 6:30pm california time today, Wed, november 16, 2011 (it feels like i'm holding up a newspaper for a hostage photo) and you can hear us live in the studio... you can also call in and interrupt the show by dialing (408) 335-4755

cheers
robin

2011-07-02T10:50:00.000-07:00

From the Finale of The Voice (Concept by Rachel) from Robin Diane Goldstein on Vimeo.

(rachel weinstein and i watched the finale of the first series of The Voice and were both gobstruck when Christina performed a 'real time' adjustment. we decided it was worthy of preserving and setting to music. enjoy!)

(RSS) Feed Me, Seymour

2011-06-25T16:25:00.000-07:00

sonovista, my friends! if you're one of the few who has bookmarked the Schnauzer Logic podcast feed in your regular podcast player (XML Feed) you may have noticed that a new file showed up this morning with the title "(not) Episode 82". this is a test run of a bunch of new studio hardware and software. gone is the old Mac Quad G5 and the original G4 Cube, both of which have been replaced by a single Mac Mini and a Behringer USB Digital Audio I/O box. the result is a show that uses about 1/10th of the actual power (watts), allowing us to join the ranks of GREEN podcasters, and also keep the studio much cooler.

for not having done a show for 14 months, i was actually surprised how easily i slipped back behind the microphone and into the role of fast-talking host. and it was fun!

the next step is figuring out whether we can get anyone to come back into the studio on a regular basis... John DeKoven has already said 'yes', and Jason is most likely a definite 'no' (due to his new job as West Coast Entertainment Reporter for ABC Radio Network News). and everyone else is an unknown at this point, but we'll see. its been a while since i did any kind of extended show by myself (and it requires a different kind of rhythm than doing a show with co-hosts). but '(not) 82' felt pretty comfortable, so a solo-run is certainly a possibility.

stay tuned
namaste
r

This is why Comcast/CableCARD Support is so Awful!!!

2011-06-21T15:06:00.000-07:00

(UPDATED: June 22, 2011) sonovista, my friends!!! so today i received my new TiVo Premiere XL box and went about getting it all set up... now this is my 4th TiVo to use a CableCARD (the thing you need so a TiVo can get subscription and premium channels) and i know that in order for it to work on Comcast here in northern california, the card needs to be both Activated (connected to my account) and Paired (a second-level encryption scheme used to protect the HBO and Showtime-type-channels).

a post on the TiVoCommunity suggested it might be possible to bypass the challenges of getting a customer service representative to understand that a CableCARD is not a cable box, and that 'hitting it with a signal' isn't the same as "Pairing" it to set up the decryption chain, but after 3 attempts at http://www.comcast.com/activate, i gave up and decided to use their online chat service (as recommended on the activation page) - here is the transcript

=================

Live Chat Status:
Analyst DiosdadoJr is here and your issue status is: working

user ROBIN has entered room

analyst DiosdadoJr has entered room

DiosdadoJr> Hello ROBIN_, Thank you for contacting Comcast Live Chat Support. My name is DiosdadoJr. Please give me one moment to review your information.

DiosdadoJr> Welcome to Comcast Self - Install Kit Activation support! It is a pleasure to have you on chat. I hope you haven't waited long to be assisted. How can I help you today?

ROBIN_> hi - i need to both Activate and Pair a cablecard for my new TiVo - i tried using the online tool a couple of times, but it doesn't seem to be working (i still don't get any premium channels or a lot of other channels as well)

DiosdadoJr> It would be my pleasure to assist you in activating your service from my end and make sure that it is working fine before we end the chat session.

ROBIN_> thanks!

ROBIN_> i'm on the cablecard activation screen - what info do you need from me?

[WAIT FOR 5 MINUTES]

DiosdadoJr> "Let me pull up your account first. Can you please verify if this information that you entered prior to the start of the chat is correct: Customer's Name: ROBIN GOLDSTEIN Account Number:xxxxxxxxxxxx

ROBIN_> yes

DiosdadoJr> Thank you. While I pull up your account, may I have the make and model of the the cable box as well as its serial number?

ROBIN_> its not a cable box, its a TiVo Premiere

ROBIN_> so its a cablecard, not a box

ROBIN_> do you have experience with activating -and- pairing a cablecard?

DiosdadoJr> Yes I have Robin.

ROBIN_> excellent!!!

ROBIN_> it can be confusing if you've never done it before...

DiosdadoJr> Can I have the customer s/n # of the cable card?

ROBIN_> the Card S/N is xxxxxxxxxxxx

[WAIT FOR 5 MINUTES]

DiosdadoJr> Robin just to confirm from your end is this an additional cable card or will this replace another cable card?

ROBIN_> additional cable card for a new tivo box

[WAIT FOR 10 MINUTES]

ROBIN_> still there?

DiosdadoJr> Yes Robin I'm still here. I'm in the process of activating the cable card on my end.

ROBIN_> thanks

[WAIT FOR 5 MINUTES]

DiosdadoJr> I will now take the neccessary steps to activate the cable card Robin.

ROBIN_> thanks!

[WAIT FOR 5 MINUTES]

DiosdadoJr> Robin I have sent the activation signals to your cable card, can you check for channels now?

ROBIN_> i'm getting some channels (thanks) from the activation, but no premium channels. i believe the cable card also needs to be "Paired" using the Card ID, Host ID and Data ID info (as i recall from past experience)

DiosdadoJr> Do you have that information Robin?

ROBIN_> yes:

ROBIN_> CableCard ID: xxxxxxxxxxxx

ROBIN_> Host ID: xxxxxxxxxxxx

ROBIN_> Data ID: xxxxxxxxxxxx

DiosdadoJr> Thank you for that information Robin.

ROBIN_> cool

[WAIT FOR 10 MINUTES]

DiosdadoJr> I have already activated your cable service, and its already up and running here in my system, just in case after 45 minutes some of the expected channels are still not appearing please do contact this number 1 888 270 6445 for the activation update.

ROBIN_> so you've entered the Host ID and Data ID info on your screens?

ROBIN_> it usually doesn't take anywhere near 45 minutes to get the premium channels

[WAIT FOR 5 MINUTES]

DiosdadoJr> Just to recap what we have done today, I was able to successfully activate your cable service from my end and it is working fine now.

ROBIN_> no, that is not correct

ROBIN_> it appears my cablecard is not correctly "Paired" though it is "Activated"

DiosdadoJr> Yes Robin that is just the maximum time we give.

ROBIN_> ok - just to be clear, this was not a successful resolution of my issue. i would like to say it is, but my card is not Paired and i'm not getting the premium channels like HBO

DiosdadoJr> Robin I have actually sent the pair hit signal to your cable card.

ROBIN_> i believe you - its just not working

DiosdadoJr> Well Robin if you still have some issues regarding subscribed channels not loading, feel free to call our National Video Activation center for resolution & advanced trouble shooting regarding video activation.

ROBIN_> is that the 888 number above?

DiosdadoJr> Yes it is Robin.

DiosdadoJr> Thank you for using Comcast and have a nice day.

ROBIN_> you too - ciao

=================

so i then called the 888 number (above) and got hung up on 3 times! finally i called another comcast number and got straight through to a fellow (i wish i remembered his name) who understood that a CableCARD is not a cable box and has to be both authorized and paired and within 10 minutes (literally while i watched the screen and waited) everything was working great.

bottom line: time spent on getting my CableCARD activated and paired by Comcast - over 90 minutes (online, in chat, and on the phone) - time spent once i got to talk with someone who actually knew what to do - 10 minutes.

(for the record, i then had to call TiVo to activate the new box on my account - i wanted to do something 'tricky' and the regular customer rep couldn't help, so i called TiVo's HQ, got passed along to a second level rep and he took care of everything in about 10 minutes. so, TiVo, yea, Comcast, boo)

next up... trying to change the replaceable head in my electric toothbrush - wish me luck!

namaste
robin
------------
Wednesday Morning Update - June 22, 2011
so after i posted this on my @SchnauzerLogic twitter feed, i received a number of directed tweets from @ComcastMelissa offering to handle the issue directly. i thanked her and noted that the final CSR (who goes down as the unsung hero of this fustercluck) was knowledgeable and apologetic and got it all taken care of 'tout de suite'! she then asked for my account info, via direct message, so she could pass it up the chain in customer service, and this morning i received a phone call from another very nice woman who was equally apologetic and mentioned that she had read through the transcript and was going to be working with the CSR managers to make sure everyone had a refresher course on CableCARDS and the like... she also made an offer of 'good faith' in connection with my account (not necessary, but a clear indication that "Comcast Cares"!)... so all is good and working well... if only a call to customer service could do something about the quality of the programming!

Ringtone for the Rapture

2011-05-20T13:32:00.001-07:00

its the end of the world and i'm feeling creative! this archive contains an MP3 file and an M4R file, suitable for your iPhone.

http://www.SchnauzerLogic.com/rapturering.zip

Film Review: Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps (2010)

2011-02-09T13:16:00.000-08:00

(my friend, don, has been asking for my thoughts on the sequel to the original Wall Street, so i sat down to watch it on PPV last night, and here's where i came out.)

Roger Ebert's infamous review of Rob Reiner's 1994 film, "North", contained the following bit of prose:

"I hated this movie. Hated hated hated hated hated this movie. Hated it. Hated every simpering stupid vacant audience-insulting moment of it. Hated the sensibility that thought anyone would like it. Hated the implied insult to the audience by its belief that anyone would be entertained by it."

For some reason (ok, many reasons), this old review came to mind, repeatedly, as i fought the constant temptation to "go all Elvis" on my Sony XBR last night while enduring this 2010 sequel to Oliver Stone's iconic 1987 cautionary tale of conspicuous consumption and greed. From the opening bleats of the David Byrne/Brian Eno soundtrack to the obligatory Charlie Sheen (and two hooker) cameo, almost every moment of this obvious, blunt force trauma made me want to punch someone. Shia LaBeouf's angry innocence? Pow. Josh Brolin's cardboard villain? Pow. Carey Mulligan, Susan Sarandon, Austin Pendleton, Eli Wallach? Pow, Pow, Pow, Pow! Has there ever been a greater waste of talent (or worse collection of accents?)

We get it, Oliver. We didn't learn our lesson and now the Apocalypse (quite literally, if you're a fan of wide tracking shots over Ground Zero) is upon us. And -only- Gordon Gekko can save us. Or fuck us in the ass. Or both or neither or wait, is this thing -still- not over?

The philosopher Aristotle said in his work Poetics that tragedy is characterized by seriousness and dignity and involving a great person who experiences a reversal of fortune (at least according to Wikipedia.) If that's true, then the real tragedy of WS:MNS is that the director of "Platoon", "Born on the Fourth of July", and the original "Wall Street" has returned to a 23 year-old well intent on passing off its brackish contents as cool, clear and refreshing. But it's not. It's not even the sickly sweet "Kool-Aid" that Gecko cautions his adoring audience against drinking. Its just stale and stinky, leaving you unquenched and slightly queasy with the sure knowledge that you'll wake up in the morning with cotton mouth and a pounding headache.

Over produced, over acted and underwhelming, Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps is a thorough mess whose most entertaining moment comes in the opening scene when the newly released ex-con, Gekko, is given back his iconic Motorola-brick cell phone. After sitting through this 2 hour and 7 minute magnum dopus, it occurred to me that this whole drama could have been avoided if old 'Gordo' had (spoiler alert) simply taken that $100 million he stashed away in Zurich back in '87 and invested it in Apple stock. By the time he got out he'd have more money than he'd know what do to with -and- a shiny new iPhone.

Or perhaps it's Stone who's fucking with us, at this very moment penning the third installment, "Wall Street: Love The Yuan You're With".

So, Don, my my verdict on "Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps"?
To paraphrase the great Paul Simon, "Still Greedy After All These Years".

Theodore Roosevelt - The Right of the People to Rule

2010-12-11T12:26:00.000-08:00

Recorded by Thomas Edison, August 1912

The great fundamental issue now before our people can be stated briefly. It is, are the American people fit to govern themselves, to rule themselves, to control themselves? I believe they are. My opponents do not. I believe in the right of the people to rule. I believe that the majority of the plain people of the United States will, day in and day out, make fewer mistakes in governing themselves than any smaller class or body of men, no matter what their training, will make in trying to govern them. I believe, again, that the American people are, as a whole, capable of self-control, and of learning by their mistakes. Our opponents pay lip-loyalty to this doctrine; but they show their real beliefs by the way in which they champion every device to make the nominal rule of the people a sham.

I am not leading this fight as a matter of aesthetic pleasure. I am leading because somebody must lead, or else the fight would not be made at all. I prefer to work with moderate, with rational, conservatives, provided only that they do in good faith strive forward toward the light. But when they halt and turn their backs to the light, and sit with the scorners on the seats of reaction, then I must part company with them. We the people cannot turn back. Our aim must be steady, wise progress.

It would be well if our people would study the history of a sister republic. All the woes of France for a century and a quarter have been due to the folly of her people in splitting into the two camps of unreasonable conservatism and unreasonable radicalism. Had pre-Revolutionary France listened to men like Turgot, and backed them up, all would have gone well. But the beneficiaries of privilege, the Bourbon reactionaries, the shortsighted ultra-conservatives, turned down Turgot; and then found that instead of him they had obtained Robespierre. They gained twenty years' freedom from all restraint and reform, at the cost of the whirlwind of the red terror; and in their turn the unbridled extremists of the terror induced a blind reaction; and so, with convulsion and oscillation from one extreme to another, with alternations of violent radicalism and violent Bourbonism, the French people went through misery toward a shattered goal. May we profit by the experiences of our brother republicans across the water, and go forward steadily, avoiding all wild extremes; and may our ultra-conservatives remember that the rule of the Bourbons brought on the Revolution, and may our would-be revolutionaries remember that no Bourbon was ever such a dangerous enemy of the people and of freedom as the professed friend of both, Robespierre.

There is no danger of a revolution in this country; but there is grave discontent and unrest, and in order to remove them there is need of all the wisdom and probity and deep-seated faith in and purpose to uplift humanity we have at our command. Friends, our task as Americans is to strive for social and industrial justice, achieved through the genuine rule of the people. This is our end, our purpose. The methods for achieving the end are merely expedients, to be finally accepted or rejected according as actual experience shows that they work well or ill. But in our hearts we must have this lofty purpose, and we must strive for it in all earnestness and sincerity, or our work will come to nothing. In order to succeed we need leaders of inspired idealism, leaders to whom are granted great visions, who dream greatly and strive to make their dreams come true; who can kindle the people with the fire from their own burning souls. The leader for the time being, whoever he may be, is but an instrument, to be used until broken and then to be cast aside; and if he is worth his salt he will care no more when he is broken than a soldier cares when he is sent where his life is forfeit in order that the victory may be won. In the long fight for righteousness the watchword for all of us is spend and be spent.

(This speech contains excerpts from "The Right of People to Rule," an address originally delivered at Carnegie Hall, New York City, on March 20, 1912. See Social Justice and Popular Rule: Essays, Addresses, and Public Statements Relating to the Progressive Movement (1910-1916) by Theodore Roosevelt.)

Boyana's Dog - Rocky

2010-06-18T21:19:00.000-07:00

sonovista, my friends... hope you are all well and enjoying the World Cup (you ess aye you ess aye you ess aye)... i've been taking acupuncture treatments for my med-stuff and (shhhhhh!) things seem to be a tiny bit better! so maybe a new show sometime before 2012.

in the meanwhile i had a lovely email exchange with Boyana today about her pending graduation from university and she forwarded along a photo of her pup, Rocky, who, while not a schnauzer, seems to be a pretty cool guy (as i'm sure you'll agree!)

enjoy the weekend and Happy Father's Day to dads everywhere.
robin

It's not you, It's me...

2010-06-01T11:37:00.000-07:00

sonovista, my friends! your erstwhile host, here, with an update to the Schnauzer Logic podcast schedule.

as some of you have noticed (many with sadness, a few with glee), the show has been MIA since Episode 81 (recorded on April 21, 2010). despite rumors to the contrary, this has nothing to do with anything that's happened between our little band of merrymakers (either on-air or off). in fact, while we've made a few abortive attempts to stage Episode 82 (alas, to no avail), we did manage to get sheri, rachel, jeff and me (robin) up to Dublin, CA a few weeks ago to help judge one of the semi-final rounds of John DeKoven's Bunjo's Comedy Competition, where a good time was had by all.

the issue is my struggle to do all the pre/post show work necessary to actually have a show. for the rest of the crew the actual time commitment is the 2+ hours we spend in the studio, plus travel and snacks - for me the time commitment works out to bewteen 4x-5x that -even- with Boyana's tremendous assistance. each week i need to set aside between 8 and 10 hours to prep the show, grab the music and audio, confirm the participants, clean the studio, load the files, do the show, break down the show, edit, process, compress, annotate and upload the audio to the server, ping Boyana with links, clean the studio and mics and put everything away. under ideal circumstances i can slot these tasks in between the other things i need to do to make sure life goes on (and on and on), but recently the stars have not aligned quite so harmoniously and the show prep (pre- and post-, never the show itself) has become a source of angst and anxiety and a drain on my resources. as a result i've had to cancel the show a couple of times at the last minute, and realize i've been 'jerking' the crew around (they have lives, too!) which then adds to my angst and anxiety (still 20% jewish by volume)... combine this with a series of wednesday client meetings that can't be moved (including this week and next), and you get the Official Schnauzer Logic 2010 Hiatus.

rest assured that the studio remains intact, dusted and ready to go at a moment's notice...

instead, take comfort in the words of the poets of Persia, Jerusalem, and OK Go who have each noted with wisdom and compassion:

"This too shall pass"
این نیز بگزرد, een niz bogzarad
גם זה יעבור, gam zeh yaavor

more to say when there's more worth saying... until then, many thanks to you all (especially John, Parviz, Sheri, Jason, Jeff, Rachel, all the regulars and especially Boyana) and when all else fails, remember to:

Show Up
Pay Attention
Tell The Truth
And Don't Be Attached To The Outcome

namaste
robin

Where the hell -is- everybody?

2010-05-13T10:31:00.000-07:00

sonovista, my friends! its a good question and you deserve an answer and right now i got nothing... Sheri and Rachel and Jeff and i should be joining John DeKoven at BUNJO's this friday night to be judges in his Komedy Kompetion thing, and we'll try to do a show next week assuming i can get someone to sit in the studio with me (or maybe even if i can't)

in the meanwhile, here is a pleasant photo i took on my trip to Terre Haute, Indiana this past weekend to celebrate my uncle's 80th birthday and watch as he received an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree from Saint Mary-Of-The-Woods College.

namaste
robin

Official Episode 81 Show Notes by Boyana Atanasova

2010-04-27T08:19:00.000-07:00

If you never had the chance to listen to the famous Schnauzer Logic podcast before, its Episode 81 is probably the perfect for you to join the crazy group called “listeners”! The radio show was recorded on the 21st of April and now I have the wonderful privilege to tell you a few words about it here.

Guests at the studio were John, Sheri and Parviz and right at the beginning we learned from some of them that it is not OK to answer somebody’s “hi, how are you” with “I’m tired”. That was a cool start of an even cooler show. Among the topics there mentioned were the latest stories around Conan O’Brien and George Lopez, Larry King and his (ex)wives, Tracy Morgan’s comedy style and many, many others. Much time was spent talking about the new iPhone that “leaked” few days ago. It was a strange story with a stupid Apple employee who has left the prototype of the smart phone in a bar. This was the time when everybody in the studio began talking about conspiracies and their influence in our point of view. Parviz was the one who put there the bad story of a baby who was left in the car of its parents for many hours… Stories told by Wikileaks were also an interesting part of this segment. Some of their latest findings are really stunning! Go check them out.

Our lovely host Robin told us also his opinion about the health care system in the USA and about a car accident that was probably caused by him. But the funniest part of the show was when the phone in the studio rang… This was at a time when Robin decided to stop talking, leaving the listeners only to Parviz, John and Sheri. :) There on the phone was John’s French mother who shared her thoughts about maaany things, but mostly about Robin Diane – our wonderful host of the show. I should say this here – it was an amazing pleasure to hear this old lady with her sense of humour and interesting stories to tell!

A small segment was made about the funny videos in YouTube about Hitler which were unfortunately banned from the site. If you are listening to the whole show carefully you may be lucky enough to catch up the last few seconds of it where Parviz was again the host, hehe.

This Episode 81 will be the last for the next couple of weeks so it will be nice of you if you check some of the previous shows that will also show you how a good comedy podcast is made by real professionals.

Until the next time (which will be in about two or three weeks!):

Show Up

Pay Attention

Tell The Truth, and

Don't Be Attached To The Outcome

Schnauzer Logic Episode 81 is Online!!!

2010-04-22T10:07:00.000-07:00

sonovista, my friends! Episode 81 is online and can't truly be described using words from any known language. Surgeon General's Warning: the audio may cause hallucinations, drowsiness and possible seizures (all are which preferable to the show itself). but we do get a call from John DeKoven's Mother!

all the usual stuff applies (show notes, links, etc.) and will follow in due course (or not).

the MP3 file is ::here::

film @ 11

namaste
robin

Schnauzer Logic Episode 81 - We're in the Studio Today

2010-04-21T15:01:00.000-07:00

sonovista, my friends... just a head's up... we're in the studio today between 4pm and 6pm california time (approx) to record Schnauzer Logic Episode 81 - feel free to listen on the audio stream (http://audio.str3am.com:5070) or to call in and participate in the shenanigans at 408/335.4755

cheers!
robin

(Hospital) Room with a View

2010-04-21T07:57:00.000-07:00

sonovista, my friends... time for my annual "photograph from the window of my brain surgeon's office" this year an 8 photo panorama taken with my Panasonic ZS3/TZ7, fiddled a bit in photoshop. enjoy!

UCSF 400 Parnassus Avenue - 8th Floor - Looking North
(click on the image to see larger or view full size)

View Larger Map

Official Episode 80 Show Notes by Boyana Atanasova

2010-04-18T02:54:00.000-07:00

Welcome back to the Schnauzer Logic official show notes! Two weeks without the podcast and it came time for the 80^th Episode, which was recorded on the 14^th of April.

It was a funny show with only John and Parviz in the studio. All of Robin’s friends that used to be guests had different things to do at this time, but this does not affect the great spirit of the show. It started with a talk about the new “Nike” commercial with Tiger Woods. John and Robin were shocked that Parviz didn’t see it, because it was commented in almost every tv show in the USA. I should admit – what a strange commercial this was!

Second topic was the article Robin has written some days ago. It is called “The year of living Olbermann” and it tells the story of the fake Keith Olbermann’s Twitter profile Robin created and managed for the past 12 months. It is a nice but really long article that our host read on air so everybody that was too lazy to read it (like me, Parviz and John), to hear it now.

A wonderful surprise was the call on the phone from Mark Zinkle who has listened Schnauzer Logic from right from the beginning four years ago. Mark was then 14 and now he has his own radio show, he is building an airplane and he is probably the most attractive boy in his class, hehe… You can find more about his activities on his official site. What a nice boy he is!

The second call at this 80^th episode was from Mary, who has won free tickets for Bunjo’s comedy club! More details on Facebook!

A conversation was made about the recent events around Conan O’Brien and the news the he will probably join the forces of TBS. Different opinions, comments and positions were all gathered in Schnuzer Logic Radio Show, Episode 80!

Parviz had his own segment before the end of the show where all – Jackson’s doctor, Hugh Hefner comment about Tiger Woods and Jesse James, Jim Carrey and Jenny McCarthy, adopted Russian kid, John Tesh and Oprah and Sigourney Weaver, were mentioned.

The show ended with a Bulgarian song by Stoyan Yankoulov and Elitsa Todorova called “Water”. Jeff was the last caller at the studio and again with his amazing sense of humor added interesting comment about the recent issues with Toyota. He also told us about the “Star Wars: Uncut”.

That was it – Episode 80!

Until next time!

Four Score and Zero Podcast's Ago...

2010-04-16T09:28:00.000-07:00

sonovista, my friends! gotta keep this quick (and will update with more details and links as time permits)

Schnauzer Logic Episode #80 is Online in all the usual places. This past Wednesday Jason was out with the flu and Sheri, Jeff and Rachel were all caught up in work emergencies, but John DeKoven, Parviz and I soldered through the week's events. In addition, the SchnauzerStudioPhone (408/335.4755) got a workout with surprise calls by Mark Zinkle (teen radio host/ultralight pilot extraordinaire), and Mary from Everette (by way of Castro Valley) who won tickets to Bunjo's!!! who regaled us with tails of warm lobster rolls available -here- on the West Coast.

Plus good tuneage including Bulgarian rock courtesy of Boyana.

This show deserves copious links but yesterday was Tax Day here in the US and after having my finances examined I had to drive up to UCSF to have my head examined (yearly brain scan - pictures coming soon!) But on a happier note, my SF Giants are leading baseball with a 7-2 record, so Go Giants!

more soon and if you can't find what you're looking for, post a comment or drop me a line.

in the meanwhile
Show Up
Pay Attention
Tell The Truth, and
Don't Be Attached To The Outcome

namaste
robin

Coming this Wednesday (what? what?) A New Schnauzer Logic!

2010-04-11T17:37:00.000-07:00

sonovista, my friends! i know its been a few weeks since we've been in the studio to record a new show, but 'fingers crossed', we should all be back this week with more Schnauzer'y goodness!

in the meanwhile, a couple of photos to show that i've at least used my truancy for good and not evil...

opening day for the 2010 San Francisco Giants

(btw, you can see all my Giants Photos and a couple of Videos (1) (2) from Opening Day)

see ya all Wednesday and feel free to leave any question, comments or requests on the Schnauzer Hotline @408/335.4755

namaste
robin

The Year Of Living Olbermann

2010-04-09T08:35:00.000-07:00

(A Cautionary Tale for the Genuine Article)

It began innocently enough, as most great adventures do. Alone and drunk and sitting in front of a television, I stared as the man, the myth, the legend that is Keith Olbermann declared, “Twitter”, the day’s “Worst Person In The World.” I was gob struck, a term I was technically not allowed to use as I had opted for MIT instead of Cornell, but damn convention, this was basic cable, and it was serious. The host of the news program I had enjoyed during the entirety of the 2008 Presidential election campaign, the man who had combined humor and intelligence in the coverage of our quadrennial ‘Sturm und Drang’ had just dumped all over the latest social networking phenomena because someone had sent him an email that referenced a tweet that was apparently addressed to a fake Twitter zzzzzzzzzzzz. I don’t remember the facts. I was well into the Slivovitz at this point and only capable of one thought: This can’t be the “real” Keith Olbermann. The real Olbermann has a sense of humor and this guy on the TV was using the same bat he swung against stupidity and hypocrisy and cruelty to swat at a silly little bird. But if the fellow on TV wasn’t the real Olbermann, that left a void! So picking up my computer, I did the only thing any right-thinking American would do. I created another fake Olbermann account, named it in honor of both Puff Daddy and Spartacus, and declared for all the world to see:

“@iAMolbermann”

And, with a hastily crafted profile photo sporting the requisite ‘evil twin’ magic marker beard, I simply began typing things into the twitterverse, addressing no one and talking about nothing. No followers necessary, I just started tweeting. Random things. Silly things. Obviously insane things. For example, when the genuine KO appeared the next night on “Real Time with Bill Maher” I tweeted the ‘inside scoop’:

“bill maher smells like sweet pickle chips, the kind you put on your burger. i kind of liked it... there, i said it! i am olbermann”

And soon, like bits of cosmic flotsam and jetsam, Twitter followers, living, breathing human beings, began attaching themselves to me (or the me that was the fake Olbermann). In the beginning most appeared to be in on the joke and seemed to appreciate tweets like:

“and now, as promised, a special comment: To lower your stress, get a kitty. Lucky Numbers 6,49,5,11,2,3 i AM olbermann”.

Now to be honest, after the kerfuffle over the first 'fake' Olbermann (the one that resulted in the Countdown WPITW rant), there were those who doubted my authenticity. A few folks even asked me to “prove” that I really was Keith, which I did by taking a photo of a computer screen displaying an MSNBC KO publicity shot, clearly reflected in a hand mirror, and claiming this was a photograph of ‘me’ right after shaving that morning. The arrow cursor visible in my hair may have detracted from the air of legitimacy I was hoping to convey.

You see, in one of my many other identities (see the banner at the top of the blog) I’m a comedian and writer and posting as @iAMolbermann became an exercise to see how long I could maintain a funny Twitter stream from an alternate universe where a Bizarro World Olbermann dwelt. A tweet stream of Keith Olbermann's "id", if you will. At one point, early on, I even wrote to the producers of Countdown confessing my shenanigans and observing that I was finding it exhausting having to be Keith Olbermann for just a few minutes a day, and wondering how the real KO kept it up 24/7.

But as Nietzsche might have said (in 140 characters or less), “If you tweet long enough into the abyss, the abyss will begin to tweet back at you”, and eventually the hate tweets arrived. Angry people looking for a place to vent their frustration or confusion or just looking for a bogeyman they could lash out against. And the strange thing was how much it hurt. Personally. I knew I wasn’t Olbermann and that they weren’t directing their vitriol against me, but I had taken on the role of ‘in loco celebrity” and was, therefore, fair game.

And so the first lesson I learned in my year of living Olbermann was that people are willing to say things on the Internet that I don’t think their upbringing or religion or just good manners would permit them to say face to face. I wish this weren’t the case, but we all know its true. And it may speak more to our need, as human beings, of having our thoughts and feelings ‘witnessed’ by others, than it does to our capacity for anonymous cruelty. I’m not sure I’m smart enough to know. Remember, I’m the one who didn’t go to Cornell. But I do know that being a public figure, even an obviously fake public figure, comes at a cost, and as the real person behind the false identity, I can assure you the brickbats leave marks.

The second lesson I learned in my year of living Olbermann is that for every jerk with a nasty comment, there are hundreds of kind and compassionate folks who will offer their genuine love and support when life presents its toughest challenges. As regular viewers of Countdown know, Keith sadly lost both his mother and father during the past year, and as a jokester, I found myself unprepared to deal with issues of real loss and grief in the midst of my comic facade.

On the one hand I was writing a parody/comedy tweet stream that had no basis in reality, posting tweets like:

“OlberFunQuiz: chicken breed or name i've been called? Dorking, Clownface, Buttercup, Jersey Giant?”

and

“Went to see Avatar at the IMAX. Did you know they charge extra for 3D? I paid, but watched the film with one eye closed, in protest.”

And on the other hand, a real person, someone who I admired, had lost one (and then the other) of his parents.

Now it turns out that I had lost both of my parents during the past few years, as well, and again found that the real life events of my doppelganger had a direct impact on me through my faux Twitter identity. Many of @iAMolbermann’s followers, apparently unaware that they were not writing to the original Olbermann, sent lovely notes of condolence and consolation and I took care to respond to each of them, noting that I was a comedian and not the real KO, though still a fan, and suggesting that they send their well wishes directly to Keith at MSNBC. And so, as hurt as I was by the misdirected bile sent my way in the name of fair and balanced discourse, I was equally heartened by outpouring of unsolicited prayer and support and kindness directed towards my namesake as comfort against the universal experience of grief and loss we all, at one time or another, share.

And it was this second lesson that lead directly to the third and final epiphany I had during my year of living Olbermann:

Reading may be Fundamental, but "Reading" and "Reading Comprehension" are Not the Same Thing!

During my year of living Olbermann I managed to go from a handful of followers to somewhere close to 11,000. And a strange phenomenon I noticed along the way was that even though I repeatedly tweeted both subtly (and not so subtly) that I was NOT the real Keith Olbermann (a fact easily confirmed by simply reading the tweets authored by @iAMolbermann), the number of followers who believed I was Olbermann continued to rise. In fact, at one point I noticed that every time I tweeted I lost followers and so, after tweeting this precise revelation, I simply shut up and watched the count go even higher.

And so it went, parallel universes in perfect harmony, until April 8, 2010 (the night I originally wrote this piece). While packing my bag in anticipation of traveling to the home opener between the San Francisco Giants and the Atlanta Braves (yes, I happen to love baseball, too), I turned on the TV to catch the end of the 5pm Countdown broadcast and noticed Keith talking to John Hodgman about his intention to ‘finally’ enter the Twitterverse with an official account @keitholbermann. And, after a brief OMG/WTF moment, I quickly logged in as @iAMolbermann and tweeted:

“HOLY CRAP!!! the jig is up!!!”

and waited for my number of followers to drop. Except that they didn’t. Finishing up this article a bit over 2 hours after the “OG” Olbermann posted his first tweets, I discovered that I had even more followers than I did before, many of whom were, yes, ‘welcoming’ me to Twitter. (sigh)

As Walt Kelly wrote in Pogo,
“We Have Met The Enemy And He Is Us.”

Us, and a significant lapse in our reading comprehension.

And so, Mr. Olbermann, along with the thousands of others who will undoubtedly subscribe to the 140 characters of ‘Keithiness’ that will make up @keitholbermann, I too welcome you to the show (the other, weirder, more egalitarian show where everyone has made the roster and seems to be taking batting practice in all directions, simultaneously.) I hereby turn the @iAMolberman nation over to you, in good health and good spirits, no worse for the wear and tear and fake magic marker beard.

As Tooter Turtle might have said, “Please Mr. Wizard! I don’t want to be Keith Olbermann any more!” And as kindly Wizard the Lizard would hopefully have intoned, “Drizzle, drazzle, druzzle, drome; time for zis one to come home.”

Good Night and Good Luck being Keith Olbermann, Keith Olbermann. Its a task best left to those chivalrous of spirit, pure of heart, and clean shaven (Cornell degree optional.)

And in closing, I’ll ask that -you- answer the lovely Ann Molison @amolison of Colorado who tweets:

“So - which Olbermann do we read! This one with a hairy face! Or the clean cut - new one who finally logged in today! :)”

Keith, we both know its probably better that she hear it from you.

Article and Photo Mosaic of @iAMolbermann Followers
©2010 Robin Diane Goldstein
robin@schnauzerlogic.com
www.SchnauzerLogic.com

We All Playin' Hooky

2010-04-08T09:38:00.000-07:00

a conflagration of solar flares, sunspots, and cocoa butter resulted in the gang playing hooky yesterday, so please accept our apologies for the lack of original comedic show material (i know... this applies to pretty much every week, show or no show!)

in the meantime, please to enjoy this pretty picture from the beach at santa cruz , california, yesterday at exactly the moment we should have been in a small, hot, crowded room.

next week we're back!
namaste
robin

Schnauzer Logic’s NoNothing Review: The Apple iPad

2010-04-06T11:55:00.000-07:00

As with all NoNothing reviews, it's important to be clear right from the start. I don't own an Apple iPad. I've never touched one, felt one, lifted one, held one. I've never seen one in person and haven't spoken directly with anyone who has. Now, on to the review.

After months of delay, Apple's long awaited tablet computer, the awkwardly named "IPad" has finally been released, and much like Apple's previous tablet computer, the "Newton", this overpriced/under-featured bit of fanboy flotsam left me wanting. With its bright, clear, large flat glass screen, I was surprised to see that after picking it up, turning it over, and handing it around to all my friends, the iPad's display was covered in fingerprints. Cleaning the screen with the same lint free optical cloth I use on my iPhone, MacBook and Oakley sunglasses proved to be an unexpected source of irritation, especially when these same friends repeatedly asked, "how do you keep the screen clean?"

Equally troubling is its size. With a screen 5x larger than an iPhone, the iPad is far too big to put in your pocket. And while Apple "claims" that the WiFi version of the iPad weighs only 1.5lbs, after holding it at arms length for much of its 10-hour battery life, mine felt much heavier. Speaking of which, come on Apple… no user serviceable parts? This isn't like an electric toothbrush or an electric razor or hairdryer or the new Flip cameras or MacBooks or MacBook Pros or any iPod or iPhone ever? Its important to me to know that I –can- replace the battery myself, regardless of whether I'm ever likely to do so.

Turning next to the software, the iPad is severely limited to only those applications Apple, itself, decides to supply, or one of the few of third-party apps you're forced to purchase from Apple's iTunes store. And while Apple doesn't set the pricing for any third-party apps, I nevertheless felt ripped off when I learned that some developers are charging –more- for an updated/enhanced iPad version of the same app (some up to 300% more, charging $2.99 for a life saving CPR instructional app that previously cost only 99 cents).

Continuing to explore the software, while attempting to browse the web on the supplied Safari browser (the only browser available, by the way. Apple still won't allow Microsoft's Internet Explorer to run on the iPad) I was surprised to learn that the iPad does not support Adobe's Flash, making it impossible to view any YouTube videos, unless you use the supplied YouTube app that comes standard on the iPad. Begining with the original iPhone, first launched in June of 2007, and continuing through to today, Apple has refused to support Flash on the iPhone, iPhone 3G, iPhone 3GS and iPod Touch, making Apple's lack of Flash on the iPad all that much more frustrating. One wonders how much longer Apple can maintain this clearly untenable position.

Finally, no review of the iPad can be complete without a discussion of its durability, need for a 10 watt charger, virtual keyboard, case and how quickly its large flat display attracts fingerprints. So here goes: my 5 year old can watch all her Disney movies on the VCR in our family room, but I wouldn't let her take my iPad to her pre-school class, and you shouldn't let her take yours either. It's not clear what Apple was thinking, but this isn't a product aimed at the Ravi set. With respect to power, Apple supplies a specialized 10 watt charger, but that doesn't mean that I shouldn't expect to be able to charge my iPad by plugging it into any USB port on any product ever made. As Johnny Cochrane might say, "If the plug does fit, you must charge it!" And last, but not least, no matter what you might have thought, typing on the iPad's virtual keyboard is simply not the same as typing on a dedicated, stand alone, keyboard, resulting in the unpleasant experience of getting fingerprints on the display.

While you may find the iPad a perfect complement to the web sites, magazines, email, films, tv, music and digital books you enjoy every day, in my opinion, if the unfortunate name isn't enough to keep you away from this $500 entertainment 'toy', the easily smudged screen should be.

Robin Diane Goldstein
Schnauzer Logic NoNothing Reviewer

No new show this week

2010-04-02T04:04:00.000-07:00

Hi there, Schnauzer Logic fans and friends!

This week there won't be a new Episode, but you can always listen to one of the previous, right? :)

Until the new Show - Happy Easter and wonderful holidays to you all!

Official Episode 79 Show Notes by Boyana Atanasova

2010-03-28T12:47:00.000-07:00

Two weeks without our favorite podcast and finally there is a new Schnauzer show that I will comment down here. I won’t stop saying about every new episode that it was one of the best I've heard! It may sound a bit odd but it’s the truth – Episode 79 didn’t make difference. It was wonderful! John and Parviz (woohooo!) were the only guests at the beginning of the show, but later on Sheri join the group. The music this time was taken from the latest UK pop hits charts and Jason was again on the phone, giving his interesting opinion and insights to the discussions in front of the mikes. One of the first funny moments was right at the start of this Schnauzer - when John and Parviz were trying to make a meaningful conversation without Robin….but the great laughter was the only result at the end.

The serious talk started with the “swear” topic and Joe Biden, who managed to curse while talking on a public event. This was turned to a discussion about the recent steps in changing the USA health care system. Robin had his opinion, Sheri shared hers, John and Parviz also made great comments, so you can hear all of the details (or actually SEE how they made them on the video Robin recorded with two cams in the studio) after you download the whole episode. The serious part continued with a segment dedicated to the opposition – republicans vs. democrats. Also interesting points of view gathered there.

Aaaand, that’s all from the “serious” part. All that left was filled with funny jokes and friendly comments. Sandra Bullock and her recent marriage problems was mentioned, the origin of the phrase “that’s what she said” also there, as many TV shows like - “The Marriage Ref”, “Undercover Boss”, “Who Do You Think You Are”, “Shark Tank”, “The Celebrity Apprentice” and “Modern Family”. All of them were put in the Parviz segment where he collected opinions about his favorite TV shows and we received interesting views about them.

Robin had the luck to find wonderful stories at Boing Boing and one of them brought him to Becky Stern’s website/blog where he found an amazing scarves made by Becky herself. She was the second phone guest at the 79^th Episode and it was quite impressing to learn more information about her. She is a really talented young woman who has many ideas and probably the most important and useful things needed in such cases – the will and the desire to create and make them real. Becky is making a lot of cool stuff and she’s also writing about them in Make and Craft. It was a nice interview with a really nice girl you should definitely check her work. Oh, I almost forgot to tell you that she was involved in the making of the amazing last OK Go video. Enjoy!

If you didn’t know, there is a TigerText app for iPhone, but the details about it are all in the show, told from John. Robin was the one that raised voice for the changes that will happen in the post delivery services in the USA. He was the one pointing that back in the days mail was delivered from postmen TWICE a day.

That was this Episode in a few words that can not describe the great vibes there in the studio, but I am sure you’ll all feel them while listening and/or watching. Have a nice week! Until next time!

Schnauzer Logic Episode 79 is Online!!!

2010-03-28T07:50:00.000-07:00

Sonovista, my friends!!! Yes, I know this posting is very late and as my high school English teacher, Mr. Corbacio, used to say: "My Apologies... All Over The Place!"

In any event our -crack- team in Sofia are hard at work whipping up this weeks show notes (ihopeihopeihope) but in the meantime, here's what you need to know:

1. The show is in all the usual places (and i need to figure out a better way to do this every week!)... iTunes, direct MP3 download, the online player, tin cans and string, smoke signals, 40m SSB, etc...

2. In the studio this week were Coughy McCoughawitz (Bunjo's! John DeKoven who now has his own Blog), Sheri Stevens and Parviz Fathali and joining in from LA, Radio's Jason Nathanson (KNX1070).

3. Our discussions ranged all over the place but we did spend a bit of time talking about the new US health care legislation, Tiger Woods, some television that makes us cry (for good reasons), the possible legalization of marijuana in California, tigertexting, 5 day postal delivery, and more.

4. Our BIG GUEST was DIY artist/author/doer, Becky Stern who discussed writing for both Make and Craft and is amazing and awesome made me think i should probably start getting up earlier.

5. Blah Blah Blah... oh yeah, we now have multiple cameras in the studio and i'm trying an experiment where we record the entire show on video using BoinxTV (amazing software, btw) and you can then see it here:

The show starts out with audio from the room mic but switches over to the board so the whole 2+ hours are not echo'y but clean audio right from the mixing board.

6. And there's more but i'm totally behind the 8 ball (again) - oh... we did hear from Sean and looks like he's gotten a handle on his meds and we're all hopeful that he'll be on the mend soon and may even be back some day and we're asking you'all to send him your love , prayers and good energy.

7. Anyone out there feel like writing a positive review for the podcast on iTunes, we'd be much appreciative!

8. The show phone lines are always open for your voice mail messages (which we're most likely to play on the air) @ 408-335-4755

and that's all i got... until next time
Show Up
Pay Attention
Tell The Truth, and
Don't Be Attached To The Outcome

namaste
robin

Leprechauns Stole My Podcast! (see: Dingos, et al.)

2010-03-17T11:15:00.000-07:00

Sonovista, my friends! Just wanted to give you all a head's up that we're going to take a break this week to celebrate Lá Fhéile Pádraig and recover from a bit 'o' the illness that has overtaken a few of our team (lots of things are green - some intentional, some not!)

See you all next week with the full cast back in the studio and the (secret) premiere of the Schnauzer Logic After-Show TV Party FunTime Program

namaste
robin

Official Episode 78 Show Notes by Boyana Atanasova

2010-03-17T04:51:00.000-07:00

Episode 78 from Schnauzer Logic history was born one week ago and now I will serve you a couple of sentences about what happened in it. It lasted something like two hours and a half and you should know that it was a wonderful show again. The guests at the studio were John, Jeff and Rachel (an old friend of our host Robin and was nice to hear her at this new episode.) Jason was on the “hot line” on the telephone and the singer/songwriter/comedian Ken Turetzky called right before the end of the show, making the last segment of it really interesting and enjoyable.

The main theme of the show this time was again Oscars. We’ve received some wonderful insights from Jason who was on the red carpet. He met some actors, directors, producers, went on some parties, didn’t go to others… But the details are all in the 78^th Episode and you should download it for more info! :)

Robin showed an interesting choice of music this time. We heard some crazy j-pop (Japanese pop) tunes and a bonus song of Ken at the end of the show. Jason’s recent interview with Bill Cosby was funny to hear and it gave a nice start of the conversation between the guests at the studio. We also got some personal information about Rachel – one of the moments of confusion there on Schnauzer Logic.

As I already mentioned it – Episode 78 lasted two hours and a half and it was quite interesting to listen (as always!) so I suggest you grab a copy of it and share your thoughts in the comments box here.

It is a pleasure for me to share with you that I now live in a new small apartment with my boyfriend! So, you now understand why these show notes were delayed (or I hope you do ;)).

Today we will hopefully receive one wonderful new show sooo…. Stay tuned!

Schnauzer Logic Episode 78 is Online!!!

2010-03-11T12:16:00.000-08:00

Sonovista, my friends!!! Schnauzer Logic - Episode 78 is Online and its a humdinger (as the kids say, though the kids seem to be quite a bit older than the photos on their I.D.'s)

Boyana will take care of the show notes in due course, but here's what you need to know:

1. The feed in the iTunes Store has been fixed, so you can again browse for the latest version of the show right in iTunes. A benefit of the fooling-around we had to do with the RSS feed is that the iTunes store again shows each episode's summary, so a win all around! (and we're *still* looking for more reviews and ratings, so if you have an iTunes account and haven't rated and reviewed the show yet, please do so!)

2. The direct feed to grab the entire MP3 file is ::here:: Be advised that this week's episode comes in at a hefty 2hr 30min, so you may want to consume this show in small doses and wait at least 1/2 hour after eating before listening to the next segment.

3. As always, the PodcastPickle player in the right-hand column will let you choose an episode to listen to right in your browser, and if you're a fan of the Legacy player, its all good, too!

4. Sitting in with us this week are two of our "SNTNG" (schnauzer logic: the next generation) regulars, John DeKoven (BUNJOS!) and Jeff Maranhas... and joining us for the first time in a long time is another of my old KSCO radio partners, Rachel Weinstein.

5. Also joining us from LA was KNX's own, Jason Nathanson, who led our discussion wrapping up the film awards season and his coverage of the Film Independent Spirit Awards and the Oscars, with some interesting inside-scoopage on both. Dr. J. then favored us with his encounter with the "Coz" himself, the right honorable, Dr. William H. Cosby, Jr., Ed.D, at the famed Playboy Mansion in LA. Classic audio, Classic Coz, Classic Jason.

6. Finally, as we entered the last segment, Jeff and Rachel had to leave, so JDK and I proceeded to wrap up the show, and opened the phone lines (408/335.4755) and who should surprise us with a ringy/dingy but our good friend, the award winning singer/song writer and all around funny fellow, Ken Turetzky (he of TuretzkySyndrome FaceBook fan page fame and the upcoming Jew Collar Comedy Tour). Turns out ol' Ken knows the ol' Coz, as he scored an interview hisownself many years ago, so we deconstructed Jason's encounter with the Temple legend and discussed comedy, music, comedy-music and musical comedy and if you're really good and listen all the way through the end of the show, past the closing credits, you can hear a special bonus presentation of Ken's neo-classic, "She Won't Blow Me".

7. And finally, all of this week's show music (except for "She Won't Blow Me" and the original "The Cosby Show" theme, "Hikky Burr") came from a collection of the Top 100 J-Pop tunes from 2009. (i've loved this genre of music since my first trip to Japan in 1986, and a good high-energy ジェイポップ tune still makes me smile!)

and that's all i got! we had a good time this week (as we do every week) and look forward to next week when Parviz should be back in the studio, and our guest will be Associate Editor of Makzine and Craftzine, Becky Stern...

so until then:
Show Up
Pay Attention
Tell The Truth
And Don't Be Attached To The Outcome (based on the novel Push by Sapphire)

namaste
robin

All Hail Dalten Duncan

2010-03-08T14:42:00.000-08:00

sonovista, my friends... we hope we'll be able to do a new show this wednesday...

in the meantime, All Hail the Great and Magnificant, Dalten Duncan!

No Show Today (Wed March 3, 2010)

2010-03-03T14:58:00.000-08:00

sonovista, my friends! quick note: due to circumstances beyond my control we won't be recording a new Schnauzer Logic today... i need to check in with the crew to see if we might be able to push this week's show out to tomorrow (thursday) or friday, but nothing certain at this point...

on the plus side, it appears that the iTunes store has finally caught up and the latest episode (including just our interview with Rich Vos) is online.

thanks to boyana for a great set of show notes!
namaste
robin

Official Episode 77 Show Notes by Boyana Atanasova

2010-03-02T14:00:00.000-08:00

Episode 77 was uploaded six days ago and I am now obliged to say – it was hell of a show!!! Wow! Really, it started with the great interview the comedian Rich Vos gave to Robin and when you hear the first twenty minutes of the new podcast, you’ll understand why so many people (including Sheri, Jeff and John in the studio) enjoyed listening to the things he was making up every minute with his amazing sense of humor and with the help of his innate intelligence.

If you never heard about him (like me, before listening the show regularly), now you’ll have a great impression about his professional abilities. That was a funny first segment, Robin, great job! Afterwards many topics were commented including Olympics, the press conference that Tiger Woods made, also the "Shamu" incident, Andrew Koeing and his missing and so on. Twitter was also put on the plate and Robin asked a great question connected with all of the impact these kind of social media are having on the democratic processes. In Episode 77 you will also hear some very nice inclusions from Jeff who gave his point of view about all of the latest Tiger Woods’ issues and Toyota present problems.

It turned out that some of the readers of my show notes didn’t like the way I talked about our host Robin – that I did not use “she”, but “he”. Actually I think that John was the first that talked about this a few months ago and Robin’s opinion then guided me how to continue my writings… So, thank you, Robin! When I first use “he” I did it without any thinking. If it is hurting anybody – please, tell me, and I will change it. No offense!

On the 1^st of March I have send Robin a virtual martenitsa so I am doing this thing again here – for you. I wish you all to be healthy and happy. If you want to learn more about this Bulgarian tradition, you can always read this article.

Schnauzer Logic Radio Show Number 77 was again amazing and surely one of my favorite episodes ever! This is a real Schnauzer, people! Go and listen to it!

Until next time!

Schnauzer Logic Episode 77 is Online!!! Rich Vos Brings The Funny...

2010-02-25T11:48:00.000-08:00

sonovista, my friends... quick update as today (Thurs, Feb 25) is a bit out of control...

first and foremost, Schnauzer Logic Episode 77 is Online in all the usual places:

iTunes, Sidebar Pickle Player, Legacy Player, MP3 Stream, etc. (as of 11:51am PST it hasn't show up on the iTunes music store, yet, but if you're a subscriber it will download automatically, and all the other sources are working fine)

we had a great show yesterday with John DeKoven, Jeff Maranhas and Sheri Stevens in the studio, and our special guest, comedian Rich Vos, on our phone for more than 30 minutes... John knows Rich (he booked him at Bunjos earlier this month and they bonded over golf, two jews engaged in outdoor activities - how bizarre!) and asked him to be a guest on our little show... i know Rich though his stand-up, tv appearances and regular spots on the Opie and Anthony Show on Sirius/XM radio here in the states, but never met or spoke to him prior to pressing down the button on the phone and saying "Sonovista"... so you can gauge the speed and lethal quality of Rich's humor when you realize that about 30 seconds into our call we were all braying like donkeys into our mics, laughing too hard to take control of the show...

i think we upped our game to make the whole of Episode 77 "Vos-worthy", but you be the judge... for those who are fans of Vos and don't want to dig through our entire show, you can download just the interview as an MP3 file ::here::

we talked about a lot more, too, including an update on Tiger Woods, more news from cyberspace and the twitterverse, best-detention-note-ever, an interesting take on the Toyota 'crisis' here in the US, and much more... its a worthy listen and detailed show notes will be forthcoming from Boyana (and i might toss in a few links too)

in the meanwhile, its Plug-O-Rama® time:

Rich Vos on Facebook
Rich Vos on MySpace
Rich's "I'm Killing Here" Comedy CD
Rich's HomePage
and Rich will be at Magooby's Joke House in Baltimore today (2/25), tomorrow and saturday and at the Moehegan Sun Cabaret, next Saturday, March 6

John DeKoven's Bunjos Comedy Sun Cabaret has their weekly Pro/Am Open Mic tomorrow (friday) and headliner Jeff Applebaum this saturday night (2/27)

Mark Zinkle (who?) is a talented young guy on the move and sits in on Saturday's on KMYC from 1-3pm and has his own podcast, The Mark and Stephen Show that's worth a listen

and the rest of us got nothing (as it should be!)

enjoy the rest of your week... more show notes and links to follow... feel free to call the show line and leave your comments... and until next time:

Show Up
Pay Attention
Tell The Truth
And Don't Be Attached To The Outcome

namaste
robin

SchnauzerLogic Goes LIVE @4PM PST Today with our Special Guest, Comedian Rich Vos!

2010-02-24T14:32:00.000-08:00

Schnauzer Logic - Episode 77 - Goes Live @4pm PST today
With our Special Guest, Comedian Rich Vos!

Here's how you can join in:

1. The phone number for the studio number is:

or you can use the Google Voice Widget on the right and be connected to the studio (or leave a voicemail message when we're not on the air!)

2. You can listen to a live stream of the show audio at http://audio.str3am.com:5070/listen.pls

3. You can peek (and listen) inside the studio on USTREAM.
The show page is at http://www.ustream.tv/channel/schnauzerlogic

Official Episode 76 Show Notes by Boyana Atanasova

2010-02-23T02:06:00.000-08:00

Here we go again! Episode 76 of Schnauzer Logic Radio Show is online for a few days, so here are the show notes.

Robin made a wonderful post after the show was recorded, putting maaaany links to the things mentioned in the show, so I will make these notes briefer. Guests at the studio the last Wednesday were John, Jeff and Sheri. Jason was again on the phone and Robin was guiding everybody through the interesting topics chosen for this episode. Nice explanations about some of the sounds that are played at the beginning of every show were made. You will now understand whose voices were used and why were they put there.

During the two hours of the show Jason talked about his “Oscars’ experience”, we’ve heard two of his wonderful reports for KNX radio and receive information about the Kevin Smith case with the Southwest Airlines. Robin wrote that they spent too much time talking about “FatGate”, but when you hear the show, you’ll enjoy their comments. Interesting to hear was the conclusion that was made by Robin about Auto Tune, but if you are interested to know more - download the latest episode. ;)

Also mentioned were Lindsey Vonn and her cover for Sports Illustrated, the new applications for smart phones which are changing the way we perceive information, Hunter Thompson and the angry voice message he left many years ago, the new Kindle Sheri got and the health issues that Sean still has. Jeff was again a great guest with his amazing sense of humor, so hopefully he’ll be back in the studio the next time there is a show. Parviz was not part of the 76^th episode, but I hope that he can make it tomorrow, for example. :)

I said that it will be briefer, so here it is. Nice and short show notes, he he. Don’t forget that our favorite Schnauzer now has a telephone line and you can leave your voice message whenever you want. A live stream is also available soooo – stay tuned!

Until next time!

Schnauzer Logic Episode 76 is Online!!!

2010-02-20T10:58:00.000-08:00

sonovista, my friends! as noted in my quickpost below, Episode 76 is online and can be found in all of the usual places (iTunes, Pickle Player, Legacy Player, MP3 Stream, etc.)

we continued our live audio-stream experiment on ShoutCast, and also created a brand-new USTREAM.tv channel where you can watch us live in the studio while we record... we also waited expectantly for our new show phone to ring, but alas, like the night before the senior prom, no calls, no messages, a pint of Chubby Hubby® our only real friend!

the studio was full with John DeKoven (Bunjos!), Sheri and back for a return visit, our friend Jeff Maranhas, who i mistakenly put in Parviz's chair (mistakenly because as a still-new-member of our team he's learning the flow of the show and by sitting off to the side, he couldn't see my eyes unless i turned to face him, and so didn't have a visual cue of when it was okay to jump in, etc. my bad and even though i've been doing this for a long time i learned something new!)

we also had a visit from our friend, Jason Nathanson (KNX-1070) who discussed his visit to the annual Academy Awards Nominee Luncheon and allowed us to play his two KNX audio reports. we also spoke with Jason about the Kevin Smith/FatGate story and, upon reflection, we spent too much time on this and that was my fault, so apologies! (i think as someone who struggles with weight, i was particularly sensitive, but ultimately its not -that- interesting a story. mi scusi!)

we cold-opened the show with a vintage Parviz Fathali School of Broadcasting promo and also went into the first break with our vintage Dick Cheney Shot A Man In The Face/Dickie Goodman parody.

and now on to the random things we said we would talk about and didn't or links that may explain what the hell we actually were talking about:

1. Sarah Silverman problems at the TED conference
2. Steven Colbert (The Colbert Report) take on the Sarah Palin/Rush Limbaugh/"Retarded" controversy
3. Family Guy/Sarah Palin controversy
4. Kevin Smith story
5. BAFTA's Sunday February 21
6. Whitney Houston "Kiss My Ass" is from the TV show, "Being Bobby Brown" made famous by Joel McHale on the TV show, 'The Soup"
7. Ali Waller (didididah, didididah)
8. Auto Tune is everywhere (including Schnauzer Logic) and here's the most clever use i've seen so far: Autotuning The News
9. Pitchers and Catchers are reporting for Spring Training (Winter is Officially Over)
10. Tracy Morgan (as Pumpkin Escobar) in Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back
11. Chris Rock (as director Chaka Luther King) in Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back
12. Bears/Cubs (the other kind)
13. Olympics time-delayed on US West Coast
14. Don't Make a Fuckin' Maniac Out Of Me
15. Opera Music
16. Sports Illustrated Lindsey Vonn Controversy
17. Kindle 2 - Electric Boogaloo
18. NYT iPad pricing
19. Walk Don't Run (Original Trailer)
20. Hunter S. Thompson - "When the Going gets Weird, The Weird turn Pro."
21. Doctor (Kelso) on Scrubs v. Lt. Bookman on Seinfeld
22. The answer to the Seinfeld trivia question is John Cheever
23. Winnebago Man

fuck... i'm done... (Boyana, you OWE me big!!! instead of a show summary this week (or in addition to), how about a sociological examination of the nature of relationships between the characters on Schnauzer Logic, the limits of humor, and a theory on why we're not more famous (or rich!) - you have 30 minutes... begin!)

and to quote me: "And now you know what you didn't know, when you didn't know what you knew!"

until next time
Show Up
Pay Attention
Tell The Truth
And Don't Be Attached To The Outcome

namaste
robin

...we interrupt this program for a brief announcement...

2010-02-20T09:39:00.000-08:00

sonovista, my friends! yes, Schnauzer Logic Show 76 is online and i'll be putting together some supplemental notes later this morning (with the Official Show Notes by Boyana® coming soon)

but in an intersection of two of my multiple universes (universi?) this morning i spoke with a Bulgarian station on my ham radio... LZ10ARDF, a special event station of the Bulgarian Federation of Radio Amateurs, on 18.13295MHz... first Bulgarian QSO (hamspeak for contact) it was short and scratchy but we heard each other for a brief exchange of call signs. for those interested, this is all due to the increasing sunspot activity we're just beginning to see as Solar Cycle 24 starts to get underway.

here comes the sun, indeed...
more to come...
r

Look For Show 76 Tomorrow (Wednesday)... Live @ 4pm PST

2010-02-16T21:38:00.000-08:00

sonovista, my friends... just a heads up... we plan to record Show 76 tomorrow in the studio with Sheri and Parviz and JohnnyD and Jeff and Jason on the phone from LA... we're gonna try and do the live-stream thing again, so you can call in and be a part of the proceedings!

1. The show number is in the blog below, or you can use the Google Voice Widget on the right and be connected to the studio (or leave a voicemail message when we're not on the air!)

2. We're also going to be streaming the show audio over at http://audio.str3am.com:5070/listen.pls

3. We're also going to be streaming live video from the studio on USTREAM... the show page is at http://www.ustream.tv/channel/schnauzerlogic

no guarantee as to the quality of any of these sources (the podcast is the reference) but we're happy to let you in on the fun while we're in the studio!

see ya all tomorrow!
namaste
robin

We're Taking A Snow Day!

2010-02-10T14:24:00.000-08:00

sonovista, my friends... in honor of the patenting of the fire extinguisher in 1863, the birth of jimmy durante in 1893 and bertolt brecht in 1898 (i wonder if they knew each other?) and the success of "Deep Blue" in beating world chess champion garry kasparov in the first game of their match in 1996, plus the snow storms on the east coast, sheri's new job and the price of cheese, we're taking the week off.

server stats would seem to indicate that a bunch of folks have fallen behind on their listening, so consider this a little chance to get caught up.

i still fully expect Boyana to write a blog post about the lack of show and this very weak excuse!

more to come

stay tuned!

Official Episode 75 Show Notes by Boyana Atanasova

2010-02-09T13:03:00.000-08:00

The 75^th episode of Schnauzer Logic Radio Show matched perfectly with the time when the podcast celebrated its fourth anniversary, so it was even more special than ever. Our dear friend and host Robin prepared for us songs that all contained “75” in their titles, there was open telephone line for everybody who wanted to interrupt the guests at the studio, they were doing everything “live”…and goodies like that. It sounds like everybody had a great fun and I can admit that it was again pleasure to hear these amazing people laughing loud at this 75^th episode.

Parviz, John and Robin were the “core group”. Billy Sunshine called on the phone and Dave tried to interrupt the talking in the studio, but unfortunately something strange happened and the connection with him disappeared. But no worries! Everything was under control – as always when these guys are involved. The fourth anniversary of the show was a great reason for some of the new listeners to get some background information about how everything started back in 2006. These details were nicely connected with some present events that bothered the attention of the friends gathered in the studio. Jason on the phone started an interesting conversation about his recent experience with the Grammy awards. You can download the show or listen it in the player in the right of your screens to find out who were Jason’s favorites at the ceremony. Also, you will learn that Will I Am is a really nice guy who welcomes every journalist interested in listening to his looong story.

This is the right place to say to Parviz that my comment from the last show notes about the “fight” he had with Robin, Sheri and John was just a result from my (sometimes) strange sense of humor. :)

Oscars' nominees were also well presented in Episode 75 and everybody again enjoyed telling the full title of the film “Precious (insert a long senseless title here)”… :)

I should make a note that this show was one of the shortest from my point of view. It lasted something like two hours but when you listen to it the times literally flies. The mood was wonderful, because it was a celebration after all. Hours after the recording of the podcast Robin has written that he was not much satisfied from the final result, but I can only tell this to him – it is all in your head, Robin! Yeah, everything was superb! Really! :)

The Bulgarian national anthem was the song at the background while Parviz told some really kind words about his friendship with Robin, John, Sheri, Sean, Jason and all of the other people involved in the craziness called Schnauzer Logic. Wonderful place for me to say: “Happy birthday, Schnauzer! Be as crazy as you are now! We love as you are. ”

To all of you who have missed to celebrate with Robin - you can still call and leave your “sonovista” to him . :)

Until next time!

Schnauzer Logic Episode 75 (Our 4th Anniversary Show) Is Online!!!

2010-02-05T13:15:00.001-08:00

sonovista, my friends... someone once said that it's not official until i say it on the show blog, so Schnauzer Logic Episode 75 is Online!

as usual you can grab it in iTunes, download the MP3 or listen in the online player on the right! (and for those asking, you can also listen in the "legacy player", though that sounds like the old guys who wave their caps before the MLB AllStar Game)

as to the show itself, well to paraphrase the late Donald Runsfeld:

"As you know, ah, you celebrate your anniversary with the show you have -- not the show you might want or wish to have at a later time. You can have all the show prep in the world and it can (still) be blown up..."

ah Donald... what a douche...

in any event, while it is a great show and i LOVE the energy and comedy that Parviz and John and Jason and even Billy Sunshine brought to the proceedings (and love them all for giving their time and talent to pump my little show), in my mind things were suppose to play out differently... i was also suppose to be thinner and have straight hair, but that didn't work out so good either.

so there you go... after more than 10 years of being back on the radio, i still get depressed when the thing in my head doesn't match the thing that actually happened, no matter how GREAT the thing that actually happened was... this is MY craziness and my instinct is not to jot it down in the show blog... but the other thing i've learned after more than 10 years of being back on the radio is that this is my CRAZINESS, and recognizing that how i'm feeling is not rationally related to how anyone else will experience what we did, helps me to put down the scissors and step away from the kitty... so i will leave in this paragraph in the hope that it may stop some other egomanical narcissist from beating him/herself up for the way life unfolds.

Schnauzer Logic Major Truth #1
Life is a lot like walking a miniature Schnauzer. You pretty much have to go where it wants to take you, or its a miserable experience for everyone involved.

anyway, back to the show... (boyana will have her wonderful detailed show notes as usual, but here are the quickies)

1. we tried something new this week and streamed the studio audio LIVE during the recording. at least a couple of folks seemed to enjoy this, so we'll try to do this again every week. the show audio is an MP3 shoutcast stream (meaning you can listen to it on just about every device, including your iphone) and is slightly-better-than-AM quality audio (not as good as the podcast audio) and you can listen to it at http://audio.str3am.com:5070/listen.pls

2. one reason for streaming the show live is that it means listeners can call us, while we're in the studio, on the new Studio Line:

during the week this number will roll directly over into voicemail where you can leave a comment, but during the live show we'll route this number into the studio so you can interrupt the flow of our conversation (or maybe even add something witty and give Parviz a chance to take a breath!)

3. tunes: so if you listened to the show live you heard 4 tunes, but if you listen to the podcast you'll hear a different 4 tunes (well, two are the same as the live broadcast)... as i was listening to the show during post-production, i realized i didn't like the flow of two of the songs, so i replaced them. the podcast tunes (in order) are:

"75" by Ben Morris and The Great American Boxcar Chorus
"75 and Sunny" by the Ryan Montbleau Band
"High of 75" by Relient K
"Seventy-Five" by Paul Brook

and the two songs we played but replaced were:

"75 Highway" by Lightnin' Hopkins
"75 Again" by The Four Horsemen

4. The Plugs:

John DeKoven's Bunjo's Comedy Club
Jason Nathanson's KNX - AM1070
Billy Sunshine's KRXA - AM540
Parviz Fathali's Preferred Sidekick

5. The corrections:
too numerous to mention and this is why i hired a virtual assistant in the first place!

anyway, many thanks and much love to you all for the voicemails and emails and tweets and notes and donations and kind thoughts and gentle words and prayers and prose and poetry. each week for the past four years a few good friends got into a small room together for a couple of hours to try to make each other laugh and take our turn at driving the universe for a bit of our collective journey... its been a nice way to share our stories and see the stars... and with any luck, in four more years we'll be doing the exact same thing...

so we got that going for us, which is nice.

until next time...

Show Up
Pay Attention
Tell The Truth
Don't Be Attached To The Outcome

namaste
robin

Schnauzer Logic's 4th Anniversary/75th Show goes LIVE at 3PM PST

2010-02-03T14:49:00.000-08:00

***Feb 4 Update***
We recorded the show yesterday but I haven't had the chance to process and upload it to the server yet. Busy day for me, so for now, please just chat among yourselves.
***Feb 4 Update***

sonovista, my friends!

SchnauzerLogic's 4th Anniversary/75th show goes LIVE at 3pm PST - listen live http://bit.ly/SL-LIVE or call the studio phone:

Official Episode 74 Show Notes by Boyana Atanasova

2010-02-02T10:28:00.000-08:00

This time the show has started with a nice pre-talk between the guests at the studio who were Sheri, Parviz and John. Robin decided to give us again the chance to hear what is actually happening “behind the scenes” and the effect was great as always. (No edits, everybody!)

There were many topics in the Schnauzer Logic Radio Show number 74, but here are the main:

- Robin gave us an interesting insight about some of the sounds he is playing at the start of every show. All of you that didn’t know why were they chosen for this purpose – you can get the information from our host every Wednesday from now on

- Parviz was the one who started again the talk about the Leno/Conan television war. ;) There were bunch of funny things told in this segment, but may be the funniest was the fact that Parviz likes more Leno than any other show host on the TV air in the USA. ;) Everybody was arguing with him and (thanks God!) at the end this did not finish with a fight. ;)

- Probably the most popular topic of all was the thing that everybody commented in the last few days over the Internet. Yesss! The announcement of iPad and all of the noise around it. It was amazing to learn that Robin was part of the Apple company right at the beginning of their developing of the first iPod. And guess what? He owns one of the first prototypes of this unique gadget! Robin was also one of the people who decided which colors should be appropriate for the “color series” of the iMac.

- There on the show you can also find a useful tip about a program that shrinks DVDs so that you can transfer them on your iPhone or other kind of mobile device

- The big news this time was the announcement of John’s marriage. The BIG day will be his birthday – 17^th of July. J

- Some health issues were also chatted about in Episode 74, but more details – in the podcast, please. ;)

- If you didn’t know already, there is a clinic for people that have Internet addiction. I hope that no one of us will ever know where the hell this place is.

- Also mentioned in the show were some baseball players, the comedian Rich Vos and his appearance in Starbucks, “guilty pleasures”, some popular tv shows, politics and (of course) Obama, the new job Sheri is getting soon, one funny video of a woman with(out) skirt and so on.

- A great conversation about charity and the ways everybody can help was made right before the end of this chapter of Schnauzer Logic Radio Show history.

That was everything, told briefly.

Episode 75 with the fourth anniversary of the show is coming this week so – stay tuned! J

Schnauzer Logic Episode 74 is Online!!!

2010-01-28T11:38:00.001-08:00

sonovista, my friends! Schnauzer Logic Episode 74 is Online and ready for your listening pleasure! you can find us on iTunes, listen in the online player (on the right) or download the complete MP3 file ::here::

Sheri, Parviz, John DeKoven and I popped into the studio yesterday for a quick go-round of the week's event and all hell broke loose... If you're a regular listener you'll recognize this as a classic "Parviz Needs Airtime" episode... if you're new to the Schnauzer Logic family you'll come to recognize this as a classic "Parviz Needs Airtime" episode. in any event its a show filled with much silliness and more than a few moments of thoughtful discourse (but mostly silliness), all leading up to next week's 4th anniversary show!

Boyana is already hard at work on the show notes and I'm trying to ~~con~~ persuade a big time/big deal guest to join us in our celebration, so stay tuned, and in the meanwhile feel free to call our brand-new studio voicemail and leave us an anniversary message!

(oh, and if you're still looking for links to reliable Haiti Relief charities, check out the post below for Episode 73)

until next time:
Show Up
Pay Attention
Tell The Truth, and
Don't Be Attached To The Outcome

namaste
robin

Official Episode 73 Show Notes by Boyana Atanasova

2010-01-26T11:47:00.000-08:00

Hello everyone!

The new year has come and so the new show notes are back on track! 2010 started some weeks ago, but the health issues our friend and host Robin had didn’t allow him to record his wonderful show earlier. However, these are the show notes of Schnauzer Logic Radio Podcast Number 73.

This time Robin realized that in a few weeks it will be the fourth birthday of the show. Doesn’t this impress you? J But let’s see what happened in Episode 73. It was called a “mini schnauzer” because of its length (which was actually something around hour and a half!) and there in the studio were only Robin and Sheri. Jason was the one on the phone, explaining his recent experiences on the ceremony of the Golden Globes and all of the interesting stuff that happened in the media in the past few days. I should make a note that there were many days there in northern California with bad weather which was the first topic in the conversation between Robin and Sheri. However, don’t be upset – they are fine and hopefully we will all get a nice next Schnauzer episode just in a few hours.

For everybody that didn’t “received” the last messages of our host here on the blog – he is now almost recovered from his kidney surgery and sounds amazingly on the podcast even though he doesn’t feel like everything is back to normal… yet.

This time Jason made wonderful segment about the ceremony of the Golden Globes where he actually was. Yes, right there on the red carpet! He was reporting what was happening there – how many the boobies are and how great is Olivia from House M.D. ;) He and Robin made a list of the winners and talked quite long time about all of the films mentioned there. There on Episode 73 you can hear the names of Meryl Streep, Robert Downey Jr. and Mo'nique. Also mentioned were Dexter, Glee, Up In the Air, Up and… of course – Avatar.

The tragedy in Haiti was also one of the most important topics this time and while Jason told us about the young journalist his radio sent there, I was thinking that I didn’t actually chose the right profession – to be a journalist… but you know what? Bad things happen and the only thing we can make is to find a proper way to help people who suffer from them. It is that simple.

Also, there was a clear explanation about the Conan/Leno/NBC Late Night Reality Wars that are probably widely commented in the USA and you can watch really interesting and funny videos from the links Robin gave in one of the previous posts. Except for that, we now understood that Jason will finally accept his award for his radio journalistic achievements.

This was it. The 73^rd Episode of Schnauzer Logic Radio Show. A mini schnauzer is not the way I will describe it, because it was a real pleasure to hear again the voices of these people and their laugh “live” on air. A great beginning of the new year, which should (and is already!) better than the previous!

Quick Reminder: SAG (Screen Actors Guild) Awards Tonight - Saturday Jan 23, 2010

2010-01-23T09:28:00.000-08:00

sonovista, my friends... for those of you who are as obsessed with the awards season as we are, a reminder that tonight (Saturday, January 23, 2010) the Screen Actors Guild Awards are presented live (here in the US) at 8pm EST/5pm PST on both TNT (Turner Network Television) and TBS (the SuperStation)...

given my amazingly crappy picks at the Golden Globes, i won't even bother to try and predict the winners here (Basterds, Bridges, Bullock, Waltz, Mo'Nique, Dexter, Modern Family, Laurie, Margulies, David, Fey, Bacon, Dee, Star Trek, The Closer), but you may want to test your skill.

enjoy your weekend and let's be careful out there!
namaste
robin

Schnauzer Logic Episode 73 is Online!!!

2010-01-22T12:26:00.000-08:00

sonovista, my friends!!! in case you just happened to be wondering, there is a new episode of Schnauzer Logic available for your listening pleasure... both the weather and my emotional health were less than ideal, but sheri made her way over and jason managed to keep from passing out, and together the three of us tossed together a little show (a mini-schnauzer, if you will) where we discussed the Golden Globe Awards, previewed the Academy Awards and took great delight in dissecting the Conan/Leno/NBC Late Night Reality Wars... plus a whole bunch more and some tasty tunes.

as always you can grab the show in iTunes ::here::

you can also find the direct MP3 download link ::here::

and you can listen online in the pickle player on the right.

our dear friend, Boyana, will be providing detailed show notes in due course, but in the meantime, here are some relevant links we discussed:

Haiti Relief:
Unicef
Red Cross
Top Rated Charities at Charity Navigator

Chinese Virtual Reality Video of Conan/Leno/Late Night Story
Original Mandarin
English Translation

IFC Independent Spirit Awards (Friday, March 5, 2010 - Jason was correct!)

Andy Borowitz - The Borowitz Report and Twitter

Gawker - The Late Night Wars (all video from every show bashing every other show)

KNX Morning News

Aunt Fran Bennet - Fran's Classics Rock Podcast

and that's all i got for now... thanks to all for the generous donations! much appreciated... and if you feel the spirit, some 5-star reviews on the iTunes Music Store would also be most lovely.

more to come, but until then:
Show Up
Pay Attention
Tell The Truth and
Don't Be Attached To The Outcome

namaste
robin

67th Annual Golden Globe Picks

2010-01-17T11:58:00.000-08:00

sonovista, my friends... at home recovering from my med stuff, i'm feeling better every day but probably have another week to go before i feel like myself again (right now i feel like a cross between (insert first funny name here) and (insert contrasting funny name here).

in any event we're into awards season and tonight is the 67th Golden Globes... usually a pretty good show (as alcohol is served to the attendees) this year its being hosted by Ricky Gervais who seriously doesn't seem to give a shit about anything, so i'm hopeful that there will be some spontaneous entertainment.

IMDB.com has a great one-page PDF ballot you can download, fill in and print to keep track of the winners, and you can grab yours here.

i've filled out my own and am posting this online at 12:04pm PST (you can see it full size by clicking on the image)

hopefully we'll be able to do a show this wednesday and see how well i did...

until then, thanks to all for the prayers and well wishes on my speedy recovery... they seem to be working!

namaste
robin

NBC Leno/O'Brien Fiasco - I Wanna Do A Show SO BADLY!

2010-01-10T15:11:00.000-08:00

Sonovista, my friends! well, here i am on a sunday afternoon reading through the hundreds of tweets from journalists at the Winter Television Critics Association meeting and their early morning "discussion" with NBC/Universal honcho Jeff Gaspin about the fate of the Jay Leno show and The Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien and there's SO MUCH to talk about (the words 'stupid', 'boneheaded', and 'duh' sure to be overused) but we've got no show this week and perhaps next week as well... So you'll just have to read the excellent reporting of these fine folks, hold some good thoughts for my fast recovery from this coming tuesday's kidney surgery (they're going to send an X-Wing Fighter into the small utility tunnel, navigate through to the caverns of Urea, force open the security gate leading to the land of Kidnea (Right Kidnea, not the communist Left Kidnea) and then use their sonic cannons to blast the rebel base that's been holed up in Right Kidnea, and then beat a hasty retreat. I'm so excited to be a part of this fantastic operation!

In the meantime, here's the NBC coverage that will make you feel so much smarter about yourself, regardless of your IQ!

namaste
robin

Aaron Barnhart's TV Barn
Alan Sepinwall
The Futon Critic
TV By The Numbers

Quick Plug for HTML Kit Favicon Generator

2010-01-05T07:37:00.000-08:00

sonovista my friends! if you look in your browser bar you'll (hopefully) see that the little "Blogger" B logo has been replaced by a tiny schnauzer-behind-the-mike logo... this is called a "favicon" and the HTML Kit folks make it super easy to generate your own from a photo or your twitter icon or just about anything except peanuts (apparently they're allergic to peanuts, which aren't actually nuts, you know, but legumes, which are a kind of fruit. just like me (huh?) wow... i got really lost there...) anyway, if you want your own favicon, just check out the HTML Kit Favicon Generator.

Happy New Year! and a Little Gift...

2010-01-02T13:16:00.000-08:00

sonovista, my friends and the Happiest of New Years! hope you're all enjoying the new decade and almost done recovering from the holidays (or should i say HoliDaze? LOL, ha ha ha)

oy

in any event, i'm back from Vegas and we'll try to do a show this coming wednesday before i take a (fingers-crossed-very-short) medical break... i'll try to put up the first AirPlayReplay Directors Cut episode in the next week and will post a link here when its online.

in the meanwhile, Santa brought me a new mac and in going through and transferring files and projects i came across the video of my appearance on the old game show Win Ben Stein's Money... for those who don't know, WBSM was a "game" show on Comedy Central where three contestants would compete against each other and ultimately against Ben himself in order to "Win Ben Stein's Money" ($5000)... i tested and auditioned and got on and didn't win, but had a great time! what happened was (yah, there's a story) during round 1 i had some problems with my buzzer... at the break i called over the exec producer and said i was having trouble, but this is a common complaint (and usually not valid, since once someone 'buzzes' in the other buzzers are locked out. i knew i was first on more than a few questions (i had been practicing at home with a pen) but the exec producer blew me off... i was in the lead after the first round and got to play the second round... because one of the other contestants was so tall they moved us (ben is always at the end) so i moved from the left hand side to the middle and the other fellow moved to my station... as the game started again there was a question where both ben and i answered wrong... the cohost, Nancy Pimental, said, "well, Doug, why don't you try" and Doug said, "i'm trying to press the buzzer but its not working!"

AhA!

stop tape, send in the electricians (or someone like them) and get ready to start again... only during the break i went over to the exec producer and said, "see... i told you the buzzer wasn't working"

now i've gone back and calculated and if i had been able to get the extra two questions in the first round i knew the answer to but wasn't able to respond because of the broken buzzer, i would have had more points than Doug and gotten to play in the final round head-to-head against ben... but in the real world they don't go back, they simply invite you to return to play again (an advantage since you already know what to expect, aren't nervous, etc.)

this was fine with me and i left happy with lovely parting gifts.

cut forward 4 months and i'm getting ready to do the very first AirPlay show (see, it all ties together)... i needed a great guest for my very first show and contacted Ben to see if (a) he remembered me and (b) if he would come on the air (he had a connection with Santa Cruz as he was a student/taught/something at UC Santa Cruz)... ben said yes and we had a lovely and entertaining time and you'll be able to hear it when AirPlay is online again...

but, when the fall rolled around and they were getting ready to start production, again, of Win Ben Stein's Money, the producers called me to go over my credentials and confirm all my details and i let slip that Ben had been the first guest on my new talk show... uh oh!... contact outside of the show is forbidden and they were going to have to check with the lawyers... which meant i was fucked because there is no constitutional right to be on a game show and no percentage for the lawyers to risk letting me on and having to answer for a claim of collusion... so that ended my game show career, but a bad quicktime transfer of a VHS tape still exists and you can see it in four parts at the links below:

Part 1 - RDG on Win Ben Stein's Money
Part 2 - RDG on Win Ben Stein's Money
Part 3 - RDG on Win Ben Stein's Money
Part 4 - RDG on Win Ben Stein's Money

i really wanted a photo with Ben and so after our game was over i asked the producer if i could have one... he said ben didn't usually take photos with the contestants (time thing, i think... they taped a bunch of shows and it would take a lot of time), but he did go over and ask and i could see ben turn around and the fellow pointed at me and ben shook his head, 'yes'... i had to wait through the next game and that's an interesting story, too, watching the game from the audience after you've just played, but that's for a future Schnauzer Logic show... in any event i want to again thank Ben for being on AirPlay and taking this wonderful photo, for Jason who took the audition and test with me and Jason's parents who let me sleep on the couch in their basement (at the age of 43, nothing weird about that!) and to Misha who came down to LA with me to the taping as moral support, gal friday and official Schnauzer photographer... nice shot, misha!)

and that's it for now... my ears are ringing and i need to answer them (hahaha... tinnitus humor... never gets old or any less depressing!)

my new years resolution?

Show Up
Pay Attention
Tell The Truth
Don't Be Attached To The Outcome

namaste
robin

Official Episode 72 Show Notes by Boyana Atanasova

2009-12-21T09:24:00.000-08:00

Schnauzer Logic Radio Show

Episode 72:

Sonovista, friends! Here are the next show notes of Schnauzer Logic Radio Show. This time we will discuss Episode 72 and almost everything that happened in it.

I will start with the fact that this was quite serious episode, but as Robin said “Don't worry... we'll change all that in 2010!” It was talked a lot about who should be the man of the decade, while this was the last show for 2009. The guests at the studio – Sheri and Parviz gave their opinion and it was fun to hear their arguments about the list of people Robin was giving them from an online poll.

Robin also gave us some details about his experience as guest at “Gender Blender” on KBOO.fm last week. He didn’t actually had enough time to tell the story of his transitions – the thing that was the reason he is there on the phone, so this interview didn’t turn out as good as he expected. Questions from the host there that were “nobody’s business” pissed him off. However, he found on that program some really nice people he would love to know better. They shared some of his thoughts so it was not so bad experience after all.

Jason was the first guest on the phone and he received a special song about “Hanukkah” – as present from Robin who was again creative with the audio editing. ;) In spite of the great discussion about the nominees for the “Golden Globe” prize Jason made in this episode, he surprised us all with the news that he won the “Golden Mike” award. Congratulations, Jason! This is really awesome! In Episode 72 you can hear the names of the most of the nominated films (for the Globes) this year and the nice comments from everybody in the studio.

Important part of the show this time was the radio journalist from KCBS Doug Sovern whose report about AIDS in Africa (the first part of it; the other can be found here – on the bottom left) was played in Schnauzer Logic. It was horrifying to hear how many problems people there have, but at the same time it was important to know that slowly things are changing for good. Part of the discussion with Doug was the type of thinking and the work of Barack Obama, who is always a nice subject of discussion in the show. Guess why? I can say that Doug was the highlight of Episode 72 and we all hope that he can be part of the show again!

Sheri shared her thoughts about China and the change in the country for the last ten years. She had the opportunity to visit some of the destinations there. The people living there were amazing with the great effort they were making to change the status quo.

It is necessary to say that after a great talk for “Man Of The Decade” was chosen again Barack Obama. It was logic while there in the list were names such as those of a bicyclist and a writer of stories about boys flying on their magic sticks, right Parviz?! ;)

Great holiday wishes were made by everybody in the studio and I am sure they will become true when we know that Schnauzer Logic will continue with its first episode for the new decade in the first week of January 2010. Your fingers should be crossed in the second week, because then will be Robin’s kidney surgery. We all wish him a lot of courage and good health for the years coming!

From my point of view – that was it, the 72^nd Episode of Schnauzer Logic Radio Show. Until next year! Gouranga!… or in other words: Be Happy!

Interesting Artifact and the Podcastification of "AirPlay"

2009-12-19T23:17:00.000-08:00

sonovista, my friends... well, having spent my entire Saturday working on setting up this new blog site i've run across some interesting old Schnauzer Logic and AirPlay artifacts.

for those who don't know, in the beginning there was Schnauzer Logic and today there's Schnauzer Logic, but for 10 weeks in the Summer of 2001, i hosted the 9am-11am/M-F morning show on KSCO. the powers that be thought that the moniker "Schnauzer Logic" was too silly (they wanted Cafe Santa Cruz), and so i came up with a bunch of alternatives... one was SonoVista (yes, the show was going to be called SonoVista - "Sonos" for sound, and "Vista" for an expansive view of things you wouldn't normally see, so SonoVista for a broad expanse of things you wouldn't normally hear - get it?)... when i suggested SonoVista the powers that be looked at me like a poodle trying to figure out a card trick, so i went back to the drawing board and came up with AirPlay (we're playing around on the air... right? right?!?) and "repurposed" SonoVista as a new greeting...

anyway, i had an actual producer for AirPlay, the legendary Jodi Lee, and after a week or so it was clear that a lot of our guests had no idea how to be guests, at least not on the radio... so i came up with a list of 10 tips, that i thought every talk radio guest should know (ie, #2 - Despite our best efforts, AirPlay is a radio show, so no one will be able to see you shake your head 'yes' or 'no' in response to a question.)

and here it is (you can click on the image to make it bigger):

now i used to run the old AirPlay shows as a low-bitrate stream on a shoutcast channel, but haven't done that in a few years... but i'm thinking that what i'll do is release all 50 shows/100 hours (including the interviews with ben stein, sugar ray leonard, chubby checker, gary coleman, etc) as a "Directors Cut" podcast, complete with introductory commentary, perhaps one a week during 2010. Sean was on those shows (he sat in almost every friday) as was John DeKoven and Jason and "Cranky Dog" Chip Street and Parviz and a bunch of other folks you may know from SL. so for those who have been looking for access to the back catalog, this will be your Christmas gift for 2010! (i also have all of the old Schnauzer Logic shows from KSCO as well as the live shoutcast streams we did before the invention of podcasting and may find a way to toss those up, too... they're a bit rougher, but still have some very funny bits.)

and now i head off to bed.

hope you all have your holiday shopping done, especially our friends on the east coast where an early storm has dumped almost a foot of global warming white stuff on the ground. Ho Ho Ho!

namaste
robin

You Found Us! - Feel free to park anywhere...

2009-12-19T14:39:00.001-08:00

sonovista, my friends, and welcome to the Schnauzer Logic Podcast blog, 2.0.

as you can see things are still under construction (we don't have all the buttons up yet and are still moving over the older blog posts), but the podcast player from Podcast Pickle is working, so it already feels like home.

any comments or suggestions about what you'd like to see here would be most welcome!

show notes for Episode 72, our last of the year, should be arriving on a flight from Bulgaria any day now and will be posted straight away! then look for us to return in the new year.

i may post other random stuff along the way, so check back now and then.

namaste
robin

Schnauzer Logic Episode 72 is Online!!!

2009-12-17T09:06:00.000-08:00

Sonovista, my friends! Well the last Schnauzer Logic for the year is recorded, encoded and trussed up like a Christmas Ham! I'll leave it to Boyana to provide the detailed show notes, but we discuss my recent appearance on Gender Blender, the entire description and audio of which can be found here kboo.fm/GenderBlender along with links to the guests, Donna Rose, Sassafras Lowery (who was VERY cool) and Joanne Herman.

We then finally get around to Jason Nathanson who discusses the nominations for the upcoming Golden Globe awards (Jay will be on the red carpet again this year), his newly announced win of a Golden Mike award, and other assorted nonsense (including a mashup of Alexandra Burke and Bill O'Reilly that goes on waaay too long!)

We also visit with Doug Sovern of KCBS and play part 1 of his 3 part series of AIDS in Africa and the work of the doctors of Faces Kenya and have a chance to discuss his experiences on this and other difficult stories. We also chat about the top/bottom stories of the last decade.

Lots of holiday tunes and much more. A well balanced Schnauzer Logic episode, it actually sounds like we know what we're doing and this could be a real radio show! Don't worry... we'll change all that in 2010!

Much love to you all for the happiest, healthiest and most prosperous of Holiday Seasons and the New Year! See you in the future, which has already begun!

namaste
robin

Welcome to Gender Blender Listeners

2009-12-15T19:12:00.000-08:00

sonovista, my friends! (the traditional Schnauzer Logic greeting)... if you're here because you just heard me babble on incoherently for about 10 minutes on KBOO and Gender Blender, welcome... this is the show blog for a weekly 2hr comedy/pop culture/lifestyle/political/music show hosted by me and a rotating group of friends (they're always friends, they're just not always in the studio or on the phone!)... as i am 'trans' this technically qualifies as a 'trans' show (its true... i looked it up in the big book of 'wha!?!')... but as i was a talk radio host before my transition, after my transition, after my second transition and after my third transition (pant pant pant) this is first and foremost an entertainment show (which is the kind of show i love doing).. i have a unique perspective on gender based on my life experience, but that's not what the show is about... in truth, its about finding ways to make ourselves, each other, and the audience laugh, think, and laugh some more.

check out some of our recent shows (we've started up again after an extended break), or dig through the archives for our interviews with Mort Sahl, Jann Karam, J. Keith VanStratten, Lisa Parade, Bobby Kelton, Taylor Negron or any of the musicians, comedians or authors we've interviewed. as i used to say in my KSCO promos: if you're not doing anything better on a saturday night, it wouldn't kill you to listen.

strong recommendation indeed!

namaste
robin

Official Episode 71 Show Notes by Boyana Atanasova

2009-12-13T13:03:00.000-08:00

Here we are – almost at the middle of December when Episode 71 of Schnauzer Logic radio show is already online. Let’s see what happened this time. Guests at the studio were Sheri, John and Parviz. This time no “phone guests”, but the talk with these people was as interesting and funny as always.

The show started with Robin’s story about his experience with listening short wave radio stations in the beginning of the 70s. Surprisingly for me, he knew a lot about stations such as this in Sofia or in Moscow, because he was a kid that enjoyed listening to music and talking from abroad at his backyard. Sending postcards to these programs and receiving an answer from countries such as Albania and Romania was also something likely that happened to Robin when he was a bit younger. ;)

This time we also heard my first audio report for Schnauzer Logic… It was actually my reading of the previous show notes, but it looked like everybody enjoyed what I’ve made. Next time I will try to do something different as I already have some suggestions from Robin, but we’ll see what will happen.

Main part of Episode 71 was Parviz’s “List of dead people: 2009”. Anything strange in this? Noooope. And, by the way – this was the part were everybody laughed for a veeery long time. Again. However – there were Walter Cronkite, Les Paul, Patrick Swayze, John Updike, Natasha Richardson and many others (someone said Michael Jackson? ;)) in this list. Sheri, John and Robin gave their opinions and impressions about everybody mentioned, pointing at Parviz that he is not well prepared for this segment. ;) On the day after the show was recorded Robin gave a long list with errors that they all made in the comments – a fact that increased the funny element in all this. Listen to the show and you’ll see… [Robin's Comment: Boyana is being very kind in her brief description of this segment. For the record, although Parviz was in a state of panic that we were going to cut him off, the actual discussion of Dead 2009 lasted for almost exactly 50 minutes, including one song break, or just under 50% of the show... I'm just saying...]

One of the nicest surprises this time was the info that someone has made a donation for the Schnauzer Logic Radio Show. So kind of you, whoever you are! This was a reason for Robin to give us advice to donate as much as we can afford and whenever we have ability to do it. An advice that also has my strong support!

Other top ten lists of 2009 were put in the conversation along with a short talk about saying “Merry Christmas” and the message people sent with it to others.

Episode 71 ended some minutes after its second hour without John in the studio. He left before the last segment of the show which Robin dedicated to his thoughts about the experience being transsexual and the process of gender transition. The death of Mike Penner was the reason he started writing some of his own experiences that will probably end up as an interesting book. This theme was also the reason Robin was invited to be a guest on "Gender Blender" next Tuesday, December 15th – on KBOO.fm.

Being happy depends on you and no one could not tell you what should be the way of your life. This is a nice way to end these show notes. Don’t forget that I am saying with them that Episode 71 of the history of Schnauzer Logic is online and waiting for you!

Again – wonderful show, a lot of laugh, good friends, nice music and positive vibes – all in Episode 71.

Until next time!

Go Elf Yourself (The Schnauzer Logic Version)

2009-12-11T13:54:00.001-08:00

Thanks to Sheri, we've all been "Elf'd"... check out the video in the new SchnauzerLogic Video Player over in the sidebar.

Episode 71 Erratta

2009-12-10T13:47:00.000-08:00

Sonovista, my friends! The official show notes from Boyana will be coming in due course, but in listening back to Episode 71 it appears that our grasp on the truth was looser than usual... this thread is a place to record various errata:

1. John Hughes did not write or direct Chinatown. Chinatown was directed by Roman Polanski and written by Robert Towne and Roman Polanski.

2. John Updike did not write Watership Down. Watership Down is a heroic fantasy about a small group of rabbits written by British author Richard Adams. John Updikes "Rabbit" series includes Rabbit Run, Rabbit Redux, Rabbit is Rich, Rabbit At Rest and Rabbit Remembered. Unlike Watership Down, the 'Rabbit" series is not about a rabbit.

3. Walter Cronkite did not end his newscasts with, "That's my story and i'm sticking to it". That phrase was recited by Colin Quinn as anchor of the Weekend News Update on Saturday Night Live. Chevy Chase signed off by saying, "I'm Chevy Chase and You're Not". Cronkite said, "And That's The Way It Is (insert date) - For CBS News this is Walter Cronkite. Good Night".

4. Bea Arthur first appeared on TV in the role of Maude as Edith Bunker's cousin, Maude Finley in the series All In The Family.

5. In my discussion about moving the show blog from tblog to blogger i completely 'f'd' up and actually described the process of moving the blog from blogger to tblog. I attribute this total mental collapse to either (a) a micro-stroke or (b) alpha particles from outer space. In either event, the best way to make sure you always arrived at the show blog is to bookmark www.SchnauzerLogic.com

6. A few hunger-related charities that are highly rated as having low operating expenses/overhead and using the greatest percentage of their income for direct charitable purposes:

Action Against Hunger

Feeding America's Hungry Children

Mazon: A Jewish Response To Hunger

Sacred Heart Community Service

7. More info as i get it but right now it looks like i'm going to be a guest on "Gender Blender" next Tuesday, December 15th. The show runs from 6pm to 7pm pacific time and i'm scheduled to be on for 10 minutes in the second half hour. You can listen live on KBOO.FM

8. It's Larry "Bubbles" Brown and not Larry's Bubble Brown. More alpha particles, obviously.

to be continued...

The Photograph Parviz Didn't Want You To See...

2009-12-10T10:06:00.000-08:00

studio shot from Episode 71 - a protective order prohibits me from telling you what Parviz was hiding.

SchnauzerLogic Episode 71 is Online!!!

2009-12-09T21:04:00.000-08:00

Sonovista, my friends! Episode 71 is online. How to describe the episode? Parviz, Parviz, Parviz! (hmmm mmmm mmmm!)

Show notes from Boyana will most certainly follow as Summer follows Spring!

until next time:

Show Up
Pay Attention
Tell The Truth and
Don't Be Attached To The Outcome

namaste
robin

Official Episode 70 Show Notes by Boyana Atanasova

2009-12-07T09:01:00.000-08:00

This time, the show started really amazing! Robin decided to begin Episode 70 of Schnauzer Logic with the Bulgarian national anthem. What a great surprise for me and a wonderful gesture of our host, buddy and pal! :p

Guests at the studio were Sheri Stevens and John De Koven. Ops, I almost forgot Jeff Maranhas just like Robin did several times with John. On the phone there was a talk with Sean and Jason. As Robin said, Episode 70 was “politics free” so pop culture was the general topic of the show. Main role was given to Tiger Woods and the voice mail message that he sent to his lover. Everybody enjoyed commenting this strange message while Jason made a material about it on the KNX radio.

Pop culture this time meant the wedding of Chelsea Clinton, TV shows that everybody in the studio and on the phone watches, a scene from “The Big Lebowski”, Ivana Trump, Samuel L. Jackson (<=this link is NOT safe for work!) and so on… It was surprising to know how many hours Robin watches television per week! All of the guests made their comment on what they like and don’t like from the list of famous shows Robin gave them.

Interesting twist in this conversation was the talk about men and women in their 40s or 50s who decided to discover themselves as gays or lesbians. The main point of view that everybody shared was this one - people don’t usually look strange on such things when they happen at that age.

Sean (? I don’t make great difference between Sean and Jason’s voice, sorry!)… hmm, I am not sure that it was actually Sean, but however – he shared his experience in writing a script for a horror movie. If we trust him – “horror” people are not as geeky as we think they are. He received many ideas from fans of this genre and now he expects a good result of his hard work from the past few months. He was the one that said that there is money for such project so everybody wished him a good luck with it.

Robin was the next one who revealed news about Schnauzer Logic. He is now looking for second virtual assistant who will help him made an application for iPhone. It is supposed to be an easy way to have access to all of the podcasts recorded under the mark of Schnauzer Logic. If everything goes right – it may help everyone who is interested to read also this kind of show notes after the show is recorded and put online.

It was quite an amazing to understand that Parviz was the man who stopped a flight some years ago and Robin was helping him getting out of the trouble he had. The story is getting even more hilarious when you hear the details on Episode 70, while you reading the news posted about it here and here.

Jeff in the studio was also one of the attractions this time. Except for his sense of humor and funny way of interrupting others’ conversation, he told a strange story that happened to him not long ago. There were pajamas, handcuffs and police involved, but if you want to know the details – just check Episode 70 online.

And that was all. Actually – not all, but almost everything interesting that happened in Schnauzer logic radio show – Episode 70.

Until next time:

Show Up
Pay Attention
Tell The Truth and
Don't Be Attached To The Outcome!

SchnauzerLogic Episode 70 is Online!!!

2009-12-02T21:39:00.000-08:00

Sonovista, my friends! Episode 70 is signed, sealed and delivered to the iTunes Store for your enjoyment, so start enjoying already! Sheri, John DeKoven and my buddy Jeff Maranhas in the studio, Jason and Sean on the phone... lots of laughs and great music... and new show notes by Boytana Atanasova coming soon!

in the meanwhile:

Show Up
Pay Attention
Tell The Truth and
Don't Be Attached To The Outcome!

namaste
robin

Official Episode 69 Show Notes by Boyana Atanasova

2009-11-30T12:55:00.000-08:00

Here we are – at the beginning of December 2009 and Episode 69 of Schnauzer Logic is online for almost a week. From where should we start this time? It is a great obligation for me to say that I (Boyana from Bulgaria, you didn’t forget this, right?) will be the “official archivist” of the radio show. Ta-da-daaa! In Episode 69 I even had my first world premiere of the notes written for the 68^th episode of Schnauzer Logic. But except the fact that something like 20 minutes from the show were dedicated to my work and the attempts to work of the other girl that was supposed to be a virtual assistant, there were plenty other interesting themes included.

This time Robin had only one guest in the studio and this was Sheri Stevens. Also, there on the phone (again) were Jason and Sean. The show started with interesting dialogue about BoingBoing.net. This online media which has a huge fan in the face of Robin, has published an intriguing material about the events before, during and after the attack on the 9/11. Wikileaks was also part of that conversation so you can try and find more information about this interesting project. Of course, if you are not in a country where the site is banned like I thought for Bulgaria, because it was not opening here for quite a long time (but it works now, though).

Also, in Episode 69 there was another reeeeaaally great thing – Sheri has a theme song at last! And what a great song this is. J Sean also heard a song that will be dedicated to his participation in the show, but something wasn’t right with its lyrics, huh Robin? ;)

Schnauzer Logic loves Twitter so we heard again a great conversation about the advantages of this social network. It won’t be fair to not mention that Jason told us that he isn’t really a fan of Twitter but his opinion was a wonderful chance to hear a nice discussion about the problems of the new media and the different types of communication between the journalists and the audience. “There is too much information there on Twitter”, said Jason and who can argue with him?

The other usual suspects (no, it is not soviet at all! :P) were also captured in the two hours of Episode 69. Jason, Sean, Sheri and Robin talked about Obama and his popularity, about the success of Oprah (who has a great picture with Jason) and the effect on the American society of actions such as Adam Lambert’s performance during the AMA ceremony.

This show was recorded only a day before Thanksgiving so there was also a time to talk about the holiday turkey and the vegetarian way of life. Jason said he is no longer vegetarian, while Robin is still “white, Buddhist, VEGETARIN”…

Some serious talk was made about an interview with Americans that went to meet Sarah Palin and it became clear that the radio show guests are not really happy of the way people (do not) understand politics and politicians. To love or fear someone? To love or to respect? That was the type of questions that Robin and Sean decided to discuss at a certain time. It sounds like it was a bit boring but it was not – I can assure you. Just listen online the podcast or download it. Black Friday was also mentioned once or twice, but you will get all of the comments about it in the “real” show.

At the end of Schnauzer Logic this time we heard Alice's Resaturant in enterity. That was all. Two hours put in a few paragraphs, which can’t represent the nice vibes that the radio show again managed to send us. We now wait number 70! Stay tuned!

Official Episode 68 Show Notes by Boyana Atanasova

2009-11-28T11:20:00.000-08:00

Sanovista, friends!

It is a great pleasure to write the show notes of SchnauzerLogic after such a long break. And the pleasure is getting even greater when we know that Episode 68 from the history of the show was A LOT of fun.

All of the “suspects”, our dear friends were there – at Robin’s house or on the phone line. Sheri, Parviz, John DeKoven, Sean, Jason and Ken. All (or almost?) every best friend of SchnauzerLogic Radio show was there to participate in this first chapter after a rest that lasted more than anybody has ever expected.

But let we focus on what was all about in Episode 68;

1. As we already mentioned it - LOTS of laugh and fun - all the time and about everything. Having fun in front of the microphone is not something new for SchnauzerLogic, but this time it was really hard for all of the people invited to stay serious for at least a couple of minutes.

2. However, there was still time for quite serious themes including politics, social networks, pop culture, new music, Bluetooth devices (all of you that didn’t listen the show yet, what are you waiting for?!) and so on. Sean and Jason gave interesting information about their life and work – everything recent that happened with them. If we have to be honest – we have tried to make a picture of what was going on in the life of everybody on Episode 68 for the past 18-20 months. Obama, Twitter, Facebook, the lack of popularity for MySpace, did we forget something? Oh, Michael Jackson’s death, of course. Everybody thinks the same about this case – it was THE event of the year! However - all of the guests gave their opinion about the recent events in the USA (including Jay Leno’s recent attempts), while they were not laughing their asses off!

3. John introduced his comedy show center – the Bunjo’s. We’re now pretty sure that this place is worth visiting and while you are figuring out when to go – you can become fan of its Facebook profile.

4. Ken Turetzky on the phone gave us interesting information about his recent work or should we say it “lack” of work? ;) Also, we realized that he had serious health problems, which (thank God!) are now gone. Also, we found some time to hear one of his songs – “Let Love In” which can be found on his official site.

5. Parviz is no longer a plumber because the “plumber guild” is not doing its job very well. But we are confident that he will find a better job without having to take money “under the table”, as he said he can.

6. Finally but not by importance – Robin gave us an important advice how to survive when we have serious issues such as his health problems from the last couple of years. Total ignorance of bad people and acceptance of yourself – in the way that you want to be, no matter what anybody else is thinking of you.

That was Episode 68 from SchnauzerLogic Radio show just in few words, but they can not describe the joy to be back online. The pleasure was indescribable!

Until next time!

Show Up
Pay Attention
Tell The Truth
And Don't Be Attached To The Outcome

Schnauzer Logic Episode 69 is Online!!!

2009-11-25T21:24:00.000-08:00

Sonovista, my friends! Schnauzer Logic Show Number 69 is online! we recorded it tonight with sheri in the studio and sean and jason on the phone.. comes in at 2hours plus, as a special bonus, if you stay until after the credits roll you can hear Alice's Resaturant in enterity.

Our blogger, Boyana, is on the case and we read her first show notes in tonight's show... i have to figure out an easy way to post the notes here on the blog... so stay tuned.

In the meanwhile, everyone enjoy the show... its like a big turkey (dinner)... guaranteed to put you to sleep! just remember to loosen your pants first!

namaste
robin

Parviz Doodles...

2009-11-19T11:43:00.000-08:00

from the desk of Parviz, drawn during yesterday's show... not sure who its suppose to be, but stay tuned...

Schnauzer Logic Episode 68 is Online!!!

2009-11-19T08:36:00.000-08:00

sonovista, my friends! (seems like oooooollllldddddd ttimmmmmeeeeeeessssss... dinner dates and movies...)

Schnauzer Logic Episode 68 is done, uploaded and online. Sheri, Parviz and John DeKoven were in the studio, Sean and Jason were on the phone, and we chatted and heard some new music from Ken Turetzky.

In order to try and reduce the SL workload (on me) i'm trying the services of two 'virtual assistants' to write each week's show notes... they both have the audio and should be preparing their version of the notes, so check back and we'll see how this experiment turns out.

The show was a little long and a little rough (no more editing... another difference in order to reduce the SL workload, going forward) but we all had a great time and laughed until the tears blurred our notes, so that's a good sign. We'll try to do regular shows once again, but my medical stuff remains (sadly) unresolved, so i may dump out with no warning and no apologies.

But for right here, right now, Enjoy!

namaste
robin

This Is Only A Test

2009-11-06T14:48:00.000-08:00

This is a test

This is only a test

If i had actually uploaded an actual episode of Schnauzer Logic to the iTunes Store, and you had downloaded it, you would have been informed, enlightened or entertained. As none of these things happen in the audio you may have just stumbled across, it is only a test.

But it least it proves i still know how to press most of the right buttons.

that's all i'm saying

namaste
robin

Taking The Week Off...

2006-06-21T14:53:00.000-07:00

Sonovista, my friends... its been a tumultuous 2 weeks... as "the Dude" would say, "lotta ins, lotta outs, lotta whathaveyous"... a huge 'thank you' to everyone who has written or called with messages of condolence... this little community of ours, based around a goofy podcast, is filled with love, and for that i am eternally grateful... my original plan was to do a show today (#20), but i stumbled and sean was back at the dentist and parviz's wife called and asked if she could take another shot at poisoning him... so i figured, we could take a 'buy' this week... plus, since we stopped doing our weekly interviews with Jason Nathanson, he's put an entire continent between himself and the Schnauzer studios... maybe it wasn't Oprah who was f'ckin up Jason's car-ma... maybe we have met the enemy and he is us?!?!?!

(nah...)

In any event, look for the return of Schnauzer Logic next wednesday with our exciting Show #20! Lots of surprises... lots of fun... a little song, a little dance, a little seltzer in your pants... my mom would be so proud!

namaste... robin

California... coming home...

2006-06-16T16:04:00.000-07:00

Sonovista, my friends... i'm back home in northern california... i arrived late last night (thursday) after an a totally fucked-up day of travel... what should have been a 6 1/2 hour flight, coast to coast, turned into 14 hour sojorun with the US Airways shuttle from LaGuardia to Philidelphia taking off an hour late, which caused me to miss my connecting flight, which resulted in me being put on an even later flight, which resulted in me getting a broken seat, which resulted in more delays, which resulted in me getting my bags at SFO at around 8pm pacific time (14 hours after i got into a cab in NYC)... oh, and although the people on US Air were very nice, the airline is SHIT... everything is broken and torn and dirty and stained and for this i was granted the privilege of paying almost $500 one way... but god bless sheri, who picked me up and took me out for a nice dinner and strong bloody mary...

And now i'm home and dealing with the moment-by-moment reality of being alone... you know, after my dad passed away about 7 years ago, i started to call my mom every day... short calls, 5-10 minutes, just to touch base... talk about politics or popular culture... it wasn't because she was lonely, but because she was alone... and i told myself i was doing it for her... but what i didn't realize is that the tether connects at both ends, and now i have no one to call when i land after a long flight or get a good report from my kidney or brain doc or score some minor cosmic win... and i keep running into this just days after her passing... i think the buddhist philosophy i've studied and integrated into how i live my life will be helpful in getting through... just pay attention to the thoughts and feelings and see how they're connected...

in any event, a heartfelt 'thank you' to everyone who has written or called with their words and thoughts of condolence... it means a great deal... the memorial service was this past wednesday in NYC and it was very nice and warm and comforting to see how many people loved my mom... my uncle (the rabbi) strong-armed me into saying a few words, so i put together something for her friends and family... its posted below...

and now we move forward... next week, if the good lord's willing, the creek don't rise, and there ain't no meltdown, we'll do our 20th episode of Schnauzer Logic... i need to collect the gang, but it should be a great show with lots of guests and comedy... and then the week after that we'll do show 21... and 22... and 23... week by week, one step, one bad joke, one plumbing update at a time...

see you all there

namaste... robin

Mom - Riverside Memorial Chapel - NYC, NY - Wednesday, June 14, 2006 - 11:30am

Good Morning… Thank you all for coming… It’s wonderful to see you all here this morning… I think it would have surprised my mom, though… we all knew how special and wonderful she was, but I’m not sure she always knew.

When I spoke with my uncle yesterday, he asked me if I wanted to speak at the memorial service this morning, and I said I didn’t know… and I said I didn’t know, not because I didn’t think I’d be able to find something to say, but because I was afraid that once I started talking, there’d be no way to stop… My mom was an amazing person… if you met her, even once, you’d never forget her… she was strong and smart and funny and opinionated… she was dedicated to her family and her friends and devoted to her grandson, Jason… and she was passionate about children and education and teaching… I think if the arthritis she suffered with and fought against for over 40 years hadn’t sapped her strength and broken her body, she would have been in classroom, even last week, passing on her knowledge and wisdom in her own unique way… There was nobody like Mrs. Goldstein… Old School, as the kids say today… my mom was old school before it was cool to be old school and she didn’t care about being cool… she was a complete human being, contradictions stacked on top of each other… I’ll give you an example… my mom didn’t like gadgets and wasn’t a big fan of technology… she didn’t have a TiVo… she allowed me to get her, only after a battle royale, a simple cell phone which she kept turned off (“its only for emergencies”), and though we’ve made considerable strides in the last 200 years in heating water, my mom insisted on making coffee by boiling water in a little pan on the stove… and she had an iPod… which she used to listen to books on tape… which she agreed to let me get for her only after I assured here they didn’t cost very much…

As I said, it wasn’t that I was afraid I would have nothing to say, but that one story would lead into the next and the next and the next… which would be fine with mom… she was first, and foremost, a story teller… in the past few days as I’ve met some of mom’s friends down in florida, they’ve all told me how ‘funny’ mom was… and she was funny, and she knew it… but she didn’t tell jokes… she told stories, in the grandest tradition… she was a natural performer with perfect timing… the few times I had her on my radio show she literally stole the show… she could have been a star in the modern world of punditry… she had an opinion about everything and wasn’t afraid or ashamed to let you know it… some of our biggest fights in recent years were over whether the latest season of Monk or Law and Order were as good as past seasons… and if she thought they stunk, she said so… and truth be told, she was usually right…

No, the challenge of speaking this morning is going through my countless memories and seeing what I can find to say about my mom that won’t end in tears now that she’s gone… I’ll tell you what I mean… I flew into LaGuardia yesterday afternoon, from florida, and as I got into the terminal I pulled out my cell phone to call her to let her know I was okay, and realized there was no one to call… when I was younger we used to fight about it all the time… “mom… I’m 20 – or 30 – or 40 –or almost 50… I’m O.K...” and she would say “I’m your mother… I worry”

So I looked for something to say about my mom that wouldn’t immediately start the flow of tears, and one thing came to mind… Pizza… My mom introduced me to pizza… I think she told me it was my first solid food… and some of my very earliest memories are of walking with her pushing my sister Lisa in her stroller, down the street, past the Bohacks, to the Newkirk Plaza, where we’d get a slice of pizza… just cheese and those hot red pepper flakes she liked so much…. i must have been 5 or 6, but I can still remember the sights and the smells and the taste… a little sweet… a little salty… chewy and crispy at the same time… when I think of meals with my mom, I think of pizza… now don’t get me wrong… she was an excellent cook… nothing haute cuisine, but good nutritious meals… veal and beef and chicken and turkey and fish…. The fact that I’m a vegetarian is no reflection on my mom’s pot roast or matzo ball soup… but she loved pizza and so did i… when I got a little older and started elementary school, the biggest treat would be to meet her for lunch at the little pizza parlor around the corner, next to the Leader Lanes on Coney Island Avenue… I still search for the taste of that memory… and when we moved to Central Valley, one of the first things we did was search out the local pizza place… in fact, I can tell you the location of the nearest pizza shop for every place I’ve every lived… and when I worked for Sony and spent all that time in Japan, I even kept the number of a Japanese pizzeria in my wallet… they were the only ones who would deliver, on a little motor scooter, and the hotel thought it was unseemly that I would order pizza on a motorbike, delivered to their fine establishment, so they would make me wait outside, in the parking lot, for the delivery, which I would accept in my broken Japanese, and scurry back to the room to taste a bit of home… and whenever and wherever I had some pizza, I would call mom and she would ask, “what did you have for lunch, or dinner” and I would say “Pizza”, and she would say, “Go On… make me jealous”… so I don’t think it’s a coincidence that the first food I had after my brain surgery, more than 20 years ago, was pizza… or that I’ve broken almost every yom kippur fast with pizza… or that lisa and I shared a pie in florida right after seeing her, the night before she died… or that I had a slice for dinner last night… you see, even though I grew up in a jewish home, my comfort food is a little bread, a little cheese, a little tomato, a little oregano, and a little olive oil… hot and fragrant… crispy and chewy… a little salty and a little sweet… my mom bought me a slice…

So the next time you bite into a slice of pizza, think of my mom and say, “Edna… I’m having some pizza” and you’ll be able to hear her say, “Go On… Make Me Jealous”

Thank you again for coming today… it means a lot to my family and to my mom.

No Schnauzer Logic This Week - My Mom, Edna Goldstein, Has Passed Away...

2006-06-12T20:24:00.000-07:00

Sonovista, my friends... just a short note to let you all know there won't be an episode of Schnauzer Logic this week... my mom, Edna Goldstein, died this morning, just 2 weeks shy of her 80th birthday, from lung cancer... mom stopped smoking, cold turkey, 35 years ago, on the back steps of the Monroe Temple of Liberal Judaism, as we were leaving a meeting with the rabbi about my pending bar mitzvah... as we were walking out the door someone told her about a mutual friend who had just been diagnosed with the deadly disease and my mom took the cigarette out of her hand, and the pack out of her bag, and threw them in the temple dumpster and that was that... so if you smoke, please stop... no good can come of it... death from lung cancer is a hideous thing to see... it shakes your belief in any kind of higher power to think that a disease with the power to inflict such devastating pain and destruction on a human being could come from a merciful creator... and yet, my mom lived to be almost 80... so who can know how many ways i wouldn't have been able to disappoint her had she continued to smoke over the past 35 years... and truth be told, if you're almost 80 and you can still give your adult child grief on your own death bed, you've probably had a pretty full life... but there are such better ways to shuffle off this mortal coil (something involving a donkey, a ballerina and a giant sling-shot, for example)... and the sooner you quit, the more days you tack on to the other end, and maybe, just maybe, the donkey (or the ballerina) will get you before respiratory failure does... in any event, if you smoke, please stop.

Here is a photograph of my mom taken earlier this year... that's my mom on the right, and her aide, pauline, on the left... i got to know pauline over the past few days and she is everything you could want a caretaker (or just a good friend) to be... kind, funny, intelligent, invested, she was a perfect sparing partner for my mom up until the end (and no, she did not go gentle into that good night... and she most definitely did rage, rage against the dying of the light). Thank you, pauline.

My mom and I had a complex relationship... the gifts many, the challenges plentiful... but through my relationship with my mom i learned that its possible to hold and acknowledge the genuine hurt that someone may cause you with the unconditional love you can feel for them at the same time... both are real and denying either one diminishes who you are... forgiveness is not a prerequisite to love. I may talk more about this at some point, but suffice it to say, nothing can change how much i miss her (already).

And so, tomorrow (tuesday) i fly from south florida to NYC for her funeral on wednesday and subsequent burial next to my dad out on long island... and, at some point, i'll head back to california and regain my bearings and start all over again... a little sadder knowing she may be out there... i just can't call her to tell her what a great show we just did...

so until we meet again...
show up
pay attention
tell the truth
and don't be attached to the outcome
(and if you smoke, please stop)

namaste
robin

Schnauzer Logic Podcast Episode 19 is Online!!!

2006-06-07T22:59:00.000-07:00

Sonovista, my friends!... Did you ever have one of those weeks? Well, today was one of those weeks... two potential guests bagged out, Sean called to say he was having emergency dental work, and Parviz's wife tried to kill him with a turkey... Much Love!... And given all that's been going on in my life, I thought about postponing the show... but then everything would be out of whack and who knows what horrible effect that would have on the universe?!?... Pretzels with cheese inside? Pizza crusts with cheese inside? Irish Wolf Hounds with cheese inside? AAARRRGGGHHH!!!!!!!

So I asked our traveling friend, Jason Nathanson if he wanted to sit in for a shortened show, and voila! All is right with the world and the universe maintains its cheesey goodness!

This week's show is only one-hour... we talk a bit with Jason about his time at KSCO, KGO and KFI, the politics of modern-day commercial/political talk-radio, and do you have to agree with the host in order to be a producer? We also learn that the first rule of computer repair has an almost universal application, to wit: step 1: make sure the computer is plugged in (for a VW van, step 1 is a bit different, but you feel no less foolish when you skip it!)... We also play the Spanish entry in the 2006 Eurovision song contest, and the #1 winning entry from Finland... And we check-in with Bryan Cox and Episode 9 of his award-winning series Real Stories of the Highway Comics... (and if a full hour with Jason isn't enough for you gluttonous bastards, you can hear this week's installment of his intervew on KSCO ::here:: )

Next week is Show 20, and we're hoping everything will be back to normbal... but until then:

Show Up
Pay Attention
Tell The Truth
And Don't Be Attached To The Outcome.

namaste
robin

Schnauzer Logic - Episode 18 Show is Online!!!

2006-06-01T16:49:00.000-07:00

sonovista, my friends... again i have no time (right now), but this was such a great show i wanted to post some quick show notes:

1. Steve Golson talks about the history of Ms. PacMan (he was one of the guys who wrote it and got sued and then hired by Atari... a classic 80's hacker-turned-hero story)... He then talks about his wife Terry Golson's newest cookbook, The Farmstead Egg Cookbook, and about their 24/7 Hencam.

2. Jason Nathanson tells us how he tracked and killed Oprah using only a large cheese pizza... check out his blog randomshow.blogspot.com for lots more information, and listen to this week's KSCO interview (maybe someday he'll plug our show and blog since we give him so much ink!)

3. All this week's tunes come from the 2006 Eurovision song contest, including the Iranian entry (hint: there -was- no Iranian entry)

4. We REALLY REALLY need your advice to 2006 graduates for next-week's Commencement Address... thanks for those who have already sent yours in... to the other 700 of you, hey! you have the rest of the summer to smoke dope...

more later (maybe)

show up, pay attention, tell the truth, and don't be attached to the outcome

namaste... robin

What Advice Would You Give A New Graduate?

2006-05-26T19:03:00.000-07:00

Sonovista, my friends! Being graduation season, here in the US, we're writing a commencement speech to give at the beginning of our next show... the problem is, so far all we've got is:

Drink 8 Glasses of Water Every Day

Never Stare Directly At An Eclipse (Solar, for sure... Lunar, we think)

Be Extra Nice To Hobos... They're Magic!

So you see our problem... Anyway, we're looking for advice to give the new graduate... something you heard at your own graduation that's helped you along the way, or something you've learned that you want to pass down to the next generation.

Post a comment to this entry, or send us an email using the email button at the top of the page... We'll collect all the advice and find a way to incorporate it into our speech!

Thanks in advance and have a great weekend!

namaste... robin

Schnauzer Logic Podcast Episode 17 is Online!

2006-05-25T13:46:00.000-07:00

sonovista, my friends... no time for the ShIfT kEy, or detailed notes but, this one was a winner!

as the show opens, we take a call from a credit reporting agency trying to get information about Mr. & Mrs. Robin Goldstein (totally unplanned, and unprofessional, but maybe a little bit funny!)

we then talk with bob lamb, business manager and financial secretary/treasurer of UA Local 582 Plumbers and Steamfitters union... actually parviz does most of the talking

we also talk with jason nathanson, who's still in las vegas

we listen to the next installment of Bryan Cox Stand-Up Comic Road Stories

we listen in as the announce the winner of American Idol

and we toss around the idea of writing a Graduation Speech (send us your suggestions for advice to the graduates we should include!)

we'll add the links and more later

but for now

namaste... robin

Episode 16 of the Schnauzer Logic Podcast is Online!!!

2006-05-18T13:51:00.000-07:00

Sonovista, my friends! The show is up (though the iTunes Music Store seems cranky about listing it, right now), and you can grab it through your usual podcast tools, or listen in your browser by clicking on the MP3 button at the top of the blog.

Time is tight... I'm trying to catch up from being "on vacation" for the last two years by filling in for an Apple attorney who's on maternity leave... so, for now, money trumps art (or at least jostles it around a bit!)... so here's an abbreviated show blog... more later (maybe, if needed).

1. Thanks to Susan Moses of the Talking Tranny for her review of our podcast. Susan's blog is ::here :: and you can listen to her audio review of our show, by itself, ::here ::.

2. Mega Mega Thanks to John DeKoven of Laugh-A-Lot Productions and his friend, Todd Westerlund of the San Ramon California Chamber of Commerce for playing a round of Win John DeKoven's Money... John's record goes unbroken (Todd won). And if you send an email to John , he'll give you a free pair of passes to any if his comedy shows... So check it out! (BTW, I found a really interesting description of the history of Chambers of Commerce on Wikipedia ... it says the earliest Chambers were founded in Europe in 1599 and the first english-speaking Chamber was in Glasgow Scotland in 1783.

3. Bryan Cox is still turning out Road Stories of the Highway Comic. Thanks Big Bry!

4. Like a peanut, Jason Nathanson passed through Salt Lake City untouched, and is now hanging out in Las Vegas before heading off to Texas. Jason has some amazing stories (which apparently he'd prefer you read, rather than hear) on his blog at randomshow.blogspot.com, and some great photos, too! And if you can't get enough Jason, you can hear his interview with Rosemary Chalmers on KSCO this morning by clicking ::here ::.

5. Parviz gave us a shortened plumbing update in anticipation of next week, when we expect to be talking with Bob Lamb, Business Manager, Financial Secretary and Treasurer of U.A. Local 582. (and maybe we'll be checking in, again, with Robin Goldstein!)

6. And we finished with a Glenrothes toast to the 1-year anniversary of my brain surgery. Dr. Michael McDermott and the neurosurgical staff and neuroradiological staff at UCSF were nothing short of amazing.

We've been shorting on the tunes... we know... we're gonna fix it... promise... But here are the amazing bands from GarageBand.com we played this week:

1. Geoff Martyn from Glasgow, Scotland - "All American Dream"
2. Aaron Cheney from Seattle, Washington - "Intimate Strangers"
3. Gadget from Moscow, Russia - "Stupid Love"

And now you know what you didn't know when you didn't know what you knew!

So until next week:

Show Up
Pay Attention
Tell The Truth
And Don't Be Attached To The Outcome!

namaste
robin

Episode 15 of the Schnauzer Logic Podcast is Online!!!

2006-05-11T13:43:00.000-07:00

Sonovista, my friends! Episode 15 of the Schnauzer Logic Podcast is online and the only word you need to remember is: TrainWreck! (smile)... ok, not exactly a train wreck, but after 3 great weeks in a row, it was inevitable that we'd hit a bump, just to remind us that we're only demigods... and just to be clear, our guests, Jason Nathanson and Robin Goldstein (the smarter) were great... the glitches came mostly from your humble hostess, me (the giggler)... but we're already reviewing the game films, looking for holes in the offense and defense, and we'll be back again, next week, with another award winning show featuring an episode of Win John DeKoven's Money, and all of us giving 110%... meanwhile, we come not to bury Episode 15 (The Ides of Schnauzer), but to praise it...

We opened with a goofy discussion about a goofy kids show from 1968, The Banana Splits Adventure Hour, which marked an early directorial effort by later day Omen/Superman/Lethal Weapon helmer, Richard Donner. We also talked about other early kids shows, including the strange/non-existant animation of Clutch Cargo and Space Angel (Synchro-Vox rules!), Soupy Sales, and Brazilian star Xuxa.

We then took a break and returned with this week's update from our good friend, Jason Nathanson, who's taking a journey across America, and chronicling his adventures on our show, and his blog at randomshow.blogspot.com. (btw, jason's theme song is by the group Rockapella) Oh, and if you want to hear Jason's interview from this morning (5/11) on KSCO, you can click ::here::

After our next break we came back with a short discussion on confidence and dating and then got directly into this week's plumbing update (well, not directly... Parviz wanted to listen to more of Ann Zimmerman's wonderful song first, but I think he was just stalling)... btw, we're trying to get a spokesman from the United Association of Journeymen and Apprentices of the Plumbing and Pipe Fitting Industry of the United States and Canada.

We then took another break, played Episode 4 of Bryan Cox's Stand Up Comedy Road Stories, and planned to come back talking with travel writer Robin Goldstein from his hotel room in Hong Kong.

that didn't happen...

1010-229 was down (even though i had tested it to the same number at the same time the day before), so we were forced into 'improv' mode...

(i hear the train a'comin...)

and i won't say any more about that effort except to say it was mercifully short (though perhaps not short enough) and it once again showed what a genius Phil Hendrie is!

However, after a quick poll, we decided to bite the bullet and pay "full fare" and we called Robin Goldstein, directly, at his hotel room in Hong Kong, where he's reviewing restaurants and hotels for Fodors before heading back to the US to celebrate the publication of his own Austin Texas restaurant review guide for Off The Map Press. I've known (of) Robin for over 10 years and though we've never spoken, he sounded totally cool and funny and interesting and I think I could kill him (maybe dump his body in a irrigation pipe, like i described to Jason) and take over his life and NOBODY would know the DIFFERENCE... or not... anyway, we're gonna have Robin back again, since he seems to be doing a much better job of being Robin Goldstein than I have!

And with that we wrapped it all up in a nice package, with a pink bow, and started into the tequila...

So, because of the technical problems, the segments were longer than usual (we know... 18 minute segments are boring!), and we only got to 3 songs, but they were terrific and can be found on GarageBand.com:

1. Simple Minded Fools from Hong Kong - "Left To Run"
2. Los Pistoleros from Orange, California - "Road Trip"
3. Thinking Out Loud from Hong Kong - "People"

And now you know what you didn't know when you didn't know what you knew... Next week John DeKoven, Jason Nathanson, Bryan Cox, maybe more Robin Goldstein... Sunday, remember Mother's Day (here in the US)... and as always:

Show Up
Pay Attention
Tell The Truth
And Don't Be Attached To The Outcome!

namaste
robin

Schnauzer Logic Podcast Episode 14 is Online!!!

2006-05-04T13:22:00.000-07:00

Sonovista, my friends!!! Episode 14 of the Schnauzer Logic Podcast is online and I have to say that it feels like we've hit our stride... great music, great topics, great comedy and truly great guests! We hope you're enjoying the shows... if so, drop us a note and tell your friends (also, would a review on the iTunes Music Store kill ya?... huh? )

Ok... life is jam packed, so here's this week's show blog: short, sweet and to the point...

First, WOW... Ann Zimmerman was a terrific guest... you've heard her music, "The Plumber Is The Man" each week as we introduce Parviz's Plumbing Update segment... Well, Ann is a singer/song writer/lawyer/mediator/teacher/horse-farm-something-or-other and a whole lot more from Salina, Kansas. Two of her albums are available for download through iTunes, or you can get the straight scoop directly from her website. (Plus Ann knows a lot of things about a lot of things, so we're hoping she'll come back and talk with us again)... and if you're interested in folks music, make sure to check out the Kerrville Folk Festival, to be held this year May 25th to June 11th.

We also had our weekly update from Jason Nathanson... Jason is now officially "on the road", mostly going from Indian Casino to Indian Casino, and sleeping in his van in the gas station parking lots... THIS is the reason his jewish grandparents emigrated to this great country. Check out Jason's blog over at randomshow.blogspot.com, and offer him encouragement and some suggestions on where to go next.

After a break we also played this week's installment of Bryan Cox's Comic Road Story (#3 to be exact). And we talked about Stephen Colbert's appearance at this year's White House Press Corp Dinner, next week's scheduled appearance of my doppelganger, travel writer Robin Goldstein, Sean's entry in the IMDB for Kwoon, and we finished with Tales from the Pipe: The Parviz Fathali Plumbing Story. (oh, and in case you were wondering, the little opening bit of audio is our good friend Misha gum-chewing, late arrival as my engineer during the KSCO days of Schnauzer Logic... She's gone one to bigger and better things, which is why i like to keep playing the one mistake she made when she was 17!)

Finally, this weeks music..,. we got to play two different songs from Ann Zimmerman, Absolute Zero from her second album, "Canned Goods" (the one where the Plumbing song comes from), and If I Had Been Beautiful from "Wild Indigo", her latest album... as mentioned above, they're both available on the iTunes music store, or directly from Ann's website... and we had a couple of new tunes from some amazing artists on Garage Band :

1. Spacestation1 from Santa Cruz, CA - "What is Up?"
2. All Hail Me from Toledo, Ohio - "Throw It All Away"
3. Sean Patrick McGraw from Nashville, TN - "Fiona"

And know you know what you didn't know when you didn't know what you knew!

So until next week:

Show Up
Pay Attention
Tell The Truth
And Don't Be Attached To The Outcome

namaste
robin

SCHNAUZER LOGIC PODCAST BLOG IS PARTIALLY DOWN - HERE IS A LINK FOR THE ONLINE PLAYER

2006-05-03T10:41:00.000-07:00

sonovista, my friends... looks like there's a bit of trouble in river city (or at least at tblog) and the banner and links for the Schnauzer Logic Podcast show blog is down... the folks here at tblog know and are in the process of fixing things, but until then if you want to hear the show with the online stream player you can click ::here::

we've got a great show planned tonight... Ann Zimmerman, the lovely voice behind the song "The Plumber is the Man" will be our guest, as well as our first travel installment of on-the-road with Jason Nathanson... Parviz will be here, and Sean is on the stand-by list... we hope to welcome you, too!

namaste... robin

Separated-At-Birth?

2006-05-01T22:19:00.000-07:00

our good friend Jason Nathanson leaves on his round-the-world-in-a-VW-van tour today and posts some photos of his 'bon voyage' dinner on his blog randomshow.blogspot.com while browsing through the photos, i realized that jason reminded me of a favorite friend from childhood, "Wooly Willy", a smiling cherub whose magnetized skull was the perfect anchor for tiny iron 'hairs' (they don't make toys like that any more!) but don't take my word for it... you be da judge:

happy trails, my friend!

namaste... robin

Schnauzer Logic - Episode 13 Shownotes!!!

2006-04-30T12:28:00.000-07:00

Sonovista, my friends!... ok... i know... i know... this is the latest the show notes have been posted... my bad... i'm struggling with a sinus infection that's sapped my strength (kind of like schnauzer kryptonite)... plus, the whole work:bills:money thing has been demanding a bit more of my time... AND we've finally had some truly nice weather here in northern california, so i've been dropping the top and taking out the ol' green convertible just to 'soak up the sun, and tell everyone to =lighten up='... but Episode 13 was a freekin greet shoo (said with a faux scottish brogue), so without further ado, lets roll the video tape:

First up, major super Great White North props to Bryan Cox, Stand-Up Comedian and Voice Actor extraordinaire, who deigned to be on the show as a guest, after we had a bit of fun with his Comic Road Story, Episode 1, last week... Bryan's a funny guy, and a great guest, and we look forward to playing the rest of the episodes in the series... Check out Bryan's own podcast, StandUps for Canada ::here:: and if you're looking for an experience voice actor, check out Bryan's production company ::here::.

We also talked with Jason Nathanson, an old friend of ours who's setting off to discover the "real" america in a 1988 VW van (along with a GPS, wireless laptop, digital camera, 180 days of freeze dried food and water, personal masseuse, Labradoodle puppy, and $5000 in gold bullion (no, not the kind you make soup with)... Jason will be with us each week with his own tales from the road, and you can read his blog at randomshow.blogspot.com.

We then had a major plumbing update from Parivz and his near-death experience with an Orbital Welder... funny, funny stuff...

And we finished off with Sean's review of the Wachowski Brothers (?) film V for VENDETTA, from the graphic novel by Alan Moore and David Lloyd...

Plus, while listening to the show in order to prepare these show notes, i noted that we touched on (in no particular order)

Run For Your Life with Ben Gazzara
Mary Worth
Kobiyushi Maru
The North Dakota State Hat
Dick Cavett and his upcoming return to TV
The Banana Splits
The New Zoo Revue
Sid & Marty Kroftt
The Maury Povich Lawsuit
Misha got Married
The Movie United 93
The Movie Snakes On A Plane

(next week, Ritalin for Everybody!)

And on that happy note, here are this weeks Amazingly Talented Musicians, direct from Garageband.com

1. ALVA STAR from Minneapolis, MN - "Unhappily Yours"
2. Becca Kaid from Effingham, IL - "Feel My Fire"
3. Tenpenny Joke from Melbourne, Australia - "She"
4. The Rantings of EVA from Atlanta, GA - "Infrared"

And now you know what you didn't know when you didn't know what you knew!

So until next week:

Show Up
Pay Attention
Tell The Truth
And Don't Be Attached To The Outcome

And Happy May Day to all the workers of the world, especially those from south of the US Border...

Mi Perro es Tu Perro!

namaste
robin

Schnauzer Logic Podcast - Episode 13 is Online!!!

2006-04-27T13:49:00.000-07:00

sonovista, my friends... busy, crazy, kookoo, nutty day, so the blog notes will be coming later on, but for now all you need to know is that Episode 13 is a winner, we have a great interview with Bryan Cox, an acomplished canadian stand-up comedian and Voice Over actor, a second great interview with Jason Nathanson, a young man in search of the American Dream (hint: it may be hidden up in canada), and classic plumbing update from Parviz... plus 4 new tunes that totally rock, dude... i mean like totally...

more, better, gooder, later...
r

Episode 12 of Schnauzer Logic Podcast is Online... The

2006-04-20T10:01:00.000-07:00

Sonovista, my friends! Schnauzer Logic - "The Deciderer Episode" is online and ready for your listening pleasure... We understand that bigger isn't always better (I mean, lets face it... of much of us can you take?), so we're going to do our level best to keep the shows to 2hrs each week, or less... This week's episode clocks in at 1:59:08, so we're off to a good start on this new resolution... In addition, I've been getting a lot of questions about the derivation of the term "Sonovista"... here's how I explained it recently:

"Sonovista is a made up word, at least for me, which was suppose to be the name of the show i did on KSCO before they made me change it to AirPlay... in my derivation it was suppose to be a combination of Sonos (the greek root for sound) and Vista (seeing inspirational views), so Sonovista was going to describe a show where you would hear things that would provide a grand inspirational view... When I explained it to the staff at KSCO, they all had that look a dog gets when you blow in its face, so we went with AirPlay and I turned Sonovista into a all-purpose greeting, like mahalo or shalom."

its a pretty good story, don't you think? one you can tell your grandkids...

OK... on to this week's show. First off, just before we were getting ready to go into the studio, we checked out the latest stories on the Huffington Post and found the "I'm The Decider" song parody by Paul Hipp, and figured we had to put it on the show... by the time you read this it'll probably be everywhere (or nowhere, if the Beatles lawyers get involved), but we had it kind of firstiest!... We then moved into the next regular segment, which is the -intentionally lame- joke (yes, its suppose to be a groaner), but i just wasn't able to get it out, and with Sean and Parviz laughing at me, i pushed the button to start the Big Show music... during the intro we gave the joke to Parviz, who managed to get through it... We then got caught up a bit with Sean and talked a bit about listener comments (we love 'em!). After our first break we talked about the 100th anniversary of the famous 1906 San Francisco Earthquake, and our own experiences getting through some earthquakes (Parviz always has an interesting perspective) and took our next break... We then dove into our new weekly Plumbing Update with Parviz and introduced his new plumbing segment theme music, "The Plumber Is The Man" by Ann Zimmerman (folk singer and Harvard educated lawyer!)... If you take away anything from this segment, its this: "Parviz Knows Nothing" (said proudly, again and again)... We then auditioned a new comedy segment from Canadian stand-up Bryan Cox, entitled "Comic Road Story"... To quote a famous (and a bit course) british expression, we could rightfully be accused of "taking the piss" of Bryan's segment, but in an exchange of emails today Bryan proved himself to be a great sport, and more than willing to poke fun at himself, so enjoy Bryan's segment and look forward to more Bryan (perhaps even -live-) in upcoming shows... We then played a bit of the "Boys from Modesto" (no, not really), and took our next break returning with a discussion of James Blunt and his hit, "You're Beautiful" which led to the first, last, and only episode of Schnauzer Idol and on behalf of Sean and Parviz i promise that we will never never never never never never never never never sing on the show again! (and if you're listening to the show as a podcast or on the in-line player, feel free to fast forward and you'll be totally forgiven)... Finally, we took our last break and return with the Question of the Week (Close Encounters of the Celebrity Kind) and wrapped it all up for another week (whew)...

On the tuneage front, apart from the opening parody, the Plumbers Song, and our two karaoke numbers, we were able to highlight the following amazing performers:

1. Desert Radio from Vancouver, BC - "February Day"
2. LIVE 45 from Sedgley, UK - "Love Me When I'm Dead"
3. Ben Park Drive from Denver, CO - "Get Away"
4. Randy Coleman from Los Angeles, CA - "Goodbye Renee'"

And now you know what you didn't know when you didn't know what you knew!

Next week we'll talk with our friend Jason Nathanson as he gets ready to head out on his trip across America... plus more sillyness and great GarageBand music, and maybe a surprise or two... so until then:

Show Up
Pay Attention
Tell The Truth
And Don't Be Attached To The Outcome

and as you're saying your prayers, could you throw in a good word for my mom... she turns 80 in another few months and they just found some masses in her lungs which is not the kind of news you want to get for your 80th birthday.

many thanks for listening and have a great week!

namaste
robin

Brush with Celebrity - Question of the Week

2006-04-16T12:02:00.000-07:00

Sonovista, my friends... hope you are all having a joyous easter/passover/other holiday...

just a reminder that the question of the week, this week, is to share your stories about meeting celebrities (stories involving stalking can and will be used against you in a court of law!)

you can send us an email or an audio file telling your story, or simply jot it down in the comments section of the blog.

btw, sean has resurfaced and all is well... whew!

see you all wednesday... until then, namaste... robin

Episode 11 of the Schnauzer Logic Podcast is Posted!!! (A little bit louder than Episode 10)

2006-04-13T12:57:00.000-07:00

Sonovista, my friends, and welcome to our second decade of shows... A short show blog this week... why read when you can listen!?!

First, we get caught up with Parviz and his new job, his new look and his same-old bad attitude... With Sean MIA, we look to hook up with Mike Lema and Parviz's friend, Ken, who has been emailing like a fiend, but come up lacking (like the hair on Parviz's head)... We then take our first break and return with the details of Parviz's new career... its the story of a spiritual journey that will inspire generations to come... we then take our next break and come back with Part (2)(a) of the Kip Addotta interview, which leads directly into our next break. When we come back we preview the upcoming trip of our friend Jason Nathanson and how we managed to score his new blog site randomshow.blogspot.com from a great guy, Anders Clerwall of Sweden, who hosts his own video blog at www.randomshow.com... be sure to check out Anders site and drop him a note to say "hi" and "thanks!" for transferring the site to Jason... we also talk about opening day with the SF Giants and running into Francis Ford Coppola as I was walking out of the stadium, and come up with next week's question of the week:

Tell Us About Your Brush With Greatness/Celebrity? - send us an email or an MP3 recording and we'll put it on next week's show!

We then take our next break (very jazzy) and come back with a discussion about Grups and a recent article in New York magazine about 40-somethings who are doing adulthood differently from their parents... Then a quick break and back with the last installment, Part (2)(b) of our interview with Kip Addotta, finally closing with an update on my Delta Airline refund (not yet), and some (even more) random ramblings.

And with that, here are this week's amazing artists:

1. Barrelfish from San Jose, CA - "Again"
2. Blinded Canada from Kelowna, BC, Canada - "Cryin"
3. Joe Turley from Nashville, TN - "Like I Doo"
4. Kick The Cat from Chicago, IL - "Blow Me"
5. Lori McKenna from Boston, MA - "Never Die Young"

And now you know what you didn't know when you didn't know what you knew!

So until next week:

Show Up
Pay Attention
Tell The Truth
And Don't Be Attached To The Outcome

and if you see Sean, tell him to call home... we miss him...

namaste
robin

Episode 10 of the Schnauzer Logic Podcast is Posted... Plus SF Giants 2006 Opening Day Photos! (Barry... Barry... Barry...)

2006-04-08T07:42:00.000-07:00

Sonovista, my friends!!! Sorry for the delay in posting this week's show notes... We did the Big Show on Wednesday night, which i edited and posted into the wee hours of the morning. Then on Thursday, I had breakfast with Rosemary Chalmers of KSCO (who was at the Queen concert Wednesday night with Parviz!) and then went to see the San Francisco Giants 2006 Opening Day game where they topped the Atlanta Braves (thanks, Larry!, for the extra ticket)... then I had some $work$ to do on Thursday night and Friday morning, and then a dentist appointment Friday afternoon and then spent Friday night in photoshop, editing the photos from the game for my Nephew... (whew...)... not that you care about *any* of this!... (although you can see the photos, full size, from the game by clicking on the photo of Barry and heading over to my Flickr site... and notice how all the Atlanta Braves have their arms crossed... i LOVE this game )

So... show notes... right... i almost forgot... we had a GREAT 10th episode anniversary show, and i just wanted to take this opportunity to thank Parviz and Sean and John DeKoven and Rachel Weinstein for taking the second mic over the past 10 weeks, as well as everyone else who blogged or emailed or provided audio or material for the show! Thanks to technology, we've managed to put together a little virtual community of somewhere between 500 and 1000 folks from around the world who get to laugh a little and think a little and listen to some cool toonage every week... We would do this even if no one were listening, but then we'd just be sad and a little tragic... this way we're "Podcasters"! (woo hoo)... and thanks, too, to Ethan St. Pierre of transfm.org for making our little show a part of his network...

And on to the show... Big Ups to Rachel Weinstein for sitting in... We opened with a bit of audio from the old KSCO show where I used to mangle the live spots for American Longevity products... after 2 weeks, the sponsor got so pissed they pulled them, but I think they were the most entertaining live reads for a liquid vitamin ever! Anyway, we'll play some more in the coming weeks. We then moved into the show and talked a bit about relationships and being single at 40 and Qigong and more with Rachel... After the first break we came back with Part 1 (Section A) of our all-new 2006 interview with legendary Stand-Up comedian, Kip Addotta. (Part 2, Section A and B next week)... As you know, I did an interview with Kip almost 5 years ago that didn't end well (!), but he was a gentleman and agreed to a second take... We talked from almost an hour, and its a fascinating discussion about the art and craft of stand-up comedy, as well as some amazingly honest observations about the comedy 'business'. Many thanks to Kip (and be sure to check out his son Victor's webpage for some of the most amazing hand crafted furniture i've ever seen!)

We then took our next break and came back with some Reality TV talk, a discussion about Paris Hilton playing the role of Mother Teresa in an upcoming movie, and more... We then took our next break, so Rachel could leave to get to an appointment, and came back with a discussion about a New York magazine article about 9/11 and "The Ground Zero Grassy Knoll"... Then, moving from something serious to something seriously funny, we played a classic Cranky Dog Spew from Critical Chip of Crankydog.com... PLEASE send an email to the Cranky Dog hisownself using this *link*, and ask him to do a new spew!... We then came back to discuss the Question of the Week and took our next break, after which we dove right into Part 1 (Section B) of the Kip Addotta interview... And finally we attempted to play (no, really!) the band, Nothing Less from Modesto, California, but got the wrong track loaded, and just ran out of time! We closed the show with Sean's broken laptop/mylar tape tale of woe, and my complaint against Delta Airlines.

Big Ups, btw, to all the celebrities who sent their warmest wishes on our 10th show, and to Jason Nathanson for managed to locate a spare spit valve for my Yamaha Flugelhorn... you da' man!

As mentioned, all the toons this week come from previous shows:

1. Casino66 from Malmo, Sweden - "Restarting"
2. Lotte from Oslo, Norway - "When I Close My Eyes"
3. Redwood School District from Montclair, NJ - "Two Guys, A Girl..."
4. BB Chung King & The Buddaheads from Burbank, CA - "Company Graveyard"

And now you know what you didn't know when you didn't know what you knew!

Thanks to everyone for listening! We really REALLY appreciate it! And be sure to tell your friends! And until next week:

Show Up
Pay Attention
Tell The Truth
And Don't Be Attached To The Outcome

namaste
robin

Episode 10 (Woo Hoo!) of the Schnauzer Logic Podcast is Online!!!

2006-04-06T10:36:00.000-07:00

going to the ballgame to see the San Francisco Giants Home Opener, so the blog will be updated later today/tonight... but the show is online and intense and funny and sad and thought provoking and hugely entertaining and just a little in a foreign language...

GO GIANTS!!!
namaste
robin

Question of the Week

2006-04-02T19:11:00.000-07:00

Sonovista, my friends... here is this weeks question:

You have to give up one piece of technology for a year... which would it be:

a. cell phone

b. dvd player

c. cable tv

d. tivo

e. the internet

f. other

cheers!... robin

Episode 9 of the Schnauzer Logic Podcast Posted... (No. 9... No. 9... No. 9...)

2006-03-30T19:24:00.000-08:00

Sonovista, My Friends!!! Episode 9 of the Schnauzer Logic Podcast is online and as we race towards our 10th episode anniversary, next week, we're picking up comedic steam...

First, before we get into the show notes, a great thanks go out to John DeKoven for coming down to the Schnauzer studios and sitting in for the vacationing Parviz, who's off schtupping his wife... John, for those who don't know, is a comedy impresario and the chief yuckety yuck of Laugh-A-Lot Productions, and drove down from Pleasanton in an obvious state of pulmonary distress to co-host and play a round of Win John DeKoven's Money. Thanks also go out to Mike Lema and Erin King who both offered to co-host, and Theresa Benson, who offered to co-host and wrote an amazing review in the iTunes music store. In the coming weeks we'll give everyone a chance to co-host, either in the studios, or on the phones, as time and logistics permit... so many thanks, and if you're reading this and also interested in co-hosting some future segment, just drop me a note and we'll add you to the list.

OK... on to the show notes:

In honor of the upcoming start to the 2006 baseball season (April 3rd) we played a famous outtake of legendary Baltimore Orioles manger Earl Weaver responding to fan questions on The Manager's Corner. I know this is a real recording, but I don't know if it ever made it on the air... if you know, drop us a line...

Starting the show we moved into a show rundown, welcomed back Sean, and learned a bit about John's girlfriend, Helene, who works for Enterprise Rent-A-Car. After the break we got Helene on the phone and played a round of Win John DeKoven's Money, which resulted in a tie (first time ever) and forced us to go to the tiebreaker round, where Helene proved victorious!

We took another break and tackled the question of the week, talking a lot about Hillary Clinton's possible Presidential candidacy and the possible challenge by Condoleezza Rice. We then took our third break and played a song by my friend Fran Bennett (the first tune not from GarageBand.com )

Coming back from the break we ran down the genesis of the "sound" of stand-up comedian Kip Addotta hanging up on me, and played the original audio from 2001. We also played a teaser of a brand-new interview I conducted with Kip earlier this week, which we'll play on next week's 10th-episode anniversary show. For those who want to learn more about Kip before next week's interview, or order his comedy CD's, head over to his web site at www.kipaddotta.com. (and for those who say that no good can come from comedy, be sure to check out Kip's son Victor's master woodworking/furniture business Addotta Fine Woodwork)

We then took our last break and came back with a discussion about FHM magazine's naming of Scarlett Johansson "Sexiest Women". John agreed... Sean was not amused... And we finished with a plug for John's upcoming shows and website (www.laughalotproductions.com )

And with that, here are this week's amazing artists:

1. Dollar Gen from Austin Texas - "Everytime"
2. Genie Dean from Allborg, Denmark - "Wasted"
3. Fran Bennett from San Jose, CA - "Arthritic Rap"
4. Soapbox Paradox from E. Lansing, MI - "Danny!"

And now you know what you didn't know when you didn't know what you knew!

Next week, a big big show... but until then:

Show Up
Pay Attention
Tell The Truth
And Don't Be Attached To The Outcome

namaste
robin

Question of the Week

2006-03-26T09:19:00.000-08:00

Sonovista, my friends! Here it is (better late than never)...

Rank the order in which you think the United States will see:

1. A Woman President
2. A Black President
3. A Jewish President
4. An Asian President
5. A Hispanic President
6. Some combination of the above
7. Other

and why!

see you all wednesday
namaste
robin

New Online Podcast Player!

2006-03-24T21:46:00.000-08:00

Sonovista, my friends! Well, i'm not sure what's going on with the very nice folks over at blogexplosion.com, but their online podcast player still hadn't picked up Episode 8 ("the -ocho-") as of 9pm california time, tonight, so i took off my lawyer hat and then my comedy hat and then my psychologist hat and then my podcaster hat and put on my hacker hat and viola! we now have a new online podcast player hosted directly on the schnauzerlogic server, and which should always be up-to-date. major thanks go out to Jeroen Wijering who wrote the underlying flash player code (and is making it available for free under a creative commons license)... please let me know if you're having any problems using the new player... i'm going to see if the player can be modified to permit the actual downloading and saving of the mp3 file (which some of you have asked for)... and if there are any other requests for the online player, just ask.

Have a great weekend... we've gotten a few offers to be a guest co-host, and i'm going to see if i can give everybody a shot (at least for a segment or two, over the next two weeks)... if you're interested and haven't let me know, drop me a line.

And until wednesday (or until something else blows up)... namaste... robin

Episode 8 Not Showing Up in Online Player - Try This Instead...

2006-03-24T12:22:00.000-08:00

Sonovista, my friends... i understand that Episode 8 ("the -ocho-") is not showing up in the Blogexplosion online player... it usually take 24 hours for them to update their links, but they're going through some changes, so things may be breaking... i will monitor this and if it doesn't show up by the end of today, i'll look into implementing a different onine player.

In the meanwhile, you can grab the mp3 file, directly, *here* . It should open up in a separate browser window, or in your computer's mp3 player (such as Windows Media Player), depending on your computer.

Any other problems, drop me a note... and thanks for listening!

namaste... robin

Episode 8 of the Schnauzer Logic Podcast Posted... Two Months and We're Still Here!!!

2006-03-23T10:01:00.000-08:00

Sonovista, my friends!!! Episode 8 ("the -ocho -") of the Schnauzer Logic Podcast is online!

Great show, though we once again missed Sean, very much, who was up at UCSF for some more med stuff... If you've got a moment, throw some good thoughts, prayers, karma, juju, or whatever up his way...

OK! Show notes... we've got show notes... This week's opening audio was a little birthday tribute to famed funnyman Jerry Lewis , the original King of Comedy , who turned 80 last week (hey, 80!)... We then dug directly into Parviz's big Dairy Update which turned out to be, there will be no more dairy updates (or so he thinks)... Parviz passed his exams and is going to become a commercial plumber (-insert pipe joke here-) and begins his 5 year plumber apprentice program ("you're fired!") the first week of April... As a result, he and his lovely wife, Melanie, are going to take a much needed vacation, so the next two shows will be sans-Parviz... this means two things: (1) fewer poo jokes (probably) and (b) if you want to be a temporary co-host, send us an email using the button at the top of the page... you can do this by phone and co-host a segment or two... enter the fast-paced and glamourous world of podcasting and impress your friends.

Then we took a break and when we came back we got into the Question of the Week (if you could have any Super Power, which would it be)... lots of listener feedback on this one, with some bizarre answers... worth a listen as it provided a source of rich comedic topsoil! We then dove right into the whole Isaac Hayes /Scientology /Tom Cruise /South Park thing (again) with a LOT of interesting updates, including some audio from back in December with an interview of Isaac on the Opie & Anthony show on XM Satellite Radio ... my take-away: Isaac didn't sound upset back in December and Isaac sounds a little bit nuts... but very entertaining.

More breaks and lots of content. To wit: Jeopardy is offering online qualifying exams next week. If you want to try out (i'm going to!), check out this link *here *. Also some Welcome Back Kotter (the Movie) corrections, a story about a flawed SF Chronicle article on a water taste test, another flawed Reuters article on how Daytime TV makes old women stupid, a brief hint at my letter to the CEO of Delta Airlines in my attempt to get a refund for an expired ticket, and a real non-plumbing-related dairy update, the all new "I Can't Believe It's Not Butter!® Squeeze ". Plus other assorted nonsense. Clocking in at 1:49, I think you'll be very entertained.

And with that, here are this week's amazing artists:

1. BB Chung King & The Buddaheads from Burbank, CA - "Company Graveyard"
2. Erik Zai from Pieta, Sweden - "Waters by the Shore"
3. Josh Goode Band from Dallas, Texas - "Spoonful of Thoughts"
4. Tobacco from Copenhagen, Denmark - "France Blues"
5. Bonus Mystery Artist and Song from mmmmphffff ....

And now you know what you didn't know when you didn't know what you knew!

So until next week:

Show Up
Pay Attention
Tell The Truth
And Don't Be Attached To The Outcome

namaste
robin

Question of the Week

2006-03-18T19:56:00.000-08:00

Sonovista, my friends! This week's Question of the Week (which we'll be discussing this coming Wednesday, 3/22 is:

If you could have a superpower, what superpower would you choose, and why?

(i really wanted to ask, "if you could have the power to listen in to people's thoughts about you, would you take it?", but that seemed too cerebral... but you can answer that one instead)

namaste... robin

Episode 7 of the Schnauzer Logic Podcast Posted... Don't Like The Topic We're Discussing? Just Wait 10 Seconds... It'll Change...

2006-03-16T11:04:00.000-08:00

Sonovista, my friends!!! Episode 7 of the Schnauzer Logic Podcast is online!

The show is off the 'juice' and we're back to our 'normal' size of about 90 minutes (and the 'bonefish' are swimming again, as Tony Soprano would say), so all is good. Well, not all good... Sean was MIA after a minor medical setback, but he assured us that he'll be back in the saddle next week, so we're all sending our best thoughts out to Sean for a speedy recovery and quick return (or I can't be held responsible for what happens to Parviz.)

And on to this week's show notes: OK... I admit it... this week's show felt kind of 'fractured' during the recording, thought it came out fairly polished... (like those rock tumblers I played with as a kid, while wearing black socks and sneakers - see photo below) enough grit and liquid and it all shines! We discuss some of our own hospital stories and our Question of the Week (which, I never answer... some things even a rock polisher can't handle) and a lot of entertainment stories (the latest Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremonies, Issac Hayes leaving South Park, John Travolta and his upcoming role in the movie version of the stage play based on the movie of the John Waters story, "Hairspary, the planned remake of the TV show, Welcome Back, Kotter slated to star Ice Cube , and more)... We also promise to discuss Donald Trump and Howard Stern and this week's American Idol and have a Dairy update, but none of that happens... and frankly, I blame Parviz (ok, blame's not the right word, but I'm not sure how to spell cuddle)... I think we planned too much show and should have been slashing topics, but we're just so gosh darned eager to make sure everyone has a good time... Mantra for next week: Less is More

And with that, here are this week's amazing artists (Canada, Utah and Washington state, RePrEsEnT!)

1. Instant Winner from Orem, Utah - "Milkshake"
2. 99 Men from Seattle, Washington - "No Fun"
3. Janet Panic from Vancouver, BC - "Blink"
4. Redshift from Toronto Canada - "Can't Let Go"

And now you know what you didn't know when you didn't know what you knew!

So until next week:

Show Up
Pay Attention
Tell The Truth
And Don't Be Attached To The Outcome

namaste
robin

We're Changing Servers (and a few old photos)

2006-03-13T12:50:00.000-08:00

Sonovista, my friends!... just a quick tech update... We're changing the location of the schnauzerlogic.com servers, so for the next few days the graphics on this blog might be a little messed up.

Don't Panic! This will not affect the postings here on tblog.com or the actual podcast stream (or anything else, i hope!)... If you find something isn't working properly, please leave a comment (you can try to email, but that's being transferred too!)

In order to ease you though this transition, here are a couple of pictures of a very young schnauzer...

that's me in the middle, bottom row, third from the left, holding up the sign... i was 14 here and about as dorky as you could be at a jewish upstate new york day camp

in the photo below i'm still on the bottom row, second from the right, a year older (15) and only a touch less dorky (if you look closely you'll see i'm wearing shorts and sneakers with black socks... Mom!!!!!!)

so for everyone who thinks that we only make fun of Parviz... well, we'l, never stop doing that! but you takes your comedy where you find it!

and now you know what you didn't know when you didn't know what you knew!

namaste... robin

Question of the Week (very late, I know...)

2006-03-13T07:36:00.000-08:00

Here's this week's *very late* question of the week:

You 'win' a one-year, all-expense paid lottery (food, clothing, housing) so that for one year you don't have to pay for any living expenses and can travel anywhere and/or do anything.

Name six things that you do (or places that you go) and why... these are things you don't already do or places you don't already go!

namaste
robin

Shameless Plug for a Great Artist

2006-03-12T08:49:00.000-08:00

Sonivista, my friends, and a Happy Sunday!

Thought I'd take an opportunity to put in a shameless plug for an artist friend of mine. Sandra Spencer is a wonderful artist who specializes in painting stylized portraits of pets and animals and landscapes. Sandra painted an original "Blue Schnauzer Behind The Mic" for me many years ago when I first went on the air, and I still use the image as my AIM icon.

You can see all of Sandra's work *here* .

Enjoy, and have a Great Sunday!

namaste
robin

Episode 6 of the Schnauzer Logic Podcast Posted... One Big-Ass Show!!!

2006-03-10T09:07:00.000-08:00

Sonovista, my friends!!! Episode 6 of the Schnauzer Logic Podcast is on the server, even as I write... Man-O-Man, what a week, what a show, what a big-ass episode!

First, about 20 minutes before we moved into the studio, Sean called to let us know that he's in the hospital up in San Francisco for some kind of biopsy or face lift or something... He should be home in the next day or so, and we'll keep checking in with him, but feel free to leave a comment for Sean...

Anyway, Sean says he wants to do the show from his hospital bed (what a f'ing trooper!), so we rearrange the schedule, make some calls to our other guests, and get the show started... The opening audio bit this week is the Parviz Fathali School of Broadcasting, which you can grab, by itself, here. We then open the show and manage to talk about Parviz and his wife and why Parviz decided she was the one to marry (hint: he says its because she didn't 'bug him'... the basis of many a great relationship!)... We then get Sean on the phone and move on to our Oscar® round-up. Some interesting insights, well worth a listen... (but to tell you the truth, I am all 'Oscar®ed' out!)

After the next break we dive into the Question of the Week, "Who Was Your Comedy Inspiration"... A lot of great references to a lot of great comedians (and for Cryill who tried to play 'stump the Schnauzer', here are a couple of links to Jerome K. Jerome, who famously said

"I like work: it fascinates me. I can sit and look at it for hours."

and Jaroslav Hašek, a Czech humorist and satirist, best known for "The Good Soldier Svejk", a book my father introduced me to as a child!)

We then focus on Parviz's comedy icons (including Patton Oswald, Wayne Cotter, Franklyn Ajaye, Paul Provenza, Fred Wolf, Brian Regan, Dennis Wolfberg, George Carlin (post heart attack), Howie Mandell and Pablo Francisco), Sean's inspiration (Johnny Carson, George Carlin, pre-heart attack, and early Saturday Night Live), and Robin's heros (Bill Cosby, David Steinberg, Alan Sherman, Monty Python, Firesign Theater and George Carlin, both pre and post).

We then say goodbye to Sean (for the week, that is) take our next break, and return with Comedian Jann Karam, of Seinfeld, Mad About You, HBO Young Comedians Special, Carson, Letterman, ER and more fame who talks at length about comedy and her influences in a great and honest segment.

Finally we take our last break and return with a short discussion about Barry Bonds, including a phone call from the man himself (!true!) and a follow-up call from Tim Worrell, and close with this weeks Dairy Update, a non-dairy entry (grrr... doesn't dairy mean cow?) featuring juices from Kerns. We also throw out mad props to Nancy Nangeroni, host of Gender Talk , a weekly two-hour program heard on WMBR in Boston, on the internet as a podcast, and streaming on TransFM.org, focusing on all-issues regarding gender. Trivia Point: I was Nancy's first guest about 10 years ago, and she was kind enough to let me spew for about 15 minutes this past week about Schnauzer Logic. Head over to her website and listen to the show!

And now you know what you didn't know when you didn't know what you knew!...

This week's Outstanding music comes from the following Amazing bands:

1. PinBoys from Aarhus, Denmark - "I Hate All The Things You Love"

2. Kurt Bordian from Vancouver, BC - "Adrenalin Drive"

3. Randy Coleman from Los Angeles - "Last Salutation"

4. Star74 from Thunder Bay, Ontario - "Believe"

So until next week (our Big Ides of March show)...

Show Up
Pay Attention
Tell The Truth
And Don't Be Attached To The Outcome

namaste
robin

New Episode Coming Later Today

2006-03-09T10:01:00.000-08:00

sonovista... we recorded the latest episode last night (wednesday) with special guest, national stand-up comedian Jann Karam, and a phone call from Barry Bonds (no, really!) and Sean calling in from the hospital... but we're a bit behind in the encoding and uploading (some small tech problems), but its all resolved now and the show should be up later this afternoon... its a good one... check back later...

robin

Results of our Oscar® Contest

2006-03-05T21:27:00.000-08:00

Final results:

Robin: 13 Correct

Sean: 10 Correct

Parviz: 7 Correct

In the interest of full disclosure, I think I (robin) got a lot of the smaller/stranger catagories because i watched the BAFTA (British Film Industry) awards a few weeks ago and figured if I didn't know anything about any of the films in a particular catagory, then I would choose the BAFTA winner. So i cheated (by doing research). But I bow down to Sean for picking "Crash" as best picture. Damn, Me-Diddy... it sure is hard out here bein' a pimp! And you da' motion picture man!

Next show Wednesday... we'll do a recap and move on to the next big thing... and if you haven't grabbed the last show (#5) make sure to get it... lots of unplanned funtimes...

namaste
robin

Schnauzer Logic Podcast

Episode 84 (and 83) are Online!!!

Schnauzer Logic Episode 83 Being Recorded Today

(RSS) Feed Me, Seymour

This is why Comcast/CableCARD Support is so Awful!!!

Ringtone for the Rapture

Film Review: Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps (2010)

Theodore Roosevelt - The Right of the People to Rule

Boyana's Dog - Rocky

It's not you, It's me...

Where the hell -is- everybody?

Official Episode 81 Show Notes by Boyana Atanasova

Schnauzer Logic Episode 81 is Online!!!

Schnauzer Logic Episode 81 - We're in the Studio Today

(Hospital) Room with a View

Official Episode 80 Show Notes by Boyana Atanasova

Four Score and Zero Podcast's Ago...

Coming this Wednesday (what? what?) A New Schnauzer Logic!

The Year Of Living Olbermann

We All Playin' Hooky

Schnauzer Logic’s NoNothing Review: The Apple iPad

No new show this week

Official Episode 79 Show Notes by Boyana Atanasova

Schnauzer Logic Episode 79 is Online!!!

Leprechauns Stole My Podcast! (see: Dingos, et al.)

Official Episode 78 Show Notes by Boyana Atanasova

Schnauzer Logic Episode 78 is Online!!!

All Hail Dalten Duncan

No Show Today (Wed March 3, 2010)

Official Episode 77 Show Notes by Boyana Atanasova

Schnauzer Logic Episode 77 is Online!!! Rich Vos Brings The Funny...

SchnauzerLogic Goes ***LIVE*** @4PM PST Today with our Special Guest, Comedian Rich Vos!

Official Episode 76 Show Notes by Boyana Atanasova

Schnauzer Logic Episode 76 is Online!!!

...we interrupt this program for a brief announcement...

Look For Show 76 Tomorrow (Wednesday)... Live @ 4pm PST

We're Taking A Snow Day!

Official Episode 75 Show Notes by Boyana Atanasova

Schnauzer Logic Episode 75 (Our 4th Anniversary Show) Is Online!!!

Schnauzer Logic's 4th Anniversary/75th Show goes LIVE at 3PM PST

Official Episode 74 Show Notes by Boyana Atanasova

Schnauzer Logic Episode 74 is Online!!!

Official Episode 73 Show Notes by Boyana Atanasova

Quick Reminder: SAG (Screen Actors Guild) Awards Tonight - Saturday Jan 23, 2010

Schnauzer Logic Episode 73 is Online!!!

67th Annual Golden Globe Picks

NBC Leno/O'Brien Fiasco - I Wanna Do A Show SO BADLY!

Quick Plug for HTML Kit Favicon Generator

Happy New Year! and a Little Gift...

Official Episode 72 Show Notes by Boyana Atanasova

Interesting Artifact and the Podcastification of "AirPlay"

You Found Us! - Feel free to park anywhere...

Schnauzer Logic Episode 72 is Online!!!

Welcome to Gender Blender Listeners

Official Episode 71 Show Notes by Boyana Atanasova

Go Elf Yourself (The Schnauzer Logic Version)

Episode 71 Erratta

The Photograph Parviz Didn't Want You To See...

SchnauzerLogic Episode 71 is Online!!!

Official Episode 70 Show Notes by Boyana Atanasova

SchnauzerLogic Episode 70 is Online!!!

Official Episode 69 Show Notes by Boyana Atanasova

Official Episode 68 Show Notes by Boyana Atanasova

Schnauzer Logic Episode 69 is Online!!!

Parviz Doodles...

Schnauzer Logic Episode 68 is Online!!!

This Is Only A Test

Taking The Week Off...

California... coming home...

No Schnauzer Logic This Week - My Mom, Edna Goldstein, Has Passed Away...

Schnauzer Logic Podcast Episode 19 is Online!!!

Schnauzer Logic - Episode 18 Show is Online!!!

What Advice Would You Give A New Graduate?

Schnauzer Logic Podcast Episode 17 is Online!

Episode 16 of the Schnauzer Logic Podcast is Online!!!

Episode 15 of the Schnauzer Logic Podcast is Online!!!

Schnauzer Logic Podcast Episode 14 is Online!!!

SCHNAUZER LOGIC PODCAST BLOG IS PARTIALLY DOWN - HERE IS A LINK FOR THE ONLINE PLAYER

Separated-At-Birth?

Schnauzer Logic - Episode 13 Shownotes!!!

SchnauzerLogic Goes LIVE @4PM PST Today with our Special Guest, Comedian Rich Vos!