Scott Sanfilippo » Personal

“Polkas, Bartels and Some Dusty LPs.” Or, “Remembering WARD-AM.”

Scott Sanfilippo — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 23:53:18 +0000

Sometimes the craziest things spark a memory.

Whether it be the smell of burning leaves that reminds you of fall and spirals you into seasonal depression or the obscured back road in the middle of nowhere that reminds you of the first time you tried out back-seat yoga in your old Chevelle.

Today, I had to go and do a walk-thru of a rental property I own, as the renter is moving out. I lived in this house about 6 years ago and thought I got all my stuff out of it back then, but came upon an interesting stash up in the attic.

In 1987 I got my first job in radio working for Jim & Dorothy Ward at WARD-AM in Pittston, PA. It was a 10,000 watt day timer and one of the few remaining independently owned, yet stand-alone, AM radio stations in northeast Pennsylvania. After Jim’s death in 1994, the place went down the toilet and I moved on in 1997 right before it was sold.

WARD was unique to say the very least. Some day I’ll talk more about my time there and the craziness that went on inside a building that had house trailers attached to it, shag carpeting on the walls, flakeboard for paneling and an oil burner that always ran out of oil during my shift. WARD was the very first station in the market to embrace an all talk format and introduced Rush Limbaugh to northeast PA. High school sports was a big part of the station’s programming (and a big help for cash flow) as was Polka Weekend.

Yes, Polka Weekend.

Sam Liguori, Dale Michaels (aka Rusty Fender / Shadoe Steele), Rob Neyhard, Brunon Kryger and myself, along with rotating part-timers, overtook the radios in every nursing home, bingo hall, VFW, corner bar and Polish household in NEPA beginning at 6am Saturday morning and not giving up until the bars ran out of Bartels late Sunday night.

We did air shifts ranging from 4 to 6 hours, did live on-air requests and dedications without a delay, queued up records, and did more remotes from church bazars and fire company picnics than I care to count, yet remember. There were no computers loaded with MP3 files – we had boxes of records, yes records, that we flipped through and queued up on turntables. Commercials and bumpers were recorded on “carts” – audio cartridges similar to an 8-track tape. There were no CD players and the Sunday early morning religious programs came in the mail on 7-inch reel-to-reel tape. When we had to voice commercials, we had to splice tape with real razor blades, not a Mac running Adobe Audition.

Today, I stumbled upon 2 boxes of those records we used to spin on Polka Weekend hiding in the attic. Notes are taped to some of them which say things like, “Don’t play cut 3 it skips” or “Do not remove from studio” – glad I paid attention to that one. They all look like they’re in good condition and aren’t warped, but I don’t have a turntable to verify.

After finding this cache, I started thinking about the time I spent at WARD and looked for some photos that I had of the old place. Low and behold, I even found some of them, with a very young and thinner looking me.

Some memories you want to forget, some you want to remember. Memories of WARD I’ll always cherish as it was a special, one-of-a-kind place even if the place at 83 Foote Avenue in Duryea is now a junk yard.

Here I am chatting on the phone in the main studio. The Lazy Susan cart rack is in the back holding all the commercials. The black and white TV up in the corner was the only entertainment we had, and also served as the audio source for when we broadcast WNEP-TV news at 6pm and 11pm during the week. The red EBS binder contained the envelope with the secret code and instructions on what to do “in the event of a real emergency!” That strange contraption to the left with the circle of orange felt is a turn table – something that doesn’t exist in radio stations today!

Here I am donning a set of Radio Shack head phones, wearing an Izod shirt and some stone washed denim – sure signs of the 80′s. The Electro Voice RE20 mic in the on-air studio was a big investment at the time.

If you look closely there is a block of wood that we used to prop up the telos telephone interface so we can see it at a better angle. The walls in the studio were wrapped in lovely shag carpeting and the jock sitting at the board faced a clock on the other side of the wall and a big hole in the roof that leaked when it rained, but it was the only way the cables from the satellite dishes in the back got into the building.

“Oh Ida!” Or, “I Don’t Have Hurricane Shutters!”

Scott Sanfilippo — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 19:17:41 +0000

The hurricane season in south Florida proved to be uneventful, which for me is good. However, just as we’re ready to put an end to the season, a wicked woman by the name of Ida is churning in the North Atlantic and the entire state of Florida is in the cone of probability. She is expected to be called Hurricane Ida later tonight as her winds increase.

Several models are showing the path taking a turn to the gulf while two models show her headed smack dab into my backyard – something I’m not looking forward to.

While we won’t know more until later in the week, the winds this weekend have been topping out at 25mph with guts up into the 30′s. These winds have kicked up the waves on a normally milky smooth ocean and kept swimmers in the pool instead of the beach. I took some video of the ocean’s waves and the wind around 10am this morning in Boca Raton, FL.

“He Looks So Good.” Or, “In My Obituary Use a Current Photo.”

Scott Sanfilippo — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 18:28:14 +0000

The obituary read like a small novel. Two large columns filled with Ted’s life long accomplishments. A father of three, a member of the greatest generation, a successful businessman. When he served his country he received medals for good conduct and marksmanship before being honorably discharged.

When I saw Ted’s picture on the obituary page, it struck me. Here’s a handsome man who was taken away from us at too young an age. At an age when the world is still yours to explore, chapters are yet to be written and decades of life and well-being are yours for the taking. But not for Ted. Ted died on October 15th.

Ted was 82.

I cannot for the life of me figure out why, when an obituary is placed in the paper, the family can’t come up with a recent photo of the deceased. Ted was 82 however, the accompanying photograph showed Ted about 60 years younger. I passed around the obit and asked several people in the office, how old they thought this man was, none of them got it right. A few said, “Why do people do that with photos?”

Chances are that nobody would recognize the Ted of yesterday when reading his obituary today. Was there not one single picture taken of Ted over the last 50 years? Sure, he may have looked great “back then,” but he died looking like he looked in 2009, not 1947.

I just don’t get it.

Headbanger’s Holiday, The Flu, The Tube

Scott Sanfilippo — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 23:07:02 +0000

Headbanger’s Holiday
Yesterday was Halloween, the one day a year when kids think the world owes them a sugar high. I don’t get the whole “Halloween thing.” Yes, as a child I too dressed up in ridiculous looking costumes, parading down the street and ringing doorbells at night singing silly ditties looking for a handout. Then upon returning home, usually spent the night vomiting due to the excessive candy intake.

Now I spend Halloween with the lights out, the doors bolted, shades drawn and as far away from my house as I could be.

So before heading to Arturo’s in Boca Raton for dinner last night, I took a shower. While exiting, I slipped, slammed my head off the marble sink and went down for the count for about a minute. Happy Halloween.

With a massive headache and a bout with the dizzies I still managed to enjoy a great Italian meal at my new found favorite restaurant.

Today, the headache and dizziness was gone, but I can’t remember stupid stuff! I got lost going to the Boca Beach Club – a place I go to almost daily – had to look up phone numbers of people I call all the time, and couldn’t remember the password to log onto my laptop.

I’m not too concerned about it, after all, they say only the good die young. I’ll be around to 103.

The Flu
One thing I wanted to do today was get a flu shot. I was anticipating getting both the seasonal flu vaccine along with the H1N1 vaccine, but noooooo.

First off, it took visits to five Walgreen’s to finally find one with the vaccines available. Since you can’t get the two shots at the same time, I opted for the seasonal flu one since the line was a lot shorter.

Two and a half hours later, I had my shot. There were people waiting over four hours for the H1N1 vaccine, to which I say, never on a Sunday! So I have to wait till December to get the other shot and with my luck I’ll either have the swine flu by then or there will be no more vaccine available.

The Tube
While watching television this afternoon, I realized that we, the viewers, are getting the shaft!

I was watching a movie on TBS and I noticed that throughout the entire film, nearly 1/3 of the screen was taken up by the TBS logo and a promo for the George Lopez show. To that I say, WTF?

Look, I’m a marketing guy and will use every opportunity to get my message out there, but this is just a plain annoyance. About 10 years ago, the “bug” started appearing in the corner of our screens. That’s the station’s logo that sits down there to remind us that we’re watching NBC, like we would forget. Now, in addition to the “bug” we get static ads like the one for Lopez, or full video ads like you see on Discovery or The History Channel.

The images you see below show the screen I’m referring to along with the percentage of the screen that the ad takes up. I’m not a fan of this new type of advertising, as I think it’s pretty annoying. Maybe it wouldn’t be too bad if it only appeared for a few seconds here and there, but for it to be visible all the time, well, that’s unacceptable.

Maybe TBS and the rest of the networks who do this would like to pay 1/3 of my cable bill.

Yeah, right.

The original screen shot showing the position of the bug and the ad on TBS.

The same screen showing the percentage of the screen that is taken up by the bug and the ad.

“My New Florida Car.” Or, “Don’t Smash This One Up.”

Scott Sanfilippo — Sat, 31 Oct 2009 16:14:10 +0000

Those who follow my blog regularly will know that I was driving a 2010 Ford Mustang around south Florida. That was until one fateful afternoon when I was rear-ended on I-95.

Following the accident, I made the insane decision to drive my 2007 BMW 335i convertible from Pennsylvania to Florida. Those of you who said, “the ride isn’t too bad” will not be getting a Christmas card from me this year. Or next.

Well, as much as I loved that car, it was time to say “goodbye.” A convertible is great in Florida, but battling the psycho drivers on I-95 in a car I could easily be tossed out of wasn’t my idea of safety. So I decided it was time to get something a little more practical.

I had my mind sent on another BMW 3-series, but a 4-door. I visited Braman BMW in West Palm Beach and quickly ruled out another 3, pondered the idea of an X3 and decided on a 528i. I got a pretty unique color, Barbera Red with brown Dakota leather that looks great!

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A Very Moving Weekend

Scott Sanfilippo — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 02:47:21 +0000

What a wild weekend.

I closed on my new townhouse in Delray Beach, FL on Tuesday and managed to move everything from my old condo in Palm Beach in just one day. Granted I felt like a gypsy driving a convertible overflowing with suitcases full of my belongings, but if it weren’t for a car without a roof my move would have been more complicated.

I had to buy new televisions so I went to Best Buy and made my selection based on the size of the box that would fit in my car. Not a bad way to make a purchase. I walked out with two Samsung, 40″ LED televisions that have amazing picture quality, are super-slim and incredibly light. They fit in the car perfectly, except they had to go in on an angle, which is another reason I went with the LED over a LCD or plasma which have to remain level and upright.

When I got them home, I had to screw the stands mounting plate to the back of the television. Not a major thing. Except I didn’t have a screwdriver. I thought I pulled this thing off without a hitch, and bingo, sidelined by a Phillips head screwdriver. Off to Home Depot and a few minutes later, mission accomplished.

I sat back Saturday night with a sense of accomplishment as I ate a not-so-good Italian sub from Publix thinking that normally I would be at Taboo on Worth Ave in Palm Beach enjoying prime rib. Albeit, I was too damn tired to even eat the sub yet alone get dressed and go out for dinner.

I crashed and woke up Sunday morning to a simply gorgeous day. Before I headed to the Boca Beach Club, I shot some video of my new place to satisfy the curious who kept asking me what it’s like. I think it’s awesome! My next mission is to explore the neighborhood, find the good places to eat and learn the first name of every bartender in a 10 block radius.

I’ve got a lot of work yet to do.

The Blooper Reel

Scott Sanfilippo — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 02:52:21 +0000

Today I had to record a series of videos for an email campaign we’re doing for Solid Cactus Call Center. While I’m usually quick to bang these things out, today was an exception…. but we had some fun! Screwing up along with me is Katrina Domkowski and Becky Pokorny who were good sports as well. Enjoy!

Fun with Baby & Peanut

Scott Sanfilippo — Thu, 08 Oct 2009 01:32:07 +0000

Like a usual Wednesday, I had dinner at Pazzo Restaurant, in Pittston, PA. Before I left, I had to bring Baby and Peanut some of Pazzo’s homemade meatballs. They were a big hit with the pups, and shortly after devouring them, they were both ready to cuddle and go to sleep.

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Someone’s got a case of the Monday’s

Scott Sanfilippo — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 15:45:23 +0000

Yesterday, I wrote about the death of my 9 year old Chihuahua, Freckles. She passed away Monday from liver failure. Just a few hours after learning of her passing, I was scheduled to be on a 6:57pm flight from Ft. Lauderdale, FL to Newburgh, NY.

I left Boca Raton around 5pm and just got into I-95 south when traffic came to a stop. While sitting in my lane waiting for traffic to move, a pickup truck slammed into the back of my car and pushed me into a SUV that was stopped in front of me.

The SUV suffered minor damage, the pickup truck “attached” itself to the rear of my car and upon impact, the truck’s airbags went off. The driver of the truck, said he wasn’t paying attention and didn’t notice traffic was stopped. Fortunately for all of us, nobody required medical attention.

The brand new 2010 Ford Mustang GT convertible with only 4,000 miles on it that I was driving, did not fare as well.

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After about 45 minutes of waiting for the Florida State Trooper to prepare his paperwork, I was finally on my way with 60 minutes to get to the airport. Wanting to put this day behind me and get on the plane, I opted to drive the car in its current condition and park it at the airport until my return. Unfortunately, traffic was still slow moving on I-95 and the normal 20 to 30 minute trip ended up taking over an hour.

I missed my original flight to Newburgh, but JetBlue was able to accommodate me on a flight into White Plains, NY. The only drawback was, my car was in Newburgh! Still going on the “I want this day to be over” theme, I called Kevin Gilbride at Gilbride Limo, who on just three hours notice, had a car waiting at White Plains for me.

By 2:15am I was home in Scranton, PA relieved that the day was over and happy to be greeted by my two Chihuahua’s Baby and Peanut. The three of us went right to bed.

So I’m going to be driving one of my cars down to Florida this Thursday and Friday and upon arrival will have to take the Mustang to be repaired. Then Monday night, I’ll get my other car that’s spent too many hours in long term parking at Newburgh.

All that is of course dependent on luck. Something which I’ve had none of this week.

The Circle of Life.

Scott Sanfilippo — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 20:55:53 +0000

Freckles, Peanut (Front) & Baby

To say I started this week off on a bad note would be an understatement. This is part one!

Let’s go back to last Wednesday. I took my one 9 year old Chihuahua, Freckles, to the vet. She was scheduled to have a hernia operation and I dropped her off in the morning and was to pick her up in the afternoon. No biggie. As part of the pre-op, they were going to do blood work to make sure she was healthy enough to take anesthesia.

About a half hour after I dropped her off I got the first batch of bad news. Her liver levels were very high and they needed to put her on an IV to see if that would repair whatever damage to her liver had occurred. She was to stay in the hospital until Monday, when they would re-test her to see if the IV therapy helped.

Unfortunately, Monday morning her liver failed, she went into a coma and passed away.

Freckles was such a happy dog. I rescued her from a breeder who probably bred her one too many times. After adopting her, I took her to the vet to have her spayed. I was told at that time, that if I didn’t spay her, she would have died within months. That was 5 years ago.

Freckles was a cuddler. No matter where you were, no matter what you were doing, she wanted to be with you. Always on your lap, licking your face and being a little jealous when either Baby or Peanut would come around for some attention. Every time I would take a shower, she would sit outside the shower waiting for me to come out so she could lick the warm water off my legs.

My sweet little girl will be missed and not just by me. Her best friend, Peanut, was depressed from the moment I took her to the vet last week. He simply wasn’t himself. He wouldn’t come for his treat, didn’t want to go outside, just wanted to lay on the bed and wait for his friend to come home. Unfortunately, she never did.

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Peanut is doing much better and is back to his normal self once again, but both him and Baby know something is different. After all, they were living for each other.

The past several months I have endured so much pain in my life I’m a bit numb. When I got the call that she passed away, I cried, and I cried and I cried. I beat myself up for not being able to hold her one last time or give her one last kiss goodbye. I know that things like this I have no control over and that it’s all part of the circle of life and you must move on.

I will miss Freckles tremendously, but I have plenty of memories and I know that the life that I have given her she would have never had anywhere else.

This is the second dog that has crossed the famed Rainbow Bridge. The first one I lost was another Chihuahua, Donald. Losing a pet is not easy, trust me. But I have Peanut and Baby to take comfort in.

After I received the news of Freckle’s passing, I was driving…… TO BE CONTINUED.