Summer vacation

It's a Sunday afternoon in the middle of July and it's 90 degrees out. I've been to 10 events this week with one more coming in a couple of hours - the sixth birthday party for a little girl named Ava. Alexis had a lot of fun last night picking out dresses for her. ​

Thursday kicked my ass. I did the show, had a couple meetings, spoke at the Munster Chamber about digital media, attended McDermott's Festival of the Lakes party, attended Mrvan's Tom Petty party, and then got up on Friday at 4:22 in the morning to do it again. On Friday, I did the show, went to a couple meetings and then played golf with Matt Reardon and Tom Dakich. 

The hamster wheel does not slow down. I crave silence with my radio stations, streaming TV channels and podcasts. Through it all we must still market ourselves.

It is a full life that I am eternally grateful for... especially in the context of what has happened to many traders who left the Chicago Board of Trade. Many couldn't make it in the outside world. 

What is the next chapter?

I don't know.  That's why I intend on taking a little break from writing to the three or four of you. I am pushing people like Rick Kubic and Kat Marlow to do TV shows. And I'm pushing people like Sam Michel and Scott Shellady (the Cow Guy) to do podcasts. And there are others in between.

But as I push others into digital, I remain basically a morning radio host. Sure, my show is streamed in video. But you know and I know that I mostly a morning radio host. 

I am not comfortable with this. Neither is Mad Mac. He is one of my many callers. He is often rude and illogical.  But as you can hear in the above HeyJED, he sometimes calls me out and gets it right.

I'm pushing everyone to test their limits of creativity and technology, to do streaming TV shows and podcasts and post on social media and  create their own web pages. 

But what am I doing to test the limits? Other than this blog, not a whole lot. And this blog is even losing its punch.

I designed the new WJOBNetwork.com website and put all the photos and links and buttons up there. And I'm not done. This takes several hours a week. 

And I do the show in the morning and I appear at all sorts of things because I'm the local radio guy. 

But I'm not reaching down to create from my core. I'm missing something. I don't know what it is. Perhaps I should be following my own advice and do a podcast. It would be easy as hell to do technologically. But what would I talk about? 

What do I even talk about on the morning (radio) show? 

It's hard to tell. As one observer put it recently, I do a lot of "ramblin' about amblin'." Maybe I should just do that on a podcast.

Or should I be creating video content? I like the camera. I like talking to it, to you. And I present decently, especially in the middle of the summer with a tan. 

But what would my TV stuff be about? Recent PNW MBA grad Ben Cowart who helps me out says we should do a reality show about the station. Call it "Fake Media."

I share this with the three or four of you because that's what we do together. I ramble and you listen... on Facebook Live, Roku, Amazon, Apple TV and the TuneIn app. Oh, and on AM 1230 and FM 104.7 FM and in this blog. I'm everywhere but nowhere. I feel the most at home  talking on the radio in the morning and blogging to you. On the rest of it, I'm confused. 

This is where I'm at in the middle of the summer, 2019. Make no mistake - I've got as good a team around me as I have ever had. There's tech people and funny people and business people and just a lot of people, both in and out of WJOB. I am proud of where we're at.

The business seems to be headed in the right direction. A lot of talented people are doing a lot of really creative things. Just check out WJOBNetwork.com. 

But I am not. I have stagnated creatively. I can feel it. There's a path out there and I need to find it. For this reason, I'm taking a break from the three or four of you. Hope you can handle it.