I was not dreading the Fourth festivities this year as much as last year. Last year I just thought it would be unbearably hot, but once we got out there and got going, we had had drinks and food and shade and it wasn't as bad as it could have been. So this year, also knowing that the temps would be down a little more than last year, I wasn't dreading it.

We had a good day. We had a good crew there and my Promo Dir had provided us with great drinks and snacks. It was incredibly hot at 3 pm and very steamy, but then the clouds moved in and we had a quick rain. We had one big bolt of lightning in the west which alarmed us, because we do have to take down the mast and stop the live broadcast if we are in lightning, but that was the only lightning at that point. A little later there was another rain, but no lightning. Things cooled off considerably and it was looking good for the evening.

I broadcast and talked and talked and talked, it felt like, from 3 pm to 830. Finally we got the symphony on the air. Then, more rain and now big ligtning right on top of us. No choice but to pull the plug. Hooray for me, I had considered this and put music in at the station that could be on the air if needed, and it was.

Tired as a peanut at this point, I was getting bored so I bailed and went home. I listened and the broadcast started up again at fireworks time so they got that portion on the air, which was good.

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I had some interesting dreams this morning. Nothing that has "meaning" that I can discern at this point and nothing that is going to stick with me all day, I think, but I want to put down at least these three memories: 1.) I opened up an old children's book, but a thick one, that I had once had and opened the back cover and there were some holes "drilled" into the paper about the size of a pencil. My first thought was that there had been bugs eating into the book, then I found coins inside of these holes. I pulled out one and it was from 1944 and it the faces on the front were of Queen Elizabeth and Princess Margaret and their mother, when they were little girls. It was in mint condition. All of the coins in that hole appeared to be like this one. I was showing it to the people there (co-workers?) and telling them about Mark selling the Batman lunchbox for so much on eBay and I was eager to get to a numismatist or on eBay to see how much these mint British coins were worth. 2.) My sister and her husband had just moved into a big old white house, one of those with a wraparound porch and two stories. I was then in the kitchen and it was huge and had big monstrous appliances that were polished chrome and red enamel and looked more like an old car than a kitchen appliance and I was saying "You've got MY kitchen! This is the kitchen I've always wanted!" I was admiring, but also desirous. Not really jealous or bitter, just wishing I had one like it. 3.) I was at a house (could have been this house again) and I was doing something with some others at the table. I can't remember now what I was doing or working on, but I was completely absorbed in it and really enjoying what I was doing. Then I looked up at the clock and sat that it was 4 pm and I just panicked. At first I was thinking it was 3 pm and if I hurried I would only miss about 20 minutes of my show (which was on the air without me, obviously), but then I realized, no, it is FOUR pm and I am really late. So I grabbed my stuff and ran out the door and up the driveway hill to get to my car, which was a small Honda. As I was going I was thinking what a shame it was that I don't have that intensity and passion and absorption for my JOB as much as I did for that hobby or whatever it was we were doing (I wish I could remember what it was!). I got up to my car and saw that the right front tire was flat. Crap! No I had to call AAA and it was going to be even longer to get to work. I called and then went back to the house and then maybe went out to the car again and realized then that this car only had one front tire in the middle (like a wheelbarrow) and it was fine and I didn't need AAA. Then I went into the house and the AAA guy was there. I said, wait, I called and left a message but I didn't tell you where I was, how did you get here? He said that all the AAA cars have GPS so as soon as they got the message they knew where I was and he came to fix it. I told him that the tire didn't need to be fixed and he said I still had to pay him $70 for the visit. I wasn't happy about that, but I was going to pay him so I could get on to work. I pulled out my wallet (I feel like we were in the waiting room of a doctor's office or something at this point, but lots of people milling around) and was trying to find the debit card. The wallet was full of all sorts of credit cards. I kept finding more that I didn't even know I still carried. There was a really old Sears card and lots of bank cards and other things. Then I found several of my mother's credit cards that I knew I needed to return to her and didn't know how they got in my wallet. I dug and dug and finally gave him a Sears card, knowing that AAA accepted it and I hadn't used it in forever so it wasn't over limit. Then I found the right card and exchanged it and used it, I believe. THE END. Weird.

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I was driven absolutely OUT OF MY FUCKING MIND by Cotton yesterday. I resolve to avoid him and ignore him and get away from him as much as I can the rest of the week. I am just sick to death of him. I keep examining why I dislike him so much when he does these things and wonder how much of it is my "shadow" that I hate.

First thing, yesterday, I am getting up about 1130 (I had been up really late, as usual, on Monday night). I see that my silenced phone is flashing and I see that it is him calling me so I ignore it. I check the message in a bit and he says, "Yeah, I'm on the air right now and I'm supposed to call out a name on this contest at 1120 and I'm trying to get a hold of (promo dir) and I can't get her and I don't have a name." There is just complete disgust, contempt, superiority dripping out of every word! "I have the winner's sheet, but I do NOT have the name . . . oh, there's the name on the winner's sheet. Okay, never mind." I talk to the PrD later and she says the message he left on her phone was even worse, reminiscent of the Fat Man and his contemptuous attitude toward everyone. "Uh, Prd, we have been having this contest for a MONTH where we are calling out names on the air every morning, but it appears that SOMEONE has dropped the ball and I don't have a name for today. Please give me a call." ASSHOLE.

He had already irritated me yesterday. Monday was going to be a live jock filling in for the Fat Man and Tuesday/The Fourth was going to be recorded. The noon hour is usually filled in with requests by the jock on the air, so I knew a jock would be on and available Monday to do that, but not on Tuesday. I told Cotton that I would fill in Tuesday with patriotic songs through the noon hour so the jock could record and not have to find music for that hour. So Monday I'm at a remote and I hear the jock on the air say "coming up in the noon hour, all patriotic music." Crap, I thought, did I put the music in the wrong day? So I called him and he said, no, Cotton had made a mistake and thought that I had forgotten to put in patriotic music so he did, etc. etc. So, not a big deal, but we had patriotic music in the noon hour two days in a row. I think that one bugs me because that is interfering with music and THAT is my domain if I want no other domain.

Then the other MUSIC issue was yesterday when I was driving to the park I heard an oldie on the radio that I was unfamiliar with. I knew it sort of, but was pretty damn sure it wasn't in any of the categories that we play and it was not scheduled to be played. Sure enough, Cotton comes out of it and says "That was Steve Wariner with a song that wasn't a big hit for him, hardly cracked the Top 10..." (to which my mind is screaming--- THEN WHY ARE YOU PLAYING IT???? . . ." ... but appropriate for today." I don't know what the song says that he thinks was appropriate for today, it probably says fireworks or veteran in it somewhere and he thinks that makes it perfect for the Fourth of July. But the damn song wasn't scheduled so DON'T play it!! This one I think I will discuss with the boss. I've told Cotton to not go off the log but he thinks he is "APD" (only in his dreams) that he can play what he thinks is right.

I was irritated enough that he was even on the air, though that shouldn't be my concern at all. That is his domain and if he wants to work 20 hours a day, I should let him. He was concerned that the weather would be an issue and we needed a live jock so he canceled the other guy and took it over himself. And THEN, when we had to suspend the broadcast of the symphony, I hear him on the air so I know as soon as he heard us do that he dashed to the station. Maybe I shouldn't call him Cotton, I should call him Alexander Haig. "No need to worry, I am in control!"

And there were even MORE reasons why I really hated his guts yesterday, but I will not delineate them all. I told my favorite intern that if Cotton called me one more time I was going to have him answer the phone and be my personal assistant and deal with him. If anyone ever had control issues, it is Cotton. Why couldn't he have just gone to Willie's picnic and let us handle Austin?

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And I cannot EVEN believe that Ken Lay died of a heart attack in ASPEN, for God's sake, and got off scott free for all the suffering he imposed on thousands and thousands of people. It just ain't right!