I just wanted to say thanks!  We received our quarterly report cards yesterday (which means the Arbitron ratings).  Without going into deep detail and boring you, let’s just say everything turned out great.  I’ve been here at the Buzz for 4 months and it is very gratifying to me that it’s turned out so well.  It certainly helps that I work with great people here> Kimberly and Beck, Pat the Producer and Dem Jones are a talented team who just happen to make it easy for me to be here.  I’ve been very lucky that the 5 of us clicked from day one and we’re surrounded by some great support people.  As you know, it makes it much easier when you enjoy the people you work with.  And I certainly give you and every listener all the credit for putting up with my sarcasm every workday on 98.9 the Buzz.  As you must know, any chimp could do my job.  If it was rocket science, nobody would have a job in this building.  Since it’s not about science and more about people and music, I got lucky.  So thanks for listening…..I owe ya one. 

A bunch of us from the conglomerate went out and celebrated the good news last night, and many are draggin’ around here today.  I personally blame it on Rebecca at the Strath bar, Mark Ehman and Joe at the Brighton, RD and Ben from the Pig in the East End, and Brandon and Michelle at Woodys.  Plus all those big dudes with purple ties who were floating through the streets.  If you can’t take responsibility for yourself, gotta find somebody to blame it on, right?    It was all Schmidty’s fault..just ask our sales guru.

Looking forward to rockin’ the Party in the Park tonight with Eddie Money.  Seen him 3 times, and everytime he entertains the hell out of me.  Watched him one time at the ol’ Newport House for a PXY Summer Jam when he went on stage with one shoe on.  Not deliberately, he was just lit up so much that he lost a shoe.  Hope he loses his mind tonight on stage.  Come downtown and check him out.  I guess the ratings celebration will have to continue with “the Money Man” (that’s what Eddie calls himself)!

One more thank you> to all our troops who fight the tough fight, and their family members here at home who anxiously await their safe return.  God bless our troops!  

This morning, my wife asked me if I had ever seen “Christian The Lion” on YouTube.  I had not, so she fired up the video as I was walking out the door for work.

Bag on my shoulder, keys in hand, I watched the following video….

I left for work with tears running down my cheek.

I’m a REAL man.

.

Today as a special guest, my fiancee Jessi wanted to share with you all the pains of Wedding Dress Shopping. Pretty funny stuff, check it out…

Oh boy, let me tell you, if you thought finding “The One” (the human companionship version) was tough, just wait until you start searching for the other “The One” (the wedding dress version). Oh yes, that’s right, it’s time for Jessi to delve into the dark and unseemly world of the bridal salon, in all its hideous and marshmallow-inspired glory. Yesterday was my first entree into this terrifying universe of hundred-pound fabric and whiteness to epic degrees, and if I have it my way it will surely be my last. Or, at least, nearly second-to-last. So let’s run down my day in Bridal Hell, shall we?

First of all, let me explain, I am not what you’d call a “conventional” bride. Hell, I’m not a “conventional” anything, and for me “tradition” might as well be a four-letter word. Well, it would be a four-letter word if I even considered four-letter words to be four-letter words (I curse like a sailor), but that’s beside the point. Let’s just say that I’m not really into the whole “Omg, I get to dress up like a pretty pretty princess in a big fluffy white ball gown with a shiny tiara and omg let’s go to the hair salon today too! Yay!” kind of thing. No, in place of long and puffy I was headed for shorter and slinky, showing off every ounce of curves I have (and I’ve got plenty), nice and tight up top with a dropped waist to hug my hips quite nicely, but light enough on the bottom that it doesn’t drag the whole thing down, something I can hop and bop around in easily, no train at all (blagh! gross!), and even slightly off the ground if I could find it so that I could show off the white Converse All-Stars with orange laces I plan on wearing. Got the picture? Ok, great, so then you surely see why I was expecting a rough day from the very beginning.

We started out local just on the off-chance that a miracle happened and a beam of light shone down from the heavens onto the little bridal shop in Brockport and the perfect dress would be sitting there on the mannequin beaming back at me with all the glory and energy of creation…. as you can probably imagine, that didn’t quite happen. We went in and the people there were very nice, but they just didn’t have a whole lot in the way of slinky dresses. I did try on a few, which was a very very very bizarre experience, let me tell you. I suddenly found myself in a velvet-curtained dressing room staring down about 8 monstrous snow-white velvety affairs with a combined weight of nearly 3 tons, and sighing quietly to myself, thinking in a thoroughly uncomfortable manner: “Well now, this is odd. I’m about to become Wedding Barbie.”

So I hauled the first few on and went, “Oh, HELL no,” not even bothering to exit the dressing room and check the big mirror. Finally I found one that wasn’t horrendous and shuffled my way outside to show my mother. I was all well and good just hanging out slightly outside the dressing room, but the sales lady made me go get up on the damnedable pedestal in the middle of the room in front of the mirrors so everyone could see it properly. Uuuuuuuuugh. I hate being the center of girly fashion attention. So we sorted out what was good and bad about the dress and it was on to try the lovely little thing one of the mannequins was wearing. It was too small to begin with, and I was absolutely convinced it would not go over my hips, so the sales lady came in and dragged the thing down over my head. Let me go over that bit there one more time in more detail. A woman I have known for about five minutes saw me in my underwear, all hot and flustered from dealing with 80 pounds of thick fabric in a very warm dressing room, and this strange lady put clothing on me. How odd. How thoroughly, thoroughly odd. This dress turned out to be actually pretty nice, although it was way too small and not quite right in certain respects. One thing I must mention though. It laced up the back, and the lady did it up for me, and I suddenly have much sympathy for the poor women of the 1800s. I now understand why women fainting was a common occurrence. Just like Elizabeth Swan in Pirates of the Caribbean, the poor things could not breathe!

So we got what we could from that salon, and it was on to the next one… in Henrietta. See, something you must understand here, Pat and I have this saying around our house, and it goes something like this: “There is nothing good about Henrietta.” And with the exceptions of an Asian import store that smells like fish and certain Italian restaurants, and possibly Show World (wink), I have consistently found that phrase to be true. Also, the place in Henrietta we were going to was basically the bridal equivalent of Wal-Mart and McDonald’s. Ogod, ogod, the horror. Packaged fast-food wedding crap… in Henrietta. Surely nothing good could come out of this, but we had to try anyway. It’s the whole “hoping for a miracle” syndrome. So we walked in and were promptly informed that we needed an appointment by the brusk little woman at the front desk. Ok, fair enough, they’re busy, so we made an appointment and checked out a little bridal shop down the street in the mean time, but they had a very very very small selection. So, back to the Wal-Mart of bridal stores we went. The first thing I thought was odd was that they give you a little baggy of goodies and ads and coupons that’s just like the little move-in pack of crap they give you in college. You know, the big plastic cup filled with Oreos and coupons for Easy Mac. This was not a good sign, especially since it was all for hair dye and tooth whitening (very not me).

So we got teamed up with a little lady who seemed nice enough, and she asked what I was looking for, and she gave me a very quick, very practiced, very precise in a military fashion, tour of the racks of white plastic-covered monstrosities (we were reminded numerous times that we could not take the dresses out of the bags because it was an “off-the-rack bridal store,” okee dokee, whatever) and we were left to pick out a few things we were interested in. There wasn’t much I liked, but since we were there anyway I figured I autta try on something at least. So then the lady came back and collected the dresses and took us into the unholy realm of hell that was the dressing room area. Picture this: really super bright lights, shining on a massive circle of glass doors in the center of the room, with mirrors and pedestals all around the outside of the circle for everyone to see you wearing whatever godawful embarrassment the lady dresses you up in. May God and the saleslady have mercy on your soul.

Then the really bizarre part happened, as if that wasn’t bad enough. Before the lady left she asked for my bra size, and apparently this is so they can give you strapless undergarments to change into to try the dresses on. How very odd and slightly gross to me, but OK, that’s what they do here, fine, and I don’t want to cause a scene. So she says to me they didn’t have my size (unsurprising. I’m thin but rather well-endowed, making for an odd number combination, so I’m used to this kind of thing), so she gave me something with a massively bigger band, like 4 numbers too big, with a smaller letter size. It’s like hello, honey, it doesn’t work that way. Eventually we had to delve into the realms of the longline bra (basically covers your whole torso), and she freaking helped me put it on. I don’t know how to properly express the horror of this situation. Scary militant dress lady is helping me put a bra on. Dear lord, what has become of sanity? Surely the whole world has gone mad around me. So there I am, standing uncomfortably in an ill-fitting bra, staring down dress lady and absolutely refusing to take my jeans off to try the damn dress on. So she tosses the thing over my head and away we go into the outside world of mirrors and too-bright lights and mothers sitting around eyeing up the other girls. I was made to stand on another damn pedestal in a horrendous dress with someone else’s bra in public. This was like gym class and the doctor and the dentist and the gyno and crazy old Aunt Bertha who pinches your cheeks and leaves lipstick marks on you, all wrapped up into one hideously scarring experience.

So I stood there, thinking “Holy hell, I am definitely going to need a rock show tonight to get over this,” and all I wanted to do was to run home and jump into bed with Pat (who was napping before the Foo Fighters concert) and have him hug me and tell me that everything was OK and that scary dress lady wasn’t real and that she couldn’t get me and that she didn’t live under the bed or in the closet or anywhere else for that matter.

After what seemed like an eternity I was finally able to hit the eject button on this crazy ride and run screaming (bravely) out of the store, in a very “Monty Python and the Holy Grail’s Brave Sir Robin” kind of fashion. [link is slightly dirty...slightly]

So here is what I think I’m going to do. With my new found knowledge of how certain styles fit on me (all thanks to the Brockport store) I am going to scour the Internets in order to find a reasonably perfect dress and see if Brockport can order it for me, and I’ll just be done with the whole thing, with the exception of any possible tailoring they might need to do. And I will hopefully never ever ever have to go through Bridal Hell ever again. This is one dress I’m very close to choosing.

“DAVE GROHL IS A FUCKING ROCK STAR”

That was our mantra last night at the Blue Cross Arena. I went to the show with my buddy Jackson Spurr from The Haystack across the hall.  He’s a big time Nirvana fan, so he was in his glory watching Dave (as well as Pat Smear) ripping through Foo Fighters biggest hits and even a rare Nirvana song.

Some highlights for me were SOLID versions of Everlong and Monkey Wrench.  The triangle solo was pretty sweet too.

Jackson is getting some fancy ass photos from our buddy Frank for his blog.  All I have is my crappy cell phone video once again. Enjoy…

I had the honor of helping to host the 8th Annual Beamer’s Golf Classic yesterday at Lakeshore Country Club in Greece.  It’s an annual tradition in memory of our good bud Thomas “Beamer” Hughes, who we tragically lost to muscular dystrophy this past winter.  Beamer put up a good fight, and now a close group of his friends carry on the fight to raise money for those afflicted with this terrible disease.  Beam’s wife Stephanie is carrying on his legacy and did a great job of putting the tourney together, aided by Beamer’s committee members: Ricky Altier, Gary ‘Gates” Brown, John Burt, Steve ‘Coyote” Carhart, Coach Pete Dawes, Kevin “Moe” Francis, Joe and Tom Huber, John Kircher, Paul McCarthy, Mark “Nokes” O’Connor, John Post and Terry Sheridan.  I’m honored to be part of such a fine group who are dedicated to carrying Beamer’s name on in such a worthy way.  It was a stellar group of players who raised lots of $, led by Senator Joe Robach, retired RPD Chief Tim Hickey, Jim Beauchamp, Steve Dunnigan, Pat Dwyer, Pat Shatzel, Eddie Thaney, Ed Schfino, Bill Turner, the McKeon family from O’loughlins, the Petzings from Shamrock Jacks, Bill Turner, Ralph Fornuto, the Romansky clan, all the Smiths, Hondo and J.B., Mike Post and Larry Thomas from the Distillery……I could go on and on about this sold out group of hackers.  Suffice to say, it was a great tribute to a great man and woman who stood by his side through many adventures in life.  Thanks to all who attended and put up with Joe Huber and myself on the mic.  I look forward to keeping Beamer’s name alive for many years to come.  God bless him, Stephanie and all our troops!

If you don’t know who the Foo Fighters are then you either live in a cave in Tibet or are simply deaf and haven’t really heard a whole lot, which is completely understandable. “My Hero,” “Everlong,” “Learn to Fly,” “Monkey Wrench,” “All My Life,” Big Me” are all songs that have been at or near the top of the billboards over the years, and not just in the rock catagory either. They’ve won multiple Grammy’s as well. Next to Green Day, in my opinion, there is no bigger rock band that spans more age groups then the Foo Fighters.

That being said, I was uber excited to go and see them at Blue Cross Arena in downtown Rochesterlast night. It is rare for them to come here, and rare for a band of this magnitude to be in the city and not stuck out in the middle of no where. The show the Foo’s put on was amazing. Dave Grohl has so much energy; he’s like a time bomb. I found myself asking how can a guy have so much energy, for nearly 2 hours, after being on the road for over a year now? Compared to every other rock front man I’ve ever seen, and there’s been a respectable amount, no one (minus the front man of Flogging Molly) has had more energy on stage. It felt like the beginning of a tour rather then the end of one. The man screams and bangs his head all night long. He shreds the guitar with every ounce of energy he has, and has a ball doing it. In terms of a pure rock show,  don’t know that you could get a better one musically.

Here’s the bad part of the show: the lack of attendance. The arena was probably 80% full… for the FOO FIGHTERS. What???? I understand it’s a Monday night, I really do. I get up for work every day at 2am…. trust me I get it. It is rare for me to do anything in the evening during the week, let alone go to a rock show. Still, how is the arena not 90-100% full for such a huge act? On top of that, we aren’t the craziest lot, though I will excuse that one because the age groups were various and it was a Monday after yet another event filled Rochester weekend.

I found myself thinking last night that maybe the Foo’s aren’t that big anymore… maybe they’ve lost their impact… Maybe rock is dead. Then I come to find out they have sold out the Meadowlands tonight which has to hold around 80-90k. So they can fill an outdoor super stadiumon a Tuesday night but only sell a little over half of Blue Cross Arena? WHAT?!?!?!?!?

I guess it really speaks for our economy as well as the lack of youth in the community. Maybe it wasn’t promoted enough, though how much promotion do you really need to do for the FOO FIGHTERS?!?!?!?

I was let down by the fact we didn’t even come close to selling out, which probably sealed the fate of them ever coming back here. Never the less, it was probably one of the best rock shows you could have ever seen in Rochester. If you missed it, which you probably did, you should feel really bad: it was amazing.

Tried my best to help OPEC this past weekend by hitting the road for some diverse fun.  Started Friday evening with a trip with Pat The Producer from the Breakfast Buzz to Buffalo for a stag party for Rich “The Bull” Genzler from the Edge radio.  Weird cuz Pat is from Buff and works here and Bull is a Roch boy, graduated from McQuaid and CMF down the hall and works over there in Buff.  Lots of the Buffalo radio peeps were there, including his boss Chet O. from Citadel Communications, Shredd and Reagan along with Evil Jim from the Edge, John Hager and Erik Russen from 97Rock.  Had a good time toasting Bull at Fat Bob’s on Virginia Place, a cool little street parallel to Delaware Ave. in Buff. loaded with bars and restaurants.  Pat was in his glory in his hometown.

Saturday it was off to the ESL Intl. Air Show at the airport.  Enjoyed the fine hospitality provided by Mike Davis and Johnny Spinder from our hard-working Marketing and Special Events Dept. as the US Air Force Thunderbirds entertained our group, monitored closely by Michele and Tony Albertelli and Gerry Brownell.  The Thunderbirds precision is unbelievable.  It’s amazing how they pull off their moves with such coordination and effort.  Makes me even more proud of our military.  I can’t imagine what it must be like to be in a foreign land when our troops show up with incredible firepower and team work.  God bless our troops.

Saturday night’s fun was staged in East Rochester.   Attended the ER Fireman’s Carnival and Parade.  My college roomie H. Paul “Earl” Kulick made the tour from Syracuse to join everyone on Woodbine at the Connor family estate, a perfect viewing spot for the parade.  Hundreds of people marched the route from Main & W. Commmercial to the carnival grounds at ER high school.  As Rich Kuhn and Johnny Hagreen rightfully proclaimed, it was a true “slice of Americana.”  Stephanie, Jared, Reagan and Jadon Kuhn led their cousins from the Schroeder family along the parade route, where we all witnessed many dedicated volunteer firefighters and their equipment.  Some of the depts. represented included the ER, Brighton, Fairport, Bushnells Basin,  Pittsford, Macedon, Wallington (where’s Wallington?) and Caledonia firefighters, plus the bagpipes from the Gates PD Keystone Club.  Many public officials were on hand, including Senator Jim Alesi, County Legislator Anthony Daniele, ER Town Board member Mark Florack, Judge Gail Donofrio, Judge Elma Bellini, former Mayor Dave Bonacchi (now running for NYS Assembly) and many more.  It was a great parade, a true piece of American culture that the town still treasures to this day.  Congrats to everybody in ER…it was really a fun night.

Since I had not spent enough money out of my gas budget (is there such a thing?), Sunday I was off to Seneca Lake to join my buddy Scooter, his beautiful bride Brandy and sons Michael and Andrew aboard the SS Avedisian.  It was a perfect day in Geneva on the north shore of Seneca Lake.  Met up with the SS Booby Trap for a day of sun and suds.  Strange to say but it was my first time ever on the lake.  Since I grew up in Canandaigua, my lake days were always spent in CA.  I did notice that many boats were tied up at the marina on Seneca, no doubt thanks to the cost of gas.  It’s been obvious to me this summer that many people are opting to not fill up their tanks for $5 a gallon on the water.  That’s too bad because it was a great day enjoying another beautiful Finger Lake.

Finished up the weekend by joining my hair stylist/sister Tracy Privitera and her hubby Steven for dinner at the Waterfront Grill on Lakeshore Dr. in Canandaigua.  I’ve said this before, but need to say again what a great place the Waterfront is.  Sara Genecco and Chef Joe Kato are doing a wonderful job, as was evidenced by the huge crowds of happy diners that have been enjoying the fabulous food and view.  The owner Dave Genecco stopped by to make sure we were happy diners: mission accomplished.

Now it’s back to the grind after a grand weekend from west to east.  Hope your weekend was as eventful and fun as mine.  Next weekend it’s a trip south for me, but not before I MC today’s Beamer Classic golf tourney at Lakeshore.  Fill you in on that tomorrow.  Back 2 the rock-n-roll!      

Prepping for the weekend, I checked out the ER Carnival last night.  It was cool and damp so the crowd wasn’t huge, but the people were fun.  Did some hangtime with the outstanding Connell family, led by Bill and Robyn who were joined by Billy Jr. in from the FDNY (our hero) along with Emily and Steve Williams, expecting another little irish babe into the fold.  ER’s Finest with Off. John Rivera kept watch on Mike Romach, Ted Connor and Chief John Alfieri’s carnival grounds.  Even The Boxman made an appearance, scouting out the location for Friday nights performance from the legendary ER All*Stars.  I’ll be back there Saturday for the parade.

Off to a Buffalo stag party tonight with a bunch of radio geeks over west, then tomorrow I’ll be with the Buzz at the ESL Intl. AirShow.  Don’t miss the US Air Force Thunderbirds over the city at 2ish.  God bless those birds and all of our troops! 

Yesterday some tool decided to say I should grow up and be a man because he said my video blog of my vacation depicted me as talking like a baby for 6 minutes… which is BS. This man is not actually a tool; I’m being ridiculous. However it did make me think about what exactly a “man” is. Low and behold, while scrolling through one of my favorite websites (digg.com) today, I found THIS… CLICK HERE Mr./Mrs. Computer idiot.

It’s a survey done by another one of my favorite sites, askmen.com, which I think does a good job of answering my very question.

Here’s some of the stats I fall in to:

I’m part of the 48% of men who’s greatest weapon in getting women is my sense of humor.

I’m with the 84% of men who think guys get screwed in divorce generally

I agree with the 79% of guys who think women put too much emphasis on financial worth

49% of men think downloading illegal music and videos is OK and shouldn’t be punished… I definitely am with them

I think a real man cries. and So do 94% of men, eat that.

And despite it being shallow, 59% of men as well as myself are concerned with how people percive my car.

There’s some stuff about me anyway… where do guys fall? Feel free to ask me where I fall on some of the other stats in this massive survey right here on the comment board or e-mail me: pmcmahon@entercom.com

When I was a little tike (also known as a little pain-in-the-ass kid) in CA, everybody couldn’t wait for the annual Fireman’s Carnival at Red Jacket Park by the lake.  That’s where the state boat launch is now located on S. Main St. in CA.  Obviously there is no more Fire Carnival in CA thanks to the insurance companies who got involved in our fun.  See, it was a BIG deal every summer when the Fire Dept. would stage the carnival to raise money for the volunteer firefighters who give so much to help others.  The carnival was a meeting place for everybody in town, with rides and games for the kids, and lots of food and beer for the adults.  There was a huge parade every Saturday night during carnival week, with what seemed like 1000’s of fire trucks from all over the area.  It was a blast, a great childhood memory.  But, as we all know, things change over time.  Someone was injured at a carnival once, a lawyer sued, the insurance company settled out of court, then jacked all the rates on the poor fire departments.  Next thing you know> poof!  No more fire carnivals!  Damn, what a shame. 

Except, there are still a few fire companies around town who have the guts to continue such great traditions.  There are two going on this weekend, and you should try to take it all in.  One for each side of town: Hilton for those of you on the west side, and East Rochester for eastsiders.  They both have parades, music, food, games, food, rides, food and drinks.  Yes, they may even have a beer tent!  I will personally check the ER scene for you and report back Monday.  I highly recommend that you support these carnivals so they don’t fade away like my poor ol’ CA carnival did.  These events make living here special.  So grab your family or friends and check ‘em out.  If you don’t have fun, I’ll refund your money.  Oh, that’s right…reading this costs nothing so I’m off the hook.  But trust me….you’ll find some fun and many great people and new friends to enjoy.

God bless the firefighters and our troops!