If you were listening to my show this past Friday 8/28/09, you may have heard Mayor’s Last Call at 2:45pm.  To sum it up, a guy called me who couldn’t understand why we honor fallen cops or firefighters when they lose their life in the line of action.  I tried to explain that we should always show respect and honor for anyone who risks their lives to help others.  This genius caller said no other civil servent is shown such respect when they lose their life.  I calmly tried to explain that other jobs or vocations are not comparable to what firefighters and cops do. Witness the loss of 2 fire professionals last week in Buffalo and 2 more yesterday fighting wildfires in California.  A listener Ellen from Long Island sent the following along to me to share what a hero means to others.  Please allow me to share it with you and think of what these ordinary people do to make a difference everyday:

Firefighter Survives in Girl Who Received Bone Marrow;
Altruism: New Yorker’s decision to donate saved a Nevada child. Nine
years later, he died at the World Trade Center.

Copyright 2002 / Los Angeles Times
Los Angeles Times…04/21/2002

 From Associated Press

Chantyl Peterson bursts through the front door, greets her mother and
slings her schoolbooks onto the floor. She’s a healthy seventh-grader
who loves horseback riding and playing the flute and doesn’t mind homework.

Nine years ago, she was dying.

A New York City firefighter saved her life back then, but not in the
usual way. His bone marrow was a perfect match for the little Nevada
girl, then 5 and badly needing a transplant.

During a 45-minute procedure in Milwaukee, his marrow was sent into
Chantyl intravenously. It turned her type AB blood into his A positive
blood, and she quickly recovered.

Afterward, Chantyl drew a picture for the donor whose name she still
didn’t know. It showed a little girl being rescued. “For my friend, Mr.
Nice Man. Mr. Nice Man is saving Chantyl from a fire,” she wrote.

Eventually, she learned his name, Terry Farrell, and they exchanged
phone calls and letters. Chantyl and her family met with Farrell on
visits to Manhattan. They took the fireboat around New York Harbor and
ate lunch in the World Trade Center.

In October, Chantyl, now 13, traveled to New York to be with Farrell for
a final time.

She read a prayer at his funeral.

He had died in the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks–like so many other
firefighters trying again to save someone’s life.

Her mother had always thought Chantyl looked pale. There were nosebleeds
and constant bruises. She was only 3 when she was diagnosed with
aplastic anemia, a disease that stops the function of bone marrow. Only
a transplant could cure her.

But her parents weren’t a match for Chantyl. Neither was her brother,
nor her sister. Chantyl needed marrow from a stranger.

Her name was put into the National Marrow Donor Program registry, the
world’s largest, with 4.5 million volunteer donors.

Doctors told her family that Chantyl had a 1 in 20,000 chance of finding
a match.

“They told us it might not happen,” says Chantyl’s mother, Sheri.

But there was hope.

One of those who signed up as a donor was a 45-year-old married father
of two from Huntington, N.Y., a firefighter with Rescue Company 4. Terry
Farrell hadn’t made anything of it; he never even told his five brothers
he had volunteered to donate.

Of five possible matches for Chantyl, he turned out to be No. 1. “They
told us they had a perfect match,” Sheri Peterson recalls. Farrell went
for additional testing required for the transplant.

For a time, an experimental drug seemed to help Chantyl. But when she
was 5 a biopsy revealed a mass in her chest. It was T-cell lymphoma, and
a bone marrow transplant was the only option.

Sheri Peterson worried the donor might not be available or might have
second thoughts about undergoing the uncomfortable 90-minute procedure
in which a needle is inserted into the hip. But Farrell quickly agreed.

A nurse showed Chantyl a jigsaw puzzle map of the United States and
pointed to New York.

“Your donor lives right over in here,” she said.

Farrell went to a New York hospital so his marrow could be collected and
flown to Children’s Hospital of Wisconsin in Milwaukee, where the
transplant procedure was carried out on July 10, 1993.

The following month, Chantyl left the hospital, a healthy little girl.

In a letter, she thanked her donor for his “tough” blood.

Farrell wrote back to his “little lady.”

“I don’t want you to become too tough with my blood,” he wrote in a
Sept. 22, 1993, letter.

“Remember you are still a beautiful little girl. My small contribution
to you is only half the battle; the other half is yours. I know you are
a fighter just by your letter alone.”

Kevin Farrell said his brother Terry was always quiet and unassuming,
and treated the marrow donation the same way.

“When I talked to him about it afterward, I got a grin out of him,”
Kevin says. “If you got a grunt out of him, it was a long conversation.”

Chantyl wore a new, pink frilly dress in honor of their first meeting,
in 1994. Farrell wore his uniform. She rode in his firetruck, and the
two families went on a picnic and made brownies together at Farrell’s home.

Another day, Chantyl’s mother took pictures as the 6-year-old ate lunch
with Farrell on the 87th floor of the World Trade Center in the office
of one of his friends, by a window overlooking the city.

They stayed in touch–once, she wrote to Farrell about Fire Prevention
Week at school and how she had learned how to stop, drop and roll–and
five years after their first meeting, Chantyl and her family returned
for a surprise visit in September 1999.

Sheri Peterson says, “I just remember hugging him, saying, ‘We’ll see
you in another five years.’ “

But then came Sept. 11, 2001.

Chantyl was in her bedroom but heard her mother on the telephone.

“She came out of the room and said, ‘Is Terry in trouble? Does he need
my help? Do I need to give him some blood?’ “

“I told her we really need to pray for him,” her mother replied.

Farrell’s body was found Oct. 25 in the rubble of the trade center’s
south tower.

The Peterson family flew to New York a third time, this time to say
goodbye. Chantyl recited part of the closing prayer at the funeral.

A New York-based donor program organized by a fellow firefighter will be
re-christened to include Farrell’s name

God bless the memory of Firefighter Terry Farrell and all who risk their lives for others. Read more @ www.terryfarrellfund.org.  God bless our troops!

Mt. Morris and I went to my home town and went to a Chiefs’ game with Hot ass Lisa and her husband, Mark! We had an awesome time watching my Chiefs and tailgating. Here’s some pics…

If you’re into music, don’t let the rain hold you back from a couple of great music fests in town this weekend.  Doesn’t matter which side of town you’re on, there’s tunes for you. On the eastside, check out the annual Fairport Music Festival Saturday beginning at noon on Lift Bridge Lane, right across from Mulconrys Irish Pub.  My boys Andy and Rob have plenty of great talent lined up for 3 stages near the canal, including Uncle Plum, Northside Johnny, Big Eyed Phish and more.  For you westsiders, check out the Hamlin Music Festival at Fireman’s Field for 12 hours kicking off at 1pm.  10 bands will rock the Ham to benefit Life Solutions, a food pantry.  Doing good work to help others, like our troops who do it everyday for very little recognition. God bless our troops.

The developers of the Firefox web browser figured out why people weren’t upgrading to their newest version. Their porn bookmarks kept popping up for all to see!  I’ve seen this happen to others when I’ve tried to help them with something on their computer.  Start typing in a url for something innocent and Firefox suggests some other sights they have visited before.  It’s very, uhhh…eye opening.  Of course I pretend I don’t see it pop up. (and then I check it out later…ya know…cuz Im curious…)

Here’s a tip. Use Private Browsing Mode (aka Porn Mode) in Firefox whenever you don’t want your “sensitive” links popping up on the big projector at work when you’re standing in front of all your coworkers. I’ve seen that happen too.  I never knew there was Star Trek porn until that day.

We lost one Kennedy yesterday just as you gain one back here on the blog.  Sen. Ted Kennedy passed at 77 after spending a lifetime in the US Senate. He certainly led an interesting life.  Now get ready for endless TV coverage of his memorial/funeral services.  As for me, I returned from a grand trip west to California.  Caught up with a big group of my buds on the left coast and did quite a tour.  It all started with my class reunion in Canandaigua Sat. 8/15 at the swanky Canandaigua Country Club. I must say it was a great time catching up with all my old high school chums, and the ladies were beautiful.  Amazing how great the babes turn out as compared to us schleps from CA.  The ladies were radiant, beers cold and heckling endless (til at least 5am)!  Good to see some things never change!

Then I hopped on the plane and ended west to Los Angeles, where I met up with a couple of old radio buddies from my 98PXY years.  “Learjet” Chris Leary and Cat Collins worked with me here in Roch back in the late 80’s and early 90’s, and we met up on the ocean in Hermosa Beach CA for a beer induced trip down memory lane.  It seems like not a moment has passed since we all buddied up here, even though they both have gone onto great success and fame, with Learjet a radio God and TV infomercial star in LA and Cat a highly successful radio programmer up in San Francisco.  We were joined for dinner by Laurie Lamartina, a former PXY team player who has moved onto the record biz in LA.  The best part is that none of us has changed from the glory PXY days, and the laughs were just as plentiful as those days here on the right coast.  Mayor Tip #1 4 U; for a spectacular view of LA, head to the 35th floor of the Westin Bonaventure Hotel downtown and sip a cocktail at the revolving bar.

After 3 grand days in LALA Land, I climbed aboard the Amtrak Surfliner for a trip down the coast to San Diego. Mayor Tip#2 4 U: If you’re ever in So Cal and want to travel from LA to SD, skip the stress of the freeway and hop aboard the train from Union Station in downtown LA.  For $30, you get a beautiful 2 hour tour down the coast.  You can sit back and enjoy a drink and the view, which includes a roll right through Camp Pendleton.   After landing in San Diego, I joined Patrick and Tim Hickey for lunch in Solana Beach with my high school football QB from Canandaigua Kevin “Tyrone” Perron.  It was a perfect way to kick off the second half of my vacation as we shared some great laughs and food along the ocean.  The SD tour included stops at the world famous Hotel Del on Coronado Island, drinks along the coast in La Jolla (Mayor Tip 3 4 U: have lunch at Georges on the Cove)  and Pacific Beach, a wonderful dinner in Little Italy (Mayor Tip 4 4 U: try Minno in Lil Italy for a great night out) followed by  a walk down the street to Petco Park for a Padres baseball game (Mayor Tip 5 4 U:  grab a drink and watch the game from the Altitude bar atop the downtown SD Marriott, then head down Fifth Ave., have a pint with my buddy Rob Gilmore and say hi to Enda, the owner of The Field, an authentic irish pub in downtown SD).  Sunday we were off to Del Mar for a day at the track (Mayor Tip 6 4 U: don’t ever take a tip on a horse at the track from me…I wasn’t even close to cashing a ticket).  We were joined track side by Tricia and Bruce J. Miller Esq., my old Geneseo moral compass.  We all celebrated our buddy Tyrone’s birthday and had lots of laughs to ease the pain of our losses suffered at Del Mar. Mayor Tip 7 4 U: for fun, check the Poseidon on the ocean in Del Mar for the sunset, Jimmy O’s for sports viewing and Torrey Pines for a great hike along the cliffs.  All in all, it was an excellent tour of the left coast, especially catching up with such great, lifelong friends. I highly recommend a visit out there anytime cuz the weather always seems to be just right.

As I said, one of the highlights on my tour was the trip down the coast on the Surfliner.  I watched from my train window as our Marines took part in training at Camp Pendleton, a vast military complex along the ocean.  While we were enjoying a break from the real world, our troops were prepping for their next deployment a world away.  Mayor Tip 8 4 U: I could tell how dedicated they were, even from my window.  God bless them for their service, and God bless all of our troops!

Many thanks to everyone at the Delmonte Spa… ESPECIALLY LORRAINE for dealing with my nasty ass toes.
Here’s the finished product, which is MUCH better than before, trust me!

Here’s the video of me getting the pedicure. I warn you, this is a pretty gross video…

Years ago I bought a copy of Quake Arena for my PC.  I think I spent $49 on it.  I played it for a while, and then moved on to another game. Just like I always do.  Today I saw an article at MacWorld that made me say “WHAAAAAAAT?!?!”  If you don’t want to read it, basically it said that I can now play that same game through a web browser for free.

It’s called Quake Live, and it kicks ass. I expected it to be slow and not look very good. I was wrong.  This FREE web based version plays fast and looks better than the original CD-ROM based version did.  Technology has come a long way over the years.

While I ate lunch at work today, I spent 20 minutes playing. Ya know, just to make sure it was good before I told you about it. I hope you appreciate my sacrifice.

Go play on your Mac or PC here.

So a 28 year old American and 2 Russian accomplices have been arrested for compromising more than 130 million credit and debit card accounts.  The largest bust of it’s kind so far.  They did it by gaining access to store’s cash register systems through unsecured wireless networks.  It’s really quite simple, and that’s what scares me.

It’s also quite simple to prevent this kind of attack. My grandmother knows her way around a wireless router, so why can’t a business set up some WAP2 and a password to keep bad guys from getting my credit card info?  I’m just frustrated i guess.

I had my card forged once, and they spent $900 at truck stops and drive throughs throughout California.  Luckily my bank caught it, and I got my money back.  I just don’t want to go through the ordeal of someone emptying my bank account again.

I might go back to using cash only.

For more on this, check out this article.

Here’s the letter we got from an anonymous source about the Drexel Family…

Dear Breakfast Buzz:

As I am sure you are well aware of the Rochester missing teen, Brittanee Drexel. It has come to ur attention that Brittanee’s mother, Dawn Drexel may be engaging in some unsavory behavior concerning the money raised and collected for the Brittanee Drexel Foundation.
When Brittanee first went missing a paypal address was listed on the Internet asking people to donate money in aid in the search for Brittanee. According to searchers, who at this time do noth want to be identified have stated that as soon as the money bgan coming in that Dawn was spending it lavishly. Dawn purchased new clothing, Guess sunglasses, purses, jewelry, expensive perfume and liquor. It has also been said that was flying her friend in and out of out South Carolina. It has also been said that Dawn got regular pedicures and had her hair and nails done. She even purchased a matching set of luggage to bring her purchases home to Rochester.
Dawn also claimed that her house went into foreclosure, there is no record of this. Her home is actually listed on Nothngale.com and is for sale.
According to Monica Caison from the CUE Center she stated as of last week that she did not recieve any monies from the foundation to assist in her searches. In fact, Monica has stted that she has several people call her and ask for reciepts and she has had to inform them that she had not recieved their money. In fact, the CUE Center conducted an 11 day search and Dawn Drexel did not show up for the search for nine days.
As of last week the Brittanee Drexel Foundation only had two members in it and that being Dawn Drexel as President and Vice PResident is Chad Drexel and all donation go directly into Dawn’s paypal account.
While Chad claims to have no income he is the owner of GotDrex.com.
Dawn Drexl claims to have filed a restraining order against Chad Drexel alleging that he hit her, yet she went to New York with him over the weekend to the Amber Ready Conference and continues to keep him as VP of the Foundation which of course isn’t even a legitimate foundation.
While some of these issues may be moral issues, I feel it is important to point out that Chad Drexel was fired from his former job for Misuse of Corp. Funds.
Furthermore Dawn Drexel claims to have a PRivate Investigator working on the case, but to date, no investigator can be found. Dawn claims his name is Phillip Kennedy and there is a Phillip Kennedy listed as alicense Arson INvestigator and does not do missing persons. There is not other licensed PI in the state of SC. According to Monica Caison of the CUE Center, a PI was mentioned but has never contacted her or Law Enforcement in the area and states she believes he may had had his credentials stripped or is a self proclaimed bounty hunter.
There have been multiple fundraisers as well as the donation site that has raise money to aid in the search fro Brittanee and there dollars are unaccounted for. As of last week there was not a single cent in the foundation.
Keri Drexel, Chad’ sister also held a fundraiser in Florida. Judging from the lenghty list of fundraisers made public, it is estimated that roughly $30,000 was collected for the foundation.
It is our sincere hope that someone can make the Drexel’s accountable for the money raised in the name of their daughter and the public will come to understand, that Brittanee is still missing and that we all need to pull together to bring one of Rochester’s own children and not hold Brittanee accountable for her parents actions.

I just dropped my daughter off for cheerleading tryouts.  It’s day one of three.   Gave her a hug and a kiss, and told her I loved her.    She tried to act cool but I could tell she was a ball of nerves.   I think the parents are more nervous than the girls.  At least the mom’s I talked too, seemed on edge. My daughter, and her friends like Ellie, Bri and Kylie, live for cheerleading.   Over the next three days, they’ll run, jump, and tumble their way onto a team.   Some will make varsity and JV’s.   Other’s will make the freshman team.   Yes I hope she makes JV’s but if she doesn’t, I’m still very proud of her for the time and effort she has put forth preparing for tryouts.    When you read this Aubrey, know that I know you gave it your all and I love you.   BTW, regardless of what your brother says, cheerleading is a SPORT.    Thanks for reading my blog and I’ll see you tomorrow morning on the radio.