Nonogirl Radio

Disecting a Bee Story

Ah, it's been a while since I've listened to All Things Considered but today during my drive across the bridge a story grabbed me and took me to the almond fields in Los Banos. John Nielsen packs sounds and scenes and conflict into his seven minutes.

The story opens with teh sounds of a tractor and I'm immediately taken to an almond orchard, an economically important crop in this region. I also learn about the important role bees play in this crop development, over a minute into the story before the narrator enters.

Another scene begins where we learn how the beekeeper does his work followed by a description of the bees doing their work.

We're introduced to bee predators and at three minutes in, the conflict begins as we're introduced to the vampire mite, bees' biggest threat. We then learn about the impact that the loss of bees had in the past with the possiblity of it happening again.

Then we're taken to a bee expert at UC Davis who offers ideas for other species of bees that could help with pollination.

Finally, we're taken back to the looming threat of loosing pollinators and the effect it may have on almond orchards.

This is a really great story to be studied and to learn from.

Violence in Guatemala

I'm beginning my research on Guatemala in preparation for a trip there at the end of my sabbatical. A number of people I know have gone, including my adventurous uncle.

He encouraged me to go and told me his crazy travel stories from the 1980s in the middle of their civil war. He said that he met one of the revolutionary leaders and could have been shot for just standing near him. He supported my travels to Guatemala 100%...until he found out that I'd be travelling alone. Being a foreigner and a woman, he felt that I'd be vulnerable. I paused.

I paused again when I heard this story produced by Maria Marti for Latino USA.

It's been almost ten years since a bloody civil war ended in the Central American nation of Guatemala. Despite the absence of war, there seems to be no end to the violence. Guatemala is a small country, yet it has a murder rate seven times greater than that of the United States. Increasingly these attacks seem to target social and human rights activists, who are there to monitor the Peace Accords signed in 1996.

Samiam 2006

  samiam set #4 
  Originally uploaded by mattfall.

I feel like I can link up my Bay Area history with Samiam:

• I fell in love with rock and roll through bands like Samiam, Jawbreaker, and OpIvy while going to school at UC Santa Cruz
• I met Srini at a Samiam (BOTH) show in '95 or '96. I knew him from hist sticker project, Unamerican; he knew me through my zine, Static
• Several years later, we saw Samiam at BOTH and Srini yelled out, "I met my girlfriend at your show here years ago, and now we're getting married!"
• By 2000, we had broken up, but were both up in Portland for NXNW. Samiam came out of hiding and played an AWESOME show
• Later that year, I did my first independently produced radio piece on Samiam when they returned to play BOTH

And that brings me up to today: now a full-blown radio producer, single, and nostalgic for this music that gets the kids to mosh up against each other at the front of the stage.

The kids totally loved the opener, Chuck Ragan (Hot Water Music). It was just him and his guitar but with that scratchy voice and working class lyrics, he truly is a punk rock Bruce Springsteen. I watched voyeuristically as I flashed back to first seeing them play at the 17th and Capp warehouse ages ago.

Back then, I went to shows sober. The music was my intoxicant. But this night, I was so wasted, I sobered up at the back of the club with the help of friends. If they had played "Don't Break Me," I woulda pulled it together and staged dive to the front!

Last Days of 25

For the past five and a half years, I've woken up every weekday morning to bike down to 25 Van Ness.

Last week, that all changed!

I'm now on a six and a half month break from my day job. Personal leave to focus on radio production, my social life, and home improvements. Time to tend to all that I've neglected while working a forty hour a week day job coupled with the additional radio work that I love.

  Mahru, Stephanie, me, and Stan 
  Originally uploaded by nonogirl.

Friends met me for drinks at the Orbit Room on Wednesday night. (I love the  street signage in the background representing the multiple options I have for my life right now!) The following day, I had a Differently-Employed Brunch.

And to add to the merriment, our house had our first house party since our new roommate moved in--a mellow Sunday brunch.

So I've got the socializing down. Now I gotta start working on my radio pitches!

AIR Board

After a five year hiatus, I've joined another board of directors. Yesterday, I was elected (by just a hair) to serve on the board of the Association of Independents in Radio (AIR).

Along with the Third Coast Festival, AIR has been an amazing resource for my development as an independent radio producer. In fact, I learned to call myself an independent producer because of AIR!

I also received offical mentorship from Dmae Roberts for voicing and Michael Johnson for technical support.

And now I'll be learning more about the inner workings of a service organization dedicated to advocating for us indies.

APAture Workshop

I taught a workshop for KSW's APAture festival. It was called NOW HEAR THIS! and was developed so that creative people could learn some multimedia tools to tell their own stories through audio and image online.

Jay Jao has photos of the workshop here. And here's one of the demos that I created to teach folks how to use SoundSlides, this easy-to-use program that folks at the San Jose Mercury News use.

Now *I* need to try to put my own teachings into practice and multi-media-tize my audio!

Loud Quiet Loud

Documenting their triumphant return to the stage after more than ten years apart, loudQUIETloud proves that influential Boston band The Pixies are still amazing performers, but remain unable to communicate with each other offstage. An exhilarating concert film and a fascinating portrait of the inner workings of a great but troubled band.

--from here

Yeah, what he said.

But really, the film didn't disappoint. The audience in the theater sang along to the songs (which I think they allowed to be played all the way through) and I was smiling, reliving the shows.

There's good editing, great pacing, and it captures the painful behind the scenes with visual poetry.

Breaking the Law

  September Critical Mass 
  Originally uploaded by nonogirl.

To break in my new bike, I rode in my first Critical Mass in ages and I'd forgotten how fun they can be! It still started out slow and messy as my new skinny tires made my shaky over Market Street.

But then we headed to South of Market and up into the bus terminal! My bike rode beautifully up the onramp and as we entered the cavernous bus area, another rider pulled two amps that blasted out Judas Priest's "Breaking the Law"!