Landing in Lousiana

Not my first trip and probably not my last. I reserved a Dodge Charger at the car rental desk. There is no more appropriate vehicle with which to traverse the south. It rained much of the day, and my boots are on the radiator drying. But thanks to wick-away socks at least my feet are dry. I'll be on the road the rest of the week, so these small early victories are critical to morale.

I spent much of the day listening to 91.1 KLSU while I worked. They are an eclectic college station, but they clearly have a clarity of vision in DJ training. Individual programs are cohesive and they operate on a DJ buddy system with new DJs training live with the more seasoned veterans. I understand that hurricane Ivan took them down for a while, but today they are strong and clear.

90.3 WBRH is playing jazz standards and while stiff, it's a welcome change from the reading services that were all I caught in past visits. 89.7 WPAE there is an amazing old-school fire and brimstone preacher sounding a little like a relic informing listeners who, and how they are all burning in hell. His voice in it's shrieking highs sounds quit convincing. I actually wish I could tape a little of this maniac to share but I don't have the cables on hand.

1260 KBRH-AM, despite it's crippling PM power-down from 5000 watts to 127 is actually somewhat audible. It's a damn shame they use it to play bad 80s singles.

NOLA to Baton Rouge, Travel Missive #3

Last week I bought The Birth of Soul, Ray Charles box set. Atlantic Records actually put out the compilation in 1991 while the famed musician was still alive and recording. Cuts like Lonely Avenue make a great accompaniment to the amazing lightning storm we are having in Baton Rouge tonight. There is a flood warning and the locals, utterly galvanized by the real thing, roll on ignoring the EAS alerts interrupting their drive-time programs.

I turned off Ray for a bit to check out the AM side. Between New Orleans and Baton Rouge there is a 50 mile stretch of Route 10 west and there isn't much AM radio audible on it. But the lightning, that's audible. Extremely audible. Lightning doesn't only make light and sound. The discharges also produce radio waves called 'sferics. Airplanes actually have devices designed to detect lightning from these RF waves.

I actually found a website recently that instructs on best use of AM radio to listen to lightning: http://www.wvlightning.com/sferics.shtml It includes audio clips.

I quote in part here:

"Sferics can turn any AM radio into a simple lightning detection device. They are easily distinguished from normal static in that they are sudden loud, crackling noises, sounding a little like someone wringing a wad of plastic bubble wrap. They occur simultaneously with any lightning discharge. Especially at night, your AM radio can pick up waves from lightning hundreds of miles away. "

Anyway, I was hoping to catch a little KLSU out here but it seems to be off air or at low power. My hotel is 4 miles from the transmitter and the religious talker on 88.5 bleeds straight across their frequency. There are two local LP stations: 94.9 WTQT a gospel outlet and 96.9 WHYR another christian Contemporary station (possibly satcaster). ... they are inaudible as well.

Amazingly here, KLSU has posted a very detailed history of their stations beginning in the 1960s. http://www.klsu.fm/history.html