Lundon Calling

Well, as the Show Host, it is my task to choose our Show guests … with a little help from my Co-hosts. I want to “like” the ones who are chosen and we don’t have to agree on everything just to “like” someone. If I didn’t believe in their sincerity, they could be Glenn Beck’s guest. My expectations from a guest are that they might share a bit of their honest humanity so listeners might “connect” with a fellow human being.

It usually takes weeks and sometimes months to actually get a guest set up for a Show … and that’s why Show Biz folks hire a casting agent, as this is similar. Everyone today is so swamped with things just trying to stay alive.

March came in like a lion for Lundon Calling and is continuing to roar thru the month on into May with a great lineup of guests.  We started March with my dear old friend and pioneer for gay rights, DAVID MIXNER.  The next week was another dear old friend, who along with Betty White, is this year celebrating her 88th birthday … the wonderful actress who created the character of “Della Street” on the Perry Mason Show: BARBARA HALE. Sitting in for Lance as Co-host for these Shows was ANA GUERRIERO, the lgbt coordinator for the U WISC/PARKSIDE.

We ran into a bit of a snag in the 3rd week of March when our webmaster became quite ill and thus the Show we did on St. Patrick’s Day on the 17th won’t get posted until the 24th – - the day we will be doing that week’s Show.  Ah, Showbusiness!  So let me tell you about the delayed-posting Show: our guest was the NYC-based writer/producer/director of Off and On Broadway Shows: BILL RUSSELL.  And we did have a bit of change going on in the background with my Co-hosts also because Lance is still on “vacation” and Phil was busy moving his soulmate from IL to MN.  So we had to do some Co-host Hustling.  West Hollywood’s “Walking WeHo” blogger, SAM BORELLI, was going to do it but then his labors regarding the upcoming Gay PRIDE swamped him.  It all turned out ok though; we found two great sit-in Co-hosts in the persons of veteran character BART WILLIAMS and author/radio host, DENNIS HENSLEY.

And now we prepare for the Show on the 24th with another gay rights pioneer … the founder of the Metropolitan Community Church denomination … the REV. TROY PERRY.  It was Troy who performed the Rite of Holy Union for Patrick and myself when we “got hitched” back in the 70′s.  Phil will be back in the saddle as Co-Host and taking Lance’s seat will be JEN MIRACLE who oversees lgbt activities at U GEORGIA/ATHENS.

The fifth Show in March on the 31st will be a rescheduled guest who had to cancel because he was stranded at an Airport in Amman, Jordan.  He is Lundon Calling’s 1st international guest who will be at his Skype mic in BERGEN, NORWAY for this Show.  He is the FLIMMER FILMS documentary producer/director: CHRISTER FASMER.

April 7th, I am bringing back for a second Show, CLARENCE W. SKYE, the Director of the UNITED SIOUX TRIBAL DEVELOPMENT Corp.   There was just not enough time in one Show to cover all I wanted our listeners to learn regarding the Sioux Nation today.

April 14th we shall be doing our first kinda-like-a-panel Show with JEROMY MANKE & BRANDON JUNG from the QUEER STUDENT UNION at UNR Reno, NV.

THE 21ST IS STILL OPEN AT THIS MOMENT … Any suggestions for a special guest?

We shall end April with the Director of TRANS YOUTH FAMILY ALLIES and President of the PFLAG TRANSGENDER NETWORK.  She is also a new grandma of her daughter’s TWINS!!!  Her name is KIM PEARSON.

And the month of May will begin on the 5th with the original “Daisy Duke” … the wonderful actress: CATHERINE BACH.

To say I’m excited would be an understatement.  I am thrilled with the way Year Two has begun for Lundon Calling because we have already had the beginning of a guest list that will knock your socks off!!

Booking guests is really a full-time job and it is not easy to contact folks week after week and sometimes months in advance to see them be able to fill a date for the Show.  Everyone is super busy these days.  It will be up to you, the listeners of the Show, to make sure you check on this web site to see WHO is or was on any Show and then click, download onto ITunes or whatever, and kick back and enjoy.

The GUEST LIST from the beginning of Year Two and into the near future is the following:

STEVE LUCAS, Penn State Queer PRIDE coordinator and Steve was just accepted to Columbia.  Congrats!

DR. PETER GOLDBLUM, Dir of Center of LGBTQ Evidence-based Applied Research + Supv. of the UCSF AIDS Health Project.

NATHAN TREANOR, Arizona-based blogger with his NathanOutLoud.

LAURIE JACOBSON, author and Hollywood historian of the 50′s thru 70′s era TV Shows.  Her husband, Jon Provost, “Timmie” on the Lassie Shows, was a previous guest on Lundon Calling’s Year One Shows.

CLARENCE W. SKYE, Chairman of the United Sioux Development Agency in Pierre, So. Dak.  We are trying to schedule a second appearance with Clarence because there is so much to cover in this topic.

DAVID MIXNER, pioneering gay rights activist who keeps on going like the Energizer Bunny!

BARBARA HALE, veteran Film and TV star … “Della” on the Perry Mason Show.

BILL RUSSELL, NYC-based writer/director/producer of Stage Shows.

REV. TROY PERRY, Founder of the Metropolitan Community Church denomination.

CHRISTER FASMER, Flimmer Films producer/director of documentary films … and our very first international guest on Lundon Calling … from Bergen, Norway.

KIM PEARSON, Dir. Trans Youth Family Allies & Pres. of PFLAG Transgender Network.

CATHERINE BACH, actress and TV star – the original “Daisy Duke” on The Dukes of Hazzard.

Marine Staff Sgt. ROBERT LeBLANC & PAM DANIELS, Pam is writing the biography of this great hero from the Vietnam era.

D.V. “Dot” BRAUER, University of Vermont LGBT Coordinator who will be guesting with some of the students in a Guest Panel.

We are now booking guests well in advance and I shall keep you up-dated.  I want to try and have a number of Shows where we can learn about the labors on Universities with regard to human and civil rights.

If you have a guest whom you would like us to try and schedule, please let us know.  We are trying to work out schedules for a number of Hollywood film and TV stars and you are going to be thrilled to meet them.

We sometimes lose track of old friends from Hi School and College days, don’t we … and we wonder: Where are they now?  We are left with only memories … and then, one day … voila!  On a social network site or whatever, our paths cross once again.  It’s a good thing … unless, of course, they may have been a stalker you had been trying to avoid for decades!

But whatever happened to Glori Whole!  Glori is another story.  Haven’t heard much about her lately; yet she was certainly popular with rich and poor men – - Red, Yellow, Black, Brown or White … hetero or homo … from a Minneapolis Airport men’s room to the Park men’s rooms for a British Rocker … Glori was popular.  However, one rarely hears about her these days and those old enough to remember the “good ol’ days” up until the 1980′s probably still wonder where she went.  You could get off on a cheap date with her; no cost for drinks, a meal or a Hotel room … and she was capable of keeping a secret.  She was that invisible tryst and an enigma to all wives, girlfriends … and even boyfriends.

Now this is just my personal opinion, but I believe her allure waned when the HIV crisis began in the early 1980′s.  It’s just my opinion … I’m just saying … it’s possible … and she may still be around somewhere!

Oh Glori!  Glori!  Glori!  Without you there are fewer Hallelujah’s!  I’m just saying!

To say writing is not work is as ludicrous as saying that sex is no fun.  A writer agonizes in the masturbation of the mind, until that final moment of ecstasy when a correct word or phrase is consummated … and then voila!  The pen fills with ink and spews the writers thought onto the paper!

Of course anyone can write … we all write letters, don’t we!  So blogging should be easy, right?  Wrong!  Bloggers have to or should have a knowledge of proper usage of language … punctuation … and spelling – - in spite of Word Check!  Bloggers need all that PLUS they need to be intelligent and knowledgeable about the topics they blog about.  And a blogger without passion is a writer without a pen.

As I mentioned in my previous blog; one of the things we wanted to see happen was that our web page would become a help to our listeners and readers.  I have been taking the time therefore to really look back into what we have on our web site now.  I was pleasantly surprised to learn we have a one-stop shopping, easy to maneuver, education info site.  There is a lot here to draw from.  We all have an intelligence, but to have knowledge takes time to seek it … and you can fill your shopping cart here!

For instance: the BLOG SITES we have listed.  I learned that if I take time to look into each one of them every week, I am completely updated on what the hell is happening the the world of activists and the straight-queer encounters.

The bloggers we recommend are involved nationally and give readers a good overview of what’s happening on the home front locally also.  However … you can’t get this from reading just one Blogger!  That would be the same as my idiot Republican friends only listening to Rush or Beck – - – they only get the Radical Right views.  Or, my Democrat friends who only want to hear the ultra Liberal views … life is more than Left or Right!  To achieve a balance and sanity, one must see the spectrum of the prism of life en toto.

So please take a look at our Blog Roll list – - – one-stop shopping can be a lot of fun.

And on our Staff Links Page, you can really dig into our personal favorites web sites which include those from our guests on the Shows.  I guarantee you could easily get lost for hours and even days if you dare to look just into the “Matt & Andrej Komasky Home” link.  It is one hellova look into past and present queer history.

And last but not lease … I do hope you will be following the blog efforts of Lance, Phil and myself.  Thanks in advance!

When we first began Lundon Calling and our webmaster/producer (Mike AKA “Spiderman”) and Lance and myself talked about what might be ahead for us … we made a few very basic decisions to guide us for the Show and for the web site.

1.  The Show itself would be an expanded version of what I had been doing on AM Radio; only now there would be no taboo topics or fear of offending anyone.  We would be as open, honest and real as possible even if it might sting us at times.

2.  Although we expected we’d have an automatic listening audience of LGBT’s because we were queers – - our Spiderman excepted – - we knew our honest approach to reality would also attract a straight audience.  And … if we might judge by the Emails, phone calls, etc. from listeners, we probably have a larger audience of straights than queers today.  I, however, think this is normal since the % of queers in only 1/10th or less of the total population of potential listeners.

3.  The Show MUST be entertainment; it MUST be informative and educational.

4.  The Show would revolve around Aristotle’s quote: It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it.” And, we would urge listeners to THINK and make their own conclusions about any topic we might entertain on the Shows.   I.e. We might not believe in War, but we DO believe in supporting our men and women in the Military … the listener may make their own decision.

5.  Since a podcast would be very different from a regular radio broadcast where I would sit across a desk from a co-host or live guests, we knew this would be necessarily a work in progress.  Lance and I have never met in person; he’s in Atlanta, GA and I’m in Bullhead City, AZ.  We expected it would take many months of Shows for us to find our comfort zone.  It’s very easy to “step on anothers’ lines” when you are unable to physically see one another across a desk.

6.  The Lundon Calling web site would also become a work in progress.  We only knew we wanted it to become a source of information for listeners to our Show … OR … for hose just web browsing who stumbled across the web site.

7.  Being activists, we knew our Show efforts would be underlined with the philosophy that human rights MUST be sought in the context of “until there is equal human rights for ALL, there really is no such thing as equal rights; it would only be a hypocritical sham being espoused.” It has to be that Red, Yellow, Black, Brown or White – - male or female – - straight or queer – - we are ALL humans and equal civil rights IS OUR HUMAN RIGHT.

So now you have a peek into how we began and here we are into Year Two of the Show with over 20,300 folks from around the Internet world who tune in to listen to the Shows.  Thank you and bless your heart!

Oh yes, sometimes when the bluebird of happiness flies over you … it poops!  And this is why I haven’t felt like blogging lately: I’ve been trying to clean up a little poop from my own little bluebird.  I’m sure this probably happens to everyone at some point and we sort of have to kick back, take a deep breath and see how we can get through all the poop.  We have to work through anxieties, frustrations, ennui, depression and that damn desire to want to become a recluse and just run and hide from it all.

So, you say, what happened to put me into this non-blogging funk?

Well, it didn’t happen overnight; it just sort of crept up on me.  And it all had to do with medical and health things.   However, I’m actually in great health … no cancer, no diabetes, no heart problems … I’m in good shape.  It’s just that I felt like I was falling apart from a bunch of little poops.  You’ve probably been there too … or you probably will in the future; it seems to be a part of our maturation process.

About 5 months ago it began.  I did something stupid for a man of my years and ended up with 4 fractured ribs and a crushed disc.  OUCH!  This began a period of weeks for me only being able to sleep sitting up.  All I could really do was give myself time because time heals ribs.  Isn’t that lovely!  Ha!  I hate moving around like I’m 70 even if I am.

Then the foot problem began and I was walking around in bedroom slippers as shoes were a no-no.  Then, the loss of hearing in my right ear and my eyesight was doing crazy things … and all simultaneously.  My mind was painting pictures of a lame old man who was going deaf and blind.  Anyway, you can see how poop like this can begin to affect a person.  Certainly made me know that I was a real person.

So, what does one do in a poop situation time like this?  It’s “Hello Doctor!” time.  We go to the best possible source for dealing with our specific poop … and THEN!  We try to be patient while they perform their poop-busing job.  Yeah … like patience, my ass!  I want it now!

And so months later … now, the ribs are healing slowly.  The disc?  Well, we’ll see what they have to do there.  And, I’m wearing shoes again after some surgery.  My hearing will never be 100% but some is better than nothing.  And, my eyesight problems are in progress to enable me to see TV/my computer screen/my crossword puzzles/my books, etc. hopefully much better than I have been able to do over the past 9 months.  I have a feeling some surgery might be ahead with this.

Thank goodness for the medical profession and the advances in medicine!!  Now, we just have to make sure it will be available for everyone and not just for those of us who live below the poverty level line … we do have good insurance coverage … but it sucks being in this level.  Keeping in touch with one’s Doctor is so very important though because an ounce of prevention is worth 20 Doctor visits!!

In closing, maybe I should add that since we are what we have been becoming … maybe we all might see what is ahead; might I have forseen the bluebird on its way!??  Of course it is strange that all seemed to poop at the same time, isn’t it!  And maybe not!

There’s always a possible genetic factor too.  However, the time factor may be more of a consideration.  Like – - – WHICH physical health areas are the first affected with the onset of age?  Yup!  Eyesight, hearing, feet problems, and teeth (guess I’m thankful I had falsies put in there a few years back!).

On the January 27th Show, our guest was Dr. Peter Goldblum, Professor of Psychology and Director of the Center for LGBTQ Evidence-based Research + Director of the LGBTQ Program at Pacific Graduate School of Psychology.

The following day we received this note from Dr. Goldblum which we share with all of our listeners now.  He wrote: “Ace, I am listening to it (the Show) now.  I am really enjoying the whole program.  As I thought about it last night, I realized how rare your program really is – - funny, intelligent, and topical.  You guys are great and I can just imagine people listening who are not out; realizing that there are people like you exist.  Thanks for the honor of being in conversation with you all.”

Dr. Goldblum is also the Programming Clinical Supervisor for the University of California – San Francisco AIDS Health Project.

How can I say this without envy in my heart!!  Our delightful, delovely co-host, Lancelot Helms, says he won’t be able to be with us on the Wednesday Show taping.  The creep has a boyfriend (finally!) and it’s his birthday … so Lance thinks he should be celebrating this with his little hottie!!  The nerve!!  Now, both Lance and Phil have someone to keep them warm on cold nights … and I am just lucky to have my 12 lb. Chihuahua, “Honey”.

I have been thinking of beginning a Round Table of Co-Hosts however … maybe this is the time to begin, huh?  So, on Wednesday, we shall have a much prettier and probably more butch version of Lance to Co-Host with Phil and myself.  Her name is Sharon Love from Toronto, Canada.  She is the founder of www.outstandinglives.ca and a leading lesbian activist in the Toronto area.   I am pleased to have her with Lundon Calling as we have gotten so many international listeners to the Show and …. hello Canada!

Our Show guest will be Steve Lucas, a 22-year-old senior at Penn State; President of the Rainbow Roundtable and just received the National Voice & Action Leadership Award from Campus Pride.  He also worked this past summer as an intern for the Victory Fund in D.C.   I’m just glad we don’t have a photo of him because he is also so damn good-looking that it’s disgusting.  Oh, mirror mirror on the wall, who is …. oh forget it!  Wrinkles are normal … I keep telling myself.

Well, I for one, am waiting for that day when a Space Probe from another planet will settle down on our little planet Earth.  And, yes, I DO believe there is alien life somewhere out there in the Universe.  I’m hoping they will arrive within the next two decades before I kick the proverbial bucket!

In case you might like to learn about my Sc-Fi idea of a planet called ITNAVA and the landing of their Space Probe on Earth (see photo to left); I’d invite you to check out my author’s web site at www.acelundon.com.  Because times are economically tough and books are so costly nowadays, I asked my webmistress to make my “The Legend Of The Planet ITNAVA” available as a FREE download for readers.  Check it out: www.acelundon.com

The photo is my design of the Space Probe which the Itnavians arrived in on Earth.  It is also the design of a billion-dollar+ Hotel Entertainment Center which the Itnavians established after their arrival.

So now, in case you didn’t know before – - I am not only your Lundon Calling Host, I have also writ three books!  There is my Sci-Fi fantasy … my novel called “Through The Needle’s Eye” … and, my autobiography: “The Closets Are Empty…The Dining Room’s Full”.  I haven’t had the bucks to promo them but that’s how the mop flops for most authors I think.  We don’t write to become rich; we write because we can’t keep from not writing.

I don’t know what other authors feel, but for myself, the real rewards come from readers who let me know they not only enjoyed the story – - or maybe hated it – - but they also comment about the writing style and all that good stuff us writers like to think about.

And now, on an earthly and not alien level – - – although Stein didn’t say ‘a book is a book is a book” – - – I happen to believe I wrote another book; a book which couldn’t be bought in a bookstore.  The times are changing with the InterNet emergence and I believe a web site can actually be a book of a different nature. I titled the web site “VietnamJeanLundonShow”.  Joseph Marino, the webmaster, did what a book editor might do and he did it magnificently … creating a 60-page “Coffee Table book” web site with 504 photos interlaced with my script.  Unofrtunately I had to take the site down a while ago because of the budget cost, but I’m hoping to get it back up in the near future.  You can check out about the site from an article at the following: http://www.veteranstoday.com/article1242.html