[Kzyxtalk] Merlin Tinker's retirement interview.

[Marco McClean]

On 3/14/2018 7:59 AM, Jacque Armstrong wrote:
 > Me Too!!! Just make sure you announce several time as I do not stay 
up late, and will have to borrow a radio.


So, Jacque and others, Merlin gave me directions and I went to his house 
and recorded the interview on my old tablet, set on a hassock in the 
living room. There's a little noise, but that kind of adds to things. 
There are these lovely chime clocks every once in awhile bonging out a 
collective aimless tune together --kind of like at Juanita's house, 
except these ones have real bells in them, not a chip-- and the rain 
starts and stops on the roof. The refrigerator compressor clicks on and 
off. Somewhere in the distance a dog barks. The sound quality changes 
abruptly when I pick the recorder up and we move into the shop, a small 
room, to examine the tools, including of course the wondrous antique 
dentist's drill that he uses for fine work. You get to hear it whizz and 
spark. And photographs. Photographs on the radio.

It's neat; we all know Merlin Tinker fixed sewing machines and other 
machines for umpty-ump years, but most of what he talks about in the 
interview is his previous life in early-and-mid-1960s computer 
programming for various companies: airlines, railroads, American 
Cyanamid, DuPont. And his ending-up-in-Northwest-Nowhere story is at the 
same time your ordinary story and not your ordinary story. Also we find 
out how his hand got that way.

I'll just play the whole thing for the first hour of my show on Friday, 
and then if you miss that because 9pm is too late, even after daylight 
saving time, the recording of the show will be up on my weblog, as 
usual, by Saturday night, and you can get it there.

Memo of the Air: Good Night Radio: Every Friday, 9pm to 4 or 5am on 
107.7fm KNYO-LP Fort Bragg, and 105.1fm KMEC-LP Ukiah. And also there 
and anywhere else via http://knyo.org or http://kmecradio.org and if 
none of that works for you try http://TuneIn.com and look up KNYO-LP. 
(TuneIn might play a loud thirty-second-long ad of their own for soda 
pop or condoms or laxative beer or something before it passes you 
through. Don't be frightened away.)

--
Marco McClean
memo at mcn.org
http://MemoOfTheAir.wordpress.com