Why is he signaling me, that guy on the other side of the glass, over the piquant boogie-woogie of Vince Guaraldi's jazz piano?
Oh yeah. Time to talk to 60,000 people on my new show.
New show? Mine? 60,000 people?
MOMMIE-E-E-E-E-E!
How did this happen? What qualifies me to host K-News Radio's new Friday afternoon drive-time show, The Steve Bornfeld Experience? Other than being named Steve Bornfeld? And since when am I an "experience"? And given the thumpity-thumpity-thumpity in my chest, the numbness in my fingertips, my sandpaper tongue and imminent bladder release, shouldn't it be The Steve Bornfeld Panic Attack?
SPEAK, IMBECILE!
"Happy cusp of the weekend, Las Vegas, as we stumble out of the workweek but glide ever-so-gracefully into the weekend."
The quivvvvver in my voice dents the low end of the Richter scale.
"I'm Steve Bornfeld, contributing editor of Las Vegas Weekly."
Thirteen seconds down. Seven-thousand-one-hundred-eighty-seven to go.
I began guesting on K-News in 1997, while writing a TV column for the Sun. When K-News approached me to host a weekly show on pop culture/entertainment, it seemed a natural next step, though a curious one, as I'm not known as a loquacious conversationalist in social configurations of two humans or more. Yet within me lurks the soul of a ham and the sensors of a performing seal.
So begins the assembly of a rookie radio show. My choice for theme music (and what young boy doesn't dream of someday having his own theme music?): Sinatra. But it's a no-go. Vocals as a "music bed" over which a broadcaster speaks create audio mud. I go instead with Guaraldi's infectious instrumental, "Linus and Lucy," that's accompanied Charlie Brown specials—a character with whom I deeply identify, especially at this moment—for decades.
Guests are booked. Hour One: Comedian Carole Montgomery, star of her one-woman show, Confessions of a PT&A Mom, at CCSN, and her actor-son, Layne. Hour Two: Local film critic/author Tony Macklin, discussing the new 007 actor and a slew of current flicks.
I'm informed that during any five-minute period, approximately 60,000 people tune in. I visualize addressing Yankee Stadium. This does not help.
As per my pleading, Producer Denise is cemented to my side (and barred from bathroom breaks), her exceptional efficiency the closest I will get this day to MOMMIE-E-E-E-E-E!
Engineer Ryan, the good-natured fellow running the board across the glass, has come up with my show's title. I'll get him for it.
"This show is called The Steve Bornfeld Experience, which sounds like something you drop a quarter into and it vibrates for a few minutes."
My first radio-host "ad-lib"—scripted, of course—as we come off the 4 p.m. news break at 4:09.
My mind-set is locked and loaded. I'm trying to channel the free and funny DJ spirits of my New York youth, the legendary WABC-AM personalities "Cousin Brucie" Morrow, Ron Lundy and my all-time fave, Big Dan Ingram.
It's gonna take ... awhile.
With seconds ticking off a console clock timed to its big daddy, the U.S. Atomic Clock, the mathematical madness of radio, its anal-retentive cues and cutoffs bracketing extemporaneous chat, its precision multitasking, elevating the walk-and-chew-gum-at-the-same-time syndrome to near-NASA levels—or so it feels at first—begins.
"I'm Steve Bornfeld, your host every Friday from 4 to 6 p.m., from now until, approximately, the end of time, or its equivalent in the radio business, which is what, Producer Denise? Month? Month and a half?"
4:09-4:18, chat up Carole and Layne. Deploy my eight eyeballs—two on the guests in front of me, two on the riggedly-timed "log" on the desk, two on Ryan to my left, flashing me hand signals (no, not that one—yet), two to my right, on Producer Denise, searching for signs of impending disaster or confirmation that I've already let the catastrophe out of the bag—while keeping my mouth flapping, my ears open and my brain functioning, focusing on the conversational flow and the next question.
Carole's enormously entertaining, a gift from the radio gods, the rapport's building momentum, the segment's gaining speed and suddenly we come to a screeching B-R-A-K-E for a ...
BREAK! 4:18. Traffic. Timing's off. The beep-beep! sound effect bleats over my intro. Producer Denise suggests that I not lead into "breaks" generically, but specifically, calling them "traffic updates." So noted. This is why she's stapled to my thigh. ... Ryan's giving me the finger. No, not that one. The one-minute-to-go one.
"I'm Steve Bornfeld, the guest who would be host, the man to whom these terribly sweet, misguided people at K-News entrusted a show. Well, I'll show them the folly of their ways any minute now."
4:24 to 4:28: More Carole and Layne. 4:27:00: Ryan's finger. 4:27:30: music cue to the half-minute. If this doesn't get my attention, Ryan will strip and smear himself with peanut butter.
4:28 to 4:29: Traffic (which I now call ... "traffic"). 4:29-4:30: Wrap-up on the half-hour. Whoa, that's me. "Coming up on yadda-yadda-yadda is yakety-yakety-yak." Lead-in to CNN News is a "hard hit." When 4:59:59 turns 5:00:00, I'm done talking, whether I voluntarily shut up or CNN shuts me up. ... CNN shuts me up.
"This is The Steve Bornfeld Experience, hosted, oddly enough, by Steve Bornfeld, who, coincidentally, happens to be me."
In the next half-hour, two words, describing 4:34 to 4:38, freeze my peas: "Steve Fills." I've been told that a minute in radio feels like an eternity. It does. Four feel like watching Gigli. A drawing for Celine Dion tickets eats up some of it. The rest? I think I said some stuff. I'd rather not remember what.
4:42 to 4:48 do not freeze my peas. They merely refrigerate them. I am conversing with an analyst from Bright Trading about stocks and bonds. With help from Producer Denise, I stagger through, never belying that I calculate the market on an abacus.
"This is Steve Bornfeld, your brand-new-mint-condition-but-depreciating-in-value-every-second-I'm-off-the-lot host."
By the 5 o'clock hour, I've settled into a groove, my voice no longer putting seismologists on alert. Tony Macklin and I banter with ease, breaks are better timed, the host no longer so needful of MOMMIE-E-E-E-E-E!
The 5:59:00 wrap-up is my exit ramp off the air, and a 5:59:59 farewell takes us, bang!, right into 6:00:00 and the familiar jingle of ABC News. "Wow!" exclaims Producer Denise. "Right on the nose."
Of course. You think you're dealing with an amateur?
The Steve Bornfeld Experience airs 4 to 6 p.m. Fridays on KNUU 970-AM.