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14 June 2008

One of those "smile, nod, back away imperceptibly" moments. I'm no stranger to obscure audio arcana, but even I can't quite explain this insane nostalgic craving for ... my hometown's pre-digital cable channel listings/weather station.
[More:]
It was rendered in hideous scrolling 1980s Commodore 64 graphics which bled from line to line like an old tattoo and used the local airport's automated weather frequency as its soundtrack. So you could read about Josie & The Pussycats reruns on Channel 66 (which we couldn't actually get) while listening to endless regional flight forecasts read in an amateurishly official-sounding Midwestern squawk-box accent, with extra double servings of distortion.

During severe weather emergencies (and tornadoes in particular), they'd do this histrionic "EMERGENCY WEATHER ALERT IN 5, 4, 3, 2 ..." in a particularly pitched, stentorian voice. It was like watching CONELRAD TV. I recall once actually running around the house preparing for a tornado while this thing was blaring at some unspeakable volume, like playing it louder would somehow make us more prepared.

I had the good sense to record all sorts of other analogue wonders of my childhood, but it never occurred to me to get that on tape. *sigh*

Nostalgia is so weird sometimes.
(Let it be said that this is so ridiculously unrelatable that I don't expect anyone to comment. I just had to vent a little.)
posted by mykescipark 14 June | 11:28
I remember the weather channel in my hometown in the 70s as being a camera trained on a slowly rotating radio-shack weather station. As I remember, it was three sided, one for temp, one for humidity and one for pressure.
posted by octothorpe 14 June | 12:34
Here's Napierville in 1987, apparently they just went with the radio...
posted by disclaimer 14 June | 15:45
Haha, wow. Good find, disclaimer. :-) That music is hideous! Perhaps I could mate it with this instead...
posted by mykescipark 14 June | 17:22
Bunny! OMG! || Did anyone celebrate Prehistoric Creatures Day yesterday?

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