Jim Bartlett’s Blog

Here’s a story we often tell ourselves. It’s not a true story, although some days it feels like one: Everybody on social media is a jerk. Some of our most popular TV shows and movies expect us to root for bad people. The way to get elected to political office is by being terrible, and […]

Jim Bartlett is in for Lanette this week. Here’s a Lazy Recipe from his kitchen!  Ann Bartlett’s Lazy Mexican Lasagna You’ll need… One pound taco seasoned ground meat, cooked and drained. (You can buy pre-seasoned raw ground meat, or buy the packet of taco seasoning that you prefer and make your own.) One can refried […]

I got an interesting phone call while I was on the air last weekend. A guy called me from Baltimore asking for the phone number of a certain radio station in Toronto. Really. He decided to call me, he said, because on the map, Wisconsin is farther north than Maryland, and maybe we can hear […]

The year was 1981. I was on the air on Thanksgiving Day, finishing up my show, when the phone rang. On the other end of the call was a very irate lady who wanted to know why I hadn’t played any Thanksgiving songs. I responded, “Ma’am, I’d be happy to play one if you can […]

Absentee ballots are going out from city and municipal clerks around the state this week. Lots of people are voting absentee for the first time in 2020. I have regularly voted absentee for years, so here’s some information you might find helpful.  You’ll get a copy of the same ballot you get at the polling […]

I have expertise in a lot of stuff very few people care about, so I’m not used to having expertise others might find useful. But I have worked mostly out of a home office since 2003, and my wife has worked at home since 2012. We have some tips that might help you deal with […]

Statistics say that about 200,000 Americans and 4.1 million people worldwide are Leap Year babies, born on February 29, the day that comes only once every four years. I am one of them. People ask if it’s weird only having a birthday every four years. But celebrating on the 28th, the not-quite-date, is normal for […]

For most of the last three weeks, I have been in the Indianapolis area working another job I have, so I haven’t been on your radio (and thank you for noticing, if you did). I have not been here the whole time—I drove home for the Badger football game against Michigan, a 700-mile weekend round […]

I do not have anything remotely like a normal job. I do radio things for the stations of Mid-West Family Broadcasting some of the time. I work as a freelance writer some of the time. And I work as a teacher some of the time. (It has been many years since I sat in some […]

In 1983, I applied for a job at a new radio station in Madison called Magic 98. I didn’t get the gig—not until 2008, anyway—but one guy who joined up that year was Pat O’Neill. Since then, he’s become a Madison radio institution, as you know. What you may not know is that as Magic’s […]


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