New World Notes - Searching for the Authentic on a Motorcycle

This week on New World Notes: radio program #358, January 13, 2015, from 12:00 to 12:30 p.m. (and on Wednesday from 8:30 to 9:00 p.m.), host Kenneth Dowst revs up his motorcycle and takes us for a ride. 

This week's show is mostly monologue. It's an extended "personal essay" by me, more or less in the tradition of Blue Highways and Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance. With maybe a few echos of "News From Lake Wobegon."

It's about authenticity and its opposites. It's also about motorcycle design, and simplicity versus clutter, and the reborn "Indian" brand, and the quiet, subtle virtues of a Harley-Davidson.

It's about how New England place-names sort of begin to make sense after you've lived here 20 or 30 years.

It's about corporate franchises and their phony food and their phony architecture. And it's about taking a motorcycle to search for "the authentic"--and sometimes even finding it when you get far enough out of town.

New World Notes is produced under the auspices (Latin for "Executive Dining Room") of WWUH-FM, a community service of the University of Hartford.

You can listen to any installment of New World Notes online or else download it (as an mp3 audio file) for later listening. The show is archived at both A-Infos Radio Project and (from #90 onwards) the Internet Archive. Either link should get you a reverse-chronological listing of available installments. Or browse the show's Web site: Each installment has a page; each page has links to the recorded audio; and a handy table of contents will quickly find the installment you want.

Series overview: Political and social commentary in a variety of genres. Exploring the gap between what we want--and what they're trying to make us settle for.

Catch New World Notes (all times Eastern): 

• Sundays, 12:30 to 1:00 PM, WIEC-LP, FM 102.7 (Eau Claire, WI). Repeats Mondays at noon.
• Tuesdays, Noon to 12:30 PM, WWUH FM 91.3 (West Hartford, CT); also on WAPJ FM 89.9 and 105.1 (Torrington, CT), WJDW FM 89.7 (Somers, CT), and WWEB FM 89.9 (Wallingford, CT). Repeats Wednesdays at 8:30 PM.
• Tuesdays, 8:30 to 9:00 PM, WWUH FM 91.3 (West Hartford, CT). Same time on WJDW FM 89.7 (Somers, CT) and WWEB FM 89.9 (Wallingford, CT).
• Fridays, 10:30 to 11:00 AM, WHUS FM 91.7 (Storrs, CT)
• Saturdays, 8:00 to 8:30 AM, WAZU FM 90.7 (Peoria, IL) & online. Repeats Mondays at 12:30 AM.
• Saturdays, 1:00-1:30 PM, KRFP FM 92.5, Radio Free Moscow (Moscow, ID) 
• Various days & times (multiple times per week), KGIG FM 104.9 (Modesto, CA) & online. Same on KHCF FM 89.9 (Gilroy, CA).

Any time: Listen to or download any installment. Just go to New World Notes and click a link to the audio at the top of the page. (Every installment has a page on the Web site, and every page has links to the audio.)