I travel a lot. I'm not out overnight all the time but I drive about 800 miles a week. I have two subs---one for me and one for my wife. She too is a Stern fan. She called me today and asked if I was listening to Howard and I said yes and she started laughing out loud at the song they played before Robin's News (played to the tune of who let the dogs out..."ROBIN GET YOUR TITS OUT........BOOBS, BOOBS, BOOBS, BOOBS") and I realized that we on this board are probably the most hardcore of hardcore fans that listen to the entire show and then break it down minute by minute. If you asked my wife she would describe herself as a "big fan" but she probably only gets about 20-30 minutes to listen per day. Most people aren't like us...they don't record or sit by their radio's for 5 hours a day to hear an entire broadcast. they listen sporadically and talk about what they heard that day in that segmented time span. This may seem like common sense to most people but I think most of this board forgets that most of the 6 or 7 million people that listen probably only hear about 20-30 minutes. My brother is the same way. He has a 15 minute commute and tells me that the Stern show is better than ever. I may disagree, but you have to look at that point of view and give it something.
You could also look at it the other way. Some of the more unhappy listeners probably only get to hear a small portion of the show so it may not be a good part at that moment, but for those that listen to the whole show, especially those who record it, we get to hear all the funny parts. You also have to take that into account when looking at Howard's testicle-less radio ratings. Many of those huge ratings are based on someone listening for 10-15 minutes.
I'm not a record the show fan. but I happen to work a job, where I sit in my office most of the time to work. so I am able to listen to the show in its entirety most days. I rarely listen to sirius at night as I only have one unit (which I never feel like bringing in the house) and I usually don't like hooking up my laptop to hear sirius. in the terrestrial days, I used to listen to the show on the way to work, and then listened to almost the entire show for a while when I worked a night time job for about 2 years. but my intro to stern was in high school in the mid 90s when I only watched him on E! only. I never heard his radio show live til around 1999. also we didn't have him in this market til around 2000 I believe.
I get to hear about 15 minutes of the live show on my way to the gym, then another 5-10 minutes around 10 am (usually the news) on my way back home. I hear about 40 minutes of the west coast feed while traveling to work, often times it overlaps with what I heard live earlier. My drive home is the same, 40 minutes of the replay, although it tends to be the same 40 minutes I heard earlier 90 percent of the time. If I'm lucky, I hear about an hour of the show each day, depending on my exact comings and goings. Thats why I come here. To read about what I missed.
My wife and I listen a LOT. I wake up to the show and we both listen around the house while we get ready for work (still have an old Xact Visor with the mega-watt transmitter in it). She works part time, so some days she is able to catch the whole show at home. I probably hear 3/4 of the show most days, since I can't always listen at my desk (meetings, and other things pull me away at times). I would say that we are probably not your typical listener, yet we also aren't the rabid fan listener who MUST hear every minute of every show. We are lucky enough to be able to listen a lot, but we also don't panic when we can't. She probably also often hears more Bubba than I am able to. I was shocked that she wanted to go to Bubbapalooza
I started listen to Stern primarily at home. During my commute I listen to Free Beer and Hotwings and Wakin up With The Wolf.
I get to enjoy Howard for the full 5 hours (though I will tune to a different channel if it gets to be boring or they're interviewing a rap "artist"). But then again, that's because I work midnight shifts and Howard comes on at 2:00 AM here in my time zone (and the Wrap-Up Show ends just before my shift is over). Perfect timing.
