Month: October 2011

I was on the radio!

Brianne Bilyeu, , , 211 Comments

A few months ago I was invited to do something new and exciting: I was asked if I wanted to be a radio host for MN Atheists radio show, Atheists Talk! I was very excited to be asked, but I didn’t want to put anything out here on the blog until all the details came together. Today they did.

Today I was the host for an interview with Dr. David Eller on his book Cruel Creeds, Virtuous Violence: Religious Violence Across Culture and History. It aired at 9am this morning on AM950 KTFN. You can listen to the interview here or on iTunes (the podcast is called “Atheists Talk”, and this is episode #137 “Exploring Religious Violence”). I won’t go into the details of the interview itself here, but it was interesting enough that I found it a little hard to stay focused on the technical side of things, instead of letting myself get completely engaged in the issues Dr. Eller was discussing.

Being the radio host was a neat experience. I read all of the intros and outros, kept an eye on the clock, introduced the guest and the interviewer, thanked the sponsors, and theoretically would have read any email questions or taken any phone calls for the guest, had that happened. There was a kick-butt radio engineer in studio who took care of the actual sound quality, getting Dr. Eller on the phone, turning the mics on and off, and other techy goodness. And aren’t we all grateful for that?

Hosting was a little nerve-wracking and I did mess up a few sections. I totally, utterly cut off Dr. Eller at two of the commercial breaks, but then the engineer came in and clued me in to how those were supposed to work (as opposed to how I had been doing them, lol). Going to commercial is a bit of a delicate dance between the interviewer, the interviewee and the host, but after messing it up twice we NAILED the third break. But then we ran out of time at the end. And I said “uh” quite a bit. And I missed an entire paragraph of script for one of the intros.

So, there’s room for improvement, but now I’ll be one of the regular hosts and I’ll have a chance to try it again! I’ll be alternating with Atheists Talk radio host (and the blogger behind Almost Diamonds) Stephanie Zvan most weeks. My next show is on Sunday October 30th at 9am. We’re scheduled to have Alex Rosenberg on to discuss his book The Atheist’s Guide to Reality.

Fun, huh?

I was on the radio!
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Married People Conversations

Brianne Bilyeu, , 589 Comments

Me: Oh my god, look at the moon!

Hubby: Yeah, it’s really pretty, especially through the the trees like that.

Hubby: Except…

Me: Yeah?

Hubby [dropping into a Peter Lorre voice]: I feel myself…changing!

Me: I will slap you right in the face if you turn into a werewolf.

Hubby [looking at his hands in horror, whispers]: Oh god no, not here…

Me: You are such a dork.

Hubby: I need blood! [leers at me] Female blood!

Me: You get no blood. We’re, like, two blocks from the restaurant. You get lo mein.

Hubby [dropping the creepy voice]: Yeah, okay. I guess that’ll work.

Married People Conversations

Cross-Country Connections: Fall 2011

Brianne Bilyeu1,059 Comments

Cross-Country Connections is a Biodork weekly blog entry dedicated to telling stories in pictures of three family members – me, my sister and Mom – living in very different locations across the country. Every week we choose a different theme and then take or contribute a personal photo that fits the theme. This week’s theme is Fall 2011.

From Mom in Carbondale, Illinois:

These red leaves amidst all the green on the tree in my backyard are the only real indication that fall is coming to southern Illinois.  However, this one branch of red has been that way for nearly a month now.  It reminds me of a tour I took of Warner Bros.’s back lot once long before I moved back to the southern tip of Illinois.  I think it was the Gilmore Girls backyard and it had this huge tree (fake I believe) with a single branch artfully painted for “fall” shots.  Strange how life imitates art.

From Erin in Bellingham, Washington: 

Photo taken in Port Townsend, WA

From me in Minneapolis, Minnesota:

Outside the lunchroom at my workplace.

Cross-Country Connections: Fall 2011

Inner Dimensional Sound Chamber

Brianne Bilyeu, , 527 Comments

I have a new blog post up at the MN Skeptics Blog!

I’d never heard of an inner dimensional sound chamber. To the interwebs!

I found a website called soundheal.com and these are a few of the things that they have to say about the principles of the magic music box:

Inner Dimensional Sound Chamber is a blending of science and metaphysics in vibrational technology. It provides a low level oscillating energy field which assists with the restoration of cellular integrity.

The sound chamber honors the body’s natural geometric ability to heal itself at the cellular level. It sends specialized music or sound through the structure creating interference patterns.

I do not think these words “geometric” and “interference patterns” mean what you think they mean.

To read the rest of my article, please go here to the Minnesota Skeptics blog.

Inner Dimensional Sound Chamber

Cross-Country Connections: Together

Brianne Bilyeu511 Comments

I decided that I missed doing Cross-Country Connections with my mom and sister, and I’ve managed to convince them to have another go at it!

Cross-Country Connections is a Biodork weekly blog entry dedicated to telling stories in pictures of three family members – me, my sister and Mom – living in very different locations across the country. Every week we choose a different theme and then take or contribute a personal photo that fits the theme. This week’s theme is Together.

From me in Minneapolis, Minnesota: 

From Erin in Bellingham, Washington:

This stretches the theme of “together” in a visual sense but I’m using this photograph as a representation of the togetherness of my husband and me.  I’m the one who drags us all over the countryside looking for new and wonderful sights, but it’s due to my husband’s skill and patience that we get any reminders of the escapades.  One summer day, out hunting for fossils, I stopped at every single instance of this wild orchid but could never get a decent photograph of it.  It’s due to Ralph’s understanding (of the camera) and patience to actual take off the “auto” setting that we have this beautiful picture.

From Mom in Carbondale, Illinois:

Together means all four of us and it always will. 

Cross-Country Connections: Together