Tom's Final Month of Doing a Live Show

At least for now.

Tom Leykis announced on today's show that his last live audio show will be Thursday, October 25, 2018. He has been saying all year that this day was coming.

What he plans to do is keep his library of shows available for paid subscribers only and to do some new content via podcasts, starting October 29, only for paid subscribers.

He mentioned that he's had to cancel (or postpone) two of his dinner events due to a "minor medical issue" and his dinners were what was keeping the business profitable this year. (Haven't heard him mention the 1,900 subscriber mark lately.) He doesn't want to operate in the red, and doing the live show costs approximately half of a million dollars per year, so he's ending the live show. A podcast should cost less to produce, but he insists it will still have a high cost compared to many other podcasts because he wants the quality to be high.

So, with six straight years of profitably, he's calling it a day and making a change.

Of course, there is always the possibility that some company will offer to pay him enough that he'll take them up on the offer. SiriusXM had enough money to buy Pandora, or so it seems. I can't see him doing that unless the deal is very lucrative and/or he is given nearly total control over the show.

As of this writing, his book is still listed on Amazon as being released October 15, which is about three weeks away, even though there is no cover art and minimal information shown.

The Reason Your Child Is Misbehaving

As I've said on this blog over and over again, I love Dr. Laura and her media and mostly agree with her.

One of the areas where I have some questions about how she handles callers is when someone calls with concerns about the behavior of their minor child, and Dr. Laura starts off with questions to determine (as she often does with other concerns) whether or not the child is being raised in a married, intact home with their mother and father. If the caller was never married to the child's other parent, or is divorced, and especially if they are the stepparent or have a new spouse/partner, or the kid is in daycare, THAT is where the call stops, in the sense that Dr. Laura asserts THAT is the reason the child is acting out.

Really? She's not even going to bother to let the caller add that the kid was once run over by a bus, or was once kidnapped and beaten, or was hurt from medical malpractice?

It especially puts me on edge when the problem behavior described in the child is something like what my children are doing. My kids are being raised in a married, intact home by their biological parents. So clearly other things aside from divorce/never married/stepparent/daycare can prompt these behaviors, right?

Isn't it possible... possible... that whatever is causing the behavior in my children is also causing the behavior in the caller's child?

Now, I have to wonder if, in these cases, Dr. Laura feels the truth is less important than what she sees as the more important thing, which is eliminating or limiting the involvement of the new partner or spouse, or getting the kid out of daycare, or whatever, and communicating to the audience that kids need to be raised within their parents' marriage, by a parent. If that is her agenda, and the caller does what Dr. Laura recommends and the child still has the problem behavior, that will at least make the child better off. It just doesn't make anything easier for the parent or eliminate the problem behavior.

Another Reason Husbands Don't Communicate More

Everything I say can and will be used against me by my wife. That I already knew.

But everything anyone one ELSE says can and will be used by my wife to be negative about them and what's going on in our life, causing me a great deal of stress. So I need to remember not to tell her what other people have said. If I need to communicate the actual thing to her, I'm better off masking the source.

Example:

Me: "My sister [who has experience with X] said that we might want to look into X."

My Wife: "Yes, I already knew that. She should just shut up about things. Your family is so screwed up."

Now, let's see how I could have better handled that.

Me: "Have you looked into X?"

My Wife: "Of course I have. You must think I don't care about anything!"

I also need to avoid going to others with what my wife said. I'm not talking about private stuff. That I wouldn't share with others. That's what this blog is for. When I relay what my wife has said, people get pissed off at her. So if it is something that really needs to be communicated, I need to mask her as the source and change the wording and approach.

Sigh.

Guys, this is how I spend my days. I'm begging you: DON'T MARRY. Don't live with a woman. Even if you want kids, you don't have reasonable certainty you can provide kids a lasting, intact, happy, stable, healthy marriage in which to raise them. It's the sad truth. So get a vasectomy and never ever let a woman move in with you. Never move in with a woman. And never ever marry. You're more likely to end up like me than in a lasting, happy marriage.

Young Newlywed Thinks You Should Make the Same Mistake

A young man by the name of Brendan Clarey had an opinion column run in USA Today.

It would appear that he's in llloooooooooooooooove!

You know it's going to be delicious when it has this headline:

Dear fellow millennials, marrying at 22 is the best decision I ever made

Getting married was the WORST decision I ever made, BY FAR!

Getting married as a 22-year-old set me apart from most millennials, but my own experience made me ask: Why does my generation wait so long to wed?

If they marry at all, most don't wait long enough!

But those who do want to marry wait because they can get just about everything they want without marrying. And because they're in debt but want a big wedding. And because marrying in your early twenties or earlier is associated with a high rate of divorce (especially if you're not a member of a cult that punishes you for divorcing) and lower satisfaction in marriage.

Millennials like to take their lives into their own hands. They prove it by posting their travels on Instagram (#WanderLust). They wholeheartedly pursue their jobs and hobbies.

Men who marry young are going to have a harder time traveling, getting better jobs, and pursuing their hobbies.

So Much to Say

There is so much I want to write here. I could update every day, multiple times per day, if I had the time and energy. There is so much that has gone on and is still going on in my life, relating to my wife and children, that could serve as a warning to others.

I just have to be careful because I value my privacy and that of my family even more, which means I need to be vague and generic about some of the things I want to tell you, but that's not always easy or possible.

In the meantime, I'll say what I've probably said in cyberspace before: my time, money, and energy is taken up mostly by things I don't want to do, that I never wanted to be involved with, that I sought to avoid, all because I married and had children. If I had remained unmarried (and, by default, childfree), I could be doing things far more enjoyable and productive. I'm under constant unnecessary stress.

The Truth About Doctor Laura

It's time to expose THE TRUTH about Laura Schlessinger! I've got the goods on her. [This was originally posted in June 2016 and is still relevant.]