After the show it’s pretty common for us to say something like, “Boy this show could’ve gone on for another hour.” As Dobie frequently points out, we’re still growing and learning, so there are also shows there two hours feels like long enough. Tonight, though, I’m not kidding when I say that we could’ve stayed on the air for four full hours and there wouldn’t be a lull in the conversation. Proof that this is true comes in that we literally took zero commercial breaks during the second hour. Usually there are two breaks, sometimes there are three. We had two lined up, but we pushed them all to after our sign-off. < /SPAN>Again, one of the beautiful luxuries of our situation. Since we’re not getting paid, we have very few (if any) paying commercials that we have to air. We do have a slate of public service announcements that we air as mostly a chance for us in the studio to catch our breath and get something to drink. For the time being anyway, the commercials are at our discretion.

       Mary Jo Pehl gave us a wonderful introduction to what it will be like when we have her on for a full hour in a couple of weeks. When I started working on “The Mothership Connection,” my first goal was to have a cast member from Mystery Science Theater 3000 on the show and my deadline for that was Halloween. After attempts from various angles, one finally paid off. Mary Jo was a fun guest and I feel like we all had a lot of good chemistry on the air.

       Next we had Mr. Stanton Friedman, who is Dobie Maxwell’s dream guest. We’ve had him on the show twice now and has been very interesting both times. I’ll be the first to admit I am quite the outsider when it comes to UFOs, but the topic is interesting. In time, more will have the impact on me that it does to Dobie. I’m looking forward to meeting him at the Burlington Vortex Conference this weekend.

       Another person I planned on having on the air from the moment I got started was Ms. Ursula Bielski. I cannot possibly overstate how much respect and just overall fondness I have for her. She wrote the book that got me interested in the topic (well, I was interested prior to her book, “Chicago Haunts,” but it would’ve been one hell of an uphill battle, not having the luxury to stand on the shoulder of her, a giant before me). Last year she also hosted a Chicago Ghost Conference in the haunted Florentine Ballroom in the Congress Hotel on Michigan Avenue in downtown Chicago. I made a number of promotional videos for her and she tabbed me to host the evening session. Just to be around so many respected individuals from this unique community made it a day to remember. Amazingly, since Ursula and I have collaborated on projects, having her as a guest on the show was the FIRST time she and I have ever been able to chat about ghosts, and I was in heaven. I had a long list of questions for her and I think I only got to two and that filled up a commercial-free 45 minutes. We’ve never done a 2-hour guest spot since I joined the show, but I will be pushing for 2 hours of Ursula this December.