Something I would’ve said in June, had I been asked

Something I would've said in June, had I been asked

I gave my love an Italian cookbook Saturday and she cut the plastic off it and opened it and found recipes for leg of kid, eel, pork liver, braised snout, sweet-and-sour snout, and I could tell that we will be eating vegan for the foreseeable future. I was just finishing up a nice helping of short ribs and she gave me a moralistic look, the sort you might give a cannibal if there were one around. And yet—who in this household is worried about high cholesterol? Not me, the butcher boy. The Queen of Greens, that’s who. Thus once more we discover the fundamental unfairness of life. The good are punished while the wicked get off scot-free.

My favorite breakfast is a sirloin steak with two fried eggs. I’m only a writer at a desk but that meal makes me feel like a stevedore looking ahead to a day on the docks running a forklift. I feel young and strong. Then I sit down at the laptop and taptaptap for a while. Meanwhile, my love eats her steel-cut oatmeal and goes for a run in the park and worries about cholesterol.

I’ve been the beneficiary of injustice for many years. I was an indifferent student and slogged through useless humanities courses and read Kafka and Camus and wrote papers about existentialism, which was all the rage back then and which nobody knew what it was exactly nor even approximately, which allowed an ignorant twerp to write inscrutable term papers about it, meanwhile the best and the brightest were studying engineering or medicine or law and forging ahead, and I, because I have a somber face and no social skills, went into radio during a boom period, and they became serfs in tall buildings in fast-moving fields (especially engineering) where obsolescence set in around age thirty-five, and I did a radio show that, because it was nostalgic, defied change, and thus did the turtle outrun a great many hares.

The plague struck in March. All of the gifted artists I knew—musicians, actors, comedians—were out of work, whereas I, the writer of homely tropes and truisms, was busier than ever. Like most introverts, I enjoyed the pandemic to the utmost.

Read the rest of the column >>>

State Fair Magic on A Prairie Home Companion

The A Prairie Home Companion season generally ran from October until the 4th of July. Garrison's love for the state fair not only found him performing at fairs throughout the summer but also found the full company performing a live broadcast from the grandstand at the Minnesota State Fair each year. A Prairie Home Companion has done 16 shows on the grandstand stage, beginning in 1986 and continuing through to the Minnesota Show in 2016.
This week we offer a smorgasbord of fair treats featuring Tonic Sol Fa, Jearlyn Steele, the Del McCoury Band, Suzy Bogguss, Andra Suchy, Mindy Smith, plus the acting company and the house band in a compilation of 5 different performances from the grandstand stage.
The link to listen is below, and we will also post it on our Facebook page on Saturday at 5:00 pm CT if anyone wants to listen as group, like we did in the old days!
Here is an original song by Garrison that is featured in this compilation show:
You Better Leave that Corn Dog Alone
You had a bratwurst and corn on the cob
A hot fudge sundae and a shish-kebob
You got a bucket of cheese curds in your hand
And yet you're stopping at the hot dog stand.
If you don't want to get in trouble (x3)
You better leave that corn dog alone
You had a taco four inches thick
And a deep fried walleye on a stick
You better be careful with that pronto pup
'Cause what goes down might come back up

Listen to the show >>>
Follow our Facebook fan page >>>

RETURN to Lake Wobegon

Garrison Keillor's new novel, The Lake Wobegon Virus, will be published on September 8th. The autographed copies have arrived and we are frantically prepping them to ship out next week to arrive on or before September 8th. We have a few of the signed copies remaining at our introductory price, so if you wish to have a signed book, order now!
Plus: CD audiobook is coming! This past month, Garrison has been visiting a recording studio that was able to follow good sanitation practices for COVID safety. He wrapped up narrating the novel, and we expect that the final CD product will be available in late September. For now, we are offering it as a pre-order.
Book description:
In his newest Lake Wobegon novel, Garrison Keillor takes us back to the small prairie town where for so long American readers and listeners have found laughter as well as the wry airing of our most familiar fears, desires, and beliefs—a town where, as we know, “all the women are strong, all the men are good-looking, and all the children are above average.”

Pre-order the book >>>
Pre-order the CDs >>>

TWA Podcast & Newsletter

During these trying times of COVID-19, we have received an outpouring of positive reviews from listeners of our poetry and history podcast, The Writer's Almanac. This is the same program that was carried on public radio for about 25 years, and it is now available as a podcast, a daily email newsletter, a website archive, and a Facebook feature. We added the link for the iTunes/Apple podcast below, but if you have a favorite podcast app, just search "The Writer's Almanac" in the search bar and hit subscribe!
Here are some quotes from happy listeners:
My daily listening to your Writer's Almanac has been even more calming, enlightening, and enjoyable throughout this pandemic lockdown. –M.G.
I recently subscribed to TWA, after not hearing it for several years. I can't begin to tell you what a comfort it is to hear your voice during these trying times, and have something to look forward to every day. Thank you. –C.G.
The first thing I do every morning, even before getting out of bed, is to listen to The Writer's Almanac. It's my daily pick-me-up! –A.D.
I haven't listened to Garrison for quite a while. A delight to hear that voice again. In these deeply troubling times, it is like slipping into a warm bed on a bitterly cold winter night. –S.G.

Subscribe to the podcast via iTunes >>>
Browse recent episodes >>>
Sign up for the daily email >>>
Donate to Support the Show >>>

Professional Organization of English Majors Shirt

Anyone who's listened to A Prairie Home Companion knows that POEM is an acronym for The Professional Organization of English Majors, our most literate sponsor! But for those who don't know, this T-shirt spells it out on the back. Available in both short and long sleeve versions.

Watch a POEM ad >>>
Get the Short-Sleeved shirt >>>
Get the Long-Sleeved shirt >>>

GOOD POEMS: Selected & Introduced by Garrison Keillor

Dana Gioia, one of our favorite poets, recommends Good Poems, the first anthology of poems featured on The Writer's Almanac. Here is an excerpt from the review posted on his website:

"Good Poems left me grateful for Garrison Keillor, whose Writer’s Almanac has probably done more to expand the audience for American poetry over the past ten years than all the learned journals of New England. He understood that while most people don’t care much for poetry, they do love poems, provided they are good poems."

Read the full review >>>
Get your own copy >>>