“Yes.” “Dick Gibson?” “Yes. Turn your radio down. We’re on a six-second tape delay.” “What? Oh. Yeah. Just a minute. I’ll turn my radio down.” “Please. … It’s two-fifty on the Sun Coast, a balmy seventy- one degrees outside our WMIA studios on Collins Boulevard.” “Dick Gibson?” “Yessir.” “I’ve been trying to reach you two months.” “I’m pleased you finally got through. Go ahead, sir.” “Dick Gibson?” “Yes. Go ahead, please.” “Your feet stink.” “Oh?” “I smell them over my radio.” “But you turned your radio down.” “I smell them over my telephone.” The crank hung up. Dick took another call. He’d had the program for a little more than two years and had been Dick Gibson uninterruptedly all that time. He would never not be Dick Gibson again; he had even had his name changed legally. Laying to rest the apprenticeship forever, he had at last found his format. The program was a simple one, a variation of something he and radio had done for years.
