So, when we can't sleep at anytime between 12Midnight and 5am CST, we can listen to the curiously USA-centric news about the Major League Baseball World Series and the recent Republican majority election results.
We can also hear some really neat programs, like Witness, reporting on historical events large and small by someone who was part of them, ranging from the Lovings' lawsuit against the Commonwealth of Virginia for violating their civil right to be in an interracial marriage to an incredibly successful jewel heist of a NYC museum to "Shoot," the performance art piece by Chris Burden. (Again, BBC World Service appears to be the British outlook of America for insomniacs and third shift workers across the USofA, even when they have guest news anchors/commentators from Nairobi, Kenya or Melbourne, Australia.)
I awoke around 2:30am CST to hear the tailend of Herman Koch on The World Book Club, discussing his book The Dinner. In synopsis, The Dinner is the story of two brothers -- one a successful politician anticipating to be the next prime minister and the other, a teacher on anger-management disability -- and their wives coming together for dinner at a neighborhood but chi-chi restaurant to discuss what they should do about their sons after a horrifying exploit that was captured by one of them on video. Both the audience and he (the "book club") were articulate in their q's and a's, and I did not fall asleep!
We miss the shipping news weather report. I think it either comes on earlier than "Six o'clock GMT" or it is part of the regular BBC broadcasts aired for domestic consumption, rather than this BBC World Service, which is spreading sanitized British culture across the globe, or at least America. But, can't have everything, I guess.
So, whenever you can't sleep, turn on the BBC World Service on NPR, sit up and browse www.booksonfirst.com or switch on the light and read a book like The Dinner.
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