Radio Jock Kid Curry Takes on MS

Show Transcript

[00:01:19] Kim "Kid" Curry: I appreciate it very much. Hello, Mark. 

[00:01:21] Mark M. Bello: Hello, Kim. Great to have you here. Tell me about the title and what, the reference is, about.

[00:01:28] Kim "Kid" Curry: Okay. It's a convoluted story. When I was a college kid I was on the local top 40 radio station in Pueblo, Colorado part-time as Gary Paxton. Now, that was a made up name that someone just gave to me. As I was going to my first full-time job across the country, I was going to Knoxville, Tennessee, and I wanted to come up with a really cool radio.

[00:01:52] these are the 1970s. I was gonna be on the radio at 10 o'clock at night, so I wanted to call myself Night Smoke. So when I got to the radio station, I walked up to the the front door and opened the door and there was a receptionist and a big guy behind her and he had big, curly hair.

[00:02:07] And I put my hand out to the receptionist and I said to her, hello, I'm your new nighttime DJ Night Smoke. And the guy behind her said if it isn't Kid Curry. My name is Kim Curry Uhhuh . In the 1970s, you guys might remember a TV show called Alias Smith and Jones. It was a show taken off of the raindrops have falling on my head.

[00:02:31] Alias Smith and Jones. Butch Cassidy. Butch Cassidy in the Sundance Butch Cassidy, right? That's right. One of the characters' names was Kid Curry. It was Kid Curry in Hannibal Hayes. And when I was in high school, all my friends used to joke, Hey, there's Kid Curry. So when the big fat guy behind her says if it isn't Kid Curry, I said I hate that name.

[00:02:51] And he says, I won't sign your check. And I said, kid Curry, it is up. That's where that came from. And believe me, it was the smartest thing ever because there's only been one kid curry on the radio in America, as far as I can tell. That's wonderful. So that's because I was a kid, the kid, the nighttime dj.

[00:03:14] My job was to collect the high school audience, the high school and middle school. So at night, at five minutes before I was finished with my radio show, I'd take open phone calls and let kids just call in and rip on their school. They could tell a joke about a teacher rip on a little brother, and I would fire back these crazy comments.

[00:03:34] And because I was the kid on the radio, . When I was finished with that segment and my show was over, I'd say "that's the end of the show. Come get me Mother. I'm Through. And that was, that's where that line came from. And it just seemed appropriate when cuz I've said that phrase in many towns in America.

[00:03:53] Yeah. And it was it, was pretty important I thought to label my first book with that title. 

[00:03:59] Bob Gatty: Now is your book. Tell us just quickly about, about your book.

[00:04:05] Kim "Kid" Curry: It's a culmination of my radio career. I, was fortunate enough to land a big job in Miami. Six months after my first full-time job, I was only at my first full-time gig for six months before I got taken down to Miami.

[00:04:20] Now, that began a process of working for two of the most legendary program directors in the radio business, Jerry Clifton and Bill Tanner. Those guys, Jerry was the first one who found me and then due to a, crazy contest called Find Greg Austin in the Bermuda Triangle. And, this Jerry was the program director of, of what was 96 x

[00:04:45] And so we are in Miami 

[00:04:47] Mark M. Bello: All 

[00:04:47] before war. Where's Waldo, right? 

[00:04:49] Kim "Kid" Curry: Oh, absolutely. . And so he got on the radio and they did this promotion, find Greg Austin where. Greg Austin's lost me, and people actually got in their boats and headed out there. That's illegal. So through all of this process, Jerry Clifton eventually gets bounced out of my first job in Miami and the competition across the street.

[00:05:11] Really liked my radio show, so they captured me. So I went from Jerry Clifton to Bill Tanner, two of the Genius Radio program directors in America. My book talks about a bunch of the crazy things we did, the contests, the interactions I had with stars, many of them throughout my career. It sounds like a lot of fun.

[00:05:30] Oh, it was the book is funny. There's I could tell this story about the time that my daughter farted in front of Gloria Stephan . There's all sorts of crazy stories. Okay. My first, the first interview I ever did was with Bob Hope. wow. So these are the, there's a bunch of those kind of stories.

[00:05:48] First actual stars I ever met were Marilyn McCoo and Billy Davis of the Fifth Dimension. Uhhuh . And you gotta realize I went into Top 40 radio back in 1976, okay? And when I ended up out of broadcasting in 2005, I'd gone through Top 40 radio. But all those different genres of. Right when I started, I was playing Casey in the Sunshine Band.

[00:06:13] When I fi finished, I was playing Puff Daddy in Tupac. There you go, . So I went through all these genres of music and that's where the, book begins. Yeah. Good. And then it goes into these crazy things that I used to happen to me throughout my life. Okay. Exacerbations of what was multiple sclerosis.

[00:06:35] but I didn't know what it was. Things would happen to me. In fact, there's a story in the book. I was, stress is a major factor in multiple sclerosis. Our, brains get lesions on them and the stress, when you have a lesion on your brain, the stress inflames that lesion and that's why my wife won't even let me talk to either of my ex-partners.

[00:06:59] So anyway because stress really it, makes my legs freak out, my arms curl up. Stress is extremely important in multiple sclerosis. I had a radio show in Washington DC at the end of my show, I was doing this little segment called Bed Check, which is, come get me mother. I'm through at the end.

[00:07:20] Now. I had done this, feature bed check in different markets around America, and it was all high school kids, teeny bop. But then when I was in Washington DC it got taken over by the politics. You'd have one political party ripping another political party, and I'm going, guys, this is supposed to be for high school kids, and these guys are having this fight on my show.

[00:07:41] And it was crazy. But during all of this, a guy would call and he would say, Hi, it's me, Frank De Framer. I'm over here at the White House and President Reagan was just in my studio listening to your radio show. He thinks you're funny, and I thought it was a joke. I just kept hanging up on the guy. Ha Yeah. He kept calling in and saying the president was just here. So I took him off the air one night and I said, listen man is this real? And he my name is Frank De Framer. I am the person who takes care of the frames of the portraits of the White House. Someone needs to do that maintenance.

[00:08:20] I'm in the Secret Service, but that's my job. I'm the framer. They call me Frank, the Framer. And so Frank would have this studio in the bowles of the White House and President Reagan would come in and listen to my radio show. He was an old radio guy, so he got off on me just being crazy with people.

[00:08:37] Wow. So then time goes, Sure. I'm now working. I've left Baltimore. I'm left Washington DC and I'm working in Baltimore a year goes by or so, and a girlfriend I had at the time, her grandmother came up from Texas, we're having dinner in Baltimore. And of course the story comes up about Frank de Framer and she says if you know somebody at the White House, you better take me over there.

[00:09:01] So here I am calling the White House. Now, not really thinking. I didn't even really know if Frank Defra was real. He told me these stories. I assumed he was real . Hello, Frank . I called the White House and the lady answers the phone. I was like, okay, listen, I need to speak to a guy by the name of Frank De Framer, and she goes, oh, Frank, hang on.

[00:09:21] I'll be. I was, whoa. I got, so he picks up the phone, he's Kid, what's going on? Cuz he was a big fan of the radio show. Yeah. And I told him my story. I said, I got a grandma here. She wants to come and visit. He says, come on over, let me know when you're coming. I'll tell the guys you're on your way. Just let him know you're here to see me and we'll get you in here.

[00:09:40] No problem. now, this is after Reagan's assassination attempt. They had not changed the security around the White House yet. Wow. So I'm driving around the White House and I'm looking for an entrance, and I see one that to me looks like it goes right up to the back door. So I'm thinking here I go.

[00:09:58] So as I'm driving up this road, as you can only imagine, Men came out of the woodwork with their guns drawn on me. As I'm driving up toward the light . Now this starts to do this stress thing in my body and I start going, oh no. What have I done? And it really freaked my body out. My arm curled up my eye lost vision in my right eye when they came to me.

[00:10:23] I opened the door and I fell out of the car and I'm yelling, it's Kid Curry. I'm here from Frank to Framer. And they're like, Hey kid, what's up? Thankfully. But that stress, that thing that happened to me there is very much the reason why multiple sclerosis is undiagnosed in people until they get an under a stressful situation.

[00:10:45] Oh wow. When the body begins to react. Wow. And that's what happened. I Three or four times. I thought one time I'd been bitten by fire ants , I thought I'd been stung by a killer bee, but these were all MS. Exacerbations. Wow. Wow. 

[00:10:59] Mark M. Bello: Hey Bob. Yeah. Good luck. Good luck getting a shorter answer out of this guy, . 

[00:11:04] Bob Gatty: Yeah, 

[00:11:04] Kim "Kid" Curry: you know what I was thinking?

[00:11:05] I by 

[00:11:07] Bob Gatty: That's not even on our script, that question I asked him, and I have no idea. I have no idea if that wipes out all the other stuff that we're supposed to ask the guy. But 

[00:11:20] Mark M. Bello: I like this one. I like this much better. 

[00:11:22] Bob Gatty: Me too. 

[00:11:23] Mark M. Bello: Yesterday. We spoke to Kim Hamer, we told you. This is Kim. This is Kim week. Kim week.

[00:11:28] Week. Kim is a woman who shared the experience of losing her husband to cancer at a very young age and I asked her about the day that she found out about the diagnosis. You're very much alive. Thank goodness. Ms. As we know, is a very nasty disease. I lost a cousin to it at age 50. I watched her deteriorate until she was gone.

[00:11:53] Essentially, it scares the hell out of people. Yes, sir. What was diagnosis day like for you? 

[00:11:58] Kim "Kid" Curry: Okay, so I had gone through all these different they, test you for everything. They poke, they prod, it takes a couple of months. The end process is them extracting spinal fluid because of my severity of ms, I didn't have any spinal fluid.

[00:12:17] I did four spinal taps in one day. The last one, they put me under an x-ray machine to be able to find it before they. So I'd gone through all this testing. Remember I was programming this big radio station in Miami, but our corporate office was over in Naples. I was three hours over alligator alley over in the Naples at a corporate meeting.

[00:12:40] And I'm sitting there with all the big wigs and the phone rings, my cell phone, my 2005 version of cell phone, and I went off to another room and my doctor said, Kim, I need to see you on Monday because we need to begin planning the next part of your life. to which I was like, excuse me, what? I was, I had no clue even where she was going with the diagnosis, cuz she hadn't said anything to me.

[00:13:07] And I said, so what do you mean by that? She says, I'm gonna officially diagnose you with multiple sclerosis. You need to be here on Monday so we can talk about what you're going to do next. How old were you at this time? I was at 2005. I was 50 years old. 

[00:13:20] Bob Gatty: Okay. So you're saying you really didn't have any symptoms any signs?

[00:13:26] Kim "Kid" Curry: Remember I said that those exacerbations I was having? Yeah. Right around the time of the big tsunami, the first tsunami that we saw on national television, remember a gentleman, it was around 2004. Latter party, 2004. We got to watch that. Indonesia be wiped out. Cows, animals, houses, everything just wiped out in the tsunami.

[00:13:47] I was at my mother's house with my wife, and we were on a vacation, and I was watching this. And as I'm watching it, my mother starts looking at my face and she says, your face is wrong. What's wrong with your face? And I said mom, I'm sitting here watching what's going on television. I'm it's, stressful.

[00:14:06] And I'm remember I'm home on vacation. I'm trying not to think about the radio station. And she says, no, there's something really wrong with you. I don't, your eyes don't look right. Your face looks like it's frozen on one side. And that was, that started happening. That year to the point to where that my mother was the one who said, wait a minute.

[00:14:26] Something's going on. You gotta go see a doctor. Because I had been complaining about crazy things, but it was not until my mother was the one who around January said, there's really something wrong. You gotta go find a doctor. My wife gets me to the doctor. So all these exacerbation things that we talk about, the arm curling I, I lost my walking gait..

[00:14:45] I couldn't walk straight at times. My loose vision in my right. This was really happening a lot that year up to my diagnosis. At the time I was in there because my mom said, you're not right, and that's when the testing began. And for the two months of testing, she didn't tell me where she was going until that phone call.

[00:15:06] So I pack up my briefcase. I tell the guys I've just been diagnosed with ms. I'll see you on Monday. That was a Friday. I get in my car and now I'm driving back the three hours over to Miami on alligator alley. I'm on the phone with my wife. I had no idea what multiple sclerosis was, so you can only imagine the 2005 version of Google.

[00:15:26] And my wife is on there on the phone trying to figure out whatever she can find out on the internet about ms. And by the time I got home , I learned that what you know is people die from multiple sclerosis. Yeah. Oh yeah. And what was happening to me was just the beginning of eight years of a very serious decline.

[00:15:49] So yeah it it, was not, and then when I got home my wife and I basically had decided before I got home when I got home, I, she said to me, you realize that we've been on the phone for three hours and you've not brought up the radio station. and that was so unlike me. I had a radio show I was very proud of four hours a day, but when you're running Power 96 in Miami, the biggest radio station in the southeast us, it was always on my mind.

[00:16:17] And she said, for three hours, you haven't even thought about the radio station, because I couldn't think about the radio station. 

[00:16:26] Mark M. Bello: You're fighting for your life. 

[00:16:27] Kim "Kid" Curry: knew what was going on in my body. I the doctor. things are gonna change as of Monday. And so by the time I got home, I was pretty much convinced I should leave the radio station because I didn't wanna be the hurt.

[00:16:40] I didn't wanna be the thing that caused disruption, which is why I eventually I asked to resign, they said I could. And I went off to find out what it was like to have multiple sclerosis for the next eight years. 

[00:16:53] You, brought me right into my next question. Okay. But before I do, before I ask it listened to the symptoms you described and I'm thinking to myself, he must have thought he was having a stroke, yes or no?

[00:17:06] Yes, sir. I did. I did. I kept 

[00:17:08] Mark M. Bello: wondering why wasn't they, mirror that. They mirror that. 

[00:17:11] Kim "Kid" Curry: Yeah. I thought, why isn't happening over here? That was my only claim was it can't be because it's not happening in my left side. This is on my right eye, my right arm. So I I, thought for a while, but the only thing.

[00:17:26] That was obvious to me was it wasn't the left side. Yeah. 

[00:17:30] Wow. 

[00:17:30] Mark M. Bello: Your father got, you started in the radio, right? Yes, sir. 17 years. And, it was, it's, listening to you talk about it is, was like your destiny. I explain, both experiences. You, this, glorious path that gets you into radio and makes you successful in it, and then you're forced to leave it.

[00:17:52] Talk to me about the emotional highs and lows of all of that. 

[00:17:57] Kim "Kid" Curry: I'm a radio baby. That means your parents were in the business and that means it's in your blood. And my father was a 20 year Korean War veteran in the US Navy. He had retired and moved us to a very small little town in Colorado called Canyon City, where there's only one radio station, one high school public high school.

[00:18:20] So you know, I, it was my blood. So it really it, really got to me. But it took time for me to you gotta remember gentlemen, I was really falling apart. My physical condition was really a concern for me at the time cuz I could feel what was going on. For the next eight years, they're giving me experimental MS drugs.

[00:18:41] I'm taking solu treatments three or four times a year just to calm my brain down. So it was very stressful to stop being who I was. And remember Kid Curry, the DJ was a famous radio dj, but when your kid Curry the program director of Power 96, at the time, I was a fairly wanted, people wanted to be next to me, but for the next eight years, the further I got into ms, I went from a cane to a crutch, to a wheelchair.

[00:19:11] More and more people, they didn't wanna be next to me and that was a mental process that took me a long time to figure out. When I left the business, nobody really called, nobody even really paid attention to it. In fact, one guy, oh, God was concerned about me all the time, and I'd been in the business for 33 years.

[00:19:29] It got me it really, oh, sure it would, it got me. But, the magic of modern science. Guys, I was really going down quickly. I was going down hard. When I got diagnosed in 2005, there were only, I believe, four to five MS medicines. Now you fast forward eight years, now there's eight to nine MS medicines, and the one that I was on was Rebif.

[00:19:55] I was on Rebif for about six years or so and nothing. Maybe eight years. Nothing changed. I was continuing to, do, to fall apart. the doctor said it was time to make a medicine change. We have a new one. I wanna give you Copaxone, and I want you to take large doses of vitamin D. Now this is the science of it where my doctor is the one I really feel has saved me.

[00:20:20] Because not only the, okay, I was a radio dj. I had used to have my mom get on my radio show all the time, and she would call and she'd have a cold, and she'd said it could be worse if I just, if I didn't take my vitamin C, my cold would be so much worse and you better take vitamin C. So I never took vitamin seriously.

[00:20:39] Ever, But my doctor said MS patients don't have, don't retain vitamin D in the first place. He believed that there's some connection between large doses of vitamin D and the medicine that you take. For some reason, he believed that it helped the medicine to work better. So for the first six months, I've only taken Copaxon.

[00:21:01] I'm not really feeling a change. But he and my wife harassed me like crazy to start taking vitamin D I was taking 30,000 IUs a day. I was shoving it down my throat and six months later my condition leveled off. I, started, I stopped with that fingernails down the chalkboard thing. I was always feeling like something was gonna happen.

[00:21:22] I could feel my body was, but all of a sudden that went away.. And it just stopped. And so we're talking two or three years go by and my condition's not getting any worse. It's not getting any better. I'm starting in my mind to start believing maybe I'm not gonna die from this thing. And it was quite remarkable because I really thought I was going down .

[00:21:48] Bob Gatty: How about your wife? All the way through, she must have been a rock. 

[00:21:53] Kim "Kid" Curry: That's one thing I can say. My wife is, she's Cuban. She is a very smart woman. She was my date at the Grammys for years, gentlemen. But then when our roles had to change she has since we, took all my money and when we moved back to my hometown in Colorado, we took our money and did some flipping and fixing, and flipping. Okay? We took a couple houses we, danced them up and we sold them. She didn't like the way the real estate people were dealing with her, and she thought I can do this. So she went out and got a real estate license in no time.

[00:22:27] Within a year and a half after that, she was breaking statewide per cap ratings had, become a, superior real estate agent, and now you fast forward to today, she is a consultant international real estate consultant around the world. And this whole thing that happened to me, I now say that it was the best thing that happened to me because it got me out of a very, stressful thing that was gonna kill me.

[00:22:55] It made my wife have to step up and my wife has taken the banner and she has just flown at high. She's doing well. I could spew about my wife. She's a COO at a company. She, does profit loss. She does, she runs company. She and she does it around the world. So this whole thing that happened to me was the best thing that happened to.

[00:23:20] Mark M. Bello: He's a kept man. Bob, 

[00:23:22] Kim "Kid" Curry: I am . I am. And I, in my book I talked about how it costs to be disabled in America. Remember my insurance company gives me one motorized wheelchair. I can use that wheelchair in my house if I wanna leave. That means I've gotta get that wheelchair out of the main part of my home, down a level.

[00:23:42] That means I've gotta have an elevator that takes it down. And then I've gotta have hand controls in my car because I'm trying to survive. So I've got hand controls in my car. I have another wheelchair lift on the back part of my house that gets me out the back part of my house. I live in a three story ranch home.

[00:24:02] Not it's a, we are on a ranch. It's a three story home, but I've got an elevator in here that takes me these little seat escalators that takes me to each level. These things are not paid for by my insurance. These things are paid for out of pocket. It costs to be disabled in America, and it is something that I am adamant about and because I see it every day I, live a life I have.

[00:24:27] If, I could only live on one floor of my home, it wouldn't be very fun., 

[00:24:32] Mark M. Bello: I hear you. 

[00:24:33] MS is a strange disease. I, look I, remember my cousin who I mentioned, and it affected her whole body. I, see you and I, and. Your upper body seems to be functioning pretty well.

[00:24:47] Looking at you, I wouldn't know you were, you had any kind of disease at all. You and she, and it affected her speech as well. Yeah. And it doesn't seem to and as 

[00:24:58] your speech changed?

[00:24:59] Kim "Kid" Curry: Here's the, You gotta remember that my doctor, who I, believe in a lot, mark Dr.

[00:25:06] Bowling outta Swedish Hospital in Denver. God bless him. He sa he says that once my condition leveled and we're talking about 2013, 14, my, my condition leveled off at that point. So since then, my brain has not been inflamed. He believes that my brain has begun to rewire itself, and I guarantee you that's happened.

[00:25:30] My voice was gone, whatever this, dope, whatever they call this thing. I was a radio guy who lost his voice. I couldn't, I still can't sing and I'm not that I can sing for anybody, but my voice really is affected. Some days it's good and some days it's bad, but it has gotten better over the last, so well since 2015 or so.

[00:25:49] Bob Gatty: Yeah, I was going to ask you your, voice doesn't sound like radio land, but it sounds like you're certainly capable. Yeah. And, so I was wondering why felt you had to quit the radio business. 

[00:26:04] Kim "Kid" Curry: What you're not seeing right now is the lower half of my body.

[00:26:06] My legs. As, I, as adrenaline runs, as stress begins, my body starts to react. So both my legs are sticking straight out right now. And just in the conversation with you and me now my legs seize all day long. I can be I, can't stand up cuz I can't let go of anything cuz if I do, my legs can seize and I crash.

[00:26:28] Ah. So we have a, line that Ms. Patients all say, and I'm, I'll bet your cousin said it. Yeah, I look fine till I stand up. I look fine till I stand up. I'm in a wheelchair and I can't get out of this wheelchair. Yeah and It, is stressful to be on the radio , you non-radio people. is stressful to be on the radio.

[00:26:54] It's very hard, difficult. It's a thought process that doesn't stop. And remember, radio stations don't turn off. So when you're the program director of one you're up at two and three o'clock in the morning making sure the guy's doing the right liner. You're there at 10 o'clock at night, it's seven o'clock in the morning.

[00:27:11] So it's a very stressful thing. In fact, my doctor will tell you, the first doctor that diagnosed me, Dr. Kalua in Miami, she believed that after 33 years of constant stress of constant thinking about radio broadcasting it was always on my mind. She thinks that's probably where the exacerbations began.

[00:27:32] Wow. Because I would work. I would be in the radio station at six o'clock in the morning on a Friday morning, work all day long at 10 o'clock at night, go out in Miami and get on a cruise liner to host the big cruise gambling thing. Get off the radio, get out of the boat at four o'clock in the morning and then be back on the radio at six.

[00:27:50] Ooh. So I did this for 33 years. Oh man. . And so the doctor believed that I may have stressed myself into this. In fact, she's, she was adamant at the time. Wow. And, as, and I, like I said, if you could see what my body's doing from the waist down, now you could see that stress really does get me. Yeah.

[00:28:11] Bob Gatty: Okay. What do you do now? 

[00:28:13] What floats your boat? 

[00:28:15] Kim "Kid" Curry: am a writer. Okay, first of all, we just turned, moved into this 10 acre horse property. I have two daughters who are equestrians. My youngest has her horse here. She's got, we have another horse in the property. Looking for two more now. I'm doing everything I can.

[00:28:31] I. I always tell my wife, my job is to figure things out. I'm going to be involved in this horse property, so I have to have a tractor. I've got a fairly large John Deere 30 25 E tractor that I need to do the maintenance around the property. I also have to groom the arena for the horses. I have a zero turn lawn mower, which I do the, cuz I can drive the zero turn with my hands.

[00:28:55] Everything here. I'm trying to do as much as I possibly can, but fortunately I have a brother-in-law. Who can do all the things it takes to stand up and he really helps a lot. But okay. So that's what I do physically and mentally. I write, I'm a writer. I wrote of course, my memoir. The next book I wrote it was called The Death of Fairness.

[00:29:16] It's the story of what happened to a small American town in its only radio station. After Ronald Reagan rescinded the fairness doctrine in 1987, he vetoed the Fairness and Broadcasting Act, and inside that was the fairness doctrine, which was the rule that required equal time for contrasting points of view.

[00:29:35] I think once that rule went away and you did not have, you no longer had the right to go call a liar out as a liar or call disinformation out as disinformation. You open the door to people who spew, spew, spew with no debate in their facts. And I believe that's why we've got a lot of the division we have in America today.

[00:29:58] So that's what that book is all about. Okay. And just my last one. One, oh go. I'm sorry. Go ahead.

[00:30:07] Mark M. Bello: Okay. My last book you, wrote a, you wrote how, what are there hobbies or therapies that, that you have to 

[00:30:16] Kim "Kid" Curry: Oh, I do all the time. I, have a recumbent bike downstairs. I use my legs as much as I possibly can because I remember I can't push them or use them, but I can use my arms and my recumbent bike, which gives me physical ability.

[00:30:30] I'm trying to in fact, I've lost. 15 pounds in the last year and a half just because I've stopped eating crap. And I've started working out more. I'm trying to stay on the planet as long as I can. My 

[00:30:41] Mark M. Bello: hobby. Your, website your, website says you wrote a novel, is that right? 

[00:30:45] Kim "Kid" Curry: I do. I have another one, my third book, which is Bonnie's Law, the Return to Fairness.

[00:30:50] Now this is the, same story. It's just. Okay, now I, took the, Death of Fairness and sent it off to a company known as Tail Flick. Now, tail Flake looks at projects to go shop them off in Hollywood. Tale Flick sent my first book, the Death of Fairness back and said it needed a deeper story, needed more character development, et cetera, et cetera.

[00:31:12] So I changed. I changed my thought process and I wanted to write the same kind of story about the death of fairness, but I wanted to write it for a young person, a young woman who might read the story and think, wait a minute. At one time we were at a place in America where you could call a liar out as a liar and get equal time, and then she wants to bring this thing back.

[00:31:36] She fights to go back to the days of the fairness doctrine when lies were made legal without. So that's the second book is about a little girl who figures out all the stuff that needs to be heard about Reagan and him vetoing the 1987 Fairness and Broadcasting Act. And she figures out that it's the Fairness Doctrine that has actually put her in a wheelchair.

[00:31:58] She's in a wheelchair, and that she believes that the Fairness Doctrine is a direct result of her being in the wheelchair because of the storyline that I wrote. I'm, adamant about this story, about the Fairness doctrine, and the reason is, My dad got me into radio. I went off of my big radio career and I kept coming home on vacation and my dad would say, you know what, man?

[00:32:21] They just fired Al Madre and they put some syndicated radio talk show on there, and the guy does nothing but lie and cause trouble, and it's gonna cause trouble in my town. and then he, I'd come home again six months later and he'd say, you know what? They fired the afternoon guy now, and they've got another one of these guys.

[00:32:38] So my hometown radio station was run by a bunch of local guys, my dad and a bunch of his friends and guys who everybody in the community knew. Eventually all those guys were fired and replaced with syndicated talk shows that were leaning very much toward the right. Sure. And it really bothered my father because he thought it caused disruption in the hometown.

[00:33:02] And that's where I based this story on, because it did cause disruption in my hometown. It was only one radio station, and there were a bunch of towns in America that had only one radio station that had this constant drumbeat of negativity and lies. And that's, I believe again, Part of why we are in the division we are in America today.

[00:33:22] Mark M. Bello: That's for sure. That's for sure. 

[00:33:24] Bob Gatty: So what's next for you? 

[00:33:26] Kim "Kid" Curry: I'm gonna continue pushing Bonnie's Law. . I got my review back from Tale Flick. I sent this back off to Tale Flick and they're gonna continue trying to get a, find a place for it because there's all sorts of broadcast media out there that need content.

[00:33:40] Mark M. Bello: Very good. Yeah. We asked Kim Hamer this yesterday and I wonder what your take is. My podcast is typically about justice and injustice, and it strikes me that a disease like MS is so random. People float through life and never experience a serious illness. Some get ill later in life, some get ill early in life.

[00:34:04] Some get terrible symptoms. Some get are in remission for a long time. Have you ever wondered why me? Do you ever ask that question and, bitch at God, or something like that? 

[00:34:15] Kim "Kid" Curry: I can tell you that there was a lot of that for a while. I'm not a religious person. I don't really, I found it more scientific than I did a personal attack.

[00:34:29] I, could see that there was something wrong with my body. I am more I'm. , the kind of guy who, and my, wife is a very positive person. When you're a coach, when you're a a, life coach and a business coach, you come up with positivity. And there came a point, as I was struggling with nobody everybody's paying attention to kid Curry, then suddenly nobody cares about Kid Curry.

[00:34:54] It really bothered me for a while and my wife said to me one time, you gotta stop being mad about being in that wheelchair. And then, you know what it, something clicked. When Kid Curry used to walk as the DJ into the room, all the little teenybopper girls loved it. When Kid Curry, the program director of Power 96, walked into a room, all the radio guys wanted to be talking to him.

[00:35:15] So all of a sudden I thought, you know what, when I roll into a room in a wheelchair, I'm once again the focus . So why don't I just start being me cuz I'm a pretty positive outgoing radio dj. Just do it from the wheelchair and stop fighting it. So I used to go into rooms, leery. I go into rooms and I control them now because I've, switched back.

[00:35:40] I've was kid Curry. I was beat down for a long time and then my wife said, stop doing that. And I thought, now when I go into a room, I'm still the guy who creates the attention, I just do it in a wheelchair and I start the conversation. I'm the first one to say anything. I smile at people because I control the room just like I used to as Kid Curry.

[00:36:01] Bob Gatty: So this is, that's interesting. That really is. Now you know what this guy Mark Bellow that we are sitting next to, virtually he, told me that I should ask you if you think the Denver Broncos will ever make the playoffs but he didn't stop there. He wanted me to ask you if you think the Detroit Lions will ever make the playoffs.

[00:36:33] And my answer to the second question is, who cares ? 

[00:36:40] Mark M. Bello: If you were 70 years old and you had a team that never made the Super Bowl ever, You wouldn't be asking, who cares? As, Kim will tell you. 

[00:36:51] Bob Gatty: Bello lives in Michigan and so we can understand why he lives in You live in Detroit mark? 

[00:36:59] Mark M. Bello: I do.

[00:36:59] Bob Gatty: Yeah. So you can understand why he feels that way. 

[00:37:05] Mark M. Bello: He had John Elway. Come on. 

[00:37:08] Kim "Kid" Curry: actually have a Detroit Lions connection from my hometown. I remember this when I was 10 years. Not too many famous people came out of Canyon City, Colorado, but at that time, if I'm not mistaken, we had a guy graduate from my high school who went off to college and ended up playing for the Detroit Lions, and I think his last name may have been like Waltman or Walton or something like that.

[00:37:33] I don't know that from my childhood. 

[00:37:36] my my Denver story is, the field goal kicker. Tom Dempsey. With half a foot kicks a 63 yard field goal and beats the lions, and he, I think they were the first, wait a minute, Bob. I think they were the first AFC team to ever beat an NFC team. . That's number one.

[00:37:55] And number two, only the lions could lose on a record setting 63 yard field goal in the last second, only the lions. Don't get me started. 

[00:38:04] Bob Gatty: Calm down. Oh my God. Calm down. It's only the lions Who cares?

[00:38:11] Mark M. Bello: That's my Denver Bronco story. 

[00:38:12] Kim "Kid" Curry: But there, there's something, mark about being a lifelong fan. I, told you earlier, my first Bronco game in 1965 I, was 10 years old and Cookie Gilchrist was playing and we used to say, we were yelling down there, don't be dumb and give it to a Crumb like cookie.

[00:38:28] But I have always been a Bronco fan. I don't care if they're good or bad, I still think they're gonna be okay. 

[00:38:34] Mark M. Bello: What are they making, the playoffs or. 

[00:38:37] Kim "Kid" Curry: This year? No, it took, it, it took Peyton Manning a year to get it right too. So I'm gonna say it's gonna take Russell Wilson a year to get it right too.

[00:38:44] Mark M. Bello: So you do remember the Dempsey Field goal, right? Oh, I do remember. 

[00:38:47] Bob Gatty: Oh, wow. I remember the Dempsey Field goal. And I don't care about 

[00:38:51] Mark M. Bello: only, the Lions . But by the way we have a, couple of minutes and I, you started to talk about what I consider to be as, Person who represented special needs people, disabled people, social security, disability recipients yay or nay, workers' compensation victims, you started to mention.

[00:39:17] Accessibility and the ada and I, would be remiss on a show like this to not ask you where you think the current state of the law is and, whether America has caught up, if you will, to helping assisting. People with special needs better than they had in the past.

[00:39:43] Kim "Kid" Curry: No America fails.

[00:39:46] I have friends all around the world who question our healthcare. We used to get, I used all these things I have to buy, like the two wheelchairs that I have, aside from my motorized the The hand controls the elevators I have around my house. The all that is paid for by me and I used to get a tax deduction.

[00:40:06] I don't even get a tax deduction anymore. Yeah. So it's the, it's not fair. It never has been. It never will be because I think there's too many people who've got their nose up the corporations and they're lost and they'll never get back to cause it's just the way it is.

[00:40:24] So it's unfortu. It would be nice to hope that this will all change, but it doesn't get any better by the day. 

[00:40:32] Mark M. Bello: So the sad part is those same people created the technology you're speaking about. Yes, sir. Yeah. None of that, existed 50, 60 years ago. Now it exists and so little, so few people have had access to it.

[00:40:44] It's just, it the word for it is, it sucks. Yeah. It's terrible. Essentially. 

[00:40:51] All right, Bob. 

[00:40:52] Bob Gatty: Listen I, gotta say this has really been an interesting discussion. Kim, we thank you so much for, being with us. 

[00:41:00] Kim "Kid" Curry: Yeah. Thank you very much.