I lost a good friend yesterday – a man I’ve had the pleasure of knowing for 25 years—longtime VP of Public Relations for Caltech, Bob O’Rourke.  Bob was not only a dedicated booster of Caltech; he was always working to connect people he knew when their interests intersected.  He was a matchmaker in every area but romance (as far as I knew).

I last visited Bob about two weeks ago and, even as his body was failing, his robust personality was fully there.  He was interested in connecting me with an acquaintance of his who was doing significant philanthropic work in our area.  His mind never stopped working.

Bob also dedicated his last years to furthering research into the treatment of Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis, the disease that eventually took his life.  He joined me on “AirTalk” just over a year ago to talk about how he was diagnosed with the illness and little is known about its causes.

Bob used his force of personality and persuasive abilities to lobby UCLA into performing a lung transplant on him.  After waiting for nine months to get a match, Bob got a new lung to replace one of his diseased ones.  Unfortunately, the donor lung never properly functioned in Bob’s body and, from that point, the illness’s course was clear.

During these past few months that Bob was home on hospice care, I had the chance to visit him a few times and enjoy his and his wife Sandy’s company, despite his difficulty in breathing.  He made sure our conversations were upbeat and warm.  His was the best example of facing impending death head-on and with spirit fully intact.

I’m sure that for Sandy, their children, grandchildren, and those very closest to him, it was extremely difficult and stressful to provide full-time care and to see the man they love so much struggle for breath.  However, I have no doubt how much pride they have in the man who set the best possible example for how to live with fast-approaching death.

I’ve reached the age of 52 with this being my first loss of a good friend.  I’ve seen the passing of several family members, but, until now, no friends.  This loss is tough.  There will never be another Bob O’Rourke, but his impact on this community and his friends will outlive us all.  Bob, I’ll miss you.

Tuesday morning on “AirTalk,” one of our planned segments completely fell apart just a few minutes before airtime.  Though that’s not unheard of, fortunately, it’s fairly rare.  We usually have at least 45-minutes to book an open segment.

Faced with a gaping half-hour hole in our show, I revisited an idea that I’d dismissed the day before from our producer, Katie Sprenger.  That suggestion, which I thought would have only limited appeal to listeners, led to an impassioned on-air and online conversation.

Katie had been complaining about spending hours cooking a turkey for her child’s daycare potluck, only to see some of the other food having been purchased at restaurants or supermarkets.  To Katie, “potluck” means it should be handmade by the participant, not purchased. 

I was surprised by Katie’s take, as I figured the quality of the food was the issue, not where it came from.  However, Katie went so far as to say it’s better to have something of lesser quality that’s personally cooked or baked than a higher-quality item that’s purchased.

Listeners took off on this topic and had wonderful anecdotes and personal opinions on what “potluck” means to them.  Opinions were varied and descriptions were mouth-watering – so much so that I closed out the segment and the hour as though the show was over.  We had another hour to go, but lunch was clearly on my mind after all the great culinary descriptions.

I can’t ever remember mistaking the end of “AirTalk’s” first hour for the end of the entire show.  I got lost in the pleasure of the conversation and assumed the segment was so much fun that we must be closing with our usual “softer” topic that we typically do at the end our second hour.  Regardless of my error, it was a blast.

That’s what I experienced last week at the historic recording stage at Sony Pictures in Culver City.  The stage was where musical soundtracks for numerous classic MGM films were recorded, including “The Wizard of Oz.” 

I was there at the invitation of Academy Award-winning composer Michael Giacchino, who was recording the score for next year’s Disney action release, “John Carter.”  The film is adapted from a series written by “Tarzan” creator Edgar Rice Burroughs.  Giacchino had an orchestra of over 100 musicians, being recorded in-synch with scenes from the film.  Time-coded sections of the movie were projected onto a huge screen at the back of the room, facing the conductor. 

Given how rarely full orchestras are recorded with all the musicians together at the same time, it was particularly fun to see.  Standing in various parts of the room, with the orchestra playing around me, was an experience I won’t forget. 

A particular treat was seeing the number of instruments and miscellaneous toys and devices available to the six or so percussionists.  They had one case after another loaded with oddities that could create different sounds – toys, pieces of metal, wood, and plastic.  Percussionists clearly look at every object as having unique sound potential.

I was joined on the field trip by “AirTalk” producer Karen Fritsche and “Offramp” producer/reporter Kevin Ferguson.  We’re planning soon to add video from our visit and, hopefully, a fully-produced piece for “Offramp.”

Two of our four “AirTalk” producers, and our technical director, were still without power in their homes Friday morning, after Wednesday night’s historically high winds hit parts of the Southland.  They’re representative of thousands of our listeners who are trying to cope with outages.

Hopefully, this is a good reminder of our vulnerability to a major earthquake, which could leave us without electricity or safe running water for weeks.  With this outage, there were at least places to go that had power.  In a big quake, we’ll be on our own.

As I was working around the lack of electricity at our home, I took it as a challenge to get our household better prepared for a natural disaster.  Maybe this time I’ll thoroughly follow through.

If you’ve seriously prepared for a disaster, was there a particular event that prodded you?

Tuesday morning on “AirTalk,” we reported on GOP Presidential candidate Herman Cain’s conference call with aides in which he seemed to pave the way toward dropping out of the race.  This followed Monday’s claim from an Atlanta woman that she and Cain had, until just before the campaign was launched, been romantically involved for 13 years.

I find this whole story unbelievable.  I don’t mean that I disbelieve either person’s account.  What doesn’t make sense to me is that if Cain and the woman were in a relationship, why he didn’t figure out how to deal with it first.  By the same token, I don’t see any reason why a woman who’s known Cain for 13 years would falsely claim they were lovers.  Neither scenario makes sense.

The nature of their friendship or relationship may never be known.  However, the allegation is almost certain to hurt an already reeling campaign.  As you read this, Cain may have already dropped out.  If so, it’s another example of the power of allegations of sexual behavior to determine many a political fate.

As for me, I’m far less interested in a politician’s personal sex life than strong, detailed, allegations of abusive behavior.  We hear many stories of politicians behaving poorly with staff and others within their sphere of influence.  That’s, to me, the real indicator of character – how someone behaves when they think they’re free to act however they like.