I heard John Prine for the first time while selling my plasma in 1978. The economy was in the dumper, and plasma-selling was one of the few ways a broke college student could earn a few bucks in Eugene, Oregon that year. The song was “Fish and Whistle”, and that afternoon I took my plasma money to Everybody’s Records and bought a cassette of Prine’s Bruised Orange.

Fast-forward to a Tuesday morning 31 years later.

I have a job that pays better and doesn’t involve needles. I don’t own a cassette player, and haven’t listened to Bruised Orange in at least a decade. I’m getting ready for a Portland Business Alliance networking event, which will take place at Talecris Plasma in Southeast Portland. Local public radio station KBOO is playing as I shave.

And “Fish and Whistle” comes on the radio.

This has nothing whatsoever to do with advertising and marketing. But I had to write it down somewhere.

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