I live in LA but I call London home. It's where most of my friends and family live. I've been here for a year and until now have never been homesick for the city before. I've been homesick for friends and family, but never for a place. I want to jump on a plane, bike to Hyde Park and swim in the Serpentine Lake. I want to shop in our local Lebanese and then walk home across Queens Park.

We all know that London is used to terrorism, and expected this. It is still a shock, but it will wear off. When I first moved to London there was a number of bombs, which were placed in street trashcans. Now every time I bike pass one I cross my fingers and hope, knowing of course that I will not be blown up. Every time I see a plane in the sky, for a moment I think it will fall out of sky. Now another thing has been sullied for me - the red double-decker bus. A symbol beloved by children and tourists.

I received an email from a radio producer in Tennessee whom I have never met: "I don't know if you're a Londoner," she writes, "but I was so sorry to hear about the terrible events of this morning." The concern of Americans who both know me and who don't, is touching and comes as no surprise. It has bought me close to tears a couple of times. It has made me miss London even more.

I got another email from one of my friends in London – "Me and girls ok - Edmund going to court this afternoon. Would quite like him home."

I would quite like to be home too -- my wife and kids are here so I can get all the emotional support I need from them. I want to be home so I can be a Londoner again, to reclaim my city, to join the inevitable peace march. It makes you cry when innocent people are killed in the place you call home.

Hi, Bill Radke here.
The piece I want to ask you about is my favorite piece on this week's show (May 14) -- "Compassionate Cooking." Click on it and listen. It's about this chef in Wisconsin named Anne Breckenridge-Swanson. She's wanted to get into the restaurant business and she realizes she can make a living cooking for the sick and dying patients in a hospice facility. She's not melodramatic, she's not self-congratulatory -- she's simply found a way to pay the rent by doing something she loves that serves other people. It made me ask myself, how can I go to work every day with a sense of service? Not always easy.

I'd love to hear more stories like it -- how have you figured out how to make a living in a way that's not all about you? The answer might seem obvious if you work at a soup kitchen. But what if you don't? I'd like to think that even if nursing isn't your thing, you could go to work with a sense that you're making the world better. Maybe that means helping people see farther, or bringing someone joy. What does it mean to you? You might inspire someone with your story, so write me back.

OK, it's too sunny to stay inside. I'm going to the John Prine concert tonight -- have a great weekend.

Bill

Hello all,

I just edited our next Chain of Influence piece, an interview with an Israeli bible scholar named Aviva Gottlieb Zornberg. We are now at six degrees of separation from the first person in our series, US poet laureate Ted Kooser, so it seems an appropriately Kevin Baconish point to take stock.

Hi, Bill Radke here, Weekend America co-host.

I just got off the air after a six-hour marathon. The Vatican announced during our program that Pope John Paul II had died, and we updated our show continuously with new developments. Normally, Weekend America is only a two-hour program. But when news breaks, we stay on the air live, from 9 a.m., to 3 p.m. (Pacific Time), to keep you posted. Right up until broadcast we, along with the rest of the world, were in the dark about the Pope's life expectancy. So we assigned reporter Matthew Algeo to monitor the situation via the Web and television. Within just a few minutes of the Vatican's announcement, we relayed news of John Paul's death to our listeners.

You know, I wonder how you feel about the relationship between "breaking news" and your public radio station. Did you stay tuned to the radio Friday and Saturday, listening for the updates and reporting? Did you turn instead to television to see for yourself the crowd at St. Peter's Square or the other many images TV brought us? Was this even breaking news to you? We've known for years about the Pope's frailty and for weeks about his dangerously worsening health. Did you feel like public radio and Weekend America brought you too much information?

I'd like to hear from you. Maybe you have your own story of involvement in an historic event; where you weren't just a news consumer, but became caught up in "breaking news." Please send us a note here. And always feel free to tell us a good story. Leave us your contact information, and maybe we can help share your tale with listeners of Weekend America.

Best,
Bill Radke

We're delighted you've come to our new blog for the program Weekend America.

What is a blog? For us, it is a place, as one blogger put it, "where your ideas can stand alone, without interference*."

The point is we want to hear from you, and not just whether you like or dislike our show. We want to "mine" your expertise and knowledge. Weekend America's desire to go beyond mere news coverage to instead present and examine new ideas – to do what we're calling a "journalism of ideas" -- offers us a golden opportunity to have our audience members offer their own ideas and help "spin the idea" and advance the thinking.

Weekend America is a relatively young program whose mission statement includes:

• Weekend America exists to give public radio listeners a radio home on the weekend, allowing them to be part of a community that shares their values -- where they feel welcomed, amused, intellectually and emotionally engaged, challenged and entertained.
• Weekend America (WA) permits Americans see themselves and to encounter the world around them with creativity, compassion and curiosity.
• Weekend America will use the weekend as an ideal time to reflect our complex, diverse, multilingual, multicultural nation back to itself.
• By examining how Americans spend their weekends, listeners to Weekend America will understand the important ideas that shape their lives and obtain real insight into what Americans value and want, refreshing listeners' intellects and replenishing their spirits.

Tell us what stories we ought to be covering, what new people we ought to be talking with, what new ideas we ought to be tracking, what issues we ought to dig into. Help us invent a new kind of weekend public radio … interesting, worthwhile, but also "weekend-y."

Thanks,

Jim Russell
Executive Producer

*We reserve the right to edit for length and inaccuracy, and to screen out offensive or illegal content.