No mixed feelings: music on public radio makes me bored

I listen to public radio in the car because I find most music boring and I'd rather listen to people talk. I can listen to sports radio hosts blather and bluster, I can choose partisan political ranting, or I can listen to intelligent people explore various interesting and pertinent issues. I usually choose public radio.

There are many, many, many options for music across the radio dial; if people are interested in music, I mean, it's right there.

So when NPR or MPR does a feature on music, I think, "Why?" I've clearly chosen 91.1 because I'm not interested in listening to or thinking about music. I want discussion on socially relevant issues, politics, world events, science, and the minutiae of contemporary life. If I wanted to listen to music, I could do so without much difficulty.

Public radio is what people listen to when they want to get away from pointless music, so why does public radio insist on including pointless music within its programming?

Here's what it's like. Let's say there's a mall, and in this mall are dozens and dozens of coffee shops. There are all different kinds of coffee shops for anybody who wants coffee. And let's say there's just one tea shop in the entire mall. It's not as busy as some of the coffee shops, but people who don't want coffee but have to spend time in the mall, or people who really like tea, or people who just want a little variety, can always go there. Now let's say every so often, perhaps once a month, perhaps every day for one hour, this one tea shop didn't serve tea. Let's say periodically, this tea shop served coffee, and if people came in to order tea, they were turned down and offered coffee instead. In a mall filled with coffee shops, the one tea shop decides occasionally to only serve coffee. That's what it's like when NPR or MPR do music features.