Many years ago, I worked at Data I/O. Initially it was as an electrical engineer. I later migrated to software. And then a while after that Randy Shulman and I were co-workers. We become friends, our wives met and we all sort of clicked. There were huge differences in our backgrounds. Randy and his wife from Los Angles while my wife, Barb S., and I were from Idaho. Me from a farm and Barb from the small town of Orofino nearby. We graduated from Orofino High School together. The population was at its peak then at between 3,700 and 3,800. The county is huge* with a very low population density. * That isn’t the only contrast between Randy and I. Other than extremely rare use of alcohol, I have never used recreational drugs. Randy once told me, “I have never tried a drug he didn’t like.” And he tried a lot of different drugs. I sing so poorly my children forbid me from singing Happy Birthday in their presence. Randy was a very talented musician and singer.
Randy described himself as a Los Angles Jew married to a Chinese (Taiwan) woman. ** She used the English name of Jan. We just happened to have our first children within a few months of each other. The two families occasionally went out for a Sunday lunch or other activity together and the children became friends too.
Barb S. and I soon moved to Sandpoint Idaho but frequently returned to the Seattle area to visit friends such as Randy and his family. And once Randy, Jan, and their children us in our home in Idaho. Visiting North Idaho was a bit of a concern for Randy and before coming he ask if there would be any problems for them. Him being a Jew and in a mixed-race marriage with mix-race children. I laughed and told him there would be no problems coming over and staying a few days. However, I told him with a wink, getting out alive might be a different story.
When Randy and Jan’s oldest child Julie ** and my oldest child were maybe four or five years old they decided to marry when they grew up. My oldest was probably almost in High School before, with grave concerns about the ethics of going back on the agreement, asked me if it would be okay to have a change of mind.
Still later I started commuting from Moscow Idaho to Redmond to work on Windows 95 video drivers for Direct X. Randy was soon recruited to help. His band wrote a song about our experience at Microsoft that summer. I is pretty accurate: Mister Bill’s Machine.
Randy and his friends had a public television show and I was invited to present a skit. I wrote and performed it solo.
I still cringe seeing this and cannot watch it. But I have been listening to Mister Bill’s Machine on repeat while writing this.
A frame from that skit was on one of their album covers.
It was during this time that I taught Randy to shoot.
After working in “Mister Bills Machine” on Windows 95 I probably only saw Randy a half dozen times. Barb S., and our kids had dinner with his new wife once. I would occasionally get a call or an email from him. He moved to Austin Texas and was adapting to yet another culture.
Tonight, I got a message, from my middle child, telling me that Julie posted on Facebook that Randy had died yesterday.
Here is a memory from Paul Brownlow who posted this on Facebook in March:
Mr. Bill’s Machine · The Swine ·
MEAT THE SWINE
Are we not logical? We are SWINE!
Somewhere around 1990, post-Cowboys and a couple other bands for me, Randy Schulman and I were working at an eastside software company, where coders like us were somewhat affectionately called “Swine” while the marketers were known as “Weasels”. I think the names came from a children’s book that someone had brought to the office.
Randy is a witty songwriter and the master of many instruments, including his 1940’s Gibson L-5 on which he strapped on a Bigsby vibrato tailpiece. It was sacrilege to purists, but he was immensely proud of it as we were anything but conventional.
We started playing together and rapidly formed a band, with my wife Deirdre on bass, Glenn Philips on a slew of twangy instruments, and drummer Duff Drew from a previous band of mine, Reckless X. Randy’s daughter Julie would occasionally join us as the Sixth Swine, a nod to the Fifth Beatle.
Glenn, incidentally, was a part owner of the New Melody Tavern in Ballard, which became the Tractor Tavern during our tenure.
We naturally called ourselves The Swine and played an acoustic mashup of grunge, bluegrass, folk, and blues, writing a bunch of songs but also injecting humor by combining unlikely musical pairs – like Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit” with Flatt & Scruggs’ “The Ballad of Jed Clampett” (which we called “Smells Like Pork Rinds”). That helped us become a fixture through most of the 1990’s on the mainstage of the annual Northwest Folklife Festival.
We’d write a bunch of songs from politics (“Politically Correct”, “I Didn’t Inhale”) and pop icons (“Shirley’s Song”, “I Saw Elvis”) to predictions (“The Future Has Hit”) and life at Microsoft (“Mr. Bill’s Machine”). Now, in retrospect, “The Anteater Kingdom” eerily describes our current political situation, even though it was written over three decades ago.
We’d satirize anyone from Bill Clinton to Bill Gates. No one was safe.
We got connected with Pete Cusumano who was producing TV shows on Channel 29, the Seattle Public Access TV station, and in 1994 launched “Swine Before Pearls” (a play on “do not cast your pearls before swine”), sharing the cable space with programs such as “The Goddess Kring” and “Bong Hit Championships”. Parts of all these programs can be found on YouTube.
Public Access was the Wild West with few rules, but with lots of room to be creative, we had a lot of fun writing, producing, and performing on the series.
Our weekly half-hour show featured skits, political humor, newly-crafted topical songs, viewer call-in, and guest bands. Eventually, we moved to a monthly, one-hour format to make production easier, and released a CD compilation of songs from bands that performed on the program.
Through all this, we found time to record a bunch of our songs at Conrad Uno’s Egg Studio. These have sat in the vault for some thirty-odd years – until now.
We hope you will enjoy this collection, now available for download or streaming on your favorite music service. (We really wanted to include “Smells Like Pork Rinds” but the licensing hurdles were too high. You’ll find it under Randy’s solo releases on the major streaming services).
–Paul Brownlow, Seattle, WA, March 2026
Randy will be missed. As I commented on Julie’s Facebook post announcing Randy’s passing, “I am so sad. He is a major bookmark in my life’s journey.”
* Clearwater County, Idaho covers 2,488 square miles, has a population of roughly 9,000 people, and is known for rugged forests, the Clearwater River system, and key Lewis & Clark expedition sites.
📏 Dimensions & Area
- Total area: 2,488 sq mi
- Land: 2,457 sq mi
- Water: 31 sq mi (≈1.2%)
If you want to explore more about the county area or geography, I can go deeper.
👥 Population
Different sources give slightly different current estimates:
- 2020 Census: 8,734 people
- 2025 Estimate: 9,118 people
- 2026 Estimate: 9,087 people
Population density is extremely low at ~3.5 people per square mile
Interesting Things About Clearwater County
1. Lewis & Clark Expedition History
The Weippe Prairie is where the Corps of Discovery met the Nez Perce in 1805 after crossing the Bitterroots. They recovered there before building canoes and continuing west. Learn more about the Lewis & Clark sites.
2. Dworshak Dam & Reservoir
Dworshak Dam on the North Fork Clearwater River is the third tallest dam in the United States. The reservoir is a major recreation area for boating, fishing, and camping. Explore Dworshak Reservoir.
3. Idaho’s First Gold Discovery
Gold was first discovered in what is now Idaho at Orofino Creek in 1860, sparking the region’s early mining boom. Ask about Idaho gold history.
4. Remote Forests & Outdoor Recreation
The county is heavily forested, with access to:
- Clearwater River system
- Lolo Pass
- Bald Mountain ski area If you want, I can list outdoor activities.
5. Very Low Population Density & Rural Character
With only ~3.5 people per square mile, it’s one of Idaho’s most sparsely populated counties—quiet, remote, and heavily wooded. Learn about rural living in Clearwater County.
** On August 16, 2009, I taught her to shoot.
*** I taught Julie to shoot too. See also I know her | The View From North Central Idaho.