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journalism

Downloading a tux pattern to avoid this in the future

And I ran. I ran not far away. Really a jog, just a little ways …

Enjoy those seagulls in your head. They chased me for 2.5 miles today. And then I was finished running. It was, as they say, one of those bad days. I would have previously thought you’d need a series of good days with which to surround a bad run, but this is apparently not the case.

The Yankee said later to think of it this way: You ran 2.5 miles and you think that was bad, which you wouldn’t have thought at the beginning of the year. Which is true, but also missing the point. It was not a good run.

But it was fine. The sun and shade were delightful mixtures. The pavement was suitably hard. The body parts weren’t in a terrible amount of discomfort. The breathing was no more labored than normal. I was just finished. My body seemed tired and my mind didn’t bother to try to convince me otherwise. So I stopped running.

Need to make sure that doesn’t happen again anytime soon.

Physical therapy today, where we moved up to the two-pound weights and added some new muscle movements, which together really wiped me out. I hope that is the saddest sentence I write today.

You stick a towel under your arm, pinch your shoulder back and move your arm in and out or up and down, depending on the routine. My amazing physical therapist had me do something today with both hands, which was new. Interestingly enough my bad shoulder felt better about that exercise than my good shoulder did.

Told you she was amazing.

There are the famous Thera-Band exercises. (We look like a physical therapy office at home, by the way, with my many Thera-Bands.) There are row exercises and bicep curls and lateral movements and so on. Then I get to repurpose a chair and use it for something approaching a push up. I dislike this exercise because it hurts my hands and wrist.

After all of that there’s the torture table where I go from resting on my stomach to arching out in such a way as to make a close-parenthesis mark that has fallen over. There is pulling on nylon and rubber straps that are attached to springs which lock into pulleys and eye-hooks. I try not to think of all the things on this table that could accidentally hurt me by pretending I’m doing a snow skiing long jump. Sometimes this distraction actually works.

We closed the session with an exercise I get nothing out of, which more than likely means I’m doing it wrong. You take a ball and roll it around in little circles on the wall while I pondering the now timeless dictate: wax on, wax off.

Picked up my tux this evening. This is the fifth visit to the rental store, each a more silly waste of time than the last visit. The first drop in was punctuated by a helpful gentleman who left you cold with the feeling he may or may not know what he’s doing and it may or may not be realized on your transaction. The second was the opposite, a man who knew his stuff, but with an air that suggests you might be leery of letting him park your car. The third visit was the first man, and this time came the measurements and he knew about this stuff. The fourth visit was Monday, because in true guy fashion, as soon as you get the thing arranged there will be a change in the parameters, necessitating a further visit, and a third and fourth person plugging aimlessly through software that was a bad idea for Windows 3.2.

So today was the fitting, double-checking the size and making sure no last minute alterations were needed. Which, if that were the case, would of course require a sixth visit. Happily that was not the case. A fifth person was there to make sure everything fell just as it should. She struggled in vain through this tedious software which would see semaphore as an upgrade to find me in the cobweb filled corners of the computer system.

What I’m saying is Jos. A Bank could do a better job of this if they wanted too. The staff have been helpful and polite, how they maintain that attitude in dealing with their software is a mystery.

So the tux is in hand. Looks nice. Fits well. Tomorrow it gets to travel.

Things to read which may be of interest …

Patriot Act author preps Freedom Act to rein in NSA:

Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner (R-Wis.), the original author of the USA Patriot Act, said Wednesday that he plans to introduce legislation in the “next few days” to restrict the National Security Agency’s surveillance power.

[…]

In a speech at the Cato Institute, Sensenbrenner argued that the Patriot Act’s “relevance” requirement was meant to prevent the kind of bulk collection the NSA is now conducting.

“This is something that Congress would have never authorized,” he said. “And since the administration has assumed this authority, Congress should not hesitate to stop it and stop it quickly.”

Long overdue. Here are more details, from The Guardian, which has seemingly beaten all of the traditional American media to the story. Curious.

And now a series of journalism pieces:

The rise of the reader: journalism in the age of the open web

Student newspapers in Northampton, South Hadley follow news industry trend with online editions

Report: Obama brings chilling effect on journalism

The Effects of Mass Surveillance on Journalism

And today’s Dumb Thing Which Is Dumb, which is threatening to become a regular feature here, Student stopped from handing out Constitutions on Constitution Day sues:

On Sept. 17, Robert Van Tuinen was passing out copies of the Constitution in honor of Constitution Day at Modesto Junior College in California when he was asked to stop. Officials told Van Tuinen that if he wanted to pass out literature, he could only do so in a designated “free speech zone” on campus and under college policies would be required to get permission in advance.

[…]

After the incident, Modesto Junior College President Jill Stearns issued a statement saying the school apologized to Van Tuinen and was working to clarify with campus officials that policies allow students to distribute printed material “as long as it does not disrupt the orderly operation of the college.” Stearns also said the school was reviewing its policies.

Is there video? Yes, there’s video:

First of all, the guy should be cited for holding his phone incorrectly, but that’s secondary.

I understand the concept. I appreciate what the universities, and Robert Van Tuinen’s Modesto Junior College is far from alone here, are trying to do. The application of “free speech zones,” however, leaves something to be desired.

One of those appeared on campus when I was in undergrad. It was a small square on a campus of 1,841 acres. They were, I’m sure, trying to balance the school’s real need to fulfill educational and research goals while limiting distraction. (The Foundation for Individual Rights in Education may disagree.) Regardless, the solution is poor. One must also be aware of the supposedly largest free speech zone in the world, the 3.794 million square miles that is the United States.

Oh look, the local chapter of Young Americans for Liberty just had a demonstration at Auburn. It reads like a success. And, it turns out, the president of the YAL chapter at Samford is one of our photographers. Good for him.

Anyway, every campus being different — the layout, the culture, the traffic patterns and so on — there is no blanket solution. Some moderate to high traffic areas, some respectful distance away from classroom doors and windows and no amplification technology seem like a good place to start. Bring in too many opinions on the question and you run the risk of getting “That green space behind the alumni building” as a working policy.

Finally, someone distributing the U.S. Constitution should always be acceptable. We have enough problems with civics in this country as it is. We shouldn’t hamper it further.

journalism / links / Samford / things to read / video / Wednesday — Comments Off
9
Oct 13

Tips on how to excuse parenthood

Sometimes the day gets away from you. Sometimes you get away from the day. Others, one supposes, are pleasantly predictable, moving at just the right pace, each thing approaching as you expected, addressed, completed and reflected upon. In between there are days that have some combination of all of those attributes.

Today was none of those things. Which is not bad, or good, just a thing.

The students at the Crimson went strong until about 3 or 3:30 this morning. That is imprecise, but chronometer precision isn’t a necessary function of my world at that time of day. The late hour, being an early hour, also informs the day.

That’s what I’m getting at here. It was late. Today was early. Things moved accordingly.

Have I told you I work at a special place?

“The Samford University men’s basketball team added a new member this weekend, 7-year-old Nathaniel “Biggie” Henderson.”

I work at a special place.

That little boy has a disease that has only been diagnosed about 100 times worldwide, and he’s already endured a host of surgeries. Now he’s got a new team on his side:

Had a fun critique meeting today. The silliness overwhelmed us, but work was done. A little more levity in the middle of the week never hurt anyone, and don’t you think that cutline needs better punctuation?

You can see the online version of this week’s issue of course.

Ran into a former student this evening. She’s graduated. She completed a high profile internship in D.C. She now has a distinguished sounding title at her new job. Charming young lady and talented, with a great future ahead of her. I wonder how many times I say that a year.

Things to read that I thought you’d enjoy. Here’s your daily dose of silly. I remain of the opinion we’re going about this all wrong, but, this story got to use “‘Gestapo’ tactics” in an American headline, so there’s that unfortunate development:

Vaillancourt was one of thousands of people who found themselves in a national park as the federal government shutdown went into effect on Oct. 1. For many hours her tour group, which included senior citizen visitors from Japan, Australia, Canada and the United States, were locked in a Yellowstone National Park hotel under armed guard.

The tourists were treated harshly by armed park employees, she said, so much so that some of the foreign tourists with limited English skills thought they were under arrest.

[…]

The bus stopped along a road when a large herd of bison passed nearby, and seniors filed out to take photos. Almost immediately, an armed ranger came by and ordered them to get back in, saying they couldn’t “recreate.” The tour guide, who had paid a $300 fee the day before to bring the group into the park, argued that the seniors weren’t “recreating,” just taking photos.

“She responded and said, ‘Sir, you are recreating,’ and her tone became very aggressive,” Vaillancourt said.

The seniors quickly filed back onboard and the bus went to the Old Faithful Inn, the park’s premier lodge located adjacent to the park’s most famous site, Old Faithful geyser. That was as close as they could get to the famous site — barricades were erected around Old Faithful, and the seniors were locked inside the hotel, where armed rangers stayed at the door.

The longer this goes on the more absurd the stories will get, it seems.

This young woman is studying to be a classical soprano in Scotland. She started following my campus blog today. I’ve been listening to some of her performances. It isn’t every day you meet talented singers. She fulfills the requirement. That link takes you to her performance as Eponine.

And now a few paragraphs pulled from this unfortunate essay about the nature of parenthood:

Parenthood, like war, is a state in which it’s impossible to be moral. Worse, the moral weakness of parents is always on display, for children bear witness to their incessant ethical hairsplitting. It may be delicious fun to tut-tut over the corrupt child-rearing customs (and to pity the progeny) of the aggressively rising class: the mother who, according to Urban Baby legend, slept with the admissions officer (with her husband’s consent!) to get her child into the Ivy League, or the one who sued an Upper East Side preschool for insufficiently preparing her 4-year-old for a private-school test. But such Schadenfreude elides a more difficult existential truth, which is that ever since Noah installed his own three sons upon the ark and left the rest of the world to drown, protecting and privileging one’s own kids at the expense of other people has been the name of the game. It’s what parents do.

Your child constantly puts you in quandaries, but everyone is right there, so ignore the lice, do their homework, hold your kid back, game the system. Everyone is doing it!

Not being a parent, I can only pretend to understand. Surely I’d want the best, and to see my child was well prepared for this and that as possible. But I’m also fairly certain that, on the off chance I did not have a perfect child, I’d want them to learn from any struggles and imperfections, so that they could, maybe, appreciate the things that come easier to them and see those less ideal moments for what they really are.

But, then, I have probably fewer answers than the author of that piece, I know. I’m only trying to be a member of her “aggressively rising class” a frame through which she portrays the most condescending examples of life you’d find in almost any other magazine, but just feel so delightfully tacky here.

Most parents don’t think of themselves as the kind of people who prize winning above all. Most hope to teach their kids what used to be called “good values,” which a previous generation learned in scouts or church: kindness and compassion, respect and responsibility, to “do unto others” and be grateful for small things.

Society now looks back and down upon solid values as quaint relics of a past age, because moral equivalence has diminished even the Golden Rule.

And then: “All the data show a generation far less ethical than their parents.” Soon after we’re learning of “a hazy space where right and wrong seem porous” which is just a logical excuse to allow for more modern superiority through the ill-defined virtues of a mantra that says no one is wrong, unless their righter or wronger than me: “There’s lots of room to wiggle here. Especially when the transgressions get you where you want to be.”

So we suggest that parents do all for their kids yet haven’t transferred a moral foundation which just makes things somewhat foggy and non-descript, but, hey, it’s for the children and so then all bets are off.

This is an article indulging our judgmental lapses. So you think I don’t raise my children according to what I read in New York Magazine, thank heavens. And you read the wide-ranging examples offered by this mother of a 9-year-old and you wonder about the ethics of others. It is, as she says, tough out there. You get the feeling it is the most difficult when she intervenes, though.

Finally, a few things from the multimedia blog that I forgot to mention yesterday:

Protip: Think before pressing “tweet”

Why geography is important in newsrooms

Release your inner RebelMouse And, now, an evening where I’ll be in bed before midnight.

I do not know what is happening. / iPhone / journalism / links / Samford / swimming / things to read / Tuesday / video — Comments Off
8
Oct 13

You’ve no choice — you will like the video at the end

I can write my day in one sentence.

In the morning I read, in the afternoon I worked in the library, in the evening I was in the pool and tonight I’m with the student-journalists who are putting their newspaper together.

Which, in the scheme of things, makes this a pretty great day. Dinner could have been healthier, but I promised myself a Milo’s burger if I swam a lot. So it was that I caught up on the morning’s news. I sat in a deep leather chair and watched the reflection of the world in the dark corners of my computer screen poring in from the window behind me.

It was a beautiful day. I had a conversation about it while I was trying to make this panorama. A colleague and I decided we shouldn’t be inside, but rather on the quad:

Photosynth, showing me the errors in my panoramas, but only after I uploaded the thing, ever since I got the app. However, if you are in a picturesque place, that’s a pretty good free app.

I made it to the pool just in time to spend that sunlight-twilight-dusk-darkness period carefully avoiding drowning.

I swam 1.5 miles tonight. I’ve been told by the best swimmer in my house — and probably the best swimmer on our side of town — that I should note these measurements in a different unit. So I swam 2,700 yards.

I do not know what is happening.

Every third lap I did freestyle, so 900 free. And remember, I couldn’t do half a length of any pool like that this summer on account of my shoulder and collarbone.

The last 200 yards or so were even more ragged than usual. I am slow, and it isn’t pretty, but I am pleased.

Then a burger and fries. Finally back to the office for a night enjoying the editors put their paper together. It’ll be done sometime after midnight. It’ll be on newsstands tomorrow. I’m sure it’ll be another strong edition.

Things to read, which I thought you might enjoy …

This is, perhaps, the best thing I’ve ever read on HuffPo, Nadine Schweigert, North Dakota Woman, ‘Marries Herself,’ Opens Up About Self-Marriage

The marriage took place among friends and family who were encouraged to “blow kisses to the world” after she exchanged rings with her “inner groom”, My Fox Phoenix reports.

“I feel very empowered, very happy, very joyous … I want to share that with people, and also the people that were in attendance, it’s a form of accountability,” Nadien Schweigert told Anderson Cooper.

So long as you now feel accountable to yourself and, one presumes, for yourself.

This is just about the most offensive story of the day, I should think. Mother of fallen soldier denied death benefits: ‘I won’t ever understand it’:

Collins said she feels lucky to have a job and supervisors who will allow her to take paid time off to take care of her son’s return. For those who aren’t as fortunate, the death gratuity may be critical to their survival and sense of closure.

“While that benefit may not be urgent for me, it’s urgent for somebody. There’s somebody who needs to fly their family home. There’s somebody who needs to have expenses covered, or be able to take off work to handle the affairs of their loved one,” she said. “And to know that the government shutting down will delay their ability to handle their business, some people just won’t be able to do it.

While, financially,she is able to address her son’s return, Collins said she still could use help in paying for his funeral.

“I don’t necessarily have $10,000 to bury my son,” she said. While she is working with the funeral home to make arrangements, she wondered: “Am I going to be on a payment plan for the rest of my life so that my son can have the services that he deserves?”

You also have this feeling that this particular cruelty will be remedied right quickly now that Congress sees it played out in the media. And that should tell you everything you need to know about how the government works.

The best story of the day is an easy one. North Haledon quadruple amputee teen happy to play soccer, motivate others:

Jorge has lived with amputated limbs since he underwent a life-saving procedure at the age of 14 months because of an infection — most likely meningococcal meningitis, Dyksen said. “His skin was just rotting away,” she said. Today, he’s healthy.

It’s not only on the soccer field that Jorge has looked past his physical constraints. He’s also a member of the school bowling team, using both arms to roll a ball without holes. And he’s also prolific at text-messaging, family friend Carla Nash said, hitting away at keys without his prosthetic right hand. In the classroom, he holds a pencil between both arms.

[…]

He said he hopes to be a motivational speaker as an adult. “Because I know there’s people out there that really need motivation and everyone says I always motivate other people,” he said. “I help them get happy in their lives. I’m always smiling and I just feel like that’s the right thing for me.”

Good for Jorge.

You want video? They’ve got video.

“Nothing is impossible,” his teammates say. Special young man, there.

errands / iPhone / journalism / links / Samford / things to read / Twitter — Comments Off
7
Oct 13

The sounds of Monday

Some people don’t get it:

Thought "Breaking Bad" was hot last Sunday? @FOX29philly See who's breakin' bad in SW Philly leavin' 6 people SHOT – Tonite at Ten!

— Joyce Evans (@JoyceEvansFox29) October 7, 2013

And then they double down:

Last tweet NOT AST ALL A JOKE. Very real life drama was the point as oppose to one that end on tv. That was my point

— Joyce Evans (@JoyceEvansFox29) October 7, 2013

Because saying that, perhaps, you didn’t play that as well as, perhaps, you could and that, perhaps, people are put off by it is, perhaps, a step too far.

Made my fourth visit to the tuxedo rental store in the last month this morning. There is a wedding in which I will participate next weekend. To recap, I am trying to match up a rental tux with the one other civilian, a man I’ve yet to have the pleasure of meeting, in the wedding who owns his own. I first visited the local shop and left with something of a poor impression. I visited a sister store after work one day and found a more enthusiastic reply. So I returned to the original shop. The gentleman there had already begun inputting my data in the archaic 1997 software system they use for rentals. The second guy, at the second shop, who’s manly look and brusque attitude suggested he knew about making a man look good in fine clothes, was only countered by fingers so thick they couldn’t hit the keys, and an apparent misunderstanding about how form fields work.

So the first store again, last week, where I rented the tux. Same guy. Same uneasy feeling of general uncertainty. But it got rented. Last night, from the wedding party, I was informed of further details to consider and, ultimately, change. So that was this morning.

“We’d be happy to help with that, just as soon as I struggle with the system for 15 minutes because we can’t boot even boot DOS Shell on these machines and the cursor buttons are broken because of storeroom angst and won’t you please by this tiny cube of collar stays for $9 or this fancy tie blotting napkin for $18. How about some $100 jeans while you’re here? Our software is terrible, but Fred Flinstone is in the back coaxing the bird into hammering the text into the stone faster.”

“Also, that’ll be a $40 late upgrade fee.”

It was during this experience when I considered the customer vs. employee experience. All these expensive pieces of handsome finery, and you can’t even give your crew a workable system? Or hardware from this century?

“You’re going to love the way we telegraph in your order, I guarantee it.”

It turns out that the tuxedo will ship the original order. And then ship the subsequent late additions. This will all be delivered by the middle of the week, so at least they have one part of the PDQ distribution model down, but not the parts that make logistical sense.

So I’ll go back to the tuxedo rental place late Thursday, for the fifth visit, so they can check to see if any alterations are necessary. And I can pick it up on Friday, the sixth visit.

I could have made the tuxedo, if only I had the pattern.

And then there was a stop at the gas station. I chose the one that orbits outside a big box store, that has four pumps, eight hoses and 16 square feet of parking lot to maneuver into. I hate this gas station, but it is the second cheapest in town and it was on a direct path to get my oil changed.

And that was done quickly. They did not spray my door hinges with WD-40, which is a part of the experience that I found I missed. The guy ran through the safety check himself, so I did not get to do the lights, the high beams or the blinkers — or as he did it: libeamblink!. I did get to tap the breaks and honk the horn. The air filter continues to be a marvel of modern technology. All of the fluids and belts and hoses look good. All of this the guy said in 2.4 seconds, which gave me something to decode for the next 10 minutes and gave him an air of cool efficiency. Nothing was wasted, no move was unnecessary, and could you sign the receipt a little faster, please and thank you?

Then work. A fight with the copy machine. A last minute tweak to the afternoon class plan. Then the class itself. Notes, notes, notes, editing, and then an editing exercise. All very riveting for probably me alone.

Most people don’t find editing to be a gripping part of their classroom experience, and you can’t blame them for that.

Then some office time with office stuff. I went to the pool, but was mysteriously locked out. Through the door you could hear the sounds of what you might interpret as people having fun. Or, perhaps they were the sounds of people being chased by a horror movie character.

So back to the office then. Some work. And then dinner. And then some more reading and writing and … that’s pretty much the day.

Things to read which I found interesting today:

The Newest Journalism:

These days, the web seems a bit less wild and more polished. Everywhere you look, there are signs that publishers are importing traditional journalism values to the constantly shifting digital environment. The web continues to do what it does better than print—delivering on-the-minute stories with a conversational tone to an always-connected audience—and the blog post, as one distinct unit of digital journalism, still offers what Andrew Sullivan called in 2008 “the spontaneous expression of instantaneous thought…accountable in immediate and unavoidable ways to readers.” But increasingly, digital journalism does its business while embracing certain core beliefs typically associated with old media.

I just did a presentation on that not too long ago. Nice to know you’re not the only one that notices shifts and changes, big and subtle.

The visual arms race of cable TV sets is now joined. Fox News debuts bizarre, giant tablets in its outrageous new newsroom:

Fox says the new “news deck” is designed to appeal to viewers who are “nonlinear” — those who sift through news all day on their phones and computers. “Just like you, we get our news from multiple platforms,” Smith says, “and this is the place where viewers can watch us sort it all out as it happens.” In other words, Fox’s new newsroom will serve as a fact-checking machine for Twitter’s firehose.

I wonder if this will stay awkward looking, or if we’ll become accustomed to it.

This seems like a bad idea. ‘Truckers for the Constitution’ Plan to Slow D.C. Beltway, Arrest Congressmen:

“We are not going to ask for impeachment,” Conlon said. “We are coming whether they like it or not. We’re not asking for impeachment, we’re asking for the arrest of everyone in government who has violated their oath of office.”

Conlon cited the idea of a citizens grand jury – meaning a pool of jurors convened without court approval – as the mechanism for indicting the officials.

“We want these people arrested, and we’re coming in with the grand jury to do it,” he said. “We are going to ask the law enforcement to uphold their constitutional oath and make these arrests. If they refuse to do it, by the power of the people of the United States and the people’s grand jury, they don’t want to do it, we will. … We the people will find a way.”

The best thing I’ve read today, and well worth your time, hence the long excerpt. Give Us This Day, Our Daily Senate Scolding:

The disapproval comes from angry constituents, baffled party elders and colleagues on the other side of the Capitol. But nowhere have senators found criticism more personal or immediate than right inside their own chamber every morning when the chaplain delivers the opening prayer.

“Save us from the madness,” the chaplain, a Seventh-day Adventist, former Navy rear admiral and collector of brightly colored bow ties named Barry C. Black, said one day late last week as he warmed up into what became an epic ministerial scolding.

“We acknowledge our transgressions, our shortcomings, our smugness, our selfishness and our pride,” he went on, his baritone voice filling the room. “Deliver us from the hypocrisy of attempting to sound reasonable while being unreasonable.”

So it has gone every day for the last week when Mr. Black, who has been the Senate’s official man of the cloth for 10 years, has taken one of the more rote rituals on Capitol Hill — the morning invocation — and turned it into a daily conscience check for the 100 men and women of the United States Senate.

And, finally, Picle still doesn’t know how to embed. But I still like the concept of a photo (or series) mixed with audio I can record and put together on my phone. It takes 10 seconds, and only needs an embed function. This has been around for a year now, so maybe someone else has an app. Let me check … Anyway, this is the day the weather broke. The sun is high, but it seems farther away. The air is dry and the evening is almost crisp. This is the first night it seems possible, I wrote on Twitter that we could lose that beautiful summer symphony.

Every year you hear the first one, but never the last.

cycling / Friday / journalism / links / music / things to read / video / YouTube Cover Theater — Comments Off
4
Oct 13

The bike, the media, the music — pretty much everything you expect in one post

Today we learned that yesterday’s problems with my bike were all about the index shifting, and almost entirely human error. That last part is not surprising, but it allowed me to receive a free education today, and probably, when I left the bike shop, they talked for an hour about how they could sucker me into any deal at this point.

So I got to ride around a bit on one of what will surely be the last really warm days of the year. Tomorrow will be splendid, and rain will come in over the weekend, even if Karen is breaking up in the gulf. That’s fine. No big storms necessary, just the rain. And behind that some drier, cooler air. Soon after will be the time the maple leaves will abandon ship, pushing aside the women and the children to fall from their sturdy branches, only to look up and realize they could have stayed around three or four more weeks.

I’m of mixed emotions about the whole thing this year.

But it was sunny and warm and I saw one other person on a bike late this afternoon. That was a kid on the side of the road, straddling his 26er with his right foot propped up on the curb and looking back behind him. I asked if he was OK, he nodded, and I dodged more traffic at the light. From the bike store I decided to find out where this side road, Longleaf, goes — because neither asking nor consulting a map will do. And about halfway down the road I remembered where I’d once before noticed this street name: on some other hilly road I’d rather not think about. Curiously I recalled that just as I got to the one big hill on Longleaf.

Then back into civilization, carefully denoted by the Shell station in the middle of nowhere, then a trailer park and then a few odd and end service businesses. Back up to campus, past the vet school where people walk across the four lane road without a care in the world these days, and then beyond the frat houses and through the athletics side of the campus.

Now I’m in a weird part of the day where to be in the shade is to be in a spot too dark for sunglasses, but it is still fairly bright when there are no trees, so I had a lot of one-hand eye practice today. There was a small, slow climb, I discovered another road on which it isn’t the last roller, but the next-to-last one that really hurts. Finally, back down toward home, through the growing intersection, into the neighborhood and so on. It was an easy and quick 20 miles, except for that one hill.

The Yankee said she saw me. She was going to the grocery store from somewhere just as I passed through that area. Said I looked good. Didn’t want to honk at me. Everyone else does. Usually it is the “You’re going too slow!” variety.

Otherwise there was school work, reading papers, grading things, dreaming up class possibilities, following the news, and so on.

Speaking of which …

Things to read, which I found interesting today …

A year after daily publication ceased in Alabama and New Orleans, media market is ‘fractured’ is about Advance’s moves in New Orleans, Huntsville, Birmingham, Mobile and Pascagoula, Miss. New Orleans has seen a Baton Rouge paper move in to give some competition and a daily publication outlet, so that dynamic market is interesting in different ways. Along the I-65 corridor …

The past year has been “a black hole for news in this city,” says Doug Jones, a Birmingham attorney who rose to national prominence for reopening and successfully prosecuting the infamous 1963 16th Street Church bombing case while serving as U.S. Attorney for the Northern Alabama district.

Jones said he and his wife are contemplating dropping their Birmingham News subscription in favor of the still-daily Tuscaloosa News, based some 60 miles south, which is testing the competitive waters by offering subscriptions in some Birmingham neighborhoods.

[…]

Combined average Sunday circulation at Advance’s three Alabama newspapers declined about 8 percent during the same period, with then-nascent digital edition circulation having little effect there.

[…]

“What I’ve seen, at least in this first year, is because of the reduction in resources committed to local reporting, we’ve experienced a dramatic decrease in quality news available to the community,” said Jim Aucoin, professor and chair of the Communications Department at the University of South Alabama in Mobile. “Investigative and enterprise coverage just isn’t there anymore.”

Birmingham lawyer Jones specifically criticized al.com and what he characterized as its generally superficial coverage. “You go online and there are all these teasers, but when you click on them, there are just two or three paragraphs,” he said. “And there’s no decent national coverage. Hell, we can’t even get good coverage of University of Alabama football anymore.”

I’ve never known Doug Jones to lie to me, but that as an absolute twist, stretch and tearing of the truth. As they say, ‘Bama gonna Bama.’

If they don’t say that, they should. Anyway, one more blurb:

Readers in highly technologically savvy Huntsville may be less troubled. “I think al.com has responded reasonably well to the increased [digital] demand by providing convenient and free online access to the state’s major newspapers,” said Eletra Gilchrist-Petty, associate professor of Communication Studies at the University of Alabama in Huntsville. “Overall, there do appear to be more strengths than limitations associated with al.com.”

Disclosure: I used to work for Advance. It is a private company, so the financial figures quoted in the Poynter piece are more of a learned guess from industry analysts. I can say this, which is relevant to my time there which ended with my return to academia several years ago, Advance’s al.com property is an impressive financial performer — largely on behalf of all of that Alabama football coverage. They know their audience, even when they should know better. So the point about looking at last year’s move by Advance as “not something that was done for an immediate payoff” is a good one.

I have faith in their numbers and in their revenue stream. I’m concerned, as others noted in the excerpts above, the link in the previous paragraph and some other material that has previously landed in this space about some of the content quality. I hope, and suspect, that will get worked it in the near future.

In our state Birmingham, Huntsville and Mobile, the three cities most directly effected by the shift last year, are the three biggest metros, boasting about half the state’s population. Clearly, there are a lot of people impacted by the daily miracle. (More than just the ones who read it, I’d argue.) Birmingham, if I recall correctly, is now the nation’s largest city without a daily newspaper. I’m not at all concerned about the medium. I’d rather we focused on the journalism. The more investigations and deep reporting, the better. The more people asking pointed questions of politicians, the better. The less time spent analyzing the quarterback and his girlfriend, the better. That’s not so much about the viability of the company as the company’s role in many communities.

Here’s a re-write from al.com, now: Alabama Theatre named one of America’s favorite vintage movie theaters by nostalgia magazine. (Back to the earlier point: It would be nice if they’d do some original reporting. Or got their own photograph. They are literally four blocks up and one block over from the theater.)

The Alabama is one of the great success stories of Birmingham. It is a beautiful and historic facility that went from near demolition to once again becoming an event destination. You can’t see enough movies or concerts there. The last one I watched was The Godfather, which was the first time a digital print was ever played in that now almost 90-year-old theater. Also, the famous marquee was once a background of my blog:

And if that isn’t something to celebrate, I don’t know what is.

WE INTERRUPT THIS POST FOR A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE FROM CNBC.

The president is … walking.

OK, then.

And, finally, Carlow University Student Kicked Out Of Class, Arrested For Dressing As ‘The Joker’. I’m assuming his crime was misreading the calendar as it pertains to Halloween?

He was charged with aggravated assault, resisting arrest, terroristic threats and disorderly conduct because someone got alarmed, called the police and then, according to police, got a little belligerent. (His lawyer says the cops have it wrong and went to the First Amendment in his public airing of grievances.) He was also suspended from campus. He’s due in court later this month. It should be an interesting one to watch.

And now, YouTube Cover Theater the sometimes occasional Friday feature which allows people using their cameras, computers and their musical instruments as a demonstration of how much talent is hiding out there in the world. We do this by picking one original artist and finding a small handful of people covering the (usually) popular tunes.

This week’s featured performers are Hall and Oates. I selected them because I saw this video, one of the van sessions, from Nicki Bluhm and the Gramblers. What’s a van session? You’ll see. Press play:

Also, there is a kazoo. A kazoo, people.

They sound so nice, don’t you agree? That band is touring, which stretches the purposes of YouTube Cover Theater, but there’s something intriguingly hypnotic about watching a full band play in a moving van.

Here are the Miller Brothers, who could be playing in a Ramada Inn Airport near you with that sound:

Take two young guys, a Korg and some bad hairpieces and … well, these guys just need more views. Help ’em out:

Apparently they recorded that for Hall-Oates-Ween last year. Fitting.

You know that frame YouTube displays before you play the video? The one on this video doesn’t do the performance justice:

Hall and Oates are still out there rocking in America, this performance was from this spring:

And now you can feel old: She’s Gone was on an album released 40 years ago next month.

Hope you have a great weekend!