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friends / IU / photo / television / Tuesday / Twitter / video — Comments Off on 500 words on Tuesday
2
Nov 21

500 words on Tuesday

This is one of my favorite views of fall here. It’s a morning view, the parking deck is oriented to the east and the colors really pop. Aside from resizing it, this is an unedited photo.

I’m not sure what, but it is trying to remind me of something. The wonders of memory, no? Some place I had to go as a kid, a piece of art in a book, or some other thing, but it wants to be vaguely evocative. I never can put my finger on it, but there are a few really great days, this time of year, when I have the opportunity to try to figure it out.

It turned into a lovely day today. I stepped outside for a quick photo at 6 p.m.

It was one of those nice-in-the-sun, chilly-in-the-shade days, I guess. I spent almost all of it indoors under fluorescent lights or studio lights. So I’m inferring a lot about my two brief trips into the great wider world.

Speaking of studio lights, here’s a comedy show that some of the IUSV students produced in Studio 5 last week. That apartment set isn’t bad at all.

And this evening it was back in Studio 7, with the news team. Here’s a freshman making his collegiate anchoring debut. He did a nice job and he’ll get better and better. I’ll encourage him to do packages every week because that’s what he’ll need out in the great wide world.

They have a segment where they cover the wide world in just a few minutes. Karlie and Larmie, who I name-dropped here, started that a few years back. Karlie is anchoring in Fort Wayne and Larmie is reporting in Morgantown.

File it under We Must Be Doing Something Right, since I mentioned two IUSTV alumni above: I worked on alumni list last week. There are at least 56 former students who’ve come through our little station in the last six years that are working in broadcast in some capacity. That’s surely not a complete list, but it is an impressive one.

One is about to start a new sports director-type job, too. Pretty cool, huh? We get them here for a while, help shape them, and then someone hires out in the world, and the long climb up the chain begins. We must be doing something right.

Today’s look was a navy suit, blue tie and a blue pocket square. Trust me, they are blue.

It’s an old purple shirt and bespoke cufflinks which sport a tiny little splash of green and pink as accents.

Hardly anyone sees the cufflinks, so I may as well show them to you.

errands / friends / IU / memories / television / Tuesday / video — Comments Off on A day that always seemed difficult, but was actually easy
26
Oct 21

A day that always seemed difficult, but was actually easy

I went to the recycling center to drop off some expired fluorescent bulbs. (Our closets have fluorescent bulbs. I have questions.) There are … one, two, three, four, five recycling centers in this county. Of those five, only one accepts this sort of light bulb. It is not our usual recycling center, which is to say, the closest one. It is three miles away from that one, an improbable nine-minute drive. So maybe it’s the next closest, but when I got down there today …

Always read the website yourself, that’s what I’ve learned. And if you ever meet anyone in charge of the solid waste management office, ask about these seemingly arbitrary Open/Closed days.

So I went to Lowes, for the second time in three days, because that’s the way it works. Lowe’s is 6.4 miles and 12 minutes from that recycling center. And today I needed to pick up a toilet seat. Because I broke the one I’d installed just two months ago.

Whoever heard of that?

I walked down the correct aisle, around a slow-moving couple who were deliberately deciding among off-white bathroom fixtures, and found all of the toilet seats were blocked by a scissor lift. Eventually a person wearing the “I work here” red vest and the “but please don’t ask me about it” expression walked by. I asked her if she could move the store equipment. We discussed the issue and she found that what I wanted was only partially blocked, so she didn’t have to find a person to move the lift. She squeezed in between that and the aisle and grabbed the thing. That was easy.

Paid, walked out, thought about it and grabbed those light bulbs. Turns out Lowe’s accepts those for recycling. That was easy, too. A theme emerges.

I had lunch with my friend, and a former student, Auston Matricardi. He watches things, talks to people, assembles sentences and applies punctuation for a living.

He’s a sports writer. A pretty great one, too.

And the building behind us there is where I work, and where we met. He was also a sports broadcaster. He’s one of those people that’s capable of doing whatever is before him.

The sort that makes the rest of us jealous.

Videos from the studio … here’s the morning show. They talked to a tarot card reader. And they got a lot of tarot cards read. Then they visited a haunted house, and that part is highly amusing.

It’s a fun show, all new people, the crew is largely new, and they are coming into their own nicely.

And this show is brand new, one of two the student television station has launched this semester, a fun look at students making films.

And today they shoot the news shows. One, which I’m teasing here, had a Halloween theme.

You’ll see that tomorrow.

This evening I got home and removed the new broken toilet seat and installed the new new one. So scarred am I from recent projects that I feared the worst, but it was simple: remove two plastic screws on the old one and line up the parts for the two plastic screws of the new one.

I wonder if I can get my money back on a busted seat which is still well within the store’s general policy time. We’ll find out Thursday! (Update: I did.)

But there will be much more here tomorrow. Who knows what theme it will hold. Don’t miss out!

adventures / friends / Monday / photo — Comments Off on Set a record for interpersonal interactions this weekend
16
Aug 21

Set a record for interpersonal interactions this weekend

Saturday we had a video chat with some friends. Two of them were supposed to be getting on a cruise ship for their anniversary, a trip they’d postponed last year, but there was a small snag in their plans. Now they will cruise next week. And that’s just the way of the world now, right? You didn’t get precisely what you wanted when you wanted, but there might be the opportunity to do it literally next week, with a bit less hassle than you’d imagine for that sort of thing, pre-Covid.

This is a part of the business model that I endorse. Maybe this level of customer service and good faith acting is something that consumers will see fit to reward when it comes to the bottom line. It’d be nice if that was a certain kindness that sticks around long after all of this is gone, if all of this ever goes away.

Remember, we used to live in a world where doctors or hair dressers would fire you if you had to cancel too many appointments. That airlines and cruise lines and whomever else are now acknowledging that stuff happens is a good thing. We can assign fault later, assigning fault is easy. Get me on the next trip to enjoy your goods and services and we can each call this a pleasant transaction.

Sunday evening we had a visit with some work friends. It didn’t go quite as we’d planned, but we’ve only been trying to do this since the pandemic began or so, so you roll with it and hope for the best.

So there we were, an advertiser, a comm scholar, a political scientist and us, all trying to be smart and funny at the same time. All thoroughly likable people, all full of giggles. It was a nice visit and we somehow managed to do it just before classes start next week and everything turns upside.

Turning upside down being a question of going from summer mode to the fall plan, and not a cynical Covid distinction. Who knows what that will bear out. Play it smart, hope for the best and thank goodness for the science that brought us masks and vaccines.

Incidentally, that three-point plan is a big part of my fall plan.

Anyway, this was the most people I’ve seen in a two-day span since the spring — and half of these folks were virtual! — we still take our precautions to heart.

But I know you’re really here for the weekly check on the cats. They are doing just fine. Phoebe is enjoying her mornings in the hall, where the sun lights things up nicely for her.

She enjoys being playing coy behind the spindles of the railing.

She also wants you to rub her belly through the spindles. If you’re nearby, that’s what you should be doing.

Poseidon spent the morning in the closet. It’s nice and warm there, too, and it’s a door we try to keep closed, so naturally he has to be in there at every opportunity, working on his Superman pose.

I don’t think we were supposed to see his Superman pose.

Now we’ve embarrassed him. Awkward photos are his kryptonite.

Finally! I’ve found a way to keep that cat in check!

And you? How was your weekend? How are your pets and friends and family?

Covid-19 / friends / IU / television / video / Wednesday — Comments Off on Human beings! We saw some!
14
Oct 20

Human beings! We saw some!

You have to like the colors. The colors are rather glorious in this, our peak time of the leaf turn.

It turns colder tonight, and we’ll have a few cool days. At some point, eventually, it has to rain — there’s a moderate drought on just now — and then the rest of the leaves will fall and it’ll be stigs and twigs and the long, boring sigh of a gray, drab winter.

But those colors are something else today!

We visited with our friends Mike and Kate for a few minutes this evening. I dropped off a bunch of milk jugs that they’ll use to start some container planting project. They’ve got a quiet spread out beyond the suburbs and we stood in their driveway and enjoyed the waning sunlight and the nice warm air and a view of a few acres of trees and their company for a few minutes. Many jokes were made! Some of them at my expense!

Even their neighbor came over to say hello. He said his wife had recently retired from 45 years at the university library. Nice fellow, the neighbor. I see him when I ride through that area on my bike. He’s always outside puttering around with something. That might be the wife’s doing.

After he left we stood around and talked about their upcoming trip to see family. What an exotic adventure they will have this next week. I wonder what that’s like. Going places. Staring at different walls. Hearing different creaks in the floorboards. Pitching in with some little project at their place, rather than your own. Seeing people.

Sometimes it is nice just to see people. Well, some of them. You’d like to see them more. In limited and carefully controlled doses. But, as they say, 2020.

This came up in our visit. Why is this the hip thing to say? Why do people think that January 2021 is going to be any different from Apritoberember 2020? And what do New Year’s Resolutions even mean anymore?

Something to think about, alas.

Here are some shows the news team produced Tuesday evening. New anchor, a first-time interview and other fun stuff:

And here are some programs the sports gang put together, that I forgot to include late last week:

Tomorrow they will produce more sports. I’ll be there. I’ll share them here. Tonight, I don’t have anything else to share, except for the dishes. If you’re interested in helping there, come on over. I’ll be sure to give you plenty of social distancing.

adventures / cycling / friends / photo / Wednesday — Comments Off on Wednesday, right? Right? Right.
22
Jul 20

Wednesday, right? Right? Right.

Just two Zoom calls today, which make something like 45 for the week. One was a big meeting where my task is to be a listener, and to make sure my microphone is muted. On the underside of that meeting is a Slack channel subtext, where my duty is to make the occasional bad joke.

I’m the right person for it.

My second call was after lunch, and for the life of me I thought it was set for next week. So calendar reminders saved me today. I’m still holding strong on days of the week, but I have to make direct efforts to keep the proper dates in mind. But the calendar reminded me that today was the day. This is an important tidbit for you to know!

I got to have a chat with an old friend about pedagogy and Zoom sessions, architecture and video. We are so meta! We might also back ourselves into some sort of project together. Who knows? That’d be fun.

He’s returning from sabbatical this term, so welcome back to him.

We went for a bike ride this evening. We went out easy and then I turned it up once.

This happens a lot. I say, I am going to ride in her pocket and not go out and do something silly. It was very humid and we agreed that our goal was to drink all the water on the ride. And then we got to a place where there was one of the sorts of short punchy hills I can get over pretty well and I created a gap. So we go on like that for a while, until she decides to drop me, which she does promptly.

I began ducking into curves and grinding through rollers and eventually I caught her wheel again. She let me pull for a while before coming around the left and settled into a high cadence. She dropped me for real. I was having a good ride, but she was enjoying a better one. Somehow, near the end, she caught me again. She’d taken a detour for fun and still found it in her catch back on as she doubled back. After a gentle two-mile ascent I got her wheel again.

She passed me, one last time, on the final hard 1,200 meters she was

I think she has a motor in her bicycle.

I’m riding in a hard gear and everything!

(That’s not a bad picture for shooting blind and trying to stay upright. But when you crop a tire it looks like a flat, which is a bad omen I’m always hoping to avoid.)

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