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If you drew it up, you’d want a mom to be the best person and mother she can possibly be, and then work ridiculously hard to be just a little bit better still. Moms give us all invaluable lessons and impossible standards. Good thing, too.
And many more … Especially since I am now, somehow, outpacing you in the birthday department.
One day I’m going to ask why I’m looking the wrong direction in this picture.
We got snow. It started around me around 6 or 7 p.m. last night. It looked like this:
It didn’t snow very much on us, but to the north they had an actual snowfall event. The roads were dry by mid-morning. Campus opened at 11 a.m. today. The expectation was that the cold temps and melting snow could make for some dangerous roads for winter-weary travelers.
So almost as soon as campus opened I had to get ready to leave. Things must be printed and copies must be made. Department credit cards must be picked up, returned and then finding another one. The rental car people have to show up. I have to promise not to transport minors to Canada. (Seriously, there’s an Enterprise form for that.) Waivers from students must be signed. And then we get to the van. It is a giant white brick. The Enterprise people couldn’t find the gas tank. We walked around it three times before we accidentally stumbled upon it. We labored with loading the thing with luggage, which was more difficult than it needed to be.
And then we were on the road, bound for Atlanta and the Southeast Journalism Conference, hosted by Georgia State University. The trip was no problem, the roads were perfect. We checked into the hotel right on time. We checked into the conference with no problem. The Yankee came over and we all went out for dinner at Tin Lizzy’s Cantina. Some of the students brought us milkshakes. I got to see a student that was in my class a few years ago, but transferred to GSU, which made us all sad. It was a nice treat to see her and learn that she was doing very well. Also, milkshakes.
Things to read … because reading goes with your dessert.
Lessons from a 73-Year-Old World Champion:
Train and race hard. Treat your training like a job and always approach it with great focus.
Never quit. Don’t shortchange any of your workouts. Always finish what you set out to do because if you can’t accomplish goals on the micro-level, you won’t be able to shoot for those on the macro-level.
Always stay in the moment. Banish all negative thoughts from your mind and focus on the task at hand.
Here are a few local stories of note.
Undocumented immigrants: A boom or bust opportunity for Alabama economy?:
While charting the population totals for each state may be inconsistent, the amount already paid in tax dollars is not. Data from The Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy , or ITEP, highlights that undocumented workers contributed $10.6 billion in state and local taxes in 2010, but this money could slowly be leaving some states who continue to fight the inclusion of undocumented immigrants.
This population is also reportedly getting smaller for Alabama — a state faced with closing a $700 million budget gap and on the verge of a tax increase.
This story is going to be huge. ALDOT director says lawmaker’s billboard went too far, kills road projects:
Alabama Department of Transportation Director John Cooper today said he has called off planned road projects in state Sen. Bill Holtzclaw’s district, which includes portions of Limestone and Madison County.
Holtzclaw, a Republican, this week put up a billboard in his district that read “Governor Bentley wants to raise your taxes. I will not let that happen.”
“I just thought the billboard was a step too far,” Cooper said today. “If Sen. Holtzclaw feels that strongly about taxes, he probably wouldn’t be comfortable with a significant amount of tax dollars being spent in his district as we had planned.”
Let’s continue with that story, where an appointee is trying to silence a representative of the governor’s own party. Alabama DOT director stops road projects because of senator’s billboard critical of Gov. Robert Bentley:
“If Sen. Holtzclaw is that concerned with taxes I think he probably would be uncomfortable with us spending tax money in his district, so I pulled the projects,” Cooper said.
Bentley announced last week that he would propose a $700 million tax increase to close a shortfall in the General Fund budget.
Bentley also said at that time, in response to questions about whether he would try to strong-arm legislators into supporting his plan by threatening to withhold project funds: “We will look more favorably on areas of the state that really do want to support our budget.”
Cooper said today that Bentley did not instruct him to stop the projects. He said he informed Bentley about his decision in a phone call but declined to say how the governor reacted.
We’re going to hear a lot about this story, I hope, in the near future.
I’ve written about this man here before. Medal of Honor recipient Bennie Adkins shares his story with Opelika High students:
According to Army records, Adkins is estimated to have killed between 135 and 175 enemy soldiers and was wounded 18 times during the incident.
“What makes it so humbling is the fact that in that time period, 30 million men and women served in our military, and there are only 79 living Medal of Honor recipients,” Adkins said. “I wear this medal today for the other 16 American soldiers with me on those days. All 17 of us were wounded, most of us suffered multiple wounds, and five paid the ultimate price for this great country. The 18 wounds I suffered are very minor compared to that.”
I wrote about his truly unbelievable Medal of Honor notice, here.
Journalism links:
Six questions journalists should ask when evaluating a rumor
SPLC project strives to empower women in student media
Firing Joey Kennedy
Tomorrow the conference begins.
I feel like universities should, every so often, make a big move to return to their classic looks. Once about every 10 years would do it. You’d have a new audience in current students and a new audience in recent alumni, plus you’d keep the branding fresh. Also, this guy is awesome and I want to buy something with him on it:
That’s found on the ground floor of F. Page Seibert Hall, a 4,240-seat arena. Seibert, a Florida businessman, put a lot of money into the university. Seibert also gave a great deal of money to Florida Presbyterian College, but his Samford donation was the largest in the university’s history at that time, and finished the building carrying his name in 1961. A decade ago, his grandchildren also donated a tidy sum of money for athletic upgrades. So there’s no mystery why that name is a prominent one on campus. We just don’t know why they don’t use that particular bulldog.
One other thing:
Sixteen, feels like three. But it's a dry feels-like-three. #alwx
— kenny smith (@kennysmith) February 19, 2015
I don't often speak for America, but when I do it is important: We are tired of the cold.
— kenny smith (@kennysmith) February 20, 2015
We clearly need a weather wall. MT @spann: New run trending colder. Let’s see the GFS before making changes. #alwx pic.twitter.com/XbZHtbvZNG
— kenny smith (@kennysmith) February 20, 2015
Another long day and late night. And it will continue on well into tomorrow.
I am writing an amazing presentation and slideshow, or at least one that will, hopefully, be helpful. I get to address the Alabama Press Association’s winter convention tomorrow and I’d like to at least make a good use of their valuable time.
I only have one Brian Williams joke in the entire thing. And, now, sadly, a David Carr observation. I just happened to be online when that started to unfold, just in from dinner, and it was strangely handled, which would amuse Carr. I found a recent video of him and he was just a shell of himself; the guy must have been going through something terrible.
You’ll see this again this weekend:
It has been a quarter of a century, by the way.
I was once told by a professor, in the 90s, that Michael Jordan no longer had any marketing star power. Pretty laughable in retrospect. But, here again, no one ages in an age when everything is available for recall and repeat.
Trying to think of an athlete with similar retirement advertising power. The Joe Greene Coke ad ran after he retired. Not the same. 1/4
— kenny smith (@kennysmith) February 12, 2015
Trying to think of an athlete with similar retirement advertising power. Bob Ueker did, but not on his baseball player "celebrity." 2/4
— kenny smith (@kennysmith) February 12, 2015
Trying to think of an athlete with similar retirement advertising power. Keith Hernandez, Walt Frazier did Just For Men spots, but no. 3/4
— kenny smith (@kennysmith) February 12, 2015
Trying to think of an athlete with similar retirement advertising power. Emmitt Smith does ads post-football, to a lesser degree. 4/4
— kenny smith (@kennysmith) February 12, 2015
Trying to think of an athlete with similar retirement advertising power. The best I can think of is George Foreman. Any I'm missing? 5/4
— kenny smith (@kennysmith) February 12, 2015
Let's stipulate that Muhammad Ali is in this post-sports marketing conversation if his health held up and that OJ Simpson is disqualified.
— kenny smith (@kennysmith) February 12, 2015
Things to read … because they’re better than my sports tweets.
From the If You’re Not Doing Anything Wrong You Have Nothing To Worry About Dept, Government wonders: What’s in your old emails?
If you’ve been remiss in cleaning out your email in-box, here’s some incentive: The federal government can read any emails that are more than six months old without a warrant.
Little known to most Americans, ambiguous language in a communications law passed in 1986 extends Fourth Amendment protections against unreasonable search and seizure only to electronic communications sent or received fewer than 180 days ago.
The language, known as the “180-day rule,” allows government officials to treat any emails, text messages or documents stored on remote servers – popularly known as the cloud – as “abandoned” and therefore accessible using administrative subpoena power, a tactic that critics say circumvents due process.
As you rush to purge your Gmail and Dropbox accounts, however, be forewarned that even deleted files still could be fair game as long as copies exist on a third-party server somewhere.
There’s nothing especially new in that excerpt, but it remains spooky. If you’re snooping around for intel on bad guys or crimes, the contemporaneous information would seem to be more valuable. So what makes this so important?
This is pretty great, Telling stories in 3-D in an immersive, interactive and integrative way:
Professions like architecture and the gaming industry have integrated 3-D technologies into their day-to-day workflow. But journalism hasn’t been as fast to integrate. To demonstrate 3-D capabilities in journalism, we’ve been working on a story about a young fashion designer who draws inspiration from a University of Missouri 175th anniversary exhibit of historic costumes. This story also forms a good backdrop to illustrate a near-term future scenario where 3-D content can be an integral part of the stories we consume and share.
The story was appealing for multiple reasons. The historic costume collection features pieces from prominent university leaders whose names are associated with some of the landmark buildings on campus. The three-dimensional nature of these dresses and richness of detail present interesting workflow challenges to produce 3-D content for storytelling. Moreover, the viewers who see this exhibit in person are not allowed to touch them, given their age and fragility. This provides an interesting opportunity for 3-D technologies to present an engaging story allowing the viewers to interact with virtual representations of these historic costumes. We were also keen to use off-the-shelf hardware and software technologies that are affordable for any news organization.
I like that last point a lot.
She’s a 4-foot-11 college senior with a constant smile. She’s also a lot tougher than you or me. Auburn gymnast Bri Guy inspires Tigers with incredible recovery from two torn Achilles tendons:
Guy was actually dealing with an injury few trainers ever see. Gymnasts are prone to tearing one Achilles tendon; tearing both at the same time is a little like a trainer’s version of seeing a unicorn.
“I have never heard of it,” Auburn trainer Janet Taylor said. “The doctors that we worked with hadn’t heard of it, either.”
A single Achilles tear takes roughly six months to resume normal activity. A gymnast usually takes six to eight months to return to action. Doctors figured tearing both should take even longer.
“I don’t think they had any idea of me doing anything remotely close to what I’m doing right now,” Guy said. “They thought, ‘it’s February, maybe she’ll start doing one or two events’ not ‘she’s going full speed on three events, trying to do a fourth.'”
We were there when it happened. It was a loud and boisterous meet. She was taking the floor, the last routine and her team was very possibly going to get an upset win. It looked like she felt the tendons go and she did what she could, but she landed on her head.
She was still. The place got very quiet very fast. She protected her head and neck somehow and by the time they carted her off she had that beautiful smile on her face again. It was great to see it on her face again last weekend and she continues working on her comeback. Can’t wait to see her do that fourth event, the floor, again.
I don’t know if it every came up in the show, but if the Flintstones had trading cards, they probably looked like this:
Sadly, it is not in mint condition.
I found this in Miami. If you have any idea what it means …
