Kenny Smith | A remarkable thing happens …

adventures / Cozumel / cycling / IU / memories / television / Thursday / video — Comments Off
14
Apr 22

The ways we fill our days

I washed my car this evening, because winter is over — I hath proclaimed it, he proclaimed — and because there was still daylight left after my work day.

And by “I washed my car” I mean I took it to one of those middle-of-the-road drive through car wash companies and spent $11 to get dust and salt and grime off the car.

This one doesn’t have the dryer jets with the big wheel that descends onto the car as you drive out. Those always concerned me as a child. The wheel landed right there on the windshield, and then rolled over the car. Why is this not a problem for anyone else? Instead, this one has two vertically mounted dryers on either side of the exit. There’s a helpful clock in blue lights, telling you how long until these things stop blowing hot air which, as I type this, seems like a feature we should all be required to carry.

You try to time it just right, the whole of the car deserves the same amount of time in the drying phase. Except you’ve no real idea when the front of your car begins to really feel the warm air, so it’s just a guess. The experience will likely be uneven. And then you try to rationalize it. Why shouldn’t this part of the car get more drying time? Then you wonder if you’re somehow distributing the air flow unevenly, as you creep through the blow zone, because of driver bias, or a misperception of the precise size of the passenger compartment, or something. Finally, you’re thinking, I paid for it, you should use the whole of the 60 seconds. Don’t give any of the air back for free!

Anyway, my car is clean. And, for the moment, the exterior smells nice. I was going to vacuum the inside, but this place charges for that air, too, and I have vacuums I can use at home on some future nice day. And I will! I like a clean carpet.

When I got to the house a spontaneous bike ride occurred. Why not do 20 miles! It’s a lovely way to spend a few minutes.

I wasn’t intending to ride today, but riding is fun, plus it was a bonus after the 25-miler I had yesterday morning!

And these are the ways we fill our days.

Here are some sports shows that the IUSTV crew produced last night. All the local stuff from IU is in this highlight show.

And on the talk show they discussed the upcoming NFL draft.

By now, if you’ve been here every day over the last two weeks and change, you’ve seen 130 photos from our recent dive trip to Cozumel. (My next chore is building a proper photo gallery for them. Perhaps that’ll get done in the next day or so.) Maybe, perhaps, you missed the larger videos. I’ve got you covered. Day-by-day, the best footage from 13 dives on the beautiful reefs of the Caribbean Sea. Check these out.

This is our second day, when we got in five days. Four of them are represented here.

And this video was shot on a Thursday, not that the day of the week matters to the fish in the sea, or the turtle, which appears right at the beginning of this dive experience.

And everything you haven’t seen so far, you’ll see in this great video.

Now, about that photo gallery …

adventures / Cozumel / IU / journalism / memories / photo / television / video / Wednesday — Comments Off
13
Apr 22

A totally professional day

I edited a podcast today, and spent time in two different television studios for three different shows. At the end of the day I set up a Disney movie for students. In between, I watched these shows. And, now, you can too!

This is the news show from last night I mentioned. The interview with the new provost is there. It’s an interesting moment to have the provost in-studio.

They talked a lot about bike racing on What’s Up Weekly, because the Little 500 races are coming up next week. Very exciting stuff for campus.

I gotta tell ya, IU Fanshop, now in just its third episode, is growing on me. It’s a show about fans, and as they start to really lean into this, they’re going to find some great stuff going forward. This is fun.

You know what else is fun, photos of people at varying depths below sea level!

Yes, we’re wrapping up the photos today. But I’ll round out the week with more diving stuff, somehow. (We’ve already planned our next two trips, and I’m only a bit sad that neither of them involve diving. Yet.)

Anyway, on to the photos!

Gymnasts, man.

Sometimes I float to one side, sometimes I float behind people. Occasionally I float above them.

That is, of course and without fail, the moment they decide to look for you.

Everything is a-OK on the bottom of the sea.

And sometimes people float above you, too.

Selfie time at a safety stop.

This is probably another safety stop, a designed part of the dive, during the ascent, where you’re allowing your body the opportunity to expand a bit more of the nitrogen that builds up under pressure. This is a planned and good feature. And, clearly, carefully done.

I wonder what she’s looking at here.

Best fish in the sea!

And, also, me.

Yes, I all but blinked during my own selfie. I was on vacation.

Cozumel / IU / photo / SCUBA / Tuesday — Comments Off
12
Apr 22

For a Tuesday, this is pretty good

I met the new provost this evening. He came into the studio for an interview with one of our news shows. I got to chat with him for about 90 seconds, but he, and the publicity detachment that came with him, was far more interested in the students, as he should be. And given some of the ongoing campus events, what could have been an easy and straightforward getting-to-know-you interview took on some real local heft.

And they got to call it an exclusive. It was a nice interview, we only missed one question, and it speaks to the news division’s growth and ambitions.

We have about two weeks left in this production cycle, and three or so weeks left in the semester, so it is time to start peeking ahead for them. Next year we’ll be in a unique position. All of this year’s leadership will return next year. This year’s youth will be the next two years savvy, veteran leadership. We will now start looking at ways to take advantage of that opportunity.

Also, today, I interviewed a sociologist who does brain science research. What a world, huh? He told me how I can keep my noodle sharp. That’ll be a podcast that should be online Thursday or so. Not to worry, I’ll let you know about it.

Let’s look at a few more pictures from our last vacation, the Spring Break 2020 (And this time we mean it!) dive trip to Cozumel.

Yes, I’ve gotten more than two weeks of videos of this trip, and 10 days, so far, of big batches of photos. And I’ve got one more day to go after this. So let’s get into this! Starting with this small school of bright yellow grunts (Haemulon flavolineatum) and gray angelfish (Pomacanthus arcuatus).

More grunts! And maybe a porgy. (I’m not very good with the silver fish.)

Isn’t it nice how the sunlight just works its way down 60-or-so feet and highlights their fins?

A queen angelfish (Holacanthus ciliaris) just showing off all of those pretty colors.

This is the regal blue tang (Acanthurus coeruleus). Pretty big one, too. They can grow up to about 15 inches. It is kind of popular in aquariums, and as a bait fish.

Who likes random coral formations?

And, remember, always look in the vase coral … because you’ll sometimes find fused staghorn coral …

Oh, look who is up there, swimming with a sea turtle.

Here’s the rare shot where there wasn’t actually anything in view. But the colors are lovely, aren’t they?

And, now, the saddest photo a diver can take. Zero feet, still air in the tank.

Tomorrow, we’ll wrap up this amazing series of photos from this wonderful dive experience with some lovely people pictures. Make sure you’re ready for that.

adventures / Cozumel / memories / Monday / photo / SCUBA / site / television / video — Comments Off
11
Apr 22

Hours of video, 10 more photos from the bottom of the ocean

And how was your weekend? Cold and gray Saturday here, sat on the porch and enjoyed the warm of a brilliant Sunday. Took a nice walk. A low-key stretch by all accounts.

More improv comedy from a live production on Saturday night. This should go right to where it starts, but if it doesn’t, scrub your way over to 12:48 to see all the funny stuff begin.

And if you’re not in the mood for young comedy — and how could that even be a possibility? — let’s have some sports talk with another fun episode of the B-Town Breakdown.

And here’s a package on a historic moment in this year’s Little 500.

I hope they did a version in Thai, too.

Let’s look at some more stuff under the sea! This is some sort of pillar coral (Dendrogyra cylindrus), I think.

Here’s another juvenile stoplight parrotfish (Sparisoma viride) hanging out with some beautiful branch coral.

This is a good place to mention that I updated the front page of the site this weekend. There are now a lot more cool images rotating through. Some of them you might find familiar from recent days here. I have a lot of really nice ones there, so we’ll be able to keep that fresh for some time. Check back often, as they say. (But keep scrolling for now.)

There’s a barracuda just hanging out under this rock. I got to within probably three or four feet of him. He was unfazed by the attention.

I’m not sure what’s prettier here, the color of the ocean, the coral or the the queen angelfish (Holacanthus ciliaris). This species, it is believed, communicates through temporary changes in color. Also, the juvenile fish are a different color. You thought you had difficulty reaching teenagers!

Always look in the vase coral. You never know what you’ll find inside. Like this lobster!

This is a moody picture, isn’t it? There must have been some passing clouds in front of the sun as I passed by this setting.

The light changes everything. You might think this is a lonely or spooky feeling, but you’d be mistaken.

There’s all sorts of interesting things to see and critters to meet, after all.

And if the fish and all of their natural wonders aren’t enough, you also have your dive buddy.

Best fish in the sea!

That is, by the by, the 100th photo I’ve published from the Cozumel dive series. And, if you’re wondering, I can probably get two more days out of this. So stick around!

adventures / Cozumel / Friday / IU / memories / photo / SCUBA / video — Comments Off
08
Apr 22

And now we can take a breath

There was a live comedy show tonight. The students at IUSTV streamed it as a three-camera shoot. I did not work on this, but I am glad they did. We are big proponents of working on live events, and I, personally, want them to do it a lot. It’s a wonderful experience, doing live shoots in the field. Also, this is quite entertaining.

I didn’t work on this event because I did enough other stuff today. My morning started with producing promotional videos for about two hours. We should get about 36 videos out of the effort, which brings to mind a project I’ve been working on more than three months now.

Well, transferring all of the files so a student can edit them should bring the project to a close for me. The project will continue on, and I’ll be glad to see it’s successful completion, knowing so many people have worried over it. I hope I didn’t worry them over it.

I also brought a poet into a studio today, so she could record … get this … some of her poetry.

At least I hope it was hers.

Then I did recruiting things. I got to tell Alex’s anecdote. I mentioned him here yesterday. A year ago, Tuesday, he was doing his tour as a high school senior. Wednesday he was anchoring for the award-winning IUSTV sports division. The point being that students get involved early, often and throughout their time here, no matter their areas of interest. It makes for a wonderful learning opportunity.

Which was how I ended my day, teaching students how to use our newest video/podcasting studio, Studio 11. (We now have seven studios, six of them in the building where I work, and three more podcast booths besides. They help make a great tour.)

But if you can’t tour this place, let’s take a tour of the sea.

We ran across a small school of tang. I think they’re tang. That’s what we’re going with here. Anyway, aren’t they lovely?

Sometimes the vase coral just appear seemingly out of nowhere. (You still look inside them.)

I always enjoy the little rocky outcroppings and coral growths in the middle of the sand.

Sometimes you have to look up, because sometimes there’s something swimming above you. Like this turtle!

Same turtle, equally cool photo, for different reasons.

I think this camera, which I bought before this trip, takes better video than photos, but sometimes, when the light is right, the pictures are brilliant.

More of our friends, the yellow tube sponge.

Look at all of these little fish floating around their neighborhood reef.

There’s a sergeant major, a black jack (Caranx lugubris), damselfish and more are in that photo. And more in this one.

And two more fish right here.

I love that pose.