Kenny Smith | A remarkable thing happens …

adventures / Monday / photo / podcast — Comments Off
05
Feb 18

On the origins of nothing, and dogs

I tried an experiment this afternoon:

I also taught a class. I’m not sure which of the two worked out better, but I hope it was the class. I’ll go back and visit those students on Wednesday, though, and maybe the technical problems we had today will prove outweighed by the abundance of knowledge I attempted to bestow.

Bestow is an almost 800-year-old word. I bet you didn’t know that. In old English stow was a place. Then there was a “be” prefix and stow got an en on the end, somehow. And that’s probably a fascinating tale, but I don’t know it. I think it had something to do with a verb tense, though. You had “stow” as in a place, and then “to place,” it seems. And then someone misheard and miswrote and misread or found a better use and said “BESTOW!”

I had a professor who was a serious and legitimate etymologist. It was amazing the things he knew, the work he’d done or read. I wonder what he thinks of my ability to just Google that these days. I hope they’re all just glad we can look at things because the ease just, you know, might entice us to do so. Those etymology conferences, though, you just never know which way a committee is going to go. They could come out of those rooms at the Ramada and take an entirely different approach.

You know what’s hard? Googling things about the art and craft of etymology. You just get etymology links to the words you are co-searching. But I digress.

Digress is of 16th century latin origins, just so you know.

Anyway, that was a little experiment above, because John Curley was nice enough to talk to me last Friday. Funny story about that, I sent his station’s main account a note on Twitter and they sent me an email address and so I wrote to them. And then Curley wrote me right back as he was about to go on the air. He was very gracious with his time when we talked, and it was a most pleasant little conversation. The end of that piece is my favorite part, and the whole premise is sublimely funny anyway.

Pet poses from the weekend:

Sometimes you just have to reach out and touch someone’s big toe. That’s not my toe, of course, and here is a 90-degree angle.

We went to a Super Bowl party to not watch the game or commercials — there was something funny about Tide, and then Eli Manning did a thing and Dilly Dilly was disappointing and probably some other things, but I find it hard to follow along with the game or the spots in a crowd. Some people did seem to enjoy the halftime show and, for some reason, there was a single yelp when Jimmy Fallon appeared on the TV. But that’s small group dynamics for you. Nevertheless, a good time was had by all, as they say. And I got to play with a dog:

That is the preferred photographic style for the canine, a technique I settled on some 11 years ago now. (Time zooms.) That pose isn’t quite the perfect angle, but it was as close as this golden was going to let me get. He is a playful and loving dog, as just about ever golden ever gifted to humanity. And the outtakes are almost as fun as that pose:

More interesting material here tomorrow. I think the books section is going to finally make a comeback. There, I’ve said it out loud. Now it almost has to happen, maybe.

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Friday / IU / photo / podcast — Comments Off
02
Feb 18

Welcome to your weekend

I went into the studio first thing this morning and recorded this.

And I walked out of the audio booth and down the hall some 75 feet, let’s say and immediately into the television studio, where I produced an oral history. And that somehow ran until about lunch.

So I had a quick bowl of noodles at a place called Noodles, with The Yankee, which has the benefit of being right across the street and, usually, pretty good lunch fare. And they are quick, which is good.

After lunch it was right back into the studio where I worked with some students from the newspaper who are wanting to do movie reviews. This reporter is creating some no-doubt award-winning content and I am watching her in the viewfinder and trying not to giggle at her movie review:

She did two takes and decided she had what she wanted for this trial run episode. And after that I was down to the little this and that parts of the day, the tidying up the desk for the weekend, part of the day, and the answering all of the many emails part of the day.

On Fridays you can get all of that into one part of your day, if you are suitably motivated.

And then it was home, home to sit and read and pet the cat and enjoy doing nothing for a little while. The problem is, you could get used to that, so I ended up straightening up my office a tiny bit and doing some laundry and thinking up new projects and plotting out the weekend and, now, here we are. I’m sort of caught up on things, for a change. I’m not sure what I’m supposed to do about that. Any thoughts?

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IU / journalism / podcast / Thursday / video — Comments Off
01
Feb 18

All about shows

There are a lot of things I like about my little show. I hope there are things other people like too, but it is good that I like some things about it since I’m, you know, doing it. One of the things is that I can get students involved. Today’s guest is my third student in the last few weeks, which is great.

The other thing I like is that these shows, because I leave the topics up to the guests, vary widely. So here’s Dominick Jean, who is the news editor of the campus paper, and he’s talking about gerrymandering.

Another thing that I like is that when sorta semi-apologized for this topic I got to tell him he should never apologize for his interests. And then he gave me what was, I thought, a really nice conversation. So check that out.

Some other things students have done this week:

They did the sports show tonight, and the other two on Tuesday. They’re all works in progress, and they’re all coming along at varying speeds. There was to be a third show on Tuesday, but it was overcome by underwhelming events. These things will happen. Tomorrow another group of IUSTV students is in rehearsal for a new late night show. And on Sunday the station is producing a concert.

So let’s count: four studio shows a week (one isn’t included above because it is for air on Sunday), a twice-monthly campus government show, a brand new late night show, a new concert series in conjunction with the campus radio station. And that doesn’t include covering something like a dozen sports they’re covering on campus and around the conference. Student media, man, they are getting some stuff done.

I may just turn in that paragraph at the end of the year.

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friends / photo / podcast / Wednesday — Comments Off
31
Jan 18

This update only seems skimpy

We placed second in a restaurant-wide trivia contest tonight. We were in fifth-place after the first two rounds, but then our table, The Yankee and two more sports media scholar friends — one a German visited the U.S. for the semester – rallied late. The final question was ranking four actors from oldest to youngest. We nailed it, finished just points behind the winner and claimed a $20 gift card.

That’s two times in a row we’ve finished as the runner-up. We’re just not going to acknowledge that it was a bunch of students that beat us – like, a bunch. We did alright despite our weaknesses in pop culture. I decided we should recruit experts in various fields from across the university and see how we did. If you can build a big enough team, you’re liable to get enough experts, right?

I had a burger, because the only thing I like at that place are the fries. They somehow manage to make a moist burger with no flavor. This is disguised

I did a monologue, of sorts, because I read this guy’s story in the local paper and it is a good one. This will take you about four minutes.

And I think I have finally run out of photos I took last weekend. So enjoy these, while I go think up some additional fresh content for the next few days.

Here’s a sunset picture with a dark, foreboding tree line in the foreground. You just don’t see those sorts of photos anywhere, do you?

Frost on things can make for some dramatic photography. I did these with my phone, which doesn’t exactly excel at macro photographs:

And, finally, here’s an accidental selfie. We’d been throwing rocks into the lake, or onto the lake, trying to bust the ice. My fingers got muddy, which is why I was holding my hand

Just kidding about the content thing, there’s always something new. Especially when the bar is a photo of muddy fingers. You’ll just have to come back to find it all.

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photo / podcast / Tuesday — Comments Off
30
Jan 18

The day’s efforts and progress

Yes, we love technology. We still love technology, always and forever.

Chris Pollone, who you’ll see on all your quality NBC newscasts across the country, joined our little podcast once more to talk about a big moment in the communication sector. We’re going 5G and that phrase is going on to take a ride on the hype train. Why, one day, we’ll look back at this message, and that you read it over LTE or wifi and have a great big laugh. And just think about what it will do for your industry, dear reader. It could do a lot. Pollone tells us more:

On the podcast we have now gotten the good news that the show has been picked up for syndication at Google Play. And you can also find the show among the many other quality programs on Stitcher, as well. Next, iTunes, then, if I survive that bit of silliness, the world!

But, tonight, the television studio, where I have studios making television shows that cover and discuss things generally related to news. I’m sure the online versions will be live tomorrow, and I can share them with you. Watch, as they say, this space.

Meantime, here are four more photos I took this weekend, including this guy, a peregrine falcon, which is the fastest species on the planet:

It was a lovely little sunset on Saturday, clearly, which is why I’m goosing this well into the next week.

I may have a few more pictures for tomorrow too. Then we can get to some really interesting stuff around here, he said, hoping that would be a tease sufficient to bring you back. So do come back.

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