The Newsroom

In 2004, I drove to Denver to watch UTEP play Maryland in the NCAA men’s basketball tournament. The Miners lost, I spent too much money and drank too much beer, but it was a great time. One of the things I did between dates (they played Thursday, and winners moved on to play Saturday) was visit the Coors brewery in Golden, Colorado. I have always been interested in how things are made and how the machine works, although beer is on the short list of things that maybe I’m better off not knowing how it’s created. 

TV news is another one of those things that I’m not so much interested in the final product, but that I like knowing how the wheels turn. This is a big reason why the wife and I now both sit ourselves down and watch The Newsroom on HBO.

I’m a recovering local TV news guy (the therapy is helping), so I have a bit of a working knowledge of how things work, but I was a morning/noon guy, and the pace was a little slower. The characters are in a fast-paced national network newsroom, one in which I would disintegrate quickly.

I suppose another reason is that this is an Aaron Sorkin creation. We were (and are) still big fans of The West Wing, another Sorkin show, and it’s easy to see the similarities. Sharp writing, flawed yet believable characters, and fast-paced shows are all things we recognize.

What also helps is that it helps paint a picture of what newsgathering really is. I know we have national news channels that folks think lean one way or the other. The Newsroom even had a recent episode dealing with this, where a producer edited video to achieve the end he wanted. But I like knowing how the doughnuts are made, and that real people are trying to make real decisions, based on their own experiences and a really tight deadline.

I almost forgot to talk about what big Sam Waterston fans we both are. Really liked him on Law and Order, though you knew eventually he'd get bumped to district attorney. He seemed a little out of place in the big chair. But in The Newsroom, we enjoy seeing him be something very different.

So The Newsroom tells me a story. 

Rocky

The First Lady and I watch TV together all the time. For every night we watch House Hunters, we watch a soccer match. She likes to watch ball on TV, and HGTV has grown on me over time. So we’ve found a nice balance. We signed up for an awesome cable TV plan that includes 450 channels and a lot of premium movie channels, so there’s always something on.

That said, she has placed two standing orders on what I want to watch while she’s around (rules don’t apply when she’s at choir practice or whatever). The first? No pro wrestling. It’s simple enough to follow… I went through a phase as a teenager and I can find enough YouTube videos of The Rock to keep me amused. No biggie here. Especially since I’m not in their target demographic anymore.

Number two: no Rocky movies. That’s right—The Italian Stallion has been outlawed.

With all the pay TV, It’s easy to find a Rocky movie in the mornings after the wife has gone to work. I’ve seen parts of the first five installments, and most of III and IV, all within the last few weeks. These are the two I saw when I started coming of age, since I was still a wee lad when the first two movies came out. I saw IV at the Cielo Vista 3-Plex, the one inside the mall, and remember the audience cheering when Balboa started pounding on Drago. 

I realize after the second film, it basically became a cash grab, as most sequels do. It doesn't stop me from watching. My thought is that the first two, and maybe the most recent (I don’t know if we can say ‘last’ yet) installment, Rocky Balboa, were about the acting and what people feel. III, IV, and V (which I don’t even watch) were about who knows what.

My favorite characters are Duke Evers and Mickey. They both seem so genuine to me. Both trainers, sure, but I’m a fan of every scene Duke is in, even the sappy one in IV, right before Rocky starts training in Russia. And Mick, well, is Mick. He’s flawed in his own way, but still dispenses truth in a blunt force trauma sort of way. Appropriate for a boxing manager, I guess.

There are also unanswered questions from the series—for one, I want  to know why there was not a Balboa-Lang 3 match. I know I’m not the first to ask, but Rocky got a rematch, so shouldn’t Clubber have gotten his chance? Besides, what kind of gate (not to mention movie ticket sales) would the third fight have gotten? That’s reason enough, by itself. Maybe it’s because the movie ended. I don’t know.  But it would’ve made a decent storyline for at least part of Rocky IV.

Another question I have is why Rocky just stands there and takes beating after beating from Creed, Lang, Drago, and Gunn. They all turn his face into tenderized meat, and Balboa just stands in and takes it.  It didn’t happen every time he fought (apparently), but it did happen every time there was a big title defense. It’s corny, but I can appreciate the symbolism— the stubborn determination of taking blow after blow and to still keep coming is something I try to emulate. Something like:

 But it ain't about how hard you're hit, it is about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward, how much can you take and keep moving forward.

In addition, I also think of Creed/Balboa I and Balboa/Lang I. The loser of those two bouts (I know Creed won, but he really lost) didn’t take their opponent seriously. Didn’t put in the maximum effort, and paid the price as a result.

The training montages are also pretty incredible—Vince DiCola and the video editing crew make me want to get out and go for a run. Great music, and hard work going on there. I even owned the IV soundtrack on cassette in the 90s. Might still be around here somewhere.

It’s not always well-acted, and the writing seems a little painful at times (no matter what), but I still watch, and that’s what they were after the whole time.

Quotes

The wife and I relocated to a new city and state two weeks ago, and we're getting out new apartment set up the way we like it. It's smaller than our old house, so we've been going through boxes of stuff and putting it away, donating it to the Goodwill down the street, or throwing it out. Paring down is something that we've needed to do for a long time.

I went through one of my old plastic storage tubs the other day, and found some old quotes that I'd copied off someone else's cubicle nearly 15 years ago and used contact paper to preserve. I'm sure it's been said in various forms by countless people all over the planet, but my quote is attributed to Stephanie Scott, who said it was the motto of the 1992-93 Texas Tech Lady Raiders. She played guard on this team, which won the 1993 women's basketball national championship, four months before I enrolled there.

                 "Accomplishing anything is 10 percent ability and 90 percent desire. You just have to want to get down and do it."

This is a meaningful quote to me. It ties in to the 'give excellence' quote I have at the top of the blog. I don't know how many times I know what needs to be done but just can't motivate myself to make it happen.

As an introvert, lots of things scare me. Things I see others do regularly and seemingly in a natural way, frighten the hell out of me. This quote reminds me that personally or professionally, there are things I have to knuckle down and get done. And most of the time, it's not as bad as I make it out to be.

Top Eleven

Every now and then I spend a little time looking for articles that talk about the best Android phone apps. Back in March, I came across a game that I've come to spend a lot of time and a little bit of money playing.

Top Eleven is one of the most realistic soccer (football, for you purists) simulations out there. You get a team, set tactics and formation, and play matches in league, Champions League, and Cup tournaments. The players perform/underperform, they practice and get better, get tired or grumpy-- sometimes both, and their play follows suit. Facilities improve as you go. State-of-the-art stadiums, medical, training, parking and youth training grounds are all part of the infrastructure, and take proportional amounts of time to build. Stadiums take over two weeks, while minor things like scoreboards, parking lots, and turfs take less time. Nothing gets done overnight-- it's all a very gradual build.

Good players and a strong bench are also a requirement, since matches are sometimes scheduled with short turnaround times. I even set my alarm for 5 am one day so I could swap players out for an upcoming match. There are big wins and disappointing losses, as well as promotion and relegation. It all makes for a very realistic and challenging feel. I guess another reason I like the game is that my side is typically pretty good. I've been promoted after each season, won a league title, made a few appearance in the round of 8 in Cup play, and lost two CL finals, including once on penalty kicks.

My heart rate even elevates a little bit during games and during player auctions, and I get wrapped up in tactics, formations, opponents, standings, and what not. Sometimes I wear myself out with research, and click away for a little while. Someday I'm sure I'll grow weary of it, but for now it's got a pretty solid grip.

Now excuse me-- I have a Champions League and League Season 5 match to prepare for.

2013

"Writing is a struggle against silence."

The First Lady and I are on the move again. Recently, we went on a couple of house hunting tours of our new city, and this quote, painted in sea blue on a large sheet of manila drawing paper, was on the bedroom wall of one of the kids who was moving out soon.

The words, attributable to Mexican writer Carlos Fuentes, were powerful for me. It reminded me of how silent I am, even though words and thoughts are screaming as they bounce around in my mind.

They are the things I believe. I am deathly afraid of how others perceive these ideas. Will they like them or dislike them? Will they reach out to me with their opinions, which I, in turn will have to deal with? I already am very bad at handling confrontations, so that poses a challenge.

I read the blog of a man who died three years ago of colorectal cancer, and I find that I kind of want to be like him. Not that I want to get cancer and die, but his blogging started several years before he got cancer, and he wrote about a wide range of topics. I am not as naturally interested in the world around me as he was, which is a flaw I work every day to correct. I just hope to talk about the things that interest me and the things that move me, much as he did.

So right now, I am willing to embrace the challenge. I am willing to struggle against the silence.

Newtown

I don't normally comment on current events/news of the day, but the shootings in Newtown, Connecticut touched a nerve with me.

So here are some thoughts.

I have only three first cousins. One lives in Newtown, and is married with three kids, none of whom are first-grade age. I don't know how much sleep she's had in the last 48 hours. She has to be heartbroken-- violence has penetrated what seemed like a safe and quiet community, and she (and countless others) undoubtedly knows parents who are trying to make funeral arrangements. I saw her being active on Facebook during the day and it was reassuring.

For me, church is a place of solace-- a place where I say words, hear words spoken and listen to music. It helps me get my week off to a great start. We had a good discussion in Sunday School, and our priest had a good message. He spoke not as a priest but as a parent of a 10 and 6-year old, and the pain and hurt and confusion were evident in his words and in the furrow on his brow. I didn't find any answers in church, none of us did. But there was no anger in his voice, and it was soothing to me that hatred was not spoken and that God's love was.

Which brings me to parents. I'll include educators here as well. What is it like to go to work or to be a parent and send our kid to school, knowing the randomness could strike them next? Isn't school supposed to be a place where folks can learn and be safe?

The pattern is pretty much the same-- we've seen it so many times before. Shooting incident is followed by  shock/outrage, which cues the media horde that descends to report/exploit the event by sticking microphones in the faces of those who grieve. Then we talk about the heroes who saved the lives of others, we make speeches and bracelets, get video of a few funerals, and hang around town for a few days until the buzz dies down, only to return in one/five/ten years to talk about it all over again. I can almost see the items being checked off the list as they happen.

And what makes me the saddest-- is that this will happen again. Newtown is the newest addition to the list of cities that have experienced this -- Phoenix, Blacksburg, Jonesboro, Paducah, Aurora, Littleton... And nothing has changed. To me, it means that folks in those communities died for nothing. They were struck down as tragically as those in Connecticut, but there has been plenty of time to figure something out so that this doesn't happen again. But we haven't. I believe that if a variable is changed, the result should change as well.

No variables have changed, so the result won't change. And the teachers and six-year-olds of Newtown, Connecticut will also have died for nothing.

Vegas III

So it's time to get back to work a little bit around here.

We'll start with cleaning up from the September Las Vegas trip which saw my college friends Drew and Heather get married. It's a little fuzzy and distant in my rear-view mirror now, but we'll do our best.

It was great seeing the old gang. They're different-- been through some things, made some choices, and raised kids. Yet they're the same good people that I came to know nearly 20 years ago at Texas Tech. I'm still incredulous that my path continues to cross the paths of so many good, solid individuals. I'm also pleased to still call them friends.

We stayed at the Excalibur. The rooms are no frills of course, since they want you downstairs spending money. There wasn't a whole lot of structure to the weekend-- no rehearsal dinner or anything like that. Just the wedding. Beforehand, we got out and about a little-- walked around some, drank margaritas, and watched football. It's amazing just how much infrastructure is there. It seemed like I could walk across town and not go outside, what with all the underground walkways and monorail systems.

The First Lady is typically in charge of the restauranting on our journeys-- we started at Fleur at the Mandalay Bay, where we observed happy hour and nibbled on fried chickpeas-- nothing too much, yet crunchy enough to satisfy us. Then we met up with the other married couple and decided to head to RM Seafood, also at MB. It was close to 9:00 pm by now, so I didn't order much-- a bowl of clam chowder and a Thai green papaya salad. Both were delicious. This was a great chance to catch up with Jacky and Kathleen, whom we'd not seen since our wedding three years ago.

As our last meal before heading to the airport, we stopped at Fleur again, having seen and tasted enough to want to go back to see what they could do. It was Monday lunch so it was not crowded, so we walked right in with our luggage and sat down.

Ann had a croque monsieur, basically a French version of a ham and cheese sandwich.  She reports this version was toasted and had a very special sauce. I had a short rib lasagna that I now remember as being quite good.

The wedding, also hosted by the MB, was at sunset at the outdoor artificial beach and was nondenominational and secular in nature, as the newlyweds are not religious. I was perfectly suited for my role, which involved being the number two behind the best man. Jacky and Drew go further back (and also live considerably closer to each other), so the Jackal played the role of best man.

We went upstairs to the soon-to-be honeymoon suite and waited for the newlyweds. The reception was in the suite, and was limited to 15 to 20 folks. After some food, conversation, and fun, we said our goodbyes and went back to Excalibur for a nightcap.

Kathleen and Jacky also stayed at Excalibur, and we met up with them for a short breakfast and say aloha before they headed to the airport. Again, I moved to Oklahoma, Kansas, and now Alabama, so my time with these good friends is always very rare and never long enough when it happens.

Before long, it was our turn to head to McCarran and our flight back to civilization.