Archives for August 2006

Got stuck in one of those automated phone systems today. Our dishwasher is the latest appliance in our new old house to die a quick death, so I had to call the home warranty folks to see about a replacement.

You know these systems. “Thank you for calling ACME Home Warranty. We appreciate your call. You are now entering our automated voice system. If you’d like to continue in English, say ‘yes’.

Now I want to continue in English, but not with the computerized voice on the other end of the line. But these voices are sort of like car salesmen. Once they get you to say something, they own you.

And if they get you, you’ll sit on the phone for 15-20 minutes saying things like “yes”, “no”, “3”, “yes”, “I don’t know”, “I don’t know”, “yes”. My wife got caught up in one of those calls tonight and I darn near missed all of the dialogue in “Everybody Hates Chris”.

So here’s what I do.

When they first ask “if you’d like to continue in English”, or “do you want to continue”, or “please say your name”, I say

“mshmorph, codaz, minkophink”

That’s when the voice says “I’m sorry, I didn’t get that.”

Then I say “ninokphant, ghorx mytosis”.

“I’m sorry. Let’s try again. Please say your name”
(a little angrier this time, and shouting)

“RYOXPITS TRINGUN BEESHPORTZIN!!!”

And then I hear those beautiful words
“I’m sorry, I’m having trouble understanding. Let me connect you with one of our customer service agents.”

It always works.

Not to skip past the Katrina anniversary, but it dawned on me today while watching CNN coverage, that it was a year ago today when I first started talking with WKRN about becoming their religion vj.

I remember because I was supposed to be in Nashville for an interview the day Katrina came ashore. I postponed it due to how busy I anticipated the newsroom and news director to be that day.

As I remember it, I first told him maybe I would be interested in joining News 2, then told him no thanks. Then a few weeks went by and he asked again and I said…maybe. After the visit to Nashville, I turned them down.
Not because I wasn’t interested or intrigued at jumping back into tv, but because I was quite happy working for myself.

I was always home when the kids got out of school. I didn’t work holidays but did work a few weekends here and there. I set my own schedule. Worked from my home office. Ate lunch with friends. Went to the gym when I wanted. Watched NASCAR qualifying on Fridays and golf on Thursdays and Fridays.

But it was on a road trip to Pittsburgh shooting a documentary that is still to be finished, when something told me to take the job. I called Steve from the hotel and he hadn’t filled the position. A day or two later, I accepted.

We laughed today at how fast the past year has flown by. He asked me if I’m still glad I took it. You bet I am.

By the way, did anyone see and hear the gaffe on CNN? Seems the anchor left her microphone on when she went to the bathroom. The audio operator apparently didn’t notice and let it go out over the air for nearly a minute. Watch the clip, and listen for the zip.

All those years I lived in Memphis, I ran into some familiar faces only every now and then. Growing up in a small town and then going off to college in a small town limited the folks that I knew and faces I often recognized.

Then again, those familiar faces that I did know, I know pretty well. That’s the give and take of being “small town, just like me” (Thanks JCM)

In Memphis, it happened only a few times in the nine years I was there. There was Danny Champion, my favorite college professor and advisor who taught speech and helped me stay on track to graduate in four years. He called me soon after I arrived to ask if I would speak at one of his classes at Baptist College of Health Sciences where he teaches.

There was also my college roomate’s little sister who lived in Memphis, and the occasional classmate who might be travelling through town who called to say hi. But that was it.

I’ve been in Hendersonville only a few short months and it seems every day I see or hear from someone from year’s past.

At church again this morning one of my former college classmates stopped me. Missy Mitchell came in as a freshman when I was a senior. Her mom and dad both worked at Carson Newman so I know her whole family. There are several other Carson Newman folks at the church we’ve decided to attend and then at another church here I’ve run into Jeff Lovingood and then at another was Robbie Quinn and her husband Todd Freeman. My old resident assistant Keith Prince is a real estate agent here and spent a day helping us find a house. I also get a call every now and then from someone I haven’t heard from in more than ten years (or twenty) who just want to say ‘hi.’

In Franklin there’s one of my closest college buddies, Rick Greene and his wife and there’s Marty Blakely and his wife Martha in Murfreesboro. Nate Schott is a dentist these days down in Murfreesboro along with others I’m sure.

Funny how seeing those folks takes me back 20 years. Since I left college, running into those close friends happened only now and then, but in Nashville, it seems to happen nearly every other day.

I’ve wondered what it must have been like to go to college at a major university. I would think you’d get to know so many more people with student bodies the size of small countries. But do you really get to know that many more people?

At Carson Newman, with a student body of just under 2,000, I really got to know and became friends with nearly every person. Nearly every student, faculty member, staff member and coach became more than just acquaintances, we became friends. And running into them today, 20 years after my senior year began, is like picking up right where we stopped.

I can’t wait to see who I run into this week.

Don’t mean to sound sour, but jeezalou!

I’ve had just about all I want of….

Nancy Grace. Who’s idea was it to put this woman on tv? Why not just throw a tv camera into a beauty shop and let the biggest loud-mouth hold the microphone? Tonight she referred to John Mark Karr’s red shirt and tie as “designer clothing”, “an outfit”, “a uniform” and said she hoped it was a clip-on tie. Anybody want to have Thanksgiving dinner with this woman?

Barry Bonds. Retire Barry. Please! Don’t go to the American League for the homerun record, just go home.

Little league sports directors. My daughter’s cheerleading team has just 2 football games left in the season! They started in late July!!! They’ll be finished the same weekend college football begins. Football is a fall season sport, not the hottest month of the year. My son’s basketball team plays its first game the opening weekend of college football season. What’s wrong wtih playing basketball in January when these kids have absolutely nothing else on their calendar?

“Whatever”. Is anyone as tired of this word as I am? We all know what it really means. It’s the same as if they’re saying “up yours” (or worse). It’s outlawed in our house. Say it, and you’ll lose $ on your allowance or minutes off your bedtime. Besides…it’s “sooo 2003”.

Us Versus Them. This may be the single thing keeping families, co-workers, friends, nations and political parties from doing anything positive. Knee-jerk over-reactions to every little thing, not because we have time to think through it, but because of who says it, is for it, or proposes it. Drop the partisanship and realize “we’re all in this together” and we’d be shocked at what happens next.

Notice I didn’t mention the whole JonBenet Ramsey story (or however her name is spelled). For some weird reason I’ve found myself intrigued by the story again. Maybe because this twerp is from my old stomping grounds or just because of the bizarreness of it all. I’d like to not care.

Unfunny funny people. Listening to the standup on XM I’ve noticed you don’t have to necessarily be funny to make a living being funny.

And speaking of XM: I love it, but whoever said it’s commercial free was lying.

WNBA. Did anyone know this league is still around?

I was all set to post tonight on 1989, the year I think gave us the best collection of big screen movies. There was “Batman”, “Field of Dreams”, “Parenthood” and my favorite “When Harry Met Sally.”

Then I heard that Bruno Kirby who played Jess in “Harry” passed away yesterday at the age of 57. He had leukemia and had only recently been diagnosed.

Back in the late 80s and early 90s, Kirby played memorable roles in several movies that, although may not be among the best films of all time, certainly entertained audiences for years. He was in “Spinal Tap”, “Good Morning Vietnam”, “City Slickers” and of course, “When Harry Met Sally.”

Kirby was one of those character actors. Not the leading man type, he managed to be the every man type. His role in “WHMS” was typical of his career in Hollywood. The straight man who first got the girl, but not THE GIRL.

I’ve been nuts about the movie since I first saw it in the theatre the day it was released in spring of ’89. I ran out and bought the cd. Then, I purchased a script used on the set along with two original movie posters (one which wasn’t released in America but only in Canada because here it was seen as slightly provocative).

I’m saddened by Kirby’s death. Not so much because I won’t see him in future films, but because an important part of that film has passed away.

One of my favorite classic songs.

It’s also one of the worst things about being married to me.

From time to time I get in these sleepwalking modes. I’m in one now. It usually hits around 2 in the morning and I’m up and trying to figure out how to get something accomplished. Lately, I remember dreaming that the new puppy has somehow made it up two flights of stairs and is in our bed. I get up, try to access how best to get a sleeping Pug out of our queen sized bed and then proceed to rustle the non-existent dog. In my dream, I’m not actually in our bedroom so I don’t know where the doors are. I’m out of bed when my wife tells me to go back to sleep. That’s when I get a little frustrated at her ignorance of the dog being inside the house and try to explain that I know what I’m doing.

It takes a few minutes before I either realize I’m sleepwalking or decide to give up and let the imaginary dog sleep with us.

I get it honestly. When I was in high school I walked into the kitchen for breakfast to see my mom with a black eye and busted lip. She had jumped from her bed and landed on the iron radiators in our old house.

My cousin, at a family get together once walked out of our aunt’s house and down the street before waking up. He knocked on a neighbor’s door to ask where he had been staying.

A few years ago I jumped out of bed and landed on the stone tile floor in our bathroom with 2 bruised ribs.

My doctor tells me it’s because my brain never fully goes to sleep and is constantly working. About 10% of the population suffers from sleepwalking and I guess most of the time it’s just a minor inconvenience. But I’ve walked in my sleep the past 4 or 5 nights which keeps me from getting a good night’s sleep.

Dunno about you, but I think this is another sign of the changing face of local news.

In the past few weeks, the folks who hired me to cover religion in Nashville have lured two of the most high profile journalists in Music City to join the VJ revolution.

Trent Seibert is the latest, leaving his job as investigative reporter for The Tennessean to pick up a camera and chase down the news for tv. I met Trent for the first time today and let me tell you he’s excited about becoming a video journalist.

Brad Schmitt was the other big hire a few weeks ago, he’s the most prominent entertainment/celebrity reporter in town.

So that’s two prominent print journalists moving over to the dark side of broadcast journalism. I don’t know if Brad will have camera in hand or if he’ll have someone shooting for him (but I’m sure someone will tell me after posting this).

Don’t be surprised if you begin to hear of other transitions in other markets as the business model of local news continues to go through its metamorphosis.

Field of Dreams was on HBO today. And every time I watch it, I think of Bob Greene.

Greene who was fired years ago from his job as columnist at the Chicago Tribune, he wrote one of the most compelling pieces I remember. Twenty years later, I think of it between the tears after Ray Kinsella asks his dad “You wanna have a catch?”

Greene wrote that as he watched this movie in a Chicago theatre in 1989, he noticed a blind woman being escorted to a seat. He started watching her almost as much as the movie, wondering what she was thinking, how much of the story she was able to pick up.

I don’t have the article so I’m going from memory here, but I recall how Greene stopped the woman after the movie ended and interviewed her. Yes, she understood the movie and yes it was just as memorable to her as it is to people who see it.

“But what about that last scene”, Greene asked. He meant the final shot as viewers saw a line of cars lining up for miles with people willing to pay to see the field and “remember their own childhood.”

The woman, according to Greene, did not know about that scene, but sensed something dramatic. I remember she told him, “I felt like crying but was afraid somebody would notice.”

Nearly 20 years later and that movie still moves me, along with that column.

Boy…to write something like that.