Saturday, September 5, 1998

September 5, 1998

"While one person hesitates because he feels inferior, the other is busy making mistakes and becoming superior." -- Henry C. Link

(Quote thanks to the A.Word.A.Day listserv.)

Ch-ch-changes: I'm contemplating a redesign of The BradLands, primarily to better integrate some new on-going features. Given my schedule, it may be awhile coming, but I welcome suggestions.

I mentioned the St. Louis International Lesbian & Gay Film Festival last update, and they refreshed the site the very next day. Check out the diverse lineup of films coming to the Tivoli Sept. 9-17. Also noted, Lileks.com is back up and with a wonderful re-design.

Holiday weekend reading:

Don Marsh, possibly St. Louis' finest broadcast journalist (in an industry where that's increasingly an oxymoron), called it quits at KDNL a few weeks back. In this RFT interview, he candidly reflects on the status quo in local TV news. [The Riverfront Times]

Within the past week, two things have happened --- and I can give you 1,000 of them. Just before I left Channel 30, I was asked, "How do you spell 'Maryland Heights'? Is it M-A-R-I-L-Y-N?" And I went, "What?" And this is by somebody who's been in this community for four years. Another one of our reporters asked me, "I did an interview and a name came up that I didn't recognize. Have you ever heard of someone named James Michener?"

When James Reston died, I said to the 10 o'clock producer, "We ought to have something on that - a two-time Pulitzer Prize winner." And he said, "Who is James Reston?" And this is a graduate of the journalism school at the University of Missouri at Columbia, and didn't know who James Reston was, but could make a graphic sing on the air.

Is it possible that purity remains in America's pasttime? The Arizona Diamondbacks' Travis Lee, profiled in the long piece, seems almost too good to be true. [Phoenix New Times]

He's as innocent as a saint. He is devoutly religious. He doesn't smoke or drink. He rides his bike to the field and lets his high school buddies crash at his apartment. He bakes chocolate chip cookies for his family. He chews Dubble Bubble gum, which he frugally buys by the case at Costco. Although he's a multimillionaire, he calls home only on Fridays when the rates are lower. He'd like to meet a nice girl and settle down and buy a house with a couple of golden retrievers in the yard. He volunteers to work with children at middle schools -- though he calls it "hanging out" and not "work."

And what of the fast life and death of Philly dentist Stephen Grosse? The former frat boy and party doyen met with an appropriately dramatic end. But did he have to? [Philadelphia Weekly]

(These last two links courtesy of the ever-fabulous Obscure Store & Reading Room.)