Officially irritated with YouTube

I am officially irritated with YouTube.com after I attempted to upload a video in which Steven Colbert makes fun of Korean singer Rain by doing his own version of a Korean pop song video. It's absolutely hilarious and I had wanted to share it. At last, it was not to be.

One good thing about my being so busy with work is that I am spending less time watching YouTube, leaving messages and comments on Myspace and Facebook and playing Poppit on Pogo.com. Yet, I am getting fewer personal e-mails, too. I guess you have to give to get.

I am getting a lot of e-mails at work, however, they have been of a different tone. They are mainly of two tones: I disagreed with your stories completely or I think you did a good job with your coverage of... I get a kick out of both e-mails. I am so happy to be getting feedback, period. By receiving these responses, I know that people are reading my stories and that they are important enough and stimulating enough to cause a reaction. When I write a story, I just try to write the most accurate, interesting and well-written story possible. I don't really think of people reading the story, but I do try to vision how it will look on the page. I am now able to better visualize layout since I have been working at the newspaper for nearly a month.

The past month at the Enterprise has gone pretty quickly. I have been feeling so rewarded. Yesterday, was a pretty crazy day in that I worked for 10 1/2 hours with no breaks, but I loved every minute of it. My phone was ringing off the hook and I was getting things done! The only thing that I struggle with on days like that or even during busy afternoons is that I have a hard time taking a really good and visually interesting photograph. I have a hard time switching from journalist-thinking to photographer-thinking. I usually get a little lazy with my pictures when a deadline is looming. I usually feel like it is more important for me to excel at the story versus the photograph. I have been trying to take time to go out and get better photos. I appreciate the opportunities to be a photojournalist for a while.

I am interested to see how my skills and abilities will continue to involve the more time I am at the Enterprise and then when I eventually move on to another paper.


Quotes: If you stop to be kind you must swerve often from your path. --Mary Webb

I certainly wasn't happy. Happiness has to do with reason, and only reason earns it. What I was given was the thing you can't earn, and can't keep, and often don't even recognize at the time; I mean joy. --Ursula L. LeGuin

Achieving goals

I am happy to report that I have been achieving what I have set out to do in newspaper reporting. One of my goals that I hoped to achieve through journalism was to affect people's lives in a positive way. I feel like I am doing that already even though I have been a full-time reporter for less than a month now. One of the more meaningful stories that I have done (but didn't expect for it to be so meaningful) was about the local Color Guard. These men fought in Vietnam and came back to the USA only to feel shamed and to lose their pride. I had no idea that Vietnam war vets were treated so badly back in the 70s. I never thought about how the backlash against the war would have affected them on such a personal basis. The men that I talked with said that they were even treated poorly by WWII vets. So, when I interviewed them about their role in local parades, at funerals and with helping Iraq and Afghanistan vets, I could hear and feel the pain that they still carry. For most of them, that pain is almost gone or all-gone, but others still carry it with them. They said they were so thankful for the Color Guard because it allowed them to have pride again and to show others that they are indeed proud to be Vietnam vets. These men travel in parades and do marching tricks and gun tricks. You've probably seen a Color Guard or Honor Gaurd in a parade or at a military museum. I felt it a great honor to speak with them. They said that now when they are marching in a parade, they receive 100s of 'thank yous' that bring tears to their eyes. After my story was published in the Freeman and the Enterprise, I got calls from the guys telling me how much they appreciated getting a chance to have their stories told. I just felt honored to be given that chance and I am so thankful for how much they help other vets and care for their families. It feels wonderful to help these men in a little way, but even more wonderful to learn about them.

New Job, New Outlook on Life

It's been a while since I put some personal information on here. I think that I was feeling kind of disillusioned with many aspects of my life, but that has changed.

I started a new job on June 19 for the local newspaper. I am now officially a full-time staff reporter covering breaking news, features, local news, and business news. My beat was originally to be the school district and the Town of Oconomowoc, but now it looks like I will be covering the city of Oconomowoc and Town of Summit. For most of you, this doesn't mean much, but the latter is a pretty big deal. Oconomowoc is booming and the growth in population and businesses is growing very quickly. We are going to be having a new mall and movie theatre and my beat will be to cover that growth and how the city deals with it.

Currently, I am the only reporter at the newspaper, The Oconomowoc Enterprise. It is a small weekly paper with a circulation of 5,500 or so and two reporters, a part-time sports reporter, a sports editor, an editor/publisher and three freelancers. I came on board right as the two reporters and the sports editor left. Needless to say, the first two weeks of my job have been very busy. Especially since there were three breaking news stories in that amount of time. I was out there with the tv news crews and enjoying every minute of it.

Journalism can really be an adrenaline rush. There are days, too, when it is boring. Overall, I am loving my new job. I really feel like I have found what I love to do.

Madison Museum of Contemporary Art (MMoCa)

I just had a great experience at MMOCA. I am not a huge fan of contemporary art museums, but I was hugely impressed by the one in Madison. I had decided to go after reading about a current exhibit, Wisconsin Triennial, in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel. The museum considered 497 artists who reside in Wisconsin and eventaully chose 90 artists. The media was varied: video installation, photography, sculpture, painting and textile. Some of the artists were originally from South Korea and China. Others were from Texas. But most were Wisconsin natives and this was evident in many of the works. I was surpised by how many artists were strongly influenced by September 11th and how they incorporated that event into their art. The vision that these artists had and their talent strongly inspired me. I am so happy to see that in today's technology-driven world that there are still so many people expressing themselves through art.

The museum itself was very nice. Located in downtown Madison, a block from the state capital, the museum in housed in a beautiful building that makes wonderful use of light in its main entrance. My main complaint about the museum was its lack of directions. The galleries and gift shop are spread out on four floors and it is not clear how to get to each gallery. I know that I missed many works from the Triennial.

I had two very favorite pieces. The first is by Stephanie Liner. The museum wrote:

Liner questions feminity and sexuality in American culture through works of art that incorporates fashion and the female body. Each detail of "Gibbosity," which means "protuberance or swelling," is carefully considered in the context of its cultural associations. A hybrid of a formal garment and a piece of furniture...Liner's explorations of the personal and social effects of gender stereotypes and the perception of women as objects of sexual desire.

One of my other favorites was 'A Terrible Beauty-Chapter II: Compulsion and Repulsion" by Jennifer Angus. Her work is so amaszing that it is impossible to truly describe. What she does is take preserved insects and arranges them on walls to form patterns a la wallpaper. She also uses them to write messages and to create an overall impression that is hard for me to describe.

This is what the museum wrote:

Jennifer Angus uses insects to create detailed patterns that reference textiles and wallpaper. Inspired by the Victorian era, her site-specific installations walk the delicate line between beauty and the aversion some viewers may have to her use of bugs.

Visit the artists' websites at

http://www.stephanieliner.com/flash.html

http://www.jenniferangus.com/

and the museum is

http://www.mmoca.org/

What the Presidential Candidates Are Worth

New York Daily News columnist, Michael Goodwin, wrote "Are Wealthy candidates out of touch?" It seems that they would have to be at least a little bit when you hear how much they are worth:

Romney: $250 million
Giuliani: $70 million
Edwards: $62 million
McCain: $25 million
Clinton: $15 million
Richardson: $10 million
Obama: $1 million

The Failure of Modern Women Writers

I do not consider myself an expert of literature, modern or classic, but I do consider myself a reader who knows good writing. I enjoy reading both classic books such as Hemingway, Wharton and Steinbeck. I also enjoy reading new literary fiction, which is often penned by women writers who have received some success. I have become more and more disappointed in these modern authors recently because they all seem to follow the same story patterns and have similiar details in their plots. For example, modern women authors usually include these elements in their stories:

1) Their main character is a middle-aged woman who is having a midlife crisis.

2) She has an affair (or yearns to have one) with a handsome man with a certain ruggedness about him and who is intelligent and well spoken. He also is seen as exciting.

3) The main character has a daughter.

4) The main character is a writer, an artist or a photographer.

5) She lives in a drafty Victorian house that needs work but is seen as having a lot of character.



I am currently reading The Mermaid Chair by Sue Monk Kidd who wrote the very successful The Secret Life of Bees. I really enjoyed that book because it had more unusual elements to its plot: a young Southern girl trying to rescue a black woman who has been taking care of her afterthe girl's mother died. On the other hand, The Mermaid Chair is very disappointing because here is yet another book whose main female character is having a mid-life crisis, is cheating on her husband, is an artist, who has a daughter and who left a draft Victorian house to return to her childhood mom. Nothing unpredictable here.



The current fiction marketed towards women often has the above-mentioned elements. The reason that this upsets me so much is that I constantly see women being left behind in the world. I feel that women often don't live up to their potential because like the characters in these books they settle down and raise a family only to lose "their self." They lose contact with their inner soul and go through life without exploring and seeking adventures. Although the authors are just writing what women today may be feeling, and probably what the author and her friend are feeling, I believe that the authors are also becoming stagnant and are no longer exploring new possibilities. I know that it is incredibly hard to write a great piece of fiction, but I wish that modern female writers would explore some different topics and characters. Push the envelope. Have a character who lives in a modern ranch and who works as a social worker or as a chief operating officer.



I think to be at the forefront of any field, you have to be innovative and to challenge preconceived notions. I want to see more women in the writing business who get attention for being original and for confronting difficult topics. I know that women can do it!

Trip to Seattle and Vancouver

My time is winding down here in Seattle. I arrived on a sunny day and looks like I will be leaving on another warm and sunny day. My 8 full days here have been great. I have gotten to see and do so much. And the rain-didn't really interfere with what I was doing because it hardly rained at all and when it did, it was in the early morning. I have visited parks, waterfalls, Pike's Place Market, cool neighborhoods, coffee shops, the international district, took a ferry to Bainbridge Island, visited friends, worked on job applications and went to Vancouver for the day. I love both cities and hope to move to Seattle if the right job turns up. the city is beautiful, the people so polite, friendly, liberal and the city full of fun places to see. There is so much in this city and in the surrounding areas. I would never be bored here. It's a very enivornmentally-friendly place and full of great coffee shops, restarants and parks. I know why my friends love it here. One of my favorite things is actually how you can't see the Target and large stores because they are hidden behind trees and disguised by the winding roads. There is a large Asia population here so I am reminded of my time in Korea. I haven't had a bad experience the whole time that I have been here. The roughest aspect has been all of the homeless people. I was surprised to see so many beggers on the streets. I never know how to react. But, it's so beautiful here and if I can afford it (beauty is expensive) and I can get a good job, I hope to move here by the beginning of summer.