Bee Happy

Recently I was subjected to Bee Movie again (my 7-year-old had the remote) and it reminded me of several very interesting articles about bees. The most recent describes the insect's apparent affinity for mathematical word problems. From that article, (in Discover, here: http://tinyurl.com/38vvbgf) you can buzz right over to '20 Things You Didn't Know about Bees,' also from Discover. (Here:  http://tinyurl.com/23sscy)


In both cases, you can bee sure the reading has a point. (Ouch!)

Hyperlocal Media: the good, the bad, and the huh?

Hyperlocal media is a cool new phrase. But it's not new, and I'm not convinced it's all that cool.

Every employer, neighborhood association, or PTA that ever had an internal newsletter - or an employee-centric intranet - has a handle on hyperlocal media.

Enter Patch.com, a newish product from AOL. Patch claims to be something new in journalism; it aims to be a complete online news source for one zip code at a time.

I'll give Patch this: its editors are qualified journalists, and the ones I've read can write, well.

That said, a 'complete' news source needs more than one contributing editor; it needs more than one perspective on what constitutes news and where and how to gather and disseminate it. News should be, by definition, worth reading. Even when you're covering "news" in a single zip code, every dog lost/cat found isn't newsworthy. Of course, many Patch sites have several contributors. Unfortunately, most of them are sending in press releases about rummage sales and library story hours.

Your local Patch may be worth reading, don't get me wrong. And for the record, I love dogs and libraries. (Full disclosure: Cats are OK. I don't do rummage sales.)

But didn't societies create newspapers to see a little further than their own backyards? I may not think I need to know today's Euro or Yen valuation, it would behoove me to think about it occasionally. But I sure love reading my local paper to find out what's happening in neighboring school districts, nearby cities, the state capital - I could expand, but you get the point.

Hyperlocal media surely has a place on the great, big, WorldWideWeb. But even hyperlocal news deserves unbiased, professional treatment. Patch doesn't appear to offer that, but it's still young...we won't know how it will 'grow up' for several years.

SportsInk.com is a site with a similar idea (and some important differences) that's grown quickly in Northeast Ohio. SportsInk covers high school sports in the greater Akron/Canton (OH) area. In that way it's hyperlocal.  It's also all but off the hook when it comes to many of those balanced-reporting type questions. It's not just journalism; it's sports journalism.

So what? How good or bad Hyperlocal Media is allowed to get is largely up to you, the readers. Are you  tuning in to hyperlocal sources? Will you continue? Speak up. (Folks in the business call that UGC. You can call it whatever you want - I call it posting a comment, and yours are most appreciated.)

~~~~What are you reading?~~~~~

Juggling books

I learned how to juggle while I was going through my divorce. I mean that literally; I attended a one-day workshop on juggling.

I am not so adept at juggling books, literally or figuratively. In spite of that, I'm too impatient to wait until I finish one book before I start another. At the moment, I'm somewhere between the covers of:

Your Negro Tour Guide by Kathy Y. Wilson
Just Listen by Mark Goulston
Saving Fish From Drowning by Amy Tan
Iran Awakening by Shirin Ebadi
The Tower, the Zoo, and the Tortoise by Julia Stuart --> this one is off to a very nice start

What about you? What RU reading?

This Game Has Gone On Long Enough

Reading Terry Pluto's feature on Bernie Kosar, I thought, a dedicated journalist could use this to show how a narrative piece can tell an engaging story without crossing the line into PR. But not me, not today. What struck me was that Kosar, at age 46, has trouble standing up and sometimes struggles to find the words he needs to express himself. 

According to Pluto, Kosar (who played his last professional game in 1996)  "has dealt with the aftermath of concussions suffered while playing. There are some headaches, some brief memory loss, some occasional involuntary twitching." Kosar says, "I struggle sometimes to say exactly what I want when I'm tired." 

Folks, that's called brain damage. The Alabama High School Athletic Association defines concussion as "a type of traumatic brain injury (TBI) caused by a blow or jolt to the head that can range from mild to severe and can disrupt the way the brain normally works."

Look, I know virtually all sports are contact sports. Serious injuries happen on every kind of court and field everyday.  But football is special. Football players experience more brain injuries than athletes in any other sport (according to The American Journal of Sports Medicine). 

The phrase "crush your opponent" was made for football.  

If you want to foster violent behavior, encourage boys and young men to learn that might is right and bigger and meaner is better, by all means, get thyself to the nearest football field and cheer on the home team.

I love sports, but football isn't very sporting, really. 


How many middle-aged men with seriously beat-up bodies and overly-thumped heads do we need to see before we evolve away from smash-mouth football?

Are you proud to say bashing heads is our American pastime? I'm not. I suggest we return the word 'football' to the Brits (and the rest of the world) and until we can come up with something a little more sportsmanlike, play their game. Who knows? Once our brains (and our bodies) are taking less abuse, we might figure out how to make entertaining commercials year round, rather than just during the Superbowl.

-------

Additional reading on concussions in sports

Concussion in High School Sports, CDC, May 25, 2010

http://www.cdc.gov/concussion/headsup/high_school.html

The Impact of Concussions on High School Athletes, Committee on Education & Labor, May 20, 2010 

http://edlabor.house.gov/hearings/2010/05/the-impact-of-concussions-on-h.shtml

Study: Kids Competing Too Soon After Concussions (and second impact syndrome can be fatal) 

Time Magazine, January 2009

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1873131,00.html

Gifts for writers/lexiphiles

Kiss and Tell and Haikubes, both available in Chronicle Book's Fall/Winter catalog, could be perfect gifts for a writer, English teacher, librarian, book club leader, or other word-lover in your life.

Haikubes is a set of 63 word cubes players can roll like dice to dish up ingredients for an original haiku. From the folks behind the Cranium games, the cubes are available in August. US $25

Players of Kiss and Tell compete to tell the sexiest/sultriest/silliest story, according to the story component  cards they are dealt. Available in November; US $19

Futbol fans rejoice!

Check out five titles all about futbol/soccer, reviewed by The Plain Dealer's Karen Long. Sounds like enough good stuff to keep you reading for a couple of months after World Cup 2010. Enjoy!

Got a soccer player at home willing to work to get better? 

Check out Matt Smith's Epic Soccer Training program. Guaranteed results; 8 week money-back offer.

Follow This

Ye gads, books can pile up! Like garbage...which is a messy segue into this brief review of Malena Watrous' If You Follow Me.  To be clear, the book isn't garbage but it contains an extensive thread about gomi, (garbage) and the rules that govern its disposal in Japan.


(Thank you, Sherry, for recommending this book; I enjoyed it!) 


As a writer, I'm impressed with Watrous' first novel, based on her personal experience teaching English to Japanese children. While the story could be just a fish-out-of-water tale, it's really about love, loss, letting go, and learning to deal - while you're also a fish-out-of-water learning how to sort the damn trash, Japanese style. (Aside: I've read that the Japanese system is highly efficient and about as environmentally friendly as garbage systems can be. Of course, to be so requires reams of rules be followed t.o. t.h.e. l.e.t.t.e.r.)


If... isn't your average love story, and, frankly, isn't as much of a story as it is an extended slice of life. To her credit, Watrous chose an immensely interesting slice, and created the characters and setting so brilliantly that they shine, even when action is somewhat slow. 


Though its appeal will likely be lost on most male readers (it's not chick lit, but it is for chicks)  I highly recommend this paperback, light and comfortable enough to tote around and enjoy wherever you find yourself reading this summer. 

-   -   -   -   -   -   -   - If You Follow Me by Malena Watrous
-   -   -   -   -   -   -   - Harper Perennial (c) 2010
-   -   -   -   -   -   -   - US $14.99

Language lovers will appreciate that each of the book's chapters is 'titled' by a Japanese word or phrase. Readers learn sekushii means sexy, taoreru means to fall or collapse, and reizoku means refrigerator - and Watrous can elaborate on all three.