Jim Murray and the Future of Journalism

I admit I don’t know much about sports, but growing up I was a Dodger girl.  I never watched football (unless LSU played, because both my mother and father were alumni) and I never read Sports Illustrated.  And when the LA Times was dropped on the front porch every morning, there was a race amongst us kids to see who could get the funnies first.  If it wasn’t me (it never was), I would pull out the sports section and read the Jim Murray column.  Because you don’t have to love sports to love good writing.

Jim Murray passed away in 1998, but his iconic writing remains available through books and newsletters.  His widow, Linda McCoy Murray, created the Jim Murray Memorial Foundation 10 years ago to honor his legacy and to inspire and encourage young people to get involved in journalism. The Foundation has given away hundreds of thousands of dollars in scholarships to college students across the United States since its inception.

We had the great fortune to have Linda join us on A Closer Look on August 20th.  She told us about Jim, his love of sports, his skill with language.  But Linda has her own sports background.  Having worked with the Indiana Pacers and during the start of the American Basketball Association, she gave us inside scoop on the early days.

Plus, we talked about the future of journalism. Will print go away?  How will media change to deal with new technology?  Will news ever fit into the “paid” model? How are young people gearing up for the future of journalism?

Linda is vivacious, smart and a whole lot of fun!  If you missed the interview, click here to go to the archive and catch the show.

Linda and I are also working together to create a symposium about the future of journalism that will include veteran journalists and Murray Scholars, and that will be covered on the radio show.

What do you think? Where IS the future of journalism?  Are you willing to pay for the news you get online?  Do you still want some of your news in print form? And if so, what type of news is that?  With the immediacy of broadcasting and internet reporting, will

long-form sports reporting go away?  Where will the future Jim Murray’s exhibit their work? Radio/television/newspaper/magazine/online … or??

Either comment for us here, or send us your comments at  news @ pamatherton .com

Till next time,

Pam

The Color of Dead People’s Eyes

You just never know what you are going to learn each day.  Like last Thursday… when CSI Director of Photography James L. Carter told us that after someone is dead a certain period of time, the color in their eyes fades away.  Consequently, actors have to wear contact lenses to give their eyes that “dead” look.

Who knew?

That’s not all he told us.  We found out the Brian DePalma that no one knows.  We found out how persistence is important, and how it paid off for him.  And we talked about how verrrrry cold those metal tables are in the morgue.

Here’s a link to the interview, if you missed it… and here’s a link to his Cinematography demo reels.  THESE you must watch!  James is up for an Emmy for CSI… and we’re hoping he takes home the statue.

Tomorrow I’ll be hosting Linda McCoy-Murray.  She’s the widow of Pulitzer-winning columnist Jim Murray, and a sports queen in her own right.  She also founded and is CEO of the Jim Murray Memorial Foundation… which has given thousands of dollars in scholarships for print journalists.  We’ll talk about the state of print journalism, women in sports, and the irrepressible Mamie Van Doren!  What??

I hope you’ll join us for the show.  It airs on Thursdays at 1pm PT/4pm ET and if you go to the show website, you just need to click the big red button to get to the right place.

We’re working on the schedule now for upcoming shows and I’m just about confirmed with the guy who teaches the FBI how to negotiate with hostage takers.  We’ve got the lovely Patricia Kennedy due up on September 10th, and many more surprises in store!

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Where have I BEEN?

I know, I’m asking myself the same thing!  I am going to studiously ignore my absence and just dig right in with a new post.

Last week Moonwalking Astronaut Buzz Aldrin was on the show!  And we asked questions that were supplied from YOU!  A big thank you to Jacque Whittle’s class in Shalimar, Florida for their questions.

(BTW, did you know that Buzz Aldrin just wrote a children’s book?  Yup, it’s called Look to the Stars.)

For more about Buzz, including his rap video, the video of Making the Rap video, articles from National Geographic from the 40th anniversary of Apollo 11, and from 1969… go to www.ACloserLookRadio.com/aldrin.php.  You’ll also find a link to the interview that we did with Buzz.

Do you remember when we were filming Believe in Me in New Mexico?  Our Director of Photography was James L. Carter.  Well Mr. Carter has continued to express and impress.  He’s currently up for an Emmy for his work on CSI!  We’ll be having him on the show this week to talk about dark mood lighting, working with new actors and filming dead bodies!  And of course we’ll talk about working with animals (he did My Dog Skip), filming in fire (he did Ladder 49) and so much more.  Did you know he got his start working as a production assistant on Carrie???  This guy is full of history and a whole lot of fun!!

For more about James L. Carter, go here: www.ACloserLookRadio.com/carter.php.

Our schedule is just packed for the days ahead:

If you love sports, you’ll know the name Jim Murray.  He’s an icon in the world of sportswriting.  He passed away in 1998, but his work is still timely. The lady who knew him best, Linda McCoy-Murray, will be our guest on August 20th to talk about Jim, about sports in general, about the future of journalism and so much more.

We get quite serious on August 27th as our guest is documentary filmmaker Skye Fitzgerald.  His new film, Finding Face, is about how Cambodian women are disfigured with acid in acts of violence.  It’s an important issue and we are proud to bring it to our listeners.

September 10th we welcome back philanthropist Patricia Kennedy.  As the Founder of StepUp4Vets, she’s been working tirelessly to raise funds to help fill the gap of need for our returning servicemen and women. We’ll talk about the new projects she’s working on, and who she’s pinned lately with the PeaceOneEarth medal.

Plus, soon we’ll be debuting our Five Minute Shots… a new way to get information out to you when you just don’t have an hour to get the show.  We’ll talk about technology, law, health and business… and of course, bring you stories of human interest to inspire, inform and encourage.

Oh… and we’ve recently upgraded the website!  If you haven’t been in a while, we encourage you to visit.  Check out the archive and catch a show you may have missed!

Thanks for being a part of A Closer Look Radio… and thanks for listening!

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Pam

Producer Nicholas Worries about our Heavy Footprint

For decades, Southern California companies were responsible for dumping chemicals, including DDT, into the Pacific. Only in the year 2000 were they found liable for the destruction they had caused. Many coastal and island populations of wildlife had declined rapidly, some perilously close to extinction. The Catalina Bald Eagle is among those horror stories.

Read more about the positive work taking place to save Santa Catalina Bald Eagles http://www.catalinaconservancy.org/ecology/actions/eagles.cfm

I spent the weekend in Catalina in order to reinvigorate myself, and find some well deserved peace and quiet. I became acquainted with the conservancy efforts taking place on the island, and was overwhelmed by how fragile island environments are. I also realized how large of a footprint I leave, specifically, on the environment based on things I take for granted. I found a helpful article by Gabe Travers on simple steps to help save the environment.

“Going Green” doesn’t have to take a lot of time or a lot of money. Dr. Lissa Leege, who heads up Georgia Southern University’s sustainability programs, offers five easy ways to help save the environment and save money.

1. As each incandescent bulb burns out in your house or office, replace it with a compact fluorescent bulb. CFLs use one-fifth the energy of incandescents and last 10 times longer, allowing you to save 670 pounds of carbon dioxide and $55 over the life of a single 60-watt bulb equivalent.

2. Replace old shower heads in your home with new, lower-flow shower heads. By law, all shower heads are now required to release no more than 2.5 gallons of water per minute – a significant savings over the older five-gallons-per-minute models.

3. Choose water from the tap over bottled water. Eight of 10 plastic water bottles end up in crowded landfills, and the oil required to make a year’s supply of new bottles in the U.S. is enough to fuel 100,000 cars a year.

4. Bring your own bags to the grocery store. They are much sturdier than the film plastic bags and they’ll never end up as litter in a river!

5. Give someone a nice travel mug to carry to Starbucks. That will save 10 cents a cup, but better yet it will save landfill space and trees by not trashing 365 cups a year.

Let’s all do what we can to lighten our footprint.  Till next time…

Nick

How to Get into the Video Gaming Industry!

I know, I know.  It’s been a while.  And so much has gone on since the last post.  So I’ll try to catch up little by little.

First of all, I’m really excited about the guest we had on the show today.  His name is Eric Nylund, and not only is he a best-selling fantasy & science fiction author, but he wrote 3 of the 5 HALO novels and his new book Mortal Coils has just been released.

Eric also works with the Microsoft Game Studio as a story consultant, and is intrinsically involved in game development.  So today we talked about family dynamics, violent video games, mythology, video games and girls, and so much more.

Plus, he spills the secrets on how to get in to the video gaming field. Eric talks about how he got into it and the smartest ways for others to break in.  And let me tell you, he says the field is wide open if you’re a female!

Check out the interview by clicking here.

Find out more about Eric Nylund here:  www.ericnylund.net There are several chapters from the new book up there as well as a “trailer” for the new book.

Fun fact about Eric: He’s a scientist by trade with degrees in chemistry and phyics.

And speaking of scientists… next week we welcome our favorite Quantum Physicist, Dr. Mani Bhaumik, back to the show.  He’s the co-creator of the excimer laser, which is what makes LASIK eye surgery possible.  He grew up in abject poverty during the independence movement in India and even spent some time in his youth serving Ghandi.

His love of knowledge brought him to the United States where his skills blossomed and he changed the world of ophthalmology.  He went on to be featured in Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous and even dated the gorgeous, and smart, Eva Gabor for a while.

After some soul-searching, Dr. Bhaumik turned his attention to the search, as a scientist, for God, which resulted in his book Code Name God. He now creates educational programs for young people and overseas the Mani Bhaumik award given for advancing the understanding of the brain and conscious mind in healing.

Dr. Bhaumik is charming, witty and fun and I hope you’ll join us next week on the show for our conversation.

In the meantime, remember to take time to hop off the hamster wheel and make sure you’re following your own dreams, not just making the dreams of other people come true.

Watch this for a reminder:

Till next time (and I promise, it won’t be so long!)

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Who knew the conversation would turn to Red Wigglers?

See, that’s just it.  You never know WHAT you’ll hear on A Closer Look!  Mary Ellen Psaltis was our guest on Thursday and we covered a lot of ground.  Including that in your own backyard!  Mary Ellen is a nutrition and wellness consultant,  so we decided to kick off the new year talking about how to increase our well-being.  Mary Ellen reminded us of some ideas we might have heard before (but forgotten) like keeping a gratitude journal… and gave us some ideas we KNOW we’ve never heard before!  (Wanna lose weight?  Get yourself some red wigglers!)  Here are some of the tips she gave us:

• Every day write down 5 things for which you are grateful in a journal.  Do not repeat. (Mary Ellen writes down such things as clean sheets on her bed, or a nice hot shower).
• When it comes to losing weight, become a label reader. No more Hydrogenated oil!  (or partially hydrogenated)
• No more High Fructose Corn Syrup! It’s empty calories and your pancreas may have issues with it.
• Keep a recycling worm bin at your house. WHAT?  Yup.  Mary Ellen says that those red wiggler worms like to eat non-protein discarded food products (think orange peels and old lettuce).  And if they don’t get enough to eat, they’ll die.  Now you don’t want those little fellers to pass on, do you?  So eat lots of fruits and vegetables to keep them happy and healthy!  Yes, it’s losing weight by guilt, but if it works…..

Other ideas from Mary Ellen include simply smiling at people (it’s contagious) and remember,  it’s not how MUCH you give, but rather THAT you give, when it comes to helping out others.

Find out more about Mary Ellen and her book,  12 Spiritual Vitamins, by clicking here.  And keep an eye out for her new book coming soon:  Gaining Thin.  I like that.  A whole new spin on the weight thing.  You’re not losing anything… you’re Gaining.  And that’s a positive way to look at it!

Coming up this week on A Closer Look… Jake Steinfeld (Body By Jake) gives us the inside scoop on steroids in body-building and how he started the personal trainer craze.  Then Dr. Keith Ablow talks about finding our truths.  Both interesting guys and sure to make a show that will give you lots to consider.  I hope you’ll join us this Thursday at 1pm PT, 4pm ET.  Go to www.ACloserLookRadio.com for more info.

And start infecting others with your smile!!

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Pam

True Confessions… I Love Trader Joe’s

I’m just going to come right out and say it.  I love Trader Joe’s.   I love it so much that I want to live there.

If you don’t know what Trader Joe’s is, let me enlighten you.  It’s heaven on earth.  It’s the most succulent, fresh, unusual, delicious, clever, creative food, drink and goodies that you can find on this planet.  And all from such good people.   Click here for the Wikipedia entry.

My daughter and I took a road trip to California to see my dad for Christmas. It’s been over 10 years since the group of us have gotten together for the holidays and since Beverly just got her Bachelor’s degree in Anthropology and Applied Archaeology (don’t ask ‘cause I have no idea what she’ll do with it), we thought this year would be a good time to go.

I love road trips.  You get to sing badly in the car as loudly as you want to songs that you would never admit to anyone that you listen to, much less have a cd of.  (Yeah, I know, it ended in a preposition)  You get to visit small towns with great food and big towns with crappy motels. But I digress.

My father lives near the mother lode of Trader Joe’s… the home office/store in Monrovia. We saved our trip to the store for our last night in California.  It was ending the trip in Utopia.  Pumpkin/pecan/chocolate tart-pie. Yogurt cheese (I had never heard of that!) Dark chocolate covered mixed nuts.  Happy Face Shiraz.  Organic produce. Fresh sushi. (not my favorite, but Beverly could eat it every meal). A “guacamole kit.” Lime rice from India. Nut butters.  I can’t bear to go on.  Everything that is good for you, and at prices that are as good as mainstream grocery stores, or better!

I want to live there.

I know, I know… what about the fact that I want to live at the Palmer House Hotel in Chicago?  Well, I have worked out a plan.  I’ll live in the spring and the fall at the Palmer House, and the summer and the winter at Trader Joe’s.

More about the road trip in another post. In the meantime, I just got this release from iDrink.com and it looked like fun, so I thought I would re-post it. But before I do… I invite you to join us this week on A Closer Look.  We’ll be chatting with Mary Ellen Psaltis about the twelve essential nutrients for well-being… a perfect way to start the new year!  Click here to go directly to the Achieve Radio site. (you will not pass GO, nor receive $200, but you might find an interview or two that you want to listen to!)

From iDrink.com….
If you are planning to host a New Years party this year you might be looking for some help to make it extra special or at the very least more unique.  A part of most New Years Eve parties is various alcoholic drinks.  Instead of just providing (or having guests bring their own) the regular beer, wine, rum, vodka and rye, why not create a theme around the drinks available.

There are various cocktails and shooters that have a Holiday theme to their names or appearance.  A quick visit to www.idrink.com/newyears.html shows more than 25 different recipe ideas with a Holiday theme.  One idea is to setup a table with the various ingredients for the drinks with smallrecipe cards and the appropriate glasses so everyone can be their own bartender.

Here is a sample of some recipes to try:

North Pole Cocktail

1.0 dollop  Whipped Cream
1.0 each  Egg White
1.0 oz.  Gin
0.5 oz.  Lemon juice
0.5 oz.  Maraschino

Shake all ingredients (except whipped cream) with ice and strain
into a cocktail glass. Top with whipped cream and serve.

Celebration

Click on photo to check out HostessWithMostess website!

1.0 oz  Cognac
1.0 oz  Cointreau
1.0 oz  Lemon juice
1.5 oz  Rum

Shake over ice and pour into cocktail glass. Garnish with orange peel.

Steaming Hot Holiday Punch Recipe

3.0 cups  Apple Juice
1.5 teaspoons  ground Cinnamon
3  sticks Cinnamon
0.75 teaspoon  ground Cloves
6.0 cups  Cranberry juice
0.75 cup  Maple syrup
0.75 teaspoon  ground Nutmeg
3.0 cups  Orange juice
2.0 teaspoons  powdered Sugar

Combine all the ingredients in a very large heavy pan, except
the cinnamon sticks. Bring to a boil and turn to simmer for
few minutes. You can put the ingredients in a crockpot after
it has boiled and keep warm over low heat.

After the party is over and you have lots of leftovers you can head on over to www.idrink.com again and enter the ingredients you have to find all the other drinks you can make with them.  iDRINK has over 32000 cocktail recipes to experiment with. Have a happy holiday season, don’t over indulge and please drink responsibly.

Indeed.  Till next time….

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Singing slime and saxophone-playing squirrels!

The holidays are in full swing and the stress levels are going up Up UP!!

We found this great video on YouTube that just cracked us up. We hope you’ll get a chuckle or two and that it lightens the workload this holiday season.

If these singing animals don’t make you laugh… then see your doctor for a replacement Humerus bone. HA!

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ps… a BONUS video! Laughing baby. A word of caution, however… it’s contagious!

Hamsters and Holiday Trees

Hope everyone had a Happy Thanksgiving.  My daughter and I finished the day off by going to see BOLT at the theaters, accompanied by vast amounts of buttered popcorn and 3-D glasses. (btw, the Hamster steals the show). Afterwards we found the Salvation Army Angel tree and picked out names of kids who might not have such a merry holiday season.

Every year since Beverly was little, we have picked out names from the tree and shopped for them.  It’s a tradition I’m proud to share with her.  For the last 3 years we have chosen the names and done the shopping in the name of the New Mexico branch of Interim Health Care.  Interim is a home health care company and NM General Manager Twila Rutter decided several years ago that the best way her branch could thank their doctors and health care providers at the holidays was not to send them yet one more spiral ham or fruit basket that would go uneaten and unremembered, but instead to help the less fortunate in the area.  The Salvation Army helps between 600-700 kids each year in the local area, and Interim proudly supplies gifts for approximately 10% of their needs.

So every year we choose about 30 girls and 30 boys and go shopping! We often will pick out the older kids, since they can be harder to purchase for and the gifts more expensive. One year, when Beverly worked for Radio Shack, she gave us her employee discount so we could get remote control cars, v-tech computers and loads of batteries for the toys.  It meant that she couldn’t get commission for her sales, but she was proud of her contribution to the effort.  And I was proud of her.

After we have meticulously made lists and purchased the gifts, we set them up on, around and over a table at my office and shoot pictures.  There are so many gifts, we have to shoot the boy gifts separately from the girl ones!  Then we bag everything up in plastic Hefty bags and label them for the Salvation Army.

For us it is one of the most joyous parts of the season.  It’s something that Beverly and I do together, commiserating and planning and deciding… deciding if Hulk Hands are still appropriate for an 11 year-old (they are), if the new Girl Gourmet Cupcake Maker is better than the EasyBake Oven (we’re not sure, but it  looks awfully cute), and what kind of Tinkerbell stuff we’ll choose for an 8 year old girl (I’m for the old-style, but Beverly likes the new “tink” look). I’ll post pictures this year after we complete our shopping.

It’s these times that we remember with great fondness and our children take forward into the future for their own families.  Tell us about your holiday traditions.  We’ll get good ideas and cheer on the creativity and kindness of others!

Speaking of traditions, Goops Publisher Barbara Ross talked with us about that last week on the show.  She shared with us how the desire to share the cherished Goops books with her grandson got her into the publishing business when she couldn’t find any of the books.  It’s a great story and an inspiring one (she was 68 when she published the book!) and perfect for the holidays.  We talk about manners for kids (that’s what the Goops books are about) and how to be good examples.

Dr. Susan was on the show as well, with her tips on how to deal with too many get-togethers and cranky know-it-alls.  Here’s her list of 5 rules for the holidays. (Listen to the show as she explains the why and how of the rules)

• 1. Cut down on the drinking
• 2. Ask yourself the question: Do I REALLY have to go to all those parties and get-togethers?
• 3. Determine if there is a way to be with people you DO want to be with that’s less stressful.
• 4. Try not to feel you need to be perfect
• 5. It’s okay (and sometimes very good!) to let people go in our lives.

Next Thursday on the show we get Frommer’s list of 10 Best destinations for 2009 (and all the cheap travel tips!) and Santa Paws comes to visit as WebVet co-founder Hope Schultz talks about great holiday toys for the pets.  (aromatherapy? a massage glove?)

Don’t forget… we’ve got a page for recipes on the site… so check it out and send us yours to add to it!

Being thankful for so much…

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Pam

ps… Welcome to TJ, a new listener.  He was my rep at QWEST when I had dsl problems.  Thanks for the great service TJ, and hope you enjoy the show!

Yes, it’s been a while….

We’ve elected a new president in the time since I’ve last posted!

I admit, things have been busy and I’ve gotten behind in my posting. We’ve had some great guests and some exciting things happening.

First of all… I hope you will join us this Thursday for our interview with Ken Levine.  (He was scheduled for last week, but we were in the middle of a studio move for our online home at AchieveRadio.com and a winter storm and crazy internet issues kept us off the air last week.  Kudos to Engineer Bill for getting things hooked up so quickly.)  Ken Levine is one of the most interesting people you will meet.  Why?  How much time ya got?!

So let’s see… he’s an Emmy award-winning television writer.  You’ve seen episodes that he and his writing partner David Isaacs have written for Cheers, Wings, Fraisier, Becker and more.  Plus, Levine has directed many episodes for those sitcom as well. And he and David were head writers for the iconic show M*A*S*H.

He’s also a radio personality, having gotten his start in the boss radio years.  Now he hosts Dodger Talk for KABC, along with a Sunday night sports show.

Then there’s the major league baseball play-by-play announcing that he did for the Baltimore Orioles, the San Diego Padres and the Seattle Mariners.

Did I mention that he and David wrote the episode of The Simpsons that named the baseball team the Isotopes… and then the Albuquerque, New Mexico team decided to appropriate it for their minor league team?  Oh, he was also the baseball announcer on that episode.

What have I missed?  Oh… that book he wrote.  “It’s Gone… No Wait a Minute.” And he’s currently working on his memoirs, even while I post.

And because he felt that no one was really giving  writers a good feel for what the television writing business is really like, he started a seminar/workshop series called The Sitcom Room, where writers, and writer-hopefuls, come from across the nation and Canada to participate in as close to a real writing room as can be created without actually being part of a show.

And then there’s his blog. (click here to view) Viewed by thousands every day, Levine has fans from around the world who read his daily postings about everything from writing to baseball to American Idol.

I promise, there will be something for everyone on the show this Thursday.  Including some Hollywood Dish!  So please tune in at 1pm PT/4pm ET. You can get to the show by going to www.ACloserLookRadio.com. Hit the big LISTEN button and you’re all set.  And if you miss the show when it’s live, you can also go to the exact same place to catch the interview in archive.  But we will be taking questions this week with Ken… so you might want to make the live show!

* * * * *

As I may have told you, I’m the voice of the Goops books for children about manners. (click here to see all about the Goops) The publishers have asked me to do a radio tour promoting the book for Christmas, so I may be on the air on a station near you!

So far, we are scheduled for:

• 11/19 at 8:40am CT on KORN with Jena O’Connor in South Dakota
• 12/1 at 1pm ET on WOON with Don Burnelle in Rhode Island
• 12/15 at 10:15am PT on KAHI with Mary Jane Popp in Sacramento, CA
• And  12/18 at 3pm ET on 880 The Biz with Kandee G in South Florida

And we’re putting the finishing touches on our annual Holiday “Best Of” List.  It’s where we share with you about unique, unusual and downright weird things for the holidays! And some of those ideas come from YOU!

So I promise, I’ll be better about posting.  In the meantime, please tune in this week, and check out the archives for any of the shows you have missed.

Till next time…

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