Media McNuggets

I’m not sure who does the public relations for NBC but they might want to rethink their transitional strategies. It’s pretty laughable that the network wants to dump all their Today Show ratings woes’ at the foot of Ann Curry. I don’t have huge sympathies for either party as all are making out pretty good. But a couple of weeks of bad leaks, followed by an awkward handful of moments for  the anchors of your money making machine for a valued employee? Strange. The producers who deigned cohost segments with Sarah Palin weren’t reassigned. At a time when we need actual news and less cooking segments, did it ever dawn on the masterminds at “Today” that maybe it is the show that needed some re-examining. It’s no wonder Kathie Lee and Hoda are tipsy so early. Make a good news show, people will watch.

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Ever notice how one decision by the Supreme Court turned all of Twitter and Facebook into constitutional scholars? I find myself wishing that those in Congress who don’t like the Affordable Care Act quit looking for higher authorities and put that energy into addressing the flaws of the bill. As Leo McGarry once said, those who aren’t in power “has to take a seat.” The pouting over something getting passed would be allowable if you were working on something to better it with, but this just makes the Speaker and others look petty. Doesn’t do a thing for “the people” to whom they are always referring.

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I sat down to watch the Mets and Yankees have at it on Sunday Night Baseball last weekend as two great pitchers went at it: C.C. Sabbathia for the Yankees and R.A. Dickey for the Mets. Dickey’s start is a great story, and true be told, he had the inevitable off-night which happens, especially when your knuckleball doesn’t knuckle. From ESPN’s announcers assigned to the game, you would have thought he was the second coming until the second homer was hit off him sending the blathering Orel Hersheiser scrambling to say something nice about Sabbathia. Got to prep for both teams there, Orel. Paging Jon Miller, Gary Thorne…..

 

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Madame Lion

One of the luckier work pictures I’ve taken

Beachin’ and Hopin’

So, some high level city meetings are being held about waterfront development. That’s great. I do worry a little as the area has good reason to become jaded at “big ideas.” Administration after adminstration has gone in pursuit of the “Silver Bullet” that will fix all the wrongs in one swell foop. I do have one notion to contribute to this and all the little successes happening at Canalside reinforces this.

A City Beach. I took the picture above at Gallagher Beach last weekend. The pieces are coming into play there. I mean think about it, you give people access to water, let em fall in, they will come and probably want to eat or drink something. If you haven’t been, drive your vehicle of choice to Erie Basin Marina some evening. Take a walk from the marina along the marina on down to Canalside. The spectrum of folks you encounter runs from affluent boat owners, landlubbers like myself enjoying slightly marked up ice cream, folks of all flavors enjoying being by the water all the way down to Canalside.

There are some engineering issues to creating beach access there, but those lessen a lot at Gallagher Beach. There is a nice boardwalk already in place. The area’s food trucks could make a good buck. The way I see it, leave the right hand side as it is for small water craft, deploy some of the city resources on the other side of the pier to actually allow for some swimming.

See, a low cost notion to enhance the outer harbor fun. A little city asssistance on the beach, lifeguards, and a little work, but not a huge amount of resources and viola, a quality of life entity.

Summertime, and most folks like having places to cool off, and someplace to get something to eat afterwords. Most of the city success stories are like this. Take something small, add a few pieces and suddenly you have something that doesn’t resember a suburbanite’s 20 year old perception of an area, and people (gasp!) come and use it.

The great things happening at Woodlawn Beach aren’t planet altering, just pleasant ways of making something good, better. I wager the same thing can happen on the Northside of the treatment plant. We’re almost there…

While Bennett Beach was a wonder, here’s a city beach that could be a legit city beach.

Hmmm?

Mother, did it need to be so high?

Let me be upfront. I like beer just fine, beer before a concert, especially on a day like yesterday, hells yeah, a pint or two is fine thing. But when you are paying at minimum of $100 for a seat at Roger Waters‘ performance of “The Wall” I think I’d be less enarmored of the $8.00 cans of whatever to see more of the show. Maybe I’m just jealous as a lot of these folks seems really well financed. Jeff Miers of the Buffalo News wrote about the show here and I got to agree, it is astounding production of one of the last big albums that rock fans think of as a whole. It’s just too bad most folks didn’t see the first few songs as people were still streaming in during the big hit “Another Brick in the Wall, Part II.” Now, Mr. Waters’ team comes with an announcer beckoning people to take their seats, but much like the Sabres’ intermission bell, it didn’t get taken overly serious (these folks learned for the intermission).

(from the Buffalo News)

I was ushering last night and foolishly suspected that both at the price point and the fact the Wall came out 33 years ago, things might be on the sedate side. A few young hipsters prove that wrong, unleashing a technicolor yawn over some poor folks. After reconciling that customer service problem, I was a little more able to take in the spectacle. If you have the means, by all means, take it in. That album chocked with alienation referenced that we all had a copy of lends its music to a number of messages from current events all these years later.

While watching Waters and the show command the bulk of the attention, it amused me to see that despite the price tag, despite the attempts at musical profundity on stage, despite the high costs (let’s be honest) of things in the arena, a lot of folks at during the show wanderlust. I’m figuring for those bucks for tickets, convenience fees, etc, I’m seeing the damn thing. It’s interesting to me that there is a population that will be lots of $ to “be there.”

Wish I had that kind of money.

It was a great concert, you should have seen it.

Mother

A few years ago, the remaining members of Led Zeppelin got together for a one-off show in London. All sounded great and greedy tour promoters started guestimating about the crapload of potential profits (and yes, crapload is a unit of measure….for the moment).

I can imagine the other band capable of causing a caniption across Live Nation would be Pink Floyd. I saw Roger Waters perform the Wall in 2010 when it first came to Buffalo and amazingly, it and he return Thursday Night. It is an astounding show, not a conventional rock concert. If you have the means, I recommend it. Of Course, if you have the means to swing these tickets, I just want to be your friend as I think the lower bowl is close to $200 a pop.

Glad I’m getting paid to be there

Dumb Ass Liberal

It’s funny how fast things can turn negative, like we don’t want to listen to each other. On a friend’s facebook status last night, a discussion about a know nothing radio guest turned into a “brawl.” Another poster said something about the guest was just a “Dumbass liberal” and you call them names they can’t take it.

Being a dumb ass liberal, I pointed out that he should be careful, language like that could make him sound like a “long time listener, first time caller.” Instead he seized on “Careful, of what, see point proved!”

I pointed out that I was kidding, making fun of talk show callers. He insisted he was too, but going for terms like dumbass in generalities doesn’t suggest that.

It resonated with me as some were upset that during Nik Wallenda’s walk, Mr. Wallenda was praying while he walked. I’m not a devout anything, but I admire that. Considering what he was doing at the time, talking to God ahead of making small talk with ABC announcers made sense.

It seems like everybody is for freedom of speech until it actually gets used. It’s a little weird that instead of celebrating diversity, it’s currently the in thing to ridicule it and placidly just watch. Vaguely stated slams seeming resonate and I don’t know what you do about that. Mitt Romney says the President is politicizing a given issue. There is a faction of viewers who murmur in agreement. Just once, I’d like to see somebody respond with, “Of course, it’s an election year, you can’t fart without it being a political statement.”

The original complainer at the top of the page probably should changed the station. Your faith is a personal thing. I respect that. An office mate and I couldn’t be any further apart on matters religious or political, but we get along fine, because disagreeing civily is a good thing, Occasionally you can learn something.

These Boots were made for walkin’

by his momma.

I readily admit, it was pretty cool to see Nik Wallenda succeed and even attempt his walk across Niagara Falls last night. It was pretty easy to be snarky about all the hype, the buildup and especially the blathering from the commentators from ABC.

In all fairness to them, they did break the story of the fact that the water in the Niagara mist was indeed “wet.” The visuals were impressive, the falls looked great and many instances, less would have been more on the analysis front from the ABC folk.

It’s hard not be taken with the images, like this one from the  Buffalo News. I respect Mr. Wallenda’s abilities even more so, watching him not only do this, but talk both with the commentators and his dad. There would have been times I might have asked everybody to “shaddup, I’m a little busy” with all the verbal back and forth. But maybe that’s how you stay centered walking uphill on a wet wire into Canada. It should be noted that he made better time than some Rainbow Bridge commuters.

Wallenda proved to be a skilled athlete and a real nice guy, calling grandma was a nice touch. I’m sure the “stumble” in Baltimore was a bit of hype, got to keep ’em watching, but the run to the finish last night was pretty good. I had made a few jokes on twitter how roller skates or hopping would be really awesome too.

Aside from admiring the thesaurus laden commentary from the commentators, the incredible feat itself (“I just walked to Canada and boy, are my arms tired”), it can be easy to read to much into one event. Probably isn’t going to change folks perspectives of the American Falls too much, but to get a few thousand more folks to the American side on a Friday evening is a good thing.

I was driving home from a wedding reception and purposely took the Moses Parkway so it would take me back through Niagara Falls proper and it was nice to see things lively on an early sunday night. Hopefully, more folks are thinking about how nice it can be and might take a visit..because it’s there.

I think I’ll go for a walk outside

As a news anchor, Ch. 7’s Keith Radford makes a pretty good photographer. Of all the many images making the rounds on the internets of Nik Wallenda and the high wire walk across the Falls, this is one of the cooler ones to emerge. It sure beats the shadow and “Walk into History” graphic that another station is using. I wish Mr. Wallenda all the best, hope it’s great show, but am personally kind of meh about the whole thing.

I’m sure he’ll do fine. The ruckus about a safety harness has the feel of manufactured drama to me as no sponsor spokespeople have appeared before microphones, not that there is any shortage of those.

I wonder more about the other hazards like: without proper id, will customs make him walk back? Will he have anything to declare?

Or will any harness actually cause some issues?

Either way, like everybody else, I’ll watch, won’t pay money for a “free” tioket on Craig’s list, when my tv will do.

Comma Chameleon

Didn’t think that one through…..but it does allow an entire new line of cooking products. “Need to saute your family?”

“I’m thinkin’…

and my head hurts.” — Yosemite Sam

I’m feeling a bit like a bad Western New Yorker as I’m not all that excited for the spectacle of Nik Wallenda‘s walk across Niagara Falls. Of course, I’ll probably watch. But the hubbub over a sponsor insisted upon harness smells less like a safety notion and more like a built in chance for a dramatic “releasing of the harness” when it is “too late.” I have all the respect in the world for his abilities, especially when heights and I, well, have an understanding. But, I also know the pole he carries isn’t there for ornamentation, ya dig.

That, and I’m pretty sure the “Slip” in Baltimore was part of the show.

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I was told about a ted ex talk that ted ex apologized for and it’s been on my mind as house GOP folk want to throw more incentives as companies who aren’t hiring and sitting on their cash. Wouldn’t it make more sense to make it easier on people who actually spend their money. The Ted ex speaker mentioned that business leaders he talked to weren’t going to produce more, cost less, hire until there was a demand. So, foster the demand, folks. It seems to me the GOP folk are attacking the problem from the wrong side, again. That and the Ted Ex folks shouldn’t have apologized. The GOP hardballers all want part of that Reagan legacy. They forget he spent and invested to get the economy going again.

And he probably wouldn’t get elected today.

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The Pittsburgh Pirates are only a couple games out of it in June? that’s kind of cool.

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Smartest and funniest bit of baseball witticism I’ve heard this season wasn’t said by me, but a brilliant Yankee fan/friend of mine. An ad touted an upcoming meeting between the Yankees and Mets with all the titles they have won, which my friend compared to the amount of money he and Bill Gates have together. (the Mets not being big winners, for the unitiated)

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Notice we are all clear on Mitt Romney‘s view of the President, but it concerns me that he both hasn’t said what he would do different and that nobody has asked him that very question.

A little alarming, I tells ya. Let’s not be sheep folks. If somebody yells about “getting this economy moving again,” make him say how

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I bypassed the annual art show that traditionally kicks off the summer time. That didn’t stop the ubiquitous shepard’s crook planters from being visible as I’d watch a few folks head back up the street. I just wish the presenting organization wasn’t such bullies to prospective merchants. I remember them having the former Java Temple owner cited for selling drinks out of her own storefront. One of the food trucks posted a map of the turf dubbed the territory of the show and that just seems petty. There are plenty of wallets to go around folks, can’t we all just get along?