Random music notes

Stevie Wonder's "I Just Called to Say I Love You" was released right about when I turned six - and I was obsessed with that song at that time.

I had a little radio - wooden box, cloth-covered speaker, metal knobs - in my room, and I remember being very excited when that song was played.

I'm not sure how long the obsession lasted, but even now, if that song comes on an oldies or light rock station, I leave it on.

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Yesterday I sang along to "House of the Rising Sun" in the car on the way home and totally nailed it, or at least it seemed that way to me. And I've tried to sing that song a number of times before and it usually comes out as some terrible, strangled, wailing mess (no shock there - the song treads a very narrow line on that point).

But for some reason, and I don't know why, it really sounded good yesterday. Alas, no one was there to hear it.

Who is this for?

I've been seeing these billboards all around town for months:

Who is this aimed at? Does anyone really drive past these things and think, "I gotta get me some Canadian whisky!"? Well, I guess some people might - so is this sign just one big reinforcement for alcohol addiction?

I guess my thinking applies to all billboards that are not on major highways. I can see the return on promoting a McDonald's, or a motel, to people driving down the interstate. But these city-street billboards seem to me to be a totally ineffective way of getting your message out.

The good old days

A Wrangell boys basketball player puts up a shot just before halftime of the 2004 Region V Class 3A fifth-sixth place game against Haines at B.J. McGillis Gymnasium on the Mount Edgecumbe High School campus in Sitka, Alaska. The shot was good. (Andrew Krueger / Juneau Empire)

It's been only five years since I covered this tournament, but it seems like an eternity - for me, for technology, for the newspaper industry.

The Region V tournament was - and is - one of the biggest regional events of the year in Southeast Alaska. In addition to basketball, there is competition in cheerleading and dance, bands perform, etc. Hundreds of kids from cities, towns and villages, all in one place.

I got to cover the tournament three times - once each in Ketchikan (2003), Sitka (2004) and Juneau (2005). The first time, I was still shooting film; the third time, we were at home, so the Empire's photographers handled most of the photos. But in Sitka, I was armed with my digital SLR camera. I covered all the games in print and with photos.

Times were still pretty good for newspapers, but budgets were in place and I took cost-saving steps to make sure I could make the trip. I took an hours-long (possibly overnight - I can't remember) ferry trip from Juneau to Sitka. I slept on the floor of a friend's house for four or five nights. I walked more than a mile one-way back and forth across a big bridge from the main part of Sitka to the island where the gym was. And for my return trip to Juneau, I latched on to the Juneau students' chartered ferry and slept amid instrument cases and gym bags.

I covered all the teams - not just Juneau - and filed reports and photos for print and Web via my Mac laptop and balky dial-up modem. I'm afraid that the coverage area has diminished since I left. It's really too bad, because there were always great stories from the little outlying villages. It was fun being the "big-city paper," if only for a brief time.

I alternated between the press box and the sidelines, writing and taking photos. The gym was a converted World War II-era aircraft hangar, and it was LOUD for the big games. I'd have to concentrate amid the noise; once I got smacked by a T-shirt blasted from a cannon on the court during halftime (I still have the shirt). My last story, after the Saturday night games, was filed as the lights were turned off and the basketball court turned into a dance floor for a big end-of-tournament party.

Out of all the photos I took, I like the one above; it seems kind of Norman Rockwell-ish to me. I have better action shots, closer to the action, but that one just seems to offer more of the scene.

I've gone on to other papers, done cool stories, taken thousands more photos and still enjoy what I do. But I always have a bit of nostalgia for that particular tournament. It just seems like things were a lot simpler and more fun back then. It was exciting being the lone correspondent, sending back photos and game stories, rushing to meet deadlines. The good old days.

OK, I could have prevented this. But...

Driving home tonight, as I made the transition from city to country, an SUV zoomed up behind me and tailgated me for a bit. I was going at or maybe a shade over the speed limit (55), which anyone who knows the area would know is, if anything, too fast to drive at night with so many deer around.

After a very short while, the driver zipped out into the other lane and gunned it, passing me as we rounded a curve - gentle curve, but still a curve. Idiot, I thought. Now, when I'm driving out at night and somebody passes me, I generally wait maybe 10 seconds before turning my high beams back on, to give them some distance. If they tailgate me and drive like morons, I might wait only 5 seconds - I'll give them a little distance, but I won't go the extra mile. That's what I did tonight. In retrospect, kind of a mistake.

As soon as I put the high beams on, the SUV - by now maybe a tenth of a mile ahead - braked. Big time. I hit the brakes. The SUV started going. I slowly started going. Then he braked again and came to a dead stop. I wasn't going fast, but I had to brake hard and swerve onto the shoulder. He swerved onto the shoulder in front of me. I swerved back on to the road. He swerved back on to the road. At some point in this, he had a shot at bashing me on the passenger side and I thought he was going to (his SUV was an old beater; I say "he" but I didn't get a look at the driver), but it didn't happen. Also at some point in this, I did turn off my brights. The SUV started going down the road again.

I followed - giving plenty of distance. OK, this was really dumb, but after giving that driver the normal amount of time - he was way down the road - I turned my brights back on. The SUV's brake lights went on again. I pulled over and called 911. The SUV kept going, passing someone up ahead while going up a hill.

I had his plate number, and I gave it to the dispatcher along with a description of the SUV and its direction of travel. She said if any squads were in the area, they'd look for it. About a mile down the road, I saw a sheriff's SUV in a bar parking lot. As I passed, its lights (regular, not emergency) went on and it started pulling out. I turned and kept going on my way down a different road. I'd like to think they tracked the guy down.

I'm fine. My car's fine. As the title of this post says, I could have prevented this. But...

My dog has sinned

Remember from the last post that Jehovah's Witnesses booklet that my dog knocked in back of the TV stand. Well....

That's the shredded remains of the first few pages. I'm on the fifth day of leaving my dog alone, out of her crate, for a full shift while I'm at work. When I got home tonight, I discovered that she extracted the booklet and gave it some good chewing attention while I was gone.

I found the rest of the booklet upstairs and relatively intact; she apparently carried it up there at some point during the evening.

I don't consider this a major breach of rules on the dog's part, so she gets a passing grade for the night. The only major incident so far was on the first day, when she pulled a Ziploc bag of dog food off the kitchen counter (I had forgotten it was there), tore into it and ate it while I was at work. Aside from that, I've discovered a few things (a boot, a glove) moved around to different parts of the house, but nothing - other than the Jehovah's Witnesses booklet - destroyed.

If they come back, I guess I can legitimately say, "My dog ate it."

I'm on their list

I was sitting in the recliner around midday earlier this week, reading a book, when there was a knock on the door. It startled me, because someone knocks on the front door of my rural home maybe once every two months, if that.

I didn't bother running around to the side window to see who it was; I just opened the door.

"Hello - remember us?"

"Oh, God," I thought to myself.

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Let me go back a few months. It was sometime in late summer or early fall. There was a knock on the door. The conversation went something like this:

"Hello. Are you troubled by all the strife in the world, by the negative ads in the election?"

"Um... I guess."

"What are your hopes for the world?

"Um... Peace and prosperity for everyone?"

"Well, all that is possible and will happen when God returns. Are you ready for that day?"

"Um... I guess?"

Jehovah's Witnesses. This went on for about five minutes, with me too polite to ask them to leave, and them clearly too used to "Um... I guess" responses to be thrown off by my mounting discomfort.

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A sidenote... I have nothing against Jehovah's Witnesses, or any other religion that respects my beliefs as I respect theirs. It's just that, well, my beliefs are kind of undefined, and I've always felt that I've got better things to do with my time than ponder the issue. And I certainly am not going to delve into the topic with strangers standing on my doorstep.

And a second sidenote... In my childhood home, we had a "front" door that was never used, and in fact was sealed up with insulation year-round except for the little window that allowed quite a view into the heart of the house. Our "back" (or, more accurately, "side") door was the one we always used. As a kid, without fail, the only people who knocked on our front door were Jehovah's Witnesses. When they came knocking and I was home alone, I hid. Sometimes, I got caught in the living room with no exit other than to use the hallway where anyone looking in the front door window could see me. So, I used military special-ops maneuvers to dash and roll and cower behind furniture and door jambs as I made my way back to the safety of my bedroom. Eventually they would give up, stop knocking and leave.

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Back to my visitors.

It was a father and son. I did not take photos, but I think I have come up with two good representations by digging into my pop culture memory. The father looked like actor James Cromwell. The son looked like an autistic kid from New York named Jason McElwain who was made famous a few years back when he got in a high school basketball game and scored a ton of 3-pointers (that was back when I had ESPN and they played that story over and over).

The father (image from Wikipedia):

The son (image from Today Show Web site):

The son took the lead in the discussion, but he stuttered and stammered quite a bit. His dad was providing backup and assistance as needed. I guess the son was a proselytizing trainee. Eventually they asked if I'd like some literature. I said sure. They gave it to me and left. I set the booklets on top of the TV. They sat there for a couple months because I felt guilty about throwing them away.

Then, in November, I came home from running errands during the day to find a couple Jehovah's Witnesses brochures tucked in my front door. I overcame my guilt in about a week that time, and they ended up in the trash, too.

Then, the visit earlier this week.

"Hello - remember us?"

(Pause) A drawn-out, hesitant "Yeah"

"Did you watch the inauguration last week?"

"Yes"

"Are you hopeful about the future and what the president will do?"

"Um... I guess"

"What do you hope for in the world?"

"Um... Peace and prosperity for all?"

"Have you thought about all the wonderful things that will happen when God returns?"

And so on.

They asked if they could leave some literature again. I took it.

Only this time, before they left, the father said, "Read it over. Maybe we can discuss it in the future."

Oh, no. Do they have a list? It seems I'm on it.

Home during the day? Check.

Does not display a gun or sic the dog on us when we arrive? Check.

Takes our brochures? Double check.

So I face a dilemma. 

They are not hostile or pushy. If they were, I'd have no trouble telling them to please leave and not come back. But they aren't, and it seems wrong to tell them that. I haven't and will not invite them in the house, but to tell them to stay off my property seems unduly harsh.

Maybe I'll have to resort to my childhood special-ops maneuvers next time they come, and hope they go away on their own.

In the meantime, their latest booklet was sitting next to the TV until the dog, while snuffling around, knocked it off and in back of the TV stand. It'll probably be there for months.

Dreaming, Vol. 4

Last night I dreamed (I think. I hope?) that I woke up, and there were doors slamming and footsteps in the house. The layout of the bedroom and house were different than my bedroom and house, so I'm pretty sure it was a dream.

In the dream, I pulled the covers up over my head and hid. That's about all I can recall.

Possible explanation? The dog has taken up nighttime residence on an old rocking chair in the bedroom. If she squirms around during the night, the rocker bangs against the wall.

Odd side note... when I got up this morning, I noticed that the back door was unlocked and slightly ajar. I'm usually really paranoid about keeping that shut and locked at night, though I'm sure that, in the course of bringing in some stuff from the car the previous evening, I forgot to close it all the way. But still....