Author: jbenton

Oh, there is one other bit of news. Thanks to the glorious reporting skills of Katherine, yours truly will be on CBC Radio One this Saturday. It’ll be just after the 2 p.m. news on Definitely Not the Opera, the CBC’s pop culture show. I’m not sure what made it through the edits, but I’m probably talking about the Mazie Project or blogging in general. If any of my Canadian homies saw fit to tape the show, I would be, commes les Quebecois disent, toujours reconnaissant.
This knocks a big item off my life to-do list (“Have my voice broadcast to the people of my ancestral lands”). Canadaphiles unite!
One other thing I feel I should mention, if only to taunt Fiona, the friend I was visiting in Boston last weekend. Fiona’s a very, very bright woman. Just a couple of weeks ago, she got a master’s at Harvard, to add to her Yale degree and her two years spent teaching in a Princeton program in China.
Aside from her intelligence, Fiona can also be very competitive. Which is why it gets to her that she will never defeat me in Trivial Pursuit.
I’ve probably played Trivial Pursuit fewer than a dozen times in the last decade — except for those times I’m with Fiona. She always wants to play. It started five years ago, just after our college graduation, when I was spending a couple of weeks at her house in Seattle. (We were dating at the time.)
We played a few games. And I won them all. From that point on, it became a matter of principle — she had to keep trying to even the score.
Unfortunately for Fiona, it’s never happened. We haven’t kept count of how many games we’ve played, but it’s certainly into the dozens. I’m something like 38-0. Fiona doesn’t like losing. At all.
So Sunday, when I was about to get on my flight back to Dallas, she decided to challenge me again. The first game was close — but I still won. Poor Fiona — her need for a victory reduced her to begging for odd rules (like, “Let’s play a partial game I can end early, and whoever’s ahead at that point will be an official winner”). In the end, we decided to rush through one more complete game. Six pie pieces to three: it wasn’t close.
I’ve thought about throwing a game to make her feel better. But then I realize that in a couple of years, she’ll be busy curing diseases, snipping out tumors, and otherwise saving lives. And I’m still be asking stupid questions to illiterate school board members. And I figure I might as well have something to hold over her.

Obligatory self-link: I helped out on today’s front-page story on the Edison Schools in Dallas.
I have to crank out three stories in the next shift, so again, blogging will be sporadic. And I leave early Friday for Las Vegas and my old college roommate‘s bachelor party. So consider this a fine opportunity to visit other happy blogs for a few days. “Wacky” crabwalk.com content will return soon enough.

Sorry I’ve been such a half-assed blogger of late. Been busy. The trip to Boston last weekend was wonderful, thanks for asking.
A few random links to tide you over until I come up with something interesting to say:
– TrademarkBots. Anyone else had these guys crawling your pages?
– Glorious Noise. “Glorious Noise is all about how rock and roll can change your life.”
– Eccentric New Orleans. I’ve been on a New Orleans kick of late (also recommended).
– Acadian Railway Company. Someone please give me lots of money.
– Girls Are Pretty. There’s plenty of room for formal innovation in blogs.
– Gigposters.com.

For Dallasites: KERA cuts 25 percent of staff. Most prominent among the laid off is Krys Villasenor, host of the (often vapid) evening talk show, Conversations. (Kremlinologists will notice her photo already been removed from its spot on the radio station’s web page alongside Glenn Mitchell’s, mere hours after the putsch.) I was not a Krys fan, but come on, she’s been out on maternity leave for the last month. That’s rude.
Now on KERA at 7 p.m.: a repeat of Fresh Air (an improvement), followed by The Tavis Smiley Show at 8.

Last weekend was my five-year college reunion. It was much more fun than I’d imagined. A few quick thoughts:
– This is really the last chance I’ll have to see most of these folks while our incomes are even remotely at the same level. As they become wealthy doctors/lawyers/bankers/etc., and as I remain a newspaper reporter, the gap will grow. But at the moment, they’re all weighted down by debt! I’ll enjoy the relative parity while it lasts.
– I was talking with my old roommate Bob — the one whose bachelor party I’m going to in Las Vegas next weekend — when the movie The Tao of Steve came up. We both said we enjoyed it and its lead character, Dex. Then Bob threw in the kicker: “Yeah, [his fiancee] Stacey and I were watching the movie and we both thought the same thing: Dex reminded us of you.”
Ouch. (I think.) Bob did clarify that a bit, pointing out the two biggest differences — Dex has a huge gut and no ambition, whereas I have a more manageable gut and too much ambition. But still: ouch.
– Shame’s a funny thing. I can’t tell you how many times I had this conversation with classmates who are, by any societal measure, launching tremendously successful careers:
Classmate: Hey, Josh! Great to see you! What have you been up to?
Me: Well, I’m still a newspaper reporter, at the Dallas Morning News.
Classmate: That’s great!
Me: How about you?
Classmate: (suddenly staring at feet, voice down a few decibels, shifting weight from side to side) Um, I’m a…lawyer.
(Or insert “investment banker,” “consultant,” “going to business school,” etc. Only the doctors seemed to remain unashamed.)

Now this is a candidate I can get behind. Not because of his political views — because of his kick-ass website. Click around, but here are a few highlights:
– Headline: Dan tries to impress girl with