Back to Normal--er, Austin
This, once again, is Austin, Texas. Yep, one of the longest weeks of my life has passed, and I'm none the worse for wear.
Okay...I didn't win the "Katie" award Saturday night in Dallas. Not a huge surprise, because I'm not as well known in Texas as the two other nominees. I'm still proud of the work and the nomination. It's a good start. (It's worth noting yet another Lyndon B. Johnson connection from this trip: The hotel Sarah booked for us was on the LBJ Freeway. Put that along with the fact that LBJ was president when I was born, the fact that the LBJ Museum is located in Austin and the fact I work at KLBJ, owned by the Johnson family until two years ago and the succeeding paragraph, and you'll see why I shake my head at the mention of LBJ.)
Had a chance to nose around Big D for the first time. We had to make the pilgrimage to Dealey Plaza, where President Kennedy was assassinated 42 years ago this month. If you've never seen it, the whole area looks very much like it did the day JFK was shot. There's a non-descript "x" in the middle of Elm Street, leading past the plaza past the fabled "Grassy Knoll" and toward a triple overpass that knits that street together with Main and Commerce Streets to form the Stemmons Freeway, leading you to Parkland Hospital, where Kennedy died. There are a couple of plaques on the plaza, too. Looming over the plaza is the red brick building that was the Texas School Book Depository. In the southeast corner of the building, you can clearly see what looks like a sniper's nest, from whence the shots were fired that made Lyndon Johnson President of the United States. It was rather chilling, and yet I shake my head again.
I did something remarkably foolish this afternoon: I launched an informal campaign to be the next News Director of KLBJ. Frankly, my chance of getting the job rival that of a snowball's survival in Hell, but I'll go through the process. I don't doubt my ability to do the job, mind you. I really don't want to be news director under our current program director. His interpersonal philosophies and mine don't really mesh. But, the worst they'll do is tell me "no." I'm an American man, living in the 21st Century. It's not like I've never heard "no" before.
My now-former news director called from his plush new office at KRLD in Dallas. We will work together again. He's one of the good ones. Being an Oregonian abroad does have some advantages, I guess. I've lived in Nirvana...and I survived a week in Chiloquin. Dallas wouldn't be a bad next step.
Okay...I didn't win the "Katie" award Saturday night in Dallas. Not a huge surprise, because I'm not as well known in Texas as the two other nominees. I'm still proud of the work and the nomination. It's a good start. (It's worth noting yet another Lyndon B. Johnson connection from this trip: The hotel Sarah booked for us was on the LBJ Freeway. Put that along with the fact that LBJ was president when I was born, the fact that the LBJ Museum is located in Austin and the fact I work at KLBJ, owned by the Johnson family until two years ago and the succeeding paragraph, and you'll see why I shake my head at the mention of LBJ.)
Had a chance to nose around Big D for the first time. We had to make the pilgrimage to Dealey Plaza, where President Kennedy was assassinated 42 years ago this month. If you've never seen it, the whole area looks very much like it did the day JFK was shot. There's a non-descript "x" in the middle of Elm Street, leading past the plaza past the fabled "Grassy Knoll" and toward a triple overpass that knits that street together with Main and Commerce Streets to form the Stemmons Freeway, leading you to Parkland Hospital, where Kennedy died. There are a couple of plaques on the plaza, too. Looming over the plaza is the red brick building that was the Texas School Book Depository. In the southeast corner of the building, you can clearly see what looks like a sniper's nest, from whence the shots were fired that made Lyndon Johnson President of the United States. It was rather chilling, and yet I shake my head again.
I did something remarkably foolish this afternoon: I launched an informal campaign to be the next News Director of KLBJ. Frankly, my chance of getting the job rival that of a snowball's survival in Hell, but I'll go through the process. I don't doubt my ability to do the job, mind you. I really don't want to be news director under our current program director. His interpersonal philosophies and mine don't really mesh. But, the worst they'll do is tell me "no." I'm an American man, living in the 21st Century. It's not like I've never heard "no" before.
My now-former news director called from his plush new office at KRLD in Dallas. We will work together again. He's one of the good ones. Being an Oregonian abroad does have some advantages, I guess. I've lived in Nirvana...and I survived a week in Chiloquin. Dallas wouldn't be a bad next step.