Some basketball Jones
I remember reading a story about Kevin Durant once.
Someone asked him, ‘What do you like to do for fun?’
KD’s answer came back quicker than one of his crossovers, ‘I play basketball.’
If that doesn’t make you miss Durant and the rest of your favorite Thunderers then I don’t know what will.
With the NBA lockout ongoing and not appearing like it will reach an end within the next few months, OKC fans might be feeling a pain of longing for their favorite basketball stars.
But have no fear… Kevin Durant and James Harden will be playing basketball again soon and you can watch it… for free!
Kevin Durant, who has been playing for the Goodman league, a DC basketball pro am league, will take on the Drew league, an LA pro am league which features fellow Thunder teammate James Harden.
The game is set for Aug. 20 in DC at Georgetown University.
The rosters are filled with a whose who of NBA talent:
Durant will be teamed up with John Wall (Wizards), Ty Lawson (Nuggets), Gary Neal (Spurs), Tyreke Evans (Kings), Michael Beasley (Timberwolves), DeMarcus Cousins (Kings), Josh Selby (Grizzlies), Sam Young (Grizzlies), Donte Green(Kings), Hugh “Baby Shaq” Jones (AND1 Tour), Emanuel “Duce” Jones and Warren “D-Nice” Jefferson
While Harden will have DeMar DeRozan (Raptors), Nick Young (Wizards), Dorrell Wright (Warriors), Brandon Jennings (Bucks), JaVale McGee (Wizards), Craig Smith (Clippers), Pooh Jeter (Kings), Bobby Brown (Aris BC), Marcus Williams (Grizzlies) and three more players yet to be named.
I don’t even care that this isn’t real NBA basketball or that the Goodman squad should win by 40 every game! This is probably as close as people will get to the NBA for months because of the lockout, and you can stream it for free on your computer! http://thebasketballchannel.net./
You’d be crazy not to watch! Right James Harden?
Let’s just hope Harden goes off and scores 50+ like he did a few weeks ago and maybe Durant can treat us all with another one of these:
Glass Case of Emotion
So the title is a reference to Anchorman: The legend of Ron Burgundy and if you haven’t watched it you’re missing out. Okay so the title is funny but the post itself is serious… seriously.
This Tuesday I was having dinner with a couple of friends, both of which have career aspirations within the medical field. One of them mentioned how emotionally draining the medical field is. Many of the stories she shared confirmed that. But I also realized how emotionally draining journalism is as well.
Some of the stories we cover every day take us on an emotional roller coaster. You can be happy, bewildered, scared or sad. For some reason I have the hardest time dealing with happy and sad. Sometimes when I do a feature over someone with a positive or happy story, I’m overcome by the character they’ve shown throughout their life or the struggles they had to overcome. I always feel so grateful to have met them.
The first time I experienced such strong emotion was when I covered the opening of the National WASP World War II Museum in my hometown of Sweetwater, Texas, a museum dedicated to Women Airforce Service Pilots. My hometown was where their training base was located. They were trailblazing patriots who paved the way for all women to be treated equally and to be able to serve their country. I cried on the way home after the ceremony; I was just so moved by their stories.
The latest incident of emotional news coverage happened last Friday. I interviewed the woman who helped make Oklahoma the first state with a 
pancreatic cancer awareness license plate. The tag will be released in November and $20 out of the tags $35 price will go towards pancreatic cancer research. The disease has grim statistics like – for every 425 patients diagnosed in Oklahoma this year with pancreatic cancer, 400 will die within one year from the disease. King chose to support this disease because her twin sister Connie died from it in 2008. Throughout the entire interview King kept it together except once when she spoke of life without her best friend.
“To be able to do this in her memory means a lot,” King said with a shaky voice. Then tears filled her eyes as she went on. “The first year was very difficult and I’ve gotten better. I’m past my grief but I still have my days.”
My eyes got a little teary but I held it together until I got in my car after the 
interview. I have a twin sister who just happened to be born three years late. We often say the same thing at the exact same time, wear the same thing though we live 10 hours apart and sometimes I’ll have strange emotions throughout the day that make no sense and it turns out she had a bad day. She was all I kept thinking of while I cried, but it was difficult forcing myself away from those thoughts during the interview. Even now while writing it, I have a lump in my throat.
I love this career but it is tough in so many ways. A professor once said that your Weltanshauung – German for world view, philosophy, ideology – is what makes you unique and a good journalist. But you’re a great journalist when you can remove yourself from your weltanshauung and just report.
Ali Harter is hitting her REM cycle.
Oklahoma songstress Ali Harter recently caught up with electronic reggae artist INABEATHEAD to cover the wonderful tune by REM “Losing My Religion.”
Listen to the song below and if you like it, you can buy it on iTunes!
For more info or to hear more sultry goodness by Ali, visit her website http://www.aliharter.com.
LOSING MY RELIGION feat ALI HARTER by INABEATHEAD (R.E.M. Cover) by Inabeathead
TOP 3: Quotes
I often wonder if there are an infinite number of ways to write a sentence, to speak a phrase, or even tell a story. The foundation of each are words. Words that by themselves may be meaningful or meaningless, yet when combined have the power to motivate, heal, encourage or inspire. This is why I want to share the TOP 3: Quotes that have a powerful meaning.
1.) Change is the law of life. And those who look only to the past or present are certain to miss the future.
John F. Kennedy
2.) History, despite its wrenching pain, cannot be unlived, but if faced with courage, need not be lived again.
Maya Angelou
3.)I arise in the morning torn between a desire to improve the world and a desire to enjoy the world. This makes it hard to plan the day.
E. B. White
- Tiffany
Doing the Noodle Dance!
Since this got removed from my actual story in print, I will say it here.
Noodling is basically one big ‘That’s What She Said” Joke.
Ah! Ok, I can breathe now.
Seriously though, when I got a hold of the noodlers that fellow intern Zach Gray and I would be following around, I couldn’t even imagine what would be in store for us for the weekend. I’ve been to the Okie Noodling Tournament in Paul’s Valley before, but to now be in cahoots with two guys who are allowing us to go watch the process of catching these river (and lake) monsters, I was more than just your average excited.
Zach and I met Tell and Chris in the parking lot of Mazzio’s Pizza in Stillwater, and we set off toward lake McMurtry in Payne County. Arriving just before 7 p.m., which was the start of the actual alloted time for the tournament, Zach and I climbed into the boat set off with Tell across the lake just as the sun was starting to set.
The actual process of getting in the water with thousands of dollars in camera equipment was much, much trickier.
With no water protective housing to aid us except for a camera that wasn’t producing the pictures Zach wanted, we both used the strategy of keeping one hand dry and praying to God that the tricky lakes of Oklahoma didn’t surprise us with some massive drop off.
Only once did things get hairy and that happened when I tripped over a fishing line that was left from a previous fool… but thankfully I had four feet of monopod to hoist the camera into the air while I took in too large of a gulp of tasty Canadian River.
No fish were caught the first night we went out, which was a real shame as the light was beautiful and the water felt great. Upon our return to shore, we struck up a deal with Tell that we would meet him and Chris the next morning in the hopes that we would find an unlucky fish or two along the Canadian River.
The whole experience was amazing and while I was riding in the boat under a setting sun with way too many people in it, all I could think about was how lucky I am to be in this funny profession of journalism where I can go and hang with guys that just like to have a good time and stick their hands in holes so catfish will bite them… seriously they want to do this!
Noodle on noodlers.
Road Trip Series: Part 3
In theory, waking up early to beat the extreme summer heat sounds like a great idea, but when my alarm went off at 6 a.m. Saturday morning, I couldn’t help getting out of bed halfheartedly.
We were supposed to meet at 8 a.m., but my GPS and I got into a fight on my way to pick up Tiffany. Thankfully, Annelise and Whitney understood as we rolled out of the city at 8:30 a.m. for the third part of the road trip series.
Near the top of Mt. Scott in the Wichita Mountains Wildlife Refuge. Photo by Krystle Wagner, The Oklahoman
After the hour and a half drive, our first stop was Mt. Scott in the Wichita Mountains Wildlife Refuge.
The drive up Mt. Scott was nerve-wracking. I feared driving off the edge of the mountain, so I gripped the steering wheel and avoided looking at the beautiful view until we reached the top.
The scenery was magnificent. After a few moments of admiring our surroundings, we walked down part of the mountain before driving through the rest of the park.
I wasn’t prepared for all the rocks and boulders. Walking down the side of the mountain was fun, though slightly worrisome when rocks shifted under my feet. I didn’t want to end up like the popular YouTube video “Scarlet takes a tumble.”
Tiffany and Whitney explored and climbed the large boulders while Annelise and I were perfectly content staying safely on the ground.
A herd of buffalo slows its roll on a hot summer day in the Wichita Mountains Wildlife Refuge. Photo by Krystle Wagner, The Oklahoman
As we drove further into the park, it was exactly what I expected, and hoped, it would be – vast lands and wildlife I’m not accustomed to seeing.
Out of everyone, I think I was the most excited to see buffalo. On a family vacation through a national park, we saw buffalo and other wildlife but that was about 10 years ago.
Our next destination was another trail we could walk.
We thought we beat the extreme summer heat, but we were wrong. The temperature gauge on the vehicle was 107 degrees when we prepared to walk on the Dog Run Hallow National Recreation Trail.
If the trail needs one thing, it would be more signs. The path was so poorly marked that we weren’t sure which path we were on, or if we were even following a path.
A canyon along a trail in the Wichita Mountains Wildlife Refuge. Photo by Krystle Wagner, The Oklahoman
It was a beautiful walk, but the excruciating heat quickly wore us down; however, it helped us build up a thirst and an appetite.
From the outside, Meers Store and Restaurant in Meers near Lawton, doesn’t seem like a good choice for food.
The long wait for a table and our meals created anticipation for the food. If it didn’t compare to the great things I heard, it would have put a damper on the trip.
The Meerscheesburger was delicious and completely worth the wait. According to the website, Meers makes their burgers from Longhorn beef.
A downside to the restaurant is they only accept cash.
I hate to play favorites, but this was my favorite trip thus far. The park was wonderful and the food was fantastic.
Striking out on Amazon’s new textbook rental feature
What a perfect excuse.
Amazon's Kindle ebook reader. (AP Photo/ Mark Lennihan, file)
I’ve wanted an e-reader for as long as they have existed, but my college student budget has kept a Nook or Kindle just out of reach.
When I saw that Amazon released a new textbook rental feature for Kindle, I saw it as an opportunity. Especially when they advertise it with, “Save up to 80 percent off the list price of the print textbook.”
Eighty percent? Whoa. That’s a big gap. In fact, I thought, that’s enough savings to buy a Kindle and still come out with my rented textbooks in the black. Right?
Well…
The Mashable.com article said Amazon has tens of thousands of textbooks to choose from. Also, if you rent it for the Kindle, you also get it on your mobile device and laptop computer. Not a bad combo. I decided to test my luck and see what kind of savings I could get.
Here’s what I found:
Screenshot of Amazon.com's Textbook Rental Page. Click to enlarge.
Out of the five classes (15 credit hours, average for college students) I am enrolled in for the fall at the University of Kentucky, I only needed five books.
Now that is unusual, but I take communication/journalism and political science classes, two fairly popular majors, so my chances of big savings should be high.
But out of the five books I needed, only one of them was available on Amazon.com for the Kindle. And that one book was not eligible for the textbook rental program.
Shucks.
My hopes and dreams of getting my hands on my own Kindle were shattered as quickly as they were shaped, but not everyone will have my luck.
TOP 3: Aijuswanascream
AAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH. Screaming is what I feel like doing right no. But, since I am in the office I will settle for screaming in this blog posts. If you can’t tell by now, I am very frustrated. I recorded a video clip to go with one of my stories, and its not on my camera. What happened? The batteries were low and it cutoff before saving. Instead of throwing the Flipcam on the ground like I want to do right now, I’ll settle for blogging about the TOP 3: Things I hate about technology to relieve some of my frustrations.
1.) Cost – I hate how new technology cost so much, yet it breaks down so often. To make matters worst technology always fails during the most inconvenient times. Now, how much sense does it make for my computer to fail during the time frame where it would be most useful.
2.) The Way Things Work – When components get old, they burn out and began to fail. Now I wouldn’t complain so much if it didn’t cost so much to buy or fix. While this sounds the the human aging process, it is much different considering the fact that you don’t have to pay to be born (FYI your parents may have to pay, but you don’t).
3.) Childlike Behavior – Have you ever noticed, that when you tell a computer to do something, sometimes it behaves like a child and doesn’t do what you tell it to do? Then, when you go to ask for help and the other person does exactly what you did all of a sudden it works and you look like the crazy inexperienced person.
Yes, me and technology have a love/hate relationship. And yes, this blog did help to relieve some stress.
- Tiffany
Public Transportation
I am currently working on a story about public transportation in Oklahoma City and the surrounding areas (primarily Norman and Edmond). Twice last week I experienced first hand what it’s like to be a commuter. I traveled once from Edmond to the office and another time from Norman to the office. Both trips took two hours. This made no sense to me as it takes 45 minutes to drive all the way from Norman and 15 to drive from Edmond to work.
The issue is the spoke and hub system that OKC’s Metro Transit currently uses. This system has been in place since Metro Transit was established in 1966. While routes have been added extended and moved around the system has stayed basically the same. Michael Scroggins of Metro Transit says the company is well aware that the system is outdated.
While Metro Transit can do research and propose different options it is up to the city to vote upon and fund them. Unfortunately, it seems this is unlikely to happen. The cities funding is not a dedicated annual amount. Metro Transit received almost $2 million more in funding in 2011 than 2010. When the budget surpasses expectations you won’t hear many complaining but it’s a different story when it’s below.
The service has had to raise fees in the past year by a quarter but it can’t raise them by much more. But raising passenger fees anymore could result in the decrease of federal funding.
But the company and service is in a pickle. Metro Transit would love to increase their coverage and regularity and the public demand is there yet they cannot do this without funding. However the city will not allocate more funding until they can see the benefits of it. It’s an egg before the chicken or chicken before the egg puzzle.
In the meantime I’m a terrible gas guzzler. But I’m hoping to move to an area within the city that would make using public transit more sensible.
Eastward just south of me (tornado destruction)
A man named Tim drove me around Piedmont yesterday. We followed the path of the May tornado from east to west by northwest. It was humbling to see the destruction, even two months later.
It was more humbling to hear the story of goodwill from members of the community after the storm. The tornado didn’t just lay waste to lives and homes. It raked across the countryside like an errant plowshare and buried small town politics. If only temporarily.
Earlier this week I surveyed some of the damage alone. The day before I went out there my cousin told me it looked like a scene from “Apocalypse Now,” but I didn’t really believe him.
Some homes were leveled. Many looked like chewed up shoeboxes. One reminded me of a grand piano, with chunks of wall missing and its roof splayed upward like a propped lid. But it wasn’t grand and the only music I could hear was the overbearing wind pushing a storm eastward just south of me.
Three guys were cleaning up the remnants of a home less than a quarter-mile away. They were busting up the foundation with a jackhammer. The driver of the Bobcat would hit the throttle – dumping pressure through the hydraulic lines like adrenaline in the bloodstream – and slam the metal spike into the concrete in rapid bursts. It was destruction razing destruction so that someone can rebuild.
Some residents don’t plan to rebuild.
Tim said construction of one house was completed shortly before the tornado wiped it out.
He told me a story of homeowners who had been fighting with their insurance company for months before the storm. They were uninsured and lost everything.
One house had just been rebuilt from a fire not long before it was demolished by the tornado.
Another house has already been repaired and sold.
Some homes had been relatively new and others had been there for 30 years. One had 12 windows busted out but was otherwise untouched. Others were reduced to twisted metal and piles of bricks and wood scattered across the ground.
The drone of the Bobcat motor and the “pop-pop-pop” of the jackhammer combined with the debris and destruction gave the former neighborhood the semblance of a warzone.
My cousin was right.
This is some of the footage I shot. I will have more video with my story. The structure in the third image used to be a three story house. Check out the last scene of the storm shelter and the storm in the background, there used to be multiple trees and houses behind the now-vacant foundation.
