Archive for the ‘Other’ Category

I’m off this week. My first week off of calendar 2009. In case you were wondering. If not, that’s OK, too.

Vacation reading: Finished “The Abominable Man” by Maj Sjowall and Per Wahloo. (Swedish detective stories — I’m addicted.) Am three-fourths of the way through “Inherent Vice” by Thomas Pynchon.

Next up: Beats me. Maybe the Neil Young biography “Shakey.” (Finally bought “Archives Vol. 1.”) Maybe a book of short stories by Henning Mankell. (More Swedish detection.) Maybe something else.

Back Monday. In case you were wondering. If not, that’s OK, too.

Continue reading Normal service has been interrupted due to vacation »

As some of you already know, I’ve been invited to participate in a three-day brainstorming session at the ol’ AJC, and today is Day 2. I managed to squeeze off two posts during Monday afternoon’s proceedings, but that was just me being my juvenile-delinquent self. I’m thinking I shouldn’t press my luck from here on.

For one thing, Monday was mostly a review. Today we get serious, cogitation-wise. And that brings us to the other thing: Wednesday and Thursday we’ll be at Cox’s palatial corporate HQ, as opposed to the AJC building downtown. When you visit corporate, you tread softly and follow the rules.

So I, barring that long-simmering Braves trade — Greg Norton for Albert Pujols — will endeavor to stop posting and commenting long enough to do two more days’ worth of brainstorming. The trouble with that is, as bad as I am at posting and commenting, I’m worse at brainstorming.

I still haven’t been able to fathom why the Jethro Bodine of sports writing was picked for anything …

Continue reading Normal service will be interrupted due to brainstorms »

This one’s for Mrs. Lou Bradley of Maysville, Ky. Or, as I like to call her, “Mom.” And Mom always said — and I mean always — that “your sins will find you out.”

Last week a video of Erin Andrews, of whom you’ve heard, surfaced on the Internet. It was shot through a peephole in a hotel room and it featured — and here the hearts of 10 million fanboys go all a-flutter — footage of Ms. Andrews unclad. Her lawyer acted quickly to have such footage removed from the Web.

“While alone in the privacy of her hotel room, Erin Andrews was surreptitiously videotaped without her knowledge or consent,” wrote her attorney, Marshall P. Grossman of Santa Monica, in a statement released on PR Newswire. “She was the victim of a crime and is taking action to protect herself and help ensure that others are not similarly violated in the future. Although the perpetrator or perpetrators of this criminal act have not yet been identified, when they are identified she intends to bring both civil and …

Continue reading Erin Andrews! Nude video! Better cool those jets, hotshot »

I’m going to cover the Hawks’ press conference — officially, we’re supposed to call it a “news conference,” but I delight in flouting regulations — this afternoon. It starts at 3 p.m. (or thereabouts — the Hawks always run late). I’m supposed to post something new by 3 p.m., but I need to go to the press/news conference to conjure up something for tomorrow’s print AJC.

Sooooo … here’s a little trivia question for you folks. (As anyone who has been following the extremely unedifying Melanie Griffith discussion today has doubtless realized, I know way too much trivia for my own good.) Someone posed this one to me a few years back, and I got it right. But I had to think hard for a few minutes. Maybe you will have less trouble.

Or maybe you just won’t care. I know trivia has that effect on some people. But there is, I should stipulate, a catch to this one. The first person to get this right will be extended the opportunity to write a Guest Blog in this space. You can pick the …

Continue reading A trivia question that carries – yes! – an invitation to blog »

Pretty cool, huh? A picture of this post atop this post. High-tech, like. (Photo by M. Bradley)

If you’re counting at home — and literally, I just did — this marks my 102nd post in 40 days. I mention this because six weeks ago my job description underwent a major readjustment, as I’m sure many among you have noticed. And just this week two respected pros — Claude Felton, Georgia’s Hall of Fame publicist, and Kim Shreckengost, Arthur Blank’s longtime deputy — asked: “So how often do you write now?”

That in mind, I’ve decided to compile what we digital types — technically, I work in Digital at the AJC now, not Sports — call FAQs. (Frequently Asked Questions, for the newbies.) I hope these will be of some service as we move forward in this bold endeavor.

So how often do you write now?

The idea is to post three times a day, Monday through Friday, the target times being 7 a.m., 11 a.m. and 3 p.m. Obviously this is subject to change when I’m covering a live event or a night game, …

Continue reading The facts of blog: Three times a day, five days a week »