Jamey Tucker’s BlogSquat

Whenever I watch my kids participate in a play or musicial or anything else really, I feel like I’m in one of those insurance commercials. You know, the “life comes at you fast” ads.

I picked up a new video camera a few months back. It’s a Kodak Zi8 which shoots high definition and fits in your shirt pocket. The advantage of having a video capable of capturing such high quality within reach at all times far outweighs the disadvantages that a pocket-sized camcorder brings with it.

Plus, this one has an audio-input so I can connect a wireless or wired microphone for interviews.

One of the neat features of this and some of other flip-style cameras is that you can hook it up to your computer and in a few minutes( seriously, 13 for this one) you can upload it to YouTube.

Sunday night, Delaney was part of the “He Has Been Good” musical at our church, FBC Hendersonville, TN. It’s an annual production just before Thanksgiving where the children’s choir sings and we collect new toys to give to kids whose parent’s aren’t able to give this year.

I’ve uploaded the performance of the song her group danced to.

Once the video starts playing, you can click the HD button on the lower right (the red one) to watch in High Definition.

Happy Thanksgiving!

When I heard Garth Brooks announced he is out of retirement and preparing for an extended string of shows in Las Vegas it made me flash back to 1990 and my favorite interview of all time.

Ask most reporters in Nashville who their favorite person to interview is and they usually say Garth Brooks (I’ve asked several). He is genuinely one of the nicest guys I’ve ever met, or one of the most genuine nice guys I’ve ever met. Not only nice, but engaging.

I haven’t shaken his hand since interviewing him in 1991, but I’m told that he is the type who never forgets a face and would likely say “Hi Jamey, didn’t we meet years ago?”

I was vj’ing Fan Fair working for WJSU-TV40 in the spring of 1991.  I talked my news director into letting me go with the promise that I could send back stories each day to run in the newscasts, plus I would write and edit a 30 minute special on country music that the station could sell and place advertising.

Garth Brooks was a tough interview to get. Everybody wanted him after his “No Fences” album hit #3 on the pop chart (unheard of back then Taylor Swift).  In addition to shooting, writing and editing a story every day and then feeding it to Anniston from WTVF, I started positioning myself to be somewhere around Garth’s publicist.

“Be at his booth tomorrow morning at 5″ she said. “He’s doing ‘Good Morning America’, maybe I can let you ask him a few questions.

I stumbled in, lugging my tripod, gigantic camera and portapack (an enormous contraption that held the ceiling tile sized videotape and connected to the camera using something we called an umbilical cord). Garth was sitting in his autograph signing booth, wide-eyed in a cowboy hat like he’d just slept the best 8 hours of his life.

The “Good Morning America” producer immediately started shouting at me to get out and not come back. The network morning shows, if you are not aware, are very protective of their guests. “We have an exclusive with Garth” she said, and “You cannot interview him today.” I tried to explain that the interview I wanted would not air for a few weeks and even then, would air only in the 172nd market in the country, but she didn’t care. Garth looked at me like “sorry dude, wish I could”.

I didn’t leave but hung around hoping for an opportunity.  Willard Scott was interviewing Vince Gill and Patti Loveless who would also sing their hit “When I Call Your Name” in the booth next to Garth’s so I figured at least it’ll be a good show.

Garth’s interview with Charlie Gibson by satellite was about to start. The lights came up, a photographer framed the shot, Garth started to answer Charlie’s first question and….everybody stopped. New York lost the satellite connection. I could see Charlie on a little tv monitor apologize for the technical problem and everybody, including the rude little producer woman, started scrambling.

In a few minutes it was discovered the problem was in a cable running out of the camera. It couldn’t be fixed in time. GMA’s big get, was gone. My camera became important.

The nasty producer demanded I let the photographer use my camera so ABC could try the interview again in the next hour.  “NO”, I’m not doing that. Since I can’t interview him, I’m leaving” I told her. The photographer was nicer, explaining if I let him use my camera it would bail him out of dealing with that horrible woman. “Only if I can interview Garth and you shoot it”. She relented and during the hour-long wait, I not only got my interview with Garth, I had a photographer shoot it for me.

It was the best interview I’ve ever had. Garth was completely engaging, answering each question with interest. I had heard him tell a story about one of his first concerts that coincidentally came in Anniston and asked if he would explain “The Anniston Nine”. His story is still the longest on camera interview answer with no video I’ve ever put on tv.

Afterwords, Garth introduced me to his mom and dad who watching their suddenly famous son. Later that day after he performed in a downpour at the Fan Fair stage, Garth saw me backstage, called me over and introduced me to his wife Sandy, and then asked someone to take a picture of us. I’ve got it around here somewhere.

I’ve interviewed my share of celebrities and it’s not always good. I know many reporters who refuse to interview or even meet their favorite artist for fear it will destroy what they think of that person. Famous people get asked the same questions over and over again by different reporters in different cities. They can have a bad day. They can just be tired or uninterested. The reporter can be a jerk.

But I’ve never heard a bad story from anyone about interviewing Garth Brooks.

He’s my favorite interview. Do you have one?

Garth Brooks is still the coolest guy I’ve ever interviewed. A lot

No more pig jokes. Swine flu may be a lot more serious than health officials say.

http://www.vimeo.com/6654696

Sad to hear of John Hughes passing on Thursday. I would hazard a guess that I’ve watched more of his movies than any one else on the face of the earth. Growing up in the 80’s you couldn’t miss his movies.

“Pretty in Pink”, “The Breakfast Club”, “Vacation”, “Planes Trains and Automobiles”, “Uncle Buck”, “Home Alone”, “Sixteen Candles”, “Mr. Mom” and “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off”.

Has there ever been a Hollywood writer/director who’s delivered that many iconic movies in such a short period of time? John Hughes entertained and maybe influenced as many people teenagers in the 1980s as anyone else.

It’s interesting because my wife’s favorite movie is “Pretty in Pink” while one of mine, and certainly my favorite Hughes film is “Some Kind of Wonderful”. It’s interesting because these two movies are basically from the same script.

The way I’ve heard the story, John Hughes’ script for  “Pretty in Pink” ended with with the girl (Molly Ringwald) choosing the the un-popular boy, Ducky played by Jon Cryer. But, Hollywood didn’t like it. The producers wanted the typical Hollywood ending where Andie Walsh gets the popular boy (Andrew McCarthy).

“Pretty in Pink” went to the screen that way despite Hughes’ disapproval.  A year later, when Hughes had made enough money to produce himself, he dusted off “Pretty in Pink” switched the genders and brought us “Some Kind of Wonderful”.

Here’s a clip from that movie: the smoking scene where Keith Nelson (Eric Stoltz) gets a kissing lesson from Watts, played by Mary Stuart Masterson.  She’s really in love with him, but is helping him get ready for a date with Amanda. Enjoy.

Careful what you write out there in blogger-world. The Associated Press is watching…and waiting.

The AP has felt cheated from the first time the first blogger took something out of a newspaper and put it in quotation marks on their blog or website. They’ve taken it on the chin for long enough, now they want you to pay up.

Here’s the dealio: cut, copy and paste anything from an Associated Press article online or in print and bloggers will be found and charged.

The rates are as follows: 5 words to 25 words for $12.50 26-50 words, $17.50, and more than 250 words will cost you $100.00. The AP will use software that will identify where AP content is showing up on the internet and send the author a bill.

First off: I can’t blame the Associated Press folks a bit for being angry. A simple Google search for one of today’s big AP stories: “Jackson Estate Confronts Fake Merchandise Dealers” finds 3,476 news articles. Some of those are obviously on news sites which pay for AP content, but it’s pretty safe to say that some of those articles are from blogs and other sites that are just grabbing quotes and other information from the story and re-printing them, so to speak, on their own sites.

We do not want a world without The Associated Press. I don’t. I don’t want our news to come from people like Perez Hilton who are looking only for eyeballs rather than honest truth-telling reporting. But if the AP doesn’t survive, and doesn’t thrive in this economy, there will be a lot more journalists creating their own web news content for profit. Then, we won’t know who to believe.

But is the Associated Press on to something by charging by the copied and pasted word? Will it stop people like me (yes I’ve done it) from posting an opinion on a story and including part of of the story itself?

Oh, and by the way, if I get billed for anything in this post, would someone loan me a few bucks.

image courtesy of Edans through Creative Commons license

I needed Tom Watson to win the British Open. Not because I had money on the tournament or any vested interest in Watson. I needed Tom Watson to win the British Open because I’m watching other parts of  my childhood fade away.

Notice all of the irony here: when Tom Watson won his first Masters, Farrah Fawcett was Jill Monroe every week on Charlies Angels. Walter Cronkite was telling us “the way it is”,  Ed McMahon was sitting at Johnny’s desk, and Michael Jackson was still part of The Jackson’s and just a few months away from recording  “Shake Your Body (Down to the Ground)”.

Now Farrah is gone. Walter is gone. Ed McMahon is gone. Michael Jackson is gone. And he was 50.   50!

And if Farrah Fawcett and Michael Jackson are old enough to die, so are the baby boomers who grew up watching them. We’re not ready to think about stuff like that, but we have to now.

This is already going to be remembered as the summer the 1970s died. Back when I was in the 6th grade with a tv in my bedroom, a nerf hoop on the back of my closet door and a Juliette model stereo tuned to Q-104. My room was painted blue with burnt orange shag carpet and I had posters of Dr. J and Pat Sullivan on the wall. I talked to my girlfriend, Kathy Driggs on the phone nearly every night. With a long telephone extension chord my dad got so I could take the phone to my room for privacy.

But I don’t want those days to be 30 years ago, at least I don’t want to feel like they’re 30 years ago. I want to remember them like I’ve always done, like they were yesterday.

So when Tom Watson walked down the fairway of the 18th at Turnberry, leading The British Open,  I got a lump in my throat. Suddenly, it felt like 1977 again, and I needed him to make that darned 10 foot putt.

If people could will something to happen, I think every over 40 man in America would have caused that Titleist to drop in that cup like there was a string attached to it.

We needed something good to happen for one of our memories of the 1970s.

But it didn’t fall. And it’s 2009. And our childhood is literally beginning to pass before our eyes.

According to Facebook quizzes, I’m:

• I’m a German Shepherd,
• Sirhan Sirhan,
• orange,
• Bea Arthur,
• a wookie,
• fork,
• sea sponge,
• 28% black,
• Captain Stubeng,
• North Dakota,
• the Hindenberg,
• Alfalfa,
• pineapple-strawberry smoothie,
• 8pm,
• Tuesday,
• 1979,
• the 80s,
• Dan Akroyd,
• filet o’ fish,
• Mellow Yellow,
• freshwater catfish,
• a dime,
• bumblebee.
• black-eyed susan,
• October,
• Arbor Day,
  
• “The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald”,
  
• Tito,
  
• Toto,
• “Casablanca”,
  
• Dodger Stadium,
  
• Sweden,
  
• Grandfather clock,
  
• blue spruce,
• Cannonball Run II,
• 2nd period history class,
• Rwanda,
  
• and finally:         Captain Feathersword.

Five years ago this month I totally choked at a job interview and audition. Good thing I can laugh about it now.

I didn’t have a contract at WREG in Memphis, hadn’t sent out any resumes and had no idea what I was going to do next. I wasn’t doing much except complaining.

My cellphone rang one day and the call was from the news director at the tv station I really wanted to work for in Birmingham. Morning anchor job open, come down for interview and audition next weekend.

The next day, a news director friend in Knoxville called with the exact same opening. Fly in next weekend for an interview and audition.

Read the rest of this entry »

Most people think Twitter has already hit the bigtime. Local and national news organizations are using it to gather information and connect with viewers. Celebrities are tweeting. Jimmy Fallon pulls a guy out of the audience and he has nearly a million followers.

It’s huge! Gi-normous.

But you haven’t seen anything yet.

Teenagers haven’t embraced twitter. They’re still texting. Oh, they facebook, but if my 19 year old daughter is any indication, facebook sort of jumped the shark when parents got accounts.

And now there’s twitter which their parents have gotten to first. I haven’t talked to any teenagers who’ve joined Twitter. I don’t hear them talking about tweets. But they’re about to.

This morning I reserved the Twitter user names for my wife and kids. My daughter said “yeah…okay. thanks” as she walked past me to the television carrying “The Disney Channel”. Then I showed her how it works and found the first person to follow…..

Miley Cyrus.

That’s when she screamed loud enough to make the neighborhood dogs barked. My daughter became the 32,948th follower of  Miley (and yes I checked it out before to make sure it’s really her).

She got a twitter account over the weekend at the urging of her sister Brandi.

So now my daughter is all over Twitter along with about a 1/100th of Miley’s fans.

And yes I’m following now too, my daughter and Miley just to make sure there’s nothing dad doesn’t know about that he should.

We’ve been having some fun around the house. Delaney came home from school saying her Irish teacher believes a leprechaun has been playing some tricks when they were out of the classroom.

Now that may be. But what happened next in our house should be remembered for a while.

First, the leprechaun’s started playing little tricks. Then Friday night while we were all out, the leprechauns left gold coins scattered throughout the house. Several in Delaney’s room. She was scared, but she laughed.

The next morning when I got up, Delaney was asleep in Trey’s bed. When she was in the shower, the leprechauns lined up all of the shoes in her room. Then when she came back from playing outside Saturday, her shoes had been stacked in a pyramid on her bed.

Sunday afternoon when she opened her bedroom door, shoes fell from the top of the door.

So Delaney and I searched the internet for history on leprechauns but what caught our attention the most was this honest to goodness news story from Mobile, Alabama’s NBC affiliate. Many of you have seen it already. But for those who haven’t: