Elliott Spitzer coverage

(Sarcastically speaking) It was very difficult to find anything on the demise of New York Governor Elliott Spitzer's downfall this weekend. The 24 hour news channels have been wall-to-wall with the coverage on Spitzer. And it hasn't just been about Spitzer. It's also put the spotlight on a call girl. The prostitute has a MySpace page and is/was hoping to be a recording artist. She had a song on her MySpace page which cost 60 cents to download. Guess what. As a result of all of this media frenzy, her song has been downloaded over one-million times...putting a nice amount of change in her pocket.

I haven't named the young lady here. I don't see the point. I think her getting famous off of this is crazy. At the same time though, not all of this is her fault. I saw a story on CNN Headline News that showed the media frenzy outside of the building where the governor was holding his press conference with his wife by his side. The media horde was overflowing outside of the building. A crew from Access Hollywood as well as Brazilian TV were there. I have one question: Why?

Do you think the coverage is as ridiculous as well?

A Great Experience

This past Monday, I took my students to the International Film Festival at Tower city in Cleveland. Every year, this proves to be such a valuable learning experience for the kids. My classes saw the documentary called "Jump!" The movie website (http://www.jumpmovie.com/) says, "JUMP! is a feature-length character-driven documentary about competitive jump rope that follows kids on five teams from around the country who push physical and psychological limits in pursuit of winning the World Championship."

Everytime I take my classes to the film festival, the organizers of the film fest have members of the cast and crew from the film there. Pictured above are members of my Excel TECC junior and senior class as well as the director of "Jump!", Helen Hood Scheer.

Below, Alex from my junior class, shows off his incredible leaping ability as he jumped rope with two crew members of the documentary.

Below, the guys from class pose with two of the stars from the movie.

Blizzard of '08

The Blizzard of '08 is over and estimates say Cleveland got hit with between 20 and 24 inches of snow between Friday afternoon and Saturday night! That's amazing. Today was "nice" in terms of a letup from the snow. The major streets have gotten plowed and salted. Here on my street, not so lucky. The photo above is my car as it was Saturday afternoon around 2, before I ventured out for a trip to the grocery store to stock up for the rest of the day and today. I got home Friday at 4:30 and had not touched my car until I decided to go shopping and took the picture. I got stuck at the end of the street going to the store and got stuck again on the way back at almost the same spot.

The photo above is of our oldest Scottish Terrier, Fiona. Fiona is seven years old and loves to play outside in the snow.

Conferences

This week and next week, in many school districts, including mine, parent-teacher conferences are taking place. Those of you who read this blog, I have some questions for you relating to this issue since many of you have been involved in this process in some way (hopefully) at one time or another.

As a parent, what do you believe is the right amount of involvement in your child's education? How much is a good education stressed in your home? If it is stressed, how do you do it? What kinds of things do you do to constantly keep it in your son's/daughter's minds that education is so important?

What are some things that you believe that teachers do well?
What are some things that you believe that teachers need to do better at?

Oh, and please, if there are certain things that relate more to certain grade levels as opposed to others, please specify that.

Consider this the online version of a parent-teacher conference. I am here to listen. Your suggestions and comments are always welcome.

New addition to the family

Hello, everybody. It's not often that I post about something personal but I need to. Meet Delilah. My wife brought home Delilah about a week and a half ago. Delilah weighs a little under two pounds and is all about love. She's really quiet except for when my wife or I leave the house. Then, she cries like a baby. She makes our two Scottish Terriers look huge.

Political tricks

No one seems to know how or who created this political ad but distorting a candidate's skin tone is a bit extreme in terms of trying to sway opinion. I think we all have seen enough of Obama to know that the top photo is not a true representation of his skin tone. I find it amazing that the candidate who has the most buzz in this election has had to endure having a photo circulate of him in African clothing as well as this color manipulation.

An era gone by.

It was reported in today's (Cleveland) Plain Dealer that polka bandleader Johnny Vadnal passed away this past Monday. He was 84 years old. Vadnal appeared on many tv shows like "Polka Varieties" and "Polkatime USA" (where the clip is from below).



And here is another classic polka artist who is also in heaven...Frankie Yankovic.


Vadnal and Yankovic were two of the most influential artists on that genre, who were often seen on national tv. Polka on national tv is long gone. Now, to watch polkas, you primarily have to get it on cable access shows.

I grow up on this music listening on staticky AM radio out of Trumbull County on the way to Warren on many weekends to visit my grandma, who was first generation American on my Dad's side.

Question to the readers of this blog: What media memories from your past, preferably your childhood, do you miss the most and why?