It's day two of the new Record! Used to it yet? Yeah, me neither. We're also wondering how they justify raising the price of the paper by 50% and then promptly cut the amount of pages in the paper by about 50%. If we pay more we should get more. End of story.
Oh, so our title chances are really fucked
Oh hey, it's that story we tried to reference yesterday. So not only have criminal homicides dropped in the last 3 years, but they're also at the lowest levels since the 70s. Yeah, I'd say our title hopes are pretty much up in smoke. Although saying that the number of criminal homicides coincides with the number of police officers isn't a good thing to mention while in the midst of layoffs. I get that it's just politics, but good lord. These are people who are dead. Blair Ulring should be saying stuff like "While we're happy with the decline that's still 24 deaths too many", not "See! Homicides go down when there's more cops! We make you guys safer! Give raise now please!"
Sam Walton and the Lodi City Council just can't take a hint
This is still going on? Fuck, take a hint Wal-Mart. The only people who want the current Wal-Mart upgraded to Super is the city council who wants those sweet sweet property tax dollars. This fight has been going on forfuckingever. You're not wanted! I'd back off now because once Lodians run out of legal challenges, they'll resort to driving you out of town the only way they know how. And for a building the size you guys are proposing they'll need one huge burning cross. Luckily there's a Lowe's right across the street.
Those trees weren't old and dangerous! They were "experienced" and "eccentric"!
Note to all of Stockton. This is how you deal with trees. Just cut them the fuck down. I don't hear anybody in Tracy bitching about how ugly that park is because a tree they used to sit under as a kid got chopped down. They're just plants. They're not alive. They don't wistfully remember the summer of '85. They sit there, grow old, then die. When we have to bring up Tracy as an example of dealing with something the right way, you know something's wrong. So for the last time, fuck trees. We're still waiting for Fitzy to blog about this though. Perhaps he'll campaign for a memorial plaque. And yes, we realize we're reaching a bit.
Rickey would like to thank Rickey's legs for being so fast and getting Rickey all those stolen bases...
And finally, let's check in with ol' bulletpoint. Yup, big pile of bulletpointed shit. He only mentions one of the bigger pieces of sports news in passing (Baseball Hall inductees announcement) and totally ignores Rickey Henderson (who, you know, actually played on a local team) in favor of talking about Jim Rice (and Jason Giambi's love of In-and-Out Burger). Come on Bobby, the best news of the week is the possibilities surrounding Rickey's Hall of Fame speech. How many times can someone thank themselves in the third person? Will he ask us to thank Rickey for gracing us with Rickey's presence? These questions need to be answered!
That should probably do it for us for today. If shit goes down we might pop in, but it's an admittedly slow news day and we'd like to take another day or so before we totally bash the Record's new format. Let it be known, we gave them like 3 days to be good and didn't ask for anything in return. I know, we're saints.
Tuesday, January 13, 2009
Monday, January 12, 2009
Quick Links for Jan. 12th
Fuck, Monday already? Let's power through these Quick Links and see what happened this weekend (you know, besides the massive redesign).
Prepare for overkill!
Generally I just skim through Mike Klocke's Sunday columns. They never really have a set theme. One week he'll announce a major website change like myRecord (which we hear officially launched today), and then the next he's doing a bulletpointed week in review. This week he brings us a warning from the future! That's right, Mike Klocke decided he needed some preemptive damage control because the Record's going all out next week (well, as all out as a 3-section paper can) tocelebrate commemorate the 20th anniversary of the Cleveland Elementary School shooting.
Now, don't get us wrong, the shooting deserves to be commemorated. But when you're defending the coverage before it even starts, that's usually not a good sign. And look, one of the stories is going to be "We'll let readers inside Cleveland School for a 'day in the life' look at how the school is prospering." Oh wow! The inner workings of an elementary school 20 years after a shooting that barely half the town remembers? How do they go on? Every day there must be some grizzly reminder about past events!
Luckily for you, the Reclaiming the Title reader, we have an exclusive fake preview of that article. Here's day 1:
"8 am: Class starts
8:15: Pledge of Allegiance
8:30: Silent Sustained Reading! Shit!
9:30: Arts and crafts, eat paste
0:00: Recess
0:05: Throw up paste after taking a gut shot (bad wording choice?) during dodgeball, go see nurse
10:15: Stare at nurse's cleavage while she leans over to take your temperature, get first boner
10:17: Get called a gay by classmates for having boner
10:20: Recess over
10:30: Math
Noon: Lunch, Salisbury steak again? Fuck!"
Exciting ain't it? Of course that was a (partial) day in the life of a student. The Record's going so in depth that we're getting a day in the life of the actual school! Which we also have a preview of:
"Midnight-11:59: Exist
11:59: Softly cry self to sleep."
Needless to say we're looking forward to Sunday.
Maybe we can at least take Oakland the distance
According to that half an article (since, you know, recordnet.com doesn't have this article on it's website. Even when you Google search recordnet.com for the lede you get this. We would have done a broader search but you try typing "criminal homicides Stockton" into google and see what you get), homicides in Stockton dropped for the 3rd straight year. So shit, looks like our violent crime rate title hopes are further away than we thought. Granted, all of this really depends on how Oakland's doing. Wait, what? They're rioting? Well fuck me. There's always next year I guess.
Ann Johnston and the City Council are for smart spending downtown...right after Kathy Miller gets rid of this Paragary's stock
Remember that whole election thing? Ann Johnston and a few other candidates made Paragary's a lightening rod of sorts. It was a symbol of the city council's monetary mismanagement in regards to downtown. Remember those $10 burger ads? Those were Ann Johnston's. Fitzy even lamented the fact that people, in his opinion, were essentially campaigning against downtown (We predictably disagreed). So it makes total sense that she appointed the wife of a part-owner of Paragary's Vice Mayor. Who knows, maybe she was just going by the Record's graphic and thought she was appointing Leslie Martin.
Well, that's a bit disconcerting
As former high school journalists ourselves, we have to express surprise that this wasn't already law. But we have to express even more surprise that Lodi High's advisor Jerry Pike didn't know it wasn't already a law considering it's his job to teach journalism, which includes journalism law. And he's been there for NINE years. Oh, and the side story of Tokay High not owning the image it uses for it's mascot is fucking hilarious. Leave it to Lodi.
That should be it from us for today. Yes, we saw this. Give us a day or two and we'll get back to it. Feel free to send us your thoughts about what comes to mind when you think Stockton. I guarandamntee it isn't theater, symphony, or opera. We're not entirely sure which Stockton Don Blount is living in, but it apparently isn't this one.
Prepare for overkill!
Generally I just skim through Mike Klocke's Sunday columns. They never really have a set theme. One week he'll announce a major website change like myRecord (which we hear officially launched today), and then the next he's doing a bulletpointed week in review. This week he brings us a warning from the future! That's right, Mike Klocke decided he needed some preemptive damage control because the Record's going all out next week (well, as all out as a 3-section paper can) to
Now, don't get us wrong, the shooting deserves to be commemorated. But when you're defending the coverage before it even starts, that's usually not a good sign. And look, one of the stories is going to be "We'll let readers inside Cleveland School for a 'day in the life' look at how the school is prospering." Oh wow! The inner workings of an elementary school 20 years after a shooting that barely half the town remembers? How do they go on? Every day there must be some grizzly reminder about past events!
Luckily for you, the Reclaiming the Title reader, we have an exclusive fake preview of that article. Here's day 1:
"8 am: Class starts
8:15: Pledge of Allegiance
8:30: Silent Sustained Reading! Shit!
9:30: Arts and crafts, eat paste
0:00: Recess
0:05: Throw up paste after taking a gut shot (bad wording choice?) during dodgeball, go see nurse
10:15: Stare at nurse's cleavage while she leans over to take your temperature, get first boner
10:17: Get called a gay by classmates for having boner
10:20: Recess over
10:30: Math
Noon: Lunch, Salisbury steak again? Fuck!"
Exciting ain't it? Of course that was a (partial) day in the life of a student. The Record's going so in depth that we're getting a day in the life of the actual school! Which we also have a preview of:
"Midnight-11:59: Exist
11:59: Softly cry self to sleep."
Needless to say we're looking forward to Sunday.
Maybe we can at least take Oakland the distance
According to that half an article (since, you know, recordnet.com doesn't have this article on it's website. Even when you Google search recordnet.com for the lede you get this. We would have done a broader search but you try typing "criminal homicides Stockton" into google and see what you get), homicides in Stockton dropped for the 3rd straight year. So shit, looks like our violent crime rate title hopes are further away than we thought. Granted, all of this really depends on how Oakland's doing. Wait, what? They're rioting? Well fuck me. There's always next year I guess.
Ann Johnston and the City Council are for smart spending downtown...right after Kathy Miller gets rid of this Paragary's stock
Remember that whole election thing? Ann Johnston and a few other candidates made Paragary's a lightening rod of sorts. It was a symbol of the city council's monetary mismanagement in regards to downtown. Remember those $10 burger ads? Those were Ann Johnston's. Fitzy even lamented the fact that people, in his opinion, were essentially campaigning against downtown (We predictably disagreed). So it makes total sense that she appointed the wife of a part-owner of Paragary's Vice Mayor. Who knows, maybe she was just going by the Record's graphic and thought she was appointing Leslie Martin.
Well, that's a bit disconcerting
As former high school journalists ourselves, we have to express surprise that this wasn't already law. But we have to express even more surprise that Lodi High's advisor Jerry Pike didn't know it wasn't already a law considering it's his job to teach journalism, which includes journalism law. And he's been there for NINE years. Oh, and the side story of Tokay High not owning the image it uses for it's mascot is fucking hilarious. Leave it to Lodi.
That should be it from us for today. Yes, we saw this. Give us a day or two and we'll get back to it. Feel free to send us your thoughts about what comes to mind when you think Stockton. I guarandamntee it isn't theater, symphony, or opera. We're not entirely sure which Stockton Don Blount is living in, but it apparently isn't this one.
Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes!
So wow, today's kind of a big day. First, all those fucking college students are back. Second, by my count it's the 12th which means we should finally have a clear picture as to what the fuck myRecord is supposed to be. Everybody turn to B4 now to follow al...hey, wait a minute. The LENS section isn't the B secti...OMG! It's Record redesign day!
That's right, following in the tradition of last year's reorg that banished Lori Gilbert to the LENS pages and caused Mike Fitzgerald to lament the death of journalism at the hands of the pesky internet and all it's newfangled Web 2.0 features (and the redesign the year before that which brought us the 3MR and LENS section), the Record has once again freaked out at the budget numbers (Damn you El Guapo!) and made a radical change. Don't you just love journalism?
We're going to reserve judgement for later in the week. Our knee-jerk reaction is that the Record now looks more like the Lodi News-Sentinel or the Manteca Bulletin than an actual newspaper. What's the next step? Going alternating days Tracy Press style?
See, that's the natural reaction for everybody. But if some of the spin Klocke and the Cooze threw out there in their announcement on the front page today (but nowhere on Recordnet.com. The more things change, the more they stay the same) (Update! (1:30): I was working on the Quick Links and saw they finally posted the announcement. It's dated 1:12 pm. Just an hour after this post. Hi guys!) is true, then it can't be all bad. The Record's badly needed a focus on Local news instead of the AP stories they've been printing for a while now. Although I am disappointed that the section in most need of eliminating (the Sports pages, natch) somehow survived relatively unchanged.
One last thing before we get back to our regularly scheduled programming. What kind of taskmasters run the Record? We make fun of them for their lack of original reporting but we weren't joking when we said today was busy. First there's this redesign. Then Mike Klocke warns us in his Sunday column that the Record's going to have an insane amount of coverage of the 20th anniversary of the Cleveland School shootings. On top of that myRecord officially launches today. All of this within a month of the Record sustaining staffing losses that they apparently don't intend on refilling. (What? You don't read the copy editor's blog?)
Wow, way to stagger this shit out guys. At this rate Frankie Bozem's head is going to explode in April. If you see an exhausted Record staffer, now you know why. Buy them a beer or something. And then tell them the new redesign sucks.
That's right, following in the tradition of last year's reorg that banished Lori Gilbert to the LENS pages and caused Mike Fitzgerald to lament the death of journalism at the hands of the pesky internet and all it's newfangled Web 2.0 features (and the redesign the year before that which brought us the 3MR and LENS section), the Record has once again freaked out at the budget numbers (Damn you El Guapo!) and made a radical change. Don't you just love journalism?
We're going to reserve judgement for later in the week. Our knee-jerk reaction is that the Record now looks more like the Lodi News-Sentinel or the Manteca Bulletin than an actual newspaper. What's the next step? Going alternating days Tracy Press style?
See, that's the natural reaction for everybody. But if some of the spin Klocke and the Cooze threw out there in their announcement on the front page today (but nowhere on Recordnet.com. The more things change, the more they stay the same) (Update! (1:30): I was working on the Quick Links and saw they finally posted the announcement. It's dated 1:12 pm. Just an hour after this post. Hi guys!) is true, then it can't be all bad. The Record's badly needed a focus on Local news instead of the AP stories they've been printing for a while now. Although I am disappointed that the section in most need of eliminating (the Sports pages, natch) somehow survived relatively unchanged.
One last thing before we get back to our regularly scheduled programming. What kind of taskmasters run the Record? We make fun of them for their lack of original reporting but we weren't joking when we said today was busy. First there's this redesign. Then Mike Klocke warns us in his Sunday column that the Record's going to have an insane amount of coverage of the 20th anniversary of the Cleveland School shootings. On top of that myRecord officially launches today. All of this within a month of the Record sustaining staffing losses that they apparently don't intend on refilling. (What? You don't read the copy editor's blog?)
Wow, way to stagger this shit out guys. At this rate Frankie Bozem's head is going to explode in April. If you see an exhausted Record staffer, now you know why. Buy them a beer or something. And then tell them the new redesign sucks.
Friday, January 9, 2009
Shit to do for the weekend of Jan. 9th-11th plus a bonus desperate plea for my sanity!
Before we get to the Shit To Do, I gotta extend my own special "Fuck you in a fresh knife wound" to the Record for killing 209Vibe. Tracking down shows for this post took fucking forever. Everybody's ceased posting shows on 209Vibe.com even though the 209Vibe MySpace indicates the recently fauxhawked Ian Hill is working to keep at least the website alive. They're not going to keep it if everybody drops it like a bad habit. They're still posting content (remember that kickass blog link from the Quick Links? Where else can you see a Record writer tell a local reality show star participant "fuck you?" Where was this during Queen Emily's reign of terror?) so visit that bitch so I can in turn use the events calendar and not spend forever hunting down fucking shows.
Sexy Friday 1/9
Honestly, I have no idea what's going on tonight. I personally plan on drinking myself silly, but what else is new? Fats usually has a band on Fridays and Saturdays. So go there or something. According to Ian Hill'scut-and-paste job final local music column PushPushPull and the Great Giveaway are playing at Eureka Coffee in Lathrop at 8pm. TBA cover though.
Saturday 1/10
Oh hey look! Shows! Brassai, Operocia (former Ocean Evaporate), and The Box Opera are playing the Blackwater at 7:30. $5 Brassai is pretty bad ass, but nothing compared to...
Filbert, Descolada, Gregory Michael and Alitak playing a free show at Empresso Coffee also at 7;30. Considering I've told Mike of Alitak I'll go to his show the past 4 shows only to be to lazy to go when the time came, I'll probably go to this. I'll be the one heckling them for playing at a place that doesn't serve beer. FREE
Sunday 1/11
Fuck, Slick stole my thunder. Spend your day watching football then head on down to the Civic Auditorium and get dumb. That's right E-40 makes his triumphant return to Stockton. Well, as triumphant as a show that's received absolutely no advertising can be. Wasn't this hyphy thing supposed to be a huge movement? Don't let Mac Dre's death be in vain! I've been a big 40 fan ever since I heard him busting rhymes on the Too Short classic "Just Like Dope", which is quite possibly the truest song of all time. Either way, it should be a fairly entertaining show. 7:30 $30-$40
Sexy Friday 1/9
Honestly, I have no idea what's going on tonight. I personally plan on drinking myself silly, but what else is new? Fats usually has a band on Fridays and Saturdays. So go there or something. According to Ian Hill's
Saturday 1/10
Oh hey look! Shows! Brassai, Operocia (former Ocean Evaporate), and The Box Opera are playing the Blackwater at 7:30. $5 Brassai is pretty bad ass, but nothing compared to...
Filbert, Descolada, Gregory Michael and Alitak playing a free show at Empresso Coffee also at 7;30. Considering I've told Mike of Alitak I'll go to his show the past 4 shows only to be to lazy to go when the time came, I'll probably go to this. I'll be the one heckling them for playing at a place that doesn't serve beer. FREE
Sunday 1/11
Fuck, Slick stole my thunder. Spend your day watching football then head on down to the Civic Auditorium and get dumb. That's right E-40 makes his triumphant return to Stockton. Well, as triumphant as a show that's received absolutely no advertising can be. Wasn't this hyphy thing supposed to be a huge movement? Don't let Mac Dre's death be in vain! I've been a big 40 fan ever since I heard him busting rhymes on the Too Short classic "Just Like Dope", which is quite possibly the truest song of all time. Either way, it should be a fairly entertaining show. 7:30 $30-$40
Kings Kolumn: Khristmas Kome Late
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Your hastily thrown together Quick Links for 1/9
Well, the first full week of 2009 is almost over. Thank fucking God. Hopefully not all weeks in 2009 are this long. Hope your week was shorter than ours. Let's knock out some Quick Links for this Sexy as hell Friday.
Gotta catch 'em all! Pokepigs!
Looks like somebody finally realized that maybe police work isn't the highly respected position it once was. Don't get us wrong, we appreciate everything law enforcement does for us, it's just that in our dealings with law enforcement it's easier to remember when a cop is being a dick than when they're cool. And trust us, there are cool cops out there. If there weren't I wouldn't have a cool Deputy Sheriff hat. All that being said, maybe encouraging kids to flag down police cars isn't the best idea in the world. Sure, it's a better idea than painting cop cars pink but, call me crazy, I like my police force to be fighting crime.
Although I have to admit the cards are hilarious. What can I say? I'm easily amused. A better idea at softening PD's (although in this case it's the Sheriff's Office) image would be to do what Tracy is doing. Yes, I know, a good idea coming out of Tracy is shocking but hear me out. I'd much rather talk to Cops over a hot cup of mud at a set time as opposed to having them flagged down while they're supposed to be patrolling the streets. Of course this is all happening outside of Stockton, so we barely give a shit. And no, we're not surprised that the police department in most need of a softer image (our own) has still done jack shit.
Second verse, same as the first, a little bit louder and a little bit worse
Oh hey, another reminder that county supervisors have term limits. Unfortunately Steve Gutierrez didn't have a hilarious role in a randomly awkward reality show moment so we pretty much have no idea who he is. But hey, more boring filler articles. And surprise! He didn't say "fuck it, I'm done with politics" and will continue to be involved in public service. These election result articles will stop after inauguration right? That's change I can believe in.
Misc. shit we can't squeeze a paragraph out of
I'd post more Quick Links, but nothing's really been going on. At least nothing funny tha we can make assholish jokes about. Some girl got punched in the face for a backpack that ended up not getting stolen, that's kinda funny. The county's taking precautions to limit local living legend Tocan Nguyen to only 3-minute diatribes which is sad because the shit that comes out of her mouth is fucking hilarious. Speaking of fucking hilarious, Ian Hill has a hairdresser...and a fauxhawk. Why he's admitting to both of these things, I don't know. But we do encourage him to go all the way with the look and grow a rat tail too. Nothing's cooler than a fauxhawk going into a rat tail. Swear.
Duke promised to get a Kings Kolumn up today, plus some Shit to do because shit's actually going down this weekend. Have fun getting hyphy this weekend.
Gotta catch 'em all! Pokepigs!
Looks like somebody finally realized that maybe police work isn't the highly respected position it once was. Don't get us wrong, we appreciate everything law enforcement does for us, it's just that in our dealings with law enforcement it's easier to remember when a cop is being a dick than when they're cool. And trust us, there are cool cops out there. If there weren't I wouldn't have a cool Deputy Sheriff hat. All that being said, maybe encouraging kids to flag down police cars isn't the best idea in the world. Sure, it's a better idea than painting cop cars pink but, call me crazy, I like my police force to be fighting crime.
Although I have to admit the cards are hilarious. What can I say? I'm easily amused. A better idea at softening PD's (although in this case it's the Sheriff's Office) image would be to do what Tracy is doing. Yes, I know, a good idea coming out of Tracy is shocking but hear me out. I'd much rather talk to Cops over a hot cup of mud at a set time as opposed to having them flagged down while they're supposed to be patrolling the streets. Of course this is all happening outside of Stockton, so we barely give a shit. And no, we're not surprised that the police department in most need of a softer image (our own) has still done jack shit.
Second verse, same as the first, a little bit louder and a little bit worse
Oh hey, another reminder that county supervisors have term limits. Unfortunately Steve Gutierrez didn't have a hilarious role in a randomly awkward reality show moment so we pretty much have no idea who he is. But hey, more boring filler articles. And surprise! He didn't say "fuck it, I'm done with politics" and will continue to be involved in public service. These election result articles will stop after inauguration right? That's change I can believe in.
Misc. shit we can't squeeze a paragraph out of
I'd post more Quick Links, but nothing's really been going on. At least nothing funny tha we can make assholish jokes about. Some girl got punched in the face for a backpack that ended up not getting stolen, that's kinda funny. The county's taking precautions to limit local living legend Tocan Nguyen to only 3-minute diatribes which is sad because the shit that comes out of her mouth is fucking hilarious. Speaking of fucking hilarious, Ian Hill has a hairdresser...and a fauxhawk. Why he's admitting to both of these things, I don't know. But we do encourage him to go all the way with the look and grow a rat tail too. Nothing's cooler than a fauxhawk going into a rat tail. Swear.
Duke promised to get a Kings Kolumn up today, plus some Shit to do because shit's actually going down this weekend. Have fun getting hyphy this weekend.
Thursday, January 8, 2009
Rising gas prices the lamest reason to be emo ever?
In case you haven't noticed, gas is fucking expensive again. What? You didn't know $2 and up is the definition of fucking expensive? Well it is, we established that a while ago. Granted none of us travel all too often so it's nothing that's too high on our radar. Although we are worried that we might have to put Joe Goldeen on a suicide watch. His blog is downright depressing. Perhaps most depressing is the last couple sentences from the hilariously titled "Will 2009 bring an even crazier gas story?" post:
"It's been a wild ride this year. Look here for me next year (I'm taking a few days off), continuing to chronicle San Joaquin County's gas scene."
I'm not even sure where to begin. We could start with the fact that fluctuating gas prices was deemed a crazy story even though gas prices always fluctuate, it was just slightly more dramatic this year. Or the poll off to the side that left out the obvious 4th choice "For the love of God why are you still writing about this?" Then, of course, there's the fact that every one of his blogs ends in a request for your gas stories, yet he doesn't seem to have posted any (at least not on the front page). Joe's lonely, will someone please tell him about the time they topped off their tank when the pump clearly said "no topping off"? Bonus points if you did so while talking on a cell phone!
But instead we'd like to focus on the last part. Apparently there's a gas scene. You know, like how 209Vibe covered the music scene, Fitzy covers the affluent white folk scene, and we cover the local media scene (to varying degrees of success). I know there's not really a whole lot to do around these parts, but someone spending time driving around and documenting the rise and fall of the price of a gallon of gas is so depressing it makes me want to curl up in a dark corner in the fetal position with The Cure blasting in the background.
Isn't Joe the business reporter anyway? His blog description now says Health Care/Gasoline but it used to say Health Care/Money or something similar. Considering we're in the middle of the biggest recession since the Great Depression and that President-Elect Barack Obama made health care reform one of his main campaign issues, it shouldn't be too much of a stretch to think that maybe the business/health care reporter should be writing about business and health care. Sure, gas prices are part of business. But that's like three blog posts tops, not a post every time the price of a gallon fluctuates by a penny.
I'm not saying completely ignore the issue. I'm saying that there are better ways to tackle it. Write about how gas prices are affecting the price of produce. Get together with David Siders and write about how the erratic prices are affecting the city budget. How do they predict how much money will be allotted towards filling up the tanks of fire trucks and police cruisers? If they underestimate it are they just fucked? If they overestimate it do they get to throw the spare cash into a Christmas party pool? There's more than one way to skin this cat. Or did the Record already use up all of these angles during their 3-part(!) series on gas prices?
Long story short, it's time to move on. It's not like the biggest business story in decades is currently happening or anything.
"It's been a wild ride this year. Look here for me next year (I'm taking a few days off), continuing to chronicle San Joaquin County's gas scene."
I'm not even sure where to begin. We could start with the fact that fluctuating gas prices was deemed a crazy story even though gas prices always fluctuate, it was just slightly more dramatic this year. Or the poll off to the side that left out the obvious 4th choice "For the love of God why are you still writing about this?" Then, of course, there's the fact that every one of his blogs ends in a request for your gas stories, yet he doesn't seem to have posted any (at least not on the front page). Joe's lonely, will someone please tell him about the time they topped off their tank when the pump clearly said "no topping off"? Bonus points if you did so while talking on a cell phone!
But instead we'd like to focus on the last part. Apparently there's a gas scene. You know, like how 209Vibe covered the music scene, Fitzy covers the affluent white folk scene, and we cover the local media scene (to varying degrees of success). I know there's not really a whole lot to do around these parts, but someone spending time driving around and documenting the rise and fall of the price of a gallon of gas is so depressing it makes me want to curl up in a dark corner in the fetal position with The Cure blasting in the background.
Isn't Joe the business reporter anyway? His blog description now says Health Care/Gasoline but it used to say Health Care/Money or something similar. Considering we're in the middle of the biggest recession since the Great Depression and that President-Elect Barack Obama made health care reform one of his main campaign issues, it shouldn't be too much of a stretch to think that maybe the business/health care reporter should be writing about business and health care. Sure, gas prices are part of business. But that's like three blog posts tops, not a post every time the price of a gallon fluctuates by a penny.
I'm not saying completely ignore the issue. I'm saying that there are better ways to tackle it. Write about how gas prices are affecting the price of produce. Get together with David Siders and write about how the erratic prices are affecting the city budget. How do they predict how much money will be allotted towards filling up the tanks of fire trucks and police cruisers? If they underestimate it are they just fucked? If they overestimate it do they get to throw the spare cash into a Christmas party pool? There's more than one way to skin this cat. Or did the Record already use up all of these angles during their 3-part(!) series on gas prices?
Long story short, it's time to move on. It's not like the biggest business story in decades is currently happening or anything.
Wednesday, January 7, 2009
Quick Links for Jan. 7th
I'm not sure what it is about this week, but fuck (hahaha, I said "but fuck"), I'm ready for the weekend. I'm also ready for the Quick Links. News! Asseeemmmblllle!
And now, the starting lineup for your Stockton City Council!
Remember that election thing from last year? Well, the results of that take effect this month! While the big change is coming in just under 2 weeks, the largely new city council is already in session and making passive aggressive remarks about each other. For a largely freshman council they sure are learning quickly. Outside of my specific district I didn't pay much attention to the local election. And even in my district I paid very little attention. So it's nice to get some basic info on the new council. Like I didn't know Ann Johnston owned the Baloonery. Or that Diana Lowery was Sally Save Water. Granted, I only barely remember what a Sally Save Water is, but knowing Stockton she probably got elected on that issue alone. By the way, is it just me or do the pictures on the front page make it look like Susan Eggman is giving Kathy Miller the look of lust? If I were Miller I wouldn't leave my drink unattended around her. Oh God, I just threw up a little in my mouth after that mental image. Let's move on.
What? Goldberg isn't available?
This is pretty old, but I just heard about it and it's pretty funny. Former WCW announcer, United States Champion, and member of the 4 Horseman Steve "Mongo" McMichael claims that fellow '85 Bear and current Niner coach Mike Singletary promised him a job as D-Line coach if he ever got a head coaching job. And you know what? I'm fine with that. While we're at it, why not just bring Ditka in? Hell, I wasn't terribly impressed with Shaun Hill, let's bring in Jim McMahon too! By this time next year we'll be in the middle of the newest dance craze "the First Round Blowout Shuffle".
Gambling's of the Devil I say! The Devil! Slot machines still under the jurisdiction of Robot Devil
Before we go any further I have to disclose that I'm a tad bit really biased in favor of this card room. Before they moved to the old Gary's Uptown location they used to be Axtion Jackson Cardroom, which was owned and operated by Jack Morgan. The same Jack from BWDW Jack's Back. Needless to say we're big fans of his. But ignoring all that, we still can't see how anybody could successfully oppose this expansion attempt. The religious group (and trust us, they're a religious group) that opposed the opening of the casino pretty much put all their eggs in the "unsavory character" basket. A year later and it doesn't look like southern Lodi's gotten any more dangerous. But opening it for another 2 hours would! Oh wait, no it wouldn't. This is just some religious group trying to push their views on the community as a whole. Look, if you don't like it, don't go over there. It's not like there's anything else on that section of Cherokee anyways. Quit being difficult and let honest businessmen run their business. If hookers start hanging out in front, you might have something. But until then, you're just bitching for the sake of bitching.
What's next? A tour of the campus so they know where everything is?
Maybe we're just naive, but we assumed when people ran for the Delta Board of Trustees using the platform of smarter spending of the Measure L bond money that they actually knew shit about the Mountain House campus and how other funds had been spent. I mean, we know that stuff. And we're just some assholes with a website. But no, the Delta trustees had to hold their second marathon meeting getting a history lesson about the bond measure and what we're now going to call the "Campus to Nowhere" (I know, timely joke). God forbid they actually be educated about shit they campaigned about. Are they going to go over this again for when Maria Serna's replacement comes in? Or are they all going to write up a term paper and each give a presentation to the newbie as if they were in English 1A? Needless to say, we shouldn't know more about Mountain House than the people who get to decide it's fate. Oh, and Ted Simas? That would be the most boring book of all time.
OK, so maybe Bob Highfill should just stick to bulletpoint columns
Ol' Bulletpoint is back today (two columns in 2 days? Did somebody switch his decaf with regular?) to participate in the yearly call for the BCS to turn to a playoff. Of course that'll never happen because college presidents are greedy sons of bitches who don't want to share bowl revenue with the NCAA, but Highfill knows somebody who came up with a novel idea! Stockton native Kevin Arbet thinks we should take the top 8 teams and put them in a seeded tournament made up of the 4 BCS bowl games. Sound familiar? That's because it's the definition of playoffs. And it's also because every College Football analyst/fan/player/coach has been pitching this idea for the past decade. But no, really, Kevin Arbet thought it up all by himself. It's an original idea and he copywrote so anybody who mentions having a playoff in college football has to credit this kid from Stockton. By the way, and maybe we're just nitpicking here, but if you're going to decry the current BCS system shouldn't you explain how it works? You know, like what stats they use to make up the computer ranking? We know what they are, does he? Yeah, we don't know how they still let Highfill write about sports either.
myRecord could use myFactchecker
No link for this one, since the Record doesn't post their corrections online. Or if they do there's no way in hell I'm wading through the search to find it. If you really want a link to a correction, here's David Siders pointing out that they flipflopped Diana Lowery and Leslie Martin. Which is pretty funny considering Martin is actually a returning council member. But back to myRecord. The soft launch started this week, less than a month after it's announcement and we already have a correction! Feel free to flip to A4 and see that the writers of the autism press release got their own phone number wrong. For those keeping count we're only 2 days into myRecord's existance. This should turn out splendidly.
(Slow clap)
We really have nothing else to add to this. Except for A-fucking-men. Oh, and there's no justice in a world where Bob Highfill can mail in columns on the easiest subject ever (sports) while Ian Hill has his taken away.
And now, the starting lineup for your Stockton City Council!
Remember that election thing from last year? Well, the results of that take effect this month! While the big change is coming in just under 2 weeks, the largely new city council is already in session and making passive aggressive remarks about each other. For a largely freshman council they sure are learning quickly. Outside of my specific district I didn't pay much attention to the local election. And even in my district I paid very little attention. So it's nice to get some basic info on the new council. Like I didn't know Ann Johnston owned the Baloonery. Or that Diana Lowery was Sally Save Water. Granted, I only barely remember what a Sally Save Water is, but knowing Stockton she probably got elected on that issue alone. By the way, is it just me or do the pictures on the front page make it look like Susan Eggman is giving Kathy Miller the look of lust? If I were Miller I wouldn't leave my drink unattended around her. Oh God, I just threw up a little in my mouth after that mental image. Let's move on.
What? Goldberg isn't available?
This is pretty old, but I just heard about it and it's pretty funny. Former WCW announcer, United States Champion, and member of the 4 Horseman Steve "Mongo" McMichael claims that fellow '85 Bear and current Niner coach Mike Singletary promised him a job as D-Line coach if he ever got a head coaching job. And you know what? I'm fine with that. While we're at it, why not just bring Ditka in? Hell, I wasn't terribly impressed with Shaun Hill, let's bring in Jim McMahon too! By this time next year we'll be in the middle of the newest dance craze "the First Round Blowout Shuffle".
Gambling's of the Devil I say! The Devil! Slot machines still under the jurisdiction of Robot Devil
Before we go any further I have to disclose that I'm a tad bit really biased in favor of this card room. Before they moved to the old Gary's Uptown location they used to be Axtion Jackson Cardroom, which was owned and operated by Jack Morgan. The same Jack from BWDW Jack's Back. Needless to say we're big fans of his. But ignoring all that, we still can't see how anybody could successfully oppose this expansion attempt. The religious group (and trust us, they're a religious group) that opposed the opening of the casino pretty much put all their eggs in the "unsavory character" basket. A year later and it doesn't look like southern Lodi's gotten any more dangerous. But opening it for another 2 hours would! Oh wait, no it wouldn't. This is just some religious group trying to push their views on the community as a whole. Look, if you don't like it, don't go over there. It's not like there's anything else on that section of Cherokee anyways. Quit being difficult and let honest businessmen run their business. If hookers start hanging out in front, you might have something. But until then, you're just bitching for the sake of bitching.
What's next? A tour of the campus so they know where everything is?
Maybe we're just naive, but we assumed when people ran for the Delta Board of Trustees using the platform of smarter spending of the Measure L bond money that they actually knew shit about the Mountain House campus and how other funds had been spent. I mean, we know that stuff. And we're just some assholes with a website. But no, the Delta trustees had to hold their second marathon meeting getting a history lesson about the bond measure and what we're now going to call the "Campus to Nowhere" (I know, timely joke). God forbid they actually be educated about shit they campaigned about. Are they going to go over this again for when Maria Serna's replacement comes in? Or are they all going to write up a term paper and each give a presentation to the newbie as if they were in English 1A? Needless to say, we shouldn't know more about Mountain House than the people who get to decide it's fate. Oh, and Ted Simas? That would be the most boring book of all time.
OK, so maybe Bob Highfill should just stick to bulletpoint columns
Ol' Bulletpoint is back today (two columns in 2 days? Did somebody switch his decaf with regular?) to participate in the yearly call for the BCS to turn to a playoff. Of course that'll never happen because college presidents are greedy sons of bitches who don't want to share bowl revenue with the NCAA, but Highfill knows somebody who came up with a novel idea! Stockton native Kevin Arbet thinks we should take the top 8 teams and put them in a seeded tournament made up of the 4 BCS bowl games. Sound familiar? That's because it's the definition of playoffs. And it's also because every College Football analyst/fan/player/coach has been pitching this idea for the past decade. But no, really, Kevin Arbet thought it up all by himself. It's an original idea and he copywrote so anybody who mentions having a playoff in college football has to credit this kid from Stockton. By the way, and maybe we're just nitpicking here, but if you're going to decry the current BCS system shouldn't you explain how it works? You know, like what stats they use to make up the computer ranking? We know what they are, does he? Yeah, we don't know how they still let Highfill write about sports either.
myRecord could use myFactchecker
No link for this one, since the Record doesn't post their corrections online. Or if they do there's no way in hell I'm wading through the search to find it. If you really want a link to a correction, here's David Siders pointing out that they flipflopped Diana Lowery and Leslie Martin. Which is pretty funny considering Martin is actually a returning council member. But back to myRecord. The soft launch started this week, less than a month after it's announcement and we already have a correction! Feel free to flip to A4 and see that the writers of the autism press release got their own phone number wrong. For those keeping count we're only 2 days into myRecord's existance. This should turn out splendidly.
(Slow clap)
We really have nothing else to add to this. Except for A-fucking-men. Oh, and there's no justice in a world where Bob Highfill can mail in columns on the easiest subject ever (sports) while Ian Hill has his taken away.
Tuesday, January 6, 2009
The "my" in myRecord apparently stands for "my press release collection"
OK, confession time. I didn't really read a physical copy of the Record yesterday. I just skimmed the website real quick, which isn't my preferred method of finding shit to write about but I didn't have any quarters on me when I was near a newsstand and I was way too lazy to head to a store to buy one. I got my grubby little hands on a copy today (of yesterday's and today's papers), and for once I'm glad I did. Why? The Record is blessing us with a preview of myRecord!
Undoubtedly you're wondering "What the fuck is myRecord?" Well, the Record announced a little while ago that it was revamping it's website. Ok, I wish they were revamping the entire website. Really it's just a revamp of the previously useless "interactive" tab so it includes more user-generated content (a great idea, wish we'd thought of it. Oh wait, we did.)
Before the closest recordnet.com got to UGC was reader-submitted photos. Those are still around, but now they want you to send backstories with them and apparently they'll be printed on the bottom half of the LENS section or something. Apparently that's the sole place to find them as the myRecord web-section doesn't seem to have any of the stories that have appeared in the preview so far (stories in the paper that are difficult to find on the website? It must be on recordnet.com!). You can also submit events and browse the events calendar for upcoming shit.
Wait a minute, opportunities for aspiring local writers, events calendar, Ian Hill in charge, this all sounds vaguely fucking familiar. If I didn't know better I'd say it sounds like the Record is folding 209Vibe into it's website in an attempt to absorb it's traffic. Although, the writers for 209Vibe actually got paid. As far as we can tell myRecord is just offering you a chance to get published, which is very craigslisty of them.
Of course when you open up publishing possibilities to just any ol' yahoo with a digital camera and an e-mail account you're going to get a lot of press releases about local events. You know, like both "articles" in today's preview. One of them is actually the minutes from a motorcycle club meeting. Riveting stuff ain't it? (Note to Fitzy: the motorcycle club met at Taste of Brittany because, as the picture shows, the members of the club are the Record's key demographic. Old white people. Actual bikers wouldn't be caught dead there.) (Wait, how the fuck did he find that story on the website? Is my computer blocking some sort of unneeded fancy gadget they're using to list the story when regular ol' html would do just fine? And why is it under the "news" tab in that link when the URL clearly says "interact"? Why can't anything on recordnet make some fucking sense!? At least it links to the other myRecord stories in the linkbacks section. Man, this thing is just oozing with our suggestions.)
Perhaps the most interesting part of these stories/ads is the bylines. Those motorcycle club minutes? "By the Port Stockton Motorcycle Club". That's right, apparently the entire club wrote it. We're not saying that that's out of the realm of possibility, most of these posts are a collaborative effort. But then, you know, one of us has to actually write them. Does this mean we can write for myRecord and turn it in as "Reclaiming the Title" in hopes of getting free advertising? Don't worry, being journonerds we wouldn't write about ourselves due to obvious conflict of interest issues. Not that myRecord seems all too concerned about conflicts of interest. All 3 stories that have appeared in the preview have been written by the groups they're about.
Hopefully that will change now that people know myRecord is accepting stories. When we suggested the Record try and include more user-generated content, press releases that are normally featured in the Local section wasn't really what we had in mind. Sadly, if myRecord is going to feature daily user-generated stories as they claim they will, it will probably feature more of these kind of useless boring stories which are really just pictures with extended captions. Because, and you can trust us on this one, writing daily stories for free is kind of tough. But if anybody wants to give it a shot, our site might be the better option. We'll give you lots of space to write more than a paragraph and we won't even require a photo to go with it. We do have a staunch "No articles about events/groups you're directly a part of" rule though. That's right, RTT has higher journalistic standards than the Record. Surprised? Me neither.
Undoubtedly you're wondering "What the fuck is myRecord?" Well, the Record announced a little while ago that it was revamping it's website. Ok, I wish they were revamping the entire website. Really it's just a revamp of the previously useless "interactive" tab so it includes more user-generated content (a great idea, wish we'd thought of it. Oh wait, we did.)
Before the closest recordnet.com got to UGC was reader-submitted photos. Those are still around, but now they want you to send backstories with them and apparently they'll be printed on the bottom half of the LENS section or something. Apparently that's the sole place to find them as the myRecord web-section doesn't seem to have any of the stories that have appeared in the preview so far (stories in the paper that are difficult to find on the website? It must be on recordnet.com!). You can also submit events and browse the events calendar for upcoming shit.
Wait a minute, opportunities for aspiring local writers, events calendar, Ian Hill in charge, this all sounds vaguely fucking familiar. If I didn't know better I'd say it sounds like the Record is folding 209Vibe into it's website in an attempt to absorb it's traffic. Although, the writers for 209Vibe actually got paid. As far as we can tell myRecord is just offering you a chance to get published, which is very craigslisty of them.
Of course when you open up publishing possibilities to just any ol' yahoo with a digital camera and an e-mail account you're going to get a lot of press releases about local events. You know, like both "articles" in today's preview. One of them is actually the minutes from a motorcycle club meeting. Riveting stuff ain't it? (Note to Fitzy: the motorcycle club met at Taste of Brittany because, as the picture shows, the members of the club are the Record's key demographic. Old white people. Actual bikers wouldn't be caught dead there.) (Wait, how the fuck did he find that story on the website? Is my computer blocking some sort of unneeded fancy gadget they're using to list the story when regular ol' html would do just fine? And why is it under the "news" tab in that link when the URL clearly says "interact"? Why can't anything on recordnet make some fucking sense!? At least it links to the other myRecord stories in the linkbacks section. Man, this thing is just oozing with our suggestions.)
Perhaps the most interesting part of these stories/ads is the bylines. Those motorcycle club minutes? "By the Port Stockton Motorcycle Club". That's right, apparently the entire club wrote it. We're not saying that that's out of the realm of possibility, most of these posts are a collaborative effort. But then, you know, one of us has to actually write them. Does this mean we can write for myRecord and turn it in as "Reclaiming the Title" in hopes of getting free advertising? Don't worry, being journonerds we wouldn't write about ourselves due to obvious conflict of interest issues. Not that myRecord seems all too concerned about conflicts of interest. All 3 stories that have appeared in the preview have been written by the groups they're about.
Hopefully that will change now that people know myRecord is accepting stories. When we suggested the Record try and include more user-generated content, press releases that are normally featured in the Local section wasn't really what we had in mind. Sadly, if myRecord is going to feature daily user-generated stories as they claim they will, it will probably feature more of these kind of useless boring stories which are really just pictures with extended captions. Because, and you can trust us on this one, writing daily stories for free is kind of tough. But if anybody wants to give it a shot, our site might be the better option. We'll give you lots of space to write more than a paragraph and we won't even require a photo to go with it. We do have a staunch "No articles about events/groups you're directly a part of" rule though. That's right, RTT has higher journalistic standards than the Record. Surprised? Me neither.
Monday, January 5, 2009
The first Quick Links of 2009
Yeah, I know. We disappeared off the face of the Earth. I assure you we all survived into 2009. I won't bore you with excuses. We're back. We're still not entirely sure who should be Real Stocktonian of 2008. Suggestions are welcomed. Based on the Record's year end lists we should just make it old white people since apparently that's who most of their year-end stories where geared towards. (If I have to hear about Dave Brubeck one more time I'm fighting someone. He's not even from here, he's from fucking Concord. He just went to school here for fuck's sake.)
Luckily one of the benefits of taking a break like that is it gives us time to let some links pile up for the Quick Links. The slow news cycle kind of killed the crutch that is the Quick Links, but now it's 2009 and we've got a decent amount, so let's dive in shall we? We'll be messing around with the format for a bit, mostly out of boredom. Luckily I doubt it'll be too jarring.
Layoffs!? You want to talk about layoffs!?
This is probably the easiest example of how slow news has been. We've known for a while that Stockton PD was going to have to layoff trainees, but then it actually happened. How is this an example of slow news? Because really it's just another way of saying "Hey, the economy sucks." One would think that without a police chief to pay we'd be able to keep one or two of the new recruits. But instead the city just paid for their training so they can go off and shoot innocent men in Lodi or something. I wonder if we can write off their training expenses as a charitable donation. Can't we at least put them in dispatch until the hiring freeze ends?
Of course the best part of this story is that we're now actually less safe than we were in 2006 when a consultant said we had too few police officers. In 2006 there were 1.46 officers per 1000 residents, now there's 1.43 per 1000. I'm pretty sure the goal is at least 3. But remember, Stockton is totally safe and living in the southern portion isn't enough of a reason to take precautions to protect your family. If you hear shit going down in your backyard just roll over and go back to sleep, it'll blow over. If we all do that we'll probably only need. 1.2 officers per 1000 residents. Think of the savings!
But who will hand low end celebrities chickens at awkward parties now?
Another reason we kind of slacked off near the end of the year was we were getting really tired of end of the year/political term stories. The Record did two stories on Mike Machado, which was two too many and could have been summed up with the sentence "Politicians have term limits and disagree sometimes" (shocking revelations, I know). Victor Mow was the latest to get the termed out interview treatment and as expected it was unremarkable at best. Hooray filler! And if the article wasn't exciting enough, there's exciting video too!
We bring this up only because we fondly remember Mow from his star turn on Kathy Griffin's My Life on the D-List. What's that you say? You don't remember that? Well, for those who don't know, one of Kathy Griffin's assistants (her assistant's assistant to be exact) is from Tracy. And in one of the episodes of her Bravo reality show she heads to her assistants' respective hometowns where everybody promptly treated them like they had "made it" in Hollywood when really all they do is the bitch work for someone who's claim to fame is being on "Suddenly Susan".
I'm not a regular watcher of this show but it's not too often one channel surfs and sees the Tracy water tower featured prominently. I usually hate reality TV, mostly due to oversaturation and the fact that most are completely devoid of reality, but after watching the Tracy episode I have to say that was the most accurate depiction of anything on a reality show of all time, ever. The highlight being a "Hollywood-style" party thrown by, you guessed it, rich old white people. A party that was so Tracy I'm surprised there wasn't a kid chained to the fireplace (too soon?). Apparently parties have a gift ceremony where Kathy's assistant's assistant Tiffany was presented with two high school boys with roses. Then Victor Mow walks in (at least I'm pretty sure it was Mow, I didn't get the chance to DVR it and you couldn't pay me enough to go to Bravo's website to double check) and hands Kathy a handbag with a chicken in it. Not Kentucky Fried Chicken mind you, but a live chicken. Griffin, of course, freaks out and everybody has a good laugh at the expense of the city girl. Like I said, it was very very Tracy-like. And yes, they also went to the Great Plate in that episode. Because really, what the hell else is there to do in Tracy? And that's how we'll always remember Victor Mow. A guy always fighting the notion that we're just some bumfuck cowtown, or setting the fight back 15 years. One or the other.
Nuclear wastein going through Stockton?
Now that we've fixed the Record's headline for that story, we've really got nothing more to say on the subject. Other than anybody who opposes this plan is a dirty commie. We can't think of anything more American than shipping nuclear waste off to France. Let those fuckers deal with our dangerous radioactive waste. Plus if those cheese eating surrender monkeys spill any of it there's a good chance we could just waltz in and take over after they cede control to the leaky barrels. Although we do have to wonder what Fitzy's column would be like if that foghorn he hears is glowing green.
We can't wait for Paul Blartt 2, Movie Security
This story confuses us. Who in their right mind listens to the rent-a-cop over the boys in blue? And even if the two were giving contradicting information, how does "charge and attack the police" even enter the realm of possibility? I don't care if you're a looky loo or just in line to see the Arrested Development movie. If I'm told to disperse, I'll peace the fuck out. It's just a movie, it's not that important. Even if the AD movie is going to rule. And frankly, I don't like to be in the same place as police anyway. They just make me uncomfortable. Mostly because I'm afraid they'll shoot me. Hey speaking of...
CHP is so good at conspiracies they can force people to run from them
Remember this story? Yeah, I almost forgot about it too. This was like 4 police shootings ago. While we agree the CHP could probably be a little more forthright with the information they've gathered, Pinasco's family really has to stop painting their son as completely innocent. Any way you paint it, he was running from the police. Maybe I'm just a goody two shoes, but once I see those lights go on I pull over to the side of the road. I've got nothing to hide. You know who usually does have something to hide? People who run from the cops when they try and pull them over. And the "He was probably just heading home" excuse doesn't work at all. I've gotten pulled over on my street about a half-mile from my place on suspicion of DUI. I was stone cold sober and pulled over. I didn't lead them on a chase to my house because that's not what innocent people do. I answered their patronizing questions (like being asked, while they're looking at my ID which bore the name of the street we were on no less, "Where you headed?"), blew into the tube, and then headed home. But no, it's obviously all the CHP's fault and not Pinasco's, who would probably still be alive today if he just pulled the fuck over. No really, innocent people run from the cops and the spin out in front of their house all the time.
OMG! A new coach! This is the biggest thing to happen to Stockton sports! The Thunder are championship-bound now! Tickets still available!
And in one final taste as to how slow news was during the holiday week, the news that we said didn't matter a couple of weeks ago still doesn't matter. But don't tell the Record's sports staff that. They're treating it as if the Thunder signed Wayne fucking Gretzky. No really, in addition to the above-linked story they also have four other stories about Matt Thomas' hiring. And that's not even including the initial story in which Cichocki was fired. They didn't even give this much coverage to Reggie Theus' firing, and he coached an actual pro team! Hell, they didn't even give this much coverage to the Ports and they won the fucking title! Quit pandering to Dan Chapman and report news we actually want to read. And when I say "we" I'm not referring to just those of us who write for this site. We have yet to find anybody who will defend the Record's sports pages when we remark that the section is completely useless, which is something we do a lot. Common response? "Yeah, totally fucking useless."
That's it for now. Duke told me he's working on something, so that means he'll have a post up by Friday. Happy New Year and Happy 6 months to us as of Jan 2nd. Who knew we'd last this long?
Luckily one of the benefits of taking a break like that is it gives us time to let some links pile up for the Quick Links. The slow news cycle kind of killed the crutch that is the Quick Links, but now it's 2009 and we've got a decent amount, so let's dive in shall we? We'll be messing around with the format for a bit, mostly out of boredom. Luckily I doubt it'll be too jarring.
Layoffs!? You want to talk about layoffs!?
This is probably the easiest example of how slow news has been. We've known for a while that Stockton PD was going to have to layoff trainees, but then it actually happened. How is this an example of slow news? Because really it's just another way of saying "Hey, the economy sucks." One would think that without a police chief to pay we'd be able to keep one or two of the new recruits. But instead the city just paid for their training so they can go off and shoot innocent men in Lodi or something. I wonder if we can write off their training expenses as a charitable donation. Can't we at least put them in dispatch until the hiring freeze ends?
Of course the best part of this story is that we're now actually less safe than we were in 2006 when a consultant said we had too few police officers. In 2006 there were 1.46 officers per 1000 residents, now there's 1.43 per 1000. I'm pretty sure the goal is at least 3. But remember, Stockton is totally safe and living in the southern portion isn't enough of a reason to take precautions to protect your family. If you hear shit going down in your backyard just roll over and go back to sleep, it'll blow over. If we all do that we'll probably only need. 1.2 officers per 1000 residents. Think of the savings!
But who will hand low end celebrities chickens at awkward parties now?
Another reason we kind of slacked off near the end of the year was we were getting really tired of end of the year/political term stories. The Record did two stories on Mike Machado, which was two too many and could have been summed up with the sentence "Politicians have term limits and disagree sometimes" (shocking revelations, I know). Victor Mow was the latest to get the termed out interview treatment and as expected it was unremarkable at best. Hooray filler! And if the article wasn't exciting enough, there's exciting video too!
We bring this up only because we fondly remember Mow from his star turn on Kathy Griffin's My Life on the D-List. What's that you say? You don't remember that? Well, for those who don't know, one of Kathy Griffin's assistants (her assistant's assistant to be exact) is from Tracy. And in one of the episodes of her Bravo reality show she heads to her assistants' respective hometowns where everybody promptly treated them like they had "made it" in Hollywood when really all they do is the bitch work for someone who's claim to fame is being on "Suddenly Susan".
I'm not a regular watcher of this show but it's not too often one channel surfs and sees the Tracy water tower featured prominently. I usually hate reality TV, mostly due to oversaturation and the fact that most are completely devoid of reality, but after watching the Tracy episode I have to say that was the most accurate depiction of anything on a reality show of all time, ever. The highlight being a "Hollywood-style" party thrown by, you guessed it, rich old white people. A party that was so Tracy I'm surprised there wasn't a kid chained to the fireplace (too soon?). Apparently parties have a gift ceremony where Kathy's assistant's assistant Tiffany was presented with two high school boys with roses. Then Victor Mow walks in (at least I'm pretty sure it was Mow, I didn't get the chance to DVR it and you couldn't pay me enough to go to Bravo's website to double check) and hands Kathy a handbag with a chicken in it. Not Kentucky Fried Chicken mind you, but a live chicken. Griffin, of course, freaks out and everybody has a good laugh at the expense of the city girl. Like I said, it was very very Tracy-like. And yes, they also went to the Great Plate in that episode. Because really, what the hell else is there to do in Tracy? And that's how we'll always remember Victor Mow. A guy always fighting the notion that we're just some bumfuck cowtown, or setting the fight back 15 years. One or the other.
Nuclear waste
Now that we've fixed the Record's headline for that story, we've really got nothing more to say on the subject. Other than anybody who opposes this plan is a dirty commie. We can't think of anything more American than shipping nuclear waste off to France. Let those fuckers deal with our dangerous radioactive waste. Plus if those cheese eating surrender monkeys spill any of it there's a good chance we could just waltz in and take over after they cede control to the leaky barrels. Although we do have to wonder what Fitzy's column would be like if that foghorn he hears is glowing green.
We can't wait for Paul Blartt 2, Movie Security
This story confuses us. Who in their right mind listens to the rent-a-cop over the boys in blue? And even if the two were giving contradicting information, how does "charge and attack the police" even enter the realm of possibility? I don't care if you're a looky loo or just in line to see the Arrested Development movie. If I'm told to disperse, I'll peace the fuck out. It's just a movie, it's not that important. Even if the AD movie is going to rule. And frankly, I don't like to be in the same place as police anyway. They just make me uncomfortable. Mostly because I'm afraid they'll shoot me. Hey speaking of...
CHP is so good at conspiracies they can force people to run from them
Remember this story? Yeah, I almost forgot about it too. This was like 4 police shootings ago. While we agree the CHP could probably be a little more forthright with the information they've gathered, Pinasco's family really has to stop painting their son as completely innocent. Any way you paint it, he was running from the police. Maybe I'm just a goody two shoes, but once I see those lights go on I pull over to the side of the road. I've got nothing to hide. You know who usually does have something to hide? People who run from the cops when they try and pull them over. And the "He was probably just heading home" excuse doesn't work at all. I've gotten pulled over on my street about a half-mile from my place on suspicion of DUI. I was stone cold sober and pulled over. I didn't lead them on a chase to my house because that's not what innocent people do. I answered their patronizing questions (like being asked, while they're looking at my ID which bore the name of the street we were on no less, "Where you headed?"), blew into the tube, and then headed home. But no, it's obviously all the CHP's fault and not Pinasco's, who would probably still be alive today if he just pulled the fuck over. No really, innocent people run from the cops and the spin out in front of their house all the time.
OMG! A new coach! This is the biggest thing to happen to Stockton sports! The Thunder are championship-bound now! Tickets still available!
And in one final taste as to how slow news was during the holiday week, the news that we said didn't matter a couple of weeks ago still doesn't matter. But don't tell the Record's sports staff that. They're treating it as if the Thunder signed Wayne fucking Gretzky. No really, in addition to the above-linked story they also have four other stories about Matt Thomas' hiring. And that's not even including the initial story in which Cichocki was fired. They didn't even give this much coverage to Reggie Theus' firing, and he coached an actual pro team! Hell, they didn't even give this much coverage to the Ports and they won the fucking title! Quit pandering to Dan Chapman and report news we actually want to read. And when I say "we" I'm not referring to just those of us who write for this site. We have yet to find anybody who will defend the Record's sports pages when we remark that the section is completely useless, which is something we do a lot. Common response? "Yeah, totally fucking useless."
That's it for now. Duke told me he's working on something, so that means he'll have a post up by Friday. Happy New Year and Happy 6 months to us as of Jan 2nd. Who knew we'd last this long?
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