In today’s Beacon, there’s a column about a family with 16 children and how they deal with the holidays. Can you imagine how crazy that would be?

I thought my family — seven kids… five older sisters and one younger brother — was too big to manage. I can’t even imagine being one of 16.

I am going to see The Pursuit of Happyness tonight. (Watch the trailer.)

It’s been awhile since I had time to go to the movies. I used to go every weekend, sometimes multiple times each week. This semester that dropped off. My TV-viewing habits also fell to empty, which perpetuated my lack of interest in movies. I didn’t see the trailers and thus didn’t know what I was missing.

This movie, which is about a single father who decides to make something more of himself by taking on an unpaid internship as at a brokerage firm, looks good and heartwarming. And I’m excited to have a few hours to spend doing nothing better than being entertained.

My only question is, who decided to spell it “Happyness”? That was honestly what made me click on the link to see what the movie was about. Apparently, the meaning behind the spelling is explained in the film. We’ll see if it’s justified. Either way.

I had a conversation the other day with someone planning to buy a new phone. My one suggestion to her was: “Don’t buy the Razr.”

I hate my Razr, as I have previously discussed. I bought it when it was still novel enough to amuse me and make me feel special. I love its size. I love what it’s capable of and all that. I hate the interface, the bad reception and the quirks (the most annoying being randomly resetting itself during conversations — a problem noted by several people I know with the same phone). The video is small, but decent for what it is, and the photo quality and camera abilities leave a lot to be desired. Aside from its small size, it has withstood the test of “Meranda is clumsy,” in that I drop it several times a week and it hasn’t broken yet. (I remember the first night I had it, I was at the store, and I dropped it so it chipped a little. My mom looked at me and asked, “Are you going to cry?” I didn’t. But if it had broken, I probably would have.) Altogether, it’s been an annoying phone. But it got the job done.

Now, I’m in the market to upgrade to a smart phone. Doing so would allow me easier and timelier access to my e-mail and the Web. I could more quickly send off breaking news notes or look up facts on the run. I also want a decent quality camera with video capabilities. Basically, I want it to allow me to condense my tech tools for work not replace them. (I have a digital camera, laptop and an iPod that I love. Why replace them?) I just need to find that perfect phone.

So, reading this story (”Forget the backpack, ‘pocket journalism’ is coming“) excites me. I want one of those phones. Also, as seen on Poynter, “Smart Phones and Reporters: Perfect Together?“

I spent the last few weeks of my editorship explaining as much as I could about how the Stater, the computers, the university worked to anybody who would listen. Although I worked to train my staff so they could replace me when I graduated, it was the last few weeks when I realized how much institutional knowledge I would take with me.

I passed on knowledge about everything from where to find stories the computer eats (there are backups on the originating computers), to the cell phone numbers of the top student leaders on campus (I posted sticky notes in the editor’s office for this reason), to how to search the Web archives before our relatively recent move to College Publisher (it’s at stater.kent.edu, but be prepared to wade through a lot of crap), to how to buy a pop from the can machine that won’t take dollars (put the dollar in the bottle machine and hit the change return button to get quarters)… Basically, I spent the last three years amassing all this institutional knowledge that was great when I was there. Anybody could simply say, “Hey Meranda, how do I…?” And I’d help him sort out the problem or sit down and work it through with him. Not so when I’m no longer there.

Tonight, I got a call from one of the soon-to-be top editors asking, “So, what do you do when there’s breaking news over break?” Doh. You find a reporter and post it to the Web asap and follow. Same thing you do when there’s breaking news and a paper the next day. Only this time, the follow also is on the Web. So I ask, “Well, what reporters do you have in Kent?” But, she doesn’t know. (Institutional knowledge learned from my own stint as a principal reporter when we had “on-call nights” — you need to know at all times who you have available and who you can call in. Otherwise, you waste time getting a lot of “I’m at work” or “I’m out of town” responses.)

I’m expecting she’ll find at least one reporter around. (I asked if she could just do it, but she, too, is at home in another state.) Then, I’m expecting to receive a call asking how to post it to the Web. There were only half a dozen of us who knew how to post to the Web. Only two will still work for the Stater next spring. Though I gave this “Web training” to all of my top eds last fall, the only two of us who ever used it were the AME/Web and myself. The incoming eds won’t learn until a week before the new semester starts.

These calls will be frequent the first month of semester, and then taper off as they do as I did and learn as they go. But still, it makes me feel useful, even as I am slowly removed from the listservs and bumped from the masthead.

I consider myself relatively patient when I deal with bureaucracy. Last spring, when I couldn’t file my taxes because Social Security had my birth year wrong, I was understanding. Mistakes happen, I told myself. So I took a few hours out of my busy day to patiently wait in the Social Security office downtown to get it fixed. I didn’t even complain.

So, when I got a speeding ticket in Michigan this week I didn’t even bother whining or trying to get out of it. It happens to the best of us, I reasoned. But I’ve never gotten a speeding ticket before, and perhaps that was why I was so absolutely confused by the transaction that took place.

Apparently, in Michigan if you’re from out of state and you get a speeding ticket you have to do one of two things on the spot, a) you have to pay $100 toward your court costs right then or b) you have to surrender your license.

I didn’t understand what the officer was talking about. I really didn’t. I made her explain three times what she meant. She wanted to take my license? Why? What, like I wouldn’t need it anytime in the next month?! Or she wanted $100? Cash? Right now? Most people don’t carry that much cash with them.

Luckily for me, my grandparents had given me $100 for graduation the day before, which I had in my wallet waiting to be deposited in the bank upon my return home. Needless to say, I wasn’t about to give up my license and hope I didn’t need to produce it anytime in the next month or so. So, I handed her the $100 bill I couldn’t really afford to give up.

I asked her how much the fine would be. I was trying to gauge how much more it could possibly suck. She snapped back, “I deal with five different courts and they all have different fines. Call the number on the ticket.” She was needlessly vicious about it. I consider the cost of the ticket a perfectly legitimate question, and even if you do deal with five different courts the base price of a ticket should probably be something you know.

Today, I called the Eaton County number on the ticket to hear the damage. According to the recording, it is $95 for going 5 mph over in a 70 mph zone. OK. I can handle that. Except one thing: I already put down $100. So what becomes of that $5? I wanted to make sure I heard it right and wasn’t missing some type of other fine that would still be due if I mailed in the ticket without any other payment. So, I listened through the whole recording until the message said, “If you want to talk to a traffic clerk, press 1.”

I pressed 1, and I waited. And waited. And waited. Five rings. Ten rings. Two dozen rings. Four minutes. No one picked up. There was no message saying, “Hey we’re out to lunch,” or “Please call back during our normal business hours, between never and forever.”  There wasn’t even a voicemail where I could ask someone to get back to me. Nothing. Just an endless ring, ring, ring that apparently was going unheard.

Ugh. So I guess I’ll just send off the ticket and hope I wasn’t wrong. Let that $5 be absorbed the state of Michigan and put toward something like courtesy training for the officers who pull people over and phone training for the traffic clerks who are apparently too busy to pick up the phone.

So, being that I am “unemployed” currently — as my sister Brandiann has pointed out, “After you graduate, you’re not on winter break. You’re just unemployed.” Thanks, sis. — I spend a lot of time looking at job postings.

Although, I am currently putting the search on hold until after Christmas/maybe New Years because nobody’s around at the papers; I’m hoping to hear from places I’ve already applied/interviewed; and most importantly, I need to sleep. As much fun as I had rushing through in three and a half years, and as much as I learned working at the Stater and going to an insane amount of classes, the truth is college exhausted me. I need to take a week to recoup my strength and energy. Plus, I figure, I deserve a week off.

Anyway, as far as job postings go, some of the pitches are pretty fun. I just came across this one for a Florida paper. The subject caught my eye, “Give your J-School degree a good home.” I clicked (aside: mom, if you read this, I’m not moving to Florida, so please don’t call me crying about how you will never see me again)…

We offer a relaxed atmosphere, reasonably competitive pay, a dress code that doesn’t include socks or ties, the opportunity to mix with fifth generation fishing guides, third generation politicians and a few first generation celebrities and pirates…

I can’t tell which is my favorite part, the dress code or the pirates. Either way, it’s a different way to attract job candidates.

And, this posting for a Connecticut paper, knows how to grab people by their egos. Although the ad itself isn’t as interesting as the previous was, the subject will get people to click: “Become a statewide name.” I mean, who doesn’t want that to happen?

Finally, this post to work for Bob Woodward, which I saw last week, made me laugh out loud. I’m sure it’s an AMAZING opportunity, but I totally get The Devil Wears Prada visions dancing in my head after reading the description. Plus, they don’t want me:

To be blunt, we are probably NOT looking for someone 24-25 years old, two or three years out of college, looking to move on from his or her first job.

Although, this seems to entirely dismiss new graduates by just skipping them over. Their loss, I’m sure. Though, I do know a number of people who would die for the opportunity to work for him. :shrug: But it’s not for me, not now at least. I have other arenas to conquer.

Those are just a sampling of the odd ads I come across.

There’s also a whole other post in the things editors like to play up when talking about their papers to you. For example, at a paper I was talking to earlier in the semester every exchange, even voicemail and e-mail, between myself and the ME included some mention of the weather. Yes the weather is different in the Midwest than on the West Coast. Yes, it’s nice that it’s “sunny” or “beautiful” or 70 degrees in November, but is that really the best selling point you have for the paper/area? That doesn’t bode well for someone like me who really does prefer having definite seasons. :shrug: There are other examples, but as I said, another post someday.

I just stumbled upon the Kent State University College Prowler book on Amazon. I don’t remember what series of clicks or searches landed me there. But it made me smile.

A book I helped edit can be purchased online on Amazon.com.

Yeah, in my list of things to achieve in life, writing a book is in the top 10. It will be a long time before that happens. But copy editing and fact checking the College Prowler book for Steve was one of those random forays into book publishing. The book is essentially a college students take on Kent State. (College Prowler has one student at each university compile the information and put together the book with his/her team.)

If you look at the “search inside” pages and click on “Copyright” you’ll see my name listed as a member of the bounce-back team. I don’t get any credit or money for the week I didn’t sleep because I had to read and re-read the manuscript or the constant complaining from Steve I had to endure as he struggled to compile the information for the book (with the help of most of the Summer Kent Stater staff). But, in the end, just seeing this on Amazon is kind of cool.

By now, everyone has heard that when you combine Diet Coke and mentos it makes one crazy fountain of foam. I saw it on Myth Busters this summer, so I know it’s been around for awhile. Still, this chain reaction video is pretty impressive. Using 251 2-liter bottles of pop and 1,506 mentos on the ridiculous project. They have way too much time on their hands, but the outcome was insanely amusing.

I saw this speech from the Scripps CEO to Arizona State University j-school grads on Romenesko.

Reading it made me feel even better about my chosen profession. Even though every week I read about dozens of reporters and editors being laid off, and I do worry about my own prospects, this speech only reaffirms for me that I have a chance. I am fortunate and excited to enter the profession right now. I have the right set of skills at the right time. Hopefully it will pay off for me.

What most excites me about the opportunities that lay in the years ahead for me is this: nobody is saying, “What do you know? You just graduated from college. This is how it’s always been done.” That phrase, “how it’s always been done” is quickly and necessarily being removed from our lexicon. Instead, newspapers and media companies are listening to people like me, people who might not have decades of experience but who have eyes and minds wide open to the future and are ready and willing to take risks. As I always say, I might hate something or fail at it, but anything is worth trying once.

Some choice spots from the speech:

We’ll also be looking to you to be good story-tellers.

We believe this is critical to the future of our local news franchises.

To stay relevant in today’s crowded media environment – to rise above the din – we have to tell compelling stories. We may have to jettison police blotter reporting. We may have to miss some city council meetings.

Or it may be a matter of breathing life into the mundane and providing insight and perspective.

All I know is that everyday, our readers should be afraid of what they’ll miss if they don’t pick up their local newspaper off the front lawn or log on to the Web site.

…

Immerse yourselves in the fullness of the communities in which you work and live.

Know your neighbors and know what really matters to them. It’ll make you better reporters and great storytellers.

AND finally:

When it comes to changing technology, we’ll be looking to you to be flexible. You’re probably already well aware by now that change will be the only constant in your lives.

My recommendations to you are to keep an open mind. Be early adapters. And reject complacency and the status quo.

…

We – and by we, I mean the business of media as a whole – will be depending on the risk-takers of the world to identify and seize all of the opportunities that flourish in a world of constant change.

My hope is that you’ll be those risk takers.

Some things to think about.

I began reading the Harry Potter series in middle school — early middle school. That I haven’t outgrown or gotten bored with the series is testament to the quality of the content and writing.

I started with book two and have had to wait it out for each subsequent book to arrive. I’ve been eagerly awaiting the final installment for quite some time now.

Apparently, now Scholastic has announced the final book’s title, and drumroll please, it will be “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.”

Cue wild fan speculation and fanfic for the next year and a half before the book ever hits stores or even Amazon.com.

UPDATE! Wait, you don’t even have to wait for the speculation and book stores. Borders immediately jumped on this bandwagon with a mass e-mail announcing the name asking users to sign up and reserve copies today. Come on…