A brutal Tornado destroyed homes and took lives in Adairsville Georgia in January 2013.
I spent time speaking to the victims for WDEF News 12 in Chattanooga and one women’s sheer disbelief left me speechless.
This short interview sums up what it is like to have everything and then nothing.
Chattanooga Jellyfish
Decided to see what this famous Aquarium was all about.
It’s divided into River and Ocean sections and features specialist areas for Butterflies to Penguins.
Bit pricey but you do get a whole days enjoyment and wonder out of the place.
Worth the hype I must say, impressive feature piece to add to a stunning waterfront.
The otters seem to attract significant attention and are highly energetic.
I did interviews in both areas one with Turtles.
The other with penguins who seemed uninterested in my presence.
Their entire focus seemed to be on attaining food from the wall behind them.
On a recent visit to Archers BBQ in Knoxville, Mason the local culinary talent detailed what Hickory, Memphis Style and all these other vague terms meant.
Below is the Irish I-Phone Interview done with him on the making of real Southern Soul Food.
For all you non vegetarians out there, this is quiet the treat.
Spent time at a Flea Market on way to Pigeon Forge and Gatlinburgh in Tennessee.
One local crafts man tells me why his form or making a living is dying in the US and across the developed world.
Where once people took up wood turning and carving he has found over the 40 years of working in the field he has less and less competitors for his goods yet interest is still high.
It’s that time, when one sits back and reflects and comprehends what we saw in a year that went too fast for some and not enough for many more. A year that exploded with talks and murmurs of the Euro Crises and Arab Spring uprisings in Egypt and Yemen led to the western world holding its break as North Korea launched and defied sanctions with a rocket that came down faster than it rose.
The Summer months saw a build up of election madness in the US that carried controversy after controversy before London 2012 temporarily reduced unemployment in Great Britain and produced stars and inspired a generation. Mr Munch’s Scream, moved on for just shy of the cost of Christiano Ronaldo as CERN and The Mars Rover push the boundaries of science and exploration.
The first Bionic Eye opens a window to a new world as Islamic blinkers are tightened with the Innocence of Muslims while Felix Baumgartner shows the potential of the human mind and body with Hurricane Sandy reminds us Mother Nature can take lives in the blink of an eye.
The Gaza crisis heightens as children are blown to pieces in Connecticut without the feeble excuse of a superhero movie while lunatics and fanatics destroy one of the greatest monuments from the ancient world as the world almost ends.
Why the EU got a peace prize and Obama got awarded is still a wonder to most as Dick Clark and Whitney Houston show awards are worth very little when life ends and we move into the next realm of our existence.
With a world that didn’t end surely we can dare to dream and hope for a better 2013, a year where less innocent people die where drought and mother nature can be tackled better and harnessed and where many must not only see a new year but also a new fishing bowl of possibility where all one can do is cast a line and wait for a bite.
We live in a strange world. Twelve months ago I moved to the UK in the hope of learning from the most talented and experienced broadcasters and producers in one of the most celebrated media environments in the world, which is the BBC.
Over the course of the time spent being enlightened and taught by former BBC employees in a well structured and informative masters at the University of Sheffield, which included a brief stint at BBC Leeds I was shown the true might and broadcasting standards that made Britain a world media leader.
The Olympics shone more light on the ability of the UK to deliver top quality broadcast content to a global audience yet two scandals can never take away from the now tarnished image of British Journalism. Hackgate and the exposure of Jimmy Saville have set the reputation of British journalists and UK media, back decades.
I spoke briefly on the Rony Robinson show on BBC Sheffield a year ago about the challenges facing trainee and wanna be journalists in Britain as celebrated journalist Piers Morgan and media mogul Rupert Murdoch were connected to the Leveson inquiry. Little did I know how much damage the phone hacking scandal would cause, with Journalists seen as scum and lying deceitful members of society.
While at BBC Leeds I was exposed to the true might and skills of employees that upheld the title of one of the most extensive broadcasters in history, yet it is shocking to imagine that it was at the station’s former studios that Saville, a celebrated BBC and British media icon abused young children.
There is a saying in this world we live and work in, that there is no such thing as bad PR, well when it involves phone hacking journalists and broadcasting institutions that protect serial paedophiles, that is bad PR!
It is also down right disgraceful, the obsession with fame and celebrity that existed from beatlemania onwards in the western world has helped create the very people who become untouchable in media spheres. Those who abuse and take advantage of innocent civilians to shift copies of newspapers or protect iconic employees from being exposed for who they really are, is revolting.
British journalists and media in the UK has some of the most talented, producers, presenters and reporters to have ever graced our columns and channels but there are no excuses for Saville and Murdoch.
What has happened in the exposure of these power houses of British media was not only required but must now set a precedent moving forward. With the advances of social media and blogging has come a whole new strand to western journalism, with the naming and shaming of racists in sports journalism via the internet and the larger wealth of opinions and content allows for greater exposure of scenarios that must never be repeated.
Governments and the media should be kept separate as history has shown, however politicians and those in power must now answer the call of the people who have been fooled and lied to for too long.
The only way for journalists and media professionals in the UK is up and the only way to do that is to expose those who are unethical and abusive and help clean up the profession they and i earn our living in.
The Swedish House Mafia’s individual and combined success has struck the world by surprise and they are actually doing what few musical acts never did, they are bowing out on top.
Musical icons have passed from this world at their peak and are immortalized due to this, Kurt Cobain being one of those at their greatest. The Mafia are leaving the music scene as one of the most successful trance groups in history, cementing their status with a song that screams of anthemic melodies and is echoing across clubs and radio playlists from Stockholm to Sydney and Brussels to Beijing.
The song in question is Don’t You Worry Child, which is more than just a sing-a-long fist thumping club anthem but has a very strong message behind it, which is eternal acceptance in the world we live in. We are frenetic, demanding and expecting so much from everything and everyone in our daily lives and the song touches on this chord.
“There was a time, I used to look into my father’s eyes
In a happy home, I was a king I had a gold throne
Those days are gone, now the memories are on the wall
I hear the sounds from the places where I was born”
Very few songs released today, touch upon so much forgetting and realism in our western culture, the song is simple and catchy but also clever and inspiring and as we face into more economic uncertainty, a shaky US election and new chapters in Space exploration, a time should be spent remembering these words
“My father said
Don’t you worry, don’t you worry child
See heaven’s got a plan for you”
Was he a prophet or was he the messiah, regardless of what role the big J played in the world over the past two centuries he would be very different about spreading ‘the good news’ if he appeared today and used social networking or would he?
@jesuschrist would be an Official Twitter account with regularly daily updates on the path to live righteously, he would be followed by hopefully more people than Justin Bieber or One Direction and would not need to hashtag due to the influence and originality of his tweets.
Youtube would allow Jesus to stream live to more viewers than Felix Baumgartner could ever have imagined for his fall from above and am sure you would be allowed to comment and like and dislike uploads.
Would Jesus use Google Plus for hangouts? More than likely yes, with the apostles, as it is probably easier than dealing with Skype group chat and being recharged constantly unaware to one’s own existence but then Jesus would not worry about money as he needed little, relying on donations like Wikipedia.
Facebook would recognize that Jesus would have a lot more subscribers than Neal Mann and Vin Diesel put together and would recognize the value in letting him remain offline and monitor his wall posts. You could not tag yourself in his pictures but he could tag you.
Jesus may not have a Linkedin Account as his role as a spreader of the gospel would not deem him useful to many job matches but may allow for significant references and endorsements if he chose to get Linkedin.
Tweetdeck would be of use, so Jesus could keep track of his Foursquare and Myspace as well as his other accounts and only have to deliver his message once to multiple platforms.
Finally Jesus would do all this from an android unless he did a clever endorsement deal like U2 with apple but one doubts this would be of interest to him.
Jesus the social networker would generate vast trends, forum threads, Google news results and be Bing friendly.
His audio clips would be on Soundcloud or Audioboo for those to listen and share and he would also be linkedin to Amazon and Kindle so you could download his WordPress blog posts and e-books.
Who knows what Jesus or any of the other prophets would have used if they walked among us today and as the song goes,
“What if god was one of us, just a slob like one of us,
just a stranger on the bus trying to make his way home?”
If he was trying to make his way home he would be using Google maps unless he had an iPhone 5.
Here in Tennessee uncertainty and debate reign supreme as the state aims to break early voting records unsure of how much an impact it will have in playing a role in deciding the fate of the United States of America.
One thing can be sure, Romney is not truly in touch with the plight of regular Americans nor is he truly aware of foreign policy requirements. However what we are seeing are many Republican voters unable to connect with a man who is worth a quarter of a billion dollars while they struggle in middle income families but also find Obama having done very little for them or their college-loan struggling children.
It has become a case of the lesser of two evils, do you go with the man who made the money or do you carry on the way America is going with increasing debts.
Like many of us in the UK and Ireland, Americans have come to accept and embrace the here and now world we live in, a society of consumerism and expectation where actions deliver consequences and results, rapidly and effectively. Obama has failed to do that over his four year term, yet only three post war presidents have failed to get a second term in office and we are facing a bizarre scenario where Mitt Romney may win the popular vote and Obama the electoral vote.
It is hard to believe but out of uncertainty breeds rash decision making and this contest has shown that it’s breeding confusion, retraction or views, contradicting and bickering.
With time ticking for both candidates the future and fate of the most powerful country in the world and that of so many here in the valleys and plains of the Volunteer State remains uncertain.
Damn hard thing making a showreel, well it’s not the initial gathering of content that is the issue, it’s how to sell yourself in the best possible light without being cheesy or over the top. Striking the balance is a challenge!
I have truly accepted that a showreel should be the best of the best and after that links to the rest if required. Less is more is relevant with ten or twelve second clips being strong enough to convey your presenting or reporting style convincingly.
Variety and the dreaded dip in the middle was something I found happening as editing progressed, keeping a viewer engaged and focused for three or four minutes is hard never mind when it is entirely the same person talking about a platter of random topics in varied environments.
All in all the debate is truly out on what makes a great showreel, as I look back at mine I feel it is merely a tool to use to get someone’s attention or to compliment an interview scenario.
Regardless don’t rush your editing and don’t dismiss anyone’s perspective, as many opinions as possible are integral.
James P. Mahon 