Been a while

I write for newspapers. Did I mention that? Sometimes I get caught up in that, for a month or so at a time, and I forget to update this thing.

For instance, I wrote a column about ice cream. It's riveting.

I wrote something your parents shouldn't read. My parents haven't yelled at me for it yet. Maybe they paid attention to the title. I used to catch an ear full about once every three weeks over something I wrote--damn Internet making things available to whomever. I hope they're not jaded already. I'm only 22, and dying young went out of style in the 60s.

I spent most of the summer writing about everything from world-touring bands to garage bands to garage artists to a guy touring across country with his guitar and his bicycle because he couldn't afford gas, but would rather do that than not play. I participated in a spelling bee, and was eliminated in the first round--a proud moment to be a writer. I drove all over the Triad for 30-minute interviews in neighborhoods in Winston or shrimp bars in High Point. I wrote a story about a musical production of "The Full Monty"--and I interviewed all the actors by phone. I gave blood for the first time, which wasn't writing-related but did happen in a conference room of the News & Record. Mostly I just wrote about too many bands to mention, and I have the towering stack of free CDs to prove it.

But the definite highlight of the summer was writing the Go Triad cover story about Johnny Walker, the radio DJ who stayed on air for 175 hours straight to win the world record for longest radio broadcast. I dropped in on Johnny a few times a day from day one until the end. It was the most involved I've ever been with a story, and it was also the most fun I'd ever had writing one. The hardest part was whittling down my 3,000 words of notes alone into a 1,100ish-word story. Filling a reporter's notebook from front to back was satisfying in itself.

And I'm sure if I focused all that typing into one endeavor I'd have a book done by now.