What was your first job as a journalist?
Guest hosting local radio when a scandal with a teacher abusing students
Have you ever used a typewriter?
Yes. As a kid I would help my parents type up their lesson plans and such on their Sears electric typewriter. Also had a travel sized one.
How is social media changing news?
Social media became both the headwaters and tidal pools of news
Who's your favorite fictional journalist?
Les Nessman, from WKRP in Cincinnati. No one else could have ensured posterity remember the Pinedale Shopping Mall bombing of Thanksgiving 78
What does it mean to be a journalist?
In the modern age, journalist are the vital link between subject, audience, and medium/platform in informing and discerning our time.
How do you prefer to be pitched on stories?
Email, Twitter DM
What tools and software do you use to do your job?
Wordpress, Docs, Word for writing. Audacity, RedCircle, Adobe Suites for radio/media/podcasting. Skype, Zoom, Google Meets for meetings.
What's your favorite social network?
Twitter
Who do you wish followed you?
Anyone interested in good work, honest opinion, serious takes on important issues.
Why did you become a journalist?
Didn't mean too, started writing which lead to doing media, which lead to wanting to cover stories and issues that matter, evolved from there
Did you work for your high school newspaper? If so, what did you do there?
no
What story are you most proud of writing or working on?
Wrote a piece on guy working hard at local pizza place, editor went to get pic, his regional manager was there, guy got promoted on the spot
What advice can you offer to aspiring journalists?
Understand the constant change
When's the best time to pitch you?
Mornings, but I am pretty flexible.
What's the best pitch you ever got?
It was an honor to get - out of the blue- pitched to write the obituary/remembrance for Medal of Honor winner Woody Williams
What's the worst pitch you ever got?
Once had an editor wanting me to write a rebutal to an opinion piece who somehow didn't realize it was a piece I wrote. That was fun.
What's your favorite drink?
Sweet tea
When you're not at a computer, where are you most likely to be?
Cooking or eatings, family time, being outdoors, road trips
Aside from your own, what's your favorite publication to read?
I enjoy reading local papers, the direct work on things like SubStack, and the occasional recipes
What's the most common misperception about your beat?
That being objective and honestly critical of an issue or person automatically means you are completely against them and all in the opposite.
