John Gushue . . . Dot Dot Dot

3 a.m., not eternal

I'm back to my normal job this week, at least for three days. If you follow the timestamps on the blog closely, you may notice I'm up and at 'em by 5 most weekdays. For the last two weeks, I was getting up after 3 a.m., in order to make it to work. I was working as CBC Radio's early morning producer. It was a nice switch - a change, as they say, is as good as a rest - but getting up that extra bit earlier is a fair bit tougher. Not to mention that the first couple of hours are certainly the busiest, which means that you're peaking in productivity before the Morning Show even signs on.

Early and indeed unusual hours, period, go with the journalism racket. I can do mornings well enough, but can no longer do nights; I haven't been able to, indeed, for years, as I've become accustomed to being asleep by certain hours. My friend Mike had one of the worst shifts conceivable when he transferred to a newsroom in Toronto: midnight to 8 a.m. It's the worst of all worlds: no one else is awake, which means you can't phone anyone to corroborate or add details to ordinary stories. Hardly anyone else is working.

Mike, who described that phase of his career as a lost year, told me of how he would finish work by dragging his feet onto the pavement, just as everyone else was rushing to work. I think he would agree with me that it's very difficult to sleep during the daytime.

I often get asked how I handle getting up at 5. Believe me, it's not that early, and not a hardship at all ... especially compared to what other people endure.

Podcast turn

I wrapped up a couple of weeks as the morning news producer for CBC Radio here in St. John's; one of the duties of the job is putting together the weekly podcast, Newfoundland and Labrador This Week, which is released first thing every Saturday morning. Help yourself to it right here.

The value of taking a pause (teleprompter edition)

Teleprompters (we use AutoCue at our station) make it easier for announcers to read the news while maintaining eye contact ... but a lack of punctuation, or directions for just taking the briefest of pauses, can make quite a difference in meaning, as the clip attests:

A T-shirt that puts on a friendly face

Face, font, type ... get it? I'll stop now. As seen here.

A thought on writing and sobriety

"You must stay drunk on writing so reality cannot destroy you."
- Ray Bradbury

Weather blog

Ryan Snoddon (above) joined us at the CBC bureau in St. John's a few weeks ago, to fill in for Krysta Rudofsky during her maternity leave. Last week, Ryan launched NL Weather 24/7, a new blog on the local weather. Ryan, who came to us from Peterborough, is still getting used to RDF-drenched June weather in St. John's; check out his posts as he keeps up with the one topic that is never dull.

A thought on heading to court

"I have come to regard the law courts not as a cathedral but rather as a casino."
- Richard Ingrams, former Private Eye editor

Oh, THAT kind of writing ...

I was clearing out some built-up materials and came across something that made me say "Harumph" a while back. Not to get all Rodney Dangerfield or anything, but I found this sentence describing Sebastian Faulks, whose latest novel, Devil May Care, is a reimagining of the James Bond character, a little curious. It appeared this winter in the Summer 2008 catalogue from Doubleday Canada:

"Sebastian Faulks worked as a journalist before taking up writing full time in 1991."

OK, I know what they mean by "writing" in this instance, but I'm struck by the obvious assumption that what journalists do doesn't involve writing. That is, craft. Harumph.

Push and pullquotes

An interesting piece I bookmarked on good practices with pullquotes may be of interest to others. I like pullquotes; they serve the reader well when used appropriately, help break up grey space (always helpful with longer stories that are light on pictures and art) and, a key point, can draw an audience to a particularly interesting quote from an interview.

Tim Russert and 10 'gotcha' moments

The sudden death of Tim Russert at his office on Friday has triggered a very large swell of tributes and commentaries; one worth considering is a gallery compiled by Time of 10 "gotcha" moments, in which the always-well-prepared Russert not only challenged Hillary Clinton, John McCain and others, but stopped the spin in its tracks.