Journalism is a fickle, fickle friend

One day? Front page, 1,000 word feature
The Next? Briefs about nothing, lots of twiddling of your thumbs

BUT...


My story is up on CP wire :)

This pretty much made my day. It means that any newspaper in Canada can now pull it off CP and run it in their papers. It's unlikely since it's mostly focused on the Okanagan region but on the off chance that it does I have a google alert running and trust me, I will share. :)

That's it for now folks. I'm off to Victoria in a few days where I plan to do nothing but hang out with Granny and Nat and relax on the ocean (as it should be).

NOT one of those lazy weekends

Saturday involved lots and lots and lots and lots of journalism (not all the good kind, more of the sucky it-has-to-be-done-but-it-sucks kind).

Today I got up at 6 (yes, on a Sunday blehh) to write a feature article before I went with Andrea to the Kettle Valley Train - it's the remaining 10km of track from the CPR in the region (from 1912) and although it was mostly little children (they played banjo and sang the alphabet over and over) I enjoyed the view and I just plugged in to my iPod.

Afterwords Andrea and I grabbed coffee at our favourite, Bliss Bakery, before we went for a hike. Yes, a hike. It's not good times. I mean, it wasn't when we started  (for me at least, I know Andrea was in bird heaven) but then it picked up and it wound up being pretty amazing (some good views).

Anyhow, here are a crapload of nature photos for your viewing pleasure (or not)... PHOTOS

Now I am off to catch up on some summer school, clean my room and sleep (sleep still eludes me and that makes me very, very grumpy).

Five days until I am in Victoria with Granny and Nat :)

A whole lot of something

Canada's tallest zipline photos.... Click here!

Man. I'm such a slacker blogger. I guess you could weigh the pros and cons, the obvious pro being that I'm clearly doing important, busy, journalism things that keep me from blogging (only 70% true) and the con being that... I don't really know.

It's Saturday morning and I have to write up a Charlatan sports story (I already did a feature story this morning), I have to catch up on this week's online summer school lectures, attend a drunken ball hockey tournament and then get into my fancy garb to report on a save-the-ducks fancy schmancy meal (at least it's free food right?).

I'm not going to lie. Mostly I just want to sleep right now. I inexplicably woke up at 5 in the morning and couldn't sleep again for awhile and then woke up for good at 7, which isn't awesome when  you're a tired, tired person. I'm sure nobody has sympathy for me since most people are underslept and therefore are too busy being underslept to have sympathy about other people being underslept, ah well.

This week was hit and miss. I've been working on a longer form feature for Monday's paper (that I'm quite proud of so far) so that's helped make the "miss" days a little bit better.

Thursday was pretty much the highlight (yesterday was a little suckier - except for the minor excitement of a dead body and a bank robbery on BMX) with a good piece on the mayor of West Kelowna re-running, my HST story making front page, and a solid look at the province's new animal cruelty laws - as well as a couple of tearjerker interviews for my feature story. Seriously, I can no longer count on one hand how many times people have just started crying when I ask them questions on the phone.

Monday was of course solid with the testing of Canada's tallest ziplines (crazy views!) and a stop off at our favourite bakery (they make awesome lemon meringue tarts - hence my new love of all things lemon meringe).

Anyhow, the main assignment editor is heading off on a two week vacation, so I'm pretty excited to see how it goes with the new assignment editor for the next little while, although really it's not much since my next two weeks of work are both 4-day weeks since I'm heading off to Victoria next Thursday night for a visit with my long-lost roommate Nat and of course Granny!

Although the newspaper doesn't really use it's website, I have managed to drag up a grand total of one of my stories (yes, one) online. It's not my best story, not even by a half, but it's the only thing I have online to show for my work. Although I have hard copies of everything.

Want to hear about an overpriced walkway? Here it is.

Later skaters,
Jane

A1

So you know how sometimes you try new things and you absolutely hate it? And it's made so much worse by the fact that you built it up in your head over a period of days, weeks or in my case even months?

It just sucks so much and you're lonely because you don't know anybody and the whole combination makes you feel like you're struggling and you don't want to feel like that because you love your life and it's really good?

That's sort of how I've felt with this internship. Ups and downs, not quite what I expected, disappointment sometimes in the newsroom, wanting to do more, be given more responsibility and not really getting it.

Your parents always (or should always) say to tough it out. That it's just the first day, couple of days or even week. It will get better, it usually does. Well it did and it is and it's not because I'm getting used to it (although that certainly helps) it's because I'm putting out ideas, asking for permission, just doing what I think should be done and then asking people's thoughts on the final product.

I've struggled this week. Struggled with being assigned stories I didn't feel were stories, with not being able to really delve into news issues I thought were worth pursuing and with adjusting to a new place where I know a grand total of one person and am lonely.

But it started to get better. I started to get better and Friday was one of those days where things go really well and you're happy about it but you're mostly happy about how you have things to look forward to.

And I do.

Not having a car = blessing in disguise.

Turns out not being able to drive to the water plant for a tour or attending technical pressers about (almost) nothing because I don't have a car is pretty handy. Instead I get a normal lunch time and I sit at a desk chair and do interviews and get the chance to look at additional things that I might want to pitch as stories, which is sort of the whole point of internships in my opinion - working yourself up to feeling confident in the newsroom and being able to pitch your own ideas and better yet, have them well received.

I took a little bit of a vacation from my Toronto/Ottawa life and mostly ignored everyone out East so I could focus a bit more on having fun out West (and I am!).

Friday I pitched and am now working on a feature idea about the closures of several womens' centres in the Okanagan valley and I lined up several interviews for next week.

Saturday Andrea and I adventured out to the nut farm in West Kelowna and then had lunch and a bit of a walk at a nice bakery in Peachland. We were all dressed and ready to hike but got rained out so instead we wandered around the Westland strip malls and went to see a movie.

After, I went for an extended walk/exploration along the little creeks and rivers that lead to the lake by the marina and listened to music, which I think makes walks about ten million times more enjoyable.

Then I spent my Saturday evening watching Beauty and the Beast. Yup, it's true. But it was wonderful and I'm not ashamed (I think).

Today, I'm tying up some loose ends, lazing around in bed and maybe I'll tackle cleaning my room.

Tomorrow? Andrea and I are taking an advance look at Canada's newest zipline. Supposedly it is Canada's highest and fastest zipline and we get to ride it for free all in the name of journalism (we're quite happy).

Best news of all to share? My story (that I pitched myself before the press releases came out) made front page. A1.

And now off I go, to gear up for what is certainly going to be a busy, long, fun, crazy week.

Missing all my Torontonians,
Jane

PS, more photos... click here! (and scroll to the end if you've already seen the first set)
PPS two weeks until I go visit Nat and Granny in Victoria
PPPS three weeks until Rob comes out west to visit me!

Taking control

Endless hours of nothing/wasted time = unhappy Jane.

Today, I did something about it.

Yup, it's true.

After a morning of writing briefs, doing rewrites and interviewing the mayor of West Kelowna for a story, Andrea and I went for an extended lunch walk (having a beach, boardwalk and mountains right next to work is just wonderful).

The morning was a bit unfortunate (I partially broke (and then fixed) a phone), but this afternoon I finally started to get into my game (about time). I'm a little more excited about work now.

I volunteered myself for assignments on the HST changes in B.C. and pitched a well-received story about Atheist ads gone missing (stay-tuned for more deets) in Kelowna.

More to come,
Jane

PS blisters are getting marginally better, so I am marginally happier

Attack of the blisters

It was a sad, sad day in Jane-land right from the get go.

First off, I seem completely incapable of adjusting to the time difference and I was wide awake (again) at 5 in the morning. Second, I walked thirty minutes to work in a pair of brand new work shoes and when I was about six blocks away they started to hurt, at five blocks they were killing me and by four blocks I was hobbling (not a joke, ask anyone in the office. They laughed- a lot).

It was not a good time. Luckily I got a ride home (but my last one for the week) so tomorrow I need to prepare. Rob has suggested I wear running shoes and bring work shoes in my bag and I think I will be doing just that, otherwise my poor feet (I now have four blisters, the kind that not even double layers of band-aids and socks can mask) will die and I need them since I lack a car and the city of Kelowna appears to lack any sort of reliable transit system.

Work, however, was it's usual good time. Today they were ready for us, so I spent most of my day writing briefs, copy-editing and chasing down interviews for a story about a city construction job gone wrong (a woman has been without water for four days now).

The humour (for me, at least) in writing this blog is that all the crazy, specific things from work (the ones that make really good stories) I can't share online. I can tell you about my experiences, that people were nice, about my adventures (and my blisters), but I can't really delve into it much more because online is a little too on the record (to use a useful journalism term).

The one thing I will say is that working 8:30-5pm with a police scanner on as background noise can be fairly stressful, but can also provide opportune comedic relief (when you get past the numerous hobbling jokes that were made at my expense - I like to think that so far I have been a good sport).

It can be stressful when you're doing an interview and you hear voices on the police scanner talking about trucks rolling over, car accidents, arrests, etc. but there were two moments of note today that made me laugh (although whether or not they are actually humorous remain to be seen).

At one point a reporter out on assignment trying to find a car accident and a person who supposedly needed to be taken to the hospital kept calling in to ask where it was and everyone was trying so hard and you could just hear the voices on the police scanner also asking each other where it was and saying they couldn't find it.

Later, the whole office just started vibrating (before 3, so not the printing press starting up) and one of the reporter's put her head on the table and said, 'I hate when it does this.' Turns out that sometimes the police scanner just relays some sort of weird static for long periods of time and sometimes it's well-timed during a crazy day.

I'm sort of reading what I wrote and it sounds a lot less funnier than it was today and as it was in my head when I was trying to figure out how to write it - sorry, I hope you still read my blog.

As for life in general, there have been several changes to my itinerary and life that I won't really go into too much depth explaining (although I'm sure once my parents read it they will follow up with a demand for an explanation, typical parents).

I am now heading home (for Toronto work) two weeks earlier than originally planned (I leave June 10, instead of June 24). Instead of visiting Granny and Nat in Victoria June 24, I am instead spending a weekend there in two weeks (May 19). Also one of my favourite new itinerary changes? Rob will be spending a week in Kelowna after my visit to Victoria.

And now? Glee.

Glee, sleep, using this blog as some sort of weird de-stressing, post-work therapy and more sleep will save me.

:)

Day One

This was yesterday:

Today was a rain cloud. So much for dry, hot and sunny (not that I'm complaining), BUT most importantly it was day one on the job.

The Courier is conveniently located downtown: one block from the marina, three from the beech, two from the courthouse, a couple steps from the police/RCMP office and more. The building itself is a medium-sized, one-story building with a printing press inside (at 3 p.m. when they start the press the whole building vibrates for awhile, it's quite entertaining).

Andrea (the other intern and a fellow Charlatan employee and Carleton journalism student) and I took bets on whether or not amidst all the election drama they would remember us (they didn't).

Turns out that since they all have to stay late tonight to get election results in, none of them planned to show up until 12:30 which left Andrea and I standing there at 9:30 with Micah, a night editor and day-time editor for the Westside Weekly, a bi-weekly publication for West Kelowna (the city across the lake that took great pains to distance themselves from Kelowna and then promptly named themselves West Kelowna, go figure).

Given that Micah had a light load for the day and we had nothing to do she took us on a car tour of Kelowna and West Kelowna, treated us to some baked goods and gave us the run-down on the paper and the town (drama, politics, the local First Nations) and by time we had returned there was a cop presser on our desk, more reporters in and work to be done.

Quick lowdown: the paper has about three reporters which means they're stretched a little thin (their world stories come from the Associated Press so the reporters just cover local), which means Andrea and I will have our work cut out for us and lots and lots to do (which is precisely why I wanted to work here).

Andrea and I hung around polling stations (feeling like creeps) asking people why they though voting was important and compiling streeters before heading back where I interviewed the RCMP spokesman and wrote up a quick brief about a marijuana bust for the Westside Weekly and then got started on rewrites for tomorrow's paper.

Everyone is cheery and fairly good humoured so I would consider it a successful (if sometimes dry) first day. Also, it's a small, small world. One of the night editors is a Carleton graduate and a former employee at Postmedia which for those who don't know, share's an office with Global National in Ottawa (or it did) when I worked there.

Alrighty, off I go for some dinner and some relaxation (I'm walking like crazy and apparently 3-hour jet lag hits me more than 6-hour jet lag, but hey!).

Hope everyone voted and is staying up to see the results! :)

-Jane

PS on sad news I have a massive blister that is causing me great pain and I just thought I would share. Please send your sympathies my way.