Flooding in New Jersey

I’ve been walking this week as I usually do in the early mornings. Walking the streets of the neat little Levittown-type “starter” homes built behind my gym in the 1950’s and 60’s -- as farm-land was gobbled up by developers. Walking – and trying not to cry.

In case you haven’t been paying attention – we had a huge rain and wind storm last weekend in the NYC metro area. Trees came down on power lines, cars and homes. And rivers came up. And up and up and up until the flooding in northern and central New Jersey equaled or even surpassed the modern benchmark – the April 1984 floods.

I covered that 1984 flood – as a local TV reporter for WWOR. And I’ve covered the subsequent major floods as I moved around the TV dial. The same streets and homes are always flooded. Some owners always need evacuation by boat and talking to them is always sad. You wonder why they go back flood after flood. Until you realize many of them have nowhere else to go. Buyout money has been available for years now in some flood plain areas – but even at market value it’s seldom enough to buy another house or even condo in the same general area. And towns don't push; they'd rather have wet ratables than untaxable parks.

By the time I started walking around the Village (as it’s called) this week, the water had mostly receded. And people had already piled their lives at the curbstone to be taken away by the town’s efficient bulk pickup trucks. Lovely velvet couches. Wooden cabinets. Multiple sections of rolled up, soggy rugs. Child-sized tables and chairs. And their toys. So many toys. Would there be money to replace them?

Do these often young families have flood insurance I wondered? It’s expensive and although the rivers overflow every few years or so – who expected another 100 year flood? Did those who recently bought one of these houses know they were moving into a flood plain? The homes are built on cement slabs. No basement where you may be able to discern water marks on the walls. A little new plasterboard and some paint and redecoration and voila! Who would know?

I talked to the young immigrant couple who runs the nearby deli where I buy my morning bagel and coffee. They were not familiar with our area when they took over the store – ravaged just a few years before by a previous flood and repaired. And although the river runs under the highway and comes out half a block behind the building --- no one told them before they rented the store about its history. At least 4 major floods that I can recall which typically fill the store’s basement with its electrical box and part of their kitchen with its bagel-making machinery with water. With some warning they had gotten most of their food out but they were trying to dry things out and then wash everything down with bleach. There was nothing I could do except say how sorry I was. Being people who spit in the face of adversity – the obviously devastated wife said simply, “we will come back. We have to.”

I realized today why all this is upsetting me so much –when I have seen it all so many times before. Then, I had a mic in my hand, a cameraperson next to me. I could take all those terribly sad stories and that compelling video, go to a town or county or FEMA official and say – what can you do for these people? What are YOU doing to help? It took the burden off my shoulders. We were helping too. Getting the story out. Pushing the ones with the power. Making connections. It’s what journalists do.

This week it’s just me, Ms Ordinary Person. Powerless without my crew and my platform.

Like all about me, I can only cry.

Security, NBC and Me

Sometimes I really wonder what planet I'm living on.

Today I cut through the main lobby of 30 Rock. I hadn't done that -- walking from the ice rink to the side entrance on 49th Street -- in a long time. The 49th Street entrance is opposite the bank of elevators which leads to NBC's and Channel 4's (WNBC)studios. Otherwise known -- for decades I think -- as the studio entrance. There's one on the 50th Street side as well.

So why am I telling you this? Why should you care? Because what happened next is a primer on how much our world has changed.

There was a group of maybe 20 people lined up on the short flight of stairs leading to the elevators. And a person I couldn't see addressing the group in a very loud voice. "Be sure to remove your belts before going through the metal detectors. And take out all loose change......" And on and on and on. All of it the now familiar instructions we hear and see as we go through airport security. And I mean ALL of it.

An errant thought crossed my mind. Women now know enough not to wear underwire bras when they fly because they set off the alarms. But to see a TV show? So when the alarm on the NBC metal detector goes off because you're wearing your usual underwire bra -- does someone with a TSA uniform -- errr NBC uniform -- come out of woodwork and wand you and pat you down to be sure that's all you in the underwire? Do you have to explain about breast enhancement??? And while I'm at it -- what about knee and hip replacements? The TSA folks wand, poke and pat little old ladies with metal hips unmercifully at airport security.

It would be laughable if it weren't so earnest. The very Soviet-style world we thought we overcame when we won the Cold War. We DID win it didn't we?

Come on guys. IT'S A TV SHOW. Not a jetliner loaded with fuel flying over the Atlantic. Or DisneyWorld.

I'll go along with searching purses and backpacks. Almost every building does that now. Not like a few years ago when only the state and federal courthouses did -- looking, I presume, for something logical-- like guns and knives. Hell -- DisneyWorld does it. I mean, gee. You can't be too careful around Mickey and Minnie.

But back to NBC and taking off your belt to see a TV show.
Y'know -- maybe it was all part of a reality TV show. Because it doesn't take much imagination to visualize what might happen to some members of the hip hop generation when they take off their belts. And then NBC might have another issue -- with the NYPD for indecent exposure. When those 4 sizes too big pants siting uneasily below the hip line --- now bereft of the one thing keeping them there -- fall off completely.

Maybe I should have stayed around for the "floor" show.

On (Czech) Language

It’s another day in black and white up here. Snow again turning everything –even the evergreens – to grey.

I could be studying my Czech language lessons. Or getting my income taxes in order. Or looking for work. Or even giving in to snow-bound cravings and eating Hershey dark chocolate kisses unfortunately left over from Christmas. I could be – but I’m not.

Instead I’ve been reading back articles in the Prague Monitor,
an online newspaper I get in my email box every weekday. No, not what I could be reading or maybe should be reading – important news stories like why the hapless Greek economy ruined a recent Czech government bond sale.

No – I’ve been reading about the use of language in Prague. Czech language. Standard American vs Southern American vs British English. And the merits of editing what you say for the sake of understanding.

Now I don’t even live in Prague except for a few months in the summer – and a few, scattered weeks in fall or spring. But even for those short stays, I find myself editing my English for my Czech friends – as Prague Monitor writer Emily Prucha found herself doing in her combined Czech-American family.

Prucha wrote that Americans find their brand of English – especially when spoken with regional accents and idioms (she’s from Virginia) – sometimes incomprehensible to Czechs who – if they’ve studied English formally have usually been force-fed the grammar and vocabulary of British English. So almost without conscious thought now, I will use “flat” for apartment and “lift” for elevator and try to keep my Lower East Side-influenced northeastern slang to myself.

But Prague isn’t the only place where British English is catching on. It’s happening here too. There are now many British and British-trained news reporters and analysts working in the US. Or as foreign reporters where cost-cutting media companies have closed overseas news bureaus. And many Britishisms that would actually be incorrect in American English are creeping into the everyday language. One of the most obvious: "gone missing" for when someone disappears without a trace or explanation. Young American reporters think the phrase sounds cool and sophisticated -- along with some others like "on holiday" and even occasionally "flat".

Words, after all, define us. My friends and I went through college saying “caio” to each other and thinking that simple Italian word (learned from Gina Lollobrigida and Sophia Loren – not generations of Italian immigrants) somehow gave us a kind of world-weary European sophistication.

Not surprisingly in our much more interlaced world today – ciao is again a college favorite – along with any other country’s words which can make a Brooklyn or Mississippi or even Boston (mine) accent sound like it’s circled the globe.

So – ciao bambino! I’m about to go missing and maybe on holiday as well. You’ll find me at some pub with a pint, some bangers and mash and my mates – some of whom may be a bit dodgy. Like me.

Childhood Obesity and Death

What does it take to wake up America to the dangers of obesity? Otherwise loving and often overly protective parents seen oblivious to the problem. Maybe because at least some of these parents fall into the obese – or at least overweight – category themselves?

Well there’s now a major study, published this week in the New England Journal of Medicine, that tracked a large group of American Indian children for an average of 24 years. The findings? That obesity, pre-diabetes (glucose intolerance) and hypertension in childhood were strongly associated with increased rates of premature death. Specifically – the heaviest kids were more than twice as likely as the thinnest ones to die before they reached 55. That’s 15 to 20 years below average American life expectancy. And typically, say the experts, American Indians are about a decade ahead of other Americans in terms of obesity numbers. Right now nearly a third of all American children are either overweight or obese. You can see where this is going….

There’s never been a good excuse for ignoring obesity. But at least if you’re an adult – you’re making your own, presumably desired, decisions. That’s certainly not true for children. And millions of kids are being doomed to an early death simply because their parents, extended families and school teachers – those most responsible for protecting and directing them – are not doing their jobs.

Never mind the impact on our already fractured health care system. Think of the impact on a kid’s life. Years of taking pills or struggling with insulin shots. Heart attacks that can ruin lives even if they don’t kill. Cancer with all its implications. Strokes.

Do you really want the worst for your child instead of the best?

Habits instilled in childhood last a lifetime. It’s a lot harder to think thin for the first time when you’re 40 than when you’re 10. Healthy food in reasonable portions combined with daily exercise is not exactly a recipe for purgatory. In fact the exercise is called play when you’re a kid. Remember?

So parents and teachers – belly away from the food bar and invest a little healthy living in your kids’ future. And maybe in the process those of you who are making bad decisions about your own lives – will add a few good years onto them.

Health Care Reform 2.0.3

Look. This is getting ridiculous. I’ve just been reading some of the details of President Obama’s new 10 year budget proposal. Which projects a deficit equal to 11% of our Gross Domestic Product for next year (2011) and even 10 years down the road envisions a deficit worth 5% of GDP. This bleak estimate doesn’t allow any room for new domestic programs of any kind.

Hello? Is anybody with a half a brain out there paying ANY attention?

Yes, yes I’m getting to health care reform. Right now. It seems obvious – what with the loss of the Democrats’ super majority in the Senate and the seemingly total inability of the White House or the Democrats in Congress to explain what is really in the 2 multi-thousand page reform bills – that we aren’t going to get much reform in this administration.

So here’s my what you might call "meat cleaver" approach. Starting with a lot less use of the real meat cleaver and a lot more black beans and rice.

Yes, America, we need a National Food Police and Exercise Agency. NFPEA. With absolute, dictatorial powers.

I don’t care how old you are --- you will start eating properly. Limited consumption of red meat. Or really, any meat. No sugar in children’s cold cereal. Much less salt in all restaurant, prepared and even home-cooked meals. (Watch out Grandma! That big flat screen TV on the kitchen wall is now watching how you make your chicken soup!) Portions a third to a half smaller. That includes those huge cups and cones of ice cream at the DQ. Reasonable amounts of vegetarian style entrees making sure there is adequate protein (like the beans and rice combination) and only enough olive oil and garlic sauce on the pasta and veggies to coat the penne – not drown it.

No McDonald’s burgers. Or any other fast food burgers or fried chicken or fried fish. Absolutely no French fries. No fried food of ANY kind – except as a very occasional treat. And whole wheat or multi-grain bread. The first edict from the NFPEA will make eating Wonder Bread and all it’s gluey offshoots an imprisonable crime.

Along with the food reform will go exercise. Every American of any age will be required to do at least enough exercise to work off more than the calories he or she eats. For those currently healthy enough to do it, that exercise will be aerobic, heart-healthy fast walking, running, biking, swimming or sweat-worthy classes. Or heavy labor. Or both. And flicking the remote at the TV does NOT count as heavy labor. (Nor does walking 3 steps to the kitchen to refill the bowl of potato chips.)

I think you get the picture. With no possible lobbying from insurance companies or doctors or hospitals ---how can you lobby against better health – Americans will slowly get thinner and healthier. The incidence of diabetes will start falling instead of increasing. Heart disease will begin to disappear. Cancer rates will drop. And kids who used to be thin and active and healthy will no longer leave the pediatrician’s office with a diagnosis of high cholesterol and high blood pressure.

In just a few years we will have accomplished health care reform without any political wrangling in Congress. And Americans – now actually able to see the rest of the world over their bellies – will start noticing what really goes on in Washington. And what doesn’t.

Health care costs will drop drastically and some expensive specialists may have to drop down to the primary care level – where they are actually needed.

It’s a simple little system. Eat less, eat better and exercise. Really now – why would we need the White House or Congress to mandate that?

Red and Me

Once upon a time in what seems like long, long ago – I was an ambitious teenager growing up in a Boston where there were only 3 things anyone ever talked about. In descending order – sports, politics and –depending on the year or person – ethnic and race relations.

And so when former Celtics center Bill Russell’s love-letter to his friend and coach Red Auerbach – “Red and Me” – was published last June –I eagerly bought it. And then – like so many of the books I buy – it sat there on the kitchen table for 6 months.

But this week I finally picked up the book – and it was like I was home again. Living in my mother’s Back Bay apartment, walking past Fenway Park on my way to school, listening to the games on the radio as I did my homework.

Our sports teams were part of Boston’s DNA – the Red Sox, Celtics, Bruins and Patriots (until they moved out of Boston to the middle of nowhere-- Foxborough). The Boston Braves were, by then, history. Like everyone in that long ago – I knew the names of each team’s stars and coaches and owners. Names that stayed constant for years at a time. But of course I didn’t know much about them as people. You only learn about people when you know them personally over time – and if you’re lucky you get to know a few people you resonate with.

I never met Bill Russell. Nor Red Auerbach. Nor Walter Brown – the Celtics’ owner. But now – after reading “Red and Me” – I feel like I know them. The values Russell writes about (with Alan Steinberg’s help) are the core values of my childhood. Attitudes and beliefs – and yes - obligations that don’t seem to be talked about much anymore. And yet my life was (and is) as different from Russell’s and Auerbach’s as – well - as oil is from water.

Russell and Auerbach were the odd couple. Unlikely friends. But they understood each other in a special way. A way perhaps particularly male – but still -- a deep and caring and lasting way.

Maybe if you didn’t grow up in Boston – in a particular time and mindset – this book may not seem so special. Russell writes in absolutes. His and Auerbach’s. Boston was like that when I lived there. Some absolutes were overt and sometimes pretty ugly. But others were internal -- hammered into our psyches over the generations. Call it the New England work ethic if you like – stiffening our spines and programming our brains to move forward no matter what life threw at us.

Neither Russell nor Auerbach were from Boston or even New England. But somehow – they were us.

In college I learned to be more flexible, to question absolutes and demand proof for everything. OK I became a journalist. But what I consider my core values – survived. Or to put it another way – once a Bostonian, always a Bostonian.

Bill Russell and Red Auerbach were among the few people who apparently never questioned their absolutes. Russell writes about the ones they shared in his exquisitely honest memoir of a legendary coach who became a firm friend.

If you love sports and are of a certain age – read “Red and Me”. If you love sports and know anything about basketball history – read “Red and Me”. And if you just love finding out what makes people tick – read “Red and Me”. Maybe you’ll “absorb” a few (New England) core values.

Election 2009

I think Walter Shapiro (http://www.politicsdaily.com/) hit the nail right on the head. Fox and other right wing media outlets will try to spin the GOP gains in yesterday's localized elections as Democratic (read Obama) losses in 2010 and beyond. But state and local elections are generally decided on local issues that often transcend party alliances. And with big job losses and rising property taxes during a recession -- New Jersey voters, at least, mostly just wanted to "throw the bum out". Chris Daggett offered some really interesting ideas but without any money behind him -- was doomed. Young people aren't particularly engaged in issues like property taxes; they will work for charismatic leaders but not for the general political good.

A year ago when the financial system nearly collapsed after Lehman was allowed to die -- who would have predicted it? A year from now? Who CAN predict it!! The one useful message to come out of this election --at least in the Northeast -- is that with Mike Bloomberg's much smaller than expected winning margin in the New York City mayoral campaign and Governor Jon Corzine's defeat in NJ -- the public is disgusted with rich politicians spending obscene amounts of money on their campaigns. Voters who have lost jobs, homes and retirement dreams are not about to endorse so-called leaders who waste enough money on ego-driven campaigns to employ half of America until NEXT November's elections.

The Health Care Debate

I’m getting so tired of being yelled at on cable TV and talk radio and blogs by yahoos who are upset about everything and taking it out on health care. They don’t have jobs anymore or their homes have been foreclosed or they can’t use their McMansion as a piggy bank anymore because it’s worth less than they paid for it. Or they’re old and afraid of change – especially if it comes with an Obama label.

Almost no one is talking about what we as Americans should be talking about. Things like how to cut costs in a way which won’t really harm people and which might actually help them. Things like what DO we do with the 46 million uninsured Americans if we don’t have a government plan for them. Things like whether everyone has a right to the most expensive medical care and if so who should pay for it. The debate has become one about health insurance reform – not health care reform.

First off – anyone with a 3rd grade education must know that in an aging society, any program which now absorbs 16 percent http://www.forbes.com/2009/07/02/health-care-costs-opinions-columnists-reform.html of the GDP and is projected by the Congressional Budget Office to double in the next 25 years isn’t possible to sustain. Most of our health care dollars are spent in the last years of life as diseases which might have been prevented must instead be managed. We also have a growing younger population, thanks to immigration and religious groups which still encourage oversized families. Those two extremes of the age scale are real; we can’t stick our heads in the sand and pretend they’re not.

So what do we do about these escalating costs? Yes – we do need mandatory electronic medical record-keeping. And some legal restraints on insurance companies. The phrase “pre-existing conditions” should be outlawed. Profits should be capped along with top managers’ salary packages. Insurers can’t be allowed to deny payments for medically necessary treatments, procedures and drugs. A good model might exist in the Czech Republic. Although Czechs still have a form of government-run health care, they pay premiums to one of several private insurance companies. Private companies which aren’t allowed to make a profit. They also have a small co-pay for each doctor visit, day in the hospital and prescription drug. No one is denied care and Czechs can choose their doctors and hospitals. But there are no unnecessary tests or procedures. And doctors are salaried. As they are at some exemplary US medical facilities like the Cleveland Clinic.

I’m not totally convinced another Medicare-like government-run health insurance plan –at least as the Obama administration has explained it – is the right move. But if we don’t have a government plan, we need to make all health care plans portable. So you don’t have to change doctors when you change jobs or when your company decides it can get a cheaper plan from another insurer. And if you lose your job – as hundreds of thousands of Americans have in this recession – there should be some kind of government subsidy that kicks in along with your unemployment insurance. Perhaps you would have to pay back some of that subsidy through a small payroll deduction when you’re employed again. Or pay such a small deduction while you are employed to build up a subsidy fund. Something along the lines of New Jersey’s tiny but required payroll deduction for a fund which now provides a short but paid work leave when a baby is born or a parent needs care.

And now here comes the biggie. The one the very powerful drug lobbies will fight tooth and nail. And it isn’t what every other country does – negotiate drug prices down. We need that too – but it would become a lot less important if we simply didn’t need so many expensive drugs.

Right now the medical system is geared toward fixing what’s wrong with you. Instead of preventing the illness in the first place. Yes – we need to pay for preventive care. Lots of it. And it doesn’t have to be expensive. Think about something like obesity. More than two thirds
of Americans are now overweight or actually obese. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/11/health/11stat.html?_r=1
The Centers for Disease Control say one third of children fall into these categories. Drug companies make zillions on insulin and related drugs as fat people develop diabetes. A disease which is totally preventable in this population. Add in the anti-cholesterol drugs, the heart procedures and drugs, the high blood pressure drugs – all stemming from too much food and too little exercise.

If we spent just a little money on health education –starting in nursery school – it would pay off big time. Instead of the current emphasis on expensive team sports – which benefit only a few well-coordinated athletes, let’s teach every kid lifetime personal nutrition and exercise habits. Instead of letting school districts slash physical education classes when budgets get tight -- make them mandatory. As sacrosanct as basic English grammar. The proposed tax on sugary soft drinks and fruit drinks would be a good start toward paying for that. A similar “sin” tax has certainly helped reduce cigarette smoking even as it helps pay for smoking-cessation programs and the health ravages smoking causes.

Let’s give doctors financial incentives to push their patients into healthier lifestyles instead of simply handing out prescriptions. And if all doctors had the same incentives, they couldn’t complain that their patients will simply find another doctor who’ll let them take the easy way out with a pill for high cholesterol instead of a prescription for fewer burgers and fries.

If we simply make good health a national passion, instead of an afterthought, medical costs will stop rising. And eventually, as new, healthier generations come along, costs will fall. Fixing the broken health care system doesn’t require brain surgery. Just a little brain power. And some heavy lifting.

Czech Politics Unczeched

Sitting here in New Jersey -- wrestling with our own US train wreck - health care reform - it's hard for me to criticize the politics of another country. Or the voters here or in the Czech Republic who, it seems, are too easily led or too apathetic or too uninformed -- or all three.

But truthfully -- if someone were trying to write a political whodunit novel--- he or she couldn't possibly imagine the current Czech political disaster. For those who haven't been following the debacle --it started last spring in the middle of the Czech Republic's 6 month rotating Presidency of the European Union. CSSD (center left Social Democrats) called a vote of confidence in the lower house of Parliament which failed and brought down the center right government led by ODS (Civic Democrats). A caretaker government of supposedly apolitical technocrats was appointed to serve until early elections set for October. About a month ago the election campaign began. Then a deputy challenged the early elections in the Czech Constitutional Court, claiming he had the constitutional right to serve a full term. The Court ruled in the deputy's favor. Chaos ensued. Politicians hatched another plan for elections in November but then that was torpedoed when CSSD withdrew its initial support. Are you dizzy yet? Now no one knows what to expect.

I've seen all kinds of unsourced editorials and columns from Prague about which party or corporation or lobby influenced the other and why CSSD (The Social Democrats) changed its stance on early elections and what the true motive of the Czech Constitutional Court might be etc. etc. I hope one of the more journalistically inclined newspapers or magazines or even TV operations has a crack team of investigative reporters hard at work to peel back the opaque political layers and get at the truth of what happened and why. Most importantly why!!! I'm returning to Prague in November to watch what I hope will be a big celebration for the 20th anniversary of the Velvet Revolution which ended Communism in then Czechoslovakia. But if this political circus is all 20 years of "democracy" has wrought --- Czechs themselves may well ask -- "why bother?"

The Woman Who Gave Me Hope

I’m home now from what is becoming my new normal: summer in Prague. Two months to teach about news and news video at a small, English-speaking Czech university called Anglo-americky Vysoka Skola – or Anglo-American University http://www.aauni.edu/ for the non-Czech speaking world. Two months which also include a seminar for Czech businesss managers on Presentation Skills or Media Training or Communication – modalities which flow easily from a reporter-anchor-interviewer’s knowledge. Two months to live as Czechs do, in an apartment my husband and I bought several years ago in what I call the Queens of Prague. In other words, in one of the unfashionable but eminently livable neighborhoods on the city’s outskirts where there is lots of greenery, the best park in Prague, and almost instant access to trams, buses and the Metro.

But this summer was different. This summer I could walk again. And run a little. And climb. And carry groceries. And stand for hours. In short – I was me again – as active as I wanted to be, full of energy, bounding up and down the steep hill to our apartment like I would have 10 years ago – before my knee started on its inevitable journey toward replacement.

But I never found the Prague woman who set me on my new path. I wanted so much to thank her, to hug her and show her my new knee scar and even without a shared language – tell her in ways women understand how much she helped me. She found me last summer – both of us working out at the gym. A woman who was maybe 50 or 55 – full of energy and in great shape She saw me limping around and came striding purposely over – pointing to her knee. I knew enough Czech to understand she had had her knee replaced 8 months before and had already returned to her passion – skiing. She even danced a little for me – just to prove what was now possible.

Through the summer and fall I thought about that woman – and how she had gotten her life back. And slowly I began to think that maybe I too could get my life back. Maybe I too could get a knee replacement.

When I came back to Prague – and the gym in June – I looked for her every day I was there. But I never found her. One of the personal trainers who speaks English thought she knew the woman. And said she would tell her for me. I hope she has. I hope this woman knows that without her very kind overture to a perfect stranger (something Czechs, who are a reserved people, don’t usually do) I might still be miserably limping around today – instead of looking at photos of the Czech mountain I easily climbed 2 weekends ago. I hope this woman knows that she changed my life. And I hope that somehow – she knows that I will never forget her.

On Running the Boston Marathon

On Monday my husband will run the Boston Marathon. Every American marathoner’s dream. And I will be there to cheer him on.

We always said as we slogged through our middle of the pack marathons that if we lived long enough we could qualify for Boston. Well a few years back the Boston Athletic Association broadened the time requirements - especially for older runners. And this fall – after running two marathons under that time limit, my husband made it.

He will be running Boston for both of us because my marathoning days were cut short over a decade ago by knee problems. But I managed to finish 28 marathons before the end and I will always be – in my mind and in my job description – a marathon runner. A very slow marathon runner. Who probably would never have qualified for Boston if I lived to be 80 – the most elastic time limit. So it’s OK. I will be there to cheer him on and support him in all ways and my running alter ego will be there a few miles behind him (as always in the marathons we ran together) as he covers the 26.2 miles from Hopkinton to the Copley Square finish. As I said – he will be running Boston for both of us.

But I have my own victory to celebrate as I bounce through Boston this weekend. When I set my total knee replacement surgery date for January 21st, my goal was to be able to walk comfortably around Boston and stand for as long as necessary at the finish line to cheer him in. And I have reached that goal and more.

So this Monday will be a celebration for us both. Frank’s – for making the cut. Me – for recovering from the cut. And there’s something else that makes it special. I was born in Boston and as a little kid – watched the finish of the Boston Marathon as it came past my parents’ music studio windows on Commonwealth Avenue – the old route. I marveled at the men in shorts running (it was all men then). I wondered why anyone in his right mind would ever want to run a marathon.

Well – I’m not sure marathon runners are ever in their right minds. I’m not sure we would want to be. But on Monday April 20th, my husband will be running Boston. And I’ll be there watching. And another of life’s full circles will close protectively around us.

My New Knee

My surgeon stood at the foot of my bed the day I was sent home from the hospital with a new knee. “You’ll lose 10 or 12 pounds; everyone does,” he said, “but don’t worry about it; you’ll gain it back when you get more active.” Since I had regained my appetite about 5 minutes after coming out of anesthesia in the recovery room I didn’t put a whole lot of faith in his promise. And sure enough I never lost an ounce. I blew my one chance in life to eat as much chocolate cake and ice cream as I wanted – gaining back those “lost” pounds.

And that’s sort of the way it went. It’s been almost 3 months now since I had right total knee replacement surgery. I was sure my recovery was going to be spent in a miserable, sleepless haze of heavy duty pain pills. After all that’s what almost everything I read suggested. I even bought a mindless autobiography to read, thinking my fogged-ed up brain wouldn’t be able to handle my usual diet of business and global news. But the pain pills went the way of the walker, crutches and cane before the end of the first week. I had incredible luck -- basically no pain and only moderate swelling. So I was able to start my rehabilitation -- simple exercises and knee bending to restore range of motion (ROM) immediately.

I started to write about my experience about 9 days after surgery – started and never finished. I was in a kind of comforting cocoon where work couldn’t get to me. Time consuming exercises had to be done 2 or 3 times a day followed by periods of icing and lots of catch-up sleep. My body needed to recover from this serious operation – even if my brain thought I was feeling “fine”. I wanted to craft any blog piece about my experience the way I usually do -- because I’m hoping that someday the writing on this page may provide a “published” body of opinion pieces.

But this has turned out to be somewhat different. This is about my life. And getting it back again in a way I really never expected. I want to shout from the rooftops in a very uncrafted way. For weeks now I have been able to walk miles. I can hike with my husband – up and down trails and some pretty steep hills. No I’m not ready to hike up Mt. Washington again -- but that will come. Along with everything else including – in a year or so – running again. I’ve been back at my gym – mixing it in with physical therapy – since the staples came out at 2 weeks. And 3 weeks ago my physical therapist threw me out – after transitioning me to my usual gym routine – slightly modified as I slowly gain back muscle strength in my operated upon leg.

At 9 days out from my knee surgery, I wrote that my brain had almost forgotten how badly my old knee worked – almost totally accepting the piece of metal and heavy duty plastic that replaced it. It is – I wrote then -- truly amazing. And it just gets more amazing as time goes on.

I was also lucky in another way; trolling the internet for pre-surgery information, I happened on a British website called BoneSmart http://www.bonesmart.org/public_forum/index.php. It’s co-moderated by a retired orthopedic nurse who just had her own knee replaced and has an amazing store of knowledge. The other co-moderator is about 13 months out from her TKR. People in all stages of recovery share their experiences and provide a body of shared information that helps just about everyone get through what is always a highly individualized recovery. I know the forum helped me understand the process and what was “normal” – a wide range of events and feelings. And now I hope I can help others with some of my own experiences and reactions.

I am convinced I had such a easy time of it because the pain mediation practiced by my surgeon and the hospital was so good. If you aren’t in pain it’s a lot easier to do the exercises and knee bending and muscle stretching that are crucial early on – and key to a good outcome and fast recovery. So I plan to write more about this aspect of total knee replacement. Some surgeons still don’t seem to care about pain mediation – and at this point – there can be no excuse for such callousness.

More – later.

Will It Ever End???

Like everyone else I know, I have been watching my money disappear. The money I worked 14 hour days for. 7 days a week sometimes. For years and years. The money that can’t be replaced with new earnings – because my industry is so changed and diminished. And because my demographic is not – shall we say – desired by my changed and diminished industry. The money that I – and many others on the far side of the moon - may not live long enough to see again.

With every announcement out of Washington, with every “coordinated” action in Europe and Asia, the financial wizards pronounce the panic attack in the markets over. And then traders and investors and most of all the short-selling hedge funds focus on something else – like the real and now so obviously recessionary economy.

Today -- with the U.S. plan in place to invest $250 billion dollars in the country’s banks – and similar moves around the world – the frozen credit markets are showing small signs of defrosting. But also today Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke said again it will take time – perhaps quite a bit of time – for things to return to normal.

Bernanke – answering questions from economists in New York – also drew on his expertise as a Depression scholar – saying the economy then – and now are not comparable. And pointing out how swiftly global governments have acted to stem the slide this time – instead of waiting three, bank-failure-filled years, as the U.S. government did in the early 1930’s, before declaring a bank holiday.

He convinced me, anyhow. But that was at noon. 4 hours later as the U.S. market closed – the Dow had plunged 733 points, NASDAQ fell 150 and the S and P was down 90. The single worst day for stocks since the 1987 market crash.

OhmyGod.

Once again the prognosticators are talking about the confidence game. As in “a vote of no confidence”. No confidence that this unholy amount of money the world is throwing at these banks is enough. (Question: how much money CAN governments throw into the pot – until the world simply runs out of money???)

So OK – the retail sales pullback in September proved what everyone already knows. Even factoring out those tottering auto sales, high gasoline prices (slowly falling now), dwindling home values and retirement funds -- and growing job fears have finally convinced the infamous American consumer that maybe those 20 maxed out credit cards aren’t the best way to live right now. We already have warnings from chain stores and malls and shopper surveys that holiday sales this year won’t be exactly stellar. It’s NOT news.

But the market mavens must have selective hearing. And blinders on both eyes. The market moves not on fundamentals these days but on emotion. Mostly on fear. And for the rest of the week we’ll have a lot of 3rd quarter earnings reports from major companies to fear.

Traders down on the NYSE floor suggested hedge funds were still selling off assets to cover margin calls or redemptions. That’s why the losses accelerated so during the final hour of trading. Who really knows.

In the end we are still throwing money at banks and firms and companies who got us into this mess in the first place. Because they’re too big to fail; because the financial system is too crucial to our economy to fail.

When you think about it – what should REALLY put the fear of God into the market is this: the brilliant financial minds who basically screwed up the system –like the former Goldman Sachs CEO, now Treasury secretary Henry Paulson – are now in charge of fixing it. Fortunately the man who may be most responsible for the housing bubble and the pyramid scheme that leveraged it around the world – is not part of the solution right now. That would be Alan Greenspan – the Fed chairman for 18 years – beloved by Wall Street because under his rule -- whatever Wall Street wanted, Wall Street got.

OhmyGod indeed!

Are Unions Still Relevant?

I’ve been a member of two “talent” unions since I was 14 – and working part time as a DJ in Boston, my home town. In those days Boston was run by a powerful Democratic political machine – and it was definitely a union town. Virtually every radio and TV station – and anything shot on film - was union. So even a kid like me had to ante up the initiation fees and dues. I came from a show biz family and was used to it. My father - a pianist – was a member of the musicians’s union during its “don’t mess with us or we’ll bust your head” period under the now legendary national leadership of James Petrillo. My mother – a singer – was a member of AGVA – which covered night club entertainers. And in college - all of us aspiring actors were desperate to get into an Equity summer stock show - because you had to be in Equity to go to an Equity casting call – but you couldn’t get into Equity unless you were hired for a union show. A Catch 22 before any of us had ever heard of it.

Early on I gave up my dreams of life upon the wicked stage for the more prosaic – and attainable dream of network news. As it turned out – I had just enough acting ability to read and talk the news before the mic and the camera. I also had a questioning mind that was a lot more useful to a reporter than to a bit part actor who was only pretending she could also sing and dance.

For a long time, I worked only under AFTRA (www.aftra.org) union contracts. I was covered for medical benefits – and my employers were required to pay into my union-centered pension – whether I worked as a staff employee or was free lance. It was a good – and in a chaotic industry – a relatively orderly life.

Then – along came cable.

And AFTRA chose not to bother with cable -- figuring the money in these then niche networks was so insignificant it wasn't worth the organizing time. I know; I was on the local union board during that incubation period. Instead of dealing with real issues, our board members seemed mostly interested in making long speeches. Which is why I quit; it was a total waste of time.

So --- many years later -- here we are – in an age where unions in general are increasingly powerless and the companies they negotiate with are increasingly all-powerful and demanding. So what are the talent unions doing? AFTRA (the “live” and tape/recorded union) is fighting with SAG (the film union) –although at this point the craft designations have almost no meaning as digital and internet technology roll over all of us faster than we can pick ourselves up. (Granted the foolish fights seem to be mostly picked by SAG www.sag.org).

There are huge cable networks like the one I work for - CNBC - and of course CNN --the most obvious example - which are non-union. That means nothing is paid into the AFTRA pension and health funds.

For freelancers like me this is a terrible loss. Having medical and pension benefits centered in a union so wherever you work you still get benefits was a master stroke by all the talent unions as they began to gain leverage decades ago. But if eventually there are no organized media companies left to pay into them -- what's the point?

All of this was just brought home to me very powerfully; I did a one line voice-over as a newsperson for an HBO program more than a year ago. And HBO continues to operate under a pre-existing AFTRA contract. Not only did I get paid what to me is a very large sum for just 5 minutes of work --- I have so far gotten 2 residual checks from AFTRA for only slightly less than I was paid for the initial session.

Now I am a business reporter -- which might make me argue that this type of payment scale may be unsustainable in our new, digitally splintered media world. Except that most of those "splintered" media entities -- internet, cable, digital cable, mobile etc. -- are still owned by the top 10 media companies. Companies which in turn may be owned by even bigger international corporations.

Bottom line to all this: none of us really knows where our industry is going as technology continues to drive change. But as a newsperson it is pretty clear to me that we - certainly - will soon have no separate designations. Print journalists are doing video for newspaper websites; broadcast journalists are writing for websites and taking still photos and of course also increasingly shooting and editing video. We have too many separate unions for this scenario -- where there ARE unions left. It seems to me we have to join forces and our first job should be to unionize as many types of media operations as possible -- even if only for small money. We have to be ready for whatever technology -- and these huge corporations - throw at us.

And second -- we have to be sure our members get something useful out of belonging to a union. Of course salaries matter. But at CNBC, for instance, people get paid pretty much what they would at union operations. And working conditions are reasonable. It's how they’ve kept the unions (no technical unions either) out. So money isn't really the issue. It's benefits. It's some kind of job security. It's provision for medical leave or the like. Etc. But most of all, I think, it's offering ways for members to upgrade their skills at all levels and in all jurisdictions so we can compete with the 22 year old college graduate -- who HAS learned it all and is so comfortable with technology that he or she sees no rough edges. These folks just do whatever is needed and that is what all of us have to learn to do also. Years ago the technical unions used to have something we knew as "one machine, one operator". You ran a tape machine or turned a dial in master control. There were penalties for asking you to do more. Late lunch penalties. "Golden time" penalties.

Non-media companies came in during the 80's and early 90's and smashed that model to smithereens. Now the same thing is happening in the written and spoken media. Actors may be insulated right now -- but they may not be in the future. We are ALL going to HAVE to do more for less money. At least for now. Until our separate and entrenched leaderships realize that only one, huge and united craft union can wield enough power and leverage to fight back for all of us.

A Tear in Life's Fabric

Something is happening. Maybe it happens to everyone eventually. It’s as if there’s a tear in the fabric of life, a break in the force field that holds us to this planet.

My friends, my colleagues, the people who have defined my life for so many years – they’re disappearing. One by one – dropping off like the leaves in the early part of fall. And you know what happens as fall deepens. The leaves become a blizzard. A blizzard of death.

Death. No amount of reasoning about nature and the way it is can make me fear that word any less. And in the past few weeks death seems to be stalking the streets I know, scooping up not only old people whose lives had shriveled up like their bodies – but much younger people who had everything to live for.

My friend and colleague Roger E. Hernandez died over the weekend. He was 53. Chalk up another one for the big C. http://www.editorandpublisher.com/eandp/news/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1003847809

It’s not that I saw Roger or his wife Dianne every day. Or even every year. They are my neighbors, living with their children just one town over. The people you keep saying you must invite over to catch up – as time speeds up and runs off the clock. How many more friends and colleagues and family members are in that category. How many more people will be gone before I get around to saying hello?

Roger was a funny, nice, straightforward guy. Not someone you would easily forget. When I first met him he was an assignment editor at the TV station I went to work for - more than 20 years ago. He was old enough when he left Cuba with his parents to remember how it was – and to be a lifelong foe of Castro. The stuff of many good - shall we say - discussions. We would laugh at Roger’s slight accent; we could never understand his directions over the noisy police-type radios we all used then to communicate with the “desk” when we were out on a story. Roger, being Roger, would laugh as well. Sometimes.

We became a family at that TV station. Dianne and Roger moved on and got married. Some of us also moved on. But the family bond has held. We used to come together at odd times to see photos of babies just born or talk about new jobs - or old ones. And now – a much older family – we are coming together too often to cry instead of laugh. At wakes and funerals and memorial services.

Like Roger’s.

If he was looking down on us, he might have been surprised at how many people knew him, were shocked at his death and already missed him. Perhaps they too felt a little break in the force field, a tear in the fabric.

Because when there’s a tear here – and a break there – one day the force field disintegrates. The fabric shreds. And not all the king’s horses and all the king’s men (and women) can put Humpty Dumpty together again.

LETTER FROM PRAGUE

July 21, 2008

The sun is just setting here in Prague. It’s Monday night. I’ve been here for almost 6 weeks now, teaching a summer course at the Anglo-American University in Prague (Anglo-americky Vysoka Skola). http://www.aauni.edu/ If you know anything about The New School in New York City --- AAU is that kind of place. Very small classes, lots of give and take between students and lecturers, lots of freedom to run your classes as you wish. A school for the free spirits and thinkers and questioners. I’m right at home.

I’m a TV-radio reporter and producer, not a professor. My “teaching” experience up to now has involved workshops for professional journalists in former Communist countries like Serbia and Albania – mostly working as second banana to a smart, funny and legitimate professor --- now emeritus – from Rutgers University in New Jersey – Jerome Aumente. But I’ve been lucky this summer. I have a very small class – 5 students. 4 of them are American young men, studying abroad for a semester, and mostly, I think, studying the Czech party, beer-drinking and summer rock festival scenes. My fifth student is a young woman from Slovakia --- getting her degree from AAU. No one seems to take the summer semester terribly seriously but then my class isn’t about War and Peace either. I’m teaching an introductory course in Broadcast News and Video – kind of an overview of broadcast journalism and how the internet is changing it. There’s a little about what makes a news story a news story. And how to write the story for TV, radio and the internet. How to shoot for news. And how to edit on a laptop. (I had to learn that myself, from my video editor husband).

I have found it a little odd to be teaching the fundamentals of news writing and production when most of the students (and I myself) have little access to understandable radio or TV news here. Without a yearly subscription to cable or an activated satellite dish --- there is only news in Czech. And one part-time BBC FM radio station. Most of my students don’t even have a TV set in the apartments they are renting for the summer. So it’s all what you seek out on the internet. I speak a little, very basic Czech after many years of coming here, but not enough to understand the fast-paced newscasters. I can, however watch the production. Which is somewhat calmer than ours at home – but otherwise perfectly recognizable.

Although we have just skimmed the surface of journalism, I was determined when I wrote up the syllabus (another newly learned word) that at least one class (and one reading assignment) would be devoted to ethics. After all – ethics are not unique to journalism and I figured wherever these students land in their careers – a dose of ethical living can’t hurt. Our text came from the SPJ http://www.spj.org and RTNDA http://www.rtnda.org ethics codes --- which I distributed to each student and which I hope they will reread now and then. We watched case histories from a special DVD put out by RTNDA. And the students read chapters from the accompanying RTNDA training book on newsroom ethics. We talked and discussed and questioned. I think my 5 students now know what “fair and balanced” really means. Despite its co-opting by Fox News. And they all had good answers to the ethics question on the mid term.

Prague is a fascinating city. It has some of the oldest and most beautiful buildings in Europe. They are meticulously maintained and virtually all survived World War 11 intact. A few hours drive to the north is Dresden --- which had the misfortune to be in Germany. Despite being considered the jewel of Europe – and despite the Germans being basically defeated - the Allies, led by the U.S., carpet-bombed Dresden and left most of it in ruins. My students have grown to appreciate all this – and have learned quite a bit about local politics and issues – thanks to assignments that required them to think in terms of news stories they could actually shoot here in Prague and get on the air that night.

Speaking of assignments -- my American students are all pretty good about doing them and about showing up for class. My Slovak student is somewhat more casual about her schooling. Over here young people typically take longer to get through the university system – dropping out for a year or so to work (or play). They are considered “students” (at least by the city transportation system) until they are 26 – getting cut rate student bus/tram/metro passes until then. Our college students should be so lucky

And then there is the ever rising Czech crown (koruna) and the ever falling dollar. This summer has seen a series of records set against both the dollar and the euro. My students have done the math and then done it based on what the dollar bought in crowns less than a year ago. And euros – because they have all traveled outside the Czech Republic this summer. Another useful lesson about currency trading, speculation and economic crises.

An interesting sidebar: a lot of Czechs have put their savings in dollars, pounds and euros (in Germany) because the interest rates are higher. But now when they need to convert back to crowns – the exchange rate is so low they are all losing money. There are also a lot of Americans, Brits and other Europeans on home country salaries who are really hurting. And many retirees - Czechs who became US citizens and now spend at least half a year over here - are finding their social security and pensions don't buy much at all.

Fortunately I am getting paid in Czech crowns and have a crown account to draw from -- money transfered when the exchange was much better. So I'm trying not to think of what I spend in dollar terms. Because when I do -- I throw up

Starbucks has come to Prague -- and opened not far from my university ---on a medieval square called Malestranske Namesti -- a big tourist area. You would not believe the prices! Forgetting the dollar -- I paid maybe half again as much as I normally do at a Wall Street area Starbucks for a muffin and a small (tall) black coffee. Not to mention McDonald’s which is also outrageous! But tourists love seeing a name they recognize -- and even Czechs will pay without complaint for a famous (and foreign) brand name.

And then there’s the ever-present grafitti, Oh not on the crown jewels – the 14th century churches and palaces in the old city. But everywhere else. It’s so bad even my students noticed – and chose to create a montage of graffiti for their field shooting and editing assignment. Last fall when I was here I wrote a letter to the Mayor of Prague (he has a pretty good, English language city website http://magistrat.praha-mesto.cz/lang/l2 ) complaining about the graffiti. I never got an answer. But just this summer Prague banned littering and introduced a leash law for the huge population of dogs in the city (Czechs simply adore their dogs). Oh – and the city has even banned public drinking in some heavily trafficked outdoor areas – an unheard of idea in a country where people believe having a beer (called pivo) just about anywhere – at any time – is a national birthright. But graffiti??? Not a word. Banning spray paint can sales to underage kids as New York City did in the 90’s? Faggetaboutit.

Wednesday is the final exam and the end of classes. My students must turn in a day-of-air news script for TV – with complete editing instructions. Unfortunately AAU doesn’t have production facilities so that is as far as they can go. There will also be an oral exam. I’ve given each student 5 to 7 minutes to defend their choice of the most important thing they’ve learned in the class. The head of the department will get the “exam” in mp3 files along with each student’s grade. I plan also to video each student and play it back at the end of class for a quick course in public speaking. Having such a small group allows, as I said, for a lot of creative thinking and feedback.

I hope we will all stay in touch through email and Skype. I guess I am enough of a teacher to hope also the class discussions will at the very least make news consumers of these 20 somethings. Having even 5 more news-savvy people in a world which knows less and less every day (despite having so much information at its mouse-tip) might just be the start of something big!

God's Other Son aka Eliot Spitzer

You know it really isn’t the sex. Sure Americans are still fixated on what many consider illicict sex — prostitution, affairs by married folks, cheeky interns and presidents with over-large appetites. In fact — maybe Eliot Spitzer falls into the Clinton catagory in a way — ego plus appetite plus the “God’s other son” syndrome as my long ago former collegue Peggy Noonan so aptly put it. I guess quite a few Presidents (and leaders of other countries too) fall into that “I am so important I can get away with anything” catagory. But Spitzer was different. He was such a zealot in his prosecutions; he was so holier-than-thou in his public pronouncements; he went after people in an almost gleeful way - beyond the legal necessity. You got the feeling he was laughing wildly behind the scenes as he attacked individuals and prostitution rings like the one which finally tripped him up. Even his resignation statement was goody goody two shoes. As if all the tawdryness he has been a part of had never happened.

As I write I am listening to NY Democratic Senator Charles Schumer saying ” your heart has to go out to the Governor and his wife etc.”. No way! His wife — maybe; unless she choses to tell us we won’t know why she stood publically by him for both of his post-prostitution statements. I’m sure there’s much we’ll never know. But if Spitzer hadn’t come on like God’s other son — he might have been able to weather some of this. Maybe he’d still have to resign as Governor; but the shock wouldn’t have been as great and perhaps he could have salvaged something of his public life. I doubt that’s possible now. I think people hate hypocrites most of all. And Spitzer is now the poster child for hypocrisy. Next to him — our former President’s stupidity looks more like - well - just stupidity.

$120 Oil

What's wrong with these people??? All of them. The ones in Washington. In the Bush administration, in the House, in the Senate. In the regulatory agencies. These people.

Crude oil futures spiked over $110 a barrel today before closing a few pennies lower. Analysts are now talking about $120 a barrel oil like it's perfectly normal. Meanwhile the economy is tanking and inflation is rising. Higher food prices, higher gasoline prices, higher transportation prices. And sky-high heating oil prices for those of us who have the misfortune to heat our homes with oil.

Why doesn't someone do something?? Why are speculators allowed to bid up at least a third of the crude oil price -- because it's a hedge against the tottering stock market and the moribund financial markets and the swooning dollar?

Capitalism and free markets are all very well -- until they affect the average person's ability to live comfortably -- or even survive miserably. This crazy oil speculation has reached the point where someone has to clamp down on it. Pass a law if necessary that speculation won't be allowed in essential markets when prices reach a certain impossible level. Like now.

Sometimes it seems like the Bush Administration really does want to build a fence around the United States -- not just to keep the illegal immigrants and would-be terrorists out -- but to keep Americans in --- unable to go to Europe or Asia or even Canada and find out how much people in other countries dislike our government. And - since we elected it - us. The dollar has fallen so low against other currencies it now costs nearly twice as much to hop over to London or Paris as it did a few years ago. And if $4 gasoline becomes a feature of the summer driving season -- Americans will be almost literally chained to their homes. Those same ones which have lost so much value because somebody didn't stop the housing speculation and the perhaps criminally creative mortgage industry before the bubble burst.

The other night I heard an economist say what we really have is a financial recession. Not an economic recession. Meaning the overly greedy financial markets brought their current paralysis on themselves by giving people mortgages who should never have gotten them. And then slicing and dicing those risky loans into securities so complicated not even the financial geniuses who rate those securities had the foggiest notion of what was in them. So one day the mortgage market imploded. And started taking the rest of us with it.

All because nobody did anything to stop it.

Beauty and the Beast in Prague

The last time I saw Prague (to paraphrase a classic song) it's heart was great -- and glorious. The old part of Prague is a storybook city -- dating back to at least the 12th century. Its buildings are so incredibly beautiful it is as if you had stepped into the pages of a fairytale -- complete with the fanciful illustrations common in the 18th and 19th centuries.

My husband and I have been spending time in Prague since just after the 1989 Velvet Revolution peacefully ended the Czechs' long Communist nightmare. As in many post-Communist cities -- with fear of Big Brother gone -- graffiti soon marred many buildings; democracy -- as we have heard many times - is messy.

But that was nearly two decades ago; The Czech Republic is now a member of the European Union and its economy is arguably the most successful of the newer entrants. So why, suddenly, has the graffiti on buildings and walls gotten worse? Early on, it was understandable. People who had just freed themselves from a restrictive government and ideology were eager to explore that freedom in any and all ways. And most buildings looked so bad anyhow -- a little scribbling didn't make much difference.

But today - greater Prague has turned from a mostly crumbling brown and white concrete city into a sparkling, multi-colored, cared-for place. Buildings have been painted in bright colors. The infamous Communist "panelak" buildings (with pre-fabricated concrete panel exteriors) have been refurbished. And there are almost as many flower boxes on window sills as you see in Germany. Apartment building lawns are actually being mowed. For the first time in the Hostivar neighborhood where my husband and I now own an apartment, I actually saw someone clipping the hedges!!! and parks are now just beautiful. (They were scraggly and overgrown for years after Communism because people felt no personal responsibility for them and because no one seemed to understand who SHOULD be responsible for them.)

But marring it all is this awful graffiti! We've complained to lots of different Prague residents about it; no one seemed to care. Not even to agree that, yes, it's awful but what can we do? (A frequent answer when I complain about something obvious). In fact one friend who lives in the upscale Vinohrady section of Prague told us that school children are taken to a nearby park by their teacher and actually encouraged to draw on the park walls -- as a lesson in creativity!!!

I got so upset by all this that I actually wrote a letter to the Mayor of Prague - Pavel Bern. How foolish of me to expect an answer: Communism may be long gone -- but bureaucrats and politicians still don't respond to much except a mass protest. And, apparently, certainly not to a mere American.

So why does a city with a very good sense of itself as a flourishing economic center and hot tourist destination see nothing wrong with graffiti?? WHY don't building owners, local police/officials, apartment owners clean it up and try to stop it? WHY isn't there a city-wide crackdown? And most of all -- WHY do the people of Prague -- who have now traveled abroad and seen how lovely other "world" cities are -- continue to shrug their shoulders????

Back in the '90's when Rudy Giuliani (he of the failed Republican Presidential campaign) was Mayor of New York City -- he cracked down on major crime by focusing first on what he called "quality of life" crimes -- public urination, homeless people sleeping on doorsteps, even j-walking. And yes -- there was a major effort to wipe out graffiti. Anyone who was caught was required to clean off his graffiti and/or repaint the area (which worked because graffiti "artists" like to see their work and show it to others.) And spray paint can sales were restricted to people over 18. (As is still the case today in NYC). The campaign didn't totally wipe out graffiti. But it got rid of most of it.

So - Mr. Mayor of Prague -- why don't you start something like that? You've scaled Mt. Everest and lived to tell the tale; you should be able to take on a few undisciplined youths who just need to have their heads cracked together.

Blogs, Journalism and Buzz

I am getting really tired of blogs. They're the new black. Or chocolate. Or the Rosetta Stone. Suddenly no one is a journalist anymore. We're all supposed to be bloggers. On the same page as a kid chronicling her oh-so-ordinary 15 year old life on MySpace. Well count me out.

"Blog" to me is just another buzzword. And the media world has gone crazy over the buzz because 50-something executives think this is the way to get 20-somethings to watch TV news and read newspapers. And if you can put three words together you can blog and your thoughts and opinions are just as valuable as the knowledge and research and talent of a reporter or columnist with 30 years of writing experience. And why do the media companies care so much about blogs and bloggers? Because media companies survive on advertising and the ad agencies (largely staffed these days by 20-somethings) are convinced no one over 35 ever tries any new product. Never mind that baby boomers (now hitting 60 in ever fatter waves) have all the money and all the curiosity and have always tried every new thing that ever came along. Nope. Old is old is dead.

Thus the blogs -- and the media companies' year(s) of magical thinking.

I do journalism (or what these days passes for journalism) for a living. And I think blogs are just another way to add to our workload. When you are researching a story and need as much material as you can find, the better blogs which are written by people with specialized insight and knowledge can be useful. And the story behind the story can be fascinating. But a lot of blogging is more like "dear diary". I really don't care about someone whom I don't know and don't want to know baring all --- every moment of life, every hour-by-hour experience. Not at 15, not at 50. Nor do I care about that someone's preferences in food or last night's blind date. Y'know??? When you're working hard and hitting 24/7 deadlines that didn't exist a few years back and trying to hit those deadlines with a well-researched, accurate story -- you really don't have time to read the blogs, never mind write them ---UNLESS you have something really important to say.

There is something to be said for the old gatekeeper method of making editorial decisions. Decisions based on an understanding of what everyday working folks need to know to run their lives and vote intelligently enough to keep the country running properly. Everyone who can type out a blog is NOT qualified to be a journalist!!! I almost feel politically incorrect saying all this. But the Internet can be a terrible time waster unless you are searching for specific information and know how to find it. With all those YouTube and MySpace videos and blogs and the 1000 new best friends this all generates -- when do the denizens of these online communities have time for studying, working or - God forbid - actually interacting with real people in the real world? You know -- something beyond text messages and IM 's. I know people who work in next-to-each-other cubicles --- who email and text and never think of standing up and just talking over the divider.

So get a life, you bloggers. A real, not a virtual life. Walk outside, say hello to the guy behind the fruit stand. Look -- really look at your office mate. Maybe you both can take your sandwiches outdoors for the five minutes that passes for lunch these days and talk about the Red Sox (OK -- I'm from Boston. Forever.)

And maybe the next time you think everyone on the Internet really needs to know what you think about life, liberty and the pursuit of the American dream -- you'll skip the blog and have a discussion with someone. Real voices. Real arguments. Real interaction. And leave the journalism to the people trained to ask the questions and get the answers. The accurate answers.