We're an odd bunch

Journalists are warped, depraved people.

We have to be.

The values system that most of America follows just doesn’t translate with the way our brains operate. Our world is different than yours.

The world in which journalists live is dictated by deadlines, getting information, and always being right (or at least trying to always be right). We live in a world that almost completely revolves around other people.

That world screws with our heads in beautiful, disturbing ways.



I got to thinking about this earlier today when I went to an investigative reporting session put on by a former Pulitzer Prize winner as part of Journalism week.

I noticed a few things.

For starters, I’m constantly thinking in terms of tomorrow. When people ask me the date, I instantly think about the date of the next day and then subtract one.

This is probably because of the whole deadline thing, which is also the reason I have a constant twisting feeling in my stomach that I can only imagine will develop into an ulcer by the time I hit 30.

Mr. Pulitzer talked about how the deadline game worked when he was a foreign correspondent, and how beating other reporters by just 30 seconds could mean a promotion and a raise.

Journalists also evaluate the world much differently than other people.

For instance, Mr. Pulitzer’s favorite president was Richard Nixon.

I’m going to guess that on the general public’s list of great leaders, Dick Nixon is nowhere near the top.

Why, then, did Mr. Pulitzer like Dick so much (get your mind out of the gutter perverts)?

Because Nixon provided and cooperated with plenty of great stories. That’s how we think. We don’t want good, decent subjects with clean pasts and perfect ideals. We want people who are a little fucked in the head. It just makes for more interesting stories.

“It’s the chicken shits that give you a tough time,” he said. For all of President Nixon’s shortcomings, apparently he wasn’t a chicken shit.

Finally, take a trip to the local newsroom sometime and prepare to be appalled by the jokes that get thrown around.

Everybody’s lives are touched by death, violence, tragedy and an assortment of other bad things. Our lives are consumed by these things.

I don’t know whether it truly a matter of being desensitized or if it’s just a way to cope, but at a certain point all the bad things that happen in the world, or most of them anyway, become instinctively funny.

During my brief time as a journalist, I’ve laughed and seen people laugh at some truly horrible things.

Take the Natalie Holloway situation. There’s absolutely nothing funny about what happened to her. But, when she first disappeared, there were wire updates about nine times a day. And, to be honest, similar things happen to people all the time.

So she became fair game for newsroom fodder.

Mr. Pulitzer talked about that as well, at least how much the business of news reporting has to do with death.

“The amount of money we make off death is astounding,” he said.

I think it’s important to note he had a smile on his face when he said it.

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Senior Night

Tonight was Senior Night for the Nevada men's basketball team - and for me.

For those who don't know, Senior Night is when fans celebrate and appreciate the contributions of all the seniors for their final home game.

I don't usually get caught up in the emotion of stuff like that, mostly because I don't entirely understand how these players are that much different than any other college student, but, oddly enough, I was a bit sad and reflective in the media work room after the game.

I've been covering that team for four fucking years, and tonight was most likely the last time covering a team at Lawlor Events Center. And as cynical as I am sometimes, I do love college basketball (just not always writing about it).

I got to cover the team during the best four years in program history. The Wolf Pack went to the Sweet 16 when I was a freshman, and I started covering them the next season. They've won 100 games since then, they were in the Top 10 in the nation last season, and they've beaten programs like Kansas, Texas, and Gonzaga.

I've spent four years taking games in from courtside, which has generally been a blast. I also have tons of awesome memories of traveling all over the country on crazy road trips (from nearly getting shot at a gas station in Auburn, Calif., to trying to entertain myself in Las Cruces, NM, to getting absolutely wasted in downtown Boise with Amanda J).

I've covered three WAC Tournaments and three NCAA Tournaments, which is pretty much the premier event to cover in all of sports journalism. Spending last spring break at the tournament in New Orleans will probably go down as my best college memory. We watched basketball all day (including No. 1 and eventual champion Florida) and spent all night partying on Bourbon Street.

In fact, when I look back at my college days, it's hard to imagine anything sticking out as much as covering the college basketball team. As much as I genuinely hate working at The Sagebrush sometimes, I've always liked the parts that involve me and a basketball game.

So, after spending so much time covering the team, it's hard to understand that I'll never cover another game at Lawlor Events Center. Tonight was my last home game, too, and it's really fucking weird to think it's over. And sad.

And because of class, I can't go to the WAC Tournament this year. That's not a huge loss, because, in a moment of unrivaled stupidity, the conference administration decided it would be a good idea to have the tournament in the crap-hole that is Las Cruces, New Mexico.

Las Cruces is a small town with nothing to do and barely enough hotel rooms to host the teams, and it's 40 miles from the nearest airport in El Paso. There's also a general odor wafting off the basketball arena that wreaks of baked beans, cow shit, and burnt ass.

Still, I've got to be honest and say that I'm sad I'm not going. The WAC Tournament is basically four days of high-stakes basketball. And conference tournaments are going on all over America, and it's so much fun to keep track of all the action and upsets that happen each year.

What's worse, this year's team probably isn't going to the NCAA Tournament. While the team is going to be really really good for the next few years, this year the team is young and inexperienced. They're going through the dreaded "rebuilding year." So unless they win the conference tournament, there won't be any NCAA Tournament this season.

We're thinking about going to the Fresno State game in Fresno next week, so there's a chance I'll get to cover one last game.

For Scott, who is also a senior, and I, we're just trying to do anything to keep the dream alive.

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