{"id":1402,"date":"2009-06-25T23:19:52","date_gmt":"2009-06-26T04:19:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/?p=1402"},"modified":"2009-07-07T20:52:14","modified_gmt":"2009-07-08T01:52:14","slug":"opening-volley","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2009\/06\/opening-volley\/","title":{"rendered":"Opening Volley"},"content":{"rendered":"

LOS ANGELES — I’m about 20 years too early to have hearing aids, but there it is. I’ve had one in my right ear since mid-2005, and six months ago had to begin wearing them in both. Each new auditory circumstance, rather than getting, “Wow, birds chirping!” often starts with, “What?”<\/p>\n

My first movie with two aids took half the show for me to distinguish between sound effects in back and dialogue in front. We should have come early enough for the trailers.<\/p>\n

Here at Los Angeles International Airport — My Beloved and I are heading to Ventura for the 2009 conference of the National Society of Newspaper Columnists — I walk from the gate to the terminal, turn my cell phone back on and see there’s two messages. One I can hear, the guy has a strong voice, but it’s nothing that can’t wait a week. The other I can’t make out. The screen indicates it’s a neighbor whom I e-mailed to watch the house while we’re away. Is something wrong already?<\/p>\n

Fortunately, MB is right there, and by this time we’re outside and it’s even noisier so I hear even less. She takes the cell, and we learn the neighbor just wants to make sure someone is picking up our mail. She phones on my cell and assures him the cat sitter is taking care of everything. He’s retired and his voice soft. Would a restroom have been quiet enough for me to use the phone? No. Is there a phone booth around? Hah! MB has to phone the shuttle service for an update; I cannot.<\/p>\n

All of which is the explainer for a disclaimer. This weekend I write from the Ventura Crowne Plaza, reporting what I hear experts say about columns, newspapers and writing in general.<\/p>\n

Or what I think I hear. Others are posting their thoughts as well. Go to the NSNC Web site<\/a> and scroll to “Blogging the Conference” and check them out. The search engine of your choice will bring you other links.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

LOS ANGELES — I’m about 20 years too early to have hearing aids, but there it is. I’ve had one in my right ear since mid-2005, and six months ago had to begin wearing them in both. Each new auditory circumstance, rather than getting, “Wow, birds chirping!” often starts with, “What?” My first movie with […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[28],"tags":[29],"class_list":["post-1402","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ventura-2009","tag-columnist"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":7040,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2021\/04\/jan\/","url_meta":{"origin":1402,"position":0},"title":"Obituary for Jan Soderstrom","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"April 22, 2021","format":false,"excerpt":"Jan in her 20s, probably late 1970s, and Jan having lunch out with her sons Kirk and Kris on March 20, 2021, in Winston-Salem, North Carolina Jan Carol Altman Soderstrom, of Winston-Salem, N.C., died April 7, 2021, at the age of 71, of cancer. She was born May 22, 1949,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Body, Home, Street"","block_context":{"text":"Body, Home, Street","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/body-home-street\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Childhood home of Ben Pollock, far right","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/09\/BenPollockFtSmithHouse.png?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/09\/BenPollockFtSmithHouse.png?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/09\/BenPollockFtSmithHouse.png?resize=525%2C300&ssl=1 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/09\/BenPollockFtSmithHouse.png?resize=700%2C400&ssl=1 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/09\/BenPollockFtSmithHouse.png?resize=1050%2C600&ssl=1 3x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/09\/BenPollockFtSmithHouse.png?resize=1400%2C800&ssl=1 4x"},"classes":[]},{"id":1604,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2009\/09\/gop-school-talk-response\/","url_meta":{"origin":1402,"position":1},"title":"GOP School Talk Response","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"September 8, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"Copyright 2009 Ben S. Pollock DATELINE MIRTHOLOGY -- Republicans are grateful that Barack Obama released a transcript early for his speech today to American schoolchildren. Rather than responding to what he might say -- as they usually do in drafting responses to the weekly presidential radio address and the yearly\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Education, Coarsely"","block_context":{"text":"Education, Coarsely","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/education-coarsely\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1383,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2009\/06\/i-thought-we-were-in-trouble\/","url_meta":{"origin":1402,"position":2},"title":"I Thought We Were in Trouble","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"June 26, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"VENTURA, Calif. -- We themed (why not?) the 2009 conference of the National Society of Newspaper Columnists \"Survive and Thrive,\" and the speakers returned working titles that showed they understood, what with the now daily frosts at the beginning of the Newspaper Ice Age. So why are they so upbeat?\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Few Bullets More"","block_context":{"text":"Few Bullets More","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/nsnc\/ventura-2009\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":56,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2004\/08\/dupe-duplicative-dupe\/","url_meta":{"origin":1402,"position":3},"title":"Dupe duplicative dupe","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"August 10, 2004","format":false,"excerpt":"Doop a dupe a doop Copyright 2004 Ben S. Pollock Tuesday, Aug. 10, 2004. The Berkeley Breathed \"Opus\" panel for Sunday 8\/8\/04 looked very familiar (His syndicate does not allow open online access). So I walked from the paper on the dining table to my home office (the north side\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "The Course of Words"","block_context":{"text":"The Course of Words","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/course-of-words\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":185,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2006\/04\/worship-at-the-alter-ego\/","url_meta":{"origin":1402,"position":4},"title":"Worship at the alter ego","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"April 21, 2006","format":false,"excerpt":"A new ethical quandary in the news media. Los Angeles Times columnist Michael Hiltzik used fake names to publish comments on his blog and on those of others. Some of his creations conversed with one another. The LAT blog was suspended; the dude apparently still has his print outlet. Mea\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Technical Difficulties"","block_context":{"text":"Technical Difficulties","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/briefs\/technical-difficulties\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3186,"url":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/2011\/11\/wheres-the-sin-in-synchronicity\/","url_meta":{"origin":1402,"position":5},"title":"Where’s the Sin in Synchronicity?","author":"Ben S. Pollock","date":"November 1, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"This column first was published as the \u201cPresident\u2019s Message\u201d in the November 2011 newsletter of the National Society of Newspaper Columnists. \"How can there be any sin in sincere? \"Where is the good in goodbye?\" -- \"Sincere\" by Meredith Willson in The Music Man It may be yet another way\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "The Course of Words"","block_context":{"text":"The Course of Words","link":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/category\/course-of-words\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1402","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1402"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1402\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1465,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1402\/revisions\/1465"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1402"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1402"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/benpollock.com\/brick\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1402"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}