Hillbonics

I stumbled across this site this evening. Check out: Hillbonics: Learn to Speak Southern West Virginian.

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West Virginia

Fifth Column has a scoop

Hippie Killer has an unnamed source who has written an unauthorized version of what happened at the Bush fundraiser in South Hills last week.

Update: The official version of the visit from the hostess is here.

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West Virginia, Charleston, WV

Broken Promise

I don't always agree with Don Surber, but I do agree that cutting 200 to 250 students out of college scholarships to save a lousy $800,000 is a crime.

Why do I feel this is just the start of measures meant to gut Promise? Maybe the state should look at using the billions it makes with the lottery every year to fund Promise. There are too few high school students heading for college in West Virginia. Let's give them a leg up, not a slap down.

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West Virginia

The new wvgazette.com sucks

There is a new Charleston Gazette homepage, and I am not a fan. For starters, who designs on five columns? It also breaks some rules of graphic design, like trapping white space inside the layout. It's very busy, and quite frankly it's a mess.

There are parts I do like. For example, the the menu items in the far left column are much cleaner.

They began rolling out the new design yesterday for the Sunday Gazette-Mail. At least all the links work today. They didn't yesterday. The five column wide design isn't anymore pleasing in a text only browser. (I've tried everything I can think of to make the site legible). The design is broken, but it is fixable. The first thing is to lose the fifth column. (No pun intended.)

Update: The site is back to its old look.
Update 2: Like a bad rash, it's back this morning (8/1).

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West Virginia, Charleston, WV

And yet another WV blogger...

I'm behind in adding WV blogs to the blogroll. I found a new one this evening via Don Surber. Local newspaper photog Tom Hindman has been blogging for a while now. I've already added him to the blogroll.
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West Virginia, Charleston, WV

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Haiku

I don't really like memes, but I like this haiku. Thanks to Sharon for the link.

Haiku2 for oncee
this really rocks two gazz bloggers are brining video podcasting
@ aboutmylife.netblogger.comblogs.gnome.orgblogspot.comdeadjournal.comgreatestjournal.comlivejournal.commyspace.comspaces.msn.com
Created by Grahame

And the winner is...

Stanton says the winner of the 2006 Weenie Awards is Chris'. I haven't visited since the 80s. I need to get out more.

Blair and I will be going to Huntington on Saturday for WEINERFEST, AKA The Second Annual West Virginia Hot Dog Festival. I can't wait to have a Stewarts Original Hot Dog.

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West Virginia, Huntington, WV, Doggers

New Radio Free Charleston

The second episode of Radio Free Charleston is online.

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Charleston Area Bloggers, West Virginia, Charleston, WV, video blogging, vlogging, Radio Free Charleston

Cazon: Capitol Streets eats

The Cazon menu is up on the web. They handed me a paper copy of the menu when I was walking down Capitol Street at lunchtime. They tell me they will be open tomorrow.

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West Virginia, Charleston, WV

Tougher smoking regulations find little support

Charleston Daily Mail: Bar owners and patrons rail against possible Kanawha ban

I still say if it works in NYC, it can work here. I don't smoke but I do dip snuff. Making someone breath secondhand smoke is like me making you drink my tobacco spit. At least you would have a choice. I can't pick the air I breath in a public place.

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West Virginia, Charleston, WV

Clerks II

I see one movie every couple of years. Blair and I went to see Clerks II tonight, and overall it was great.

It's by far the best movie Kevin Smith has made since the first Clerks.

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Clerks II, Movies, Kevin Smith

Marshall movie maps

I can't find a direct link to this story from the AP, so I'm reposting it here in its entirety:

HUNTINGTON, W.Va.
The Keith Albee Theater, the Memorial Fountain and the Marshall University campus basketball court are all noted points of interest on a new "We Are Marshall" movie site map.

Officials with the Cabell-Huntington Convention and Visitors Bureau say the special fold-out maps will feature all the film locations of the Marshall movie and direct people to places around town they just might recognize from the movie.

Other sites include Spring Hill Cemetery where funeral scenes were shot, and the Campus Christian Center.

The Visitor's Bureau plans to invest up to 12-thousand dollars on the maps, 75-thousand of which will be placed in restaurants and hotels in Huntington, state welcome centers and elsewhere.

The maps will hit the streets closer to the movie's release, sometime in late October.

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Huntington, WV, We Are...Marshall, Marshall University, Marshall Football

Smoke-free bars might be on tap

The Gazette reports the Kanawha County Board of Health started the process to ban smoking in all public buildings including bars yesterday.

The proposed smoke-free regulation would ban smoking in bars and other non-restaurant areas, including areas that the county’s current smoking regulation lets slide, provided they are separate from eating areas.

If a public smoking ban that includes bars can work in NYC, it can work here.

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West Virginia, Charleston, WV

WCHS TV and FOX 11 might go dark in Charleston

The Charleston Gazette reports WCHS TV and FOX 11 have not reached a deal to stay on the local cable company's line-up. This could mean no more “American Idol” or “Desperate Housewives.” No “Lost” or “24.” No Big East football or “Eyewitness News.”

There is a statement on the WCHS TV website that says:

Attention Former Charter Cable Subscribers: The cable systems formerly owned by Charter which were sold to Suddenlink have already or may discontinue carriage of this television station in the very near future. To ensure your continued ability to watch our programming, residents in the Charleston and Huntington markets should contact DirecTV at 1-888-777-2454 or the DISH network at 1-888-265-6902.

In An Open Letter To Our Viewers General Manager Harold Cooper says:

Although Suddenlink would like you to believe this is the fault of WCHS and WVAH, you should know that we have been attempting to negotiate with Suddenlink since we became aware of their proposed acquisition to avoid this.

He goes on to say:

Sinclair (the parent company of WCHS and the programmer of WVAH) has successfully reached agreement for the carriage of its signals of its television stations, with many cable and other multi-channel video providers, including the largest such companies, Comcast, DirecTV and Echostar. We have also reached agreement with AT&T and Verizon, both of which are starting to launch video programming in certain of their markets. In fact, as noted above we already have a group-wide deal with Suddenlink, but they have not even offered to extend the terms of that agreement to the systems they acquired from Charter.

In the case of local programing and news, I think the FCC should get involved.

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West Virginia, Charleston, WV, TV

The glamour of TV news

The Daily Mail reports WSAZ anchor Jessica Ralston has been named ‘Looker of the Week' by Newsblues.com.

In other "news", former WSAZ reporter Mike Tobin, now with Fox News, is in the middle of war zone in Gaza and Haifa.

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West Virginia, Charleston, WV

Remembering "The Site"

MSMBC turns 10 this month. They had 10th anniversary party in Secaucus on Friday.

TVNEWSER has 10 years of "MSNBC: Anniversary coverage all this weekend".

One of the most important shows, at least to me was The Site. The show helped to launch the career of Soledad O'Brien and put Leo Laporte in front of a nightly audience nightly.

The Site was the first of the efforts to make TV for geeks. ZDTV, later renamed TechTV, later purchased by G4 continues to with that role. Only TechTV ever really got it right.

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TV

Marshall Movie Update

The Huntington premiere of "We Are Marshall" has tentatively been set for Thursday, Oct. 26.

HUNTINGTON -- The Huntington premiere of "We Are Marshall" has tentatively been set for Thursday, Oct. 26, with the nationwide release scheduled for the following day, according to Keith Spears, vice president for marketing and communications at Marshall University.

Spears said Thursday that the premiere and release dates are based upon Warner Bros. Pictures' latest projections for finishing the movie about the aftermath of the 1970 Marshall football plane crash. Plans also are in the works to have the premiere at the Keith-Albee, Spears said.

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Huntington, WV, We Are...Marshall, Marshall University, Marshall Football

New Eats on Capitol Street

The Charleston Gazette has the skinny on Cazon Southwest Deli: the new tex-mex place getting ready to open on Capitol Street.

Bill Lynch, one of my favorite local writers (mainly for his bombastic style), has his take on the opening here and here.

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Charleston, WV

Now you can buy all the stuff your grandma used to have

People travel from as far away as Washington, D.C. to visit The Purple Moon. I can't seem to travel down the street to visit it.

Rudy Panucci made a visit back in June. His photo essays are here and here.

If you are too far away for a visit, The Purple Moon has an Ebay store. I found their selection of vintage adult magazines to be rather interesting.

The Purple Moon was a website as well if you want more information and photographs.

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Charleston, WV

I've hit the big time

Thanks to Douglas Imbrogno over at the newly rebranded gazzopolis for the link.

I've been a fan of Doug for years, starting when I was a journalism student getting my master's degree at MU. He has always kept the Daily Mail on the leading edge of the culture curve. While Rudy has linked to me in the past, it's a honor getting a hat tip from the main man.

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Charleston Area Bloggers, Charleston, WV

Heeee'ssssss Baaacccck!

Pee-wee's Playhouse makes its TV return tonight on Adult Swim at 11 p.m.

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TV

Deadwood: The web game

Dead Man's Hand over at the Deadwood site looked pretty slick on the previews aired after the show. (We missed the first half because we were watching the Lost Episodes of the Chappelle Show.) The game appears to be down at the moment.

System Requirements to play:
Flash 7, Virtools 3.5.0.32
Mac: Safari1+, Firefox 1+
PC: Firefox 1+, Internet Explorer 6+

I'm glad to see they didn't lock us Mac users out.

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TV, Deadwood

The wait was worth it

The "return" of Chappelle's Show was worth the wait.

The current state of video blogging (this week anyway)

Am I the only person that thinks it's ironic that the day after Radio Free Charleston goes live Rocketboom explodes on the launch pad?

In the same way that RFC wouldn't be the same without Rudy, Rockboom will not be the same with out Amanda Congdon.

The public splat between Congdon and Rocketboom producer Andrew Baron is getting rather nasty.

RFC is one of the best video blogs I've seen. The editing is great. It's pure eye candy. Rudy goes a great job. I can't wait to see the next episode.

Update: Dave Winer a long post about the drama that is unfolding over at Rocketboom: What we know and don't know about Amanda, Andrew and Rocketboom.

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West Virginia, Charleston, WV, video blogging, vlogging, Radio Free Charleston

Suber takes on Fark

Don Suber gets Fark'd.

Via raging red

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West Virginia, Charleston, WV

Video Podcasting Comes to Charleston

This really rocks. Two GAZZ bloggers are brining video podcasting to Charleston. Rudy Pannuci hosts Radio Free Charleston and Jessica Harrah hosts The Foxy Commander Show. You can find the details over at Rudy's blog and direct download links here. I'm downloading "Radio Free Charleston/ Show 1" for the iPod now. It's rather large at 36.6 MB, but it is video.

Hopefully the thunderstorm outside won't knock me offline before I can get this sucker downloaded.

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Charleston Area Bloggers, West Virginia, Charleston, WV