How the Sausage Is Made

Morbidity aside, it's pretty cool to see how events turn into news coverage here at ABC.

I'm on an internal "Breaking News" distribution list, which means I get dozens of emails from ABC News people whenever something has happened, will happen, or is in the process of happening.

In the case of today's London car bomb plot, I've gotten more than 100 emails since 5 a.m - London bureau people dashing off notes, New York people asking questions, White House correspondents in the process of tracking down officials for comment, and so on. Around 2:45pm, there was discussion on the list about breaking into regularly scheduled programming for a special report. At 2:57, they announced internally that the special report was going to happen. At 2:58:26, Charlie Gibson broke in with a 5 minute report that brought together correspondents from Washington, New York, and London for a cohesive, informative story. Damn impressive. These folks can really kick stuff out when they need to.

Quick Check-In

I'm wrapping up a week from hell here at work, and getting ready for a trip to Seattle next week. Sarah, Asher, Leah and I fly out on Sunday. I'll be working from the Disney office on Monday and Tuesday, and then we head north of the city for "vacation" with some old friends. "Vacation" is in parenthesis because we will be renting a house with three other couples, and will have in our midst 8 kids under the age of five.

Being Isaac Josephson - Sunday Morning Edition

Asher got a cold. Then I got a cold. Now both of us would like to take our heads off and put them on a shelf to drain.

Meanwhile, Leah's back to waking up every three hours at night. After sleeping for 6-8 hour stretches for the past month, it's a bit of a letdown.

Is "letdown" one word or two? Hyphenated?

Matt Pond PA's "Kc" is stuck in my head right now. So, I'm listening to it while I download free episodes of Sesame Street from iTunes.

Speaking of iTunes, I'll give you one guess what their password retrieval screen's called. Yep, "iForgot." Clever bastards, they are.

Isaac: Do you know who George Stephanopolous is?

20-Year-Old Intern (proudly): He's one of our correspondents!

Isaac: Do you know he was before he was one of our correspondents?

20-Year-Old Intern (proudly): Not one of our correspondents!

After a decade in the music industry, I don't get star-struck easily. But, I just bumped into George Stephanopolous in the halls of ABC, and I'm swooning. At age 32, this man was a senior advisor to President Clinton. They modeled the West Wing character Sam Seaborn after him.

Wow, what a much-needed vacation.

I spent loads of quality time with Sarah, Leah, and Asher when he wasn't running around with three-year-old Ella and her one-year-old sister Jessica. All kids went to sleep at a reasonable hour and stayed there, leaving the adults to enjoy extended, wine-tinged dinners. We went to an animal sanctuary, hiked by a stream, and sampled homemade ice cream.

On other fronts:

Joe Biden was on This Week again. And again, the more I hear, the more respect I have for the guy. His foreign policy credentials are unassailable. Don't worry - my vote will still go to a more liberal candidate, but damn...

I've gotten two recruiter calls in the past week - both for VP positions around the city. At this time with NPD (after 8 months), I was already shopping for a new job. Now, I simply tell the recruiters that I'm happy where I am, and pass off a few names to them. Feels pretty damn good to love your job.

Misc.

Stay tuned for some user-generated video fun from ABC News.

We're going up to Woodstock with some friends this weekend. I'm even taking Monday off, though I'll have to call in to a few meetings.

My early morning exercise attempts are still underway. Today, I ran three miles before 6 a.m.

Disturbing

1) Hamas has overthrown the Palestinian government and taken over the West Bank.
At this point, maybe Israel should build a full wall around Gaza, cut all all remaining ties to that territory, grant all Palestinians living in the West Bank full Israeli citizenship, tie its infrastructure (water, electricity, etc.) into the rest of the country, and move forward.

2) Congressional hearings into the Department of Justice
Is anyone paying attention to this? There's been a ton of illegal partisan activity uncovered. But no one seems to be culpable. DOJ officials are lying under oath, then "revising" their testimony ex post facto. They're pointing fingers at each other, and playing "he said, she said." Congress is too ineffective to determine who is responsible, and to wimpy to start jailing people in contempt. It's pathetic how toothless the Democrats are being.

We share office space with the production team of "Who Wants To Be A Millionaire." They spend a lot of time reviewing show tapes, which means I have to hear the theme music about 500 times a day. It's slowly driving me insane.

On the plus side, they have a constantly refreshed candy plate in the center of the room.

Because It All Relates Back To...

real estate.

My parents are in town for a few days (more on that below), so we took advantage of their babysitting prowess last night to check out some jazz at the nearby Tea Lounge.

The Tea Lounge - which is roughly 100 yards from our apartment - is a stroller derby lounge by day. By night, it's a hip jazz venue, a movie theater, a performance art space... or still a stroller derby, depending on when you drop in. Monday nights are jazz 'n movie nights. The Alan Ferber Nonet kicked things off with a blend of electric and straight-ahead. Beautiful stuff. We didn't stay for the movie because Leah needed to be fed. But wow, was it some fantastic music.

How does this relate to real estate? It's obvious - There's no Tea Lounge in Maplewood.

* * *

Leah's Simchat Bat - a celebration of her arrival - was on Sunday. We waited two months partially because that's the earliest we could get a space in the neighborhood, but also because we thought it would be nice for Leah to be more alert. And it was. She behaved perfectly.

I threw my back out this morning.

I'm listening to Nick Drake right now.

I have no meetings from 1-5:30pm today.

I need new shoes.

After listening to a Carl Bernstein interview on the way to work today, I like Hillary Clinton less.

The interns have descended on the office. They are young.

Quick Morning Hit

New Wilco

One of the happiest mysteries of the past decade is how Jeff Tweedy has evolved into a peerless experimental rock bandleader whose increasingly innovative work remains grounded in an accessible, rootsy ethos. In part, this transformation has been driven by a revolving cast of muses – musical luminaries like Jay Bennett and Jim O’Rourke who have pushed Tweedy’s Wilco to set the bar higher on each release. With Sky Blue Sky that mantle has shifted to avant garde jazz guitarist Nels Cline whose New Monastery – an audacious interpretation of Andrew Hill’s music – was one of the most interesting records of 2006.

Against such a backdrop, anything less than a once-in-a-generation album would have suffered from high expectations. And while Sky Blue Sky is still a solid release, it falls far short of its promise, instead landing near the top of that largely risk-averse, roots-and-jam-band genre known as “dad rock.”

Musically, Sky Blue Sky is a mature follow-up to the band’s 1996 release Being There. The songs are impeccable; Tweedy sprinkles in a few well-timed George Harrison licks, and percussionist Glenn Kotche, a longstanding enemy of the standard backbeat, mixes up the rhythms enough to engage listeners, but never lets them forget it’s a rock album. Still, Wilco has traversed much ground since 1996. A throwback to that earlier Wilco does not do them justice.

There are exceptions - the back-to-back “Side With The Seeds” and “Shake It Off.” The two traverse miles of musical ground in a manner not attempted since the days of early Pink Floyd or Selling England-era Genesis. Cline earns his paycheck here, adding textures that turn what would otherwise be simply solid compositions into mind-blowing psychedelic affairs.

To be sure, many of the other songs on Sky Blue Sky will be welcome additions to the Wilco canon once they’ve been worked out in the live arena. But at their core, they’re a step back both musically and lyrically.

A Tale of Two Cities

We visited Maplewood, NJ on Sunday, and it's hard to argue against living there. The commute would be only about ten minutes more than what I'm doing now, including a short *walk* (no need to drive) to the train station. There's a cute, New England-esque downtown area. The schools are good. The blocks are kid-friendly and full of NYC transplants. The houses are HUGE and AFFORDABLE, and South Mountain Reservation - with 2,000+ acres of hiking and biking -is two miles away. They've even got their own version of Parkslopeparents.com with Maplewoodonline.com.

But...

On Saturday, we met a bunch of friends in Prospect Park for an impromptu game of toddler soccer. The outing lasted four hours, and included a hike to a waterfall, a guitar, and sitting in the shade while Asher ran wild with a pack of boys and girls his own age. That evening, we dropped Asher off with Sarah's parents, and went into Manhattan for a party. (Leah came along, since she's not taking a bottle, and could not be left with her Grandparents, but she slept the entire time.)

!!!

I'm not sure what the point of this piece is, but it's utterly absurd.