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Running Away From Reality

I've been a delinquent blogger of late, but it's been a tough week all around. It just seemed wrong to complain about a sore leg on the day a thousand religious pilgrims tumbled off a bridge to their deaths in Iraq. And the sorrowful story of human suffering in Louisiana and Mississippi not only left me feeling emotionally stunned, it also overwhelmed my time as I worked to help cover the story. It is humbling to experience how the filter of other people's misery makes you reconsider your own phenomenal good fortune.

I've still been running every day of late, and even twice on Wednesday. If I manage to get through 10 miles with my friend Gavin tomorrow morning (and I will), this will be my fifth 40+ mile week in a row. Sometimes going for a run is the most efficient way to process the anxieties of the world, even if it comes with a modicum of pain. I've really needed the escape, since my days have been so consumed with helping to tell sad stories and confronting shocking video footage.

"Currently in last place, "CBS Evening News" needs to be reinvented, and the problem is stark: how do you combine news with entertainment? News stories are often dark, and [Les] Moonves would like to find a way to make them light.

We have a very interesting six months ahead of us," Moonves said as he got up to leave. ‘‘Hopefully, by then, we’ll be an independent CBS.’’ He paused, smiled and added, ‘‘And with any luck, we’ll have a naked news show."

- New York Times Magazine, September 4, 2005

This article was released earlier this week, and was actually sort of amusing in a dark humor sort of way. You've got to wonder how the hurricane story might have been told in a more entertaining way. And the only naked bodies I saw on the news this week were dead ones. Somehow, I don't think that's what he meant.

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This page contains a single entry from the blog posted on September 3, 2005 2:21 AM.

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