sochi

MY OLYMPICS JOURNEY: Ready for Rio, preparing for the grind

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Eight years ago this week, I received my first opportunity to cover a major national event … and thus my first experience with, for an extended period of time, working to the limit.

I flew to Denver to report from the 2008 Democratic National Convention and the eventual nomination of our current president, Barack Obama. I operated by myself in a sea of tens of thousands, lugged 50 pounds of equipment to and from my workspace each day, turned roughly a dozen stories, and used any brief window of free time to gobble down enough food to sustain me for the next few hours.

Exhausting, right? Not enjoyable at all, right?

And yet, when I returned home, I wrote this — in all sincerity — to my boss:

This was one of the most unforgettable weeks of my life. I ended up working some 60 hours in four days in Denver, and it was partly because I kept looking for new things to cover, because I didn’t want to waste a minute of the experience.

Yup. When the work is that riveting, I actually crave it. And as I stare into my immediate future, I spy another extended brush with extended hours:

On Saturday I head to Rio de Janeiro to cover the 2016 Summer Olympics.

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My favorite posts of 2014: The Olympics experience

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I am spending the next few weeks looking back at 2014, recapping the best stories I watched or read while also reflecting on my favorite blog posts of the year.

A cool thing happened last week:

I posted my 200th entry to the Telling The Story blog.

I continue to truly enjoy the experience of writing a blog, hosting a podcast, and communicating with storytellers and journalists worldwide. This platform has allowed me to share my own experiences in the field and provide a window into my day-to-day life.

No experience this year stood out quite like my month at the Olympics.

I flew to Russia on February 1st and didn’t get back to America until the 26th. During that time, in addition to my primary duties reporting for my TV station and others, I wrote 15 blog entries that saw significant traffic.

Here are my five favorites, with excerpts from each:

Arriving in Sochi, awaiting sleep (2/3/14): 3:34 AM.

The clock on my computer is staring back at me, screaming, “GO TO BED!” in its non-threatening, tiny white font.

And yet, I am nowhere near tired.

Welcome to the road-trip life, nine time zones away.

I have officially arrived in Sochi, Russia, home of the 2014 Winter Olympics. This is a truly exciting opportunity, one that I cannot wait to tackle.

But first, somehow, I have to get my body right. (more…)

3 GREAT STORIES: Starring Upworthy, ageism, & post-Olympics Sochi

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More and more, I see long-form writing being spread on short-form media.

I found two of this week’s 3 Great Stories through links on friends’ Twitter feeds, which struck me as ironic both then and now. Here is a social media service, designed for lightning-quick communication, often derided for the lack of depth it encourages through its 140-character Tweet limit. And yet, it has become — on some small level — a conduit to explore much larger works of writing.

My vantage point on Twitter is, I believe, not unique. When I use it, I typically want a quick scroll of headlines, quips, and commentary to keep me abreast of the latest news and conversation topics. But I also find myself turning to Twitter during pockets of down time, and in those moments, I find myself susceptible to being lured into a long-form read.

Here is what lured me in this past week:

Watching Team Upworthy work is enough to make you a cynic. Or lose your cynicism. Or both. Or neither (3/23/14, New York Magazine): Speaking of something that seemingly succeeds by functioning against conventional wisdom, enter Upworthy.

The web site known for its bluntly emotional headlines and sincere content is also notorious for its astounding ubiquity online. It is much-loved and much-hated — and the envy of virtually every web developer eager to duplicate Upworthy’s rags-to-Internet-riches success.

Give credit, then, to writer Nitsuh Abebe for penning a fascinating article that goes behind the scenes with Upworthy’s 40-person staff. Abebe covers all angles of the Upworthy saga, from its founders’ mission to its detractors’ skepticism.

More than that, Abebe, normally the music critic at New York Magazine, performs the deft trick of revealing various details of the Upworthy creative process while still acknowledging the seeming mystery of the site’s monstrous performance. He maneuvers around that tension throughout the piece, which remains absorbing throughout.

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