Good Lord MÊL

Welcome to the JCWB's latest -- an experiment in Citizen Journalism. For starters, we hold no illusions that we are professional journalists -- we are every day citizens. Your next door neighbors, your co-workers, your friends. What we lack in experience we hope to make up for in enthusiasm. And we hope to take advantage of having our ears close to the ground, and bring you the stories that the professional news outlets -- the Goliaths -- might just miss. They might not be the most glamorous stories, nor the most high-profile -- but that doesn't mean that they're any less newsworthy, or any less real.

Our name -- Davey News -- is a tip of the hat to the book "An Army of Davids: How Markets and Technology Empower Ordinary People to Beat Big Media, Big Government, and Other Goliaths." We're living in an age where tools like the JCWB, the Wiki, our various Blogs, and websites like NewzJunky, give the ordinary citizen a voice. We hope that our voice finds an audience -- as well as other like minded citizens who'd like to try their hand at Citizen Journalism. If you are interested, please do get in touch -- experience not necessary!

MÊL

Not much else to add to that -- MÊL

For those of you reading this group blog, you might find it easier to read everyone's posts by clicking here -- it's just a different view.  And if there are comments on a post, you can see that in the header and click on a link to easily view them.

While not a true substitute for the JCWB, the blog does at least provide us with an outlet when the board is temporarily down.  It's a change of pace -- one I am hoping that, over time, will become more integrated with the JCWB. 

Meanwhile, we've got 4 members who have decided to jump into the field of citizen journalism -- I'm looking forward to see what they come up with.  Mama Moose, I don't know if you saw my post regarding your assignment -- I will forward you some E-Mails later which may help you out.  I'll be working on a commercial for our "newz" blog this week -- hopefully we'll be able to unveil the whole thing sometime next week.

Meanwhile, we're still down.  We got an E-Mail from our host advising us of an upgrade right around the time we went down -- the timing is a little suspicious, so we're waiting to see if that's what happened.  I'll post another update later today.  MÊL

Just to confirm -- and to answer those who have E-Mailed -- it appears that we are experiencing technical difficulties.  We'll do what we can to get us up and running as soon as possible.  MÊL

Okay, for those who want to confess -- this is as good a place as any. Note to the confessors, if you choose to confess, create a new blog entry and cross-post it to the group. Don't just add your confession in a reply to this one -- your confession is special and should be listed in its' own entry. Also, once the board is up, we can link to it directly. (We can't link to comments directly).

My Confession

On January 1st, 1969 -- the day after my parents had a lot of friends over for a New Year's Eve party -- I woke up and ran into the living room to watch TV. We had just gotten our first color TV for Christmas and the novelty hadn't worn off yet. I was doing what 4 year olds tend to do when their parents were sleeping off a hangover -- I ran around, jumped up and down, and made a lot of noise. I'm sure that noise was banging around my parent's skull -- but that was nothing compared to the noise I made when I jumped off the couch and my little left foot smashed down on a champagne glass that had been forgotten on the floor.

Ouch! The glass broke, and my pinky toe was just about cut off. There ain't much bone in a 4 year old's pinky toe -- and what bone there is slices like butter, apparently. My toe was hanging from a thread. My parents rushed me to the hospital where they said there wasn't much they could do. An old doctor said he'd sew it back on, just so I wouldn't walk uneven the rest of my life, but that it wouldn't be much good to me. Fair enough -- what good is a pinky toe anyway. To this day, I can't move it independently -- and I can't say that I've really missed having that ability. I've never had any feeling in that toe again.

Flash forward a few years -- and, somehow, I discovered that I could stick a needle all the way through the toe {chuckle}

How did I find out? I don't recall. But it seemed pretty cool -- and in my friend's basement, we did a "magic show" where I took a needle and pushed it all the way through the toe while the other kids "ooohed" and "ahhhed." It was actually pretty cool. Anyway, the day after the show, the toe started swelling up and turning a funny color -- and dripping stuff. Pus. That was pretty gross. I didn't say anything to my parents, but in a day or two I started burning up -- I had a fever -- I had an infection. So I got whisked to the doctor and by the time we were going there I was having trouble walking. They took off my socks and my mother almost died when she saw the toe. They asked me what happened to my pinky toe and I gave the classic 7-year old's answer --

"I dunno."

The doctor poured some nasty stuff on my toe -- it friggin' burned. And I was forced to give up my career in magic.

Good Morning -- we're still having technical difficulties on the JCWB -- in the meantime, a few members have taken the plunge and joined up on Vox -- welcome aboard to Greyghost, Kimbuctu, and Yukongirl -- hopefully we'll see more members joining up.  This will give us a little outlet while we're fixing the problems with the board --

Just got an email stating that we're having problems.  Looks like we're down at the moment . . . as soon as we have more information, we'll pass it along.  In the meantime, why don't you take this opportunity (if you haven't already) to join Vox and drop me a line so I can add you to our Group Blog!

Verizon Wireless announced that it has expanded its network in Lewis County, New York with new cell site in Brantingham.

The new site improves coverage and capacity along Route 12 between Lyons Falls and Lowville.

Click Here For Full Story

Due to its relatively easy access to transmission lines, upstate New York may end up with some TWENTY THOUSAND wind towers (e.g. www.windaction.org/documents/3575).

Click Here For A Summary

Cape Air - the Massachusetts based airline that provides passenger service to Rutland- is expanding its reach into upstate New York. The regional carrier will begin flights to Saranac Lake and Plattsburgh later this month.

"We're flying up to the communities of Massena, Ogdensburg and Watertown and we're going to be discussing with airport officials in those towns - nonstop service between Albany, New York, Massena, Ogdensburg and Watertown."

Read More