Whoops, forgot to ever look up the judges’ comments for the 2005 award winners, which are now available.
Belatedly, here they are for us at the Hesperia Star:
3B Best Feature Story
SECOND PLACE: Beau Yarbrough, Hesperia Star
They Ain’t Scared of No Ghost
COMMENTS: This was a whimsical and well-told story with nice details.
6B Best Law Enforcement/Legal Affairs Story
SECOND PLACE: Beau Yarbrough, Hesperia Star
High-flying in Hesperia
COMMENTS: Can a helicopter have a personality? This one does. The writer takes us along for a vivid ride and makes us feel a part of the air support team.
9B Best Government/Political Story
THIRD PLACE: Beau Yarbrough, Hesperia Star
Is the Hesperia casino really ‘terminated’?
COMMENTS: Well written.
29 Best News photo
THIRD PLACE: Peter Day, Hesperia Star
“Pacific Storm”
CATEGORY COMMENTS: Again it’s worth repeating what outstanding overall work in this category, it’s nice to see so many great photos in the contest. The first place photo is a standout in a category with a lot of great photos. The image of the sheriff wiping away the widow’s tear with a single finger is a real genuine moment. It’s a moving image.
I was at the gang sweep staging area at Victor Valley College for hours on Friday while I waited to get photos of guys being brought into custody, with nothing to do but take a lot of photos.
Here are some highlights, including photos not published in this week’s Star:
If you haven’t been listening to the Hesperia Star podcasts (and odds are, you haven’t been), this week’s is a pretty good one. Peter and I have an excessive amount of fun with digital effects in GarageBand, to the point that I don’t get why every podcaster doesn’t go over the top with them. Fear the day I get my own Mac and do my own personal podcasts.
So, last night, Jenn used the same seasoning on our steaks that senior management at Hesperia city hall (Code Enforcement’s Tom Harp, as I recall) used at last week’s annual employee cookout (see the photos at the bottom of A3 in this week’s paper). The steak they cooked smelled so good, but I was ethically prohibited from having any that was offered.
The theory goes something like this:
I cover Candidate A’s fund-raiser and he’s serving something not-great. Let’s say Sbarro Pizza, which is possibly the worst pizza available in every mall on the planet.
A few days later, I cover Candidate B’s fund-raiser. (It’ll get like this later this summer.) Candidate B is serving steak. (In fact, two years ago, Councilman Dennis Nowicki had former Hesperia Chamber of Commerce President Mark Lawson making his tri-tip, which I know for a fact is fantastic, and my stomach growled so hard smelling it, I had to flee the area so I could concentrate on my job.)
The next week, I write an article about the election and supporters of Candidate A hate it. (Experience says that the supporters of Candidate B will also hate it, but that’s not important in this discussion.) They then decide I was unduly influenced by Candidate B’s steak.
Now, I know where to get steak. I can grill steak myself. (I did so last night.) If I could be influenced, it’d take a hell of a lot more than steak. But it’s not worth the headaches of getting slammed for bias when it’s something I can avoid by just not eating the steak. Or the Sbarro pizza, for that matter.
This has turned into a bit of a running joke with officials in Hesperia, who now like to taunt me with things like the steak at last week’s cookout, knowing I won’t eat it. But it’s just not worth the hassle of eating it.
(I notice that ethics don’t prevent me from ever doing anything unpleasant: “Well, Congressman, I’d love to clean out your gutters, but my ethics mean I have to reluctantly decline.”)
There is one exception to all of this: Since the Star is a member of the chamber of commerce, there’s no problem with me eating chamber food in my capacity as a chamber member. So Lawson, who’s having a mixer in July where he’s serving tri-tip again, I believe, will see me chowing down on his awesome tri-tip. But if there ever was a question as to how I was covering the chamber, and why, I’d cut that out, too.
Of course, there’s nothing stopping me from asking, say, Tom Harp as to what was done to prepare the steaks at the cookout and doing the same at home. (Nice thick steaks, McCormick’s Montreal Steak Seasoning, high heat, and turning the steak just once to sear it and seal in the juices.) And man, they were damn good.
OK, got the location: Maria and I will be at the Hesperia Expo tomorrow from 10 to 5. This year, Sultana’s doing some renovations over the summer, so the chamber of commerce’s expo will be held at Epicenter on I Avenue near Hercules Street. Hope to see some readers there.
