I decided to skip over Tuesday because it was a totally boring day...but Wednesday was fun. Nothing exciting at work to report on but after work I went with a bunch of the kids from BYU to try and get tickets at the Wicked lottery. All of us were unsuccessful in that venture but we ended up going to dinner at this fun place called Ellen's Stardust Diner. The place has been around forever and is famous for its' singing wait staff. The food is really not that amazing but the atmosphere is what counts. The whole time your eating, the waiters are belting out show tunes. Everybody that works there is trying to get onto Broadway and so halfway through your meal they bring around a collection tin where you can give money to help support the talented waiters. The diner uses that money to pay for singing, acting, or dancing lessons for the members of their staff.
After dinner some of the kids went to see Mamma Mia, but I already seen it so Allison and I decided to go try to get tickets to A Chorus Line. We literally walked up to the box office 20 minutes before the show and ended up getting student rush tickets for $35. Mario Lopez is performing in the show this summer but he was on a short hiatus when we saw it. The show was very well done but it just wasn't my cup of tea. I thought it was set in the 40's but it's actually set in the 70's and is pretty sad a depressing. The first half is pretty funny, but then the rest of the show is mostly monologues and sad songs. It just isn't a very uplifting kind of musical. There aren't any elaborate sets or costumes, and the kick-line (which is what I thought of when saw that Chorus Line was playing) lasts all of about two minutes. I wills say that the actors were very talented but I probably would not recommend this show to anyone.
Sorry I don't have any pics from this day! Allison took them on her camera and I haven't gotten them from her yet.
Monday, May 26, 2008
Sunday, May 11, 2008
I heart New York!
Ok guys so because I haven't posted in a week I'm going to give a very brief description of what I've been up to since Monday...
Tuesday:
-Work = boring
-Found out I was supposed to go in early to help with a fashion segment on Wednesday but got a call from the producer saying she didn't need me anymore (yo = muy triste)
-Went shopping with Allison at Anthropoligie and H&M and then to dinner at Chipotle which made the day much better!
-After dinner Allison and I watched Gossip Girl online!! And I totally called it that Serena had killed someone!!!!!! We were freaking out!!!! Love that show!!!
Wednesday:
-Got up a 6am to call my internship supervisor to find out if I could still come in to help with the fashion segment -- found out the first segment had been canceled so I went in at 9am instead and helped with another segment. (If anybody watched the show it was the one about getting your legs ready for summer.)
-Ok funny story -- I was in the green room and the guys walks by me and one of the models for the segment was like "Oh I just saw you on TV!" and the guy was like "Oh actually that was just a video of me playing, I'm about to go sing right now. By the way, I'm Dierks. It's nice to meet you." It was totally Dierks Bentley the country singer! I totally didn't recognize him and he was standing right in front of me! Crazy huh!?!
-Went to a NYC LDS Professionals meeting that night where all the LDS Professionals came and talked to the interns about their experiences in NYC. The meeting was pretty sweet and they gave us some great advice. Only problem was that almost everyone who spoke was in advertising so it got a little boring after a while.
-Oh and I almost forgot that before the meeting Allison, Sarah, and I went to the American Girl Place on 5th Ave and relived our childhoods!! That place is soooo cute!! They even have a restaurant that is all decked out in pink and polka dots and you can apparently get food there for your doll!! Seriously if any girls come to the city who had an American Girl doll when they were little you have to check this place out!
Thursday:
-Work = not too exciting. I just did the normal stuff like logging tape and making dubs.
-I went shopping after work to get a mother's day present for my Mom and my Grandma at Anthropoligie. Also went shopping for myself at H&M and Banana Republic:) and I went and explored Saks. That place is AMAZING!!! Totally waaaaay too expensive but amazing none the less.
Friday:
-Got picked up by a chauffeured car at 6am to take me to work! I have to say I felt very cool driving through the city in a black car with tinted windows. It was very NYC.
-I helped with the Ambush Makeover segment. I didn't actually get to do that much but I got to be in the studio for a while. I did get to see Al Roker, Anne Curry, Kathy Lee, and Hoda Kotb up close which was very cool!! I also saw Mary J. Blige doing her soundcheck! She sounded awesome life!
-That night I went out to dinner with Allison, Sarah, and Jared at this sweet bar-b-que place just a couple of blocks from I-House. It's called Dinosaur Bar-B-Que and the food was really good and not too pricey.
-After dinner we had a surprise b-day party for Christ Cutri, our faculty advisor, and then I went up to the ESPN zone in Time's Square with Allison, Monica, and Tara and watched the Jazz beat the Lakers! Woohoo!
Saturday:
-Left the house at 10am to get Legally Blonde tickets. Allison and I got front row seats for $26.50 with the student rush discount!! For any students coming to NYC this is such an awesome deal! You just have to have your student ID. Check out this website: http://www.talkinbroadway.com/boards/index.php?rush=show for a list of all the shows that do student rush or discounted tickets. It's totally the way to see all the shows.
-Allison and I then went up to 5th ave and explore Bergdorf's which is the coolest looking department store ever. The place is seriously gorgeous! Then we went to Tiffany & Co. and looked at all the amazing jewelry.
-We then met up with a bunch of other BYU kids on Canal Street (which is the place for the all cheap designer knock offs) We walked through SOHO and Little Italy and then had lunch in China Town. My friend Monica speaks chinese so she ordered us lots of yummy food at this chinese restaurant.
-Then we wanted to buy fake designer purses. What an experience! So like everywhere you go in China town there are these little Asian ladies that stop you and are like "You want purses?" and if you say yes they lead you to where they are selling these purses. Monica is an old pro at this so she knew what to do. The first lady she talked to leads us to a van parked on the side of the street and Monica pushes Allison and Tara and I into this van!! The van was full of fake designer purses and this lady was like pushing them at us trying to get us to buy some!! It was seriously crazy!! Then the next lady takes us into this office building and into a room that said "Attorney at Law" on the door to throw off the police. So in this office they have all these purses and there are all these women buying these designer knock offs. It was seriously the weirdest experience. And these Asian ladies are so worried that they are going to get caught cuz it is totally illegal. These purses are like the best knock offs I've ever seen. But what's funny is that if the cops wanted to bust these people it would be totally easy because they are everywhere in China Town. It was seriously an experience to remember!
-After China town we went to Ground Zero and saw the WTC site. They've rebuilt a lot of the surrounding building but they are still working on getting the building up that will replace the two towers. It's really sad to go and look at all the destruction that took place. There was this funny guy there that was telling the story of 9/11 and had all these pictures and he had a bucket around his neck that you could put money in. There were also street vendors that were selling books that told the story. It was sad to see all these people making money off of such a tragedy. It's like you want to hear the story but you don't want people to be profiting off of it.
-We all went to this awesome yogurt place called Pink Berry after ground zero. They have delicious yogurt! It's kind of like Yoasis for those of you back in Provo but a little bit better.
-That night I went and saw Legally Blonde: The Musical and it was sooo cute! The music is really fun and happy and the dancing is great. I would definitely recommend it to anyone!
-After the play Allison and I went to the Carnegie Deli and got cheesecake! Sooo yummy!!
Sunday:
-Just church and relaxation after a long week!
Tuesday:
-Work = boring
-Found out I was supposed to go in early to help with a fashion segment on Wednesday but got a call from the producer saying she didn't need me anymore (yo = muy triste)
-Went shopping with Allison at Anthropoligie and H&M and then to dinner at Chipotle which made the day much better!
-After dinner Allison and I watched Gossip Girl online!! And I totally called it that Serena had killed someone!!!!!! We were freaking out!!!! Love that show!!!
Wednesday:
-Got up a 6am to call my internship supervisor to find out if I could still come in to help with the fashion segment -- found out the first segment had been canceled so I went in at 9am instead and helped with another segment. (If anybody watched the show it was the one about getting your legs ready for summer.)
-Ok funny story -- I was in the green room and the guys walks by me and one of the models for the segment was like "Oh I just saw you on TV!" and the guy was like "Oh actually that was just a video of me playing, I'm about to go sing right now. By the way, I'm Dierks. It's nice to meet you." It was totally Dierks Bentley the country singer! I totally didn't recognize him and he was standing right in front of me! Crazy huh!?!
-Went to a NYC LDS Professionals meeting that night where all the LDS Professionals came and talked to the interns about their experiences in NYC. The meeting was pretty sweet and they gave us some great advice. Only problem was that almost everyone who spoke was in advertising so it got a little boring after a while.
-Oh and I almost forgot that before the meeting Allison, Sarah, and I went to the American Girl Place on 5th Ave and relived our childhoods!! That place is soooo cute!! They even have a restaurant that is all decked out in pink and polka dots and you can apparently get food there for your doll!! Seriously if any girls come to the city who had an American Girl doll when they were little you have to check this place out!
Thursday:
-Work = not too exciting. I just did the normal stuff like logging tape and making dubs.
-I went shopping after work to get a mother's day present for my Mom and my Grandma at Anthropoligie. Also went shopping for myself at H&M and Banana Republic:) and I went and explored Saks. That place is AMAZING!!! Totally waaaaay too expensive but amazing none the less.
Friday:
-Got picked up by a chauffeured car at 6am to take me to work! I have to say I felt very cool driving through the city in a black car with tinted windows. It was very NYC.
-I helped with the Ambush Makeover segment. I didn't actually get to do that much but I got to be in the studio for a while. I did get to see Al Roker, Anne Curry, Kathy Lee, and Hoda Kotb up close which was very cool!! I also saw Mary J. Blige doing her soundcheck! She sounded awesome life!
-That night I went out to dinner with Allison, Sarah, and Jared at this sweet bar-b-que place just a couple of blocks from I-House. It's called Dinosaur Bar-B-Que and the food was really good and not too pricey.
-After dinner we had a surprise b-day party for Christ Cutri, our faculty advisor, and then I went up to the ESPN zone in Time's Square with Allison, Monica, and Tara and watched the Jazz beat the Lakers! Woohoo!
Saturday:
-Left the house at 10am to get Legally Blonde tickets. Allison and I got front row seats for $26.50 with the student rush discount!! For any students coming to NYC this is such an awesome deal! You just have to have your student ID. Check out this website: http://www.talkinbroadway.com/boards/index.php?rush=show for a list of all the shows that do student rush or discounted tickets. It's totally the way to see all the shows.
-Allison and I then went up to 5th ave and explore Bergdorf's which is the coolest looking department store ever. The place is seriously gorgeous! Then we went to Tiffany & Co. and looked at all the amazing jewelry.
-We then met up with a bunch of other BYU kids on Canal Street (which is the place for the all cheap designer knock offs) We walked through SOHO and Little Italy and then had lunch in China Town. My friend Monica speaks chinese so she ordered us lots of yummy food at this chinese restaurant.
-Then we wanted to buy fake designer purses. What an experience! So like everywhere you go in China town there are these little Asian ladies that stop you and are like "You want purses?" and if you say yes they lead you to where they are selling these purses. Monica is an old pro at this so she knew what to do. The first lady she talked to leads us to a van parked on the side of the street and Monica pushes Allison and Tara and I into this van!! The van was full of fake designer purses and this lady was like pushing them at us trying to get us to buy some!! It was seriously crazy!! Then the next lady takes us into this office building and into a room that said "Attorney at Law" on the door to throw off the police. So in this office they have all these purses and there are all these women buying these designer knock offs. It was seriously the weirdest experience. And these Asian ladies are so worried that they are going to get caught cuz it is totally illegal. These purses are like the best knock offs I've ever seen. But what's funny is that if the cops wanted to bust these people it would be totally easy because they are everywhere in China Town. It was seriously an experience to remember!
-After China town we went to Ground Zero and saw the WTC site. They've rebuilt a lot of the surrounding building but they are still working on getting the building up that will replace the two towers. It's really sad to go and look at all the destruction that took place. There was this funny guy there that was telling the story of 9/11 and had all these pictures and he had a bucket around his neck that you could put money in. There were also street vendors that were selling books that told the story. It was sad to see all these people making money off of such a tragedy. It's like you want to hear the story but you don't want people to be profiting off of it.
-We all went to this awesome yogurt place called Pink Berry after ground zero. They have delicious yogurt! It's kind of like Yoasis for those of you back in Provo but a little bit better.
-That night I went and saw Legally Blonde: The Musical and it was sooo cute! The music is really fun and happy and the dancing is great. I would definitely recommend it to anyone!
-After the play Allison and I went to the Carnegie Deli and got cheesecake! Sooo yummy!!
Sunday:
-Just church and relaxation after a long week!
Monday, May 5, 2008
The Fun Continues...
Ok so I guess the last time I wrote was last Thursday so let me update you all on what I've been doing since then...
Friday I went to work of course. It was kind of a boring day. The only interesting thing I did was help one of the producers get some of his b-roll for a segment he's working on. He's doing a segment on like the health of your teeth or something and he needed shots of someone using this Crest mouthwash. So watch the today show for a story on mouthwash and you might see my hand pouring the mouthwash and then my mouth swishing it around.
That night I went to the Museum of Modern Art which I highly recommend to anyone who visits the city! It is seriously awesome!! And the best part is that every Friday from 4pm-8pm the admission is free!! The place is seriously huge. There are six floors full of amazing artwork. I barely saw three floors in 2 hours. A lot of the stuff is a little bit weird but the permanent collections include tons of Andy Warhol, Monet, van Gogh, Picasso, Matisse, Pollack, and about a million others. "Starry Night" is just sitting there on the wall with hardly any protection and you can take as many pictures of it as you want. I seriously stood there staring at it for a good five minutes because it is soooo gorgeous in person. The prints just do not do van Gogh justice. I seriously could not talk enough about this museum. I just have to say do not miss out on it if you ever get to visit New York.
After the museum, my friend Sarah and I went to the very famous Carnegie Deli for dinner. It's just a few blocks away from the museum on 7th ave. We had sandwiches the size of our heads that were so delicious. And for dessert...the best cheesecake of my life!! Like seriously, the stuff was incredible!! It would be impossible to describe. Just come to NYC and try it for yourself...you won't regret it.
Saturday I slept in late and then it the grocery store to get a few snacks for my room. Then that night Sarah and I went and saw Mama Mia and loved it! We got standing room tickets for $21.50. I know standing room sounds pretty sucky but it really was not bad at all. I wouldn't recommend doing it for a lot of shows but it was great for Mama Mia. The bottom level of the theater only has 21 rows and you stand right behind the last row. We were dead center and they have this bar thing that you can lean on the whole time. Plus, you are paying attention to the show so much that you don't think about your sore legs. The price could not be beat -- the cheapest normal seats for the show are about $67! So we saved a ton of money and saw a really awesome show!
Sunday was pretty typical. Church wasn't until one so I got to sleep in. We would normally go to church in the Manhattan temple building but it's under construction right now so we're going to a building on the upper east side. It's a little tricky to get to but it seems like it will be a pretty good ward.
Today I went back to work after a very nice weekend. I went in early to escort a guest from her hotel to the green room. I was supposed to be able to stay on set but they didn't end up needing my help so I hung out at the front desk and watched the show from there. My internship coordinator later told me I should have pushed to stay on set but I didn't realize I could do that. I felt a little stupid after she told me that and it kind of ruined my morning. I guess I'm going to have to learn to be pushy if I'm going to make it in this business. I think she was kind of disappointed in me for not being more aggressive. I was also bummed out that I didn't stay on set because right after I went back up to the office Cameron Diaz and Ashton Kutcher were on the show!! I totally could have seen them!! And then later Christina Ricci and Emile Hirsch were on the set as well. But I did get to see Matt Lauer! He came into the office and walked right by the front desk a couple of times so that was actually kind of cool. I also found out today that I'm going to be helping out with the Ambush Makeover segment that they do every Friday, which should be really fun, and...I'm scheduled to help with the Fergie concert!!! I'm soooo excited for that!! That was the concert that I really wanted to work on!! So that was basically the highlight of my day. I was on front desk duty all day so nothing too exciting happened. Hopefully things will get more interesting this week. Peace out ya'll!!
Friday I went to work of course. It was kind of a boring day. The only interesting thing I did was help one of the producers get some of his b-roll for a segment he's working on. He's doing a segment on like the health of your teeth or something and he needed shots of someone using this Crest mouthwash. So watch the today show for a story on mouthwash and you might see my hand pouring the mouthwash and then my mouth swishing it around.
That night I went to the Museum of Modern Art which I highly recommend to anyone who visits the city! It is seriously awesome!! And the best part is that every Friday from 4pm-8pm the admission is free!! The place is seriously huge. There are six floors full of amazing artwork. I barely saw three floors in 2 hours. A lot of the stuff is a little bit weird but the permanent collections include tons of Andy Warhol, Monet, van Gogh, Picasso, Matisse, Pollack, and about a million others. "Starry Night" is just sitting there on the wall with hardly any protection and you can take as many pictures of it as you want. I seriously stood there staring at it for a good five minutes because it is soooo gorgeous in person. The prints just do not do van Gogh justice. I seriously could not talk enough about this museum. I just have to say do not miss out on it if you ever get to visit New York.
After the museum, my friend Sarah and I went to the very famous Carnegie Deli for dinner. It's just a few blocks away from the museum on 7th ave. We had sandwiches the size of our heads that were so delicious. And for dessert...the best cheesecake of my life!! Like seriously, the stuff was incredible!! It would be impossible to describe. Just come to NYC and try it for yourself...you won't regret it.
Saturday I slept in late and then it the grocery store to get a few snacks for my room. Then that night Sarah and I went and saw Mama Mia and loved it! We got standing room tickets for $21.50. I know standing room sounds pretty sucky but it really was not bad at all. I wouldn't recommend doing it for a lot of shows but it was great for Mama Mia. The bottom level of the theater only has 21 rows and you stand right behind the last row. We were dead center and they have this bar thing that you can lean on the whole time. Plus, you are paying attention to the show so much that you don't think about your sore legs. The price could not be beat -- the cheapest normal seats for the show are about $67! So we saved a ton of money and saw a really awesome show!
Sunday was pretty typical. Church wasn't until one so I got to sleep in. We would normally go to church in the Manhattan temple building but it's under construction right now so we're going to a building on the upper east side. It's a little tricky to get to but it seems like it will be a pretty good ward.
Today I went back to work after a very nice weekend. I went in early to escort a guest from her hotel to the green room. I was supposed to be able to stay on set but they didn't end up needing my help so I hung out at the front desk and watched the show from there. My internship coordinator later told me I should have pushed to stay on set but I didn't realize I could do that. I felt a little stupid after she told me that and it kind of ruined my morning. I guess I'm going to have to learn to be pushy if I'm going to make it in this business. I think she was kind of disappointed in me for not being more aggressive. I was also bummed out that I didn't stay on set because right after I went back up to the office Cameron Diaz and Ashton Kutcher were on the show!! I totally could have seen them!! And then later Christina Ricci and Emile Hirsch were on the set as well. But I did get to see Matt Lauer! He came into the office and walked right by the front desk a couple of times so that was actually kind of cool. I also found out today that I'm going to be helping out with the Ambush Makeover segment that they do every Friday, which should be really fun, and...I'm scheduled to help with the Fergie concert!!! I'm soooo excited for that!! That was the concert that I really wanted to work on!! So that was basically the highlight of my day. I was on front desk duty all day so nothing too exciting happened. Hopefully things will get more interesting this week. Peace out ya'll!!
Thursday, May 1, 2008
I've only taken and couple of pictures so far and here they are! This is 30 Rock -- the building where I work! Pretty sweet looking isn't it?!? I'm going to try and take some pics inside tomorrow and get some of I-house so you can all see how pretty it is! The picture underneath is the ice skating rink! During the summer they turn it into a restaurant. If you are standing in front of 30 Rock you just turn around the the ice rink is right below you. It's pretty cool getting to work in one of the cities most famous landmarks. Just wish I could be here are Christmas and see the gigantic Christmas tree!
That final picture is me out in front of Cafe Lalo -- the one from You've Got Mail! I just realized you can't really recognize the cafe from this picture so I might have to go back and take a picture of the whole front of the restaurant but if you look closely those picture that are hanging right behind the gate next to me are of the movie! It was just the cutest cafe. It's on 83rd street between Amsterdam and Broadway and super easy to find. 
The Big Apple
So I'm finally sitting down to tell you all about my adventures over the past couple of days. I flew to New York on Monday night at 11:45 pm. I had the nasty red eye flight but luckily JetBlue gave us free flight vouchers so it didn't cost me anything! I got into New York at 5:45 am. Then I met up with the other BYU interns that had been on my flight and we all took a shuttle together to our apartment complex. We are staying at the International House at Columbia University. It is this really awesome kind of dorm thing were Columbia graduate students from all over the world come to live. It's in this really old building that has been here forever. It's on the Upper West Side of Manhattan right next to Riverside Park and just a couple of streets over from the Hudson River. It really is an awesome location and the subway is about 2 minutes away from our building.
So anyway after that nice tangent...it took forever to get to our building on the first day because the traffic was so horrible but we did eventually get there. Once we got to the building we checked in and got set up with our rooms. I'm on the eighth floor of the building and my room is pretty much the size of a closet. I'm getting used to it thought and I guess it really isn't that bad. I'll have to post some pictures of it. The view is actually kind of neat and it does have a bed and a dresser and a desk. So after I put my stuff away I had breakfast in the cafeteria and met some of the other kids from BYU. Then we had an orientation meeting to learn all about I-House. After the meeting was over I was pretty much dead tired so I took a little nap and then got ready for some afternoon activities. Our faculty adviser had planned a scavenger hunt so we all met to get ready for that. Before the activity a couple of the kids and I went over to the subway to get our monthly passes. It's $81 for a month long, unlimited use pass. It's probably the best $81 I've ever spent because the subway is pretty much amazing -- I think it will take me a while to get used to driving again in Utah.
Ok, so then we got into groups of three for the scavenger hunt. I got with these two awesome girls named Allison and Monica. We decided that we didn't really want to do the scavenger hunt so we just went and explored for a while in the city. We headed downtown and found my internship which is with the Today Show. The office is in the GE building at 30 Rockefeller Center which is pretty much amazing!!! After we found that building we just kind of wandered around the city and explored for a while. It was a really good way to kind of learn our way around the New York grid system. We even got library cards at the New York Public Library -- which is pretty much the sweetest library ever. It is soooo gorgeous inside. We also tracked down Monica's internship spot which is in the oh so cool fashion district of NYC with all kinds of awesome shopping. After that we found a K Mart and got a few things for our rooms - including towels that actually cover your body and fitted sheets for our beds. Then we had dinner at this cute little sandwich place called Cosi. After that we just came back to our building and hit the sack and got ready for our first day of work!! yay!!
So my first day of work didn't really go as planned. I left 4o minutes before work thinking I would have no problem getting there. But of course I got completely lost like I always do and ended up being 30 minutes late for work. The story is almost to painful to retell but I basically got off the subway way too early and then I couldn't figure out which way was east, west, north or south. I got completely turned around and found the place when I finally asked for directions. Then once I got checked in at the security desk I got lost again because I didn't know which elevators to take. I finally got up to the office at about 10:30. And of course I was practically in tears! It didn't help that my eyes were watery from allergies and the sun and I was so upset that I had gotten lost. I felt so unprofessional because I was half crying and I was soooo late. But in the end it turned out all right.
From there the internship coordinator took Mallory and I around the office and introduced us to people and just kind of got us familiarized with the place (Mallory is the other BYU intern at the Today Show). We did a lot of arbitrary paperwork and talking to people in the morning before lunch. We had lunch at a cute salad place that is in the food court underneath the building. A good tip actually if you ever visit the city and need a place to eat -- if you just go to the concourse level of Rockefeller Center there are TONS of good restaurants that are pretty reasonably priced -- meaning like $9 for sandwich. After lunch we went back up to the office. My job for the rest of the afternoon was to sit at the front desk and answer the phones. I would forward people to whomever they needed to talk to or talk to the viewers that called in with story ideas or comments about the show and then send them to the appropriate place. The phone calls you get are pretty funny sometimes so it was a fun afternoon. I also got trained on how to do a couple of other things by some of the other interns.
I just have to say it is going to be so cool working for the Today Show. Everyone is really nice and I'm going to get to meet lots of amazing people. Matt Lauer and Meredith Vieira's offices are right in our area. They are both out of town so I haven't seen them yet but I have seen their offices! Haha...exciting I know! The executive office suite is on our floor too so the President and Vice President of NBC have their offices right by our front desk. I did see the Vice President today and I saw the back of Brian Williams while he was talking to someone in the hall!
Anyway -- I got off at 5 and then decided to do a little exploring around the city. I knew there was a subway I could take on 59th street right by Central Park so I decided to walk down 5th avenue and look at all the amazing shops. For dinner I ate a hot dog at the park and I saw some sweet break dancers that were doing show on the corner by the Plaza. I got home around 7 and just kind of hung out in my room the rest of the night because I was sooo tired. But it was a good first day of work!
Today was my second day of work and it was a really good one too. I of course got lost again and was a few minutes late but nothing like yesterday! Thank goodness! Luckily after work today I found the best fool-proof route for getting to work that I'm planning on taking tomorrow. Anywho -- when I got in this morning my first job was to learn how to dub tapes which is something the interns do a lot. The basic idea is that producers often want copies of their segments that air on the show either for themselves or for one of their guests. It's the interns job to get the tapes of the show from the tape library and then make DVD's of the segments that the producers want. Today I was also in charge of filing everyone's mail in the mail room and I also learned how to log tape. It was a pretty basic day but I was able to get the hang of jobs that I'll be doing on a regular basis while I'm here. Oh the one highlight of the day was that our internship supervisor took Mallory and I on a tour of the Today show studio. We got to go on the set and we even saw Kathie Lee Gifford live on the set! I didn't get very close to her though because they were actually on the air when we went on the set. The set is a lot smaller than you expect it too be which is usually the case for any news set -- but it was really neat to get to see all the behind the scenes stuff.
After work I headed back to I-House. Then I met up with another one of the BYU interns named Sarah, who is on the same floor as me at I-House. Neither of use know very many of the kids that are here so we decided to go out to dinner together. Sarah had found the address of Cafe Lalo, which is the cafe in You've Got Mail that Meg Ryan and Tom Hanks meet up at for the first time -- you know the part where she sits with Pride and Prejudice and a red rose and then he sees who she is and acts like a real jerk to her? Yeah that's where we had dinner...pretty cool, huh? It was a tad pricey - about $20 for dinner and dessert -- but I guess that's cheap by New York standards. I had this Morrocan egg dish thing that was kind of interesting. It was different than I expected it to be and I'll have to say I was a little disappointed -- it was still good but it didn't really fulfill my taste buds the way I wanted it too. I did have a really yummy piece of cake for dessert though -- it was white cake with a creamy filling and topped with all different kinds of fruit. If I ever went back I would probably stick with just dessert which seems to be their specialty. After dinner we just came back to I-house. It was a pretty full day and I am totally exhausted and ready for bed. Tomorrow I have work again from 9-5 and then all the BYU kids are meeting up to go to the MOMA (museum of modern art) -- which I am sooo excited about. It should be really fun. Saturday I'm hoping to hit up Canal street to buy some fake designer purses and then maybe catch a Broadway show. You can get special student tickets for about $20 to tons of the really popular shows so I'm planning on taking advantage of that! That's it for today! I'll try and update this again tomorrow or Saturday! I hope you aren't too bored reading about my stay so far in New York. I know I haven't done anything too exciting yet but I know I will eventually!
So anyway after that nice tangent...it took forever to get to our building on the first day because the traffic was so horrible but we did eventually get there. Once we got to the building we checked in and got set up with our rooms. I'm on the eighth floor of the building and my room is pretty much the size of a closet. I'm getting used to it thought and I guess it really isn't that bad. I'll have to post some pictures of it. The view is actually kind of neat and it does have a bed and a dresser and a desk. So after I put my stuff away I had breakfast in the cafeteria and met some of the other kids from BYU. Then we had an orientation meeting to learn all about I-House. After the meeting was over I was pretty much dead tired so I took a little nap and then got ready for some afternoon activities. Our faculty adviser had planned a scavenger hunt so we all met to get ready for that. Before the activity a couple of the kids and I went over to the subway to get our monthly passes. It's $81 for a month long, unlimited use pass. It's probably the best $81 I've ever spent because the subway is pretty much amazing -- I think it will take me a while to get used to driving again in Utah.
Ok, so then we got into groups of three for the scavenger hunt. I got with these two awesome girls named Allison and Monica. We decided that we didn't really want to do the scavenger hunt so we just went and explored for a while in the city. We headed downtown and found my internship which is with the Today Show. The office is in the GE building at 30 Rockefeller Center which is pretty much amazing!!! After we found that building we just kind of wandered around the city and explored for a while. It was a really good way to kind of learn our way around the New York grid system. We even got library cards at the New York Public Library -- which is pretty much the sweetest library ever. It is soooo gorgeous inside. We also tracked down Monica's internship spot which is in the oh so cool fashion district of NYC with all kinds of awesome shopping. After that we found a K Mart and got a few things for our rooms - including towels that actually cover your body and fitted sheets for our beds. Then we had dinner at this cute little sandwich place called Cosi. After that we just came back to our building and hit the sack and got ready for our first day of work!! yay!!
So my first day of work didn't really go as planned. I left 4o minutes before work thinking I would have no problem getting there. But of course I got completely lost like I always do and ended up being 30 minutes late for work. The story is almost to painful to retell but I basically got off the subway way too early and then I couldn't figure out which way was east, west, north or south. I got completely turned around and found the place when I finally asked for directions. Then once I got checked in at the security desk I got lost again because I didn't know which elevators to take. I finally got up to the office at about 10:30. And of course I was practically in tears! It didn't help that my eyes were watery from allergies and the sun and I was so upset that I had gotten lost. I felt so unprofessional because I was half crying and I was soooo late. But in the end it turned out all right.
From there the internship coordinator took Mallory and I around the office and introduced us to people and just kind of got us familiarized with the place (Mallory is the other BYU intern at the Today Show). We did a lot of arbitrary paperwork and talking to people in the morning before lunch. We had lunch at a cute salad place that is in the food court underneath the building. A good tip actually if you ever visit the city and need a place to eat -- if you just go to the concourse level of Rockefeller Center there are TONS of good restaurants that are pretty reasonably priced -- meaning like $9 for sandwich. After lunch we went back up to the office. My job for the rest of the afternoon was to sit at the front desk and answer the phones. I would forward people to whomever they needed to talk to or talk to the viewers that called in with story ideas or comments about the show and then send them to the appropriate place. The phone calls you get are pretty funny sometimes so it was a fun afternoon. I also got trained on how to do a couple of other things by some of the other interns.
I just have to say it is going to be so cool working for the Today Show. Everyone is really nice and I'm going to get to meet lots of amazing people. Matt Lauer and Meredith Vieira's offices are right in our area. They are both out of town so I haven't seen them yet but I have seen their offices! Haha...exciting I know! The executive office suite is on our floor too so the President and Vice President of NBC have their offices right by our front desk. I did see the Vice President today and I saw the back of Brian Williams while he was talking to someone in the hall!
Anyway -- I got off at 5 and then decided to do a little exploring around the city. I knew there was a subway I could take on 59th street right by Central Park so I decided to walk down 5th avenue and look at all the amazing shops. For dinner I ate a hot dog at the park and I saw some sweet break dancers that were doing show on the corner by the Plaza. I got home around 7 and just kind of hung out in my room the rest of the night because I was sooo tired. But it was a good first day of work!
Today was my second day of work and it was a really good one too. I of course got lost again and was a few minutes late but nothing like yesterday! Thank goodness! Luckily after work today I found the best fool-proof route for getting to work that I'm planning on taking tomorrow. Anywho -- when I got in this morning my first job was to learn how to dub tapes which is something the interns do a lot. The basic idea is that producers often want copies of their segments that air on the show either for themselves or for one of their guests. It's the interns job to get the tapes of the show from the tape library and then make DVD's of the segments that the producers want. Today I was also in charge of filing everyone's mail in the mail room and I also learned how to log tape. It was a pretty basic day but I was able to get the hang of jobs that I'll be doing on a regular basis while I'm here. Oh the one highlight of the day was that our internship supervisor took Mallory and I on a tour of the Today show studio. We got to go on the set and we even saw Kathie Lee Gifford live on the set! I didn't get very close to her though because they were actually on the air when we went on the set. The set is a lot smaller than you expect it too be which is usually the case for any news set -- but it was really neat to get to see all the behind the scenes stuff.
After work I headed back to I-House. Then I met up with another one of the BYU interns named Sarah, who is on the same floor as me at I-House. Neither of use know very many of the kids that are here so we decided to go out to dinner together. Sarah had found the address of Cafe Lalo, which is the cafe in You've Got Mail that Meg Ryan and Tom Hanks meet up at for the first time -- you know the part where she sits with Pride and Prejudice and a red rose and then he sees who she is and acts like a real jerk to her? Yeah that's where we had dinner...pretty cool, huh? It was a tad pricey - about $20 for dinner and dessert -- but I guess that's cheap by New York standards. I had this Morrocan egg dish thing that was kind of interesting. It was different than I expected it to be and I'll have to say I was a little disappointed -- it was still good but it didn't really fulfill my taste buds the way I wanted it too. I did have a really yummy piece of cake for dessert though -- it was white cake with a creamy filling and topped with all different kinds of fruit. If I ever went back I would probably stick with just dessert which seems to be their specialty. After dinner we just came back to I-house. It was a pretty full day and I am totally exhausted and ready for bed. Tomorrow I have work again from 9-5 and then all the BYU kids are meeting up to go to the MOMA (museum of modern art) -- which I am sooo excited about. It should be really fun. Saturday I'm hoping to hit up Canal street to buy some fake designer purses and then maybe catch a Broadway show. You can get special student tickets for about $20 to tons of the really popular shows so I'm planning on taking advantage of that! That's it for today! I'll try and update this again tomorrow or Saturday! I hope you aren't too bored reading about my stay so far in New York. I know I haven't done anything too exciting yet but I know I will eventually!
Saturday, April 26, 2008
New York City
Hey everyone!! So I've decided to join the masses and start blogging. For the next seven weeks this will be the place for my friends and family to read about my internship and experiences in New York City. I will try to update this page as much as possible and include lots of photos!! I leave for New York on Monday night at 11:45 p.m. Gotta love red eye flights! I get back to Provo on June 18th. For anyone that doesn't know I will be interning with the Today Show. I'm not sure what I'll be doing yet I'll find out soon. But anyway I hope you all enjoy reading this blog and looking at my photos. I'll hopefully have time to update it every couple of days so you can all see what I'm up to. See you all in seven weeks!
Monday, April 7, 2008
Comms 301 Oral History Interview
Communications 301 Oral History Project
Interview with Conley Thatcher
Date of Interview: April 3, 2008
*The interview was conducted by phone. The interviewer was in
Interviewer: Kaitlyn Thatcher
Transcriber: Kaitlyn Thatcher
Begin MP3 file titled Dad’s Interview Part One
*Transcribing ends on that file at 26:31
Kaitlyn: What is your earliest memory of using the mass media…like newspapers, radio, or television?
Conley: My earliest…mass media…newspapers and radio.
Kaitlyn: What do you remember about them?
Conley: We got the daily newspaper everyday and my parents read it and all the kids even before we learned how to read, we looked at what we called the funny papers, which was the comic strips in the newspaper.
Kaitlyn: What was your favorite comic?
Conley: Oh quite a few of them I guess…Orphan Annie and the Cat’s Pajama Kids then when WWII came on it was Steve Canyon and Terry and the Pirates.
Kaitlyn: What newspaper did your family subscribe to?
Conley: It was the Salt Lake Tribune…we had two of them…and the Deseret News.
Kaitlyn: Did your parents talk about things that were happening?
Conley: There was no television so at the dinner table the talk was about what was in the news…the headlines.
Kaitlyn: So do you think you were pretty aware of world events and national events?
Conley: Yep…yep. It was talked about all the time in my family. And we used to listen to the radio, they had news on the radio. I can’t remember how far back…Lowell Thomas was one of the newscasters we would listen to all the time.
Kaitlyn: Did you have any radio shows you would listen to besides the news?
Conley: Oh yeah after school all the kids shows…Captain Midnight and Tom Mix and Little Orphan Annie…that’s some that I remember.
Kaitlyn: Didn’t you tell me that you used to listen to opera on the radio?
Conley: When I was in high school I listened to the Metropolitan Opera broadcast every Saturday morning during the opera season…I was listening to the opera while I was doing chores.
Kaitlyn: What was your first memory of radio…do you remember when your family first got a radio?
Conley: Going way back I remember listening to President Roosevelt and his fireside chats.
Kaitlyn: What was that like…was it a really weird thing to hear the President on the radio?
Conley: Oh yeah…I mean it was something very special in those days even though we were not Democrats. And there were special radio programs that everybody listened to. I think on Monday night it was the Lux Radio Theater and um…I can’t remember there were some other special ones that families listened to. Oh um, Jack Bennie and Faber Magee and Molly and The Great Gildersleeve, all these comedies. And there were some more…and I said we didn’t have television but everybody listened to the radio at night during the primetime hours.
Kaitlyn: Would the whole family get together and watch…like you and your sisters?
Conley: Yeah on Sunday night everybody would get together and listen to the Luxe Radio Theater…and what that was, they had radio broadcasts of the hit movies in the radio form.
Kaitlyn: Do you remember hearing War of the Worlds on the radio?
Conley: No I don’t but I remember the effect of it that it had…but I don’t remember us listening to it.
Kaitlyn: What kind of effect did it have?
Conley: Oh it was kind of a sensational thing that people actually for a long time thought that there was a real invasion until it finally got through that it was just a radio drama. That program was on…I think it was called the Mercury Theater and I don’t think we listened to that all the time. We didn’t have too many radio stations.
Kaitlyn: Was it just 3 or 4 radio stations?
Conley: In
Kaitlyn: And you said you got the Salt Lake Tribune and the Deseret News, was that when you were living in
Conley: Yes. One of them was a morning paper and the other was the afternoon.
Kaitlyn: So they didn’t have any newspapers in
Conley: There was an
Kaitlyn: Did they cover world events and national events?
Conley: Oh yeah absolutely during the depression and the war…World War II…news in there everyday.
Kaitlyn: Do you think they did a pretty good job of covering the depression?
Conley: I didn’t have anything to judge it by but people placed pretty much reliance on the newspapers in those days that you could pretty much believe what you read.
Kaitlyn: Do you remember hearing about
Conley: Oh I mean I remember exactly where I was when it was announced on the radio.
Kaitlyn: Tell me about it.
Conley: Ok, we were over eating Sunday dinner at my Aunt and Uncle’s house, my Uncle Harris and Aunt Mable in Teton,
Kaitlyn: What was the talk after you found out, like around the dinner table?
Conley: Oh well initially people were saying we’ll take care of them in a few weeks…they don’t know what they’re asking for. It didn’t dawn on people how serious
Kaitlyn: After it happened were ya’ll kind of glued to the radio trying to find out…
Conley: Oh yup, yup. Everybody was…I can still remember everybody sitting around listening to that and how shocked everybody was.
Kaitlyn: Did they keep updating as new information came in?
Conley: Oh from then on for the whole war the news of the war was the main item of interest in the papers and what was on the radio and then all the movies…I mean everybody would go to the movies on Friday night and they always had news reels and that’s where you got the actual video of the war news.
Kaitlyn: Lets go back a little bit to the depression…you said they covered the depression a lot in the newspapers…I remember you telling me a long time ago that the depression didn’t really hit Idaho as hard…like you guys didn’t get affected quite as much as some people…what was that like in the news coverage of the depression?
Conley: Well our family…our town was affected because there were people who were out of work but my dad…we had a farm and my dad was a school teacher so he had a job and um because we had a farm and a big yard we raised a lot of our own food. So it didn’t really affect that much, and in those days people didn’t have the standard of living we do today, so people never had a closet full of clothes and that kind of stuff, so if you had a pair of shoes and two pairs of pants and three shirts you had all you needed. So you know the main news was how the places were hit hard like back in the east and towns where people worked in factories…automobile factories and stuff like that. But there were some people in our town that were out of work. The government had the WPA,which is the Works Progress Administration…that was intended to give people jobs that didn’t have jobs so they hired people that were out of work and they put in a new water system in our town…the WPA…so they dug all the trenches in all the streets in town and put in the new water pipes…so that was the WPA project.
Kaitlyn: …do you remember that coverage of when Hitler was staring to get big?
Conley: Oh absolutely…the war in Europe…Hitler and the rise of the war in Europe was in the newspaper and on the radio everyday and my parents and my grandparents and my aunts and uncles that was all they talked about. When you got together as a family there was no watching television, they would sit around and talk about politics and world events or major league baseball.
Kaitlyn: What teams were you talking about in
Conley: In
Kaitlyn: So it was pretty necessary then to keep up on the news or you wouldn’t really have anything to talk about?
Conley: Yup, yup. I think people were in general were a lot more aware of world and local events than they are today.
Kaitlyn: Do you think that’s kind of sad, seeing as we have a lot more access to news now?
Conley: Yup, yup it is.
Kaitlyn: Do you think that the state of the media has gone down a lot, like the quality and the trustworthiness I guess?
Conley: In my opinion it has in my adult life. The newspapers…uh…well…I think some stuff. World news and stuff like that I think the coverage has become more selective and biased. The quality of the papers in sports and entertainment and stuff like that, I think that is still good. But newspapers were always somewhat biased cuz up in
Kaitlyn: Was it owned by the church back then?
Conley: Oh yeah the Deseret News has always been but the Salt Lake Tribune was not owned by Mormons. Going back in church history before my time it was anti-Mormon…solidly anti-Mormon, it was always fomenting anti-Mormon feelings.
Kaitlyn: Was it not like that anymore when you were older when your family was reading it?
Conley: Not as much but on any issues that somebody would take sides…they always took sides against the church.
Kaitlyn: I had one more question about radio for you…do you remember what kind of radio you had, like what it looked like?
Conley: Yeah most people had a big console radio in their living room…I think ours was a…oh I can’t remember for sure…it might have been a Filco or a Zeneth…it was a fancy cabinet with some fairly big speakers. And then when I was in high school I had a small shelf type radio in my room. When I was doing homework at night I used listen to this radio station, KNX, from
Kaitlyn: You could get that in
Conley: You could get KNX at night up in
Kaitlyn: What year would that have been when you were in high school?
Conley: That was 1943 through 1947.
Kaitlyn: Was Edward Murrow on the radio then?
Conley: Oh yeah he was on the radio all during the war.
Kaitlyn: So do you remember listening to him?
Conley: Oh yeah he was very famous…Edward R. Murrow and Lowell Thomas and there was probably some others…Cameron Swayze.
Kaitlyn: Getting more into television…do you remember watching those really famous anchors?
Conley: Walter Cronkite and Chet Huntley and David Brinkley…yeah… I used to watch them and admire them and so on until I finally figured out how liberal they were. And Walter Cronkite was concentrated a lot on the early days of the Space Program so we watched him and he was very good at that but later on my opinion on him changed that he was mainly a talker and there wasn’t as much there as he tried to put on…and I quit listening to Chet Huntly and David Brinkley long before they went off the air cuz I figured they were just totally biased.
Kaitlyn: Do you remember when you first got a TV?
Conley: Well, um after the war I went to college for two years and then went on a mission and there was no TV in Canada then and TV was coming in so I never saw a television set until I got home from my mission in 1951. And then I went off to the Air Force for four years and people that I knew at church had TV’s and we had a television in our day room on the Air Force base but I didn’t like any of the programs. So I never seriously sat down to watch television until 1955 when I got out of the Air Force…and we bought a television set in our house that we rented for my roommates and I. So that’s when I first started watching. So a lot of the early TV programs that people from the early days of TV remember, like Sid Caesar and Ed Sullivan and the puppets, Fran and Ollie…I never saw any of those programs. So when I finally got a TV and was able to watch it all the time it was the Westerns and the Sunday night programs, What’s My Line and Wonderful World of Disney and then of course the news in those days everybody of course watched the major network news and Ed Sullivan and the variety program and what was the other guy…oh man I can’t remember…that had the variety program on in competition with Ed Sullivan…
Kaitlyn: American Bandstand?
Conley: No, I never watched American Bandstand.
Kaitlyn: You didn’t?! You don’t remember seeing the Beatles or was that Ed Sullivan?
Conley: That’s the 60’s…that’s when your older sisters and brother were growing up…yeah the Beatles were on Ed Sullivan all the time…I couldn’t stand the Beatles.
Kaitlyn: Do you remember when you guys had your TV in college, would you all gather around on Sunday nights?
Conley: Yeah we watched Gunsmoke, and Maverick, and Trackdown, and Wanted Dead or Alive…there was all kinds of westerns on. Just like the cop shows today they had all the westerns. And there were the situation comedies but I didn’t watch any of those so I can’t comment too much about that…I Love Lucy and the Honeymooners.
Kaitlyn: Did you watch I Love Lucy?
Conley: Oh a little bit…I didn’t like it much. But the comedy shows that were on in the early days…we liked Bob Hope and Jack Benny and Faber McGee and Molly were on. Let’s see what were some of the…Jackie Cooper had a sitcom on…and that’s the ones that stand out in my mind, I’m sure there were some others. Then in the 60’s the one that, the family one that everybody liked was Andy Griffith Show.
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