Brian.Indrelunas.com

K Club members, rejoice...

2008-11-14T19:31:00.003-07:00

The Office proves it: Peeps who do pushies get the ladies.

George W. Bush throws up a pitchfork;Brian gets a little more Internet-famous

2008-11-14T12:16:00.005-07:00

In case you haven't heard, President Bush hosted the Sun Devils' national champion track and field and softball teams at the White House on Wednesday and threw up the ASU pitchfork in a photo op during the visit.

That's right; the President of the United States is showin' off a pitchfork on Day 2,854 of his presidency. (I say we should shoot for an Obama pitchfork photo-op by Day 200.)

But wait; it gets better.

Dashiell Bennett, associate editor of the sports blog Deadspin, commented on Bush's Sun Devil spirit (and the fact that the pitchfork closely resembles the shocker) on the blog this morning. And in so doing, he dug up a photo of yours truly showing his Sun Devil pride with a huge Sonic cup on rollerblades at the drive-in on Broadway Road.

So I'm pretty excited that I've got a new Internet claim to fame. Perhaps my newfound identity as "that guy throwing up a pitchfork with the Sonic cup" will soon eclipse my title of "that guy who made the 'ridicuously Methodist' facebook group" — at least in the U.S.

Internationally, I'd imagine I'll still be best known for my German modeling work:

I got to see Ben Folds play at Gammage!

2008-11-12T01:43:00.004-07:00

Ben Folds played the ASU Homecoming Concert tonight at Gammage Auditorium, and since Luke is pretty banged up and couldn't go to the show, I got to take his spot.

Now, I've gotta say, the show was really good, but it stopped short of life-changing, which is kinda what I as hoping for based on how much I love Ben Folds' music. Some would attribute that lack of life-changing-ness to the admittedly lackluster atmosphere of the crowd, but I blame the relative lack of bitches. See, Ben neglected to perform "Bitches Ain't Shit" and didn't even play "Rock This Bitch." Still, he did play the fake version of "Bitch Went Nuts," which was aptly titled "Bitch Went Nutz."

The story behind these fake songs, which made up a major portion of the "new shit" half of the concert, is that Ben and the band threw together a bunch of tracks with similar titles to those on his new album, "Way to Normal," and leaked them on the Internet ahead of the album's release date to give the kiddies on teh interwebs something other than the real songs to file-share. Turns out, the half-assed songs are pretty good. In fact, I like some of the fake versions better than their real counterparts. For instance, "Bitch Went Nuts" is quality, but "Bitch Went Nutz" just won't get unstuck from my head.

Bitches aside, though, it was really freakin' sweet to be able to see Ben Folds live. I had heard a Ben Folds Five song or two in high school, but I really started listening to Ben Folds stuff my freshman year of college, and as such, Ben Folds is an indispensible part of the hypothetical soundtrack to my college years. So needless to say, it was awesome to get to see the man in concert before those years officially end.

'Blah blah gay sex. Blah blah Congress.'

2008-11-10T22:37:00.004-07:00

I generally consider myself a reasonable, logical person, but occasionally I get the sense that some of my thoughts are either ahead of my time and/or completely crazy.

Sometimes I feel like Huey Freeman in the Christmas episode of The Boondocks when he tells his teacher, "My vision would turn your world upside down, tear asunder your illusions and send the sanctuary of your own ignorance crashing down around you."

If you haven't seen the episode, which is one of my personal favorites from the series, you can watch it below:

'For a day, at least, newspapers were cool again.'

2008-11-06T00:40:00.005-07:00

That's what Richard Pérez-Peña wrote for The New York Times, one of many American newspapers that ran extra copies of Wednesday's edition and had to print even more as the paper sold out at newsstands.

Since the Newseum's Today's Front Pages, which reported heavy traffic Wednesday, doesn't accept submissions from college newspapers, here's what Wednesday's State Press front page looked like:

The election's over,but I still can't get this song out of my head

2008-11-06T00:25:00.001-07:00

What a supremely memorable day

2008-11-05T05:15:00.005-07:00

I started out Election Day still awake from the night before, aiming to vote early and quickly at 6 a.m. Unfortunately, since I wasn't the only one with that idea and a poll official for my precinct overslept, I instead embarked on a two-hour voting odyssey.

After I had voted, I went and picked up a copy of Tuesday's State Press, which sported the paper's look from 1958 since we were marking the 50th anniversary of a '58 vote that changed the name of what was then Arizona State College to ASU. I think the front looks so incredibly cool, and apparently it was much talked about on campus today as well.

Interestingly, the Arizona Daily Wildcat also marked the anniversary with a story that took a dramatically different tack than ours.

But of course, the election provided most of the day's memorable experiences — overseeing a newsroom's election coverage, taking some shifts manning a breaking-news Twitter feed and watching the election of the nation's first black president.

The moment itself was so much earlier than I expected. Just before 9 p.m., we had the sound up on the middle of our three newsroom TVs, which was tuned to the live election broadcast from Cronkite NewsWatch. Gov. Janet Napolitano was talking to a NewsWatch reporter from the Democratic watch party in Phoenix when, all of a sudden, the crowd behind her erupted into cheers. A split second later, I saw on the TV to the right that CNN had called the race for Obama. After another second or two, on the TV on the right, ABC put up a full-frame picture of Obama and labeled him "president-elect." A quick check of other channels revealed that the projection had been made at roughly the same time on all major television network.

I was not only surprised that the projection came so early but also that it came so simultaneously.

Also exciting and surprising was getting word that our reporters and columnists made it out to the lawn at the Arizona Biltmore and would see John McCain's concession speech in person. (The campaign had planned to let only a limited number of media folks into the area, and in fact our photographer was barred from moving outside where McCain gave his speech.)

Speaking of The State Press' election coverage, we missed deadlines and spent too long putting Wednesday's paper together, but despite the lateness, I'm incredibly proud of the product we're putting out. The photos and design are appealing, and the stories from our reporters who were out in the field tonight are really compelling.

So if you'll be on an ASU campus Wednesday, pick up The State Press in print, and also check out our coverage on asuwebdevil.com, which is looking great this morning:

OK, so kids have fun at Halloween too...

2008-11-02T23:25:00.000-07:00

Remember "Sparky" from the 2005 season's Sun Devil Fan Stories?

Halloween is so much more fun for grown-ups

2008-11-01T03:40:00.004-07:00

This year for Halloween, I was ASU senior quarterback Rudy Carpenter at his worst, complete with a boot on my "sprained" left ankle and mud and grass stains on my arms and legs. I also added in some essentials like his pushed-up hairdo and wrist tattoos.

And toward the end of the night, before I ditched my costume I staged a re-enactment of a ridiculously good (and ridiculously depressing) photo that Arizona Republic photographer Rob Schumacher caught during last week's loss to Oregon:

You know, I've often derided Carpenter's seemingly baseless optimism even if the face of a five-game losing streak — comments like, "We have a chance to still accomplish all the things we want to." But maybe Rudy's right and all our wildest dreams can come true. Let's hope that's as much the case in Corvallis tomorrow as it was in Chandler tonight:

RIP Energy 92.7/1011

2008-10-31T17:00:00.001-07:00

'High School Musical. Who says we have to let it go?'

2008-10-25T01:59:00.003-07:00

I bet Disney execs are singing that title track from HSM3 to themselves, but if you ask me, the third movie was a nice ending to the series.

I don't think any sequel can ever top the original HSM, but HSM3 was certainly enjoyable. The plot was engaging enough, and even though the threequel was in theaters, thankfully it still retained much the series's Disney Channel Original Movie camp.

Phoenix is about to get a lot straighter

2008-10-24T21:50:00.002-07:00

Sad news I stumbled across tonight: KNRJ-FM (Energy 92.7)/Phoenix to Jettison Rhythmic CHR

Although it'll be sad to see Energy 92.7/101.1 go, I'm honestly surprised the dance format lasted in the desert as long as it did.

Almost forgot...

2008-10-24T01:40:00.001-07:00

We also met our print deadline tonight!

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Farewell, 22...

2008-10-24T01:31:00.002-07:00

I had a pretty sweet last full day as a 22-year-old, marked by...

some pajama-clad "Office" watching
a really enjoyable and productive meeting (aka my "date with Dean Callahan")
seeing seven people in the Downtown newsroom when there were only five in Tempe
getting a date story over to the Web Devil midday
making all sorts of lame jokes in Baby Budget

But now, I really need to get my on-the-cusp-of-23 self to bed so that I can get up bright and early for the first thing on my birthday agenda — The State Press editorial board's meeting with ASU President Michael Crow.

Taip mes galite — er, ¡Sí se puede!

2008-10-22T17:46:00.004-07:00

So I just got this e-mail invitation to ASU's Hispanic Convocation.

Should I go? I kinda want to.

If only Palin had actually performed this...

2008-10-19T02:26:00.002-07:00

Oh well. I guess there's always "Paper Palins."

This was a really quality Saturday

2008-10-12T02:40:00.003-07:00

Today was amazingly fulfilling since I managed to do so many fun, yet low-key and decidedly not work or school related, things.

After some morning errands, some peeps came over to watch the USC game at my place, aka the LA Memorial Coliseum East:

Let's be honest; that game sucked. Luckily, Jenn and Judith and myself were determined to have some fun this afternoon, so we started off by watching various Muppets singing "Chocolate Rain" and then making our own Sparky version.

Then, somewhere around halftime, we busted out my toy box and emptied all its wonderful goodies out all over my living-room floor. Soon, Jenn was gunning down those pesky flying squirrels from last fall:

And at some point in the awful second half, we came across the good ol' Knockers to Knockers card game from SSP '06, played the classic version and then added a whole deck's worth of new Wesley-related cards to the mix!

After the football carnage had ended, I got partially caught up on Grey's Anatomy down at my mom's house and then came back up to hang out with some Wesley peeps at Vista del Sol. There, we fooded, and some people volleyballed, but the key attraction on a night that has now (at 02:55) gotten down to 53° was putting our feet (and noses) in the hot tub:

After we had cooked our feet (literally) we were hankerin' for some ice cream, so a run to the Sexy Safeway was in order:

And to cap off the night, Jenn and I went and met up with Sam and Claudia at Casey Moore's and followed them to Amado's for some late-night Mexican food.

Take that, Cookie Monster!

2008-10-11T19:36:00.001-07:00

This is how goofy we got during USC's 28-0 shutout of the Sun Devils this afternoon:

Yessss!

2008-10-10T13:23:00.002-07:00

I was really sad last night when I found out that Michael Scott's favorite YouTube video wasn't real, but now it is!

(I think I still like Kermit singing "Chocolate Rain," and better yet, "Damn it Feels Good to Be a Gangsta" more, though.)

We did it!

2008-10-07T01:14:00.002-07:00

Tonight we successfully produced the first multiple-edition State Press. Tomorrow morning, the front page on the left will show up at the Tempe, Downtown Phoenix and Polytechnic campuses, while readers at the West campus will see the front page on the right (assuming that all goes well overnight at the printer and with our distributor).

I am so proud of our newsroom and production teams for bustin' it to make this happen tonight... and for getting everything done by midnight, only a half-hour past our print deadline. (Heck, we did worse on deadline last night, when we only had one edition to print.)

Damn, it feels good to be a gangster State Presser

2008-10-03T15:12:00.003-07:00

Even though we missed our print deadline last night, I knew today's State Press would be one that I was really proud of. If you haven't yet, pick up a copy or visit ASUWebDevil.com to check out our stories on flag football, friends remembering a student who was killed in a car crash, recycling programs, a study on music and mood, the upcoming ASU-Cal football game and, of course, the nine arrests made in the milk-vomit crash near University Bridge in Tempe.

Cops reporter Tessa Muggeridge's story is the first SP story to be picked up and rewritten by The Associated Press, and the AP version is making the rounds in Valley media outlets this afternoon. Our reporting, as redistributed by AP, is now showing up on:

eastvalleytribune.com

Does this mean Sarah Palin reads The State Press and SPM?

2008-10-01T17:25:00.003-07:00

Katie Couric: What newspapers and magazines did you regularly read before you were tapped [to be a VP candiadate]?
...
Sarah Palin: Um, all of 'em.

It was a good Double-D-Day...

2008-10-01T03:17:00.003-07:00

Today marked the first of what I've called "a series of shameless bribes to get people to hang out in our newsrooms more often," aka Downtown Donut Day.

The addition of two dozen Dunkin Donuts to Student Media's newsroom in Downtown Phoenix brought "more people than ever" to the new newsroom, in the words of Phil, one of our reporters.

Phil, who has been one of our Downtown stalwarts, said there were as many as five or six people in the Downtown newsroom at once today. That sounds like a mission accomplished, if you ask me. Heck, I'd like to see those numbers during daylight hours at our older newsroom in Tempe.

Anyway, many things did not go quite as planned today, and much of the day was frustrating for me... but at least Downtown Donut Day was a sugary success.

Check out this cool new dance I learned:

2008-10-01T01:09:00.001-07:00

Apparently Palin's been nicknamed Bible Spice...

2008-09-26T15:41:00.002-07:00

I'm gonna have to reserve judgment on the appropriateness of that name until I see some more dance moves from the VP hopeful, preferably a performance of "Spice Up Your Life." And if this JibJab video is any indication, I'd say she's got potential: