Life Of Jason

Last night at the Springfield Local Blogger’s Association awards (a.k.a. the Blogaronis) I was honored to have received five awards…Best Local Coverage, Best Special Event Coverage (for liveblogging of Springfield City Council meetings), Rookie Blog of the Year, Post of the Year (for “If I Had A Retard For A Kid…“) and Blog of the Year.

I cannot really describe how I felt last night.

You know I made that bet with Chris Brewer that I would get shut out at the awards last night. I did think I had a reasonable shot at Rookie Blog of the Year but outside of that I was the new guy. There was no way I could seriously expect to win many awards being the new kid on the block. I still have dues to pay. I still don’t feel like I’m on the level of some of the other local blogs around here that have been staples for years like Chatter by Ron Davis. The fact that so many of my fellow bloggers in Springfield voted for me in so many categories is humbling and I feel honored beyond words.

I want to thank:
God for the chance to do this.
My fiancee Amy for being so understanding about my not being available every other Monday night.
Springfield City Council, city staff, area groups and businesses for being so open to dealing with the “new media.”
My fellow bloggers of all kinds for their kind words, encouragement and challenge to be the best I can be.
My critics and haters on both far sides of the political spectrum…if you weren’t there that would mean I wasn’t doing something right.

I also felt a moment of “oh crud” last night after realizing I’ve won the blog of the year that I now have to live up to it. I decided that I’m not going to change what I’m doing but I’m going to set some goals for the next year that I may or may not be able to reach in this blog. (In some cases, I highly doubt they would happen.) You can keep score at home if you wish (ha ha.)

1. Finish interviews with the City Council members who have not yet been interviewed in this blog (Chiles, Rushefsky, Whayne, Wylie, Collette, Manley. While he hadn’t done a formal interview, Councilman Burlison has been in the blog several times on various issues like the audit so I’m letting him go.) If any council members would like to volunteer to go next, you can let Louise Whall know and she can pass the info along to me.

2. A formal LifeOfJason interview with KSGF’s Vincent David Jericho. Same rules as with the council members…it’s recorded, he gets a copy and it’s transcribed here so that he has an independent record of the interview conducted at a neutral site.

3. A formal LifeOfJason interview with John Q. Hammons. As someone who was not born and raised here I have to say that Mr. Hammons was the first “famous” Springfieldian to me. There’s no question his impact on the Springfield area.

4. A few roundtable blog discussions where I get several community members to discuss issues that effect us. Invite a few folks to my house on different sides of an issue and have some dinner and discussion.

5. A few “day in the life…” kind of blog entries. For example, a day in the life of a Springfield Cardinal or a day in the life of the city manager…cover them from when they arrive at the work until the end of the night. Show that there’s more to some jobs here in town than just the highlights you see on television. I don’t know if the Cardinals would do that or the new city manager when he/she is hired would be open to that but I’ll give it a shot.

And…the top thing I’d like to do…a tit-for-tat interview deal with Springfield’s funniest comedian, Jeff Houghton of the Skinny Improv’s Mystery Hour. Me there, him here. If you haven’t seen this guy perform then you need to make plans to go see him. Then again, knowing the comedic ability of Mr. Jeff, he would do the interview here and then pull the “Matt Damon on Jimmy Kimmel” thing where he’d have me out, have me sit down and then apologize for being out of time.

Again, thank you to everyone who voted for me. You have no idea how much it meant to me.