Palindrome visits Grand Rapids on the Going Rogue Bus.

Where is Alanis Morissette when you need her?  From the windows of my apartment I can see three retirement homes, three buildings run by the rescue mission, and one scrap yard.  If the perpetual haze of West Michigan would have lifted this week I might have been able to see Sarah Palin, twenty miles away in Grand Rapids.  I was bombarded by local media channels informing me of the arrival of this exhausting “politician” for three straight days.  I tapped a note into my phone about her arrival and the embedded spelling program auto-corrected Palin to Palindrome.  Imagine the intellect embedded in a flurry of palindromes rolling up on a bus to taut a new book!

Instead, a direct quote:

“My husband is hunting and I have no responsibilities so I will head to Barnes and Noble at Midnight.”

Yes, I was peeled to the local news: hunting, husbands, responsibilities – the people camped out to see the woman that’s ruining female for me are a people-watchers dream.  The local news rolled its Econovan up to the Grand Rapids Barnes and Noble and interviewed these intellectuals for a few days in a row.

Found in the bathroom of a restaurant that I can also see from my window.

Lately, I’ve been interested in WOODTV 8.  As social media channels allow me to self-tailor the content I consume to my needs, interests, and surroundings, the traditional local news has a chance to relate to its communities along relevant axes.  The demand for hyper-local news appears to be higher than ever.  If there is going to be a wooden shoe convention on my street this week (yes, it happens), I want to know about it.  If there is going to be a tomato throwing party on your street this week (it could happen), I don’t care as much.  But, the local news is getting trashy, turning tabloid.  Why can’t it respond, iterate on the same boring model that repeats the same sentence five times in a row for apparent gravitas?

I’m staring out the window now, looking at MY missions, rest homes, and scrap metal. Is there a story there?

I wish, madam, that you had written ‘rouge,’ not ‘rogue.’