I'm back

It’s been a most interesting summer for me. Here at OTN I’ve been spending most of my time trying to figure out how high-definition television works. I’ve had some success. Some.

This is complicated stuff here. Codec’s, resolution, memory usage, encoding, file formats and on and on. I’ve blogged about this before so I won’t wear you down with that nonsense again. The good news, I think, is that I decided on a server and a methodology on how to go about producing in high-definition. We’re also going tapeless. Good for the environment and good for the budget, no more tape to buy. Now all we have to do is put the practice in place.

Most of the staff is set but there a few more positions to fill. OTN will be at the SU Job Fair next Friday September 4^th looking for a graphic artist, a program manager, some programming people, a public relations assistant and an editor. So if you’re interested, stop by.

OTN has a new office too. I annexed the conference room next door to me and cut a hole in the wall and doubled our space. More room to grow.

Finally, two more things. If you have read this blog you know I was dealing with some health problems with my daughter at the end of last semester. Well, that problem turned out to be something serious. Fortunately, we had some good doctors and caught it early. My daughter Anita is back on her feet, good as new. We’re grateful and relieved. It was an ordeal I’d rather not do again.

Second, I’m really glad you’re all back. I love the quiet after graduation for about a week. This place isn’t the same without you and I miss that energy you bring to the campus. I’m really looking forward to this year and another attempt to help you bring great student produced programming to SU.

Welcome back!

Summer Vacation

I made a promise, mostly to myself I guess, that I would be more disciplined in meeting my Friday blog deadline. It’s pretty obvious I haven’t done a very good job at doing that.

At the risk of sounding like I’m making excuses, I have some pretty good reasons why I have not been able to scribble down my random thoughts every Friday, reasons that I won’t go into at the moment, but good reasons nonetheless. I have made a decision though, I’m going to take some of the pressure off myself; this will be my last blog until the new school year starts in August. I’m taking the summer off.

But before I go, some thoughts . . . .

We had a really good year here at OTN. I think we raised the bar on some of our shows and incorporated some new programming. Most all the staff that worked here had fun and learned some new things; at least I think they did. I think we created some good opportunities for students to get some good experience and for that I am pleased.

I too had some fun and learned some new things. I taught a course this semester for the first time, “Short Form.” It really kicked my ass, never worked so hard at a course in my life. I hope the students got something out of it.

During the past year I’ve spent a lot of time learning about high-definition television. It’s interesting, different than what we’re currently used to, challenging, mind numbing and complicated. I’m still trying to wrap my head around it all so when we start up again this fall I’ll be able to explain all of its applications to the students.

And I’m really looking forward to taking some time off. My wife and I are taking some road trips with our kids. Both my girls are big fans of The Jonas Brothers and David Archuleta so we’re going to seem them perform (in different concerts) in Pittsburgh and Boston. And we have a good friend who turns 50 this year and we’re going to head out to Chicago to help him celebrate that milestone.

Finally, I’ve always encouraged my students to look at their lives and careers with what I call the “lazy eye” approach. I believe it’s important to keep one eye squarely focused on the day-to-day stuff to make sure you’re doing a good job and staying healthy and happy. The other eye needs to be focused down the road to see what’s coming and where you’re going . . . or would like to go. In spite of being a middle aged old fart, I still do that . . . I’m not spending enough time with my music . . . I want to spend more time at home . . . I really like learning and using After Effects and Flash . . . I’m challenged with how to incorporate new media into OTN more effectively . . . I’m not sure that I want to keep up such a rigorous sports freelance schedule . . . I’d really like to work on more video projects for some not for profit groups . . . I’m considering offering my professional services to the Central New York Jazz Foundation, I see that they’re using some video and I think I could make it better . . . I want to create something for the Urban Video Project, I have an idea right now that I think would be a fun piece to do.

So many ideas and so little time.

Have a good summer everyone, I’ll be back in the late summer and hopefully I will have a little more focus on what my “down the road” looks like when I get back.

Nothing Worrisome

It’s Sunday morning and I’d rather be reading my newspaper, sitting in my chair at home and drinking coffee out of my OTN mug. Instead, I’m sitting in the chair I used as a bed last night, drinking coffee from a Styrofoam cup in room 5401 on the fifth floor of the Memorial wing at Crouse Hospital having just endured our sixth visit from a health professional since 6:30 this morning (it’s 8:12am as I start to write this) checking in on my daughter Anita. I guess I shouldn’t use the word “endured” because that makes it sound like they are bothersome or otherwise not welcome. Nothing could be further from the truth. They have all been, since we arrived Thursday evening, thoroughly professional, compassionate and accommodating.

The back-story of why I’m here is that in early March my daughter contracted the flu (no, not that flu) and was out of school for most of the week. Anita is a very healthy kid but the cough, fever and other flu symptoms really floored her. About a week after that she contracted a 24-hour stomach bug. A nasty one, two punch.

Around the same time she developed a swollen lymph gland, which we, her mother and I, determined was just a reaction to the illnesses. No sweat we thought. She exhibited NO other symptoms. She was eating, sleeping and laughing as usual. But a couple of weeks later Anita asks, “Shouldn’t this (pointing to the gland) be going down?”

That first trip to her pediatrician was the start of a many visits to many doctors and many tests. All along the way we were told that her tests indicate “nothing worrisome.” Her blood work showed a healthy kid, no reason for alarm but . . . there was a reason for silent, personal alarm; they could not definitively say what it wasn’t.

Her pediatrician “doesn’t like the way it looks” so we schedule an appointment with an ear, nose and throat doctor. I remember pulling into the parking lot and Anita sees the sign at the new doctor’s office and she says, “Surgeon?” I told her not to fear, they wouldn’t be performing surgery on her there although her pediatrician did prepare me for the possibility that they might do a biopsy.

The first appointment with Dr. Reynders went well in that she reassured me that she was very gentle, smart and thorough. Good traits in a doctor. She ordered a round of antibiotics to see if that might take the gland back to normal but it did nothing. Next step was a fine needle aspiration or FNA. Simply put, a needle is inserted into the infected area and tissue is extracted for examination under a microscope. Ever have a needle inserted into your neck just below the jaw? I haven’t but now my 14-year-old daughter has. The results? Nothing worrisome except this thing is big and isn’t going away.

Next a CT scan and afterwards it showed, again, nothing worrisome. Another round of antibiotics, still nothing. While I was out of town last week Dr. Reynders scheduled what we thought was simply an ultrasound but rather, it was an ultrasound “guided” fine needle aspiration. Second time this kid has had a needle stuck in her neck.

So last Thursday the gland, which has now become very red and scaly, starts to leak a little. A call to the doctor, a visit to Dr. Reynders office and here we sit, in the hospital.

Anita is allowed “nothing by mouth” after midnight because she will likely have a procedure on Friday that will get rid of this thing. Dr. Reynders explains that the gland is “pointing” and that the scans and tests indicate an abscess that needs to be removed. The procedure is short and simple but will require her to be moved to the operating room and placed under anesthesia. Anita is justifiably nervous. We assure her that she won’t feel a thing because there is “nothing worrisome.”

But Dr. Reynders has patients all day Friday and will not be able to do the procedure until later that day or early evening. Anita, who is as skinny as a rail, eats like a horse. No food all day is a real struggle for her. In support, I do not eat until she eats.

Thinking the procedure won’t occur until 7 or so that night, I run home around 4:30 to get our other daughter Rachel and bring her back to the hospital. While I stop at the P&C to get a little cash, my wife calls to let me know they started getting Anita ready. I rush back to the hospital only to find that she’s in the OR getting an anesthetic, being put to sleep so a surgeon can slice that nasty gland into submission and excise it.

While this happens, I wait. And go to a very bad place. What if there is something worrisome in there? I have a little experience with that place and I’d rather not be there, it’s a place I’ve been before with my father. But when it’s your 14-year-old daughter, well, you get the idea.

Surgery is over, Dr. Reynders comes to see us and tells her in graphic detail what the mass looked like, what she did to get it out and her expected outcome. Did I mention that while gentle, smart and thorough she’s also very descriptive? I don’t find that objectionable at all but not sure my wife was all that thrilled with the description of what the abscess looked like. But I digress . . . Dr. Reynders is pleased that she decided to do the procedure in the OR as opposed to bedside because the abscess was a little more invasive that what she thought. The abscess wasn’t all that unusual; the gland was simply doing its job. All in all, it went well, “nothing worrisome.” Right now Anita has a tube in the “cavity” so it can drain and not fill up again. The doctor wants us to stay through to Monday so she can be sure it’ll heal properly. Hopefully we’ll go home tomorrow.

I am really grateful to Dr. Reynders. I am lucky she decided one day to be a doctor. I am fortunate that this community has many caring and deeply committed health professionals. I am appreciative that we have excellent health insurance. I am one lucky person today because of all of those things and mostly, because it doesn’t appear that there is anything “worrisome” with Anita’s outcome.


So here I sit, Sunday morning and now it’s almost 9:20 AM, two more visits by health professionals since I started writing. Poor kid needs some sleep. And I need some coffee.

Viva Las Veags

Next Tuesday I’m going to Las Vegas for the National Association of Broadcasters and Broadcast Educators Association convention. When most people hear “Las Vegas,” they immediately launch into either a squeal of delight or some other affirmation. To which I usually say, “Save it, I hate Las Vegas.”

If NAB or BEA were held in any other city I’d be happy. I don’t gamble. I’m a happily married, middle-aged family man. I don’t do that “other” Las Vegas stuff. And the shows, while I might find one that appeals to me, not sure if you’ve seen this or not but, the ticket prices for those shows are expennnnnsive!

But all that said, I am really looking forward to this trip because I’ll be on a pretty neat shopping trip. I’m going to see the equipment I hope to acquire for Orange Television that will launch us into high-definition television production and deployment. This is a pretty big deal.

Television as we know it has been produced on a 4 by 3 screen since its invention. The move to digital has been slow and steady but only for the last few years. Now, we’re changing to a 16 by 9 format with a huge increase in picture quality through high-definition and going completely digital. I’m also going to be looking at going “tapeless.” What that means is that all production will be acquired, edited and sent out via hard drives or other solid-state technology. Much the same way that VHS tapes were replaced by DVD (and now Blue-Ray), videotape is being replaced by hard drives. This is a seismic shift in television.

The other neat part of this trip is the back end; the Broadcast Educators Association convention will be at the end of the week. BEA is Thursday, Friday and Saturday and each day will be filled with papers, panel discussions on topics of interest for those of us who are in the academic field of broadcasting. It’s also a good chance for me to see what other schools are doing and how we can improve ourselves here at Syracuse. I’m on a panel discussion myself on Saturday morning. I always learn something new and interesting at BEA.

I won’t blog next week but when I get back I’ll fill you in on the details, what I learned and maybe what I’ve decided.

Wish me luck ;)

Think Time

I haven’t been very consistent with my blog this semester. Blogging is on my calendar to do every Friday morning but sometimes, things get in the way.
I like to blog because it forces me to step back and think about things. Thinking time is vastly underrated. We Americans are kind of programmed to keep moving and accomplish tasks so just sitting and thinking is frowned upon. It shouldn’t be.

I do some of my best thinking when I travel because I’m not in a place (work or home) where I can accomplish tasks. Unfortunately I haven’t traveled much lately so I’m down on my thinking time. And I guess I should clarify what “kind” of thinking time I mean.

We all think about stuff. “Gotta clean the garage, pick up the prescriptions at the drug store, fix the gas grill, etc.” That’s pretty normal.

The kind of thinking I haven’t had much time to do lately is bigger picture stuff especially here at OTN. I’m trying to gather a lot of information about high definition television so I can move OTN to producing and deploying high definition content. While that might sound simple, it’s not, especially for a non-techie like me. I really have to buckle down and wrap my head around codec’s, bit rates, file management and workflow, budgets, physical layouts of how this gets positioned here in the office to name just a few things.

And you know, we are constantly being asked to divert our attention somewhere that robs us of that think time. I delete between 350 and 400 emails every week. A lot of them are junk but many require me to respond. That’s a lot of email.

If it sounds like I’m complaining, I guess I am. I like think time. I want think time. I have to get better at making think time a priority. I also like blogging and I apologize for not being more consistent this semester. I promise to do better.

They got your back

I was in New York City last week as I took ten students on the Newhouse Benchmark trip. We visited CNN, Atlas Media Corp., Guiding Light (the soap opera), NBC, ESPN at Madison Square Garden, CBS Sports and the Late Show with David Letterman. At each stop we were given a tour and with the exception of ESPN, all the people who hosted us were graduates of Syracuse University. A sidebar, there were SU grads on the crew at the ESPN compound; they just weren’t part of the tour.

Enough has been written about this wretched economy but if the participation of our graduates is any indication, Newhouse students will be well taken care of. I was both impressed and gratified at the support, kind words and genuine interest all our tour guides had with our group of ten.

“Let me know what I can do for you.”
“Feel free to email me with questions.”
“Things are tough but I’ll do what I can to help.”

Just a few of the comments I heard.

I was also so proud to see some of our very recent grads doing so well. Liz Morrison as Production Coordinator for Atlas Media Corp and Jay Bungay is an editor for “Guiding Light.” They’ve both been out of school for only two years.

I was also tickled to see my old colleague Bob Matina again. Bob is the studio director for CBS Sports. If you’ve watched the “NCAA Selection Show” or the “NFL Today” you’ve seen Bob’s work. Bob is a ’78 grad and he and I worked together at WCNY-TV in the early 80’s. When I called him to ask if we could visit him he was only too happy to oblige.

Say what you want about the plusses and minuses about Newhouse but one thing you simply can not say is that the people who leave here and go on to work in the business do not care about you. They want to help and are almost always willing to do what they can to pave the way for you.

Things are tough but compassion and support are in big supply out there if you are part of the Orange Nation.

What's in your future?

People aren’t buying cars. They’re not taking big flat-screen TV’s home either. Furniture or appliances? Fuggedaboutit.

So what are we consuming?

Food and entertainment. Attendance at the movies is up. People are also staying home and watching TV. What we do in television is still in demand.

Kind of nice to know.

As we try and navigate our way through these tricky economic waters it’s worth putting these experiences into our memory banks. When things turn around you’ll want to bring them back to remind yourself of what bad times were so you can appreciate the good times. But you’ll also want to make sure you have what I call “split vision.”

Split vision is the act of being focused on two different parts of your professional life. The present and the future. The present is pretty obvious: work hard, be on time, add value to your job and be seen as a valuable contributing member of your organization. Hopefully you are part of the group that’s adding to the bottom line. Literally.

The future part is a little trickier. It requires you to look at where you are, what skills you have, what you like to do and are good at and see what kind of changes you need to make to stay current with your industry. Or, look ahead to see what kind of changes you need to make to head in a completely different direction with your career. You need to do this, the future thing, every day and you need to be prepared to make changes that might be looked at as a sacrifice on your part or the part of your family.

My old boss at a company I worked at used to say something I liked. He said, “The Univisions (the name of our company) road ahead is always under construction.”

So what we do is in demand and the people who can bring a lot to the table in their work places will be better off than those who can’t. Are you a good writer? Can you shoot and edit? Can you light well? How about web skills? Any competence in After Effects, Photoshop or Flash? Do you know how to encode video to the web? Ever done any voice-over or on-camera work?

These days will end and things will turn around. Will you be ready for the next difficult economy?

It's a perfect game

Major league baseball pitchers and catchers have reported to spring training and it’s been 15 years since I’ve cared about that.

I used to be a big baseball fan. Big. I was the person in my family who when they couldn’t quite think of the perfect birthday or Christmas gift got me something tied to baseball and I was happy with it . . . usually.

Then came 1994.

That was the year major league baseball players went on strike. Can you imagine that? They went on strike because, um, you know, I can’t remember why but whenever ANYONE goes on strike it has to do with money. What was the end result of the strike? I can’t remember that either other than they cancelled the World Series. For me that was a deal breaker.

I grew up playing baseball in Little League, in front of my house on the street, in the backyard, pretty much anywhere anytime I could find a game I’d play. I played softball as an adult and played pick up games with my friends. I played the game because I loved it, it connected me with my passion and perhaps most of all, it was fun.

Baseball is such a beautiful game. It’s the only game where the offense doesn’t have the ball. The dimensions of the field, 90 feet down the base paths, 60 feet six inches to the mound, nine players spread around the field are perfect. The amount of strategy involved on every pitch is mathematically stunning.

A man on first, decent speed, the pitcher has a so-so move to first, the hitter is a left-handed pull hitter, keeping the runner on forces the second baseman to cover a wider area so the first baseman can hold the runner. Can the pitcher keep the ball outside so the hitter doesn’t get a pitch to pull? Does he walk him? Should the hitter bunt?

An amazing game. And I miss that.

But I just can’t go back. They broke their promise to me. They promised to play the game and it’s not that they just quit playing for a while; they didn’t play the World Series. So I quit the game they quit. I never got a chance to pass down that love to my kids. I really miss loving baseball.

And for the record, I was a Red Sox fan and never watched a single inning of any World Series they were in this decade. I couldn’t tell you who their players are, no idea.

I love the game and I really miss it.

When it comes to Syracuse men’s basketball, I am the eternal optimist. As I look at the team this year I see a team that has all the ingredients to make a deep run into the NCAA’s. They have big dominant players inside who can score and play aggressive defense. They have guards who can run an offense and shoot the three and they have depth. OK, well, maybe not a lot of depth but there’s enough for a run. They have a coaching staff that has experience and success in the playoff’s and they have played a schedule (so far) that has them battle tested.

I think the one thing I haven’t seen this year is a team that can play for 40 minutes with intensity. It shows up but not as often as they’ll need it come tournament time. Can they do it? A qualified yes because, as they say, you play like you practice. If you’re practice sessions don’t have intensity, it probably won’t show up on the court. Now, I have no idea how this year’s team practices but based on the performance on the court this year, I could conclude that the practice sessions have been inconsistent too. But you know, they had that insane stretch where they played something like five games in 10 or 12 days against ranked competition. How would you like to go to school and have the toughest final exam you’ll every take . . . every day!?

And having watched Syracuse basketball for 30 plus years, the team has always seems to do better when they fly under the radar a bit. Right now they’re a middle of the pack team in the Big East, not ranked in the top 10 and they’ve lost some games they should have probably won and lost, badly, to G’Town, Villanova and UConn. They’re definitely under the radar so I see a deep run into the tournament, maybe Sweet 16.

But I say that every year.

My head hurts

H.264, MPEG-4, Codec, HD, SDI.

This is a tiny sample of the future of television. And it makes my head hurt.

I started in television when there were three major commercial networks. The proliferation of cable was still a few years away and “working in TV” meant getting a job at a television station, perhaps working your way up and moving on to bigger markets. Working in a “Top 10” market was seen as a sign of success. I guess I don’t have to tell you things are different today.

Just like when you go to the grocery store and are blown away confused with the number of choices you have for something as simple as toothpaste, so goes the medium of television. And it’s funny how when computers first came out they were complicated, erratic and intimidating but over time they got easier to use and understand. Not so with television.

As the industry steers toward high-definition, the “kind” of high definition one chooses to create is as important a decision as any you’ll make. Will you capture in HDV? 1080i? 1080p? 720p? Uncompressed high-definition? These are some of the questions and issues I deal with now as I try and steer the Orange Television Network toward high-definition.

My experience and background is mostly on the creative side as a producer, director, editor and videographer. The technical side is something I’ve learned along the way. And let me tell you, this HD stuff is mind numbing. But fortunately I have some good friends who know this stuff better than I do and I’m consulting with a couple of vendors who are really knowledgeable so I think I’ll be able to figure out the right and best solution for OTN.

But in the meantime, google H.264 and see why my head hurts.

TV, Music & Mr. D

Last night I had my weekly rehearsal in the Lyncourt Community Band. The conductor is Tony DeAngelis otherwise affectionately known as “Mr. D.” Mr. D has been a fixture in the Lyncourt Community for well over 50 years. He only recently retired but he agreed to come back to conduct the community band last year.

There are a couple of stories here; the first one is Mr. D. He is an accomplished musician (original member of the Syracuse Symphony Orchestra) and a gifted teacher. Many of his students over the years have gone on to either careers in music or continue to play as a hobby, like myself. So you’re saying, what’s the big deal? Lots of communities have a “Mr. D.” Maybe. But when you don’t retire from teaching at a very small elementary and middle school until you are in your seventies, and it’s not because he needed the money, that says a lot about him. The man has lived to teach and he has lived to be around music. Period. I don’t want to shortchange his personal life as he has been married to the same woman for a bunch of years and raised three very successful daughters, but it’s been music that has been the thread that weaves through his life. He gave us the gift of music, taught us high standards with the blessing of passion and humor. For me, and many, many other former students, he changed our lives.

The second story here is the art and skill of playing music. Playing in a band, small, medium or large, requires you to listen to each other and contribute your part with as much skill as you have. It’s kind of like working on a television production. I watch my students work on SUper Sports or productions at the Schine or live television shows from the Dome and I see the exact same dynamics in play as I do in community band. Many times we get it real right and sometimes someone is playing the wrong key. But hey, that’s the way it goes when you put your creative soul on the line isn’t it?

As I think of it, maybe there’s a third story here. When I was in the fourth grade I went to the music room and told Mr. D I wanted to play the trumpet. I didn’t know it then but that started a relationship with a man who changed my life. And to a certain extent, he might be changing yours too. Amazing how we are all interconnected isn’t it?

Four really good people

I don’t consider myself a “news junkie” but I do consider myself well informed. For the record, I consider a “news junkie” to be someone who is obsessed with news to the point where it’s all they think or talk about. I like sports and American Idol too much to be that obsessed.

So being well informed, I am inundated every day with bad news: the economy and jobs keep going south, oil prices are going back up and tragically, a beautiful young model from Brazil had both her hands and feet amputated only to die from the disease necrosis. I’m no doctor but the way it has been described, it seems like she didn’t get the best care she might have somewhere else. Tragic.

But push that all aside as I want to get out from under the doom and tell you about four really good people. I had the privilege of having lunch last Saturday with some current and former SU students: Melissa Morton, her boyfriend Steve Wanzik, current SU students Steve Andress and Torie Wells. What makes them “really good people?” Well first off, the fact they got up before noon on a Sunday to have lunch with me for one. Second, they are thoughtful, engaging and funny people. Third, they are working to pursue their dreams and are having success.

Torie is a reporter and producer for the ABC News bureau here at Newhouse in addition to working part-time here at OTN as well as going back on occasional weekends to work at the Fox affiliate in her hometown of Albany. Steve Andress called the play by play for a portion of the Syracuse/Pittsburgh basketball game last Monday on ESPN. Yup, that’s right, ESPN. Steve Wanzik is working for a small radio station near Philadelphia doing news and play by play of high school sports. His boss? The Philadelphia icon and play-by-play announcer of the Eagles, Merrill Reese. And Melissa is a special education teacher at a Philadelphia charter school doing at least four preps and co-teaching with the other teachers for those preps. If you know anything g about teaching, more than prep is hard, co-teaching is harder and doing all that in your first job while taking graduate classes is harder still.

The next time I start my day by being “well informed” and proceed to devour more doom and gloom, I shall remember my lunch with Melissa, Steve, Torie and Steve, four really good people making a difference.

Happy New Year!

I’ve been trying to zero in on what I should blog about after my absence. My holiday break? All the fun and exciting things we did at OTN this past semester and what we have planned for the spring? Andy Rautins knee?

I don’t think so.

I think I’d rather tell you how I feel today.

Mostly I’m anxious. I’m anxious about this economy. Coming to work everyday with NPR is like listening to a doctor when he comes into the examining room with the test results. Will it be bad news or good news?

The Dow goes up. It goes down. More people are laid off from a company and there’s another stimulus package being planned. It seems like when we get a really lousy piece of news; another follows it.

And I’m anxious for you, the students. How many of you are being impacted by this? I’m guessing that your family is feeling this in some way too which has to trickle down to you. If you’re about to graduate this May, you must be worried that getting that first job will be twice as hard as it was last year. And with those loans to pay off, I imagine you have concerns.

I’ve also been thinking a lot about my father and his generation lately. Pop was born in 1916 and grew up during the Great Depression. When he was 25 the United States entered World War II. Compared to him and his generation, we’ve had kind of an easy time of things. But I’ve been trying to imagine what he was thinking with all the upheaval his generation was going through? They certainly didn’t ask for those troubles but they were handed to them nonetheless. Did it make them feel as powerless as it makes me feel today?

I played by the rules here, lived within my means, saved some money, worked hard at my job and tried to live a decent life. And it has all been upended by greed. And I never saw it coming. I guess I feel something else today, a little anger. I’m a little p@#$ed that there are people who knew that what they were doing was wrong but kept on doing it for their own rewards, not caring how it would impact the rest of us.

But then I think of my father. I never asked him how he felt about being handed such a lousy hand of cards in his early life. But based on his life, I’m guessing he did what we’re all trying to do, just trying to live a good, decent and fulfilling life.

I’m really glad Andy Rautins knee is okay, maybe that’s a sign of things to come.