A little more about the Journal...

I have written blogs about the LeFlore County Journal before, and you might be tired of reading them.

But I try not to do them very often. Honest. There are a few things I would like to mention, though.

First point: We are up to 886 fans of the Journal on Facebook as of this afternoon. Wow, I wasn’t sure there were that many people who knew of the Journal.

There have been several people who have gone out of their way to invite friends. I know somebody’s name will be left out and I apologize, but Ralph Perdue Jr., Jerry Pitchford, Don Barnes and Lara Baggs have invited a bunch of people and many of them have responded.

So thanks to you and everybody else who has helped spread the word. And to those of you who have sent in pictures or information, a big thanks to you as well.

There are a lot of people who still don’t know about the Journal and any help you can give by spreading the word would be greatly appreciated.

Second point: It is a little different when people approach me now.

If I haven’t seen them recently, they ask: “Are you still at …” referring to my past employer who I will not mention here to keep them from receiving any free advertising.

“No, I haven’t been there since July,” I respond.

“What are you doing now?” they ask.

I tell them about the Journal, how it is a news and information web site for the county and all the stuff we offer on the web site.

They get a confused look about halfway through. “What else are you doing?” they ask.

“This is it.”

About that time, they beat a hasty retreat, looking at me like I had lost whatever intelligence I once possessed.

Then, whenever I approach somebody for information, the following conversation usually takes place.

“What newspaper are you with?” they ask.

“It’s not a newspaper,” I say, and have said so many times that I probably sound like a recording. I then go into the usual ad for the Journal da…da…da.

“Never heard of it,” they respond. I pull out a card and give it to them and say they should check it out.

Sometimes, they look at the card like it might have the N1H1 virus attached and germs are likely to jump on them and make them deathly ill.

Other times, they take the card and either check out the web site and hopefully like it, or pop it in the trash can as soon as I leave.

The next and final point: Most people I have talked with about the Journal are excited, or deserve an Oscar for the act they put on. Some have seen the potential that I see. Others think I have gone off the deep end.

I might have, but for the first time in my life, I am actually doing something I enjoy full time and with most of my energies. I actually put in more hours every week than I have ever done at any other job.

True, some of those hours are covering sporting events or talking with people, but that is still working. It’s only that I am doing something that I want to do. Nobody tells me I have to do this, or have to do that. I get lots of you should cover this or that, and I greatly appreciate the advice.

The popularity of the site has increased each week since it started in late September. I knew that it would take time, but it is growing faster than I hoped. I always figured it would take until basketball for the Journal to take off.

After all, when I cover a game at one of the smaller schools that doesn’t play football or have a weekly newspaper, they don’t get a lot of coverage. I went to Howe’s games with LeFlore last week and the number of fans on Facebook has gone up over 100.

Yes, I know a lot of people from Howe and have a lot of friends there, but most of them did not know anything about the Journal. Now, many of them do. And hopefully they and the rest of the county enjoy the Journal as much as I enjoy what I am doing.