ESPN's SportsNation hosted a live chat with Derrick Williams yesterday. The former U of A basketball star discussed his pre-NBA draft workout, his hopes to win Rookie of the Year and his gratitude for all the Arizona fans, which is so strong that he thanks us three times in a row. (You're welcome!)

Some highlights:

Toby (Orange County)
How has playing under coach Miller prepared you for the NBA?
Derrick Williams
I think it's prepared me really well, especially with him having a lot of confidence in me to lead Arizona. He told me that if we're going to go far, I'm going to have to play at a high level. When you have a coach with confidence in you like that, it brings out the best in you.

Ciaran (Solihull)
What kind of preperation have you been going through prior to the draft>
Derrick Williams
I've been working out three times a day for the last two months, five days a week. I do basketball twice a day and I either do yoga or weights for the other part. Yoga is great for flexibility and preventing injuries.

Derrick Williams
I just want to say thanks to all of my fans. I wouldn't be in this position if it weren't for my fans. I want to say thanks to all of the fans, especially the Arizona fans.

Click on the above photo somewhere. Watch as the focus changes. The forthcoming Lytro camera allows the user to shoot digital photos and then play around with the focal point of the image using computer software later. Worried that you're missing the point with what you're photographing? Just shoot stuff and work out the details later, which sounds like exactly the sort of camera I need.

Science fiction blog io9 is tackling the tough issues of our day, literally researching two websites to find out whether you can urinate in a pool without consequence:

Most of us have heard, at some point during our childhood, that before we go in the pool there was something we should know. Everyone knew that sometimes people peed in a pool. Knowing that young children often took advantage of this — pool managers put a chemical in pool water that reacted to urine. If someone peed in a pool, they'd be surrounded by a cloud of colored water and publicly shamed. It's such a common belief that some pools put up signs saying that they treated their pool with such chemicals, and it was featured in a movie, Grown Ups, in which four adult men were found out in such a manner.

So this happened yesterday. Hanks seems to be understanding what the anchors are saying, even if he's not replying in Spanish, which probably means he had an earpiece or something, otherwise, this would almost be exactly like a reoccurring nightmare I've had.

Update with playlist and download at bottom of post

• Photo Ryn Gargulinski
• Got grass?

In fact, wearing saggy pants led to the arrest of a University of New Mexico football player.

That story and more are up this week on Rynski’s Shattered Reality radio show on Party934.com and FM 94.9 in Hudson Valley, N.Y.

Next show is Wednesday, June 22 (today!), and every Wednesday online at Party934.com. Showtime is noon in Arizona, 3 p.m. EST.

Party 934 is a radio alternative for listeners sick of stations that play one song followed by 500 commercials.

One more week of smoking hot FIRE songs is on the agenda, which should finish off the sizzling lineup of requested tunes.

Thanks! to all who keep the song requests coming.

While I'm thrilled that Tucson is crushing Portland, Oregon in the largely meaningless poll conducted by Outside Magazine, for some reason our fair city is trailing Chattanooga, Tennessee with a few days left to go. Possibly you didn't know that you can vote every day? That you can win a trip to one of the other cities in the process? That failure shouldn't be an option?

Information you should know about Chattanooga [*]:

1. That the hit song "Chattanooga Choo-Choo" was originally an anthem for a return to the era of slavery and the Confederacy.
2. That the Little Debbie company, located in nearby Collegedale, has giant signs in their factory reading "Thank You For Making America's Children Fat And Lazy".
3. That the city charter of Chattanooga requires that residents spit angrily at the ground after saying the word "Tucson".
4. That the tow truck was invented in Chattanooga, and every time someone's car is towed, each of the city's residents gets a penny.

* - None of this is actually true.

Gannett Blog published a corporate memo sent to more than 20,000 Gannett employees today to announce the newspaper company plans to layoff 700 workers this year:

While we have sought many ways to reduce costs, I regret to tell you that we will not be able to avoid layoffs. Accordingly, approximately 700 employees within USCP, or about 2% of our company’s overall workforce, will be let go. Publishers will notify people today and we will make every effort to reach everyone by end of day. It is important to note that these decisions do not reflect individual performance and we thank and respect those employees for their work. We will do everything we can to help them and to minimize the impact on our other employees going forward. In an effort to reduce the number of people being let go, there will be furloughs in the coming months but they will be limited only to those on the USCP corporate payroll who make over a certain salary. You will be notified by your publisher if you are among this group.

The blog describes this as the biggest layoff since 2009, when the company eliminated 1,400 jobs.

Gannett Blog:

Today's cuts came after many newspaper workers took one-week unpaid furloughs during the current quarter; virtually all took a furlough in the first quarter. And they come three months after GCI disclosed that Chairman and CEO Craig Dubow got paid $9.4 million last year — twice what he earned in 2009. Other senior executives also got huge raises, company documents show.

Dubow's pay included a $1.75 million cash bonus, based partly on his success in reducing costs through layoffs, furloughs and other austerity measures. Bonuses awarded other executives were also calculated according to that same formula.

On Thursday, June 16, a group of Tucson clergy issued a letter in support of ethnic studies:

June 16, 2011

Dear Board Members,

As faith leaders within the Tucson community we join the growing chorus of voices in defense of Ethnic Studies. The recent release of the audit has only affirmed what we have long believed - that the Ethnic Studies program is a valuable educational program that has fostered high academic achievement for its students, and has produced engaged community members.

We are writing to urge the Governing Board of the Tucson Unified School District to take the following actions:
§ Stand in support of the Ethnic Studies Program
§ Join the Mexican-American Studies teachers’ lawsuit against HB2281
§ Meet with students, teachers, and the community to strengthen and improve the Mexican-American Studies program
§ Publicly correct the misinformation disseminated about Mexican-American Studies at TUSD

As people of faith, we recognize how important our history and stories are to us. Scriptures are nothing more than the passed down stories of people who wanted their children and their children’s children to remember the ways in which God had moved within their lives and in the course of human history to bring forth freedom from slavery, forgiveness from retribution, love from hate, and grace from sin. The history of the people of faith within sacred scripture has never been the dominant history; our history is not the history of Egypt but the history of the Hebrew slaves, not the history of Babylon but the history of those carried away into captivity, not the history of Herod but the history of a refugee family who had to flee to Egypt, not the history of Rome but the history of a peasant named Jesus and his followers.

Because we understand how important our history is, we affirm the desire of others to learn their history. As a community of diverse religions, languages, and cultures, it is necessary that we not forget the richness that resides in the history of our people. The Ethnic Studies Program, by enriching the education of our youth, enriches our larger community and teaches us about the ever-important principles of tolerance and civil dialogue.

We encourage everyone in the Southern Arizona community to join together in support of the Tucson Unified School District’s Mexican-American Studies and the entire Ethnic Studies Program.

Sincerely

The Reverend Alison Harrington
Pastor, Southside Presbyterian Church

The Reverend Bill Remmel, S.D.S.
Pastor, Most Holy Trinity Roman Catholic Church

The Reverend Ron Oakham, O.Carm.
Pastor, St. Cyril’s Roman Catholic Church

The Reverend John Fife
Former Moderator of the Presbyterian Church (USA)

The Reverend Gene Lebevre,
Presbyterian Minister Honorably Retired

The Reverend Randy Mayer
Pastor, Good Shepherd United Church of Christ

Mr. Leo Guardado
Social Justice Minister, MHT

Mr. Noel Andersen, M. Div
Assistant Pastor, Good Shepherd United Church of Christ

The Reverend A. Stephen Van Kuiken
Pastor, Rincon Congregational United Church of Christ

The Reverend Frank Bergen
St. Matthew's Episcopal Church

The Reverend John M. Wall
Hon. Retired, de Cristo Presbytery, Presbyterian Church USA

I've been up in Seattle for a few days, so I've missed some recent court action. I'm a little sad that I didn't get to see Marshall Home declare that Jonathan Rothschild was an agent of the Queen of England, but judging from what Gibson reported, the whole thing went on a little too long, anyway. (I felt the same watching Gone With the Wind when I saw it at the Fox a few summers back.)

Anyway, when I left town, my friend John C. Scott was still on the air, but then there was some kind of trouble and now, instead of John C.'s booming voice, I'm listening to an old episode of the Twilight Zone radio drama on KJLL.

I get the feeling that working at the station in recent months has been like being trapped in a dark corner of the Twilight Zone. My condolences to the whole bunch of them.

John C. and his son, Mark Ulm, do a great job of bringing a wide range of voices to create an ongoing community conversation on the airwaves. I hope they find a new home soon.

It seems that fewer than a million people watched each episode of the Onion Sportsdome, so I blame you, fellow Americans for not providing the show with the support it needed. Now Comedy Central has canceled the show (along with the Norm McDonald sports-themed ripoff of The Daily Show, which I have no affection for whatsoever). Are you happy now that you've taken away one of the only things I actually cared about? Are you?