I have always loved words and there is what seems to be a new phenomenon happening—the portmanteau. These are words like “Podcast” from iPod and Broadcast, or “Blog” from Web and Log combined to make new words. We recently combined the word “correspondent” and the portmanteau “blog” to form Blog-o-spondent.

Technically, a portmanteau is a combination of two words, so if we combined a word and a portmanteau, did we make a “wordmanteau” or “portmantord” or maybe “portwordteau?” If we did, I should register it or at least put an entry into Wikipedia claiming I invented it. I suppose I should decide what to call it first, though. Either way, you are going to start hearing one of these words and you will think of me!

The Ultimate Blog-o-spondent contest is in full swing and you can read the press release about it under News or go straight to the video contest site. (link here)

I, along with Paula, Christi, Brian and others will be at BlogWorld (I don’t think this is a portmanteau as much as just writing two words without a space and a capped second word) and we are planning all sorts of fun for our booth. If you are in the neighborhood, please stop by—we would love to meet you.

The gang (see above mentioned names) have conned me into being the emcee of our booth. I can’t decide if should do it old-school Vegas (with a martini in-hand) or mid ‘90s Vegas (with a small child with me—remember when Vegas was trying to get families out there—what were they thinking?) or just be my own charming self.

On this episode of Red Belly Radio, I speak with several people from BlogWorld 2007, including Luther, our winner from last year’s photo caption contest. This year’s contest will be a little more work, but we will be taking the top three to Vegas with us where they will shoot and edit a video to win the Ultimate Portmanteau! (Blog-o-spondent.)

Pictured right: Christi Day with a BlogWorld 2007 attendee.

Start stretching, loosen up those vocal chords, and get ready for your close up! Beginning today, we are hosting an online casting call to find our next Blog-o-spondent for Nuts About Southwest!

As many of our regular readers know, over the past six months, we’ve been sending our very own Christi Day around the country to film short video segments for our blog, including features on our Employees and Operations.  We’ve kept her up all night filming crab shipments in Houston; we’ve had her up at dawn to follow our Flight Attendants from Baltimore; and, we’ve thrown her in the belly of an aircraft in Albuquerque to see just how quickly our Employees have to work to turn our aircraft in 25 minutes or less. 

I think it’s safe to say that Christi has had a lot of FUN along the way, but now she’s ready to share the spotlight and allow one of you to become our next Nuts About Southwest Blog-o-spondent. 

If you want to be Southwest’s next Blog-o-spondent, travel to select Southwest cities, and produce video segments for our blog, submit your one-minute audition video on the official contest site as soon as possible.  Between today and August 31, your fellow bloggers will be able to view all video submissions and vote for their favorites.  The three contestants with the most votes on Sept. 1 will be invited to join me, Christi, Brian, and the entire Southwest Blog Team at this year’s BlogWorld Expo in Las Vegas on Sept. 20-21, where they will compete in a final competition round. 

So Break-a-leg…and click HERE to see all the contest rules and guidelines!