Working with the new guy

So I headed off to High Point to train on the satellite truck. You see, we now have a new digital uplink for our much outdated analog sat truck. It was necessary for me to get some training on this new $40,000 piece of equipment so the next time our regular sat truck op is on vacation I'll be ready to pull the trigger. While I'm on the subject, I've got to tell you a little about our big black behemoth of a sat truck. It came to us seven long years ago from WAGA, the Fox affiliate in Atlanta. Let's just say it was on it's last leg at that time with 10 good years of service and several hundred thousand miles logged on the odometer. Three, yes three, engines later here at Fox the "big black box" is still running.

After my training session with a very New England sounding Wolf Coach engineer I was ready to "pull the trigger" on my first digital uplink. It worked and all was good in the uplink world.

I was ready to take my engineering hat off and place the photojournalist lid upon my head when Robert informed me I had a really "great" story to work on with Jeff Varner, our newest Anchor/Reporter. It seems Jeff had been making phone calls all morning to get the family of a recently killed little 5 year-old girl in a drunk-driving accident. The little girl's organs were donated to five different people and their lives saved. Ain't the news business grand!? Well, after a little trip over to the family's house, Jeff finds out the mother is upset because some other family members set up the interview without her knowledge. No story right? Wrong. The desk decides we should go to the scene of where the accident happened nearly FIVE days ago. Sounds reasonable.

So we make it to the accident scene and find three ladies on their porch just watching the day go by. Of course our finely quaffed friend Mr. Anchorman feels he can charm his way to an interview with the toothless wonders on the porch. Much to his dismay, the ladies declined, instead sending us to the corner where we encountered an old gentleman who told us very colorfully what he saw that night. During the interview my hip began to ring, you know the intrusive device we all can't do without nowadays. The CELL PHONE. On the other end, our Assistant News Director informing me of "Breaking News." It seems the Winn-Dixie company was closing all of it's stores in North Carolina. Jeff and I rush to the nearest grocery to get reaction from frightened customers. Oh, the humanity, our Winn-Dixie is closing, what will we do?

Through it all, Jeff kept a smile on his face and did live shots for the Five and Six o'clock newscasts. Tomorrow, back to my comfort zone in Winston-Salem and my buddy Brent Campbell.