Long Trip

It's Saturday and I am very tired. I am currently in Ironton, Oh for my nieces graduation from college. I'm not tired from the graduation, I'm tired from the stress of driving Thursday night. You see that picture, I had to drive through the area where that happened.

To maximize out time with my family, we thought to was a great plan to drive after I got off work at midnight, stay overnight in Beckley, WVa and drive the last three hours on Friday morning. Well, there were a storms a comin' and I heard it was a bad one. Come to find out it was storm that had large amounts of hail and tornadoes. I decide to slow down and hope we miss it. Luckily we missed the hail and tornadoes, yet we had to deal with the aftermath. Over turned semis and trees on the interstate so we lost an hour and a half from that. By the time we got to Beckley it was already 5AM and I said screw it, I want to get there and I'll sleep for a few hours before the rest of the family makes it. Well, yet again fate was against us. A semi jack knifed going south bound and they decided to close our lanes to clean it up. We had to sit there for an hour and a half.

We finally made it to Ironton around 9AM. It took over 9 hours for a trip that takes 6 and a half. I hope the trip back goes a lot easier than the way up.

Yeah Rain! Wait... Is That a Funnel Cloud?

Finally we got some much needed rain and I knew I would have to be out shooting it. I;m teamed up with Boston Stevie (He wanted it changed from just Boston) and we head out. We get some nasty looking clouds a little rain and head down to Ashboro. Never heard of Ashboro, neither did I till around 4PM. It's 70 miles from Raleigh and I felt like I was back at The Network chasing storms. We get half way there, Siler City, when I see some of the darkest and lowest clouds I had ever seen. We get more video and continue on our way. We listen to the Local number 1 station's radio broadcast and get some important info and Boston Stevie's weather radio keeps mentioning Asboro, we even stop for some food and people keep telling us that a tornado was seen in Ashboro. Well, there was dark clouds and no actual tornado, but we get a weather warning from the Nation Weather Service and a Tornado touched down in Fuquay Varina... and hour and a half back towards Raleigh.

I'd love to just rip the station, but my cover has partially been blown so I won't get into that right now, I will just say it was a long and difficult night that could have been easier, but people thought it would be more fun having us in the dark. I will say this the best line of the night was this "Well Ashboro and Fuqauy are only and inch apart on the map." You can't make that up.

We get to Fuquay just after 8pm and we get lucky, we find four people to talk and have one guy drive us to a tree down over some power lines. Before we left we found a woman who gave us a great interview and mentioned she has never seen wind like the ones we had tonight.

I know we have not had rain in 18 days and the whole area has not had a good rain in over a month, but do we really need tornado's? Just let us have some rain so we get out of this drought.

Unlucky Number 7

It's been a while since I last post. It's not that I haven't had anything to talk about it's that I've been working, tired, or sick.

Thursday started out normal until I got out of bed. I was not suppose to go on a trip with a report that I feel that we are polar opposites. We just have different styles and it makes the day go by longer. We drive two and a half hours, shot a story, and start back. Well The heavens opened up, dark clouds swarmed around us and I thought I saw a woman on a broom wearing ruby slippers. Come to find out a Tornado hit about 45 minutes north of our current spot (Anna, Oh) in Lima, Oh. I'm itching to go. Said reporter is still on the phone deciding what we need to do. After a couple of stops and delays along the way, we finally hit Lima. We find the airport destroyed! 18 airplanes damages and 2 hangers are ripped to shreds. We go into town and find that two hotels have their roofs ripped off. While the reporter was on the phone (notice the trend here) I find a guy who saw the tornado (BONUS!) We go over to the second hotel and see a crew from Toledo, I know the reporter, we talk and we grab the owner. I find a lady that had her car ripped apart by a piece of roof (note again he was on the phone). The satellite truck shows up I'm ready to edit and he is off doing something or other. We have a 9pm live shot and I'm finally handed a package at 8:30pm for those in TV that's like saying Hey I need you to read this entire post in 5 minutes, very hard to do, but can be done. I bust the story out and this continues for three hours.

Then the phone call. We have to stay over night. The one thing I hate about shooting in the rain is having my feet wet. I HATE THIS! So I don't have any back-ups in the car and the only Wal-Mart with in and hour is closed because it does not have power. J-Dog not happy!

We get to the hotel at midnight and then leave at 4am. We do live shots from 5am till 8am. We go around town look for new video and sound. Get back for a noon live shot and at 1pm I FINALLY get to go home. An hour and a half later we make it to Columbus, but oh wait the day is not done. You may have forgotten about the story we originally went up there for. The reporter did not. I do not get to leave work till 6pm. I worked 29 out 33 straight hours. I am tired and go home.

Saturday I was suppose to work with the same reporter, but thank you Micah you saved me! The only thing of interest today is The Wife and I spent way too much money on things we did not need and We ate at Applebee's, I had shrimp (is this fore-shadowing?).

Sunday at 6am my stomach starts to roll. I roll over on my back to hope that will ease it. 6:30 I'm in the bathroom and lets just say I'm not sitting there sick. I go back to bed 6:50 back in the bathroom. The Wife knows I'm not doing well and says I can stay home from church. She goes to the store and gets some Petobismolt I take it and immediately run to the bathroom and lets just say I'm bowing at the feet of the porcelain goddess. We find out that I have food poisoning from the shrimp. In 30 years I have never had food poisoning and I hope I never get it again. I wish I could have died. Only good thing to happen during all this is that I slept all day and watched all of season 4 of The Simpsons.

Monday took of due to illness, bought The Wife her birthday present, a very expensive Palm Pilot, it's not top of the line, but much better and more expensive than I wanted it to be.

Tuesday rather dull day at work, but still feeling a little sick. Except for one thing remember the story I had to stay late on Friday to edit? Well after I worked over an hour to edit and still had him nit pick the piece and had to change shots. HE WENT BACK AND CHANGED IT MORE. Why am I mad? It was my work that he changed. If he asked to change it I might not have minded as much, but he does this all the time. I'm tired of having my work changed and I thought he made it worse.

Today I get in and find out I need to work on a story I shot two weeks ago. I get it started, there are some voice issues and I tell the talent and they will revise it when they get a chance. Well before that happens, I find out that I get to go to Van Wert. Van Wert is over two hours and automatically makes for a long day. We get the work done, but I get off late. I'm just tired of driving across the entire state. Oh yeah and I find out that tomorrow "fav reporter" and I are working together.

Sorry to complain, but I need a drink or a new job.