IT'S ALIVE!!!!

It's alive! My camera works!!! Behold me in all my glory! Suck on that Murphy your my bitch now! Crap I probably cursed myself now. Ummm, hi Mr. Murphy... my your hair looks nice today. Please don't make things suck. I'm off with Gilbert to the Alamo for some touristy crap.

Murphy Strikes Again

I was hoping today would be better, alas not so. I got the battery plate around 10 in the morning only to find out it's the wrong plate. For some reason Panasonic and Anton Baur decided to make different plates for each model of camera. So, for another day I was cameraless.

We developed a system for having only one camera and that worked out fine, the only other problem was feeding video. I guess the Alamodome or the NCAA tournament did not realize TV stations would feed through the internet and there is not enough bandwidth to deal with this issue. So what took 20 minutes last week was now taking and hour or longer. I caused a lot a panic and then at different points through out the day the laptops kept "freaking out." Mine would not respond and then we would have to start the sending process all over. Gibby's was just going real slow.

Luckily for the most part the viewers never saw a problem, except when the IFB (the way the reporter can hear what is airing and hear the producer) when down. Also we had a problem coming back from commercial one time. We did not know they were going to not play the normal music, instead they went straight into the Mariachi band that we sent back. All I heard on the phone was; cue... CUE, J DOG CUE PENN! I frantically started waving my hand at Penn and he response was classic. What? Oh, hi?!?! Welcome back.

So after two days we have had our fair share of problems and I am looking forward to a relaxed morning and a slow start before the chaos known as game day. I may see the Alamo tomorrow and I might do some other touristy crap before we have to head to the arena. I hope tomorrow I will have more time so I can do more than one post a day.

A Bad, Then Good, Then Painful, Then Meh, and Then the Absuded

For the last two weeks the only work to describe work is well... ass-tastic. One of the big reasons I left The Network was story quality, I was tired of going to pressers and meeting and using file. For some strange reason, the last two weeks I have done nothing but meetings. I've been getting frustrated and then just add in the general stupidity of an ever increasing manager base that seem to not know what they want has brought back angry J-Dog. I do not want this to happen. I was tired of it with The Network and it will only create problems here, even though the entire night side crews feel the same as I.

So I walk into work not happy. A couple other photographers are around and we sit there complaining about the stuff that is happening around up. New job descriptions that make us indentured servants, working late for a live shot even though there are other mid day and night side photographers (including myself) sitting around not doing anything. We have new cameras sitting in a room unused. You know the general things that happen every day.

At this point The Chief walks over and is basically attacked. I lob the question "When the hell are we getting the new P2 cameras." The others jump on like The Chief is chum in a shark tank. He gets flustered, we throw up other things he can't really answer because they are beyond his control and finally he leaves to get "answers" about the new cameras. We go back to our conversations, then we walks back and I think "Why is he coming back for more? He knows we are on the attack." Well he has an answer and it involves me getting a new camera, not just any new camera, the 800 model, the caddy of the new cameras! I go over the tutorial and was informed that if they get my laptop up grated that I will get the camera on Thursday.

I'm in a better mood, when I am formed that I am going to shoot a package with an intern. A local group is building a car that can drive itself. The twist is that it may be an anchor package. I'm not pleased with that thinking. With the addition of a 7pm news the anchors get lunch from 8-9 and that means I won't see a package until 10 and that's if they just do it fast. I'm a little down, but we get to the assignment and we hit the jack pot.

We meet the engineers and students and I see a small trailer with Lotus automotive stickers on it. I ask is the car a smaller model and I get a look of shock. "Ummm, no there's a Lotus in there. A FREAKING LOTUS! They pop the top of the trailer and I see a beautiful car covered with cameras, sensors and other things. I'm not a car guy, but I know a Lotus is a high end car that I will never own or probably never have a friend that will own one. The reasoning behind them having Lotus sponsor them a car was to show they can get all their equipment into a small area and IT'S A FREAKING LOTUS. The intern and I spend the next hour and a half shooting interviews and generic shots of the car. Everyone piles into some cars and one student and my intern get to ride in the Lotus (Damn intern!) We get to the test street. I hop out of the bed of the pick-up. WHACK! Everything turns blurry and I see stars. I feel a sharp shooting pain in my shin and I realize that I just walked into the trailer hitch. Within a minute I start to bruise. That's how hard I hit it. The Adrenaline kicks in and I continue to shoot. We finish the story and leave.

I find out on the way back I have to shoot fresh gas video. I ask "So where is the closest refinery?" I hate blanket statements like this. Shoot me weather, go shoot the wind, find me people doing stuff. Some times the desk does not think what they are actually saying. One thing you can't shoot the wind. You can shoot the effects of wind and what the hell is "fresh" gas video. I know they mean new video of people filling up, why won't they just say that.

By this time the adrenaline has worn off and my leg is pulsating. It's making it hard to drive. I get back to the station and find out we are holding the car till tomorrow. I'm glad, I just want to sit and not move my leg. I realize the season finale of Lost is on and get excited that I may get to watch it live. I pop on a TV and then I hear: "J-Dog can you go to Durham?" Something is happening on the scanners, even though we do not chase spot news, we have been burned of late by some bigger stories that happened so now we are gun shy and any thing that might show interesting we send someone. I get the directions and drive the 30+ minute drive to the not so nice part of Durham (I know, does Durham actually have a nice part?). The cops in Durham won't talk, seriously they have rules that they can't talk to TV. Every market I've worked in cops were not suppose to talk, but at least they would give me a vague idea what is going on. Here... nothing, only the PIO can talk and the PIO won't answer the phone after 6pm. I finally get this bit of information out of someone. There maybe multiple things going on. Wow, that helped, it's a dark street the locals are out and most of the police have left. I call back and let them know that it really is nothing. Come to find out later it was a sting and nothing really happened. I missed Lost, so I was bummed, but I got a nice drive out of it.

I get back to the station and start talking to Shawn and Boston. To the three of us that Boston and I were they only ones night side. We start talking about it when the deskie walks up and mentions that I was the one not on the schedule. I was suppose to edit Thursday and Friday, but The Chief "remembered" that one of the part time editors was going to do it. Well no one put me back on the schedule so no one knew when I am suppose to work. For some reason Boston started laughing hysterically and I thought he was going to need oxygen. Will all the problems we have had with the increasing management structure and our difficulty of figuring out what is going on and who is at fault that just typified our problems and Boston had to laugh. He laughed to the point of coughing. So hopefully when I go into work on Thursday I'll get a new camera and finally figure out what I am suppose to do.

March Madness 2: Getting Better

After i finished my last post I called the banks and it looks like all the deductions have not cleared and then I called an hour ago and they are still in banking limbo, so Hooray me! I have money and I don't have to worry... as much.

I met up with sports guy and get lunch and we have the slowest service ever. It takes forever for our meal so we are now getting to the arena much later than I wanted. We walk into the media area and we basically forced our way into a spot and marked it off with tape and proclaimed that spot for JDOG-17! Wow I had a Civilization III flash back. We start getting video and sound from Southern California and we just worked our way from there.

The one big thing that happened to me was the creation of the "photographer sandwich," basically you have my head, my camera to the right of my head and then add someone else's camera to the left side of my head and you have a "photographer sandwich." You would think less and less media would be here at this point, but it's getting worse. For all of the interviews you have to fight your way into them. Sometimes it's civil some times it's a dog fight. Today was not that bad, but I do not like "photographer sandwiches."

I am done for the day and now the fun begins. We are getting ready to head to New York for a little dinner and fun. I've never been there before so I'm taking lots of pictures and lets hope I don't get mugged and will be able to show them to you either in the morning or in a drunken state.