little lost robot

Saw this delicious food advertisement today on the way to shoot a story…

Of course, this photo doesn’t show the fine print detailing how the world will certainly fall out of your butt if you end up eating one of those ‘homade’ hot dogs.

I was gonna do some fabulous, mega-post about all the behind-the-scenes stuff from the Democratic Debate in Orangeburg on Thursday, but after working 15+ hours, I decided to put it off. Instead I’ll point you to my Flickr gallery, and my DVD-style behind-the-scenes commentary on our station’s website.

I will say that it was fun. NBC really hooked-up the local affiliates, and I got to see my favorite dems up close.

…then our station would be really out of luck, as it would’ve taken out the whole photography staff at our station. Well, most of us anyway. We all gathered at the downtown baseball stadium and posed in front of the “jumbotron” - with our station logo prominently displayed behind us.

We took the shot for our staff photo that’ll be going into the National Press Photographers Association magazine and on our nifty “Medium Market Station of the Year” award. I still have no idea how we got everyone together in one spot. Kinda good thing that there wasn’t any breaking news.

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Ask the photogs around your local TV station what item they think should be put in the budget and you’ll get some similar responses: more tapes, wide angles lenses - stuff like that. But this year my station blew the entire capital budget on just one item: a stargate.

Don’t get me wrong. I mean, it’s cool to be able to instantly travel between locations (and star systems) and all that. But, sometimes I wish I just had more 9 volt batteries. Oh well.

Today I went a shot a story with the new guy. It was about how GE execs dropped in today and gave a big fat (cardboard) check to the science center. Anyway, I shot a ton of video of kids playing with the weird sea monsters, so I had to give it a try when we wrapped up shooting.

I chose to check out the freakiest, most disgusting thing they had: the horseshoe crab. Okay, so it wasn’t that bad, but I definitely wouldn’t want it crawling into my bed (or nightmares) some late night.

Earlier in the shoot, when the instructor asked, “what do you think stingrays eat?” I whispered to the surrounding kids, “it eats children!” So I kinda regretted it later when it came time to stick my arms in the tank and pull out the crab in front of those same kids. I flinched at first, and maybe made a girlish sound. But, then I remembered that the nine year-olds had no problem messing around with them, so I dove in and picked up one of those nasty bitches (and then I was all, “umm what now?” and dropped it back in a moment later).

Cooper and I had to go to the local Radio Shack today to pick-up some electronics supplies. And while the clerk was ringing up the purchase, I came across a possibly suicidal, Robosapien. [Trust me, it looked way more pathetic in person]

I say this for two reasons: 1) Its price was marked down, and that’s gotta hurt; 2) It was perched at the top aisle, ready to take a dive the moment it worked up enough energy.

Of course, I felt a brief moment of guilt when I realized that this was probably one of the bots that we forced to compete in a brutal robot deathmatch (near the phone accessories) on our lunch break several months ago. Wow. It’s a long, tragic fall from the top. Brutal game, them robot battles.

I finally pre-ordered Lord of the Rings Online. I was on the fence, but as I was running around a scary spider cave with my online pal, Melinda, I had a stunning realization: I actually was having fun. As everyone knows, I love the MMO games, but Vanguard and Everquest have gotten to be too much of a chore - and LOTR is surprisingly fun (although I have yet to find a unicorn to murder).

Anyway, if you end up on Silverlode server, give Thadlean a shout out.

Other things I’m thinking about:

I’m warming up to the new Nine Inch Nails album.
I can’t wait to cover the Democratic debate/media circus this Thursday.
I really hope Veronica Mars (and Jericho) get renewed.
It’s only a matter of time until someone puts Sanjaya and William Hung in the same room.
Did a story Friday on high school kids that compete in CSI competitions [video].

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NAB is all wrapped up (for me at least), and it’s time to send it off with some photos and “shout outs.” Below is a link to my NAB Flickr set - which I wish was much larger.

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I was wandering around the NAB show floor yesterday, came across the SNG truck vendors, and much to my surprise, found the new KPTV live truck (which has an awesome sat internet dish mounted on top).

Right away I sorta yelled, “Fox 12! Aww yeah!” like the excited weirdos that you occasionally come across while in the field.

And for old times sake, I pretended to tune in a live shot, but unfortunately I wasn’t able to get a signal out. All I know is that the problem wasn’t on my end and that it’ll be written up in the producer’s DR after the show.