Small World.

First, let me just say, Owwww!

I'm sitting in the cafeteria at work. Had a dental appointment this morning and it seemed easier to just roll into work rather than drive back home. I needed a loose filling replaced, so I'm kind of grumpy because going to the dentist, getting numbed up and not eating tends to do that to me.

Still, things are pretty smooth right now. Had an easy day yesterday. Tried very hard to grab a bit of news to put on TV, but it just didn't happen.

For the most part I'm glad and I'll tell you why.



I was sent out about 6:30pm to meet another crew in Whittier. Hollywood to Whittier at 6:30pm isn't completely traffic free, but it could have been worse. Shucks, it could have been 5:30pm.

Rita Garcia and her photographer Nick Mercado were heading to Whittier because of an Amber Alert. Children were missing and threats had been made. Sorry, but I never got the full story. I just knew we had a little over an hour to meet up in Whittier and put Rita on TV.



We arrived at nearly the same time. Rita and Nick from the South and I was coming up on the location from the North. They waved at me as we passed each other at an intersection.

The story was over.



The suspect had turned himself in and the children were safe. Yay, but the station still wanted a liveshot from us. It was about 7:50pm and they still wanted us for the top of the 8:00pm show. Nick and I started throwing the gear out and I ran up the mast.

We hit one bump in the road because I wanted to set up the liveshot for HD. We're still having some issues in our system and sometimes it just takes a little more time to get the signal locked in.

We didn't have the time.

I bailed on the HD signal, went back to standard definition and changed the cabling to match.

Rita was in front of the camera, the IFB was dialed up and Nick had her framed up.

I think there was less than twenty seconds to spare when the anchors tossed to Rita and she was live. No HD, but we made slot.

Sometimes that's as good as it gets.

After the live hit, we dropped the mast and packed away the gear. Rita and I went cruising for news in the Long Beach area and Nick went to help on another liveshot. It was just a slow news night and we never made it back on TV.

My dentist, who lives in Long Beach, saw us driving around the downtown area. That's what I was saying, small world.

Blogged with the Flock Browser