Squatting with the Competition

With four news stations bent on continuous team smotherage, there ain't alot of time to sit down in this town. But the other day I copped a squat on a county-owned bench with a couple of other deadline veterans and as, is my wont, I popped off a few snapshots. Eric and Doug barely looked up; they're used to me taking pictures by now. So while I fiddled with my digital, they acted like my kids and ignored me. Together we must have been quite a sight: three grizzled lensers sitting amid their gear, making small talk while eyeing a courthouse doorway. With the clock about to strike four bells, we ALL had other places to be. But the subject of our coverage was deep inside the marble edifice and until he or his handlers appeared, we weren't about to budge...

So we sat and chatted - about what exactly I don't remember. One thing we didn't talk about was Sydney Lowe ll, twenty-three year old son of N.C. State basketball coach and, if police evidence is to be believed, straight up thug. Lowe was the reason we convened after all. While we watched the smokers congregate outside the courthouse door, young Sydney pled his case deep within. Or his lawyers did, anyway. After all, when you're facing mutliple charges involving robbery, kidnapping and brandished weapons, notarized mouthpieces are a must. Who better to explain how a life of privilege led to such destruction, how 'social phobias' and too much Ecstasy were the real villians here - not this nice young man in the sharply tailored suit...

Back outside, there were few social phobias on display and ectasy of any kind was nil. Instead, there was idle banter about the insufferable heat - platitudes peppered with the boops and beeps of three separate cell phones. Looking around, I wondered for not the first time how we gathered news when the only available phones were stored in randomly placed transparent closets. I was about to ask my cohorts - whose data-gathering habits date back as far as mine - when a few locally famous faces appeared at the door. Reporters, discs in hands and details on their minds, raced for nearby live trucks and motioned for us to follow. We did - without even finishing our thoughts. There'll be plenty of time for that the next time we gather - which by my calculations - should be somewhere between now and a half-past inconvenience.

Now, you were saying?