The Pot Shack

"What was the worst job you ever had?", asked a favorite website message board. I pondered over it, and for once the answer had nothing to do with TV News.Remember the part of the Guns and Roses song "Welcome To The Jungle", where Axl Rose screams "YOU'RE IN THE JUNGLE BABEEEEE!"? Hearing that always takes me back to the worst job I've ever had.

It was aboard my first ship during my far from illustrious naval career. Fresh from tech school, I was eager to show my newly-learned radar reading prowess in the cushy confines of Combat Information Center. No such luck. A burly Chief with a bad tattoo soon informed me ALL junior enlisted had to serve three months 'mess crankin' - the U.S. Navy's indentured servant program designed to staff their many kitchens.

It wasn't so bad at first - pushing a mop on the messdecks was something I'd done plenty of in boot camp. Ever the schemer, I soon weaseled my way into a cooking gig in the Chief's Mess. For about a week I had it made - cooking up burgers to order for senior enlisted, and eating every third jumbo shrimp that passed my way. The food was GREAT, a far cry from the dogfood they fed us on the messdecks. Soon I was trying to figure out how to smuggle this top-shelf chow out of the kitchen
to sell belowdecks.

I never got a chance to perfect my plan, though. To make a long story only a little shorter, something I said to a humourless Master chief was misconstrued as a smart aleck remark (I know, I was as shocked as you are). Before I could swipe another jumbo shrimp for the road I was being escorted several decks below to a terrifying place I'd only heard about...

The Pot Shack, a 12 by 12 foot closet with large industrial sinks lining every wall. Just off the junior enlisted mess decks, it was where our fellow slaves brought every dirty pot, pitcher and baking pan used in feeding the troops. But there was no automatic washing machine. No, that was my job.

For two solid months I, along with a guy from Coco Beach, Florida whom everyone called 'Maggot', manned the two, wildly whipping oversized hot water sprayers that hung from the overhead. We'd pull ten hour shifts, scrubbing, spraying and cussing as ceiling-high stacks of food-encrusted cookware backed up outside. With steam rising from the dish-filled sinks, visibility was pretty nil inside the Pot Shack.

Not that there was anything to see. From morning to night, we were soaking wet as we reached into three foot deep sinks of scalding water with two feet of protective gloves (you do the math). No matter how hard we busted those suds, we never, ever, ever got caught up. The two losers who relieved us every evening never failed to bitch about the leftover dirty dishes and they'd always pay us back in return the following mornings.

There was also no love for the Pot Shack Warriors. As our fellow shipmates walked by, they always paused to mock and sneer - laughing at our slumped, soaking wet forms. If it weren't for the battered waterproof cassette player strapped to the bulkhead blaring late eighties metal, I may have lost my mind inside that scalding hot prison.

Instead I hunkered down and did my time, banging my head to Maggot's musical selection while I scraped burnt cheese off of three foot wide baking pans and asking myself why in the heck I'd ever joined the Navy in the first place. However, Maggot was less troubled by our plight, seeming content to scrub the days away. He loved his tunes and played the then new "Appetite For Destruction" cassette about forty times a shift. Every time "Welcome to The Jungle" came to that certain part of the song, when Axl Rose asked, "Do you know where you are?!?...Maggot would lift his head and scream, "YOU'RE IN THE POT SHACK BABEEEE!!!" And then he would bang his head with glee as he scrubbed at abaking pan that had been used ten thousand times.

These days I only think about The Pot Shack whenenever I hear that song, or when some well-groomed reporter, who's never done a minute of hard labor in his life, is complaining about his job.

Taking the Tower 4

Fla-BOOOOOM!

Every muscle in my body flexed as the white hot blast consumed everything around me. In the sliver of a second that it took the concussion grenade to detonate, sound eclipsed sight, dust motes became projectiles and I just about dropped a very expensive camera. As the echos of the blast bounced from wall to ceiling to floor and back again, I remained very still, trying to wrap my brain around what had just happened.

Flash Bang. A SWAT team's favorite tool of diversion. I'd seen (and felt) them used before in training but never so unexpectedly, and never inside such a small enclosure. The very volume of the explosion was painful. Though only a fraction of a wartime ordinance, the flash bang rendered everything instantly irrelevant when it erupted from the corner of the room. The force blew the helmet off the SWAT team member closest to it, the unmistakable sound of it's thin plastic shell skittering across the concrete floor providing a delicate filligree against the blasts painfully bass echo.

When my vision DID return, I froze like a statue, absorbing the sound and wind and light as it slowly evaporated into shadowy daylight, my eyes darting around the room for signs of injury and finding none. The SWAT team were milling about and looking at the floor, already piecing together how they'd set off the booby trap. Everyone looked pretty casual but the rapid breathing sounds coming from behind their face masks told me even they weren't expecting a concussion grenade to be stashed amid all those cardboard boxes.

Only then did I think to look at my camera. As I turned my head toward the viewfinder, the red 'Record' light stared back, a beacon in the dark that told me I'd be able to relive the proceeding moments ad infinitum.

Through the ringing in my ears, I heard the sounds of Erik's voice coming through the headphones around my neck.

"Hey Stew - you need to come outside and change pants?"

My drawers were fine, but I stumbled down the stairwell anyway. Nothing else I captured on camera would top what I'd just recorded and I was anxious to watch the footage. Over lunch. In a hillbilly diner down the road. As I stumbled out of the training tower, still a bit punch drunk from absorbing the blast, I realized that, for better or worse, I still liked my job - deadlines, flash bangs and all.

Passion Play Interruptus

I was trailing a group of enthusiastic ac-TORS on foot across the campus of Wake Forest University as they led a roving audience through an impassioned performance of "The Life Of Christ".

Several times I caught nasty looks from all involved as I inadvertently got in between the audience and the performers, my brightly-logo'd gear-laden form apparently upsetting the authenticity of their wandering outdoor drama.

It all came to a head just as Christ was about to be betrayed by his apostles. As the actor playing The Messiah gathered his flock around a tree, he paused for dramatic effect - the band of thespians and spectators hanging on his every word…

"WEE-DEE-DEE-DEE-DEE-DEE-DEE-DEE-DEE-DEE!"

From it's low-slung position on my hip, my newly-issued pager erupted in a fit of high-pitched screams. Worse yet, with my hands full of camera it me took several prolonged seconds to lay hands on it and silence the bloody thing.

By that time, the Messiah, the Twelve Apostles and the gang of angry patrons were boring holes in my skulls with evil death-ray eyes. Forgoing my plans of sticking around for a sound-bite, I immediately slunk off like a modern-day leper - grateful not to have been stoned to death by the overzealous crowd.

Soon after I figured how to set my pager to vibrate, but to this day, I hate theatre people.

Sidewalk Karaoke

My Monday started on the steps of the County Courthouse, making small talk with familiar faces while complete strangers set up microphones and a podium. The topic at hand: a last minute clemency plea from supporters of a death row inmate. The awaiting media crush consisted of three: myself, another TV photog whose name I've never known (even though we've loitered for hours outside various scenes of tragedy together), and a newspaper photographer with the poetic moniker of H. Scott Hoffman.

Together we stood under the morning sun, commenting as lensmen will that the light is never quite right. A passing homicide detective I haven't seen in years stopped by to chat, telling me he had a new baby and asking me if I remembered that long summer afternoon in the barrio. But before I could answer, Daryl Hunt walked by and I had to get to work.

Not quite a year ago, the state of North Carolina released inmate Daryl Hunt after DNA evidence pointed to another suspect in the murder of a Winston-Salem woman. Hunt walked, but not before serving 18 years of a life sentence. Today he stood on the edge of the small crowd, his trademark skull cap and blissful glint giving him away, Within seconds my colleague and I swooped in, attaching lapel microphones and rolling tape on the affable exoneree.

Ten questions and eight answers later, Hunt melted back into the crowd and the promised rally began. I'm not sure what it says under 'rally' in the dictionary, but if there's a picture of a half dozen senior citizens staring into space while a portly legal wonk mumbles into an badly-overmodulated microphone, then yes Virginia, this was a 'rally'.

Behind the viewfinder, I rolled my eyes and watched the 'Record' light glow. On stage, the morning sun threw harsh shadows on the speaker's back, through my expensive lens, he was nothing more than a pudgy black silhouette. I wrestled with my iris and wondered for the millionth time who, if anyone, coordinates these events.

No one apparently, because the cheesy karaoke microphone sounded like just that, making the quickly-aging crowd to lean in a little and tap their earpieces. Those who turned up their hearing aids quickly regretted it, as a city worker's unbridled leaf blower soon drowned out any hope of public discourse. Thus, the deperate pleas of a death row inmate's family were swallowed up by the sounds of city sidewalk maintenance.

I love a good rally.

Pricey Mudhole

"I don't think we're gonna make the live shot..."

Taking the Tower 3

“AIK ECK EX EVEL!”

The SWAT team leader barked orders to his men, but his gas mask muffled the words. The team seemed to understand tough, for their heads moved in different directions all at once - each member surveying a different quadrant of the heavy metal stairwell. I trailed behind, lens up and riding the iris as we all shuffled up the stairs. Trying to ignore the pain in my shoulder, I dropped the camera low and got a shot of the their chemical suit booties taking a grunt-filled step at a time.

Is this any way for a grown man to make a living? - I thought for not the first time. This crap was a blast when I was twenty two, but at thirty-seven, I’m beginning to feel a little silly. I got friends ascending corporate ladders, and I’m here chasing these goons up a tower. Country boys playin’ Cops and Robbers, and me still playin’ Tee Vee. Wonder if that little hillbilly diner down the road has chicken pastry today?

The needles on my camera’s audio meter danced crazily and jarred me out of my daydream haze. The clang of the oxygen tanks punctuated the cadence of the men's mechanized breathing and my on-board microphone recorded it all. Watching the needles dance, I judged the nat sound’s quality.

“What about Newark? Say I come back on Monday?” -- Erik’s voice crackled on the other channel, a distant conversation about a distant place. Shaking off the sound, I pulled out to a wide shot. As the men rounded the corner and out of sight, I stopped a moment in the stairwell, flipping switches on my camera and trying to think sequentially.

That’s important when you’re gathering news images. Uncle Jesse may wear out his camcorder’s zoom button every Thanksgiving, but the TV News photog opts for rock steady shots that will fit into tightly-edited sequences. Wide. Medium. Tight. It’s like storyboarding comic book panels in your head, blocking action scenes as they happen, mentally editing the footage as you shoot it -- a tricky feat when you’re chasing a SWAT Team up a winding stairwell and your back hurts.

Up on the second floor, the SWAT team fanned out, leaving the bright sunshine of the stairwell for the dusty shadows of the cavernous space. Through the viewfinder I spotted a mannequin on the floor, strapped to a stretcher that looked broken. A jumble of cardboard boxes took up one wall, but it was hard to see. With all the dust in the air, I started to worry about vulnerable electronics of my brand new camera. But there was nothing I could do now, so I checked the battery strength indicator in my viewfinder’s reassuring haze.

In front of me, the SWAT team medic advanced cautiously on the department store dummy on the stretcher. Through my viewfinder , I tracked him as he squatted over the mannequin and checked for the unlikeliest of pulses. Once he determined the victim would never again model fine fall fashions at JC Penney’s, he moved on.

“YA-LL BETTA GET OUT! - I’M A KILL EM ALL!!!

The voice from the PA speaker before now rang down from two flights up. It sounded even closer. I even flinched a little at the sound, though I knew it was only an out of town deputy holding a room full of mannequins hostage. The SWAT team shared my feelings, and picked up their surveillance sweep of the dusty space. As the dust cleared, the room grew bigger and I noticed the training sergeant standing in the far corner, a no-nonsense toothpick jutting from his bushy moustache. A look that told me not to point my camera his way.

Turning back to the SWAT team I readjusted my shot. A team member was poking through the wall of boxes while the others took a moment to check each other’s oxygen tank. I put one knee to the ground and my camera on the other. I was trying to decide which shot to go for next when I heard what sounded like a spoon bouncing on the cement floor.

That’s when all the air, sound and color left the room.

Next time, the conclusion...

Headset Perry

I remember one junior producer from a few shops back, who thought his new gig as weekend producer required him to assume the air of a battlefield general. Let's call him Perry.

Perry was...a dubious individual. He favored wearing a telephone headset, and would pace up and down the cubicles having loud conversations with people I'm pretty sure weren't even on the line. His co-workers abused him with names like 'drive-thru boy' and the like, but Perry only swelled with pride, certain his colleagues were only jealous of his newfound authority.

All in all, he was harmless. And clueless. Once while roaming the halls on a weekend shift, he rang up the on-call manager on his headset with a red-hot alert:

"Hey, this is Perry. Just thought you might wanna know we got some flourescent lights flickering in the hallway here at the station..."

That particular newsbreak earned him an instant arse chewing from the surly on-call manager, who threatened to come down and perform an invasive anal procedure with his nifty telephone headset. Perry declined.

But the eager young producer worked hard to avoid me, after an episode I'm not especially proud of. I myself was lounging at home one weekend when the phone rang. It was Perry, out of breath with excitement...

"Stew, there's a trailer park burning to the ground just south of you and I need you to roll everything you got on it!"

I fought the urge to tell him 'everything I had' was a filthy Ford Explorer with only fumes in the gas tank. But I thought better of it and was soon behind the wheel, racing toward the reported conflagration with visions of burning mobile home residents in my head.

Imagine my relief when the trailer park in question was NOT engulfed in flames. Instead the modest neighborhood was in the throes of a crowded block party. The gathered masses cheered as I pulled up, and soon I was sampling the finest in trailer park cheeseburgers.

Between bites, I pieced together what HAD happened. One of the charcoal grills had flamed up a bit too high for comfort, and the gathered Dads tipped it over and shoveled trailer park soil over it to extinguish the blaze. Someone HAD called the fire department, but the alarm was cancelled before the fire trucks could even arrive.

Looking down at the three foot wide circle of burnt grass, I fished my cell phone from a pocket and dialed the station.

"Hey Perry," I said "Nothing to it. A grill got out of control but the folks here put it out. Fire department didn't even make it out. I'm headed home..."

Perry's reply almost made me choke on my cheeseburger.

"Yeah, well, uh - I tell ya what, why don't you go ahead shoot video anyway and bring it in. I'll decide whether there's 'nothing to it' or not..."

I noticed one of the trailer park Dads looking at me - no doubt wondering what was making my face turn purple. I turned and walked out of earshot, feeling the blood change gears in my veins...

"Perry, I don't who the #$@! you think you are, but if you expect me to shoot this, you got those headphones on too tight..."

Though I should have stopped there, I continued -hurling every invective I learned in boot camp. It felt good at the time, but the next Monday I got called into the corner office and asked why I'd reduced the new weekend producer to a quivering mass of junior-executive jello.

They all laughed when I told them why, but I was warned not to treat the producing staff like boot camp recruits. Good advice.