Either there's been a rift in the time-news continuum, or key members of the Fourth Estate have switched brains with my teenage daughters. How ELSE do you explain a picture of two battle-hardened photogs gaping at their phones like a couple of food court zombies? What's up, fellas? Hello Kitty drop a new cat counting app? Justin Bieber tickets go on sale? Candyland finally offer dual citizenship? Hey, how you spend your downtime is up to you, but it's awfully hard to mythologize our breed when you guys go all Hannah Montana on me. Hmmm? What's that? The President is in town and you're killing time during the security sweep? No problem, I once knitted an entire Cosby sweater waiting for Bill Clinton to polish off an intern.
Not a lot of folks know this, but Santa Claus himself spends the off-season under glass. No kidding - nine months out of the year he shoots morning television down in San Diego. From what I understand, the local mostly leave him alone. Good thing, too - 'cause the old guy really gets into it. Rising early to run cable, Standing all handheld for hours on end, nursing his girlish figure every day at a different drive-thru... why, it's an exiled figurehead's total fantasy! Best of all - none of those filthy elves running around the place! At least that's what ole Kris Kringle said when he caught me stealing batteries out of his live truck. Said he was gonna out me on some kind of list --
--Hmmm? What's that? It's NOT Santa Claus? It's some dude named 'Big Al, the Weatherman's Pal' - that elusive shooter for Meteorologist Dave Scott on Good Morning San Diego Weekends on KUSI Channel 9?
Indulge me a moment, for there are things far more important than local TV news. Like, my bike! It's a standard enough Trek with front suspension and a rigid seat, but when I climb aboard it becomes a heavenly vessel, one capable of defying gravity, folding time and bloodying my shins. It is quite possibly, my favorite possession. But for the better part of the past four years I've let it gather dust in the corner of my garage. Now, however, I'm back in its rock-hard saddle, thanks to a break in the weather and a totally intact mid-life crisis. No, I'm not gonna go drop coin I don't have on a shiny news Corvette (What kind of choad do you think I am?), but I WILL toss the Trek in my truck, find a winding path through the local jungle and forget my troubles as I surf the Earth. What I won't do is wiggle into those biker clothes, you know - the gay superhero look. Hey, you can 'don't ask don't tell' all you want, but if you're hanging out in the woods in day-glo spandex, it might be time to have that talk with the wife. But I digress.
Of course, to really get off track you need a narrow, twisting path full of bowls, berms and other nut-busting luxuries. Here in the Piedmont, we got that in spades. Why within a stone's throw of my humble abode, lies the kind of tail-derailing trail that can make a forty-something father of two feel a quarter of his age. That, or end up in traction. And while there are other, more fabled bike paths around these parts, I've become enamored of a place called 'Blue Heron'. With far fewer roots than I'm used to a nice, open flow, Blue Heron features the kind of jostling topography I could only dream of when I lived closer to the ocean. In fact, I'd only lived here a couple of months when a photog by the name of Allen Horton turned me on to the endless network of bike trails that tattoo our many parks. Since then, I've reveled in the scenery, the solitude and serenity of this thing called 'singletrack'. You can have your skinny-tired cycle and lime-green Lycra tights. I'll be down in the holler, rocketing over hilltops and trying NOT to wrap my torso around a tree.
Still, I had to know where I stand, er crouch. So I called on some folks with chain grease in their DNA. Jerry Wolford and Michael McQueen are friends of the blog and its somewhat humble author. Now, technically, they're both newspaper employees and talented ones at that. But I know them as crime scene connoisseurs, recorders of the the highest order and bruised enthusiasts of the pedaled pursuit. What I didn't realize is how hard they ride. The day I joined them on the Blue Heron trail, they easily outpaced me without breaking so much as a complimentary sweat. The nerve... not to mention the corpuscles! That HAD to be why 'Jelly and Da Mangler' could carry on a casual conversation while I fought to keep up and catch my breath. McQueen especially - with his BMX past - can turn a handful of scattered pebbles into glorious air. Why, I saw him bounce off a woodchuck, taco his wheel and still beat me back to the truck. That's including the breather he took while I stopped to hack up a few ghosts of cigarette past.
Though I felt like I'd been run over by a dump truck the following day, I did return to the scene of the crime long enough to turn the tables on someone even less prepared to bike than I. Weaver - he of the positive attitude and McGyver tattoo - brought his boys, bikes and brawn along for a Thanksgiving morning ordeal that would leave anyone with a monster appetite - provided you still had any teeth left at the end of the ride. As for the Weavers, they left with their bicuspids intact, but not before spending a couple of hours negotiating hairpin turns and unexpected dips at less than breakneck speed. Yeah, we weren't the fastest cyclists out there that day, but we were among the giddiest. Don't believe me? Watch the video below and listen to Weaver giggle, huff and snort. Those, gentle readers, are the sounds of a grown man shedding a few dozen years along with a couple of quarts of sweat. I'm not saying he had a good time, but the last time i heard him squeal like that, his Droid was wedged in his watch pocket and stuck on vibrate.
Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go pry some tree bark from my teeth.
There's certainly nothing I can add to this brilliant send-up of photogs and boot camp, so why even try? Enjoy... then check out the priceless thread it inspired...
Pay no attention to the man behind the van. He's only doin' time. Okay, so a twenty year gig in local television ISN'T a prison sentence; those of us with numbers under our necks just like to pretend it is. See, I'm a lifer. I staggered into this silly business two decades ago and haven't worked up enough momentum to stagger out. I'm okay with that. Sure, I've seen many inmates plot their own escape - even helped a few clear the wall. Back in 1993, I myself even bailed. Fed up with being a one-man-band in a thankless bureau, I ignored my gut instinct and took a job pumping out commercial dreck for the man. I hated it and it hated me. So I followed some of the smartest folks I knew to a place called El Ocho. There I found a home where I could write, shoot and edit for a daily wage. Yeah - I thought my news bosses would take one look at my coterie of skills and insist I go back On Air. It did not happen. And as my hair's grown thinner and my glasses thicker, even I've grown less enchanted with my own reflection. So here I stand, a medium market television news photog who's pushing 44. Gimme a minute, will ya? I got to go breathe into a paper sack...
Okay, I'm back. Now, where was I? Oh yeah, teetering on the edge of a corporate stepladder. Honestly, it's a view I'm used to. Why, from way up here I can see the future of TV News and it's a broken, plastic landscape littered with the bones of poor souls like me, who never wised up enough to seek a new horizon. Or maybe that's the past. Truth is, no one knows what local TV news will look like a few years from now. Loyal viewers are dropping like overstuffed houseflies, new gadgets and fewer escudos are taking the team out of team coverage and everywhere you look, people are staring at hand-held screens, chortling at what some neighbor just out on their taco platter. I suppose we gargoyles of the Fourth Estate should continue to squint, cast scary shadows across the land as we fly away, the remains of our once beloved institution crumbling under our stony claws. Well, as my esteemed Father would say, "piss on that."
Honestly, I'm optimistic about the future of TV News. Sure, it's about to shrink, ripple, and remold itself into something new, but can you name another industry more overripe for reform? I can't, but then again, my eyes are a little off from staring at life through a tube all these many moons. But new bifocals aside, I'd say my vision's pretty clear. And what I see is a whole lot less people. Already, studios and newsrooms have found ways to do without half their staffs. There's more (or less) where that came from, for sure. And while I only wish joblessness on a precious few, no one can say they haven't been warned. Really, it's been in all the trades, not to mention that new thing the kids call the internet. Fewer producers, smaller anchor teams, less techies underfoot... it's all a bit of a drag. Unless of course you're a competent shooter who can write, edit, shuck and jive. Then you might be tempted to think the future is kind of bright, for once we get rid of the pretty people and pretenders, all that's left will be the likes of ME.
Take a moment to let that soak in. Feel free to lunge for the remote if you must.
Just don't get me wrong. I'm not celebrating the extinction of long-held jobs. Nor am I predicting any of this will make for a better viewing experience there at home. Quite the opposite, actually, for over the next five to ten years, broadcast news is going to get even uglier than it is today. But it's my utmost hope and half-held belief that whatever form local television news takes, it will be grittier, harder to watch, finally free of most of its hokum. I for one can't wait, for if local TV news stayed the same, I'd be even less inclined to show my lifer card in public. As it is, I'm still a bit hesitant. Too many talented people have let the fold already. Perhaps if I had more exciting options, I'd consider it too. As it is, I'm stuck under glass, biding my time, watching and waiting in hopes new opportunities will crop up before I resign myself to pumping out reruns. Am I kidding myself? Perhaps, but nowhere near as much as the spunky new reporter chick who's counting on a posse of underlings to do her heavy lifting. Who knows, I might even get out from behind this van...
Attention Rookies: Beware the dude looking totally chill in the middle of a shit-storm. He's about to block your shot. It's nothing personal. He's just been here before. He knows the podium and the players, his sat truck is perfectly parked just outside the door and he already knows what he's having for lunch. Don't hate him. He used to be you. But the rub of ten thousand newscasts has left him more than sore. It's left him strangely centered, gifted with a sense of Zen so implacable you'd be ill-advised to jack with it. Give him room. Know that he's made every mistake in the book, including a few he invented himself. So do yourself a favor. Be nice. He'll be nice back, for if decades of dealing with drifters, incumbents and news directors has taught him anything, it's that you don't HAVE to be an asshole just because you can.
Oh, and remember this: his time is more precious than yours. The suits know full well the powers he's honed. They expect him to bend space and twist time without getting his mullet in an uproar. If he came in one day able to levitate, his bosses would shrug, say it's about time and immediately assign him a three part series on Teaching Anchors to Fly. He'd do it too - not because he believes in the project, but because he refuses to put anything but his best on the air. How else could he stay so smitten with such a limited field of view? Don't answer, plebe. Just know that with enough fortitude, time and grit, you too can emit the vibe of a lifer.
Who knows, you could even rock one of those Three Musketeer mustaches the ladies love so much.
