I finished up a short, 2-day week, inside the newsroom.
Our weekend morning show features some interesting guests. We interviewed folks from the State Fair last month. One of them folded up dollar bills and made these cute origami pigs for us.
My anchor and meteorologist were tickled by the pigs. I said I could have used it for some chips from a vending machine.
Still, the pigs were cute and they looked neat on TV after the cameras zoomed in for their close-ups.
This weekend, I produced my first PM news shows at my station.
Crazy good times. On Saturday afternoon, I got a call that set my newsroom into battle mode. The caller said he had some breaking news and he wanted to make sure I had a pen ready.
I’m wary when I get calls like this. Many times, it’s from a PR person who trying to get our attention for an an exhibit, beauty pageant, political candidate or proposition. I think it’s unethical that they use the term “breaking news” for this purpose. I still take down their information and make sure it gets out to the rest of the newsroom.
Well, this caller understood the definition of “breaking news”. He gave us a major tip on a murder investigation in Fairfield and an arrest in Las Vegas. After I got off the phone with him, we sent a live crew down to Fairfield to start digging and we started calling everybody with a connection to this case. I got hold of a news station in Vegas. I also started dialing up Vegas PD and Fairfield city leaders.
The afternoon went by in a blur as we dug up crime scene video, ordered graphics on the murder suspect and punched up city council members for live phoners with our anchor.
In fact, I left a message on the voice mail of another city council member who passed away hours earlier. We found out about the circumstances of his death during one of the phone interviews.
I thrived on that adrenaline rush I get from chasing down big news stories. I almost forgot about eating dinner. Then my stomach started kicking my ass.
Later, I said a prayer in my heart for the two dead city leaders and their families.
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