Dude @ The Desk

I am a photographer. From the first day I picked up my camera to when I added the Fuzzy Mic to enhance my bag tricks. Need me to head to a house fire in the middle of the day, no problem. Time to ambush some joker who got his hands caught in the cookie jar, piece of cake. Roll out of bed to a shooting during the black of night, I got it. But in the latest evolution of the television industry you have to be able to handle many hats in the newsroom.

Take today for example, I was needed to handle the duties of the assignment desk. I had been linked to the immovable object in the newsroom. No shoots, no interviews, and no roaming around the city. Just me, the scanner, and the phones. This was a headache waiting to happen since the phones would not be quiet. The voices on the other end were constantly bombarding me with some crazy things through the hotline. People were complaining about the weather. Calls came in to ask why a train stopped in the middle of their town. Another wanted to know if I was someone who just answered the phone. While all of the verbal clutter is clogging the phone lines only one thing comes to mind, how does the assignment editor deal with this on a daily basis.

Seriously, how do they do it? After the phones went silent , I developed a new found respect for my assignment editor and the ones in newsroom across the country. They are the ones who have to deal with what to cover, who is going where, and all of the tension that goes with it. This is a job that doesn’t get a lot of recognition. I don’t know how you pull this off but somehow you to do. I’ll keep this in mind when my lovely AE gives me my next assignment. May have to bribe her also, did you know?