stuff

this week didn't get off to a great start - worked a semi-split on monday, since i was solo that day - wanted to go to the reporter's meeting and just check in on any potential daily assignments, and then volleyball that night - the day-side assn. turned out to be a bust - couldn't get it organized to write/shoot that day, so then it was just sports....i thought i'd try to find a feature at the game, since the story that didn't work had been lated to be page 1 - got to vball, was striking out on finding a feature, but that turned out to be a good thing in a way, because when i got back to the office and popped my card in, it came up 0 images in folder - what the heck? i saw the virus scan going through hundreds of files, so i stuck it back in the camera - same thing - zippo on card - man, what a sick, sinking feeling washes over you - i fire up Bryan's computer, since his has image rescue on it - but everytime i launch it, up pops the "application has unexpectedly quit" message - and after the 7th or 8th try, it really wasn't that unexpected anymore let me just say - turns out that was old software that wouldn't run on our updated macs anymore, so pretty much nothing i could do  - left the card and a big note and voice mails with everyone coming in in the morning - HELP and be prepared for no sports fotos for your section front....so that was monday - second work day in a row that i found myself leaving in tears....stinks.....

they were able to retrieve all the images on the card - i guess they can just essentially reformat themselves - haven't had that happen before - the good things out of all this are that they are getting us updated software so we can just take care of it ourselves right away, and i found a new spot i like to shoot volleyball net action from

yesterday was the opening of the new Walmart supercenter - woo hoo!!! there weren't the huge crazy crowds that i thought there'd be, but there's something just really funny about this moment that happened when i was hanging out trying to shoot the greeter - she looks about as confused as to why these people walked in and started pointing at her as i was! it's funny though, to me at least.....

later, one iof our reporters came over to say the fire investigators would be at the scene of an apartment fire that had happened the other night, could i go or should he shoot something - heck no - please, i mean we've been practically begging for things to shoot! so, i get there, and the investigator's just getting in, and the woman who lived there is there as well getting what she can salvage of her and her toddler son's belongings - they both made it out safely thankfully, but i can't believe they did! everything except the back bedrooms were charred and melted - her tv was just an amorphic blob of black plastic - and the paint was bubbled and peeling off the wall - furniture melted - just crazy, crazy what fire does to things....but, like i've said before, and as the reporter and i were talking about later, there is something strangely almost tragically beautiful about it all - but the smell, not so much - good god, i think i was tasting it for like an hour later....

the really sad part is that the fire started from candles she had burning in the living room - she was using them because she's had financial problems, lost her job, and she'd just had her electricity shut off - so it was the only source of light she had.....really tragic....and scary, because i burn candles all the time! to see what can happen if you're not really careful is just scary!

anyway, better day yesterday - no tears, actual assignments, even though i did try to do a little feature hunting later...to no avail...now that school's back in, the afternoons are a hard time to find anything going on....but i'm hoping for autumnish features soon - it's feeling like it...our weather has been that cool low 70's, sunny - perfect fall days! it's time to go for a walk in the woods or a pumpkin patch or something cool like that! i love the fall!