A loading dock of our own…
Did anyone ever think it would take five trucks to put on a month long show on the road? I mean we travel like no other; we have a satellite/production truck, back-up microwave truck, a lighting truck, an F-150 full on engineering paraphernalia, and a HUGE RV. I mean…an RV, just so we can meet, eat, and fill up three parking spaces! Well, most stops when the 6 News crew shows up on location, there is always that one person or security guard that didn’t know we are supposed to be there. You know, that one person that hasn’t had their ego petted lately and the MEDIA shows up in all its glory. And it takes three acts of congress, and enough time for me to play the slowest game of Sunday morning golf, to actually get in position to begin set-up.
But on Wednesday, the Carolina Place Mall gave us THE WHOLE LOADING DOCK to ourselves. I couldn’t believe my ears. We even had security guards waiting to accommodate our entourage! Allison, our trusty leader could have even parked her Monster Truck of an SUV in the spare space. Her Chevy must have forty-eight inch tires with a six inch lift; she will be premiering in the Monster Truck competition later on this month! The point of this is…the staff at Carolina Place Mall had their ducks in a row.
A brief tangent…where did that little get your ducks in a row idiom come from? I referred to the definition of the idiom on www.dictionary.com and found the following:
– Complete one’s preparations, become efficient and well organized, as in I’m trying to get my ducks in a row before I go to Europe. This synonym for get one’s act together probably alludes to lining up target ducks in a shooting gallery.
That’s weird, comparing organization to shooting fake ducks! I guess the next time I want to get all my ducks in a row…I will just line up the random things in the office I am trying to organize and shoot them with my grandfather’s, single action .357. More like disintegration than organization.
Anyways, now that I have cleared that up…Oh what fun it is to ride in five truck caravan, hey! And our caravan found the newly renovated Carolina Place Mall Food Court ready for our three thousand feet of cable, three cameras, six wireless microphones, two dozen lights, and four festive anchors (Chris, Terri, Mike, and Chuck). I am just surprised we didn’t trip any young children with all the cable we pulled! We used so much tape to secure the cable to the floor; we had to call in reinforcements…the Carolina Place Mall support staff. Yep, they made sure those mats – covering the cable for all the cameras – were so secure that it took almost the same amount of time to play another eighteen holes of golf to rip the tape back up! No one was going to trip on their watch!
There was a lot to do at the mall. From Mike trying to take us on a “Behind the Scenes” tour of Victoria Secret – Mike remembered it was a family show –, to Santa making an early appearance, and of course….food! Yep, a taste-test of some really good turkey…Chris is still nibbling.
But the highlight of the night was the fashion show. I am not sure if the WCNC-TV Engineering staff was more excited about the fashion show or the parents of the models because they were on live television! Both were taking pictures…and not of each other! And there was a chance to check out some new gadgets from Radio Shack. Terri and Chuck got so carried away with all the radio controlled toys…that the frequency from the controller messed up the frequency of their microphones. I guess no one was really listening, they were watching Chuck trying to run everyone over with the radio controlled hovercraft! Boys and their toys??? Actually my grandfather told me that “he who dies with the most gadgets, WINS!”
Speaking of men and their toys…we are off to the Convention Center in Uptown Charlotte for the 2005 International Car Show. I hope they have the new Mini Cooper! The Road Trip roles on…ZOOM ZOOM!
Bobby
Originally posted: http://www.beloblog.com/WCNC_Blogs/blogger/archives/2005/11/a_loading_dock.html