My amazing day with WUSA 9

I have a great friend Sandy who is so kind and helpful and hooked me up with WUSA news, our CBS news affiliate. Recently, I got to visit the station for their live News at Noon show.  I worked on a news set in college - was the Technical Director of our college news show - meaning I literally pushed buttons 1 through 5 when someone told me to.  Not too fancy, but I had seen TV sets before.  Still, there is a lot of magic behind the scenes, and that was super fun to see!  JC Hayward was friendly and so cool under pressure and was the ultimate professional.  She sits on the media throne in the photo above. See those robocams? They move around themselves.  When one of the producers started calling out "30 seconds!", I swear I starting have a little panic attack for JC, but she was cool as a cucumber.

Especially cool as a cucumber when during a commercial, one of the people in the control room above heard of some breaking news on Twitter about the US Consulate in Italy.  He told her he was still checking things out, but to prepare for breaking news.  Later in the show, the news was confirmed and it was magically put on the prompter and a "breaking news" graphic was ready to run.

There was a lot of changing gears in a newscast.  From a 4 year old boy who was murdered in DC, to the guest from A Chorus Line, to the cooking segment above by one of my favorite restaurants - La Tasca - JC had the audience with her all the way.  I don't get to watch TV news a lot, but I can see how people would be loyal to a great news anchor.  

Above, JC thought a couple of plates needed to be moved.  The producer called out "40 seconds!" while everyone was madly rearranging things.  Again, I almost had a panic attack.  Everyone was cool though, and I got to see the chef begin an amazing dish of scallops and crabs!

Oh, and one of highlights of this day?  In the end, I got booked for a September 2 segment!  I'll be on that set talking about food preservation.  Ahhhh!!  Now I'm really having a panic attack!