Traffic

This bottle of hair spray must be ten years old. It was at least two years since I last used it. Does hairspray go bad? No, but it does harden and clog the sprayer, which I remembered when I pressed the pump and the stuff shot everywhere. Some even landed on my hair. Good thing I had thought to close my eyes.

It's not every day that I use hairspray. It's also not every day any more that I appear on television. I had a one-day stand as the morning traffic anchor for WTSP-TV this morning and the first attempt at using the hair dryer went well enough that I decided to spray the look into place.


Once done, I had overcome the biggest obstacle of the day. I've done the traffic for Tampa Bay's CBS affiliate ten days scattered between June and now. It's not enough to get into a rhythm but I've gotten comfortable enough that doing the job is routine. OK there was that one time I came back from the restroom and forgot to put my microphone back on before my next report. That was a shame too because the weather anchor mentioned that today was National Boss Day right before I came on and when my turn came I wondered aloud, "Isn't every day boss' day?" It drew laughs from the anchor desk and from the studio crew but they were the only ones who heard me. There are many things that kill a joke. If you have to explain it, for one. If no one hears it, for another. I reached around, plucked the microphone off the desk behind me and held it to my lapel for the rest of that report.


When you appear on live television 12 times over the course of four hours with no script not all of them will go perfectly smoothly but I managed to spare myself any moments that could haunt me later when they appeared on YouTube.

It might not sound like a grand ambition but it will do for now.

---

(Here for the story about Chris's Plumbing
Service in Riverview, FL? It's right here.