« Moving to Mt Nittany | Main | So Out of Shape »
August 10, 2006
On-Air TV Weather Debut
I guess Matt M. thought I was ready enough to go on the air that he put me on the schedule for today. That was totally fine by me, I've been fairly eager to get a chance to do this stuff for real, even though it means I have to wear a shirt, tie and sportcoat. Fortunately, through the magic of TV, I'm still able to get away wearing shorts and sandals with all that! Seeing people wearing shorts with a suitcoat, shirt and tie isn't that uncommon an occurrence in Walker Building actually, but I'm almost tempted to wear that combo out and about once or twice, just to see the reaction I'd get out of people, hehe. But anyway, I think my first time doing this whole TV weather thing "for real" (even though CNET Weather is taped, not live) went pretty well. I know I messed up in a couple places, and there definitely some things I can improve upon (such as not spending a really long stretch looking and talking straight at the camera), but overall I was pleased. I must say I was somewhat disappointed with the physical quality of the tape when it was aired on CNET though, either they have a really crappy VCR/AV system or we need to buy some new VHS tapes. There's no CNET next week, so it'll be almost two weeks before I go on the air again. I'd gotten used to the sound of my voice from doing radio, so that doesn't seem quite so odd to me anymore (though it always will sound a little odd listening to a recording of myself), but tape-delay or not it's still a very weird experience for me to watch myself on TV... But this is fun, I really enjoy making my own forecast, making the graphics and then presenting it all on camera.
This evening I went up to Tussey Mountain with Jon, Vic, Jacob, Arden, Daniel & Katie to the 4th week of Wingfest. It was quite the gorgeous evening, particularly when compared with the night I went two weeks ago, when it started pouring an hour and a half after we got there. There were some really good wings there this week, particularly from the Osceola House, including their delicious Hot Butter Garlic flavor. I could definitely see myself eating a full order of those.
A very interesting article appeared in yesterday's USA Today about global warming. Much of it was a very frank and intellectually and scientifically honest discussion about global warming by Dr Craig Bohren, Professor Emeritus of Meteorology here at Penn State. I haven't ever read or heard anything in this whole debate before that's anywhere near as open and straightforward as Bohren's discussion, especially listing his biases, and the shortcomings of both sides of the argument. I would very highly recommend this article to anyone who's at all curious about getting a very fair picture of the whole global warming issue as it currently stands.
And thank goodness I don't have any plans to be flying on a plane anytime soon. At least we can count this as a major victory in the War on Terror, with the British police foiling the plot to bring down 6-10 trans-Atlantic passenger flights with liquid explosives. Maybe this will serve to remind people of the fact that we are in a war with people whose goal is to kill and terrorize civilians (us), instead of sticking to military targets like would happen in a conventional war. And maybe people will wake up to the fact that we are most likely in World War III already, a war against radical Islamofascism, and that it's a many-pronged war that will take a good deal of time and determination in order to come out victorious.
As for other current happenings about potential terrorism going on in our own backyard, two college students from Michigan were recently arrested with thousands of dollars of cash, a bunch of trackphones, info on various flights, and a map of all the Wal-Mart stores in a multi-state area. There's no good reason you need to be buying 600 trackphones and selling them to one person...
And is Iran planning an August 22nd surprise? I wouldn't put anything past that nut-job Ahmadinejad. He's itching for a large-scale war, and the prospect of mutually assured destruction isn't a deterrent to him, which is rather scary.
Posted by Jared at August 10, 2006 11:47 PM
Comments
That is so cool! You were on TV!!! Thats so weird you can wear shorts underneath like that and they can't tell. Can't wait to see you on Kare 11 in a few years!
Posted by: Jill at August 20, 2006 03:17 PM