The temperature dropped below 70 again in Miami. You know what that means! I get to do another "cold weather" story!
Wait! Don't stop reading yet! I have a fun story to share. A story behind the story. We shot our pkg at the Art Deco festival on South Beach. After shooting our obligatory dog in a sweater shot (which we tied in nicely to the 'Hot Dog' stand. heh)--we noticed a family eating ice cream. Turns out they were from Turkey. They spoke very good english... but, my reporter and I were about to learn just how American a certain ice cream addage is...
When we do a story like this we always try to have fun with it. Make it different. (though i can't resist shooting the doggy in a sweater everytime). Otherwise, we're just eating up 1:30 of the newscast telling the viewers what they already know from the weather guy. So, to get a fun response from the ice cream eating family from Turkey, my reporter said "I scream! You scream! We all scream for ice cream!". The Turkish Dad then says "Oh, okay," he begins issuing orders to his wife and 2 kids to stand next to him "now stand here and I will count to 3. Then we will scream 'ice cream'. Ready? Okay. 1...2...3... ICE CREAM!!". They took the saying literally. They thought we wanted them to look into the camera and shout 'ice cream!' at the top of their lungs. We thanked them and told them good job. hehe. It was a cute moment. And yes... we put it in our story. :)

Now it's time for Hartman's portion of the blog:


Thanks to Christine for pointing out Hartman's talent for album cover impressions.

Today was an okay day... But yesterday was a GOOD day! We did a story on the General Motors Collision Avoidance System. Why was that fun? Was it because they fed us lunch? Hey, I'm easy to please... Free lunch would make my day. As good as the tuna sandwich, potato salad and fresh fruit was-- the highlight was driving a car straight towards another car while trusting that this handy device will activate the brakes for us. On the left you see this little piece of technology--er--it will be little when it's finished in 5 years anyway---right now, however, it takes up the entire trunk. It can actually take control of your brakes if it deems a crash imminent. As Dave was picking up speed and heading straight for the shiny bumper ahead-- I felt like I was back in drivers ed. *flashback* Suddenly I was back in 1988. I was in the car with Mr. Whathisface and 2 other girls. For me, the nerve wracking part was never so much when I was driving-- as when one of the other 2 girls were. Not that I wasn't nervous... but one of the girls reeeeeally couldn't drive. I remember we were headed down the East side of McKay on past the cemetery when the one girl who could not drive suddenly SLAMMED THE BRAKES AND SCREAMED AT THE TOP OF HER LUNGS AND THE OTHER GIRL IN THE CAR SCREAMED AND THE TEACHER WAS GRABBING THE WHEEL THEN--- Finally, the car stopped... She had panicked because there were birds in the road. "Well, i didn't want to hit them!".... Let's just say the teacher made sure that we all understood that birds tend to fly out of the way of vehicles. *back to 2006* Our car kept speeding closer and closer to the other. Dave said he was just a moment away from hitting the brakes, but resisted. The device worked... though I'm sure you all figured that. It would not have been a good day if it hadn't! It waited until the last second it seemed. I guess in the future, cars will drive us around. I think we're a long ways off from that. :)

Later that evening Dave and I had take out. Look! My fortune cookie said you're all going to leave comments on my blog! ;)

So those are the highlights from yesterday. The highlight today? I was working alone and met a guy with the worst plumbers crack in the history of plumber crackage. Yeah. Cookie didn't metion anything bout that.

Here's something for all you Stargate fans out there. And I mean die hard fans. You have to be a die hard fan to get this or find it even slightly amusing! I found the funniest video comparing Stargate to StarWars. Now, and I know there will be some eyerolling here, but I've actually thought about their similar character formula. The person who created this video put waaay more thought in it than me! Enjoy! And remember new Stargates on Friday at 8p and 9p eastern on the SciFi channel! Hallowed are the Ori!

And now: an important message from Mr. T

(click on the above picture)

Working weekends for a CBS station during football season rocks! Often, we don't have our first show until 10p. What does that mean for us field crews? Well, for one it means our last show may not go on until midnight because of the game. But it also means---Dinner!

One of my favorite places to go is Boston Market. On the left is the BM we ate at in Margate, FL on Sunday. Why am I telling you all of this? Well, as it turns out, the most... blogable...thing of the day happened in this restaurant.

My reporter/husband came back from restroom, sat down and said "Ooookay. That was wierd.". Imagine walking into a restroom and finding the stall door wide open, with some guy sitting on the pot taking a bm (this time, bm does not stand for boston market). It made for great dinner conversation.

In keeping with the theme of this post I sought out a link to share with you on the history of toilet paper. I've looked it up before and it's really interesting, scary, funny, disgusting...etc In Rome I think it was, they actually used a public sponge on a stick dipped in salt water. In India they used their left hand. While searching for the link I found the site you see on the right. Notice they say "great gifts for christmas and chanukah!". Can you imagine?? Which is more shocking: Finding some dude taking a bm with the stall wide open or opening your christmas or chanukah gift of toilet paper?

And which is worse: using a public sponge on a stick or having to tell people who ask what you do for a living that you are president of Toiletpaperworld.com.

Food for thought...

Ironically, I was headed for a really long press conference held by an attorney.

I know the holidays are over... but wouldn't this make for a great holiday card?

Is this sign really necessary? Who in their right mind would try to pet or hold an alligator?

...nevermind... ;)

Dave and I spent our day off in the Everglades today! I know it's only been a week since Cruisegate '05... I know we swore we'd never get on a boat again without dramamine... but this was an airboat. Nice and smooth. And yes... the theme song to CSI: Miami did keep running through my head.

We saw some killer (stuffed) raccoons!

As adventurous as we are... No, we did not try an order of the snack shop's Gator Nuggets...

We enjoyed shooting pictures of all the wildlife...

And we took care not to be shot...

Later, We donned our coonskin caps (not really)...

...and went out for Sushi (really)! Mmmm.... For all you Miamians, goto Sushi Ko on Bird rd just west of the Palmetto! Best-sushi-ever!

There are plenty more photos of our day on our flickr site! Oh, and in case you forgot...

Hartman is super cute!!

Happy New Year! The photo above is Dave entertaining a crowd of 25,000 at last nights New Years Eve celebration in downtown Miami. You can see me on the left taping him in my super cool Green Lantern t-shirt!




While I was busy editing...



Dave and Waleed were busy making shadow puppets... :)

There was Disco...

There was the longest fireworks show in history...

But most importantly there was Nelly Fat Cat! What a crazy character!





2005 was a good year for us. Here's to all the adventures of 2006!