I believe i have said this before, shooting video for the news is like playing a round of golf with a 50 handicap and a six pack. No matter how many times you hit it in the water, hit a tree, lay it in the sand or slice it into the next fairway you keep going back as long as one shot goes semi-straight and more that 5 feet high off the ground. For me, shooting news is that way. This past Thursday I was given the assignment of shooting a story with one of our sports reporters at the KC Zoo with a player from the Kansas City Royals. I know, doesn’t sound promising, but wait there’s more. The Royals player in question is Mike Aviles the 27 year old rookie short stop.
Now seriously, who goes to work and after being there for 2hrs, surfing the Internet for another job, does someone come up to them and say “hey i need you to go shoot a story with the Royals rookie short stop Mike somethin or another”. Yes, i know, that’s my life. :-)
Now some pro sports superstars are usually very douchy and have to be pampered and catered to 24/7. And the Royals i believe have one of “those” guys, but most of the Royals players are pretty cool kids and why wouldn’t they be, they play for the Royals and they all know they are one strike out, one error, and one blown save away from the Dizzy Bat Race in Omaha.
So we get to the Zoo and meet mike and his fiance. And just as i had predicted, Mike Aviles is a pretty cool kid. He isn’t bitter or mad that he didn’t make the bigs till he turned 27, but instead he savors the opportunity to suckle on the teet of stardom and success. And lets admit that on this team the teet hangs pretty low to the ground.
Mike has recently come into this thing where he loves to visit Zoo’s on Royals road trips. Mike loves the big cats and gorillas, but Mike also admits its more than that ” Its a place to come relax and get away from baseball for a couple of hours.” So for the next couple of hours we follow him around the Zoo on his quest for big cats and gorillas. But being the new star short stop for the Royals his anonimty at the Zoo does last long as a small child comes up to him and says ” uhhhmmm,<gulp>uhhhhhh yea…..uuuhhhh<gulp>….uuuhhhh one of my babysitters uhhhhhh would like a picture with you…” Seriously it was hilarious, just spit it out kid. :-) And being the big kid himself mike smiles and takes a picture, in fact mike will end up taking several pictures by the end of his zoo excursion. Mike makes it to most of the animals in the Africa section of the Zoo or as like to call it…”where all the cool animals hang out” and he is pleasantly surprised at the size of the zoo and the quality of residents. Apparently word is out that our zoo sucks. I have to admit i had not been to the zoo in a couple of years and IT was pretty cool and relaxing.
So after hangin out with mike and talking baseball and big cats it was truly a refreshing aspect in the daily grind of car wrecks, pedophiles, murderers, perverts and vacant house fires that is my life. But more important as we left the zoo i had the realization that i had just hit one semi-straight and more that 5 feet high off the ground. :-)
Adios
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