I caved...but not completely

So I decided to keep this blog so I have a record of what I did while I was at RTNDA, because I have the worst memory in the world and will probably forget 99% of it when I have to put it on a resume under job experience.

Also, when I finally am able to travel outside of this state, then I will document all the fun that was had, soo….

For those of you who thought this was the ticket into the juicier details of my life…I apologize, hehe.

Monday was my first day of work, and my mom started what will hopefully be a weekly routine of dropping me off at the West Baltimore MARC train station en route to Washington, DC. And, for the first time in history of riding it, the conductor didn’t check for my ticket! So I lucked out on not having to pay one way fare for the first day. The managing editor I’ll be working closely with for the next six weeks, Sarah, is awesome and extremely helpful. She gave me an outline of what I’ll be working on during my time there, introduced me to the staff, and gave me some back issues to study for most of the day. Sarah also signed me up for this newsletter called Shop Talk which is all about the tv and radio news industry, so I’m asked to read this every day to stay on top of the news and to come up with ideas for another section of the magazine called “Tough Calls.”

Tuesday was slightly busier. The headshot picture folder in the photo library file needed organizing. My task was to go through each name, and format each file name the same way, with the last name first, an underscore, their first name, and a number if there was more than one photo of that TV/radio personality. There were about 30 last or first names I couldn’t find pictures for to confirm their identity, but considering there were over 500 pictures in that folder I’d say I had at least accomplished something. The next task was proofreading some possible stories for the News Break section. Proofreading definitely took longer because I’m so anal about editing that it has to be just right before I give anything to anyone (even though it still contains stuff I missed). It also took longer because I had to edit them according to AP and RTNDA style, and their style required me “unlearning” some of the stuff I learned from the AP book over the last few months of getting acquainted with it.

Today, Sarah and I agreed to call Thursdays our “News Break” days, where we would discuss story ideas for the news section. What I did most of the day was delve deeper into the topics she gave me for possible news stories. Learned some interesting things while I was searching, such as two news stations in Chicago creating street level studios where people passing by can see what ever live show is airing just by peering through huge windows (copying the Today Show in other words). Not only that, but they are building another one for their CBS affiliate. That almost makes me jealous that we don’t have one in downtown Baltimore; nearly all of our stations except two are on TV Hill.

Not that we should have a street level studio anyway, cause it would only be a matter of time until some knucklehead tried to shoot at the glass. Gotta love Baltimore crime.