Oh, the lovely J-school (sarcasm dripping)

Hmmm. . . so much (and yet less than nothing) has happened. Right now I can't even remember half the things I meant to post on here, and so much of that is obsolete already anyway. Let's see. . .

This week has been the j-school-takeover-of-my-life-week. In addition to regularly scheduled classes, we were sent on TWO fieldtrips. Class meets MWF, but we were made to clear our schedules on Tuesday from 3-5 and Thursday from 5-7 (not including traveling time), drop everything else, and go running at the j-school's beck and call. Not to mention that a) they expected us to get to these places ourselves b) didn't deign to give us directions, and c) told us to find our own transportation. GRRRR! I know several classmates who had to get out of other classes twice in the same week (wince) just to make it to the stupid visits to the Missourian and KOMU. What's more, our teacher showed up, left a sheet for attendance, and then went to his own classes! (he's a grad student) It's so insane!

The Missourian visit was completely pointless anyway. Almost all of us (if not all) had already had the tour when we visit campus, and the people were too busy trying to actually put out the newspaper to really show us around. We sat in on their budget meeting (what stories are going where), which was way too small of a room to accommodate us anyway. Then we were shoved from one student guide to another, most of which were only two happy to find someone else to take care of us. All in all a pointless waste of time and general disaster.

The visit to KOMU (the campus owned NBC affiliate TV station) went a little better (but not much). Kate and I decided to carpool, and headed off (with her driving, thank goodness) in what we assumed was the right direction. Thankfully we found it, but as soon as we saw the station we turned too soon, and ended up on a one lane road with cows. We had to turn around, go across the highway again, and take the next turn. Once again our teacher announced that he had somewhere to be, and left. Only two of the class were broadcast students, so for most of us it was pointless anyway. Our student guide (poor guy) had never given a tour before, so overall he did a good job. Only none of us cared to be there, and he kept asking if we had any questions, as we looked at him bleary eyed and wished to go home. We got there at 5, and were going to sit in on the 6 o'clock news, so he had an hour to kill. Unfortunately there was not that much to say. So we someone new came in halfway through he decided to start all over again (groan).

Sitting in on the actual news was interesting--for the first five minutes. The newsroom is actually very small; the anchor's desk is really tiny, and the weather stuff is all in this side corner and parallel wall. It's like four mini corner rooms in one. The three cameras-robot things are fully automated; they move around by themselves for each shoot. So one just takes off and moves across the room when it's time for weather. We (the 20 of us) were all given those plastic lawn chairs and sat (mostly) out of the way. Some people had to move when the sports section was up, because that's on the back wall close to where we were sitting. They didn't even bother to tell us to be quiet, just assumed we knew it (foolish on their part, I say). The red light just goes on, and then all you can hear is the anchors' talking. We they cut to a video clip or commercial, that's heard and shown on a TV, but it's weird because you can see the anchors, in person and on the screen, but only hear the sound from their actual voices. I'm not making any sense, am I? Anyhow, the whole time I was terrified that I'd drop something or sneeze. Not to mention being hungry and tired. And now, I was going to go home this weekend, but nooooo. We have to do a video interview with a partner, and they gave us the cameras on Friday and want them back Monday. And all this is for one three hour class!!!!! It's insane, I tell you.