Just A Normal News Day…

While the New Jersey elections provided nothing but yawns for anybody seeking a sizzling story, this week has been a lot more chaotic than ever imagined.

No newsflash here about the Penn State scandal that has engulfed the nation, followed by the pandemonium that took over the streets of State College, Pennsylvania overnight.

This is a story that I have found disturbing, frustrating, intriguing, and fascinating all in one package. It is a story, though, that has completely foiled best laid plans the entire week. Let me start by making it very clear that I am no victim here. This is merely a showcase of just how volatile and fast-moving this scandal has been.

After the drama that ensued at PSU on Tuesday night, I figured I was safe to spend a bit of time on a long-form piece for the website. So I did, and gave myself the pat on the back afterwards, thinking the story would stick for the majority of the day as a relevant piece. This was about 8:30AM.

Fast-forward to 10AM, where I was about to anchor my one and only newscast of the day, pitching in relief of the great Joe Cutter, who worked late hours a night earlier for the election. During a commercial in the newscast, our awesome Program Director, Eric Johnson, ran in to alert me that Joe Paterno had decided to step down at the end of the season.

In a rush, it was thrown into the newscast after traffic and again before weather. It got reported without a hitch, but again, the odds of this breaking story landing in my ONE newscast were extreme.

We fast-forward one more time to Wednesday evening. After finishing some prep work for the morning news, I was ready to lie in bed and watch some Top Chef before waking up in a few hours.

Then, the big bombshell came across the Twitter feed on my phone. Joe Paterno was out as head coach. There was no doubt that Happy Valley was going to pop off.

At that point, not only did I want to see how things were going to play out for the interests of what my morning work day would be like, but this was just a captivating story.

Needless to say, I sat glued to my television and Twitter feed till about 1AM, and woke up at (gasp) 2AM to start the morning news work day.

One opinion here: Penn State got this one right. As much as I respect Joe Paterno, there was no way he could be on that sideline Saturday or any game moving forward this season. I think the Board of Trustees was much like a hung jury, until Joe Pa tried to dictate the terms earlier Wednesday.

Thank god for great afternoon naps....All in a day of news.