A Bittersweet Transition

This is the day. June 24th has been marked on the calendar here since afternoons were cool and the sun was down before Wheel of Fortune was over. My friend and partner Nance Burgin is packing up her thermometers, barometers, relative humidity devices and other tools and moving on. That makes it a bad day. The US Air Force needs Nance's husband for another job. I met the captain a few times. He's the kind of guy you want behind the controls of our military service planes. I appreciate all that he does, except perhaps today.

Nance is a hard-working meteorologist...serious about getting the forecast right every day. She's also a lot of fun. Most of the young people her age just roll their eyes at my corny jokes. Nance actually laughs. I think I remind her of her dad. That's an honor.

It has been a privilege to work with Nance. I was just thinking about the last few years. I have had a great privilege of working with a lot of good meteorologists. Sonya Stevens, Kira Miner, Kailey Franz and now Nance. They are all very bright, professional and conscientious. They were all delightful partners for the Daybreak and Noontab news broadcasts. I grew to appreciate all of them and considered them as friends. I stay in touch with a couple of them.

Now we have a new meteorologist for the morning and noon newscasts. Monica Tassoni has been working here for the last few days to learn about the computer programs and graphics we use and the little nuances of KTAB in general and this old newsman in particular. I'm sure that we will have a great time, too. She's from Philadelphia. The only problem I can see from here could be two Monday mornings in the Fall...if the Eagles beat the Cowboys. Welcome Monica. I know the mornings start early, but we'll have fun as we do this job.

Nance, I'm going to miss you partner. May God Bless you and your hero husband as you soar off into the wild blue yonder. Ron

Police Scanners

Police scanners are constant companions for news reporters. There are times in the early morning hours that that's about the only sound I hear in the newsroom except for the tapping of my fingers on the keyboards. The scanners get to be routine. The calls range from routine traffic stops and cattle out on the roadways to officers reporting that they have finished their shifts and they're going home. We occasionally hear things on the scanners that get our attention. It may a different excitement level in the voices of the officers and radio dispatchers. It may just be different ten-code numbers. Those of the kinds of calls we listen closely to hear. We then decide if we need to send a reporter to get the details. That happened this morning with a death investigation. It turned out to be a man with medical problem. It's always a tragic event for the family...but usually not something for the news. I guess we learn to listen even when don't realize that we are.

Covering the President

Some members of our Big Country Homepage Staff have an exciting assignment today. Lane Stone, Brittany Pelletz and photographer Mark Gustafson are traveling to Austin to cover the appearance there of President Obama. Its going to be a busy day. It's also an interesting day for Abilene reporters. We don't get to cover a president very often. It's a little different than covering our local elected officials or even the members of the Texas Legislature or U.S. Congress.
Security is a lot tighter. It has to be. There will be many other news crews there. Some of them are not familiar with our Texas way of doing things. They will be in a bigger hurry and won't likely care much about the feelings of the crews from smaller cities.
There is an interesting feeling you get when you hear "Hail to the Chief." The office requires respect. I hope they have a great time. I look forward to seeing the reports.

All That Racquet

Don't call it a comeback!

I think I'm finally ready to do athletic things again. As of this writing, it's been 2 years, 8 months, and 2 days since I had surgery to repair damaged cartilage in my left knee (pre-op photo attached). Now, I'm not saying I had athletic prowess before the injury, but I was fairly active. That may have been my downfall; it was during a game of baseball that I suffered the injury.

Since the surgery, I've put very little stress on the bum knee. No basketball, no baseball, no tennis... one company game of kickball stands out, but that's a bunch of reporters playing, so how much stress could it really be?

Today, I stepped out on the tennis court for the first time in years to take on John Nolan-- at his own game, no less-- and put that knee to the test.

Surprisingly, it passed! Now all I need to do is remember how to serve and volley, and I'll be golden.

Next up, basketball? Anyone?

Props to Nance from a Viewer

We received this very nice e-mail from a viewer that I wanted to pass along. It's the type of note that's sure to make Nance's day!

I am a HUGE Fan your news station... In fact you are the only news station i am willing to watch!! I was a little disapointed the other morning when everyone gave Sam Nichols all the credit for Easter Sundays Weather Forecast when the storms came thru the Big Country. When in fact Nance Burgin was there in the studio when it all started. She was amazing!!! You could understand every bit of her on what, when, where and why the weather was so random and crazy. She was great with the graphics zooming in and out without getting nauseous, her drawings where big enough and able to follow easily. At one point she was getting many updates with in seconds and was great at receiving them and informing the public. She was wonderful during the hole hour and a half she had stopped one time to get something to drink which she deserved and apologized for it. My family and I thought it was funny of her to apologize because she deserved a drink by then because she was so busy relaying all of the updates. Its not that we don't love and appreciate Sam Nichols because we do. We just thought that Nance Burgin did indeed deserve a big thanks and a big high five for what she had did for the public that day!!! She did an amazing job and i would like for her to get a little credit for being the one who started the weather announcements on Easter Sunday when the crazy storm formed out of nowhere, after all she was there and stayed on top of it like a pro!!! Way to Go Nance Burgin!!!

Big Fan of KTAB

To the viewer who sent this, thanks for sharing! We'll give her that hi-five on your behalf :)

Honoring the Veterans

This story of the World War Two veterans going to Washington, DC stirs some great personal memories. I was the Washington State representative for a national speech contest sponsored by the Veterans of Foreign Wars back in 1976. The veterans paid for one high school student from each state to fly to Washington, stay in a nice hotel, eat heartily as teenagers do and visit the Memorials on the National Mall, The White House, The Capitol and other tourist and historical sites there. The old soldiers honored us. I was too young and immature to appreciate the irony. I was a high school student who had done nothing significant and they were honoring me for writing a three-minute speech and sending it in. The veterans had served in horribly difficult places like Normandy, Guadalcanal, North Africa and Meat Loaf Hill. And yet, they were honoring us. Now that I'm about the age they were then, I understand a little bit better. They just wanted to know that someone from the next generation would appreciate the freedoms they fought for. It's a sobering thought. Thank you veterans.

R.U.D.E.

I have to preface this email with a little confession – I love Fort Worth and tend to feel more at home there than I do in Abilene. Not because I don't love Abilene too, I just have a lot of family and friends and memories in Fort Worth.

That being said...

Meanest. Drivers. Ever.

I was there last Monday and found myself on the west edge of downtown, picking up my brother at his job at Radio Shack headquarters for a lunch date. I've driven in Fort Worth a bunch of times, but not on those particular streets any more than once or twice.



On our way to the restaurant, I braked and started to turn from Montgomery on to Lancaster, as my brother warned me that I actually needed to take the next turn on to Camp Bowie. I can't imagine my slight mistake made any real difference to the car behind me, but that did not stop him or her from laying on the horn. I'm talking a solid 15 seconds of blasting me for no valid reason! I may or may not have honked back in a very ugly way... for which I am sorry. But still, geez!



After dropping my brother back at work, I failed at trying to navigate a fork in the road. The traffic was really heavy in this area, and I ended up having to sit in the little median wedge for a sec before zipping into the correct lane. Yes, I was cutting it close, but the car that was actually affected didn't seem to care. The MASSIVE pickup truck behind that, however, was peeeeeeved. Commence another ridiculously long horn honk! But this one actually lasted a good 30 seconds, and the driver followed me around, keeping up the honking! I waved, nodded, waved, shrugged, waved...

HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOONK HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOONK
HOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO
OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOONK.

Seriously? Your life is that stressful that you need to blow a horn for that long?

Instantly, I was grateful for the polite, laid-back attitude of Abilene drivers and the lack of traffic. Now I know that Abilene had a deadly road rage incident recently, but I'm not taking that into consideration right now. I just want to commend the 99.9% of drivers here who wave to let others through, wait their turns, and forgive honest mistakes like mine.