One of the largest comic shops in the Northwest (if not, North America) closed its door forever today. Here's a little restrospecive, of why I'll miss it so much:



The Collection Connection had an insanely large back issues room. I couldn't even fith the whole thing in my shot - I didn't have a wide enough lens! Whenever there were back issues I need, I was sure to find it there.



And, they passed my little 'test of a good comic book shop': back issues of the Elementals. They passed the test with a 100% - the entire series, and every spin-off.



They had a section dedicated to all my my favorite writers: Warren Ellis, Garth Ennis, and Grant Morrison. How rad is was that?



I'm still holding out hope that I win the lottery soon, so I can go buy everything they have left.

fingers crossed.

Monday I was put on the Mt. Saint Helens beat. The mountain has been having thousands of little earthquakes below the surface for the last few days, and people (mainly in the newsroom) are talking about "volcanic eruptions" and the like. Wilson and I drove up there to get the scoop.



Basically, on Monday no one was worried and geologists were all overly-excited about it - using the following phrases over-and-over-again in every interview: "seismic event" and lots of stuff about how it's a "real treat for geologists".



Anyway, I spent the entire day up there doing interviews and then later shooting satellite live shots for Fox affiliates all over the country. And, when there was enough time to spare - I was rocking my Xbox.



I keep my travel Xbox all ready for situations like this. I've been stranded in enough weird places (for up to a ten days) to not have all my toys with me. And, I'm way to obsessed with Star Wars: Battlefront lately to just leave it at home.

But, that all ended when the SAT truck guy told me "Better save your game, I'm gonna shut everything down." And, a few minutes later he turned of everything and left us sitting in the dark for 90 minutes.



He wanted to take in the 'majesty of the mountain at night' or something, so we basically had to sit there in complete darkness with nothing to do. We had no working phones, except for the ultra-expensive satellite phone. And, the sat truck guy wandered off for a bit. *sigh*

Anyway, I can't talk too much more about the last part without getting myself into trouble. It doesn't matter. Every time I go up there something weird happens. Last time (four years ago) a live truck guy forgot to fuel up, and we ran out of gas up there. And, with all the rumbling the mountain is doing this morning...next time I'm up there will probably be much more chaotic.

And, I can't wait. I want a photo of my robot next to a lava flow.

Oh man. I've been so busy. I don't want to give excuses or anything, but I feel like I need to explain where I've been. I threw down two posts before this one, giving some insight to what I did last week and the week before.



I admit, much of my time had been throw into video games. I got Star Wars: Battlefront for Xbox Live. It's easily one of the most fun online Xbox games ever, and also the most infuriating (because of all the server problems). It has its advantages though: Not only do you get to pretend to be an imperial Stormtrooper and shoot Jar Jars and Ewoks, but you also get to go online and shoot dorks and middle school kids.

You'll be seeing some changes to LLR in the next few weeks and I get more busy. This page will become the main page, and the blog page will be reditected. This will probably be temporary, but it's gonna happen for several reasons:

1. Season's Bleedings, the LLR sponsored/organized film festival will be launching, and I'm gonna be spending a ton of time watching and making short holiday-themed gore films. The official site launches this week - more to come. Don't go there yet. It won't work.

2. November sweeps is coming. It's like the black plague mixed with the worst Y2K paranoia, and there's no getting away from it.

3. Various personal projects. I've been finishing up some robot portraits for a possible upcoming gallery show, and I've been finishing off some comic book scripts that I've been working on. Too bad I can't draw. Know any really good 'sequential artists' looking for work? Send them my way.

Oh! And, I saw Sky Captain and Shaun of the Dead. Both rad.

Anatomy of a media circus

Last week I worked a day shift to cover the Ward Weaver sentencing hearing. I got there at 7am, and was ready to do battle. Not familiar with the trial?

Here's the short version: Two teenage girls went missing. The FBI arrested Ward Weaver, a nearby neighbor for their murder. Their bodies were found in his backyard. He continually made an ass out of himself in the press for two years, all-the-while claiming his innocence. He later pretended to be a retarded mental patient or something. Then he finally owned up to the murders - thus the media circus begins...


Every station brought at least two live vans to the event. By 8am there were more enough vehicles to haul every single person in Oregon City to their trailer parks and back like private limousines.


And where there's live vans, there's a million miles of cable. We had one square block completely covered. There was enough unmarked, untapped, and unsupervised cable to spawn dozens of "accidental falling" lawsuits.



Here's the wall of news photographers by ONE of the doors. There was a gang like this at every entrance/exit, ready to get some video.



Of course, my door was the one where everything happened. And, this blurred dumbass guy from another station made it a point to put his head right in front of my lens at all the wrong moments. Eventually, I just kept bonking him in the back of the head with my camera until he moved.



KOIN got new mic flags. They're enormous. You can't really get the scale down, especially since their mic flag is the furthest away in this shot - but, trust... they're HUGE.

That was about it. I shot a ton of video, and then had to run all over the country getting extra stuff. I had to do it though, I was on the Ward Weaver story from day one, and I had to see it through. Matter of fact, Later this week I'll write about my TWO interviews with the serial killer. Good stuff, I assure you.

Two weeks ago I had some crazy stuff happen at work. Okay - not exactly crazy, but fun. Here are some highlights:

Shauna's Lasik Surgery

Our anchor Shauna decided that she was sick of her poor vision - especially when it comes to reading the teleprompter - so she went in for some lasik surgery.

Our station decided to have her get her eyes 'lasered' live on our morning show. I went along with her for the check-up visit. Here's what we saw:


This guy showed us a surgery-in-progress on a 72" monitor. Every microscopic detail was right in front of our eyes faces on a giant projection screen.


We just sat and watched all the crazy 'eye poking' for about twenty minutes.At this point, many people would've passed out.



And, then there was the actual surgery we watched up-close. I've photographed enough surgeries not to get grossed out, and it didn't smell like the disgusting breast-job story I shot - pretty fun.


Of course, Shauna didn't find any of this the least bit enjoyable.


Later, we pretended to be stars of our own ensemble drama on NBC: Third Watch: Lasik Surgery


Pot Bust

Two days later I shot a story about tarantula venom, and how it helps stroke victims. It was lame, though: no spiders, just boring-ass doctors. Fucking lame.



Although, the next day I went to a house that the East Portland cops stumbled across. They found over 150 pot plants inside. We were the only TV crew there at first, but they wouldn't let us go inside. But, the detectives let my little digital camera go inside, and they shot a ton of photos for our news segment. How rad is that?



I later emailed some of these exclusive photos to the local paper, but they had to give credit to FOX 12 NEWS. Every little bit of branding helps, I think.

A funny thing happened to me tonight at the end of my shift. My reporter and I are heading back to the station, and we stop at the gas station to fuel up the live van. We pretty much only visit this one station, since it's only two blocks away.

We pull up to the gas pumps and the attendant slowly makes his way out to our truck. He's a tall slacker-ish guy with multiple bad piercings in his face. I really don't have anything against the guy, other than the fact that he always says really creepy stuff to us. Last time it was a long story about he was "after some girl for the last few years" that he called "too pure and innocent" and was planning on "getting her and really breaking her in." That's a sample of a typical weird-ass conversation we have with this guy, so I'm prepared for another round of it.

Anyway, he walks up to the window with an annoying smirk on his face and says, "So, I guess if I wanted to be a reporter I just need to completely throw away all my morals, right?" Both of us in the van just stare at him for a second. Did he just say what I think he said? WTF?

People have their own opinions about the news media and I respect that. I even expect them to let us know it when we're out on the field on assignments. They always do. But, that's the first thing out of the gas station guy's mouth when we pull up? I don't think so.

I say, "[expletive] this" and start the engine. I was in no mood to listen to this crap (or get into an argument about it). He quickly starts laughing and says, "I was just joking! Don't go!" We were about to drive off, but I decided to stay. He starts to pump our gas and then says to me, "Looks like someone's had a bad day." I look over to my reporter and her eyes widen up, as if to say, 'oh my god. I can't believe this guy'. Without missing a beat I say, "No we didn't. You just said a really dumbass thing."

So, for the next two or three minutes he stands by the pump and doesn't look at us. We don't talk either.

Pure uncomfortable silence.

I have an ability - maybe even a superpower - that makes me say WAY too much, especially in the heat of the moment. But, this time I just shut my mouth and didn't say a word. I don't a have a problem with people in the service industry or whatever. We all have jobs at certain times in our lives that we need in order to get by. I'm not about rubbing that in someone's face. Even if he started it. So, I just sit there and keep my mouth shut before I say something I'll regret.

The pump finally clicked off, and he handed us our receipt without coming near the window. We just saw his hand pop out like Thing in the Addam's Family and give me the slip of paper.

All the way back to the station we were all like:
"I can't believe that!"
"What a jerk!"
"You should said...."
"No, what I should've said was...."

In the end we both decided it would be best to just tell his manager tomorrow. Our station spends hundreds - maybe thousands - of dollars there every month. They'll take care of it.

Well, here comes the "funny part"...

We get back to the station and decide to tell the first person we see (another photographer) about what just happened to us. We both tell him the story, taking turns with the details. And, when we're done he just looks at us and shakes his head, "I talked to him too. It's all my fault."

Basically, he tells us that he pulled up to the gas station and the guy comes up to his window and says to him, "So, if I wanted to be a reporter what would I have to do?" Our photographer's response to him: "Throw all you morals out the window...[and about fifty other sarcastic anti-media things]."

So, I guess the guy just came up to our window and was trying to be cute. He didn't give any context to his comment, and ended up totally looking like a dick. To him we looked like we were angry for no reason - although hopefully he replays the conversation in his head and thinks, "oh...that sounded bad." And, the other photographer is kinda disgruntled I guess. I'm glad we figured it out before I called to get the guy in trouble.

Whatever the case: I think it's time I started looking for another gas station for a while.

I'm a gadget freak. Today I got a new light-gizmo-thing for the top of my news camera, and it made my day. But, I was also reunited with one of my favoritist toys - my lip mic. We use it so the reporter's audio track on our news segments are clean and perfect.

[What's a lip mic?
It's officially called the Coles 4104 Commentator's Ribbon Microphone, but commentators like ABC's Ted Koppel have referred to it on-air as "the lip mic." Designed by BBC engineers in the mid-1950s, the lip mic captures intelligible speech in areas of high background noise, places such as battlefields or in airborne helicopters." (source: Broadcast Engineering)]

It was on loan to my Meredith sister-station peeps, at the RNC this past week. When I got it back, I wondered what a fun and interesting adventure the little guy has had. Who's strange lips had he ("lippy") been dancing resting on? And, the more I pondered my lip mic's Benji-like adventure, my thoughts started get more disturbing. What sickness has been brought back with my microphone?



After putting "Lippy" in quarantine, I hit the Google search bar. There weren't really any stastics for bacteria on lip mics, so I checked into something similar - the telephone. Here's what I found:

"A study conducted by the University of Arizona concluded that telephones can be contaminated with up to 25,123 germs per square inch, and that telephones have 500 times more bacteria than the average toilet seat." [link]

Nasty.

Looks like I'm gonna go buy some more moist towlettes tomorrow on my way to work. And, probably never put that thing next to my face again. But, I better do something soon. It'd be insane to see all of our reporters getting mouth herpes and doing live reports.

[update: There a market for every weird, little niche on the internet. I just found catalogs offering "disposable lip mic hygiene screens". Who knew?]

Our weekend producer(and regular fixture on LLR and Hasservision), Angelo Simone has left town. We had an insane karaoke party last night at the Ambassador, and to be honest - I was too drunk to take any good photos.

Anyway, I'll fight through my hangover to reflect on some of the adventures that Angelo (or "LoLo") and I have had in recent months:
He starred in my film festival contest entry, Represent [video link].

He field produced the Playboy Anniversary party, and the Seahawks scrimmage game with me.

And, then there was the drunken ski day the off-the-hook Halloween adventure, and the LXD Beach house.

Anyway, have a good time in San Francisco, Angelo. Just go already! Get out of here! I don't want to cry...

[at this point I'm crying and can't keep posting - maybe that's best]

When I heard that a photographer was needed to go to the state fair for the day, and interview Peter Frampton - I was all, "Oh! Pick me! Pick me!" And, when they asked why I wanted to go so bad, my answer was, "Um...not sure."





Anyway, I spent the first part of my shift shooting Peter Frampton playing guitar into some 'home recording studio' that he was trying out. To tell you the truth: I don't know all the much about Frampton, except for all the songs I hear on the classic rock station.

Here are a few things I learned about Frampton:
1) He's short. Tiny, even.
2) He reminds me of General Zod (Terrance Stamp) from "Superman 2." I was considering photoshopping a pic of him saying, "Son of Jorel, kneel before Zod." [blog had a similar/brilliant thing recently, so I didn't.]
3) He's really cool guy.

I shot Frampton for a while, and then had to take a little break until the concert started. I decided to take a little walk around the fair. Here are a few of my highlights:

PEARLY GATES: SALEM BUREAU



There was a booth that claimed: "Are you getting into Heaven? Find out in two questions." I picture my session going like this:

LL: Am I getting into Heaven?
BOOTH: What's your name?
LL: LL Robot
BOOTH: No.
LL: What about my other question?
BOOTH: That's all we needed.

NEW FOOD TRENDS

Fuck corndogs. The new delicious snack at the fair was "pork chops on a stick" I saw people walking around just gnawing at these things. Just your ordinary pork chop plopped onto a stick.



OLD TIMEY PHOTOS



I went by the old timey photo booth. This is something that I've been bothering everyone to do with me. One day we even made it a mission to get down to the fair (an hour's drive) and get the photos taken, but it turned out that the fair didn't open for a week. Anyway, I opted for a rugged gunslinger look, and was promptly undressed dressed-up by a bunch of 13 year-old girls - presumably the photographers kids.



Looking at this photo, I feel like Ed Swearengen from HBO's Deadwood. You can see the word, "c--ksucker" about to roll right off my lips.

After the old timey photos, I went back to the concert hall and watched Eddie Money and Peter Frampton perform while I shot some more video. Not a bad day's work.


Random stuff:
Hasser posted some stuff from our Vegas trip over on his site.

Fox 12 discovered that a chick from Portland was selling herself on eBay. We ran a story, and she got a gazillion hits/bids within minutes - then promptly freaked out. [ebay might've removed the auction by now]