EPEric's Blog

I'll try to add to this throughout the day to give you a little behind the scenes of the day as we cover the North Carolina and Indiana primaries. It's about 12:15 right now... I've been in the office for about 45 minutes.... about 2 hours earlier than usual. We're getting crews out the door for tonight. Brent Campbell is covering Obama. We'll get help from our sister stations in St. Louis and Chicago to cover the Clinton headquarters in Indiana. Leah Beno, Angela Rodriguez, Nicole Ferguson and Caron Myers are on the governor's races and Chad Tucker and Roxanna Haynes are covering Kay Hagan and the local races.. especially the bonds in Guilford County. Neill and Julie will lead the coverage from the studio with Bob Buckley and Melissa Painter helping out. FOX News anchor Shepard Smith will join Neill and Julie at about 10:45 tonight. We'll also have Elon University's Dr. Hunter Bacot with us to add some perspective to the voting. It will be interesting to see if we get a runoff in the Republican race for governor.

It's a little after 1pm. Julie Luck has just arrived. She's going through her binder with all of her notes about the races were are covering tonight.

It's just after 3pm now... we're finished with the afternoon editorial meeting. All of the crews are just about in place. Bob Buckley is practicing with our new tool called News Navigator. You've probably seen us use it with varying degrees of success over the last few weeks. It has the ability to work with a touch screen and we're able to build some different types of map based graphics with it.

It's starting to get a little hectic. All of the crews are now sending back their scripts and video from the field.

We're through the early newscasts. So far, so good technically considering how many crews we have out and how many of our partner stations we're trying to coordinate with.

Talk about your ultimate TV set up... here is what our producer sees during the newscast.

As of 7pm our reporter from our sister station in Chicago says to expect Hillary Clinton to give her speech in Indianapolis sometime after 9pm. We'll stream it and bring you a live report in the 10pm news.

Update:  8:30pm

The Newsroom is really buzzing now.... we have people from news as well as sales and finance and interns buzzing over computers... entering the returns into our system that puts them on the website and on-line.   Lesa Layno from our assignment desk puts all of the races together.  She does a great job.  It's very tedious work.   Our Operations Manager Timmy Hawks and I are busy working the phones talking to satellite trucks and the crews in the field.. so far we've kept it to the organized chaos level.  The timing of victory and concession speeches will really dictate how things go from here on out.

 We're expecting Kay Hagan just before 9pm and we'll try to stream it live on the site.

Count my daughter among the millions of pre-teens who love Miley Cyrus.  Count me as one of the parents who has added to Miley's and Disney's bankrolls because of it.  Miley says she's embarrassed by a photo Vanity Fair just published of her.  Now the magazine and her people and the photographer (the famed Annie Liebovich) are going back and forth over the circumstances surrounding the photo shoot.    Vanity Fair has won its  share of fans and critics with edgy photos like the naked pregnant photo of Demi Moore.  Edgy certainly has it's place, but I for one would rather Vanity Fair stick to shooting photos of adults and leave the Miley photos for some more age appropriate magazines. 

I've put a group of viewer photos from Feb 12th's snow in a folder.  Enjoy.  Thanks everyone for sending them to photos@wghp.com

1) A Christmas Story or Christmas Vacation?

2)  It's a Wonderful Life or Miracle on 34th Street?

3)  Grinch the cartoon or Jim Carrey Grinch?

4)  Scrooged or A Christmas Story?

5)  Elf or The Santa Claus?

6)  Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer or Frosty the Snowman?

7)  Polar Express or Home Alone?

8)  White Christmas or Charlie Brown Christmas?

1)  The Godfather or Goodfellas?

2)  Scary or funny?

3)  Jim Carrey or Will Ferrell?

4)  Pacino or Nicoloson?

5)  Julie Roberts or Angelina Jolie?

6)  Star Wars movies or Indiana Jones movies?

7)  Young Tom Cruise (Risky Business, Top Gun) or current Tom Cruise?

8)  Casablanca or Gone With the Wind?

Next week.. Christmas movies.

Ohio State and LSU fans rejoice!

Va Tech, Georgia, Oklahoma,  USC fans gripe!

Missouri, Kansas and West Virginia fans wonder "what if."

Illinois' 3 losses come up smelling roses.

Hawaii is unbeaten, but won't win the title (remember when BYU did).

Such is life in the era of the BCS.  Now we're left with argument after argument after argument about who the best college football team is.

If Ohio State wins, it's hard to argue against them, or is it.  The Big Ten is a joke (and I grew up in the Midwest, so if anything I might be an apologist), and LSU would be their only legitimate win (sorry Michigan and Penn State fans).  Wins against Youngstown State, Akron and Kent State hardly make a national champ to me.

If LSU wins,  at least they can claim a whuppin of Virginia Tech (sorry Cindy Farmer) and wins over Florida and Auburn, but only two two loss teams have ever been national champs.

Everybody else is flawed too.  So let's have a playoff.  All the other sports do it, ah but here's the catch.  The pros have a handful of teams.  The BCS is supposed to help major college football narrow the focus to a few elite leagues, but as long as "big time" programs schedule cupcakes, you won't be able to narrow the BCS to 8 teams very often.  11 or 12 have arguments this year.  Wanna play Florida in a bowl game?  The Gators aren't even in the BCS.

We'll give a national champion a big crystal trophy right here on FOX January 7th.  Trophies make things seem real, but to me it's still a mythical champ.  We'll argue some more after Virginia Tech or USC or Georgia thumps somebody in their bowl game.  We'll argue a playoff is what we need.  All the other sports do it.  Really?  Oh wait, March Madness is coming.  Bubbles will be burst.  Teams will complain, "why were we left out when (name your mid-major or 6th place major conference team) is in?"  College fans across the country will get in a whole new set of arguments.

Anyone on your block arguing someone is better than the Patriots?  Anyone on your block argue over who's best in the NBA, MLB or NHL?  Following college sports isn't so bad after all is it!

1)  Turkey breast or turkey leg?

2)  Pumpkin pie or ice cream?

3)  Do you eat leftover stuffing for breakfast Friday?

4)  Will you watch the Macy's Parade?

5)  Will you watch football?

6)  Do you get up early to shop Friday?

7)  How many people at Thanksgiving dinner?

8)  What is one thing you have to have on the table Thursday?

In keeping with our 5pm newscast stories "On the Money" this month... 8 questions about your spending habits.

1)  $3 a gallon gas.. are you driving less?

2)  Chistmas is coming, spending more or less than last year?

3)  Do you eat out more or less than last year?

4)  More or less in savings than last year?

5)  Big ticket item you're most likely to buy next?

6)  Guilty pleasure you'll keep buying at the grocery store?

7)  Guilty pleasure you've stopped buying at the grocery store?

8)  Will you keep your home cooler this winter to save money?

One of my favorite lines from the movie "Top Gun" is "I feel the need, the need for speed."  Apparently too many drivers live this every day.   A FOX8 On Your Side Report

http://www.myfoxwghp.com/myfox/pages/InsideFox/Deta
il?contentId=4831864&version=2&locale=EN-US&layoutCode=
VSTY&pageId=5.7.1

showed you two ways to slow people down in your neighborhood.  One is to petition to get the speed limit change.  The other is to ask for speed humps.  Now High Point is looking to take a little further.  The city learned today about portable speed bumps as a way to target problem neighborhoods.  Any parent will tell you speeding cars are one of their to fears for their children.  "Slow down!"  I remember my Mom yelling at drivers when I was a kid, and I've seen my daughter yelling the same thing imitating her mother in their neighborhood.  How does your neighborhood deal with speeders?  Is there any neighborhood out in the Piedmont that deserves special attention?

A friend of mine sent me one of those endlessly forwarded e-mails the other day.  Normally I don't look at too many of them, but this one was priceless.  Someone found the 1977 JCPenney catalog in an attic.  Feel free to caption these photos, just please keep it clean.

1)  Scary costume or funny costume?

2)  M&M's or Snickers?

3)  Better movie series... Halloween, Friday the 13th, Nightmare on Elm St. or Scream?

4)  Munsters or Adams Family?

5)  Candy corn or Smarties?

6)  Tootsie Roll or Tootsie Pop?

7)  Plastic pumpkin or candy bag?

8)  Trick or treat?

Fresh from vacation... a new eight questions... no real theme this week?

1)  Bob Barker or Drew Carey?  (ok, drew has only had a few days, but people are talking about it)

2)  Red Sox or Rockies?  (how many of you will stay up late to watch?)

3)  Rachael Ray or Emeril?

4)  Governor Schwarzenegger or actor Schwarzenegger?

5)  Beard or clean-shaven?

6)  Carrie Underwood or Kelly Clarkson?

7)  Eggs scrambled or sunny side up?

8)  Desktop or laptop?

1)  American Idol or House?

2)  Leno or Letterman?

3)  Cop show or comedy?

4)  Seinfeld or The Simpsons?

5)  Court shows or talks shows?

6)  Soaps or cable news?

7)  Mash or Cheers?

8)  Do you ever watch infomercials?

It's back for a second week.  This time a food theme.  Copy them over and put in your answers.

1)  French fries or onion rings?

2)  Eastern or Western bbq?

3)  Pizza or burgers?

4)  Broccoli or green beans?

5)  Ice cream or candy?

6)  Queso or salsa?

7)  Pretzels or chips?

8)  Chicken or steak?

Congress is now looking at hip-hop.  Are the lyrics too racy?  Maybe.  I remember the hearings on the "heavy metal" in the 80's.  Those songs seem "Rated G" today.   Still, is it Congress' place to say what we can and can't listen too?  Maybe on the public airwaves, yes, but it seems to me we're headed down a slippery sloap with the right to free speech.  What do you think?

From AP today: