From here, there and everywhere

There are only two forces that can carry light to all the corners of the globe... the sun in the heavens and the Associated Press down here.
-Mark Twain (1835-1910)

It was another busy day in the office as I started my day as news reporter. I was informed that I would be writing mostly news stories today. I was comfortable with this as I had already experienced writing news stories. To most people the number three does not seem like much. But when you are expected to write three 200 word stories- it is. After completing a career profile I was give two media releases. One was about Napoleon Perdis’s visit to the town and the other about the new umbrellas on Flinders Street. So I began looking for as much information as I could from the releases. It turned out that I could write a whole story from the Napoleon Perdis media release but not from the umbrella release.

I had an interview lined up at 12.30pm to meet with a source for the umbrella story. I double checked the photo diary to make sure I had the time correct. A photographer and I drove to Flinders St to capture some shots and talk to my source. After waiting for over half an hour we decided the source was going to be a no show. Which I thought may have been my fault as I could have misread the photo diary. But when I got back I checked and I hadn’t made the mistake. But I still had one major problem no story!

I contacted the media number I had and told them no one had turned up. They then said that someone had gone there earlier but the chief of staff assured me that we had rescheduled an appointment. All I wanted was someone to contact me back. Having previously had little luck with the council I didn’t have high hopes. Within an hour I had a councillor call me back to answer my questions. I had both on record and off record answers. As I continued to ask my questions I couldn’t help but feel his answers were scripted. I guess that is what you get when you interview a councillor.

My next story seemed to be quite a boring one. But I headed out with a photographer where we learned the importance of directions. As we were told we weren’t allowed to park on the grass, which was near where the interview and photo shoot was going to be. I thought I would be conducting my interview with the source that was there but it turned out he was not even aware we were coming. So I got a few quotes from him and then had to contact another source for the rest of the quotes.

Today was a busy one! Along the way I learnt many lessons and I have realised the importance of feedback and taking note of the little things in my articles. If these simple things were fixed it would may my editor’s job a whole lot easier. But I think it is the trouble with learning a new writing style, which is turning out to be a lot harder than I expected.