In radio, you work with some very creative people. This creativeness can be a double-edged sword; often, it is used for good, but more frequently the greater tendency is to entertain oneself at the expense of the unsuspecting! It's similar to forcing your sibling to inadvertently spit food out of her mouth at the dinner table, knowing full well that your father, the retired Lt. Colonel, will not even remotely appreciate the humor in seeing a projectile of white chunks of buttery mashed potatoes flying towards him like shrapnel from an exploding missile. In fact, that's the main reason to do it.
When I changed the news copy that was to be read on the air by the new guy, a part of me hoped the boss would hear it. What had irked me about 'newbie' was that he would print the news stories he was going to read and just leave them in a stack right out in the open. This struck me as careless and I felt a certain responsibility to help rid him of this reckless behavior. The story he had printed read, "the New Mexico coroner's office performed autopsies on the three decomposed corpses." I eagerly took the news copy, whited out the word "autopsies" and replaced it with the words "magic acts."
I drove home as fast as I could and waited by the radio. It was really just pure luck that his parents and brother were in the control room visiting and eagerly awaiting his broadcast. He read the story out loud with all the power of a 1.21 gegawatt FM transmitter behind him. About ten seconds later, he paused. In the background, a faint audible snickering was building to a roar of hysterical laughter. That's when he first shut off the microphone. Intermittently, the mic would pop back on as he repeatedly tried to continue in a nonchalant manner. It always ended the same way. As the muted laughter would approach hysteria, his voice would rise to a pitch not normally heard in an adult male. This went on for a good two minutes. Two very good minutes.
When I changed the news copy that was to be read on the air by the new guy, a part of me hoped the boss would hear it. What had irked me about 'newbie' was that he would print the news stories he was going to read and just leave them in a stack right out in the open. This struck me as careless and I felt a certain responsibility to help rid him of this reckless behavior. The story he had printed read, "the New Mexico coroner's office performed autopsies on the three decomposed corpses." I eagerly took the news copy, whited out the word "autopsies" and replaced it with the words "magic acts."
I drove home as fast as I could and waited by the radio. It was really just pure luck that his parents and brother were in the control room visiting and eagerly awaiting his broadcast. He read the story out loud with all the power of a 1.21 gegawatt FM transmitter behind him. About ten seconds later, he paused. In the background, a faint audible snickering was building to a roar of hysterical laughter. That's when he first shut off the microphone. Intermittently, the mic would pop back on as he repeatedly tried to continue in a nonchalant manner. It always ended the same way. As the muted laughter would approach hysteria, his voice would rise to a pitch not normally heard in an adult male. This went on for a good two minutes. Two very good minutes.
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