Week Five...
As I walked in the door at 8.30am I was handed the keys to a work car and told I was to head to the Motor Boat Club to do a quick interview with a woman who was turning 90 for our (monthly? I think.) aged persons lift-out.
The story was to be short and fluffy so I was more worried about crashing the work car or getting lost than the interview and story. All ran smoothly and I was back in the office by 9.20. I wrote the story but it wasn’t a very inspiring piece... when Linda edited it she changed the order of the pars I had written and it flowed much better.
I was then given a piece on two Townsville companies who had just won Queensland Heritage Awards. I did phone interviews with the co-ordinator of Life Long learning at CityLibraries who won an award for a ten-month lecture series they did, and also a woman who has volunteered more than 30 years of her life to the Townsville Heritage Centre, who won an award for their volunteers and care of historical artefacts.
It was a difficult story because Linda had outlined that she wanted it to begin as a news piece and expand into a feature... she had outlined what information she wanted to be stated in the first four or five pars, but when I wrote it as she had asked it didn’t flow the way it should have...so I was torn.
I made a few changes from what she had asked and it worked a bit better but it still wasn’t great. When she came to edit it she had the same thoughts and made even more changes to the areas that I had clearly seen needed changing... I felt good about it because even though I had felt ‘stuck’ with where to take the story, Linda ended up making the changes that I had thought about making anyway....So next time I’m going to trust my instinct.
After that I was given more Catholic news stories from the infamous list. As this year is the centenary of Mary MacKillop’s death the next Catholic News lift-out will feature many stories on her. The first story I was given a little piece on a sister who is coming up from Brisbane in October to give some lectures on Mary MacKillop, the Sisters of Saint Joseph and their history within Townsville.
I found it a challenging piece because I couldn’t figure out what was really newsworthy about it... the Catholic News lift-out is met with a little bit of distain within the office I think, because it really is trying to make news out of not much at all.
(I think I forgot to mention that last week I also wrote another story on Baptism preparation workshops in Townsville... another story where I was trying to make something interesting out of very little.)
I was to write another story on a family who live in Townsville who are descendents of Mary MacKillop. Even though that in itself is interesting...I found this story difficult because it was to just be about the family...who really are just an average Australian family... AND because when I rang the father of the family around lunch time he said he wouldn’t be able to talk until 4.30. So I was twiddling my thumbs for a while until it ticked 4.31. I did a quick phone interview and then had to rush home to open my house for my new housemate to move in. Which meant I had to write the story from home over the weekend... I think it turned out ok. I really like my lead... but I still feel like the story lacks a point. It will be interesting on Friday to see what my Catholic News colleague has to say.
Hopefully next week will be a little more exciting... and newsworthy!
Tuesday, September 08, 2009
Four-ging ahead...
Week Four... was a bit of a flop really.
Linda had emailed me earlier in the week to say she wouldn’t be in the office but that my other two colleagues would have work for me...
Taking a leaf out of last week’s book (where I was shoved a 9am job as soon as I entered the office at 8.45) I decided I’d rock up at 8.30 this time... only to discover that no one else was there. Luckily I had brought my own work... an interview from one of the business managers I met at last week’s dinner meeting for my partner’s work. The talent was an accounts manager at a Queensland wide radio station (based in Townsville) who started her career with heavy involvement in volunteer work... It would make a very interesting story. All I had to do was turn my little question and answer form into a 400 word career profile...easy as pie! Turns out neither of my colleagues arrived in the office until almost 10am...So I was extra glad I’d brought something to occupy my time.
However even once the other two ladies arrived they seemed a little lost for ideas of what I should do... It’s a bit difficult working on Fridays because the whole office is in end-of-the-week mode, while I am in Monday-mode...wanting to achieve as much as possible and working on high speed. The two women I work with are head of the social club and their Fridays are often taken up with barbeques and raffles... as they were this particular day, leaving me a little lonely and lost.
We had the Catholic News lift-out that is printed every three/four months to fill in (next edition is to be printed in a few weeks) so one colleague gave me a list of phone numbers with three or four word descriptions next to them...a faint clue of what the story might be about when you ring the phone contact... unfortunately as this is the list provided to her by the Catholic Diocese she couldn’t really help with any more information than the very little that was on the list... it was a case of the blind leading the blind really.
My two office companions also had places to be in the afternoon and left the office about 2pm...leaving me alone with the “list from hell.” (Her words, not mine!)
I tentatively rang the first number...a Father in Mt Isa answered and told him I wanted to talk about the Pilgrimage... he rattled off very few details at lightning speed and I felt my stomach turn... politely asked him to repeat himself...tried the re-word the question a dozen times... and finally got down something remotely story-esque.. .
I rang the next number... the contact wasn’t home but the person who answered the phone would get them to call back on Monday.
I rang the next number... similar story.
I rang the next number... no answer.
It was 4.30pm. I left the office. Hopefully next week would look up.
On Monday I got an email from Linda regards the career profile story I had filed;
“Hi Bessie, I feel so bad. I should of told you we don't do career
profiles of radio. They are our opposition. Last time I did it I was
called into the General Managers Officer. It is bit different in the
general news pages of the paper but because our publication out here are
linked to advertising I think that is the reason. Sorry again. Linda”
As you can imagine... I was ecstatic. Though really I was incredibly gratefully that she let me know later rather than too late... it would have been beyond awful for it to have been printed and then for me to have been called into the general manager’s office... but still I felt like my day there had been a great waste. And I was worried about telling my talent that I couldn’t run the story.
Another stroke of luck was that the talent took the bad news incredibly well and even gave me a long list of her friends with interesting jobs who didn’t work in the media sphere for me to me to do profile on... So at least this week kind of finished on a high. :)
Linda had emailed me earlier in the week to say she wouldn’t be in the office but that my other two colleagues would have work for me...
Taking a leaf out of last week’s book (where I was shoved a 9am job as soon as I entered the office at 8.45) I decided I’d rock up at 8.30 this time... only to discover that no one else was there. Luckily I had brought my own work... an interview from one of the business managers I met at last week’s dinner meeting for my partner’s work. The talent was an accounts manager at a Queensland wide radio station (based in Townsville) who started her career with heavy involvement in volunteer work... It would make a very interesting story. All I had to do was turn my little question and answer form into a 400 word career profile...easy as pie! Turns out neither of my colleagues arrived in the office until almost 10am...So I was extra glad I’d brought something to occupy my time.
However even once the other two ladies arrived they seemed a little lost for ideas of what I should do... It’s a bit difficult working on Fridays because the whole office is in end-of-the-week mode, while I am in Monday-mode...wanting to achieve as much as possible and working on high speed. The two women I work with are head of the social club and their Fridays are often taken up with barbeques and raffles... as they were this particular day, leaving me a little lonely and lost.
We had the Catholic News lift-out that is printed every three/four months to fill in (next edition is to be printed in a few weeks) so one colleague gave me a list of phone numbers with three or four word descriptions next to them...a faint clue of what the story might be about when you ring the phone contact... unfortunately as this is the list provided to her by the Catholic Diocese she couldn’t really help with any more information than the very little that was on the list... it was a case of the blind leading the blind really.
My two office companions also had places to be in the afternoon and left the office about 2pm...leaving me alone with the “list from hell.” (Her words, not mine!)
I tentatively rang the first number...a Father in Mt Isa answered and told him I wanted to talk about the Pilgrimage... he rattled off very few details at lightning speed and I felt my stomach turn... politely asked him to repeat himself...tried the re-word the question a dozen times... and finally got down something remotely story-esque.. .
I rang the next number... the contact wasn’t home but the person who answered the phone would get them to call back on Monday.
I rang the next number... similar story.
I rang the next number... no answer.
It was 4.30pm. I left the office. Hopefully next week would look up.
On Monday I got an email from Linda regards the career profile story I had filed;
“Hi Bessie, I feel so bad. I should of told you we don't do career
profiles of radio. They are our opposition. Last time I did it I was
called into the General Managers Officer. It is bit different in the
general news pages of the paper but because our publication out here are
linked to advertising I think that is the reason. Sorry again. Linda”
As you can imagine... I was ecstatic. Though really I was incredibly gratefully that she let me know later rather than too late... it would have been beyond awful for it to have been printed and then for me to have been called into the general manager’s office... but still I felt like my day there had been a great waste. And I was worried about telling my talent that I couldn’t run the story.
Another stroke of luck was that the talent took the bad news incredibly well and even gave me a long list of her friends with interesting jobs who didn’t work in the media sphere for me to me to do profile on... So at least this week kind of finished on a high. :)
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