Thursday, March 10, 2016

What a day...

So, Monday I went to the high school first thing in the morning for an assembly. As it turned out, the principal had won the state's Principal of the Year award, which is awesome. We got it in Monday's paper, although I was very disappointed in the placement of the story on the front page, since I believe such good news for the town should be above the fold, not below it.

In any case, it was a bit of a frantic morning for me, despite being trusted by the district to write up the information ahead of time.

That afternoon I went to an open house and worked up a little story about the local community college's tiny branch in town. It's a great place, and I wanted to give them some inches in the paper.

That evening I got to go to a Port meeting, which was fun as those meetings tend to be... lots of great folks talking about wonderful technical stuff that supports the town's economy. I enjoy the meetings, even though I wasn't expecting, and didn't get, a full story out of it.

Then I went to a "Math Night" in a neighboring school district. It wasn't at all like the Math Nights we put on at Math 'n' Stuff (I don't remember ever having teachers get pies thrown at them at our math nights) but it was still a lot of fun and nicely mathy.

It was a big day, and the cold that had been brewing in my lungs was grabbing more and more at my energy. By night time I was finding myself struggling.

Then came Tuesday.

So I didn't have a morning event to go to, but I had a lot to write up and a very big afternoon. Plus I expected to have a morning meeting... as it turned out, I ended up not doing the morning meeting. Other things, some terribly chaotic, were happening right in the middle of it all. I was still feeling sick, but I tried hard to keep it under control. In the middle of everything, I was told to go get a story about a medical marijuana collective garden... so I went in an took a photo of giant marijuana plants while I was already feeling woozy.

Afternoon was tough, I started by running out to the bridge with a hole in it and getting yet another photo of it. I've only been there... three times? Yeah, three I think, since the hole formed. It's just on the edge of our new coverage area.

After the hole, I went to a local high school to have an interview with a Miss City candidate. I didn't grow up with the concept of Miss City, but over here there is a Miss Sunnyside, Miss Mabton, Miss Grandview, Miss Prosser, Miss Granger, Miss Toppenish... if there's a city, there's a royal court for it. And somehow, through some sin of mine, I've been doing the interviews for two of the cities we are covering. There's a total of four courts/pageants we will likely be regularly covering. One thing we have done with Miss Sunnyside in the past is do a bio of each candidate in the weeks leading up to the pageant. The bios run on Fridays and are a big deal. The new publisher said if we are going to do bios for Miss Sunnyside, we have to do them for every city... and so, here I am, interviewing teenage pageant candidates. Yikes.

After that, I went to a place I'd driven past many times but never knew what it was. Turns out it's a company that makes fishing lures, Yakima Bait Company. Our congresscritter was coming to do a tour, and the media was invited. Since I was already in the same town for a later city council, I went to the tour as well. It was fascinating and fun, and I got lots of photos, even though we only ran one.

Next up was the council meeting, which was less fun since it was about banning marijuana, a topic I'm heartily sick of. As expected, the council banned it. I got my story and a nice bonus photo of the girls basketball team, which won third place in the State Tournament and was the top-rated public school in their division in state, posing with the mayor.

I was home late, had a late dinner with hubby and crashed into bed exhausted and still fighting that cold.

Wednesday morning I struggled to wake up. The cold was hitting me hard, but I got to work, wrote up my stories and got through the first half of deadline. Then I found myself running to the bathroom every five minutes for dry-heaves and decided to leave. I didn't really ask permission, since I was afraid I was going to pass out or throw up on my boss. That may come back to haunt me, I don't know. I didn't care at the time, and I'm not entirely sure I care now.

Once home, I tried to write up my Miss City story while staying near the toilet, but quickly discovered I couldn't write. I couldn't read, either, so I finally went upstairs to try to sleep. I discovered that pulling the comforter, an extra quilt and all the blankets I could find over me was enough to drown my nausea and pain, and I slept until Eric got home and woke me.

This morning I felt much better and was able to accomplish some stuff. I had yet another surprise "somebody in the school district got an award" event, and, yes, another Miss City interview in a different town. I got those done, but needed to do some more "Over the Shoulder" archive searches for tomorrow, so I stayed late and got it done. It was nice. I have to run and get a photo tomorrow morning, but I don't need to be in the office until 8 a.m., which is nice. I also don't have much on my plate, supposedly, which *might* mean I can get some of the long-term special section stories written, which would be REALLY nice. Knock on wood.

And so to bed...

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