Archive for the 'Relief' Category
February 7th, 2010 by Mike Redding
SASTP is coming up on a milestone. 150,000 readers. I’m told that’s a lot for a blog.
If you’ve been counting, I’m three “contest winners” behind. The two who tied for 130,000, Nic and Donna, and the winner at 140,000, Don. I’m not sure what to do about it. It’s been a weird, WEIRD busy time for me and the WDBJ news team.
In the last 45 days in this sleepy little part of Virginia we have had no less than 5 national news stories. They were of the nature that we all work extra hours and days to cover them. And whatever time I’ve had left I devoted to Anna and baby Crowley. I thank the dear lord that Anna is a journalist. She fully understands.
It started Dec 18, 19 & 20 –Friday, Saturday & Sunday– with a snowstorm the likes of which they haven’t seen around here in almost 15 years. We got 18 inches in Roanoke and along the Blue Ridge. Up to two-feet fell on the western slopes of the Allegheny Mountains just to the north of the city. (Roanoke sites in a valley between those two mountain ranges.) An estimated 1000 drivers were stranded on a ten-mile stretch of Interstate 81 north of the city. We were the only media outlet to get there and tell the story.
A couple days later on December 23, a man hops in his car in Bristol, Tennessee, and drives to Virginia and waltzes into a small town post office on the far western edge of our TV station’s viewing area. He has four guns and claims to have a bomb. Says he’s going to blow the place up. He shoots three bullets through the front window of the Wytheville post office for emphasis and takes three people hostage. It was a long day and night here. It ended with no bloodshed.
In the second week of January a Roaonake man told police three men forced their way into his home, knocked him out, tied up his 3-year-old and kidnapped his 2-year-old stepson, Aveione Lewis. The whole state was on the manhunt and Nancy Grace turned it into a national story… Continue reading ‘Five big stories and a milestone…’
February 4th, 2010 by Mike Redding
Many of them gave her hugs and thanked her for being there. Some soldiers got off the bus and avoided her. They had been in Iraq for many months but when they stepped off the bus in North Carolina they didn’t say a word to Rebecca.
Later a few sent her e-mails or left voice mails explaining. It was guilt. They felt they had failed her. One said, “I promised you I’d bring Carlos back and I didn’t. I couldn’t face you.” Of course Rebecca feels none of that. She is only grateful to these men and women who stood next to Carlos on the wall. The wall between us and chaos.
When Rebecca arrived earlier in the day it wasn’t until she parked the car at the armory when her heart started pounding. That’s when it became real. She said a silent prayer to Carlos and asked for strength. She talks to him frequently.
It was Wednesday evening and Rebecca Baldeosingh was standing behind a group of military families waving banners and signs welcoming home their husbands and wives from Iraq. The NC National Guard 1/120th Infantry left for Iraq nearly a year ago. In the middle of their deployment four of them were blown up by and IED (Improvised Explosive Device) in Baghdad. Carlos Baldeosingh was one of those four.
I’ve written at length about Carlos’ tragic death (just hours after he told Rebecca by phone from Iraq that he felt nervous about his mission that day)… and how Rebecca found out what happened to him and what would come of her three young girls in the aftermath.
But Wednesday was six months after Carlos was killed on the streets of Baghdad. Rebecca was supposed to be standing here in a cold February rain with butterflies in her stomach waiting to catch the first glimpse of her soul mate and husband stepping off that bus. On a dark chilly evening all these families will go home happier than they have been for a long, long time. But one wife will go home alone tonight.
She put on a brave face through it all. She was there because she had given her word. Come hell or high water Rebecca would go and welcome home Carlos’ brothers and sisters. She hugged and talked to whomever greeted her. Patiently waiting for each soldier to grab his family and head home.
Then after it quieted down, she found an empty room, sat down alone… and cried.
This is war… MR
February 4th, 2010 by Anna Redding
Thank goodness between the two snow storms we’ve had, Crowley has acquired a taste for his snowsuit! The first time I put it on him, he just cried… couldn’t move and cried! 30 days of strength training later and he can at least move his arms (more like a weak wave), though sitting up for long in the stiff quilted outfit… not so much!
So another foot or so is coming which is fine with me. I love it! Even though I have lived in frozen tundras of Syracuse and Utica, NY, along with some time served in Boston… I still love the snow. LOVE IT! Raised in the Carolinas, the little girl in me jumps for joy every singe time a flake falls from the sky… especially now that I am not rushing out the door to cover it for the news!
Mike is. Hee hee… Anna
February 4th, 2010 by Mike Redding
This child is adorable and amazingly composed. Click here to listen in on his 9-1-1 call to save his mother.
February 3rd, 2010 by Mike Redding
I have time now to answer the question many of my journalism friends have asked: Is going from in front of the camera to behind the camera what I hoped it would be?
I really didn’t have very high hopes about the transition to start with. So exceeding my hopes wasn’t going to be hard. That said I’m having more fun than I expected. But it’s not the perfect job for me. It’s close though. And it is exactly the right place for me. This town, my coworkers, this TV station, all are part of this strange morphing from TV guy to manager guy. Choosing WDBJ7 made this transition as painless as it could be.
The biggest surprise is I’m more exhausted than I ever imagined I would be. Here’s the Genesis.
It was a move I have given thought to since about 2000. I looked at television news, didn’t like most of what I saw, and wondered if I would be better off running a newsroom or should I just shut my trap and keep reporting.
I like reporting. It’s not hard work. You meet new people every day. Keep your facts straight, tell a good story and try not to babble in your LIVE shot. If you do all that you’ll go places. Of course some of those places suck. Ask any number of my reporter friends. But being on TV was something with which I was never entirely comfortable. No matter how comfortable I looked.
For me fame is a HUGE downside to being on TV. It bothered me. I was never rude to anyone who wanted to meet me, shake hands and say hello. I have met some truly wonderful people in my 13 years on TV.
And I would have stayed on that side of the camera if… Continue reading ‘Answer The Question!’
January 31st, 2010 by Anna Redding
At the lower left the bonfire. Off in the distance is the city of Roanoke and the Roanoke Valley. And in between is our street-turned-sled-riding-hill.
Pleasantville, USA – Norman Rockwell’s America is alive and well in The Noke… AKA Roanoke, Virginia.
The snow started falling on our street at about 10:00 Friday night. Crowley was fast asleep and as I headed off to bed, I heard it. The sound of laughing children echoed up and down our frigid block. The sure result of an unwritten rule in Southern households. Never spoken, but clearly understood because snowfalls here are rare (most winters,anyway). Whenever it starts to snow, no matter the hour, even if you are snug in your pjs and under the covers, fast asleep… when the snow starts to fall, kids can, should, and must get up, get dressed and get outside! And so I fell asleep with a smile on my face as the giggles and shrieks of joy traveled up to our window.
The sled riding hill to end all sled riding hills is our street. The V-DOT (Virginia
Anna & Crowley staying warm...
Dept of Transportation) plows know better than to plow our street until the neighborhood has had a few days to turn it into a sled riding party that goes from 8 AM to 10 PMish… so long as school is cancelled.
I am writing this Sunday night and they’re still out there, squealing and hollering as they fly down our road on inner tubes, toboggans and Radio Flyer sleds. And it’s not just the kids. The little ones have to battle their parents for a sled! At the top of the hill, a bonfire warms up a circle of neighbors, keeping warm and laughing as one sled after another launches down the hill just a couple feet away.
Crowley and I kept warm by the fire, the Roanoke Valley sprawling out in front of us, as Mike “borrowed” a child’s sled and
Walk out my front door every morning and see a mountain! Just over that peak is the Blue Ridge Parkway...
made a number of runs.
It’s an amazing thing. All these neighbors gathered, kids running around giggling. I know nothing is perfect. None of these families is perfect. Including ours. But this feels so good, it’s as close I ever expected to get.
I wish you all could experience this… Anna
January 26th, 2010 by Mike Redding
Big News! Our second sponsor is another friend Mike and I go a ways back with. We are all about cronyism here. He is one of Mike’s rock climbing buddies. And just as important, he’s our financial advisor. And in 2009, when our income went from,
Todd Calamita's ad will rotate back and forth with The Bovender Team ad there on the right side of this page,
well, Carolina Traveler income to say, what’s that called? Oh! Unemployment. We needed good advise more than ever. Todd was there. A steady voice in the storm. Here’s the kicker, it was the advise Todd gave me a few years before 2009 that actually saved our hides last year.
Let me explain…
‘Sweeps.’ A very dirty word for TV reporters. Only, saying ’sweeps’ doesn’t make you feel better. No, saying ’sweeps’ is like punching yourself in the stomach so hard that you wish you couldn’t breathe. Because passing out would at least provide a little relief from the terrible feeling that only that word can produce. Mike says that description is a little strong. But he never had to produce thirty sweeps pieces in one month!
It happens four times a year: February, May, July and November. Television ratings are measured. And advertising rates are set on the results. Bottom line, reporters will come up with endless special reports designed to impress, dazzle, titillate and wow you…. just to get your attention. When the bottom line is involved, the pressure to deliver is on!
I have to admit, while the sickening feeling would torture me for the months of sweeps and 30 days of preparation before… I loved it in a sick way. This was a time when you could convince ‘management’ to commit you to longer term investigations, series and consumer projects.
And I am a bit sado-masochistic in that I dream up these elaborate story ideas, sketch out a road map for executing them but somehow block out how much work is involved… until the project is approved. What is that all about? Incredible denial? Or a Bill Clinton level ability to compartmentalize.
So, as February quickly approached, I’d noticed a trend. And I noticed long before the economic nightmare became reality. A little newsletter from Raleigh caught my attention. Foreclosure rates in some counties in the Charlotte metro area were up 300%. I started thinking – what if we tackled some of our viewers’ personal financial problems. We could choose three teams who represented real people with real problems. We’ll pair them up with financial experts and follow them on their road to recovery. Better still, we’ll all learn a little something along the way. Sounds simple. Right?
I won’t get into how much work it took to pull it off, but I will tell you that I learned a tremendous amount from these segments, called “The Financial Fitness:Bootcamp Challenge.” It seems like every night, I was coming home and saying to Mike, “you won’t believe what I learned today.” The series truly lit a fire under my rear to get our finances under control.
I’ve mentioned him before in a blog called “The Show must go…or not!” one of the experts, in fact the leader of our winning team, was Todd Calamita. He’s a financial consultant with RBC Wealth Management and a certified financial planner. Some of the basics that Todd taught our audience really hit home with me:
1) Make a budget. Painful? Yes. Critical? Yes. Truly making a budget is like telling people you watch PBS. Most of us just say we do.
2) Pay off the credit card debt.
3) Set aside enough savings to live off of for 3-6 months.
4) Decide how you want to live when you retire and start planning accordingly.
These sound easy enough but they are big commitments. And item #3 saved us from certain financial disaster when Mike’s job was cut from the WCNC budget. Unemployment insurance is NOT a salary replacement. It’s but a fraction of your take home check. Plus when you lose your job, you have a brand new ENORMOUS expense, COBRA. If not for that savings, we could have been in serious trouble, very quickly.
As for our retirement, at the rate we were going, we would have had to move in with our children for retirement and hope that the Redding boys marry good cooks.
What we went through last Spring, Summer and Fall, wasn’t easy. It wasn’t easy at all. But it also wasn’t a complete disaster. We have Todd to thank. Which is why I am especially proud to introduce Todd Calamita as our newest sponsor. He’s someone we could count on during tough times and you can, too.
The one thing that stood out about Todd from the beginning is his passion for what he does and for helping people. Believe me and I hate to offend… but sometimes, financial experts… well.. uh… aren’t very exciting/excited when they talk about money and numbers. Which made it very scary to spend a month of television on this. I mean this wasn’t The Charlie Rose Show (no offense). But when Todd talks about budgets and retirement, you find yourself paying close attention. That’s his passion at work. He will also hold you accountable.
“Advisors can keep the boat steady when times are rough. They can help you not make emotional decisions when you are going through an emotional event,” Todd says, “I’ve told clients when they need to sell their houses. And no, that’s not what people want to hear, but my job is to help them with their ability to save by managing their expenses.”
After such a brutal year financially as a nation, I think we’ve come to appreciate a reality check. But don’t look to Todd for doom and gloom. For him, money isn’t emotional. It’s simply a puzzle that needs to be figured out.
“I always think there is a solution. There is always a way to solve the puzzle, even if it requires a great deal of creativity,” Todd says.
I’ve been thinking about how easy it is to put this off, to say you don’t have enough money to budget it, etc. The bottom line is that if you have been to Starbucks in the last two months, you have money that can improve your financial situation. Todd’s approach is to listen to your goals, look at your spending and find ways to help you meet your goals. It’s a great feeling… a great relief to face money head on and be in charge of it to an extint.
We are so grateful that Todd is supporting what we are doing at StopandSmellthePeople.com. Todd says he believes in the power of positive story telling. In fact, he says the mission of this site and his own mission aren’t so far apart, “I think you and Mike make a difference to your viewers – with some of the stories that you are sharing. I want to make a difference in the lives of my clients. I want to make a difference in their financial future.”
Mike and I believe in the future of StopandSmellthePeople.com and the SASTP Nation. You all have become an important part of our lives. We are truly grateful to our sponsors for supporting what we’re doing here. If you have a moment and want to tell Todd how you feel about his support of SASTP, click here. And for those of you interested in talking to Todd about your retirement and other financial goals, mention this article and your first meeting with him will be on the house!
Back to smelling,
Anna
January 26th, 2010 by Anna Redding
Just wept when I saw these… so you people at work, better grab some tissue fast! This morning more NC National Guard troops arrived home and in their family’s arms. Today’s homecoming Lincolnton, NC.
- Father and daughter reunited
First hug just hours ago in Lincolnton, NC
NC National Guard soldier embraces his child Tuesday morning
The little things so easily taken for granted like taking a family picture
January 25th, 2010 by Mike Redding
I know we’ve been promising to launch our second sponsor early this week. I think all our ducks will be in a row for a Wednesday launch. Cool beans? Cool beans.
Now, I have to tell you the brief and funny story of the cupcakes.
I got word about the NC National Guard coming back from Iraq through several sources. They don’t publish this stuff. In fact they don’t send out the press releases until a few days before they are bussed to their home cities… long after they have landed on American soil.
I had a pretty good idea on when they would get in country and then when our local soldiers would get to Charlotte. They don’t talk in exact dates until they are very close to U.S. soil. That’s partly because if they put a date out there and everyone back home gets jacked up and then the Army changes things the delays can feel like a kick in the gut. It’s also partly die to the fact they don’t like to give out too much information because, well, it’s just safer that way. And it’s partly because they don’t want to jinx it.
One of my sources (who is rapidly working her way onto the SASTP imaginary payroll) made mention that it would be nice to have some food or snacks on hand when the buses arrive in Charlotte. I don’t have the free time I used to have. I go non-stop from about 7 Am to 7 PM each work day. I love my work and the time zips by but it’s still time I don’t have to work my peeps in Charlotte trying to get some food lined up for this amazing homecoming.
2973 cupcakes not pictured.
But I do happen to have a great relationship with the people at Harris-Teeter Inc. I shot an e-mail to Harris-Teeter CFO Jeff Sherman. Jeff and I have become friends through a fundraiser we team up for every year… eight or nine years running now. He got Jennifer Thompson, Harris-Teeter Communications Director, involved. Jennifer and I go back even further. We worked together at WCNC-TV back in 1998. The two of them snap their fingers and voila! 3000 cupcakes are on their way to Charlotte! Let me spell the out: t-h-r-e-e t-h-o-u-s-a-n-d. WOW!
When Jennifer told me that on the phone two nights before the buses would arrive i said,
1500 cupcake air-fresheners...
“What? I’m sorry I thought I heard you say 3000 cupcakes. Did you mean 300?” Nope. 3000! I belly laughed out loud. That is a lot of cupcakes!
Ironically our future unpaid employee, April Blasky, called SASTPUE#5, Brian Christiansen, to help pick up the 3000 cupcakes. Brian could only get half of them in his SUV. But even 1500 cupcakes was enough for every soldier to have plenty to take home and enjoy with the family.
So hooray for Harris-Teeter stepping it up for our soldiers!
And a special thank you to my old friends, Jeff Sherman and Jennifer Thompson.
Peace… MR
January 25th, 2010 by Anna Redding
Check out this story by FoxCharlotte, and this one by WSOC capturing the homecoming! Not to spoil the joy here but I searched the Charlotte Observer and WCNC and WBTV websites and couldn’t find stories about this homecoming.
I know WBTV was there. WSOC went live at noon Saturday. WCNC was close enough to walk there and chose not to. Can’t tell you how disappointed I am in my alma mater.
Okay, enough rant. Let’s jump out of the gutter and onto the joy train with some more photos of the homecoming here in Charlotte. Oh! A reminder to SASTP Nation: If you’re having a soldier homecoming in your town, send us some pictures with names, we’ll post them here! Also, if you missed yesterday’s post “When Johnny comes marching home,” check it out! Once again, to #5 (you know who I’m talking about) for the incredible photographs.
Children who haven't hugged daddy in along, long time!
The waiting is the hardest part...
April Blasky starts to mildly freak out as busses pull into view!
Let the hugathon begin!
Cody and Leah Fowler reunited!
When Harris Teeter found out the troops were coming home, they sent cupcakes for the party! 3000 cupcakes!
Enjoy these images today and we’ll make our big SASTP announcement tomorrow! We are bringing a new sponsor on board. You’re gonna like him!
Peace,
MR
