That's not a bad thing. It's just a thing. This is the time of year when news directors who work on a calendar-year-budget try to predict the future and guess how much it will cost to run a newsroom for the next year. I did not budget correctly in 2010 for two big events (Scott Roeder trial, Chiefs camp in St. Joe). Both were predictable and I'm challenging myself to do better for 2011.
I'm also challenging myself as a leader to learn (and help my team to learn) how we can improve our response to distributing news and information on "the set, net and cell." Not as easy as it sounds!
And then there's the personal stuff. Somehow, I didn't pay close attention to how our company health insurance works. Son Charlie is a full-time college student (in his fifth year; will graduate next May). His birthday falls at the wrong time of the year and he got too old (age 23) for the Scripps coverage. We were faced with a COBRA payment of $550 per month (not in the personal budget) through the end of the year. I, for one, am happy that the health care reform bill will allow me to cover his medical expenses as of January 1, 2011. And I'm thankful that the University of Tennessee has a health insurance alternative that costs just $350 for the fall semester that will take care of the minor emergencies. It's not the best but hopefully Charlie can avoid a catastrophic health crisis for the next four months.
New topic.
So what about those Chiefs!? I watched last night's game from beginning to end (and what the H happened with the KMBC signal for the first eight minutes?) I looked for an explanation on their website and Facebook page. Maybe I missed it? The station got thrashed in the Twitter universe when the "technical difficulties" slide came up instead of the game. I watched on ESPN2...and made a mental note that I'd always have a plan B and C if I had such a huge game to broadcast. (Please, NFL and NBC, please?)
Life lessons. Gotta love 'em!
