Jennifer, John and Mark on the Slide

I’m often asked, “What do you guys do between newscasts?” They mean between the 6pm and 10pm shows, the time of day when most people are relaxing at home eating dinner, playing with the kids, watching a little TV. While there’s usually work involved, like writing stories, shooting teases for the late news or emceeing events, believe me it’s not all work and no play. Like yesterday evening for example.

The evening news, weather and sports gang: Kristin, Jennifer, John and I, took in a local carnival. Our promotions guru is always looking for an excuse to get us out in the community and snap a few pictures and shoot some video for Channel 8 promos. (See the finished promo at the end). Football games, festivals, parades. Wherever there are people. So why not a carnival on our side of town?

I learned something about each of my co-workers. First, my co-anchor Kristin Dickerson LOVES carnival rides. She went on everything! Here’s a picture of her getting a high-five from sports anchor John Moss after she survived the Zipper without puking.

Kristin celebrating with John after riding the Zipper

Meteorologist Jennifer Zeppelin, John and I tackled something a little tamer. Or at least that’s probably what Jennifer thought! How difficult can the burlap sack slide be? After all, little kids do it. From the picture below, you can see John and I are hamming it up for the GoPro John is holding. But by Jennifer’s look on her face, she’s realizing the end is coming up much sooner than thought, and she’s forgot to put the brakes on. Her backside is about to get a big jolt. Jennifer can sure forecast the weather, but she can’t predict how a ride will end. That one hurt for a while!

John and Mark are hamming it up for the camera. Jennifer realizes she’s quickly coming to the end!

And remember when you were a kid at the carnival or fair, and you desperately wanted to ride the big rides but you weren’t quite tall enough? John may look like he’s well over 6 feet tall. Looks can be deceiving. He tried to sneak onto the Graviton, but he’ll just have to wait another year when he grows a couple of inches taller. Sorry John!

Sorry John! You’re not quite tall enough for this one.

We don’t get to do something like this very often. When we do, we like to call it “team building”.

Kristin, John, Jennifer and Mark at the carnival

Here’s the promo that’ll soon be airing on Tulsa’s Channel 8: