To be honest, Iwasn’t exactly on TV, but the entrance to our neighborhood was. And the old railroad trestle next to our development was. And the “Dead Man’s Curve” under the bridge was. So there.
It was quite an interesting day, to say the least. My first day of my “new” normal was definitely…not.
It all began about 11:40 or so, when I heard a strange noise outside our house. We hear construction noise continually, from heavy trucks rumbling down the street, to saws and hammers, to Mexican radio stations… and then of course there’s the lawn services with the blowers and the mowers and the trimmers. This noise was different. It remained constant long enough for me to figure out that something was strange. It sounded like a helicopter, and it wasn’t moving. My first fear was that there had been a serious accident on Highway 5 and someone needed to be CareFlighted out of the area. So I stepped out into the back yard to take a look, and sure enough there was a helicopter hovering over the fields next to our development – about 100 yards away or so. After realizing that it wasn’t landing, and it wasn’t colored like a CareFlight helicopter, my next thought was police. And they had their man cornered. Yikes. That’s not a pleasant thought, so close to my house. After about 5-8 minutes or so, the helicopter began to move. I heard it come toward our house and so I stepped out into the front yard to take a look. Crisana and I watched as the helicopter appeared over the roof of our house! THAT was a pretty cool sight, let me tell you. It hovered there about 20 seconds and then made a few passes over the area. While it was hovering, I could see “N8 TV” printed on the underside of the helicopter, so I knew it was a news chopper. I immediately ran inside and turned on Channel 8 to see if there was breaking news, and to find out what it was all about. The whole noon broadcast came and went with no indication of why we had a news helicopter circling our neighborhood.
So, citizens, I returned to my life, because there was obviously nothing to see here. Went out and had lunch with Trey at his school. Ran a couple of errands. Got home and put Crisana down for her nap. Went to check email…and there it was. From one of our neighbors through the neighborhood email loop:
Channel 8 is in the neighborhood investigating the dangerous situation on
Hwy 5 with our non-used railroad bridge and the sharp curve. I had agreed
to work with the City of Fairview – who is frustrated by Txdot’s lack of
interest – to bring this to the media. Channel 8 is coming to my house to
interview me (a surprise) in five minutes. Is there anyone else out there
at home who would agree to talk to them?
If I had only known, I coulda been on TV!! Oh well. They probably couldn’t have handled my beauty, wit, and charm. I would have been too much for them.
So, the story led off the 6 P.M. broadcast. The news van sat at the entrance to our subdivision for about an hour. Steve Stoler did a live broadcast from that location at 6. Unfortunately, in the time it took to gather the kids and the neighbor and head to the corner, he was just finishing up the story. We came in on the tail end – but got to meet him, receive some autographed dartboard fodder – er photographs – (his words, not ours. His cameraman claims they are GREAT to kill crickets in the corner.), and the kids even got to hold and look through the camera. The crew was very gracious to us, and we enjoyed meeting them in person. I’ll try to get the link on the site to the news story so you can see it for yourself. Here are the few pictures we were able to get of this momentous occasion.
Here we are, the gang with Channel 8 Collin County reporter Steve Stoler…
And our friend Ryan became a cameraman for a moment…
