'Real' dress rehearsal

March has not disappointed! In a recent entry I sensed an exciting month ahead....and it's been absolutely nothing but action-packed!

On a personal note, I recently had a day off...yet work always seems to weave into the course of the day, even an off day.

During my day off, a very rainy day, I needed to drive over the Valleyview bridge not once, but twice! Holy cow. In light of the fatal accident just a few weeks ago, it is quite frightening driving over that bridge, let alone in a torrential rain storm. Even during off time, newsie events loom in the back of an assignment editor's mind!

I usually work every St. Patrick's Day --St. Pat's Day 2011 off the charts. OK, let me preface what I am about to say with this --I understand St. Paddy's Day can be crazy, zany, with thousands of obnoxious drunk people everywhere. But for some reason, 2011 stepped it up a few notches. I can not believe the constant calls on the scanners for public intoxication, people just laying in the streets passed out, broken limb calls, and then shortly before 6pm, a massive fight broke out in front of Tower City. A Cleveland Police officer broke his foot as patrol cars from everywhere zoomed to Public Square.

We were in the thick of things but honestly, it actually sounded much worse than it was....at the time, it seemed it could go either way and balloon into something much worse. After the fact, it was a typical St. Patrick's Day melee.

Closing out the week with a bang! OSU vs UTSA at Quicken Loans Arena! OSU blew the covers off this game winning 75-46. And with all of the NCAA festivities in town, wkyc took the Friday 11pm show on the road. Romona has been ill much of the week with an awful virus. (Sidebar --the news desk has been receiving call after call all week long asking where Ro is --she's just been sick everyone!! She will be back very soon!!)....

So the new 7pm team of Robin Swoboda, Chris Tye, Jim Donovan, and Betsy Kling had a 'real' dress rehearsal leading up to Monday's 7pm debut. Robin anchored from the studio as Chris Tye, Jim Donovan, and Jennifer Lindgren were all live outside Q Arena for various OSU /Sports stories. Add in Betsy and Maureen back in studio and you have a blockbuster show! The 11pm news rocked big time. It was so fun to watch and be a part of the entire production.

Perfect end to what has been a pretty perfect week so far......

Be sure you get outside this weekend to witness the Superbig Moon! A big end to what has been an enormously successful week!

Time to make the paczkis

Looking ahead into the wkyc crystal ball during the month of March and beyond should prove to be quite exciting!

Not only are we approaching March Madness, always an exhilarating time of the year, but I'm seeing more and more STO people roaming around the building as Spring Training winds down leading up to Cleveland Indians' Opening Day on April 1, 2011.

The time change always perks people up as the days begin getting longer and longer....

Spring is right around the corner.

And a transformation for our 7pm show as Robin Swoboda and Chris Tye take the helm with some wonderful new ideas and segments....

A few days ago many celebrated Fat Tuesday --a precursor for Ash Wednesday and the Lenten Season.

But Fat Tuesday also means something else: Paczkis!

Personally, I prefer the plain, empty paczkis (which I guess are more like fried dough!)....the authentic New Orleans beignets are magnificent!

In honor of Paczki Day, we sent Betsy Kling out to whip up some tasty treats.....and she came back with a whole slew of authentic eats she made with her own hands! Delicious!

February 2011--Great month for stories

Yes, it is winter in Cleveland.

Everytime we go out to do a 'snow' story or I'm asked to have a crew shoot snow, I keep reminding myself, it's just winter in Cleveland.

But even I must admit, we've been dumped on moreso this year than in years past.

The great thing about modern technology, wkyc.com, facebook, and even twitter is the immediacy of sharing pictures and video. As a member of the wkyc facebook weather warriors page, I upload lots of pictures during snow storms to share what's happening in my neck of the woods. Hopefully, viewers from our entire viewing area are doing the same! We sure do love to see what's happening in your neighborhood, especially if we can not get there ourselves!

Every other week has had a different weather event playing out...one week it's 50's and rain with tremendous thunderstorms (February 26) and then the next we are in the midst of yet another white out, knuckle clenching snow blizzard.....strap your seat belt on folks, we have a little ways to go before winter is officially over!

Another story stemming from our Cleveland winters began when my package delivery was delayed.....simple idea yet quite funny. We got socked yet again toward the end of February.....I was set to receive a PKG on a Thursday and sure enough the darn snow delayed it for 5 days....well, it was not anything that pressing but does make you think about those people that do wait for supplies which help save their lives and help their quality of life. The weather delays can put them in quite a predicament.

As I checked the UPS website everyday, it had this huge message on their homepage that the bad weather may be delaying deliveries ....the 3 main areas that popped up were OHIO, CALIFORNIA, and LIBYA! Cleveland and Libya in the same sentence quite comical and then the comedians on fb had to get into the act and ask me what I had purchased from Libya!

Whether we want to admit this or not, yet another huge story this month was The Cleveland Cavaliers playing the Los Angeles Clippers and winning 126-119. The Cavs seem to beat the great teams....but more importantly was gathering added information to feed to Chris Tye after the game....when the game ended, social media takes over.

It's a hoot to be on facebook and Twitter and see people from literally all over the world commenting on the same story....maybe friends of yours who have scattered but are still Cleveland Sports fans monitoring the game.....and then if you follow big wigs on Twitter...it's awesome to see the likes of who is commenting at the game's conclusion. ESPN, NBA, Ted Williams the Golden Voice, Drew Carey, Josh Cribbs, Ozzie Guillen, just to name a few, all interjected their congratulatory comments to the Cavs' strong game against LA.....and to add a little flavor to Chris Tye's live shot, we fed him the comments we were reading all over the social media world.....

It's very fun to scream something to the producer who relays to the talent in the field and literally minutes later, it's coming out on the air.....it's that 'Broadcast News' moment!

One other big story for me particularly was the death of my Mother's best friend. Mercedes Karpinski Spotts was a real influence in the legal world in Cleveland...but so much more. She helped those who could not help themselves....I honestly can not do justice in a few words here to praise all this woman stood for and did for Cleveland and beyond as a wonderful trailblazer and humanitarian.

Since I was very close to Mercedes, she imparted on her family that I sing her funeral and I was in the loop almost immediately after her passing. In turn, I wrote a story on wkyc.com way ahead of the competition including Cleveland.com. It all came together in memorializing this wonderful woman who established so much of what Cleveland has become.

At Mercedes' funeral, there were judges and other politicians, religious, and pretty much people from all walks of life. Jimmy DiMora showed up at her funeral. No matter what you think of this man, I find this moment very telling and heart warming. This man who is certainly in the spotlight now more than ever chose to honor his friend above what people may say about him ....I'm sure he was uncomfortable but he exemplified (at this moment) what we all should...the right thing above caring what people may say.