Weather every 10 Minutes

Without exception, the people who work in front of the camera at your local TV station are equal parts worldy egomaniacs and sheltered, dim-witted know-nothings. Also without exception, the smaller the market in which you work, the larger the egos of said anchorfolk. Imagine what it was like working in the 30somethingth largest market in the US. God help anyone who gets stuck working in Billings, Montana.

In Iowa, local TV personalities are real celebrities. The kind you might wait in line for hours to see and still feel good about yourself. If George Clooney and Kevin Cooney were each attending separate events in Des Moines, it'd be a toss up as to who would draw the largest crowd.

Worst among anchor offenders are the weather gu, er 'meterologists,' with their delusions of meaningfulness they attach to boy-who-cried-wolf type weather hysteria. Prime-time television might as well not even exist in Iowa, because the meterologists are always pre-empting it to talk about the rainstorm halfway across the state.

During my stint at one of DSM's local TV huts, I worked with a particularly obnoxious misogynist, excuse me I mean meterologist, whom we'll call John Updike for the purposes of this story. John was young. Fresh out of weathivision school and ready to impress. He'd lick anyone's minge to get ahead, but he'd draw a firm line at sucking dick. I never much cared for him.

Because John was a certified idiot, I spent a lot of time intentionally making him mess up on-air. Most of the time I would take pleasure from forcing errors most viewers wouldn't notice; giving him bad cues, mis-timing his countdowns, and 'accidentally' switichg off his prompter which showed him his position relative to the map on the green screen behind him.

After one particularly annoying Saturday morning assholish comment from John, I decided it was time for him to pay. We were doing a segment on dog owners after the break, and John was to toss from the weather center to the anchor-with-guest in the other studio. During the break, John was pre-reading the copy for his toss on the prompter and asked me how to pronounce "Daschund." I was already looking for a way to embarrass him on-air, and hallelujah the man had tossed me a home-run pitch, right down the center of the plate.

I confidently explained the word was pronounced "Dash" (as in Mrs.) Hound." He accepted my answer without question and during the toss announced that anchor 'Joey' was in the studio with some special dash hounds.

As if the anchor in the studio with the puppies were in on my devious plan, he corrected John on the air before beginning the interview. Ah, the power of live television to make the people who make it laugh.