My assignment last Thursday was to go tackle people at Lilith Fair and find out what kind of sunglasses they were (or weren’t) sporting.  Here’s what I’ve noticed over they years … if you’re holding a mic and have a cameraman in tow, you’re a magnet for crazy people.  The sad part?  People who weren’t crazy before you stepped outside your news van suddenly become bi-polar lunatics when you walk up to them.

Case in point … I would ask a simple question.  “Hey, I’m doing a story on sunglasses.  What kind of sunglasses are you wearing?” or “Where did you get those shades and why did you pick ‘em?”  Instantly people would go on the defensive … like I was some sort of sunglass spy.  “Why do you want to know?” or “None of your business” were the main responses.  Little did I know there’s a secret society of sunglass conspiracy theorists.

Other people would run willy-nilly up to me and start asking me questions.  “Whatchoo’ doing?”, “Why is you all up in hurrr?” or my personal favorite, “Can I be on TV?”  (If you have to ask, the answer is an unequivocal no.)

Eventually, I got frustrated in the 110+ heat and just starting plucking people from the crowd.  The problem there is you have to interview 10 people before you get ONE usable answer.  Put a camera in people’s faces and one of two things happen:  1) they can no longer use English and begin babbling in an uncontrollable-conscious-stream-of-thought-that-makes-no-sense-whatsoever-but-sounds-like-it-does-when-it’s-spewing-forth-words-from-their-mouth-and-am-I-still-talking-wait-what-was-the-question-again-hi-mom!”  Or 2) folks try to become pithy and comical in their answers and end up answering a completely DIFFERENT question.  I had a woman tell me a bunch of useless information concerning the sunglasses featured in “Top Gun”.   Ma’am … that movie was 25 years ago.  I could not possibly care less and I’m poised to walk away from you.

The live shot, my first, went off without a hitch.  See the link below:

http://www.kctv5.com/video/24275993/index.html

The only nerve-wracking thing is I was walking around an outdoor amphitheater with $2,000 of merchandise on me.   I’ve been accosted for leftover pizza before.  But somehow, I managed to come out of it unscathed.  And I managed to make friends with several thousand lesbians.  I even got invited to a bonfire this fall, where I’ll wear my sunglasses at night.