London Happenings

Another week has passed without a blog entry! I don’t know where the time goes. I just re-read my last post and it seems almost annoyingly happy, which is a good thing, I guess. Today I’m not feeling quite as euphoric, but once again I’m enjoying the quiet of the common room, even with the now-soothing tube rumbling by outside.

Last night one of my biggest fears about this whole experience became a reality…I was Skyping with my Mom and the phone rang. It was my dad at work telling her about a phone he had just gotten from the police dispatcher. My grandpa was on the way to the hospital in an ambulance…someone saw him slumped over in his truck and managed to stop it and call for help. Big heart attack. After a pacemaker and special attention from a cardiologist/family-friend, he is now sedated in the ICU in St. Louis. He's stable and hopefully his heart will get stronger. Doesn’t exactly defy my theory that life as a journalist equals a personal life reduced to a series of missed events—birthdays, anniversaries, holidays, the list goes on…

So having that on my mind all day made running the teleprompter from 7 a.m. to 11 slightly brutal. There’s not a lot of room for error in TV news and often that’s reflected in stress levels. It’s hard being an intern because I feel like I can’t always defend myself which is okay, but I hate it when people think I’m stupid or incapable. Anyway, I did manage to amuse myself by expanding the cast of characters I’ve been working on…one of my favorite things about this internship is all the different personalities that seem to show up over and over again in newsrooms. From the producers, directors, on-air presenters, supervisors…it’s like there’s a mold at every station and only the names are different. This means nothing for the non-KOMU readers, but it’s just strange that there are such close comparisons for everyone from Jim & Angie, Stacey, Cate, Bowman, and Holly (her likeness is Rosie, which I find hilarious).  

After a crazy weekend in Italy, this week has been pretty calm. I did have a pretty weird experience at the ‘launderette’. I’m still nursing a swollen lip because of it…

On Tuesday I only had a few hours before my pathetically early bedtime, so I thought I’d be productive and do some laundry. Last time I had the people do it for me (actually cheaper, not me being a brat). It was great but the clothes were a little wrinkly for my taste…so I decided to do it myself. I gathered up my clothes and headed down Hogarth. The place is a little shady/dirty but not horrible, so I had a ‘get over it’ moment and set to work. I threw my colors in the washer and closed the door. Which didn’t close. No big deal, so I moved them to another washer. Time to pour my detergent in so I got out my ‘non-bio’ and attempted to get the cap off…which would not budge. The ladies sitting on the bench were already eyeing me skeptically, so I was determined to act like I was a pro at this. I failed. I finally got the cap off, but not without busting my lip in the process. I honestly don’t know how I did it, but the scowling evil mother-in-law types were kind enough to offer a dirty rag from the floor to help me clean the blood from my face. No thanks. So I started the load while my face burned with injuries (blushing from damaged pride and bleeding from busted lip). I started another load and then went back to check the other one—just to make sure—and of course it had stopped. Four pounds for 2 minutes? The ladies couldn’t figure out what happened so they sent me home to get more money (which was complete with deafening walk-of-shame music in my head).

With only the thought of having absolutely no other choice, I returned to start over. The ladies were giggling at this point, and of course chatting in an obscure language, which was fine because I don’t think I want to know what they were saying. Surprise—all the other small washers were full so for the sake of escaping as soon as possible I prepared to bite the bullet and pay an extra pound for the big washer. I started loading…until 2 of them cornered me. “Too big. No use.” Did they actually work there? I explained that I didn’t care but they were not having it. “Waste money. No use. Wait.” I’m not sure why, but I knew I had absolutely no choice but to comply. So I unloaded for the third time and waited while they stared at me. Finally my clothes were churning in the washer and I calmed myself down a bit. Until the roach scampered across my foot. Yes, really. I suppressed a scream, but the ladies saw my look of terror and a few actually walked out the door because they were gasping for air due to laughter. The rest of the experience went by pretty uneventfully…other than spending 3 pounds in a dryer that didn’t work and being scolded for folding my clothes wrong. Don’t worry though, my new friends helped me re-fold and I think my experience was the best laugh they’ve had in awhile.  I think next time I’ll just embrace the wrinkles…

Italy blog in the next 48 hours! (I promise, Meg!)