As I found out first hand over this last couple of weeks, reporting can be a dangerous business.
Ok, perhaps its not as risky as jumping off a cliff without a parachute, or becoming the head coach of the Edmonton Oilers, but I did have a couple of odd scenarios recently that doesn’t quite come up at journalism schools.
They weren’t life altering or anything like that, but it does go to show that sometimes odd things happen when you are not typing away at your desk.
My first incident took place on May 2, when I was sent out onto Highway 2 to take photos of a two-vehicle crash where a tanker truck had flipped over onto its side.
Since I knew that the highway traffic was going to be moving at a snail’s pace in the southbound lane because of the wreck, I travelled down one of the rural roads next to the highway so I could get to accident scene quicker.
After a quick drive that transformed my car into a vehicle that had travelled through a giant mud pit, I realized I would have to hop over a barbed wire fence just to get a good photo.
I happened upon a part of the fence that was much lower than other parts along the road, so I hopped over it and eventually made my way towards the accident scene, where an RCMP officer called me over and filled me in on what happened.
As I was taking photos, I noticed the wind had seemingly started to pick up and my left leg was suddenly a lot colder than it had been.
When I looked down, I realized I had ripped a giant hole in my dress pants.
It was a bit embarrassing but it could have been worse, as I may have had a massive gouge in my left leg if I had tried to hop a higher fence.
After tossing those pants by the wayside, and eventually washing my car clean of the 80 layers of mud, my next strange event took place at the Foothills Athletic Park in Calgary on May 21.
Since it was going to be a warm day at the Rocky View Sports Association track and field meet, I knew that I was probably going to be in the sun all day, so I lathered on the sunscreen to make sure I didn’t turn into a lobster.
That gameplan was going well and my day at the track was a pretty good one, as I had talked to a number of different athletes and was asked to buy Calgary Stampeders season tickets at one point, which is another story for a different column.
During one of my last interviews of the day, I suddenly felt a sharp pain in my left arm.
After making a sort of muzzled ‘Youch’ as I chatted with the track and field coach from George McDougall High School in Airdrie, I quickly discovered that a wasp had stung me.
Now this isn’t the first time I have been stung, as I was once attacked by an entire nest during a day of weed-whacking a few years back, but it still freaked me out a little bit.
I mean, I was just standing there and no bugs were around all day. You don’t really expect to be attacked by a stinging object at that point in time.
While my arm was feeling off for the rest of the day, everything turned out fine, but I’m still a bit worried.
They say bad things happen in threes, so with two strange incidents behind me, I plan to stay in the house for the next little while.
Of course, that means I’ll cut my finger making a sandwich this weekend.
