I joke that it’s my off-Broadway debut. That’s because the Irvington Town Hall Theater is just off Broadway in Irvington, New York, about 20 miles north of New York City and just south of the Tappan Zee Bridge. It’s a beautiful little theater that sits atop the Village Hall (hence the name). Back in the days before TV and the internet, it was the center of Irvington’s entertainment and cultural life. These days it’s an intimate little space in which audiences can catch a movie, a lecture or—the Clocktower Players production of ‘Camelot.’ I’d received an email mentioning the auditions in late spring. It sounded like fun—I’ve loved the music to ‘Camelot ‘ since I was a kid, although I never managed to see the show until I caught Richard Harris in a revival during the mid-80’s. So back in June, music in hand, I found my way to the theater. “How tough could it be?”, I thought. Irvington’s a small town. I’d done some community theater back home in Colorado more than 25 years ago—this couldn’t be much different, right? Wrong. The audition was, in a word, humbling. I was the third one scheduled. The woman who had the second audition went in ahead of me. When I heard her magnificent singing voice filling the theater and spilling out to the lobby where I waited, I knew I was out of my league. Leaving occurred to me; but then the door opened and it was my turn. I’ve since learned that gorgeous voice belongs to Lisa Spielman, a psychologist and biostatistician who is now our Guenevere. In that role, she’s simply perfect. Our magnificent King Arthur is Larry Reina, an attorney. And yours truly won the role of Lancelot. Originally I wasn’t sure I wanted to be the French knight who steals the Queen, but it’s turned out to be a great assignment. Taking myself out of the mix, I can honestly say it’s a beautiful production and a lot of fun to watch with glorious costumes, cute little children, amazing choreography and wonderful actors and singers who are onstage just for the sheer joy of sharing this beloved fable with audiences. As Lancelot says, “I’m honored to be among them.” We play three more shows this weekend and that’s it. It’s been a quarter-century since my last play, and it might be another before I return. If you’re in the tri-state area and have some free time this weekend, we’d love to see you—in Camelot. Tickets are available at Irvingtontheater.com.
Wow! Aren't we glad we bought that cake from Angela Logan. She's having a bake sale; hoping to salvage her home. She has 11 days to raise 2,600 dollars or lose her home. We'd be glad to help contribute again. YUM!
If you were watching today’s edition of Happening Now, you probably saw our coverage of the partial evacuation of the U.S. Capitol building. Details are still coming in, but it appears a pilot flew into the restricted airspace over Washington without the proper authorization. In this post-9/11 era, that’s a huge mistake for any pilot to make.
You might have heard me mention, after that breaking news and near the end of our second hour, one of the scariest events in my time as a pilot—an event that involved my little Cessna, restricted airspace, and—Jane’s house!Here’s what happened: I enjoy taking aerial photographs of the homes of friends (and co-anchors!); they make great conversation pieces and, therefore, great gifts. I wanted to surprise Jane with an aerial photo of her home for Christmas.
The day I’d chosen was perfect for such a mission; clear skies and low humidity. It was also the day on which the Pope was in the U.S. and visiting a location not far from Jane’s house.
I took a flight instructor with me so that he could handle the flying while I handled the camera. We were aware of the restricted airspace—it was a circle, 8 miles in diameter as I recall, over the Pope. Jane’s place was a mile or so outside the closed airspace so we circled it a number of times, I took my photos, and off we flew to a second place I wanted to photograph.
As we were wrapping up shooting that second location we got a somewhat ominous call from an air traffic controller; he wanted to know our tail number, what we were doing and where we intended to land. Lots of questions that seemed way out of the norm. He gave us an F.A.A. phone number to call once we were back on the ground.
We landed at my home airport; I noticed as we taxied to the ramp a number of burly uniformed men holding automatic weapons standing nearby. Block letters on their bulletproof vests i-d’d their agencies; FBI, ATF, Secret Service, county police. I quipped to the instructor, "Look! They sent us a greeting party!" I thought I was making a joke. Then, as I shut down the engine, the burly posse advanced toward us. Nobody among them was laughing.
They inspected the aircraft and escorted us to a conference room inside. Names were taken, questions asked, pilot licenses examined. We dialed the F.A.A. number we’d been told to call.
Turns out a police helicopter, in the air to protect the Pope, had seen us circling over Chez Skinner and thought we might have violated the restricted airspace. I never saw it, but that chopper apparently chased us, took down my tail number and radioed it back to HQ. Thus began the scariest moments of my years as a pilot.
It was all much ado about nothing. The F.A.A checked the radar tapes; the man on the other end of the phone said, "Nah, they’re fine, there was no violation." We had not strayed into the Pope’s protected airspace. I breathed a huge sigh of relief.
Afterward, a burly Secret Service agent walked up to me. Head shaved, body armor making him look even more barrel-chested than he was, hand on his automatic weapon—he stared at me intently. This guy was scary! Whatever it was he had to say, I knew I didn’t want to hear it; I prepared myself for the kind of verbal tirade I’ve sometimes heard the Secret Service dish out. He opened his mouth. I winced. Then he spoke but four words:
"We LOVE Fox News!"
And with that, the posse disappeared. Crisis averted. I would fly another day.
Oh—and after all that? I didn’t get the photo. You see, it can be difficult to recognize a place from a thousand feet up.
I'm wearing the 'golf' tie our youngest daughter gave me for Father's Day awhile ago. I thought it was a bit garish--but every time I put it on, people seem to like it. Our daughter came in with me for "Take Your Kids To Work Day" here at the News Channel this morning... so I thought I'd show off her gift.
We want to apologize to you, our loyal viewers, for an incident that occurred during "Happening Now" earlier today.Correspondent Griff Jenkins was covering one of the "Anti-Tax Tea Parties" underway throughout the nation today, this one at Lafayette Park across from the White House.Griff was reporting live as we always try to do during our two hours, talking to participants and finding out what motivates them to take part.As he was speaking to some of them--and to you watching his coverage--a few nearby participants struck up an a capella rendition of "The Star Spangled Banner".
Their patriotic message was as beautiful as it was spontaneous, but it put Griff in the uncomfortable position of having to finish his reporting by "talking over" the national anthem, something we strive never to do on Fox News Channel.
Having been a reporter, live in the field, for many years, I can sympathize with Griff's plight; he could stop speaking and let the anthem be heard, in which case the thrust of his story would not get out.Or he could continue to report--which is what he did.With an earpiece in one ear to hear instructions from our producers in New York, and the open ear listening to the folks he was interviewing, he might not have even heard the song that erupted around him--"live shots" can get very hectic, and the pressure on our correspondents is often tremendous.
So for those of you, who are upset with us, please accept this explanation with our apologies.It was absolute happenstance, a bad bit of timing--and completely unintentional on Griff's part.
We thank you for honoring our Anthem with your comments and, as always, we are grateful you're watching "Happening Now".
Last week I blogged about how my frugality has, on occasion, cost me a bunch of money. Over the weekend, my miserly nature almost cost me something even more valuable--my face!
Saturday morning my wife complained that her shower was lukewarm. I told her it was probably because a couple of the kids and one of their overnight guests had used all of the hot water. Saturday afternoon, when my youngest son tried to shower, it was ice cold. I knew what that meant.
I wandered down to the furnace room and sure enough, there it was—the telltale water on the concrete under the 5-or-6 year old water heater. The tank was leaking. Time for a replacement.
I dialed my faithful plumber. He was more than willing to help, but pointed out that all of the plumbing supply houses were closed for the weekend. He said he’d be happy to pick up a new water heater at one of those consumer warehouse stores which ARE open on weekends, but the only brand they carry, in his opinion, would last no more than three years—sometimes only one. Better, he said, to wait until Monday when the supply house opens and he could pick up a quality unit. I agreed. Why pay all that money for inferior goods and have to do another replacement installation a couple of years down the road?
I looked at the current, leaking heater. It was dripping, but it wasn’t a gusher. Water heaters are cleverly and safely designed so that leaking water eventually fills up kind of bowl atop the flame spreader—which looks like a giant version of those on a gas stove. The water in the bowl keeps the flame from igniting; that’s how you soon learn your tank is leaking—no hot water. There’s also a failsafe that shuts down the pilot light.
No hot water? For the rest of the weekend? No showers, clean dishes, clothes washer? My wife was less than thrilled. I decided to relight the water heater--which isn’t as completely stupid as it sounds. My thought was that I’d mop up the water from the leak, re-light the pilot and let it ignite the main flame. Heat the water in the holding tank good and hot and it should get us through the weekend. My plan worked fine—except one tank wasn’t enough. There was always the need for one more shower, load of laundry, vat of dishes. Each time, I’d head back to the basement, flop on the concrete and go through the same drill.
By Sunday afternoon I was working on about my fifth re-light. Yes, I was tired of crawling around on the dirty floor, mopping up water and reaching into the belly of the tank to hold a match to the pilot. So I did what my father, my flight instructors, my inner voice have always told me not to do.
I took a shortcut.
Why mop out all that water for yet another relight? Won’t it just boil away?
I lit the pilot. I turned on the gas. I heard a curious gurgling noise, apparently the sound of gas bubbling through that “saucer” of water atop the flame spreader. I waited. Nothing.
If I were smart, or careful, or both, I’d have turned off the gas before I made my next move, but I didn’t.
I assumed the pilot light had been extinguished; I lay down on the floor to take a peek into the access door where that tiny flame flickers.
WHOOMPF!!!
It is difficult to describe the moment of clarity that hit my brain about the same time a wall of blue flame hit my face. “You moron!” said my brain to the body it directs. “You just roasted yourself in a mini gas explosion!”
It took no longer than the blink of an eye; I know that I did close my eyes, although not before noticing the lovely blue color of the jet of flame that was erupting out of the viewing port at the base of the tank and wrapping around my head. I bolted upright in an instant to get my face out of the line of fire. But by the time I reached a sitting position, it was over. Flame gone. Whoompf gone.
Face? Still with me. My eyes felt strange; that turned out to be the odd sensation provided by eyelashes suddenly singed and now curled back against the eyelids. Eyebrows and hair, also singed. The resulting smell? Not pleasant. But no skin damage, no burns, no serious damage of any kind, really. Just the sobering reality that I had done something very, very stupid and come out pretty much unscathed.
Oh, but there was evidence. Hilda—the makeup artist here at Fox tasked with making me look presentable—and Carol, who styles my hair—noticed right away when I sat down this morning. The steel-wool texture of my eyebrows. The melted lashes. The missing hair. Trust me--you do NOT want to have to endure a lecture from those two.
Plumbers, firefighters, OSHA experts—I appreciate your concern, but I don’t need to hear from you. I know better than anybody that I did something really, really senseless. It’s not much fun to feel your head enveloped in a ball of burning natural gas, if only for an instant. Thankfully the angels were with me, and I could be on-air with Jane—and you—today.
Yes, the plumber is at my house right now putting in a new water heater. And no, I won’t do that again.
I prefer to refer to myself as ‘frugal.’ It’s a skill I learned from my parents, both of whom came through the Great Depression. My dad was never able to afford a college education but taught himself a great deal in the school of hard knocks; he built a very successful business primarily through guts and hard work.
My mom taught me more about scrimping. I’m the youngest of six children. While Dad was out trying to build his business, Mom stayed home and took very good care of all of us. It wasn’t easy. I remember her scouring both Denver newspapers for grocery coupons; she’d take me along, usually to two or sometimes three different grocery stores, in order that she could get the best deal possible. If she could get ten cents off green beans at Safeway and seven cents off a bag of flour at Albertson’s, she’d patronize both. I remember, during our grocery-shopping trips, me pestering her for a dime to put in the machine for a can of soda pop; the answer was always no, you don’t need it.
She was better at it than I am, but I still do things like turn over the bottles of ketchup and salad dressing and drain their dregs into the new bottle. Ranch dressing drives me crazy—so much of it sticks to the sides of the bottle that I feel my mom’s displeasure when I finally toss it out.
I’m also the one who will eat leftovers of virtually any age. As long as I don’t see big splotches of colored fuzz growing on top, I assume it’s good to eat. My wife won’t touch things that I’ll happily consume, and I don’t usually give them to the kids—but if they look OK, and pass the smell test, I’m happy to scarf them down.
I’m not one to buy flashy cars. My high school ride was a Chevy BelAir that my dad bought new in ’55 (a year-end discount, of course). He drove it awhile, then gave it to my mom. When my oldest brother reached driving age, my parents began handing down the car that we lovingly nicknamed, "The Gem." All 5 of my older siblings drove it before I bought if from my sister for $35. It had at least 170,000 miles on it. Maybe 270,000. The odometer had rolled over and nobody could remember how many times. Cars, to me, are a device to get me and my passengers from one place to another. I tend to buy what’s practical and drive it ‘til the wheels fall off. The last new car I bought was a Prius in 2003; I loved that hybrid mileage and would work to get the dashboard display as high as I could. (I was getting 43.4 MPG when the car went to my brother—he’s doing even better!)
There is a downside to my frugal habits, however. I’m "Mr. Do-It-Yourself", and while I take pride in some of my home repair and construction projects, they don’t always turn out to be moneysavers .
Around 1990, my wife and I lived in Miami and bought a house that—as so many Miami homes do—had a pool. "Carlos the Pool Guy" offered to continue maintaining it for us, as he had for the previous owners. Carlos charged 25 bucks a week. Being the proud "do-it-yourselfer" that I am—and with a new, larger mortgage to try to pay—I told Carlos that I would handle the pool maintenance. Unfortunately, I was also a globetrotting correspondent at the time and would often be away from home for a week or more at a time. One day I came home to see big black splotches growing on the sides of our pool. I called an expert who told me it was ‘black algae’, that it only grows in pools when the water chemistry is way out of whack. I asked him how to get rid of it. "You can’t", he said. "The only way is to drain the pool, sandblast it away and then re-tile the pool." In the end, it cost me $6,000.00 to re-do the entire pool. Carlos the Pool Guy would have been a much better investment.
I don’t live in New York City. It has its charms, but most of them are lost on me. Concrete, traffic, noise—not my idea of a place to call home. So I live in the ‘burbs. We have grass and trees and wildlife passing through the yard in a variety that still surprises me. Owls, hawks, coyotes, groundhogs, wild turkeys and way too many deer. But I digress. This is not about city versus suburban living.
It’s about New York versus the rest of the country, and it was motivated by a conversation I had with an acquaintance yesterday morning. We both ride one of the early trains that takes us from our outlying town into the heart of Manhattan. He—like so many in New York—works in the financial industry. He’s an investment advisor for a relatively small firm, someone who tries to help the rest of us figure out good, safe places to put our money these days.
As we left the train station and walked toward our respective offices, we were talking about—what else?—the economy. He said something that surprised me: "I find, as I travel around the country talking to clients, that there’s generally a lot more optimism about the situation than you find here in New York."
I hope he’s right! Optimism, more than anything, is what the nation needs right now. One of the ongoing philosophical arguments we have at Happening Now revolves around the steady drumbeat of bad news that seems to cross the wires: layoffs, financial scandals, another drop in the Dow, a retail report that shows consumers aren’t spending, housing starts down for another month.
I sometimes worry that in a place like New York City where the successes and failures of Wall Street have such an inordinate impact on the local economy, we in the media are making too much of this economic downturn. It doesn’t help that so many media headquarters are packed together on this little concrete island. Wall Street stumbles and we in the media are there to witness it firsthand. And what happens when we witness something? We write about it, or put it on TV. We share it with our viewers, readers and listeners. That steady diet of bad news doesn’t do anything to make any of YOU feel positive about this nation and our shared future.
We spend a fair amount of time at our morning editorial meetings discussing this question: There’s plenty of bad news out there to report, or so it seems, but are we overdoing it? Are we—in the New-York-centric media—looking at the world through mud-colored glasses? Do you feel it’s as bad as we in the media are making it out to be?
If my friend is right, maybe we’re overdoing it, even at Fox News, where we try very hard to keep things "Fair and Balanced." We’d love to hear your thoughts.
Jane is out of town so I called her to brag that I would be the first Happening Now anchor to see Janice Dean's new baby boy.
This is how it happened:
I was so proud of myself! I wrapped a baby-blue gift and made a special trip to the Hallmark store for a card. Then I called my favorite new mom, Janice Dean the Weather Machine. Janice let me know the best time to visit her new family. That's when I called Jane to brag. Didn't she rain on my parade--Jane went to see Janice on Monday! I guess I came in second.
Janice and little Matthew are doing great. Janice told me she would be posting pictures on her blog soon. Check it out! http://weather.blogs.foxnews.com/
I'm so lucky! Jane surprised me yesterday with a vat, a tub, a MOUNTAIN of brownies. And not just any brownies from some boring box. These are her patented, made-from-scratch, super-chocolatey brownies with just the right combination of chewy and gooey. I'm not sure what I did to deserve them--I had only mentioned in passing that "it had been awhile" since she'd baked. Whatever--it worked! The crew and I dove in. Most of the mountain was consumed by the time we hit air. There were just a few remaining, conveniently located on a side table that sits to my right, just out of camera range...
Before Happening Now concluded yesterday, I'd eaten four of them. Talk about an energy boost! I've concluded THAT'S what we need to get the economy moving again--feed every American four of Jane's brownies.
Happening Now airs on FOX News Channel weekdays from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. ET. Hosts Jon Scott and Jane Skinner bring you the news, with breaking updates from Harris Faulkner.
Check the blog frequently for behind-the-scenes, interaction with our hosts, and exclusive info on stories that didn't make it to air!
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