A Little News

First an apology; I have been too busy to update the blog much of the week so it has been a bit stale. The boss has been out on medical leave and we have been very short handed which means same amount of work with less people. Plus I have been doing a lot of after hours free lance work which is a blessing but it is draining. Some days have run on to what seems like the next day. Enough about me.

I thought I had done a pretty good reader profile on my colleague Jonathan Palmer last week but then he one upped the profile. Jonathan, I think I mentioned, is a very gregarious young man and, being from Kentucky, likes the whole horse thing. The Limestone Sheriff’s Department hosts an annual rodeo which he really enjoys shooting. Only problem is the rodeo is mostly a night event and the arena redefines dark. Jonathan was talking to the man who does photography for the Sheriff’s Department and explaining how great it would be to hang a couple of monolights above the chute. Jonathan can be very persuasive and the guy bought in to the idea.

Now Jonathan is not just a salesman, he is a hustler as well and I mean that in the positive sense of the word. After his shift at work was over he spent a couple of evenings helping the Sheriff’s Department set up and tweak the lights and they are being kind enough to let us use them. Now you have the background. Jonathan did not have the rodeo assignment but I told him he could tweak the schedule any way he liked as long as the jobs were shot. He worked the schedule so he could be at the arena to shoot the event he had spent so much time helping to light. Don’t you just know it, Jonathan is in the right place at the right time and ready when a bull leaps out of the stall and knocks the Limestone County Sheriff off the top of the chute. The fall caused the Sheriff a dislocated shoulder and some cuts and scrapes. Jonathan captured a four frame sequence using the strobes that he put so much work into without a thought to getting anything out of them. He was just being the nice guy that he is.

We ran two shots on our Sunday front and a four frame sequence on our web page. I have the two best shots here for you to enjoy. Our online edition requires a subscription so I can’t refer you there for a free look at the whole sequence but if you want to subscribe you can do it at decaturdaily.com if you like. Now you know that being a good guy does pay off. And, like Paul Harvey always says, “Now you know the rest of the story.”

Photos Copyright The Decatur Daily, Jonathan Palmer. The opinions expressed in this blog are my own and do not necessarily reflect those of my employer.