The worst day of my life (aka the Big Gulp story)

Despite knowing the details of this story as well as anyone and having heard me tell it many times, my friend Mike told me to post it.  Sadistic bastard.  So here goes...

The year was 1994, the first in my brief radio career.  I was working at WIOD, which at the time was the top talk radio station in the market, boasting a lineup of heavyweight talent.  It was my first real job out of college.  I was working as an overnight board operator -- the low man on the totem pole.  My shift was Sunday through Thursday, 11 p.m. to 6 a.m.  My job consisted of playing tapes all night, scintillating stuff.  On my way to work each night I stopped at 7-Eleven and picked up a 'Double Gulp', 48 ounces of Dr. Pepper in a cup that you had to pick up with both hands.  This night was no different.

I have a little quirk where I don't like to drink from straws so I would toss out the lid and drink straight from the cup.  It was past midnight and I was playing a tape of the 'Don & Mike Show' broadcast from earlier in the day, a couple of hacks out of Washington D.C. if I remember correctly.  I was sitting with my 'Double Gulp' on the counter in front of me, perilously close to the control board, watching T.V. with the sound off.  Some time during the 12:00 hour I was coming out of a commercial break and reached up to hit 'Play' on the DAT machine above the control board.  That moment is frozen in time in my memory.  On the way up my left elbow struck the 'Double Gulp', knocking it over right onto the control board, emptying it's sugary content into this expensive and vital piece of electronics. 

I sat there like a deer in the headlights.  I knew I was fucked, but didn't know what to do.  Then the monitors went out and it suddenly became silent.  I fiddled with the volume knob to no avail.  Next, all of the equipment fired at once, playing several commercials I had cued up, the rejoin back from the commercials, the station's legal ID, and several other taped pieces that had been idle.  I thought about just grabbing my shit and leaving, choosing flight over fight, but I couldn't do that. 

The phones began ringing off the hook with listeners hearing all these different pieces of audio playing over one another calling to ask what the hell was going on.  Instinct forced me to answer the phones and try to explain what was going on but I quickly realized this was not the time for that.  The hotline rang next with  friend Mike, who also worked at the station and had been listening at home, asking me what the fuck was going on.  As I was trying to explain the control room phone rang.  It was another producer who had also been listening inquiring what was happening. 

The lovely Annamaria, who worked down the hall at The Coast, had also been listening during her shift and came over to see what had gone wrong.  She walked in to find me standing in the middle of the room with a phone to each ear franticly explaining my plight (she does a great impression of me at that time).  When I noticed her I told my co-workers I had to go and threw down the phones.  Assessing the situation and feeling terrible for me, she grabbed the garbage pail and began picking up handfulls of ice from the control board.  Once we removed all the ice she told me I had a serious situation on my hands and needed to call an engineer. 

I looked at the schedule on the wall to find who was on-call that morning and to make matters worse, it was Steve Ziegler, the engineer who worked the Miami Dolphins broadcasts with Mike and I.  Mike and I worked the broadcasts together in the control room and we had a previous incident with a 'Double Gulp'.  Despite Mike being blind, I sat my drink on a counter near him one game and he accidentally knocked it over while feeling around for something.  The soda shorted out a monitor that displayed what the camera at the front door of the building picked up.  So instead of just kicking back like he usually did during the football games, Steve had to take apart the monitor and fix it.  Naturally, he lectured me on the stupidity of keeping a drink near electronic equipment, especially with a blind guy in the room.  If only I had learned my lesson...

But I had obviously not learned my lesson and now had to call Steve around 1 a.m. and tell him I had spilled another soda, this time into the control board.  This was like calling your parents to tell them you had just wrecked their car.  I woke him out of a dead sleep and told him he needed to get down there immediately if not sooner.  Then all I could do was wait. 

Once he arrived and realized the gravity of the situation he went ballistic, yelling that I should have known better than to keep a drink near the equipment and that this was a serious emergency and I needed to call in the other engineers.  So I had to wake up two more guys in the middle of the night and tell them they needed to come in ASAP.  The other engineers arrived and the first priority was to get the station back on the air so they rigged a production room for broadcast and told me to get back to work.  I spent the rest of the night in this cramped room playing my tapes, occasionally going to the control room to grab more tapes and commercials.  Without them even saying anything I could sense their anger so I spent as little time in there as possible. 

Around 5:00 the morning show crew showed up and were not happy about my blunder.  They were all going to be extremely inconvenienced due to it and were not afraid to share their displeasure with me.  I just wanted to crawl underneath a rock and never come out again.  Finally at 6:00 I was able to leave and escape the chaos.  As I walked out the door I said to myself "that was a short career, what field am I gonna go into next."  Since I was making dick at the time I was living with Mom and Dad.  I arrived home, grabbed the newspaper and went inside to be greeted by Mom.  I told her what had happened and being a mother she said "don't worry, everything will be fine."  Sure.  Despite the overwhelming desire to slit my wrists, I went to bed.

I awoke in the afternoon hoping it had all been a bad dream, but when I turned on the radio my hopes were dashed.  The afternoon guys were talking about the catastrophe that had taken place earlier that morning.  Figuring I had lost my job and feeling like a complete piece of shit, I walked outside and got high.  When I came back inside I picked up the phone and checked the voice mail.  There was a message from my supervisor Marvin, who was the producer of the afternoon show.  He said I wasn't gonna lose my job but he really needed to talk to me.  I called the station hotline to speak to Marvin but someone who's voice I didn't recognize answered the phone and told me to hold on. 

Next thing I know I hear that familiar hiss you hear when you go from being on hold to being on the air.  Rick, one of the afternoon hosts, says "Steve?"  After I replied "yeah" I hear electrical charging sound effects and the guys laughing hysterically.  Fuck me.  As if I hadn't been through enough, I was live on the radio for the guys to have fun with.  And I was SO stoned.  They asked what happened and I tried to explain but it was no use with all their jokes, laughter and sound effects.  Once the call was over I turned on the radio to listen to them humiliate me publicly. 

The next call they took was from Adam, another producer at the station, whose first words were "I'm off the hook for the blimp!"  Adam had a major fuck up of his own under his belt and was ecstatic he was no longer the biggest tool at the station.  During a Dolphins game, the station had their van out there and were giving away prizes.  Adam was responsible for securing a WIOD blimp which would be floating above the van.  Unfortunately for him, he didn't do too good a job and the $4,000 blimp floated away, making him the butt of many jokes.  Now he was off the hook, as there was a new loser in town: me.

The control board had to be completely taken out for repair and a mini board was set up in the talk studio.  But the phone bank was in the control room, so now instead of having one person working each show there needed to be two -- one working the control board in the talk studio and one answering the phones in the control room.  So that meant all of the producers were working double shifts, which didn't endear me to anyone.  Now management was pissed at me because my 'Double Gulp' was costing them a ton of money in repairs and overtime, the engineers were pissed at me because they were working around the clock to repair the shorted out control board, the hosts were pissed at me because they were inconvenienced by working under make-shift conditions, and the producers were pissed at me because they all had to work double shifts.  The last thing I wanted to do was go back to that place.  But they didn't fire me -- that would be letting me off easy; better to make me suffer by working with people cursing me not even under their breaths.

My next shift was the Saturday overnight-Sunday morning shift.  I showed up around 10:30 p.m. and as soon as the guy on the air spotted me walking into the control room he said on the air "hey, 'Big Gulp' is here!"  Wonderful.  Not in the mood for any more public humiliation I walked out and went to the 'jock lounge' to check my mailbox.  There was a memo from the General Manager announcing a new policy forbidding any food or beverages in the studios.  In a nice touch, it started out something like "due to some jackass spilling a diet coke in the WIOD control board..."  It was a Dr. Pepper dickhead, if you're gonna insult me at least get your facts straight. 

The Saturday night crew soon left and I was by myself in my misery, but at least I was alone and wouldn't hear any more jokes or insults.  I worked my shift uneventfully playing tapes all night.  The Sunday morning show started at 6 a.m. and since it was a live show I had to stay and answer the phones while the producer ran the board from the talk studio.  I was tired and in no mood to take any more shit but that's exactly what I got.  The prick doing the show made a point of constantly telling the listeners about my fuck up and the inconvenient situation it placed him in.  He even went as far as saying "I feel like a father -- on one hand I want to put my arm around Steve and tell him it's gonna be alright, but on the other hand I want to give him a swift kick in the ass."  The phones kept ringing with people I didn't know telling me they wouldn't know anything had happened if this asshole hadn't said anything as to them the station sounded as it always did.  That helped boost my sinking spirits a bit, but I still felt as low as humanly possible. 

Just when I was ready to walk into the newsroom and throw myself out the window, the hotline rang.  It was former Dolphin Kim Bokamper, who was a part-time sports host at the station.  He had been driving in his car, heard this guy trashing me and decided to call.  I had never worked with Kim but he told me "Dude, ignore this asshole.  You had an accident, it happens.  Don't let him get you down, keep your chin up."  I'll never forget that as long as I live.  I had never even met him yet he took the time to call and give me a pep talk.  And this was a guy I used to watch and root for while he played for the Dolphins; he was a member of the 'Killer Bs' defense for fucks sake!  Every once in a while when you think you've hit rock bottom someone defies the human condition and offers compassion, decency and thoughtfulness.  Bless you 'Bo'.

To wind this epic up, despite my stupidity costing the station about $125,000 I didn't lose my job.  My willingness to stand up and face the music (as well as the endless jokes and insults) like a man earned the respect of my employees and co-workers.  I eventually shook off the 'Big Gulp' nickname and was even promoted and worked my way up the producer ladder.  I don't know if I learned anything from this experience or whether or not it had any effect on who I am today, but I do know I certainly wouldn't go through it again or wish it on anybody.

Comments

[PinkLady]

Ugh...sounds like hell. But you know what...you going back there after it happened says an awful lot about your character. I'm not so sure I could of done the same.

[Rhi]

I actually gasp when I read that. I have had a few oh shit moments, but I must say that yours took the cake. I couldn't even (nor would I want to) imagine.