March 15, 2008
There's No Business Like Snow Business
Being a TV reporter is dangerous work. Just ask intrepid reporter Rob Leth, who set out on a fine sunny day to do a typical fluff piece in Riverdale Park.
We're still unclear about what exactly he was hoping to accomplish with a camera and his "trusty stopwatch" at the bottom of the toboggan hill. He could have been timing a toboggan race or demonstrating how quickly sledders could lose control. Or maybe it was supposed to be a consumer report on the advantages of inner tubes over traditional wood.
What
is clear is that just a second after Leth announced that Reubenone of the two participants careening down the hill on inner tubes set to
ludicrous speedwas winning the race to the bottom, all hell broke loose. Reuben's inner tube slid straight into the surprised reporter's legs, sending him into a surprisingly graceful mid-air somersault on the way to an unsurprisingly hard landing on the snow.
Lethever the trooperquickly rose on his elbow, brought his microphone to his mouth, and declared with a healthy dose of hindsight, "That was a bad idea. At Riverside [sic] Park, Rob Leth, Global News," before collapsing back into a lump on the snow.
It wouldn't be so funny if Leth didn't get up and walk it off, but he did, and it is. You've got to know that the brain trust at
Citytv is wondering how to duplicate the stunt after the next storm. We're certain that
Michael Kuss would be up for the challenge.
Thanks to reader David Newland for the tip.
