December 13, 2007
A North Side resident has confirmed that he caught a glimpse last night of that one really smoking-hot reporter on NBC12, though the Richmonder acknowledges that the TV journalist may have been from 8 News.
“So I’m at the Kroger salad bar reaching for the red onions, right, when I look up and it’s that one chick from channel 12,” said Kevin Kirksdale, who at the time was debating over whether to put those little corns in his salad. “I forget her name and all, but it was so crazy to see her in a normal place like Kroger, just shopping for dinner like everyone else.”
But, the 34-year-old added, “come to think of it, she might have been from 8.”
Skeptics were quick to question Kirksdale’s claims.
Smoking-hot reporter sightings in public are rare, if not a myth, according to decades of scientific research, one of the most recent studies coming from the University of Virginia at Wise. While seen frequently across the nation on channels generally no higher than 13, smoking-hot reporters typically feature various colors of hair, skin, eyes and and other features common to the homo sapien.
The species has not been documented publicly since the most recent smoking-hot reporter sighting in the Pacific Northwest woods in 2003. The last international spotting was near a Scottish lake in 1997.
Many consider public viewings, however, to be something of folklore.
Kirksdale, a Web designer, speculated that the “wicked, I mean wicked” smoking-hot reporter may have just finished interviewing people “about a scam or toy recall or something” in the Kroger parking lot, a common tactic for TV news journalists. “I wish I knew her name though. It begins with an ‘D’ or maybe a ‘J,’ but I’m fairly certain she covers crime things on 12, but now that I think harder, it really could be 11.
“No, wait, that’s not her,” the befuddled Kirksdale said. “I’m thinking of the one on 12 who does the morning traffic report, but 11 has that one who looks similar.”
When told that 12, the local NBC affiliate, was also 11, the Fox station, Kirksdale said “yes, my hypothesis may have made sense, then.”
His analysis of the smoking-hot reporter, however, “is questionable at best,” said Herman Ward, a science professor at UVA-Wise, citing a lack of conclusive evidence and unreliable eyewitness accounts such as Kirksdale’s.
“Yes, we see smoking-hot reporters all the time on television at the scene of the latest wreck or fire or standing in front of an electronic map explaining to us that, say, traffic is backed up on the Powhite so you should probably take the Chippenham to work this morning,” Ward said. “But have you ever seen one out at a bar? The mall? That luxury Arby’s in Short Pump? Of course you haven’t. The smoking-hot reporter sighting is a hoax, it’s folklore.”
Further complicating Kirksdale’s case, he admits, was that he thought the 12 reporter who he saw at Kroger recently got married, “because I remember how her last name changed all the sudden. Or maybe I’m thinking of the one who was pregnant a few years back on 8. But she may have left, so I could be thinking of someone else on 6.”
Added Kirksdale: “Shit.”
After a long pause, Kirksdale composed himself and tried to pinpoint the source of his confusion. “It went down like this,” he said:
While he favors coverage from the NBC affiliate, therefore tuning into “The Today Show” in the mornings and taking advantage of 12′s advanced First Warning Doppler-radar system, yesterday was different.
On Tuesday night with approximately 8.4 million other Americans, Kirksdale was watching the “Shrek the Halls” Christmas special on ABC – channel 8 – and turned his TV off directly after to go to bed early. Therefore, he woke up to “Good Morning America” spliced with local 8 News updates and never switched to NBC. He believes there was at least one smoking-hot reporter viewing on ABC, which he said could have confused him later in the evening at the alleged smoking-hot reporter sighting at the salad bar.
Kirksdale isn’t the only local resident to have a recent sighting of beings said to exist only in legend.
Last month, several Church Hill residents reported seeing guy reporters with hair-product-in at The Hill Cafe, sipping beers. “I couldn’t believe they drink Bud Lights just like us,” said one of the residents, who did not give her name nor did she document the episode on film.
When asked to clarify which reporters were present, a Hill Cafe source said it was the “definitely” the guy on 12 who does those commercials stressing giving to the Salvation Army Angel Tree. “Or maybe it was the other guy who does that commercial about switching out your regular light bulbs to those ones with squiggly tubes to save energy,” the source said.
And, just last week, Jen Martin of Chesterfield County spotted NBC12 anchor Gene Cox having lunch at a Five Guys restaurant.
“I couldn’t believe it, I see him every night on TV,” said Martin, who asked for an autograph but said she really wished Cox co-anchor Sabrina Squire were there, too.
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Way tooo funny!!! Nice!
I admit to a very slight thrill at realizing Tara Morgan shops at the Willow Lawn Kroger, just like me. But she manages to be smokin’ hot while doing that too.