Planning for the worst, we headed down early but to our surprise got onto the floor with no problem. We were able to get our shots and have a decent view of Sen. John McCain's acceptance speech. The entire time, I was constantly looking up at the balloons hung above the arena. I had seen the balloons drop on TV before and was anticipating the moment when they would start to fall on top of us.
The first set of balloons pleased the entire crowd including my reporter and myself. We knew this was the official sign of a convention celebrating the nomination of it's candidate and we were glad to experience it first hand. But the balloons kept coming and there was a second and third drop. By now we were in a sea of balloons up to our chest. There were even moments when we we could barely see because they were all around us. I even had trouble breathing at one point. But certain members of the crowd as well as Xcel staff waisted no time in starting to pop the balloons. Below is a balloon drop slideshow.
It took quite some time for the floor to clear up and for us to shoot our final on-camera reports but we did one final interview with a delegate and got all of our elements for the 11 p.m. newscast. We even shot a promo for the station featuring
Nightline's Terry Moran. His advice to aspiring journalists, "love what you do" and "know your stuff" if you want to be in this business. By the time we left the floor, the party was dying down and clean up began.
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