Started the day taking photos of a guy I can’t tell you about (until the story runs).

Then my day got shuffled. I was re-routed to an assignment involving 7,436 teddy bears after another photographer was rushed onto a plane to cover breaking news out of state. I don’t know what the story was, and apparently the his wife didn’t either. She twittered: “Husband: I’m going to Seattle & don’t know when I’ll be back. It’s like he works for the CIA.”

My third assignment of the day was a swim team. With no time to work it I expected little from this one but it turned out okay.

My fourth assignment was a basketball game at Judge Memorial High School, where a great travesty was taking place: the snack bar was charging a buck-fifty for a candy bar. Upset by the price gouging I shot unsugared.

I talked briefly with a writer covering the game. Feigning interest I asked, “So is this going to be a close game?”

“As long as the clock keeps running, I’ll be happy,” was his response. Then he asked if he could borrow a pen.

The gym was pretty dark so I set the ISO to the “noise blizzard” setting and let the frames fly.

There were only fifteen minutes left on my shift when I finished sending in photos from the day’s four assignments. I was looking forward to finally getting a break and crawled into bed when a voicemail shattered the peace and delivered my fifth assignment. The voice said, “I’ve just been told that I need to call you about a murder-suicide (on)…Redwood Road. They told me that you should call (the reporter) for further details. You can call me with any questions. Thanks, Bye.”

I loaded up and headed south. The crime scene was an apartment complex and surprisingly the TV news trucks were parked in the complex’s parking lot. As I got out of my car the media was being kicked out (private property). In the dark I was able to get a few photographs before a police investigator alerted a security guard to my presence. I left when he asked, having no choice but to leave.

The media moved across the street, waiting for updates from police. I sent my photo from the car, checked in and drove home. And again crawled into bed, two hours after the first time.