Top Story in the Wrigley Union Recorder- Thursday, March 22nd, 2007 by mickeymvt

[mickeymvt]

Title: Top Story in the Wrigley Union Recorder-Thursday, March 22nd, 2007
Author: mickeymvt
Prompt: Number 100 for dsnorthernews: Flooding closes Mackenzie winter road near Wrigley
Pairing: F/K; Vecchio/Stella
Rating: PG
Word Count: 677 words
Notes: Thanks tobluebrocade for a super-speedy and thorough beta

Comments

[primroseburrows]

When told that he too was a hero for helping to save Quincy, Kowalski shrugged it off, saying, "I’m glad the guy’s alive, but I didn’t do anything special. I was just keeping Fraser from doing something stupider than normal."

*LOVES SO MUCH*

Great job! I love the format. And Ray. *g*

[mickeymvt]

That's Ray for you- all shy about being a hero and worrying about Fraser. Chicago or the NWT's, he'll never change. Just like Fraser.

Honestly, I've always wanted to write a newspaper article for a story challenge and here was a golden chance to do it. I'm thrilled that you loved it

[k1p2psso]

Uh... not to dispute your reporter's article, but doesn't water freeze (by definition) at 0 degrees Celsius? Hope he doesn't get the weather forecasting or science beat next...

* * *

Oh, I know... the answer is:
Under normal conditions, yes.
But with Fraser involved, who knows?

File this under Magical Realism, X-Files, or Kolchak: The Night Stalker division?

[burntcopper]

It's more kinda like *starts* to freeze, in very small amounts - a few molecules here, a few molecules there. Fridge freezers are normally minus four or five, but then any water in there isn't moving around. it's got to be really, really, really cold for anything liek a river to freeze.

Like how if you boil water (100 degrees C) though the entire lot is boiling, only the stuff at the top will evaporate.

[mickeymvt]

Please forgive our esteemed reporter and his editor, but he's an American, just out of college and that whole Celsius and Fahrenheit thing is something he doesn't quite grasp yet. As for the editor, even they make mistakes sometimes.

Also keep in mind that the Mackenzie River is VERY deep and that while water does freeze at 0 degrees C, only the first 2 feet or so actually freezes, the water underneath that is warmer and thus does not freeze. Hence, the cold water without the freezing.

[bluebrocade]

oh noes! i failz at betaing. :( I meant to check that, but I forgot. And I probably wouldn't have understood it anyway. Those crazy metric-using Canadians! :D

[luzula]

Oh, cool format. Since English isn't my native language, I very rarely read newspaper articles in English. But every time I do, I'm struck by how much harder to read they are than other texts, at least to me. I think one part of it is the density of information in the text, and another part is the shortcuts in language that they use. And I think you caught some of that quality.

I liked having Vecchio reading it at the end.

And I was also wondering about the -10 degrees C...

[mickeymvt]

Thank you SO much for your insight on the format. You are right that English articles( or American, in my case) do have a very dense amount of information in a short amount room. That is how journalists are trained here in the US, to do it like that. Not to brag, but I have a Journalism degree and in my very first class, we were told that they stucture of a "hard news story" such as this one, is like an upside down pyramid: You get to the cold, hard facts at the very beginning and then if you have room, you put in the tinier details. The reason for this being that an editor will cut the bottom of the story rather than the top of the story, if they need room to fit in into the actual paper. Therefore, you try to cram as much info as possible into an article, leaving out a lot of words and phrases that are unnecessary

[luzula]

Cool info on the journalism stuff.

But what I will say is that the water underneath the first 2 or so feet of ice DOES NOT freeze, it's always warmer,therefore it could potentially be -10 C.

Actually, -10 degrees C is colder than 0 degrees C, which is when water freezes. In a lake which isn't frozen solid, the water at the bottom is mostly 4 degrees C, because that's when water is the heaviest. Water can be cooler than 0 degrees C and still be liquid (this is called supercooling), but only in the absence of little particles to freeze around. This mostly happens in lab conditions, although you can also get supercooled rain, which freezes instantly when it hits the ground.

I'm sorry, I didn't mean to nitpick, I just found the subject interesting. I do like your explanation that the reporter is American and forgot how to do Fahrenheit/Metric conversions. : )

[mickeymvt]

Little late on this, but interesting stuff on the water and freezing, even though it made my brain hurt a little. There is a very good reason why I'm not a scientist- stuff like this usually goes over my head. Thanks for the little educational lession :)

[brigantine]

Heh. Still at it. Fraser leaps, Kowalski tries to keep him from getting killed. Ray's attitiude - pacing the hospital hallways, shrugging off any kind of prais. Wonderfully typical.

And RayV and Stella, chuckling over it all in their warm Florida sunshine. *g*

[mickeymvt]

Thanks! Even though it was a newspaper article, I still wanted to put in a little glimpse into Ray and Fraser's life, hence the pacing the halls, etc.

Vecchio kept insisting that he ALWAYS checks up on the papers in the NWT, keeping an eye on Benny and so I had to put him in there.

[nos4a2no9]

This was very cute! I loved the structure and the Ice Road Trucker stuff :-) The little details (Kowalski pacing the hall, Fraser diving right into the water) were great, and the concluding scene in Florida was a lot of fun. *hearts F/K and V/S stories* Thanks for the fun read, mickster!

[mickeymvt]

No, thank YOU for your lovely, insightful comments!

I cannot tell you how much I adore that everyone, yourself included, liked the structure. I had that even before I had a story! And I loved the Ice Road Trucker series so much that I HAD to put in in here as well.