Longtime WJZ reporter Mike Schuh joins Nestor at G&A Restaurant in White Marsh to discuss his new storytelling gig that has taken him new places and even to see the Northern Lights in Iceland after 27 years in Baltimore on TV Hill.
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
people, story, media, crab cake, call, long, run, years, reporter, news, iceland, question, week, friends, business, job, work, ravens, knew, journalists
Nestor Aparicio 00:00
W N S t tell us a little more and Baltimore positive we are positively going to have a crabcakes Maryland crabcake tour. It’s all presented by our friends winter nation 8669 the nation in conjunction with our friends at the Maryland lottery I have holiday cash drops. I do have a handful of a raven scratch off still to give away. We are a GNA Coney Island hot dog. We’re not at Coney Island. We are no longer in Highland town we are in Whitemarsh Andy joined us he is back there working to crabcake action. And I figured I’m gonna build a show around some fun friends Tony della rose couldn’t make it out today. We had Nick here, Andy here, Mike Chu, who has never been on the show before. And I’ve never like done anything media oriented with you with Jay Z. I was sort of banned to Jay Z. I was sort of the other side from CBS Radio. But I’ve run into you in airports 1000 times when ravens games 1000 times I don’t really know you well, we’re Facebook friends. And I see you out doing this thing after Yes. JC post jays, why did you leave Jay Z? I mean, cuz I’m gonna say was like two or three years ago, you’d be like 10.
Mike Schuh 01:02
It was COVID. It was it was corporate and COVID driven. And CBS needed to get rid of 400 people. And I was one of them. And it was a case where my bosses were like, it’s not you. It’s strictly their boss said this time is we need these are the numbers here that people go. And in fact, even like big time anchors out in LA, like, you know, like some like the people who be neighborhood or household names here in LA, like five of those people went because they weren’t under contract. And you know how it works in the media business? Sure. You’re working through your contracts. And mine was in that cycle. And I just negotiated a raise. But because there was a corporate merger, they have the ability to put the pause on everything. And then they did and then COVID hit and all of a sudden now they’re just like, man, every you know, everyone,
Nestor Aparicio 01:47
welcome to journalism, right. Welcome to News. Welcome to media, right, I
Mike Schuh 01:50
was I was in the middle of signing my night contract you want I mean, I mean, how many years did 27 I did it. I did 37 uninterrupted years of television news, which is both frightening and I’m proud of because it’s a difficult business you know what I mean?
Nestor Aparicio 02:04
Sure it is what’s your background? I don’t even know where did you grow up and stuff.
Mike Schuh 02:08
Waukegan Illinois up by Chicago so I was a bear so the great thing about being a bears and a Cubs fan there’s always next year right of course in you learn that around
Nestor Aparicio 02:16
you get to number one pick you know it’s next year is the big year.
Mike Schuh 02:20
It’s going to be huge. Yeah, so Chicago, the Illinois region that I went to Southern Illinois University
Nestor Aparicio 02:25
he’s had a great you were Saluki like to like pass then you ambassador
Mike Schuh 02:29
that we were different eight he’s he’s a little bit more advanced than me.
Nestor Aparicio 02:34
Who has more wisdom? Let’s call it Oh,
Mike Schuh 02:35
yeah, Billy has lot more wisdom. Yeah, so we both Salukis that’s what a great memory you have. That’s good. Yeah.
Nestor Aparicio 02:41
Well, Marty and I are close nobody knows that. Yeah, Marty knows that. But but Sharon knows that yeah, not everybody knows that. Dixie knows that but not everybody not everybody knows that. You put the news part of you being a media member of me being a former media member thanks jets do that the media people we run into each other and in a town like this? Yeah. There’s there’s only a handful the the literally how many guys own an am radio station. How many reporters there’s there’s four stations. And there’s a handful of people. That’s
Mike Schuh 03:12
what you what’s great about Baltimore media is that we’re all competitive, if you’re if you’re going head to head, but we’re friendly. And that’s one of the things that I like people said, Well, why don’t you go to this market or that market or DC and I got nibbles from a lot of different places. But DC is different people it’s like personal competition. And I never I never understood that because we’re all in it together and maybe maybe I’ll get some today that you only you’ll have some that I want but that doesn’t mean I I’d like you lesser I don’t want to talk to you off camera or or when we’re not doing business. And Baltimore is such a great place for making those connections and being able to say hey, how’s it going and chat chat chat, you know, when you’re not in the midst of running, you know, covering news, and I always I always appreciate it What
Nestor Aparicio 03:52
was your favorite part of doing it? I mean, like you were sort of man on the street and like I got mad standing out and snow storms Yeah. Had Rob Roblin owns like my all time favorite reporter ever because he would do crazy things with the Preakness you know I had fun with him out and he retired and he came out into the showed me last year actually had a margarita with him, which I loved. Maybe we get a Schlitz with me and you were just on point but the job I know a lot about it. And it’s a job that I as a writer, I came from the newspaper side. I looked into radio radio was not like what I was going to do right television was something like Oh, hey, you can be Johnny Bravo and you know, and I tried out when Buren right when Ely got the job. Yeah, I was always done. Moeller Yeah, I was one of the people that got a read write real John Muir Oh, I have the video I got one two molar made the air I watched molar and eastpoint Mall. On TV. Do the six o’clock news one the reading one night? I didn’t get to that
Mike Schuh 04:51
cut. Wow. But you didn’t good. I don’t know why. You never know what they were. I was 17
Nestor Aparicio 04:55
years old at the time. It was 1986 and I was a kid save it. Even better, but people always said me. Oh, you you know, you could be civi you know, I’m thinking to myself, all I remember is guys like you and Cunningham and Garza having that little wet thing in your ear in the back and the thing on the bed anytime I would work with you guys like Marty and Dawn would send me down. Back when you had a budget Jamie didn’t hate me back in the 90s Yeah, I would be at Oriole Park at Camden Yards all morning for the morning show is when they were too cheap to send on to Marty and actually do a remote Yeah, but they will be back in the studio I was the unpaid yes of Chi from radio wild nasty Nester down at the Babe Ruth statue with the with the camera guy 530 in the morning with the sun coming on killing it and killing Albert and killing it. But they would give me all of this stuff for TV. Yeah, that I was not a train TV person. And I just thought this is awkward. You know, doing television, to me, was always a little weirdly awkward and really fascinating to say everything you need to say, because you got 30 seconds, and we’re back and back to you, Denise. And I do radio and it’s the sort of like, open and we can talk and whatever. That was always the hardest part of your job was get to the point where you got 40 seconds.
Mike Schuh 06:13
And you know, you know that clocks running in your head to win a different kind
Nestor Aparicio 06:16
of worry when I bring Billick on the show here and I’ll tell Brian is he’s not as good as he used to be. Because he worked in TV, and everything he gives me now. I had Mike Lupica and James Patterson on yesterday. Wow. Okay, they did a book Yeah, together. And I looked at the transcript, every one of their answers is like a sentence or two. Because they worked in television were trained. They worked in television, and I’m trying to get a story out of them. I’m trying to, like, talk. Yeah, story tell you story. Tell now. Right? Like your your things different? Yes. Then what it was working on channel 30. Oh, complete.
Mike Schuh 06:58
I mean, the time budgets are different, everything is different. But I mean, it’s still it’s still, it’s sort of like the foundational part of storytelling. It’s just expanded. And it’s longer in the sense that, you know, it’s like telling a joke. I mean, telling a story is telling a joke. Yeah. You give people some background, you give them some setup. And then you reveal the surprise, or someone else reveals the surprise. And as long as that sort of pattern fits, you’re going to tell a story, whether it’s a serious story about somebody dying or a new product, or, you know who what, where why, when right like that, well, then it has to be part of it. But that’s not the most important thing. And this is where I used to get in some philosophical discussions with my superiors about get to the point. And my point was the point will will be much better if we get to the point in 30 or 40 seconds from now, rather than we get to the point right now because we get to the point right now. It’s over. No one cares anymore. You know, you have to set it up. Oh, crab
Nestor Aparicio 07:51
cakes. Look out. This is the part of the crab cake tour we love. This is what we liked about so so keep going. We will talk soon. Oh dressing saw, you know, just a little ranch. Absolutely. Yeah, Mike’s the man to keep going. So storytelling,
Mike Schuh 08:08
I mean, storytelling, this joke telling. And if you said you would have
Nestor Aparicio 08:11
differences of opinion with news people, because they just wanted it, spit it out, not set up why it matters to set up,
Mike Schuh 08:19
give give you the perspective and give you you know, for a joke to make sense. It has to be unexpected, it has to you have to know some of the facts ahead of time, I’m actually not really a joke teller at all. But I can tell the story. The if you don’t have the what you need to know ahead of time, the punch line doesn’t make sense. And if you’re doing good storytelling, thank you, there are multiple reveals there are multiple little aspects, anything that is like what I used to say about news is, is there there, there are parts of any news story, which naturally lead itself to be the surprise, which is the News, the news angle of it, and you have to set up the surprises in order to get the most out of them to have them be memorable. And the problem that a lot of people have when they do news stories when you’re talking about television news, and, and not necessarily, you know, there’s a person shot in West Baltimore, but something which has a story more of a story to it, is they don’t do the due diligence and setting up the surprises and letting the people who are affected be the ones who reveal a surprise. And then it has more meaning. I mean, there are plenty of stories that people do every day, but people don’t necessarily remember them. And I think one of the the things that I was fairly good at and will instill I am I mean, I’m, I don’t like saying that in that way. Because it sounds unusual to me to kind of brag that way. But it’s being able to identify the surprises and produce the story in such a way that will allow those surprises to be revealed when the story is told. And therefore it will make it memorable. Because if you’re doing work that’s not memorable. Well, who are you servicing? And why are you doing that work? And eventually will anybody ever hire you to do it because if your stuffs not memorable, well then what what’s your value as a storyteller? So to me, it’s all the little basics I learned along the way. Doing new Who’s but I learned it at a conference of photographers, national press Photographers Association holds a conference every year. And luckily for me early on in my career, a friend of mine went to that and came back and, you know, like, like, you won’t believe this. And he sort of laid down some of the basics for me. And I’m like, Oh, that makes that makes an amazing amount of sense. And so I started to practice that and practice that and practice it poorly. And eventually got a little bit better, a little bit better. And now I’m one of the faculty members who teaches that at that workshop, and it’s a source of pride for me, because, you know, once you learn, once you learn what you need to know, all the past follow from that, and how to how to act and how to behave and how to just be out in the field. I mean, you know, well,
Nestor Aparicio 10:44
your job changed dramatically over 27 years. Oh, tremendously. I mean, the technology every part of it changed, right. Yeah.
Mike Schuh 10:51
Everything I mean in Yes. The one of the reasons I’m not very active on Twitter right now is because of having to do the forced religion when it when Twitter became hot. The only mean, I got thrown
Nestor Aparicio 11:04
off Twitter after right about Lamar Jackson. About five weeks ago, I got banned and suspended. I have no idea. Who you Who do you call? No, there is no right. Exactly. The arbitrary this, this happened the weekend that all the journalists were getting thrown off. Oh, what happened? That revelation? Yeah, I felt really good. They really see how much more work I’m getting done. Now that I got thrown off Twitter. I bet I’m way more productive the last six weeks. And I figure eventually, I’m the might let me back on. I mean, I still can read. It’s Larry because every time I pull it up, it says you’ve been permanently suspended. And I’m thinking, My God and
Mike Schuh 11:38
you didn’t swear or curse or you just swearing and
Nestor Aparicio 11:41
cursing, you throw it off. I did not swear curse. I didn’t do anything I wrote about Lamar Jackson. It was the week that Lamar cussed out the fan. Right? And I wrote about that. Wow. Yeah, my shoes here. familia WJ Z. Now what do I say about you? Like what? You’re doing your own thing. So you to start eating? You can’t do that. Oh, well, because we gotta talk. Let me let me let me do this. Test it mine. Hold
Mike Schuh 12:04
this up. Can we test it?
Nestor Aparicio 12:05
Yeah, let’s do that. It’s the Maryland crab cake tour. We’re GNA. And I’m about to get into this crab cake because I want to do it. Yeah, man. Yeah, he’s Greek. I knew it was gonna be good.
Mike Schuh 12:16
I’m gonna put this out of my nose. All right, man. Delicious. All right. So three years ago, that’s what I’m doing. There you go.
Nestor Aparicio 12:24
Ms. Story works. You’re holding up right there. And that story works. Very good. That’s me. What is is there? Ms. I know the MS. That’s my issue. Right? I got that then story,
Mike Schuh 12:33
you have C story and the works. My stories work. Ms story works. You know, so I still do some news, when they call me. I’ve worked for the Washington Post and for a startup website, and for CNN, and then one of my first jobs with Chesapeake Bay media. So I still do some news, you
Nestor Aparicio 12:50
think you were gonna go get a job at Channel Five, like, you were just,
Mike Schuh 12:53
you know, a blessing. So this happened like two half months after COVID started, that’s when the four corner people got let go on the same day. That was me too. So I, I did my I did my six months on the couch, because I was actually when I was out working at the height of the height of the beginning of COVID, where no one knew anything and what we were how does it you know, all that stuff. I was a little jealous of the people who got to stay inside and be on the, you know, still get paid and be on the couch? Because I’m out there. And we didn’t know, we didn’t know. Could we enter buildings? Could we talk to people how far away we were holding carbon fiber boom mics, you know, sure crossed the alley to talk to somebody in that while great that I was fortunate to be able to be out there and to be employed. There was a lot more stress that came with that because you didn’t know and I don’t want to die. You know what I mean? I respected the virus at the time, though. I still do. God knows it’s a silly statement. But But having done that for two and a half months, when everybody was let go, it was a bit of a relief in the sense. Oh, I get to I get to kind of pull back from society a little bit. And at that point, I that was I enjoyed that. But after six months, I was just bored out of my tree, right? I mean that frankly. I mean like a lot of people to me, I don’t have to do anything else. I’m I’m all I’ve ever done. I’m not one trick pony, man. I like literally, I know how to tell stories and mow lawns. No. I like mowing lawns. But yeah, I didn’t feel like doing I didn’t feel like reconfiguring myself to have to do something else. And God bless the great people who are in public relations and, and other ancillary businesses where a lot of former reporters go and work. I didn’t want to do that. And I’ve been blessed by having a good long career in the media. So I had the resources to be able to sit on the side for a while to figure out what I wanted to do.
Nestor Aparicio 14:38
I’ve rented a couple of colleagues of ours I would say, and I can even name drop them in I ran into Brett Harris recently not in the industry anymore. Very happy. I ran into Rob Carlin recently at not the business very, very happy. These are people who were go to really really knowledgeable sports journalists and ice A that is a guy who spent most of my adulthood looking to hire really smart sports journalists who knew about the Ravens knew about you knew enough that they could do this for a living, take phone calls, and not make a fool of themselves. It was really hard to do. It’s hard. So Luke is still with me all these years later, and we became this different kind of operation. But I’ve seen what’s happened to TV news, what’s happening to salaries, a TV news, what’s happened to the legacy people, Denise, stepping down, you know, Bob target and whatever happened to him? That probably was a little on toward that didn’t really come out. Poker Face. Yeah, I got you, man. But like, I don’t have a poker face about Jay knew him. And I walked in, I told him exactly what I thought. So in retrospect, he didn’t like that very much. But that’s okay. Because it’s okay. But I, I also know, the embargo against me personally, by some of these media organizations that I work for or against, and the fact that it’s shrinking so dramatically, right. Yeah. And I could talk about Chad’s deal, and my press pass and all that. But the truth is, the Ravens gonna play game in Cincinnati on Sunday night, it’s the biggest game of the year. And when the game ends in Cincinnati, they’re probably going to lose, maybe by the time you listen to this, they have lost it, maybe they want to replay in Kansas City this week, and that Lord knows that’s possible. But I know this when the game ends, John’s gonna come downstairs into that interview room that he was in the other day, and there’s gonna be two or three reporters in there. And that’s it. Well, and there used to be 20.
Mike Schuh 16:21
It used to be 20. And what’s what’s what’s unfair about this is every single manager out there saying, Oh, no, there’s a camera in there. We’ll just take the feet. But what they’re missing is you need someone sitting in the chair to ask the question asked to ask the right question. And one of the thing that drives me nuts about sports journalism is, is that as a whole of sports journalists have to keep going back to the same well all the time. So it seems to me as a regular news journalist, they don’t want to piss those people at all. So they ask these little fluffy wiffle ball on the stand questions. And instead of asking the city,
Nestor Aparicio 16:54
there’s an intimidation level by all of them, right? By by athletes and by coaches, that me being in sports that it’s taken me taking the cuffs off to say I can get Westmore on the phone right now I could get Cal Ripken they would come and sit in a you can have a crappy all these people have a crab cake. The only ones I can’t get a crab cake with are the people of all with the orals and the Ravens and my whole business was set on my home media organization was set up to love them pat them on the back help them sell tickets help them sell fireworks nights, how all of that right and it’s unbelievable the amount of arrogance that is endemic it’s it’s built in this built in. We’re more important than you that I don’t I don’t deal with anywhere else in the world. When I go to a PC I want to promote your your crabcake they say Sure. When I go to you and say I want to promote store works. You’re like sure I want to come in. And as long as you’re a nice guy and you do it from integrity. There’s sports isn’t like that sports is from the beginning. Your rat poison your 14 year old kid who can poop they tell you avoid, avoid the media avoid the media, the agent comes in says avoid them at the AAU handler says avoid the media. Then the college coach gets a handle on me says the rat poison and then and then they show up here. Yeah, yeah. And then you have no shot of ever getting through whatever that exterior of you’re only here to do me harm. Well, that’s your only
Mike Schuh 18:21
it’s it’s made to be that way the only there would do harm. So the three guys are people who are in the room to ask those questions. They’re just gonna give him fluff balls. No, no one’s gonna say the simple question, which is who? You really stunk it up today. Which is a valid question because then they can go they can really go in a million different direction. Last
Nestor Aparicio 18:39
set of questions I asked. It really pissed them off. Last season. Right before Lamar got hurt. They played the Minnesota Vikings. overtime game here. Lamar ran the ball 21 times in the game. Yeah. At the end of the game. I went and they won barely and they had to scrap was when they were falling apart. And I went to the locker room and Lamar was first one and I said, Lamar, you ran the ball 21 times today. Do you think that’s sustainable? And any answers a good answer? I’ve asked him. Hey, I ran more today than we should probably I’m not gonna run 21 times every week. You just say something. Move on right? And steady bird up. And you know, and then hardball came out and I gave him the same question. hardball. I got the I got the neck all like Godzilla, you know, and I’m like, You have a lot of power my friend. I said, bro, you ran your quarterback random ball. 20 Did you can say that. That’s too much. It’s okay to say that right? So and it’s okay to say that your quarterback seeking contact is not safe long term. And there’s a reason the other 31 teams do it differently and strategize it differently. They strategize to the quarterback doesn’t run into linebacker, right. This is part of this this. You know, this is a feature not a bug in your offense. Right. So, and then when you piss them off you Find you have a press credential six months later, because you’re the only one in there willing to take the obvious, which is your anabol 21 times and base a question on that. They don’t. But they the difference in sports in a big way is they are their own media organization. Yeah. And they weren’t 20 years ago, Ray Lewis used to have to wait in his locker room for me and John Barrowman to come by and ask what he thought and put it on. Yeah. Now once once social media happened, the paradigm shifted. Yeah, the democratization
Mike Schuh 20:28
of media and everything. Yeah, absolutely. And they, they bought their way in smartly. So so they can put what they want out there.
Nestor Aparicio 20:37
You see the incoming for you business wise that like, at some point, you knew the thing was shrinking, at some point, it would get to you. Because I wonder that for me, at some point, it’s shrinking.
Mike Schuh 20:46
Mine didn’t shrink. Mine was a lot of side factors at that. And I believe the bosses, would they say that nothing to do with me. I knew for a while I was good at what I did. But I knew for a couple of years, it wasn’t necessarily lighting my own fires, because of the boxes that we had to work in to be a local television news reporter at least for me in the morning. So the opportunities to do what I really enjoyed doing. I honestly, I mean, every story that made that out the door was acceptable. It was okay. But the ones that I loved, I had maybe two or three times a year, I really liked the story. So that showed me that, wow, there’s a lot of days where I’m trying to make the best out of something. But that was the only way to keep myself sane is a really long, roundabout answer to your question, which is, early on, I learned that even if you grade a story on a one to 10 basis, there’s some days you’re it’s just a three. That’s there’s no there’s nothing you can do. But just put someone there. Yeah. Oh, it’s just a three it has some value, but it’s but it’s at the minimal level of three than if you’re if you’re gonna go do a three. What can you do to make that a four? Is there anything you can do? Can your writing be perfect in your Can you stand up be good? Can you ask just the right question? Can you think about how to tell this in a way that has a theme or the photography is amazing if you can, if you can put threes to fours and fours to fives. It was kind of like a baseball players have slapped special sauce. Yeah, you know, I mean, it’s like someone who like maybe not great, but they’re gonna get on first and second all the time. Well, if I know that I can put that guy he can get it first every time. Well, that’s that’s it. There’s value to that. So sure. So when you say did I see the end coming? I saw that I wasn’t doing the stories I loved as much. But what made me intellectually interested in it was how can I take whatever I got? If I if I’m given an ugly baby? What can I do with it? How can I make that thing prettier and better, and then occasionally, everything came together. And there were those great days were like, wow, that was unexpected, right? This was a really good day, this is a really good story. You know, I have to go back for more time and all that stuff. And, and so yeah, I knew the industry was changing. But on the other hand, people have called me and want me to come back to do the work. So the work is still there. And they’re still jobs listed for all the local stations, like, you know, to be a regular reporter. So it’s, the need is still there. And the need to do regular reporting, I think is is more than it’s ever been. I mean, you know, you look at the, you know, you look at the banner, and then you look at what Fern Shan does with what’s there’s Baltimore beatdown what’s hers? No, not Baltimore be done. She’s different one fishbowl fishbowl, I’m sorry. Yeah, you know, I mean, those types of things, as well as the sun or the ghosts thereof. It’s all important. It’s all important to get everything out there. You look at the guy who, you know, the Republican up in Long Island. I mean, that was just who fabricated most of the story, Santos Santos. I mean, all that came from a tiny little publication that was Republican leaning, you know, and they still said, This guy’s got no clothes, and they ended up endorsing the Democrat with those types of core value, small time reporting, that we kind of take for granted. We think everything is going to be somehow magically applying this box, well, someone has to be out there and do that there’s always going to be a need for the physical whether it’s Nestor or Mike to actually be out there to talk to the people to bring that stuff back. It’s very analogous to the people who are just taking the feet out of the Ravens locker room. Well, at some certain point there may not be anybody in front of them to ask those
Nestor Aparicio 24:11
well I wrote that at some point horrible is gonna come out it’s gonna be like opening the refrigerator at night and the lights gonna go on and he’s gonna be talking to no one’s gonna be like our deal. You literally just shouting into the abyss after a game but that that’s the state of media at this point. You know what I mean? They’re the people want to cover up, get mistreated, the other people get held out and then there’s budgets. Where I mean, Viviana didn’t go two weeks ago to the game and Pittsburgh because WJC didn’t have the money to send it was the end of the year. So it’s just so there’s one less reporter one less set of eyes, one less set of questions, one Well, I
Mike Schuh 24:47
think it said I know it personally because, you know, journalism paid the bills for all those years. I mean, I I’m a subscriber to the banner I pay into that I pay into the New York Times I pay into Washington Post. You know, I pay
Nestor Aparicio 24:59
answer’s no nice job as a journalist, right? Parents do
Mike Schuh 25:02
a nice job. I mean, I think they’re still finding their way. But I think they deserve the support because they’re they’re looking at things from a different angle. And I think they’re letting their people think, how about that that’s most important, because a lot of times, it news tends to be a producer or an editor says, Well, we think this is what’s going on. And what I like about the banner is through letting the people in the field, say, I kind of I got a story, I gotta feel let
Nestor Aparicio 25:26
me go, let me go right to storage racks for more original content.
Mike Schuh 25:29
You don’t I mean, it’s it’s truly original, something you wouldn’t find because it came on the other end of a press release. And that’s why I really respect what they’re doing. I think they need to do more of it. But I, you know, the caveat is I worked I did a job for them briefly. So I mean, I have I have accepted their money.
Nestor Aparicio 25:49
My shoe is here he is Ms. Story works formerly at WJC only 27 years, I didn’t realize you were there that long, I would have given you 15 Yeah, it was
Mike Schuh 25:57
a great run. And I talked to Zurich, right after it happened. I actually I called him right away, because I wanted to get my my, I want to get my side of the story, because I knew that they that just the nature of how television is not Jay Z, or CBS, it’s just they never, if they let someone go, they never really say anything about right, it’s just so I want to make sure my point got out in, in the ground rules I had with him. So I’m not gonna say anything negative, I am not saying anything negative, you can’t have 27 years out something being negative, but I’m not gonna say it because they put food on my table, they were good to me, I was good to them, we had a good relationship. And it was just business. And while it was a tough pill to swallow, but it was just business. And I hit it. I mean, do me personally, and I’m really happy about that, and the leadership I was able to bring to them. And you know, it’s also all the stations except for Fox 45, or Union Station. So it was very, what I really enjoyed. Also, as part of my work, which no one ever saw up in the field or on TV, was I was the shop steward for 20 some different on air people. And it was always amazing to me to have to work the issues between the people who were on TV and the people who were employing us, and to be able to sit in the corner office and say, look, here’s how it, this is how we see this, this is how this works. Let’s figure out a problem, or let’s figure out a solution to this problem. And it was I learned so much by being able to talk to different managers and some who were more receptive than others. And where I learned the most was the ones who were the least receptive. And because it forced me to up my game to figure out how do we both benefit from this without having to use threats or get angry or, you know, I always entered with a smile and left with a handshake. Because that was the most important thing to me was to preserve the relationship. So we could actually talk about these issues. And it worked out well. It only rarely did I have to say, look, we can either figure this out peacefully here in this office between the two of us, or we can let our subordinates in New York are not supporting us, we can let we let the people above us in New York do the work. And then we’re both saddled with whatever decision they make. So I trust us to work it out, rather than them to work it out. And, you know, most of the time, they’ve got good results. Well, it was
Nestor Aparicio 28:07
a big company. And you know, I mean, and obviously we get a lot of power Jay Z was so how can my audience help you? What is ms story?
Mike Schuh 28:15
So what I do now, I’ve just done a couple of projects in Iceland for a startup and for environmental, and for an environmentalist. So I’d be I travel around, I’ve worked with a developer down in North Carolina, who’s locally based telling you about their new project site, I do corporate video for large and small clients. I’m doing a job next week for Andersen windows. It is the corporate office. But it’s a small, almost new story about a veteran who gave a lot and now she’s getting free windows and doors from the company. So that’s a corporate promotional spot for them that they call snackable content, which is just going to run internally. And then I’ll also do these long, you know, 10 and 15 minute long sort of mini documentaries. And what your audience could do is I call
Nestor Aparicio 28:59
that a podcast segment.
Mike Schuh 29:02
For me, that’s long, because there’s a lot more, there’s a lot more layers to it. But I mean, I do if your business needs a video to promote yourself for the web, or for whatever reason, or for internally, I got that.
Nestor Aparicio 29:14
So I could come to you and say it’s my 25th anniversary this year. I need you to create a corporate video that’s four minutes long for me telling my story in some sort of way.
Mike Schuh 29:21
Yep. And then we figure out budget and stuff like that, because everything’s it’s all time based. You know, if you have a huge project, there’s gonna be more time all throughout the process, and it’s a shortened short being get it done relatively easily. So that that’s primarily what I do lately, I’ve been doing some work. I just finished up on a PBS primetime show with the chef Patti Janish. And she’s running across the border in America in Mexico and did for segment writing for that which was amazing with my friend Darren Darren black at early light media, who’s a former national Photographer of the Year and used to work at Fox 45. We met out in the street and did another project for him on a guy named hockey that’s running on Discovery plus in it was an hour long show where they did the production everything but they handed it to me to write. And that was a, that was a monster getting 300 gigs of media just dumped and say, Okay, here’s here’s what we here’s the outline, go figure this out Oh, wow. It was it was broadening for me to see how how that stuff works and that just air started to air about a week ago, and it’s on Discovery plus and it’s called Hi, my name is hockey. And it turned out really, really well. Partially because early light media with Darren, their award winning group of mostly former Newsies, but they really, really have a fantastic editor on the backend, Jody Weldon who, you know, my stuff was okay. All right, it was good. And he made it really good. And that was, it’s great to see, I’m used to doing where I control everything, but you’re
Nestor Aparicio 30:49
doing something completely different than you. I mean, you did the same thing for 27 years, but to some degree, yeah. Oh, no, no, yeah, I did 456. You know, variation was done at the hospital, something happened organically, you know, wherever.
Mike Schuh 31:00
So, so that so by doing these corporate videos, or these, these, these communications, I had coffee with Jane Miller was yesterday, the day before. And we I was talking like, you know what, I, I always thought it was a little bit different. But in a way, I’m still telling new stories, but I’m telling the story for that corporations audience or that corporations, employees or you know, I mean, it’s, in a sense, I still feel like I’m doing news. I’m doing news for those people. And it’s fascinating. It’s rewarding me to be out in the middle of a fjord in northern Iceland, and be in control of the boat captain who owns this beautiful boat, one of the world’s leading help scientists, the CEO of the company that hired me to divers and a drone operator. And I slept to do my photography work, because because I am Oh,
Nestor Aparicio 31:44
did you see the Northern Lights? That’s
Mike Schuh 31:45
the most Yes, I did. What? Twice? What? Boom,
Nestor Aparicio 31:49
that’s my bucket list to
Mike Schuh 31:50
them. They look here. The camera. They look green, though that color. Yeah, they’re green. They are like a green pepper. It’s amazing. They’re green, like a green pepper. They really are. And will
Nestor Aparicio 32:00
you storytime going to have a G and a crab cake. Keep going?
Mike Schuh 32:04
Well, we got lucky because you got to be awake. We got to be awake. And it is late and and I had I had contacts and I left accidentally, my little bucket we had we had a group that gets split up in a couple of groups. And the girls were off on a sheep farm. That’s where they were sleeping. And almost as soon as they got out of our car and started driving away, I’m like, Ah, I can’t believe I don’t have my own my my things to take my contacts out. And they’re a special kind of they’re the size of saucers and you just can’t go blink blink. You got to use a little like toilet plunger. My wife has absolutely. So when I’ve been you know, that plunger in Iceland, was far away from me. So I had to call them like, I’m sorry, you got to come back. Otherwise I’ll die. You know. And so they come back and we keep it a little bit. You know, it was late at night. You know, we had a cocktail and then the girls go to leave.
Nestor Aparicio 32:50
And Mr. Jokes out the window all of a sudden, yeah, all of a sudden,
Mike Schuh 32:53
they come back like, Get the car. We gotta go. Like what like look? Oh my goodness, what we’re gonna sit even though it’s a tiny city of like, 500 There’s still light pollution. She goes, I know where to go. We went up into a little mountain pass.
Nestor Aparicio 33:05
And how long does go on? Oh, how
Mike Schuh 33:07
long did the northern lights go on? Oh, hour. Eventually you get bored? Yeah. Oh, no. Oh, no, no, no, I
Nestor Aparicio 33:13
would never get bored.
Mike Schuh 33:14
How about this 117 degrees. And you maybe should have put on all your gear right? After about 40 minutes. You’re just kind of like, I gotta either get in the truck, or we gotta go. And then what happens is they come and go. They it’s not like it’s a pre credit program show. Yeah. And then all sudden, you’re like, Okay, well, they look like they’re fading out and the last person in the car will go, Alright, no, they’re not come back out. And then they all suddenly start dancing again. And they’re different. You can
Nestor Aparicio 33:38
get my wife and I went to see Pearl Jam. Yeah, about four or five years ago before the plague 1718. So 18, probably, we went out to Montana, to see Pearl Jam in Missoula. And the persuade meteor shower was happening that week. And I knew about it. And we got up at three in the morning and drove 50 miles east of Great Falls notion just tried to get way out in the middle of nowhere. And we sat on the hood of the car was very, very waiting guard. And we’re sitting on the hood of the car. And we looked up and you see one, you see one, you see one, and then all of a sudden it’s like, Damn, it’s cold out here. Let’s, let’s go back to grateful. You know, so I understand what you’re saying.
Mike Schuh 34:20
So the two the two nights, we saw two nights in a row. It was that it finally was cold that that drove us in. Because it was so beautiful and so gorgeous. mind altering that. I loved it. But we had to go Now conversely, other friends of mine who who’ve had jobs in Iceland, who’ve been back 678 times. I’ve never ever seen him because you know, like that’s a it’s a great place to see him. But it’s an island in the middle of the Atlantic and you know, you get cloud cover a lot. I mean, you better you better like clouds if you go to Iceland, which by the way. Thank you. The the Iceland sky is like no other because you are in the middle of the ocean. So there’s a lot of clouds that come and go and this and that and Oh my my stuff, the stuff I shot nice and look gorgeous. I landed
Nestor Aparicio 35:02
in Reykjavik a couple of times on the way to Europe. I’ve never gotten out because it’s expensive. And I’m always in a hurry to get the euro. You know, it’s just like, it’s never felt like I’m gonna stay in that that Blue Lagoon thing was little cheese ball. For me. There’s little cheese
Mike Schuh 35:16
in there. And the funny thing is, is they’re they’re probably 20 other of them around as possible. Oh, there’s no there are hundreds of little what they call hot pots. I mean, they’re the size. Thermo Yes, most of them. Most of them are free, some of them are all spa like. But the bluegill did a great job marketing that in you and it is it’s right next to a geothermal plant and they needed a place for some of their extra thermal energy. And so literally that that was sort of a co branded thing to the geothermal plant that’s right next door, when you can’t
Nestor Aparicio 35:46
if you’re gonna spend any time there you’re gonna wind up there or in Reykjavik and a $40 cheeseburger or something like that, right.
Mike Schuh 35:51
But if you ever go again because play and air Iceland and some of the other ones have, you know, good things where you can stop and do around you can easily do the South East tour on the ring road. You can do two days and see a lot of stuff now. It’s strictly the sort of the, the tourist parade right, but boy, is it still a good looking tourists parade? I like the Westfjords which is up on the other side than
Nestor Aparicio 36:13
I did if you were to Southern New Zealand on the South Island, just mana poori in the bottom of the world. Yeah. Unbelievable. Yeah, just
Mike Schuh 36:21
I mean it. But how lucky are we to be able to travel? You know, I mean, some people never get out of West Baltimore, East Baltimore or, or they never get out of their state, you know, and, and, yeah, I feel it’s a beautiful world. It’s a beautiful Well, I feel that’s one of the things that I that I loved about doing news is because it was a hard, tough business but both personally physically, you know, sometimes financially and mentally. But yet if you have a positive attitude, man, you can see so much good in people when you’re out there every day unexpected goodness. And that’s what I was like just said that thing about how lucky we get to travel. Because we are fortunate, you know to remember are fortunate how fortunate we are I think if you can do that and make a business of it, which I kind of feel like I’m doing with the MS story works. I feel I’m super lucky when I finish a project like that was cool. I met people I
Nestor Aparicio 37:09
wouldn’t have been doing that if I stayed there if I was still doing the other thing right when my friends
Mike Schuh 37:13
who are still in the business not just that their team otherwise they they you know sometimes they don’t wanna take my calls because like okay, where have you gone cool now?
Nestor Aparicio 37:21
So the northern lady Yeah, where are you gonna call now and I’m like It’s
Mike Schuh 37:25
not like that every day but what I missed from they get to do is they never know if they’re gonna show up any given day and fly on a C 130 Or a Blackhawk or run around or or meet unbelievable people like we would never would have met if I would have gone into corporate communications right from the jump right because we just different world different world. And so I feel very I liked it doing what I did for Jay Z I’m not glad I’m not there anymore. I’m glad I’m doing something different because those are all good people there to my shoes.
Nestor Aparicio 37:52
Here he is Ms. StoryWorks. So you remember from WJC 2017. We have crab cakes were a G and a Coney Island hot dog we are in I’ve been peeking at mine and here we are in Whitemarsh no longer in Highland town. Come on out have a crab cake have a hot dog. Visit the new place wait in line if you have to want to Saturday Sunday morning for some breakfast. Really good seeing you man. Thanks for coming out. I have a Maryland crab cake tour scratch off lottery I I’m gonna give you a holiday Castro because I think the snowman looks kind of cool on here. And the Ravens season is almost over with so big appreciation to all of our guests out here Ken came out ride shotgun as well. Andy from GNA as well as my dear friend Nick Fisher from wise markets, he’s a store 180 at honey go right around the corner. If you’re not gonna stop there and get a gallon of milk. That’d be a wise choice for me on the way home. And we just had a great day here and I’ve been waiting to get out here for nine months. He’s been open since March. It’s been packed out here. And I knew the crab cake was going to be delicious little little Saltine here and it’s delicious side salad to go with it. I’m getting ready for football. Yes. Pray for the Ravens. Okay, pray for the offseason. Pray for Lamar. Let’s all have a purple prayer right now. All right, I am Nestor. We are WNS TA and 5070 Towson Baltimore signing off from Whitemarsh at GNA. We are Baltimore positive.com. Stay with us.
