Again I stray from the focus of the Computer Circus (there is so much more to life, isn't there?). This time, it is about the media.

Don't you just love how melodramatic the media is? How about interrupting normal programming for hours to talk endlessly about an airplane that is flying around in circles to burn off fuel before it lands on its twisted landing gear?

Do we really expect to see people die? Do we really want to? You know that's what everybody is thinking. Oh, how terrible this situation is...LET'S WATCH! Got to hand it to the media to bring us the latest tragic story into our comfy living rooms, hyping it up like it was an alien invasion, hoping for the worst, interrupting my lunch while I'm trying to RELAX. Next thing you know, they'll be televising an all-out nuclear attack.

I knew how this story was going to play out. There just really wasn't a whole lot that could have happened. Yeah, it's kind of bad when landing gear doesn't play right on an airplane, but the thing was turned a full 90 degrees perpendicular, so there were only two real options that could have played out - the wheels would be ground off on landing, or the strut would break and the nose would be ground up a bit on landing. Either way, nobody dies.

What I didn't quite expect was to see a landing that was so phenomenal. That had to be one of the greatest landings I have ever seen. I'd fly with that pilot any day. But as far as the landing gear went, it was pretty much what I imagined. I even said to myself - out loud - when I pressed the mute button on the TV remote before the plane landed - that after all this build-up and hype and nya-nya-nya-nya-nya, the plane would roll to a stop and the passengers would unload and all would end well.

I swear the news commentators were absolutely giddy about the situation. You could tell they absolutely couldn't WAIT to see the thing crash and burn. The disappointment in the end was almost painful in their voices. Just think - all this air time, all these other planes and helicopters scrambling around to get pictures, all the interrupted advertising dollars lost, all these resources consumed to capture this late breaking story that might not have otherwise even made the news if they didn't know about the situation beforehand.

I guess it just wasn't quite 9-11.

Sure, it was exciting to see the plane coming closer and closer to the ground, imagining what it must be like to be on the plane in that moment. But really, did we all need to be dragged through this experience? Do we need this sort of thing in our lives to be happy and healthy? Just what is the deal with all this "reality TV" these days?

When it was all over, I wanted to know what it sounded like inside the plane when it landed. I wanted to hear from one of the passengers to know what it was like inside the plane. To me, that seemed like the real story...yet I never heard mention of that. Never heard a personal account, and not a peep about what it sounded like when that nose wheel came down. It just wasn't news.

Nobody died.

Aw, shucks! Maybe next time.