If you had to live with me, you would change your mind. But because viewers see the best 30 minutes of my week on Saturday nights people think I’m funnier, smarter, and better smelling than I actually am. (By the way, never end a second with the word “am.”) My friends can’t believe how cool people think I am. (I did it again.) I’m not cool at all. I’m a word nerd basically. My wife married down to balance out her extreme coolness. My friends stick around because I make great pasta sauce.

The truth is every once in a while someone rips me a new one via e-mail. Or at least says something questioning my story judgment. Today is such a day.

The following is an e-mail I received Monday. It’s not a “You suck, Redding!” e-mail. Hardly. It’s more like constructive criticism. But it raises an interesting subject regarding our show… which I will address briefly after you read this:

Dear Mike,
My husband and I are huge fans of "Carolina Traveler", making sure to schedule our DVR to record every episode. Watching it is like eating dessert for me. I enjoy all the interesting and uplifting stories you cover. Tonight I was disappointed with your story on the nude runners. I thought it very uncharacteristic of your normal fare. How do you think your younger viewers felt being ushered away from the show you encourage them to watch? This episode really didn't fit with your show's image and would be better left for the other "B rated" shows to cover, not "Carolina Traveler." I hope you will reconsider your choice of stories in the future.
A Huge Carolina Traveler Fan,
Yvonne K.

Dear Yvonne,
Story selection is one of the keys to Carolina Traveler so you’ve touched the nerve center. Not that I’m sensitive about this… you haven’t touched that kind of nerve. But story selection is something I take very personally and is at the heart of our show. It all starts there.

There are several reasons we do the stories we do and don’t do the stories you never see. On average, I get a handful of story ideas sent to me each work day. That’s a few hundred every year. Because there’s only one me and one Andy we can get to between 50 and 60 a year! Truth be told most of the stories suggested are not doable anyway. Some are just not as interesting as the e-mailer thinks and others while interesting don’t translate well to TV.

For example, a viewer is suggesting we do a story on some friends of hers and the emotional, complicated road they traveled trying to have a baby. It’s a truly great story… for a magazine or a newspaper, but not for the Carolina Traveler show. Maybe “Dateline” could do it, but we can’t. It’s because we tell our stories in a very particular way. Our stories have a hundred plus video and sound edits in just few minutes. Some stories simply don’t have enough video variety for our type of storytelling.

Now, naked people running through the woods, well, that’s got endless video. Granted we have to edit around the not-so-private parts, but we have more than enough video to tell the story. So a Nude 5K passes that test. Then it has to pass a couple other tests. Is it interesting enough to me and will our viewers like it? Some stories have oodles of video but they’re not interesting.

I have given up trying to figure out what viewers like. I now know I’m not smart enough to figure that out. When Andy and I complete a show and prepare it for air, we joke about which story we’ll get the biggest reaction to, the most e-mail, etc. We are wrong about 90 to 100% of the time.

So all I’m left with is this: “Is this story interesting to me? Would I watch it?” That’s all I got. I have to go with my gut. I have no other formula. As we put the Nude 5K together, I wondered if people would be offended. I knew it was interesting. I knew I would want to see this story, but I’m a nutcase. So I guessed some viewers would be bothered by the subject. And you raised those very reasons for objecting to this story.

And for that, I’m sorry. But I would do it all over again. I have to. My hope is you will stick around to see the bigger picture. Sure I’m going to misfire on occasion. That’s because we’re not a TV factory. It’s just me and Andy tooling around trying to bring you the most interesting stories we can.

If an occasional story makes you uncomfortable, I don’t know what to do about that. It’s going to happen. I can see by your e-mail you get that it’s a rare circumstance. And I appreciate that.

So thanks for writing and being fair.

Okay, I’m trying to set of some more stories for February so I’m off… way off…

Mike Redding