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9 things Channel 9’s Vanessa Echols learned from working from home

ORLANDO, Fla. — Many people, including most of Channel 9′s team, are working from home due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Channel 9′s Vanessa Echols just wrapped up her first week of anchoring from her home.

Here are nine things she learned from the experience:

Read: Coronavirus: 4 reasons you didn’t get your stimulus check

1. No Shoes: Yup, went a whole work week without wearing shoes to work.

2. Discipline: It truly does take discipline to focus and not goof off. I discovered that one of my favorite old shows is on a noncable station during the day. Matlock can be very distracting for fans like me.

3. The kitchen has a voice: Yes indeed it does, and it kept calling me to eat potato chips -- as in an entire bag. I resisted though. Seriously, I did. I pinkie promise I did.

4. Noise: There’s a lot of outside noise I didn’t notice before. Like the post carrier truck, the neighbor’s lawn service and mine, too, birds chirping, squirrels, well, you get the point. Another potential distraction to avoid.

5. Neat Freak: Contrary to what my parents said to me growing up, I don't need to be a neat freak after all. Anchoring from home requires a lot of cables, wires, camera, lights and various other equipment. What "some" would call clutter doesn't bother me at all.

6. Tolls: I’m not paying them 'cause I’m not driving to work.

7. Gas: So from what I’ve heard on the streets, gas prices are down, way down. I wouldn’t know cause I’m not driving to work.

8. My co-workers: I miss seeing them. Texting, zooming, phone calls and emails really don’t replace seeing them face to face.

9. It takes a village: Doing TV at home is a team effort. And I’m grateful for our news operations manager (McGyver), the engineers and IT folks back at the station. They’ve come to my rescue several times this week when I encountered technical issues.


Vanessa Echols

Vanessa Echols, WFTV.com

I have been a member of the Eyewitness News team since 1992 and currently anchor Eyewitness News at Noon and 4 p.m. on Channel 9.