Poor Annie ... Get well soon, kid

Rumors were flying already Monday morning.

 "Did you happen to catch KEYC news last night?" a coworker says.

"Um ... No," I said. Because I usually don't. Not that I don't like KEYC. But because I generally don't watch television news on Sundays.

"That anchor, not sure what her name is, must have been drunk or something," the coworker says. "It was bad."

We waited for a couple of days for that broadcast to make it onto YouTube. And finally, by this morning (Wednesday), there it was.

We laughed at first, as news anchor Annie Stensrud stumbled through the first story, something about a new cancer center or something in New Ulm. But things got worse when she reported on Santa being at Farmamerica.

And we laughed ...

... And then I felt like crap for doing so.

What we'd witnessed was a train wreck, for sure. But there's something more going on here, clearly. Was she drunk? Well, unless Annie comes forward to talk about that night, all we can do is say, "It sure looked like it." Could she have been on cold medication? Sure. Or muscle relaxers? Yep (I took muscle relaxers once before an interview and I'm quite sure the president of the National Nurses Association believed she was interviewed by a drunk man that day.) But at this point, the jury of public opinion has rendered its verdict, and they've decided Annie was drunk. It's all over Facebook, YouTube, media bloggers are talking about, it's even on the Huffington Post.

Let's assume she was drunk. We could collective laugh our butts off at her. It's what we do in America these days -- we troll YouTube for funny videos and laugh at them, people can't wait for their buddies to do something stupid so they can Facebook it and embarrass them, and we feed off the misfortunes of others (ever seen the Failblog?)

Or we take a step back and cut Annie some slack. I'm not claiming to be holier-than-thou. Like I mentioned earlier, I waited for Annie's video to hit YouTube, too. I'm just saying that, wherever Annie is today, she's sitting in a pool of regret, probably wondering if her career is over.

If she was drinking, she chose poorly by going on the air that day. No question about it. She shouldn't have. But I'm guessing KEYC is staffed about the same as we are on weekends: one journalist. She probably figured, intoxicated or not, she had no choice but to try and get the job done because there was no one else.

If she was experiencing a medical issue such as a stroke, then let's hope everyone who called her a drunk will take it back. If she had taken too much cold medication, then let's hope she can come out and just set the record straight.

Let's go easy on Annie, here, folks. IF she was drunk, then she needs help and let's hope she gets it. She's not some attention whore whose every miscue needs to be publicized and ridiculed. She's a working member of our community who needs help.

I'm not condoning anything. Quite the contrary. As a journalist, putting yourself and your work in front of the masses in a compromised state should never be tolerated. And this town has certainly had its share of alcohol-related attention. We've had MSU students drink themselves to death, we've had police officers drinking and driving, we had an alcohol-fueled riot that put our community on the national news for a few nights.

So ... I'm just saying we all make mistakes. And IF this was one of Annie's mistakes, let's forgive her and move on, even if that means we move on without her.