It began as a great morning at the Spring Dairy Expo in Columbus, Ohio. The Holstein heifer classes were big, the crowd was growing and the Ohio State University Buckeye Dairy Club students were busy getting the cattle ready for their annual Buckeye Classic sale.

I was broadcasting the Ayrshire, Guernsey and Holstein Buckeye classic sales for “Dairy Agenda Today” and I needed to get things set up. With my great assistant, Chad, we were plugging in, hooking up and tuning in to the broadcast site.

We only had one hiccup, and that was where to put the cable for the microphone that was going from our table to the auctioneer’s box. In no time, Chad was down on his hands and knees burying the cable under the shavings in the sale ring. We were ready.

The Guernseys were first in the sale ring and we had the world by the tail. The audio was nearly perfect, the video was good and we were able to relax, knowing we had everything under control.

Enjoying the sale and keeping track of the prices, suddenly I saw the cable that Chad buried had surfaced in the sale ring. As the next heifer went through the ring, the cable got caught on her foot and I began to panic. As I hit Chad in the leg, I tried to remain calm, saying, “Chad … the cable.” Chad didn’t move.

A little louder, “Chad … look … the cable.” Chad didn’t jump into action like I thought he should and the cable was now caught around the heifer’s leg. Finally, I hit him harder and with a little higher-pitched voice, I yelled, “CHAD, GO GET THE CABLE!”

Moving as though he were walking through mud, Chad-the-man-with-only-one-speed methodically walked into the ring and tried to quietly take care of the situation. All I could see was the heifer getting this cable wrapped around her leg, giving it a kick and watching the whole thing disassemble in front of the crowd.

Finally the auctioneer caught on and disconnected the cable and handed it to Chad.  I sat back and said, “Phew – dodged that bullet.”

Getting settled back into a routine, we were halfway through the Holstein sale and gaining our broadcasting confidence back. Texts were coming in from our show ring reporter and they weren’t good. She was having trouble and I could clearly feel her panic through her texts.

I was trying to solve the problem via text messages – and suddenly the fire alarm went off. With this obnoxious alarm piercing every eardrum in the place, no one moved.

The auctioneer barely missed a beat. If there was a fire, we were all going to burn sitting in the bleachers because the cattle were selling, and no one was going to stop it.

With all this happening, I received this text from our panic-stricken show ring reporter: The sale report disappeared, my computer locked up and now the joint is burning down!

Clearly, things were in pure chaos. And now someone was calling me to tell me they couldn’t hear the auctioneer on the broadcast.

My reaction: I could do nothing but laugh. Laugh at all the things that were going wrong, laugh at the fact that we couldn’t hear a thing and laugh at the fact that nothing, not even a fire alarm and a potential fire, would keep an auctioneer from crying his sale or bidders from buying.

Sometimes you just have to laugh, without fearing the present panic and chaos.

The views and opinions expressed in this column are those of the author and not necessarily those of Farm World. Those with questions or comments for Melissa Hart may write to her in care of this publication.