It happened a month ago, so no doubt everyone else has already processed the "Gary Anthony Ramsay spazzes off on a NY1 call-in show, then quits/gets fired from the channel" story and moved on, but I just caught wind of it last week, and...wow. 

New Yorkers (well, the ones who have Time Warner cable) have a relationship with NY1 -- as though it's a person.  A family member, sort of, in the sense that nobody is like, "I LOVE that station!", but it's around all the time and you need it, in a way, and when it's gone, you miss it.  When I lived way out in Brooklyn, outside the Time Warner Cable service area, I had satellite cable -- and Time Warner is NY1's parent, so, no NY1.  Then I moved further in, closer to downtown, and got hooked back up with Time Warner, and of course the installer did his remote test on NY1 and the minute it came up onscreen I yelled out, "Lewis!"  Lewis Dodley is a pro, man.  He's such a great reader: "My mustache and I are interested in -- but, because we are professionals, not surprised by -- the story we are about to share, sonorously, with you." 

You start out not even watching watching the station; you just put it on because it has the temperature bug in the bottom left corner all the time, and you want to know if you need a jean jacket.  But...then it's on, and then it's on some more, and you form bonds with it, with the segments and the anchors, like when Kristen Shaughnessy was growing her hair out and every woman in the city was like, "Hooooo, that's tough."  Or when Annika Pergament showed up on a Sopranos episode in the first season; it put a badge of tri-state authenticity on the show's lapel.  And when you're talking about gi-GANTIC eyebrows, for a national audience you go with a Scorsese joke...but for the locals, you use George Whipple.  (Awesomely, in the staff profile page I've linked to, said brows wiggle Flash-ily.  Hee.)

So, it's weird to know Ramsay's off the air.  He wasn't my favorite anchor; that honor goes to the delightful Pat Kiernan, who does "In The Papers" and mods The World Series Of Pop Culture.  I met him once, when I was a researcher on a pilot, and he's just as lovely in person; he even emailed the next day to thank me and the writer on our three-man team for our help, which he didn't have to do.  But Ramsay has been part of the cultural landscape around here for a long time, him and his businesslike flat-top.  It's probably one of those stories that, outside the catchment area, nobody will care much about, but for the locals, it's distressing.

Not so distressing that I'll stop doing my Neil Rosen imitation, though.  "Because what he actually did just wasn't that big a deal in the end...out of a possible five apples...I'm going to give Gary Anthony Ramsay's departure...only one apple."  Hee. 

Anyway.  Good luck, Gary!  Thanks for all the headlines.