I was doing sound for a Hare Krishna event. I had the usual surprise instruments show up for several of the acts – but that's no surprise to me anymore. Anyhow, there was a bit where this guy was doing a long speech on a hand-held wireless. This seemed like the opportune moment for me to grab a bite to eat.
It was a fasting event. They weren't too bothered about it with outsiders, but I thought so as not to rub it in their faces, I would stand at the back door – quite some distance from the desk.
After a while, I realize, "Hey, there's no speaking coming through the PA, maybe he's finished." So I have a look over, and he is making gestures of throwing the mic and is still trying to talk to the audience.
So I race over, assuming the batteries are dead, and as it turns out, the LED on the mic is showing that it's fine.
As I get back to the desk – it was fortunate that some muso was actually standing there at the time and understood what he had witnessed – some little kid had come along and pressed the auto scan button on the receiver. So it was now on another channel.
The only way to fix this is to go back and grab the mic – in the meantime, I'd handed him a cabled one – and use the IR to auto tune it back to the receiver and then race back to the stage to give the mic back.
It's lucky they're very peaceful people.
