Dear dimwit on the phone

It reminds me of jim gaffigan's bit about it.

What kind of advice would the bowling coach give? Hey this time I want you to knock down ALL the pins. You sure, coach? Yes. Trust me on this one.

 

Someone around here tried to start a regional sports paper that would cover every team in about 12 counties. Most of the stories focused on about 5 of them. I think it made it through the sixth week of Kansas' nine-week high-school football season.

 

Not as easy as it looks, eh? Especially when one has to sell ads, print the thing, distribute it. If newspapers were making money hand over fists, there wouldn't be so many going out of business, laying people off, etc.

 

Outfreakinstanding

 

day after bama beats Arkansas:

Caller: You got the new poll?
Me: yep.
Caller: Where's Alabama ranked this week?
Me: Uh, that'd be No. 1, same place as last week. You didn't think they'd drop after beating the No. 10 team, did you?
Caller: I was just checking.

 

It's not like they got ranked at 0-5...

 

Reader writes to me for some reason about the cooler being out in the gym and how students were told to just grin and bear it (Indian summer's packing a punch here in Cali this year), going on wondering where CPS is and we should do an investigation. Then writes she doesn't want to get involved because of possible reprecussions for her children. She even signs it "concerned mom."

My beat is sports, not gym class, so I forwarded it to the education reporter. Three minutes later, she comes to my desk and says "does the person who wants to be anonmyous realize her e-mail address is on the letter?"

After an hour or so of having my eyes dialated, probed and other things to ease some problems, then having to drive 40 minutes or so from the next town over, I hadn't noticed ... but it definitely made my day!

 

Yeah, okay so it's not journalism.

Anyway some guy calls me at work yesterday and asks me if we carry something called a "SmartSock". I don't think we do, but I look anyway and can't find it. I politely ask him if its by a certain company. He says no, but is convinced we carry it.

Then he starts asking me if we have a specific "sock person". A soxpert, if you will. I tell him no, but he could try some place like Dick's or Bass Pro, and while I don't think that they have a soxpert they're more geared towards athletics and could probably help him out more (we're general retail).

The guy won't give up, has a friend who swears he could find anything and my store and again asks if we have a soxpert. Like I'm an idiot and I just don't know about the legendary SmartSock. Finally I give up and just tell him to call our men's coordinator today. Now that I've bitched, I guarantee they'll arrive on our truck tomorrow.

For those of you who are just dying to know:


You can follow on Twitter too.

 

Dear coked up news guy.

It does not, I repeat, doesn't not take 20 hours to lay out an eight page A Section so stop pretending you're not a complete waste of space.

I'll see your 20-hour shit layout and do it much better, much more dynamic in 20% of the time.

Sincerely yours

-Sports

 

Phone call from Wednesday (KySportsWriter can confim):

Me (answering KySportsWriter's phone, which is also the main sports line): Sports, this is "C" (I don't give my last name).
Caller: Is this KYSportsWriter?
Me: No. I said, "Sports, this is C" because, well, I'm "CKK". "KySportsWriter's" not here.
Caller: Is your name "C KySportsWriter?"
Me: No. As a general practice for, well most businesses, you don't have aliases. Thus, when I say "C" I mean "C".
Caller: I've got today's paper right in front of me ...
Me: The one with "KySportsWriter's" full name - and not mine - above the middle school football championship recap?
Caller: Yeah, that's why I'm calling.
Me: Go on.
Caller: Well, I'm looking at the photos he took of my son yesterday.
Me: That's impossible. He doesn't take photos. Did you mean the photos by our photographer?
Caller: Who's the photographer?
Me: You know the small bold print that identifies the photo of your son?
Caller: Yeah, why?
Me: Do you see the name of the photographer in that same general area?
Caller: Yeah, why?
Me: That's what we call a "photo credit". Whoever took the photo is given the credit.
Caller: So you're saying "KySportsWriter" didn't take the photo?
Me: Exactly. Would we put a photographer's name on a story I wrote?
Caller: That would be stupid.
Me: So you see my point?
Caller: No, but that doesn't matter. Can "KySportsWriter" email me more photos of my son?
Me: No. That would be up to the photographer, since they are his photos. But both of our photographers have a stance that if you want their photos, you can go to our web site, click on the photo in question and go to the pay download site.
Caller: So "KYSportsWriter" can't just e-mail me the photos for free?
Me: No. I thought I just explained it to you?
Caller: My son's going to be disappointed. I told him I'd get more photos from you.
Me: And you CAN, but you must go online to pay for them.
Caller: How long have you had that policy?
Me: Since before your son started playing tackle football, unless he was held back for the greater part of a decade in order to play middle school football.
Caller: This isn't fair. I'm calling your boss. Since my son is in the paper, I should be given all of your photos of him for free.
Me: I'll wish you the best of luck with that argument. Should I transfer you to my boss or someone in our business department?
Caller: No thanks (hangs up).

 

Dear wife of person who sponsored little league team that competed three months ago and was slaughter-ruled twice,

I'm not running the team pic I got from you for an event that took place in late June. Okay, maybe it was the first weekend of July, I can't remember. I'd call to tell you the bad news, but the way I look at it, I have another two-and-a-half months to come to a decision. After all, it was sooooo important the picture make it into the paper, that it was dropped off sometime last week. If this had come even six weeks earlier, I could've gotten it in before football season started. While you're at it, tell your husband that if he wants the free mention in the paper, he should be a little nicer to our ad department when they come calling. No is fine, but he doesn't have to be a dick about it next time. I know, you'll bitch about it to my publisher. That's fine, and I'll probably eventually run it at the point of his bayonet. Not yours.

Signed,
Expendable

 

Took a "You run too much high school football." call, then five minutes later received a "You don't run enough high school football." call. I have to get these two together.
Also, why is it whenever the elderly call, they always preface everything with their age?