Dear dimwit on the phone

Dear 57-year man who needs a hobby,

When I said my newspaper would love to feature you as a columnist every other week who writes a "Good Government" column, what I didn't say was that every other week, you'd be able to spew your hatred about how the other side is wrong about everything and every one under the sun.

As I told you three times when we met, if you want to write your Democrat-slanted, fact-less dribble, I'd love to publish it. It just won't run as a column because, well, frankly because I don't have time for your stupidity. I'll run your idiotic letters, when space is available and when the little old lady with the bake sale didn't meet our deadline.

And if you don't like it, you can either 1.) Eat a big steaming piece of shit or 2.) Restart your conspiracy website that three people besides your mom visit.

Yours in Christ,
SchiezaInc.

 

Damnit, don't give anyone any ideas. 10 years from now, that may well be industry standard.

 

So you offer someone a column with a topic about government, which would include the political machinations thereof, but you don't want to run it because you disagree with their views?

Not comprehending here.

 

This guy pitched me a column on "good government". It was supposed to highlight, in his views, the ways in which local government does good things in our state and gets overlooked.

I said that it was a good idea simply because we already have two columnists that are on the other side of the issue, one of which does a "I'm an old guy who likes to complain about the way things are" column and one who does a "I'm dying of cancer and don't have much longer to live so these are my perspectives about what really matters" column.

The only problem I have with the guy listed above is he sold me on the idea of a "good government" column saying that it's a shame no one shows all the good ways the government helps people, e.t.c. and now what he ACTUALLY wants to write is an attack column blasting the people he doesn't agree with because he can't separate policy from politics.

Again, I don't care what his views are, that's not my job. My job is to run columns that people want to read and, in my opinion, no one wants to read slanted attacks on one side of the aisle or the other. Especially when that's not what we agreed on in the first place.

Does that make sense?

 

Gotcha. Thanks for the clarification.

 

Dear Big School HS parent,
Thanks for e-mailing. You think our coverage has excluded your school and instead, we've spent more coverage on Small Public School and Small Private School.
Hope you enjoyed the stats I sent you on our coverage numbers showing Big School HS has gotten significantly more coverage this spring.
Boom, roasted.
Rhody 31

 

Dear High School Baseball Coach,

Thanks for not saying "hello" when I answered the phone. Also, thanks for giving me attitude and then when I ask for the box, you have absolutely nothing prepared almost three hours after your single game concluded. You let me slave on the phone for 15 minutes because you know nothing and it's no surprise your team lost by 11 runs.

 

Have to pass along an anecdote told to me by my boss.

On the bottom of the sports front in every Monday's paper is a spot for four of us to write 2-3 inches on anything of our choosing. Doesn't even have to be sports related, just a "food for thought" sorta thing. Our lovely mug shots are attached to it.

Apparently my boss got a call the other day. It was some lady saying that we ran a wrong photo. One of our reporters (an African-American woman) wrote a blurb about a local stock car driver.

The lady called in saying that the photo wasn't of the stock car driver. My boss (an older white guy) said that, yeah, he knows, it's the photo of the writer.

Then he offers this gem: "And if you look over to the left (to his blurb), you'll notice that's not Shaquille O'Neal."

"Oh. I hadn't gotten that far yet."

My lack of faith in the public is rewarded on a daily basis.

 

For Memorial Day, we gave our writers the day off and sent the Tuesday paper to bed on the Friday before (We print Tuesday through Saturday). Obviously having a paper done four days early presents a couple of problems, including having an updated weather graphic. I printed the Saturday graphic in the Tuesday paper because it was the most up to date one I had. Knowing I would get some complaints, I wrote a note above the graphic that explained the problem. Without fail, we get a phone call from some woman who points out the graphic is out of date.

I don't think some people actually know how to think critically any more. If it doesn't look right on first glance, it's automatically wrong. Granted it could very well be wrong, but I think most of us at least look a little deeper to make sure it's wrong before we point it out

 

I've tracked that sort of thing on an excel sheet in the past, and yes, it is vindicating to consult your #s and be able to back up your coverage.

Of course, many times I'd say "Look, we covered Big-Time High baseball five times this spring and only been out to small-town prep twice."

That would only be met with "Well, it should have been six times...it was our senior night, the boys are crushed about the lack of coverage and their scholarship chances have been dashed."

 

I love conversations with people that keep referring to "the press" or "the media"

At an end of year all-star track meet last week, and a guy tracks me down saying he had a great suggestion for "the press"...at the end of the season wouldn't it be neat if we could supply all the seniors with any photos of them we have on file.

Sure thing...now, my additional duties should include professional photographer for hundreds of area families, and I should do it all out of the goodness of my heart.

I told him we sell photo CDs if parents are interesting in purchasing photos from any of their kids events and left him my #...surprisingly, I haven't heard from him

 

If we're thinking critically: Why run a Saturday weather graphic on Tuesday anyway? Who gains from that?