I've made a big decision. I've decided to quit my job. I'm moving to Phoenix and becoming a pool boy and professional blogger.
April Fools'!
OK, so I know I probably didn't fool anyone. Anyone who knows me would know I'd never do any job that requires manual labor, even if it is only fetching towels, and I don't blog often enough to be a full-time blogger.
I've never been any good any good at coming up with clever April Fools' jokes. It's not one of my talents. I think part of the problem is that I can't sell the joke because I'm a terrible liar.
Don't get me wrong, I couldn't qualify for sainthood. It's not that I don't fib, or stretch the truth or tell a whopper from time to time. But, I'm must not good at looking someone in the eye when I do it. The lie is painted all over my face.
That's not a good trait for pulling off the gag.
So any and all attempts at pulling an April Fools' joke always had to be quick, before my face cracked or my transparent acting skills were exposed.
One thing I've never figured out though is the tradition of an April Fools' edition for a new publication. I admire the talent, like this piece from The Guardian, but if you are a news outlet, do you really want to be good at publishing a piece of fiction in your publication and "fooling" people?
I hope you have a great April Fools' day and don't get fooled too much, or by anyone with a sense of humor that is too cruel. It's always much better to be the fooler than the fool.
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
Friday, March 20, 2009
Some people just ruin things for everybody
I knew the minute I walked in the door that something was different. I hadn't actually been inside the bank in a while. Usually I do my transactions from home on my computer or outside the bank at the ATM. But it was getting late in the afternoon and I wanted to make sure the deposit got posted as quickly as possible so I can pay some bills this weekend.
The first thing I noticed was that the lobby had been rearranged and some more desks added right where the table used to be where people filled out their deposit slips. But that wasn't the only change. That honor was reserved for the bullet-proof glass in front of the tellers. I fell like I was back in Southern California again.
When I moved to Southern California 14 years ago this month, I was shocked to see bullet-proof glass when I walked into the bank to establish my account in California and get checks with my new address on them.
My friends told me that bank robbery was fairly common in the town where I was sitting up residence. Welcome to Southern California.
After living in California for more than 10 years, I got used to bullet-proof glass in the banks. In fact the only bank branches I was in that didn't have the see-through security walls were the bank branches inside grocery stores.
I got used to the glass, but I didn't like it. The glass made banking more impersonal. It didn't help that the tellers didn't seem to want people coming to their windows anyway. At one point the tellers starting asking me on every trip if I had tried using the ATM to make my deposit. For a while, they even set up an ATM in the lobby and had a bank employee going around to people in line offering to show them how to use it. I soon took the hint and started depositing my checks at the ATM and didn't have to shout through the little slots in the glass wall to deal with the tellers.
Eventually banks went to drive-up ATMs and then one employer offered direct deposit and I quit having to visit the bank at all to make deposits.
When I moved back to Oregon in 2005 I had to start going to the bank again from time to time. While my employer does pay me once a month through direct deposit, in order to get paid twice a month I have to take a draw, which is paid by check. Usually I deposit the check at the ATM but sometimes it's actually nice to go into the branch and flirt with the tellers. Maybe they don't consider it flirting, but given my lackluster social life of late, a smile from a lady qualifies as flirting in my book. Banking has been more personal and intimate on those visits because there was no bullet-proof glass. That is, until today's visit.
The branch I visit most often is on Market Street here in Salem. It's on my route between home and work, which makes it a convenient place to stop. Apparently it has proved convenient for people with less scrupulous intentions too, because that branch has been robbed twice in the last year, most recently in January. I guess that was too much for the bank. Now there is bullet-proof glass. So, now the tellers are certainly safer. But banking has become more impersonal again. I miss a lot of things about Southern California.
However, I learned today that impersonal banking conducted through bullet-proof glass was definitely not on the list of things for which I was longing.
The first thing I noticed was that the lobby had been rearranged and some more desks added right where the table used to be where people filled out their deposit slips. But that wasn't the only change. That honor was reserved for the bullet-proof glass in front of the tellers. I fell like I was back in Southern California again.
When I moved to Southern California 14 years ago this month, I was shocked to see bullet-proof glass when I walked into the bank to establish my account in California and get checks with my new address on them.
My friends told me that bank robbery was fairly common in the town where I was sitting up residence. Welcome to Southern California.
After living in California for more than 10 years, I got used to bullet-proof glass in the banks. In fact the only bank branches I was in that didn't have the see-through security walls were the bank branches inside grocery stores.
I got used to the glass, but I didn't like it. The glass made banking more impersonal. It didn't help that the tellers didn't seem to want people coming to their windows anyway. At one point the tellers starting asking me on every trip if I had tried using the ATM to make my deposit. For a while, they even set up an ATM in the lobby and had a bank employee going around to people in line offering to show them how to use it. I soon took the hint and started depositing my checks at the ATM and didn't have to shout through the little slots in the glass wall to deal with the tellers.
Eventually banks went to drive-up ATMs and then one employer offered direct deposit and I quit having to visit the bank at all to make deposits.
When I moved back to Oregon in 2005 I had to start going to the bank again from time to time. While my employer does pay me once a month through direct deposit, in order to get paid twice a month I have to take a draw, which is paid by check. Usually I deposit the check at the ATM but sometimes it's actually nice to go into the branch and flirt with the tellers. Maybe they don't consider it flirting, but given my lackluster social life of late, a smile from a lady qualifies as flirting in my book. Banking has been more personal and intimate on those visits because there was no bullet-proof glass. That is, until today's visit.
The branch I visit most often is on Market Street here in Salem. It's on my route between home and work, which makes it a convenient place to stop. Apparently it has proved convenient for people with less scrupulous intentions too, because that branch has been robbed twice in the last year, most recently in January. I guess that was too much for the bank. Now there is bullet-proof glass. So, now the tellers are certainly safer. But banking has become more impersonal again. I miss a lot of things about Southern California.
However, I learned today that impersonal banking conducted through bullet-proof glass was definitely not on the list of things for which I was longing.
Monday, March 16, 2009
Goodbye P-I
Starting Tuesday, Seattle is a one-newspaper town.
When I heard the announcement today that Tuesday's edition of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer out be its last print edition, I though maybe I would write a long, philosophical post about it. But I just don't have it in me. But I just can't. It's all too sad. Layoffs, furloughs, pay cuts, papers folking. It's just all so bleak. Every newspaper journalist I know has been touched by this. Even those left with jobs have seen 401(k) plans shot to hell and they are left to wonder if, or when, their livelihood might evaporate too. Journalists can relate to those who have lost jobs in this economy, because we all know someone who has joined the ranks of the unemployed. And we all know the competition for future job openings, at least in the short term, will be fierce.
We are like the former newspaper employees who set type in hot lead or did paste-up work in composing rooms. Their jobs were lost forever to technology.
Now, news staffers know the feeling too.
The P-I name will live on, at least for a while, in cyberspace. But it will have far fewer people doing the journalism that covers the issues important to Seattle and the Pacific Northwest.
When I heard the announcement today that Tuesday's edition of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer out be its last print edition, I though maybe I would write a long, philosophical post about it. But I just don't have it in me. But I just can't. It's all too sad. Layoffs, furloughs, pay cuts, papers folking. It's just all so bleak. Every newspaper journalist I know has been touched by this. Even those left with jobs have seen 401(k) plans shot to hell and they are left to wonder if, or when, their livelihood might evaporate too. Journalists can relate to those who have lost jobs in this economy, because we all know someone who has joined the ranks of the unemployed. And we all know the competition for future job openings, at least in the short term, will be fierce.
We are like the former newspaper employees who set type in hot lead or did paste-up work in composing rooms. Their jobs were lost forever to technology.
Now, news staffers know the feeling too.
The P-I name will live on, at least for a while, in cyberspace. But it will have far fewer people doing the journalism that covers the issues important to Seattle and the Pacific Northwest.
Wednesday, March 4, 2009
Emerald staff on strike?
Are you following the dust up at the Oregon Daily Emerald? If not, you might want to check out this story about the Emerald news staff going on strike.
I won't try to tell the story here. It's bizarre beyond words, but apparently the students objected to a job offer to Steven A. Smith, thinking bringing him on board would someone threaten the editorial independence of the student journalists. Yes, that's the same Steve Smith who has been editor of the Spokesman-Review in Spokane, Wash., Statesman Journal in Salem, Ore., and Gazette in Colorado Springs, Colo. Smith shares his side of the story on his blog.
Forgive, me, but I find the whole thing funny, but sad. Where is the reality of the working world in this whole scenario? Journalists at a financially troubled paper choosing to go on strike? Now?
Makes me glad I am a journalist trained at Oregon State University and gained some practical experience at the Daily Barometer, although the journalism program (part of the College of Liberal Art, not a Journalism school). But the reality is, what I learned in school only got me that first newspaper job and a lot of training has happened since.
One of the things I learned outside the student environment was a point perhaps too subtle in understanding the First Amendment when I was young and more principled than experienced. The thing about freedom of the press is that freedom belongs to the people who own the press, not the people the owners hire to run the presses or cover the news.
This would all perhaps be a lot more amusing if my daughter wasn't thinking that she may want to go to the University of Oregon and study, God forbid, journalism.
On, and all you purists out there lamenting the rise of social media, guess what? I learned about the strike on Twitter.
I won't try to tell the story here. It's bizarre beyond words, but apparently the students objected to a job offer to Steven A. Smith, thinking bringing him on board would someone threaten the editorial independence of the student journalists. Yes, that's the same Steve Smith who has been editor of the Spokesman-Review in Spokane, Wash., Statesman Journal in Salem, Ore., and Gazette in Colorado Springs, Colo. Smith shares his side of the story on his blog.
Forgive, me, but I find the whole thing funny, but sad. Where is the reality of the working world in this whole scenario? Journalists at a financially troubled paper choosing to go on strike? Now?
Makes me glad I am a journalist trained at Oregon State University and gained some practical experience at the Daily Barometer, although the journalism program (part of the College of Liberal Art, not a Journalism school). But the reality is, what I learned in school only got me that first newspaper job and a lot of training has happened since.
One of the things I learned outside the student environment was a point perhaps too subtle in understanding the First Amendment when I was young and more principled than experienced. The thing about freedom of the press is that freedom belongs to the people who own the press, not the people the owners hire to run the presses or cover the news.
This would all perhaps be a lot more amusing if my daughter wasn't thinking that she may want to go to the University of Oregon and study, God forbid, journalism.
On, and all you purists out there lamenting the rise of social media, guess what? I learned about the strike on Twitter.
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