{"id":262,"date":"2003-11-05T09:52:01","date_gmt":"2003-11-05T09:52:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/tommangan.net\/printsthechaff\/?p=262"},"modified":"2003-11-05T09:52:01","modified_gmt":"2003-11-05T09:52:01","slug":"life-outside-the-desk","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/tommangan.net\/printsthechaff\/2003\/11\/life-outside-the-desk\/","title":{"rendered":"Life outside the desk"},"content":{"rendered":"

Another great Testy Copy Editors’ thread<\/a>, this one about whether it’s rational to expect to have a social life when you work nights covering the news. Here’s a nod to Wayne Countryman of the Baltimore Sun, who always seems to sum these things up better than the rest of us:<\/p>\n

Aside from fulfilling an urge to work on breaking news, night-and-weekend schedules do have advantages, including:

\n1. Fewer bosses around while you work.

\n2. Your commute will probably be easier, unless you want to use mass transit, which will probably shut down before you get off work, or if driving at bars’ closing times makes you nervous. Or if you fear getting assaulted in the dark.
\n
3. Lots of time to work on your tan.

\n4. Lots of time to run errands to daytime-only businesses.

\n5. When the cable company says it’ll send someone between 9 and 5, you just tell them to knock loudly.

\n6. Shorter lines at the 24-hour supermarket and drugstore — if you can find a cashier and the cash registers aren’t down for the nightly download.

\n7. Flexibility in child-rearing — if two parents work different shifts, one will usually be home or available to run child-related errands.

\n8. You won’t have to set your VCR to watch your daytime “shows.”

\n9. The Internet usually runs its fastest after you get home from work in early morning.

\n10. You’ll save money by using natural light at home instead of pesky, expensive light bulbs and electricity.

\n11. You’ll save money you would have wasted on having a social life and all that goes with it.

\n10. You say you’re thinking of looking for Ms. Right to marry? You have an advantage in pursuing night-shift nurses, cops, waitresses and cashiers. And copy editors, if that seems like a good idea.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Another great Testy Copy Editors’ thread, this one about whether it’s rational to expect to have a social life when you work nights covering the news. Here’s a nod to Wayne Countryman of the Baltimore Sun, who always seems to…<\/p>\n

Read more →<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[7],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/tommangan.net\/printsthechaff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/262"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/tommangan.net\/printsthechaff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/tommangan.net\/printsthechaff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tommangan.net\/printsthechaff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tommangan.net\/printsthechaff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=262"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/tommangan.net\/printsthechaff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/262\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/tommangan.net\/printsthechaff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=262"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tommangan.net\/printsthechaff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=262"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/tommangan.net\/printsthechaff\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=262"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}