I’m the one to blame for this mess. If you’re a newspaper editor or anybody
\nelse in the news biz you’re apt to find interesting stuff. If you’re a
\nmedia critic you might glean insight into the thought processes of a working
\nnewspaperman. If you’re looking for evidence of the International Liberal
\nMedia Conspiracy, welcome: I am a dues-paying member. If you’re one of
\nmy relatives … well, sorry, you did your best but I came out this way
\nanyway.<\/p>\n
This site is mostly about my work, which at the moment is on the features
\ncopy desk at the San Jose Mercury News, or the Merc as we call it when
\nwe can’t be troubled to type the rest of those characters. The Merc has
\nnothing to do with the content here, except that having a job there discourages
\nme from ranting about the folks who pay the rent. <\/p>\n
I’ve been in this job for four years, having come to the Bay Area to
\nwitness the high-tech boom, and arriving just in time for the bust. Before
\nthis job I worked for six years doing features design and copy editing
\nat the Journal Star in Peoria, Illinois, my hometown, a place I moved
\naway from when I realized that every Peorian who ever became rich and
\nfamous did so after<\/i> moving somewhere else. My somewhere is a suburb
\ncalled Dublin, which is surrounded by lovely rolling hills that will be
\ncontinue to be scenic until they build new suburbs on top of them. The
\nwork is well under way. <\/p>\n
Before the Peoria gig I spent five years on the news copy desk at the
\nTampa Tribune, my first metro daily. The Trib was a nightmare in those
\ndays, but these days people seem to like it much better, from what I hear.
\nMy first job out of school was at the Southern Illinoisan in Carbondale,
\nIll., home of the main campus of Southern Illinois University, where I
\nworked on the student paper, the Daily Egyptian, for four years. <\/p>\n
I took my first journalism class at Illinois Central College in the spring
\nof 1984. I was 22 at the time and had no background in news beyond reading
\nthe paper since I was a kid. I had never worked on any school papers or
\nyearbooks, which, I suspect, gave me a leg up because I didn’t pick up
\nany bad habits working on the high school paper. My first journalism teacher
\nwas a guy named Mike Foster; he led me to believe I could be a newsman,
\nwhich was a nice thing to do considering I hadn’t done worth a damn at
\nanything I had tried up to that point.<\/p>\n
At Southern Illinois University I learned to think, a bit, and to party,
\na lot. While working on the campus paper I figured out that I had a peculiar
\naptitude for getting pages to the composing room on time, and writing
\nheadlines that fit the space needed. I also figured out that I really
\nhad no stomach for being a reporter. I don’t mind writing or researching,
\nbut doing both in a hurry was too much like work to me. <\/p>\n
Over the years people have encouraged me to keep doing this work, which
\nis remarkable when my newsroom behavior is taken into account. I’m prone
\nto cussing at my computer and inflicting poorly thought-out rants with
\nthe poor saps who work next to me. One of these co-workers was so patient
\nthat he introduced me to the woman I married. Or maybe he thought of it
\nas revenge. In any case I came out the winner.<\/p>\n
I’ve been an online junkie since about 1990; I created my first webpage I try to keep the tone light and civil around here, though I am prone <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I’m the one to blame for this mess. If you’re a newspaper editor or anybody else in the news biz you’re apt to find interesting stuff. If you’re a media critic you might glean insight into the thought processes of…<\/p>\n
\nin October of 1996 and started my first blog late in 1998. More on my
\nblogging background is here.
\n<\/a><\/p>\n
\nto bouts of invective now and then. I apologize here to everybody who
\nhas been wrongly slighted by any posts past, present or future. It’s not
\npersonal, it’s just blogging. <\/p>\n