(no subject)
Thank the gods this week is fucking over. Today in particular. Work was hell from the word go today. I can't remember if I've mentioned it, but I've been the assignment editor for three weeks now (it's basically what I was supposed to have been doing since January, but with the fucktards in charge around here.... *heavy sigh*). Anyway, that means I hand the stories out to the reporters.
Problem No. 1: We are short two reporters. One was moved to features a month and a half ago (and has since quit), and she has not been replaced yet. The second quit maybe a month ago, and ditto on the replacement. They've had a few candidates in for interview, but I don't know if they've made any offers. If offers have been made, they've apparently not been accepted, because I still am short two reporters. That leaves me with six and a half reporters. (The half reporter is the assistant managing editor who covers one of the county commissions, police beat on Friday when our regular police reporter is off, and a few other "big" things that we throw his way. Basically, he writes like three stories a week, whereas our other reporters tend to crank out 10 or more per week.)
Problem No. 2: Two of those six and a half reporters are "enterprise" reporters. That means that most of their time is spent working on big projects, and a few items a la the half reporter. Even though I'm two reporters short, I can't hand these two enterprise reporters any of our general assignment stories.
So today's clusterfuck....with the shortage of reporters and the same amount of space to fill in the paper, everyone's writing a lot more stories than normal. On Fridays, two of our reporters are off. Thus, I essentially had two reporters today ('cause the two enterprise folks were out at meetings and trials), who already had about four stories each to write for the weekend. Of course, that means all hell breaks loose. We found out that there's going to be a Big Damn Fundraiser concert here in October (the day after my 30th fucking birthday, thus my birthday plans are shot because I'm going to have to work that day). Reprioritize someone's day and get her working on the story for that (which I think, by 5 p.m., we actually pushed the story back another day, so the reporter can work on it Monday and thus our freak-out was for nothing). Next, we have to get a story in about one of our businesses moving to a new location. The reporter we needed to do this story, well, HIS FUCKING CELL PHONE WAS TURNED OFF so we couldn't get ahold of him. We finally did (*after* when we needed him to be doing the interview) and he got the story, but I was ready to choke him. Then we find out that another Big Damn Corporation might be setting up shop just up the road for us and we need to get a story on that. Half Reporter got that one (and we couldn't get any confirmation from the Big Damn Corporation, so it ended up being a standalone photo of the Not-so-big Damn Store going in beside it...really a photo of a sign in front of torn up earth....very lovely to look at.... *sarcasm*).
And then the idiots in charge kept fucking with the budget all day, moving stories around and just generally pissing me off. I had to talk myself out of margaritas for lunch.
Put it this way....it's a very shitty day when you whip out a sticky note, write "Bang head here," stick it to the desk and proceed to follow those directions.
And this was all on top of nearly killing a reporter yesterday because she had two Big Damn Stories that she forgot to put photo assignments in for (and she's been talked to about her photo assignment problem before....).
*HEAD DESK*
I wanna go home....I'm so tired of this bullshit....
About the only upside was planning my birthday with Mom. She and I are gonna go to Savannah, Ga., a week or two before my actual birthday (because that works better with her schedule, and with mine after today's announcement). I couldn't even console myself with retail therapy because the shirt I wanted at Bealls wasn't in my size. Damn it. And now my computer is pissing me the fuck off. I need a new one and don't have the cash for one. *sigh*
Problem No. 1: We are short two reporters. One was moved to features a month and a half ago (and has since quit), and she has not been replaced yet. The second quit maybe a month ago, and ditto on the replacement. They've had a few candidates in for interview, but I don't know if they've made any offers. If offers have been made, they've apparently not been accepted, because I still am short two reporters. That leaves me with six and a half reporters. (The half reporter is the assistant managing editor who covers one of the county commissions, police beat on Friday when our regular police reporter is off, and a few other "big" things that we throw his way. Basically, he writes like three stories a week, whereas our other reporters tend to crank out 10 or more per week.)
Problem No. 2: Two of those six and a half reporters are "enterprise" reporters. That means that most of their time is spent working on big projects, and a few items a la the half reporter. Even though I'm two reporters short, I can't hand these two enterprise reporters any of our general assignment stories.
So today's clusterfuck....with the shortage of reporters and the same amount of space to fill in the paper, everyone's writing a lot more stories than normal. On Fridays, two of our reporters are off. Thus, I essentially had two reporters today ('cause the two enterprise folks were out at meetings and trials), who already had about four stories each to write for the weekend. Of course, that means all hell breaks loose. We found out that there's going to be a Big Damn Fundraiser concert here in October (the day after my 30th fucking birthday, thus my birthday plans are shot because I'm going to have to work that day). Reprioritize someone's day and get her working on the story for that (which I think, by 5 p.m., we actually pushed the story back another day, so the reporter can work on it Monday and thus our freak-out was for nothing). Next, we have to get a story in about one of our businesses moving to a new location. The reporter we needed to do this story, well, HIS FUCKING CELL PHONE WAS TURNED OFF so we couldn't get ahold of him. We finally did (*after* when we needed him to be doing the interview) and he got the story, but I was ready to choke him. Then we find out that another Big Damn Corporation might be setting up shop just up the road for us and we need to get a story on that. Half Reporter got that one (and we couldn't get any confirmation from the Big Damn Corporation, so it ended up being a standalone photo of the Not-so-big Damn Store going in beside it...really a photo of a sign in front of torn up earth....very lovely to look at.... *sarcasm*).
And then the idiots in charge kept fucking with the budget all day, moving stories around and just generally pissing me off. I had to talk myself out of margaritas for lunch.
Put it this way....it's a very shitty day when you whip out a sticky note, write "Bang head here," stick it to the desk and proceed to follow those directions.
And this was all on top of nearly killing a reporter yesterday because she had two Big Damn Stories that she forgot to put photo assignments in for (and she's been talked to about her photo assignment problem before....).
*HEAD DESK*
I wanna go home....I'm so tired of this bullshit....
About the only upside was planning my birthday with Mom. She and I are gonna go to Savannah, Ga., a week or two before my actual birthday (because that works better with her schedule, and with mine after today's announcement). I couldn't even console myself with retail therapy because the shirt I wanted at Bealls wasn't in my size. Damn it. And now my computer is pissing me the fuck off. I need a new one and don't have the cash for one. *sigh*