Change It Up, Change Them Out

Last week I sat on this panel for a marketing association that was holding an event to show PR and marketing people how to get their health care stories into newspapers. The panel had been scheduled last year in November or something, and I'd consented without thinking once I figured out a reporter from the daily would be there as well as people from the daily and business newspaper in Dallas.

The week before the panel, I get an e-mail from the reporter at the daily who said she was starting a new position in the newsroom and couldn't come. I sent her back a congratulatory e-mail; she'd edited me once or twice when I was a freelancer, and I frequently saw her around at events once she started reporting (after layoffs). Then, later that week, and just days before the panel, I see on the Dallas blog that the editor from the Dallas Business Journal who was supposed to show at the panel got canned.

Needless to say, I was pretty curious how things would work out, and I showed up at the panel early and saw the health business reporter from the Dallas Morning News, a really nice guy that I think I could learn a lot from. (I have plans to befriend him and absorb all his wisdom by osmosis.) Then I find out the other health reporter from the Fort Worth Star-Telegram is going to show up, since the woman I was used to seeing around town was presumably in her new job. I was glad also to see that the health reporter from the DBJ was able to come, since the editor who was originally scheduled was off cursing the heavens somewhere.

Ok, I don't know if he was cursing the heavens. But if I'd gotten canned, I'd sure as hell be shaking my fist at the sky and bellowing, right?

So there were four of us at the panel, all representing the four big papers in Fort Worth and Dallas, and I was pretty proud of the marketing group for making it look like everything was seamless, even though I know they were probably panicking in days leading up to the event, when things started falling apart.

And even though I had jack shit to do with any of it, I was proud of the four of us panelists as a whole, for showing up and representing, even in the face of the merciless and unpredictable journalism industry.

As a sort of side note, the health reporter from the Star-Telegram who showed up told me that evidently the woman who got switched to a new position got moved back to her old position earlier that day. How fucked up is that? A daily can't get its shit together enough to move a person without fucking it up? And having to move her back? Again, if I were that person, I'd be cursing the heavens. It's not like the newsroom is so huge that there are too many people to keep track of. They've laid off practically half their staff, so it shouldn't have been that hard to keep everything in line. Ugh. This is why journalism is a cold hard bitch.

Now on to non-journalism things. Spring appears to be making tentative progress here, and I have high hopes that pretty evenings will be back in about a week and a half, after the daylight savings change. We're in March right now, and after March comes April, and in April comes my favorite event of Fort Worth: The Main Street Arts Festival.

(I know you're ask yourself, Wait, she doesn't love the Stock Show the most? Really? Buckle bunnies and calf scrambles and Future Farmers of America goat judging? But no, my friends. I like art more, and walking around in sandals, not worrying if I'm stepping in pig shit. I am that yuppie liberal, I guess.)

(Whatever. I totally voluntarily and willingly walk around in horse shit. I'm not going to feel bad about liking flip-flops for the time not at work or at the barn.)

(I do not have anything else to add and so will end awkwardly and with parentheses, because I heart me some punctuation.)