Friday, September 23, 2011

Wet Troll Woman. You can't make this stuff up!

Working at a newspaper that exists on severely limited funds has it's challenges.

The lights in the conference room are not working for some reason, and they have yet to be fixed. I had to do an interview of a high school kid regarding a club he is president of. Since he is under 21, I could not meet him at the local Tavern, where I have started to do my interviews to spare the people I interview having to deal with our spartan existence. (I love this place, but there's limits to what others should have to tolerate!)

Since I had limited time, I agreed to have this kid and his mother meet me at the office, and I took them to the back area which we have been using as our makeshift conference room since the idea of having to talk to people in the dark is a little odd.

Unfortunately this area is also where the circulation 'office' is located.

Right in the middle of the interview, the back door opens and this dripping wet troll of a woman shuffles inside. Dripping wet! I am not joking. She had to have been in her late 50s, short, squat, and dripping wet. Wrapped in a towel, in a bathing suit, shuffling along in flip flops… it looked like she had literally stepped out of a pool and into our lives. Wet Troll Woman grunted at us as she walked through, grabbed some papers that were on the wall, and shuffled her way back outside.

I was appalled, to say the least. A bit embarrassed too.

I don't know who she is, or where she came from. But, if I were to hazard a guess, I'd say under a bridge somewhere. Isn't that where trolls live?

Tuesday, September 13, 2011

Pre-Coffee Rambling

(Note, I wrote this blog early this morning, but realized I wanted to shift it to a new blog, dedicated to my new journeys as a writer. Enjoy!)

Thinking back to starting the new job at the newspaper a couple weeks ago. How much I've grown in the way I write since then! I was hired as an assistant editor, not just for my writing skills, which they are (thankfully) training me in, but my ability to wrangle page layout programs, work around antiquated equipment, and my background in design, teaching, and art. These things help me in interviewing the folks I need to for the articles I must write.

So now instead of writing whenever the whim takes me, I have to complete at least one article a day. It is a change that I find exhilarating on one hand, somewhat terrifying on the other. I mean, me? A writer and assistant editor? For a newspaper? Who knew? Bylines with my name on it? Unimaginable even four months ago.

I'm already noticing a change in me. This morning, even before coffee, I had to fire off a rather lengthy post on a private forum I moderate. After I finished my mini-novel (I can get wordy sometimes) I had to step back and look at the amount of writing I accomplished  in so little time while the brain was still asleep. I may go back in a couple hours and gaze in horror at what I wrote since I'm still barely speaking coherently, much less thinking in full sentences. But you never know. Maybe writing is another thing you can program into your brain's "muscle memory" to do reflexively.

Now I must get my day started. Maybe a little yoga to get brain and body caught up with each other, then to the office where I must interview a crazy author and get a paper out.

Seize the day!