From: Rogers, Tim
Sent: Friday, January 30, 2009 3:54 PM
To: edit-all
Subject: Oops!
Importance: High
Dear Folks Who Use Internet E-mail:
Well, gosh darn. Color me embarrassed! By now — if you have a computer or know someone who does and could print out something for you — you have probably already read the e-mail I sent to Wick comparing Eric Celeste to a trained monkey. Not sure how “edit-all” got into the CC field. Could have been my fingers.
Anyway, by way of explanation, I was talking to Wick this morning about whether we could replace Eric Celeste with a trained monkey. Wick said it wouldn’t work. As you can tell, I’m a big proponent of the monkey idea!
There’s a lesson here for all of us. And that lesson is this: computers can be our friends. But they can also be like evil robots designed to embarrass us and get us in trouble with HR.
t-rog
12 comments
How much more money does Celeste make compared to the monkey?
ba ha ha… reminds me a lot of this…
http://frontburner.dmagazine.com/2008/11/17/d-empire-shrinks-by-19-percent/
Once you get a diaper on the monkey, your decision should be pretty simple.
T-rog? Seriously? How many first round playoff series have you won? And shouldn’t the plural of series be serieses? If D hired a monkey, would the creationists organize a boycott due to your endorsement of evolution? What kind of monkey would you get? Obviously not a Spider Monkey due to the confusion that would cause around the office, but what about a Proboscis Monkey? A Woolly Monkey? Is Woolly Monkey duplicative?
@ Ben: Let’s be clear. I’m not making fun of the fact that the Star-T is (likely) going to be laying off some people. I’m making fun of Jim Whitt.
yeah, whatever.
Yes, making fun of Jim Witt. Let us know if there will be sequels.
I say bring the monkey in to mentor Celeste. Money-see, monkey-do. That’s a win-win.
I think it’s charming the way you folks carry on.
Gosh darn you guys are so neat!
I hope Nasty Nestor strangles you.
From: Witt, Jim
Sent: Fri 1/30/2009 6:37 PM
To: bunch of people who shouldn’t read this because it’s about them
Cc: edit-all
Subject: bunch of people who shouldn’t read this because it’s about them – Oops again!
Darla:
Well boy Sorry about stepping in a pile of journalistic/ethical/legal s–t again with all these accidentally released private emails about which of our sportswriters we should s–t-can! The way I’m steppin’ in it, good thing that I come to the office every day wearing cowboy boots, huh!
Oops!
Hey, that second email in which I confirmed my high level of buffoonery by fibbing while attempting to explain the first email that detailed in very specific terms what sports department heads I think should roll? Well boy it’s a real good thing that nobody knows about the other four employees who we have very specifically mentioned in our conversations and that they weren’t mentioned in my edit-all CC emails – otherwise we might have four more lawsuits on our hands!
Oops!
Anyway, let’s stress here that so much good work is still done in this sports section. Randy Galloway is a icon that still brings the heat in everything he writes. LeBreton is a talent. Reevo is a local legend. We’ve got good people who can follow Randy’s lead and take us forward.
So let’s not make me, Jim Witt, the story here, OK?
Well boy Here’s some reasoning on why Jen Floyd Engel is about to get a 65-percent raise:
*I mentioned in the email that she pitches in more than the guys around here do but that she makes 65-percent less. So, if she’s paying attention – between all the super work we made her do rating the chicken wings and the Bride-to-Bride exclusives — she’s already lined up a lawyer to secure that raise for her. And that’s my bad, since the whole point of this was for me to CUT budget, not to increase it.
Oops!
Also, here’s some reasoning on why Gil LeBreton and Jim Reeves are now safe from being dismissed from the company to which they’ve devoted a combined 69 years: After my email, if we fire either one of them, they’ll sue our f—–g a—-s off.
Oops!
Somebody left a couple of messages today on my phone … one referred to “age discrimination.’’ The other one referred to “sex discrimination.’’ Darla, can you look into that for me?
Otherwise, well boy, let’s do our best around here to keep a lid on this. My emailed comment that in a sense revealed how uncommitted upper management is to paying people for online content and blogging? Let’s hope nobody noticed – or realizes that the reason upper management is uncommitted to the future of the industry is because at our ages, none of the members of upper management will still be here to see the death of this rag.
More immediately and just speaking for myself, how can I be expected to be concerned about online content and blogging when I don’t even know how to properly use email!
Oops!
For that matter, how can I be expected to figure out a keyboard by 2009 when it took me the entire decade of the 90’s to figure out how to open the main door to the meeting room?
Anyway, we can keep this quiet. We’ve kept quiet that little scandal about the two editors who have sex on their office desk, right? (Remember all the times staffers would forget to knock first and thus be involved in coitus interrupt ‘em? Ha! Oh, and the way we’ve lost top-notch staffers over the years and not replaced ‘em? We can get away with that, too! (I’m thinking we can blame Obama.) And the whole secret-merger thing between us and the Dallas Morning News. … have you noticed how there’s not really a public outcry against us? That’s good, right? No public outcry?
Unless, I suppose, apathy among readers is a bad thing. I dunno!
Well boy, we can spin this. I’ve already convinced the world … Literally – the WORLD, all over the globe. The Star-Telegram gets e-mails from places you wouldn’t believe – Egypt, Japan, some places in the Middle East. Under my leadership, we have quite a following. I mean, nobody in Fort Worth actually reads us anymore. But in Egypt? We are f——g HUGE with them Egyptians. … anyway, I’ve already spun with my second oopsmail that this whole LeBreton/Reeves/Floyd-Engel thing was just me spit-ballin’ about the mergery thing.
So I’ll just spin this, too. With more edit-all CC emails!
Could we maybe do some sort of Super Bowl “distraction’’ like The Ticket pulled off? That Gordo fight was cool, hip and relevant! It even seemed almost unplanned! We’ve got to get our marketing dept. on that, Darla.
Well boy I’m thinking maybe have Jennifer Floyd-Engel run naked across the field in Tampa. Or maybe Reevo and Gil could get in a choke fight on Radio Row? I bet “Deadspin’’ would “link’’ to that!
(by the way: , Darla, what is “Deadspin’’? And what does “link’’ mean?)
So let’s ignore the naysayers who are disgruntled with McClatchy … hey, McClatchy’s the one who started this, right, by ordering that we dump five people from sports?
And let’s also ignore anyone who is probably thinking at this very moment that the manly thing to do now would be to rescue and finance the careers of the five-to-eight employees I’ve just embarrassed by me, Jim Witt, immediately submitting my resignation from McClatchy Newspapers and the Fort Worth Star-Telegram.
jwitt (oops!)