Image via WikipediaThe Second Helpings blog on northjersey.com carries a farewell written by Bill Pitcher on Aug. 6, his last day as food editor of The Record of Woodland Park. He refers to it as 50 things that have crossed his mind, and obviously, he didn't do any editing before writing them down.
It's long-winded, and he couldn't resist slapping the hands of restaurants for typos (without acknowledging he made many mistakes in stories and on the blog himself).
Keep your eyes peeled. Pitcher throws lots of curve balls, fast balls and screw balls. Here is the link:
Bill Pitcher's farewell
Cheese Louise, I could only make it as far as No. 17, and I gave up around the time Chakra put Billy's picture on the wall. I don't see why the Record is even hiring a food editor, with all the cutbacks they don't need one, ShopRite's still going to advertise on Wednesdays, and they can get a zillion recipes off the wires. Tisk tisk, Stevie could put an addition on his Tenafly bungalow with what the paper would save by going food editor-less.
ReplyDeleteYes. It's tedious, but reflects one of Bill Pitcher's few gifts -- one of gab. I agree that a new food editor would be a waste of money. But Stephen isn't against wasting company money to benefit him and his family. At the same time, recall his statement, overheard by one of the sports reporter, that he dreamed of a newsroom where no one made more than $40,000 a year.
ReplyDeleteCan't say I am a fan of Pitcher but I have no faith that someone will be brought in that can produce something worthwhile. Maybe they can hire the numskull who insists A Mano is the only authentic Neapolitan pizza restaurant in the area.
ReplyDeleteDon't give them any ideas. Once they folded the Food section, food coverage became secondary. Restaurants are the big thing now, because of the potential advertising revenue. We'll see a lot of pandering to chefs, restaurant owners and so forth.
ReplyDeleteYou've been placing too much blame on Pitcher. He's a decent guy, they had to pay him what they paid him because he was serving as managing editor at another (smaller) daily, and the fact that he'd cooked for newsroom on holidays made him a food expert, at least in Scandale World, a strange place where one staffer became a key adviser on youth culture simply because the reporter once "had played in band" and another was promoted to management on the basis of not reading the newspaper, thus proving he was more in touch with the non-readers Scandale coveted than the staffers who did read the paper. The Scandale World is one devoid of logic.
ReplyDeletePitcher could not have saved the food section, and you couldn't have, either. Dissent is not permitted in Scandale World. Everyone with at least half a brain knew that within a month of his arrival, but some of us were simply unwilling to do the butt-smooching that would have ensured personal prosperity because we found the prospect of doing so completely disgusting. I think Bill played the middle ground, as most people do in that newsroom. Venom would be more properly directed at those on staff who actively sucked up to get ahead or save their jobs. I don't think anyone could rightly say Pitch was one of those. He'd already worn himself out arguing in another newsroom and could ill afford to do it again. But at least he did not grovel and connive to prosper at others' expense.
My opinion is that age likely was not the key factor in who got to stay and who had to go, as some fossils remain. Rather the dividing line was more like who tells Scandale what he wants to hear and who doesn't. The truth is that more experienced journalsists are likely to fall into the latter category than the former. We have a stronger revulsion to applauding thoroughly stupid ideas.
Your anger is understandable but wrongly directed. Pitch wasn't hired instead of you. He was hired instead of someone else who would have been hired instead of you. That's no knock on your work, but it is how it was.
You seem to know a lot about what goes on inside the newsroom, but I don't agree with all of your conclusions. You probably were not around in the mid-1980s, when a pattern of bias against older workers became evident. The selective hiring of a few older workers, or their retention, doesn't diminish the age discrimination practiced with such cunning against others such as Rich Gili, Joanne Hoerr, Lorraine Matys, etc., plus the attempts to force experienced people out by unilaterally cutting their salaries, taking away their column-writing duties or just eliminating their jobs (Lawrence Aaron, Paul Wilder, Kevin O'Neil, etc.) and so forth.
ReplyDeleteBilly's gone, so let's move on. Hey, I'm a poet, anon of course, and didn't know it. What's done is done, so let's focus on where the food section and the rest of "Scandal World" ... oops, Scandale World, is headed. Incidentally, rumor has it that the Record pension fund is "restricted," I wonder how much the paper is in arrears. You'd think they could call in Steven's mortgage and make up some of the arrearages.
ReplyDeleteWhat does "restricted" mean? I learned things about the paper during depositions in my age-discrimination case that I am not at liberty to disclose nor was I allowed to question Stephen Borg, when he was on the stand, about his salary, company mortgage and fiances, and so forth. I doubt you will ever see a sacrifice by any Borg to help the paper or its employees. It's sink or swim. They'll still have the Sorbonne, the Upper West Side apartment, the Hamptons and the $3.65 million Tenafly mansion.
ReplyDeleteThat should have read, "company mortgage and finances," not fiances.
ReplyDelete"Restricted" means underfunded, so that former employees and retirees seeking either a lump sum or certain higher-payout options are informed that those options are not available.
ReplyDeleteMaybe Stephen's mortgage came out of the pension fund.
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