Part of my work each Saturday night involves is proofing pages for the Sunday paper and then going over the proofs with whichever of my fellow editors has laid them out.
Typically, Kate Schell takes care of page 1 and the two jump pages for both the Albany and Corvallis editions. She does very clean work overall, but nobody’s going to do that many pages — and the front pages are also quite involved — without making a few mistakes.
When she’s done with those pages, Kate hands me her proofs, which I read at my desk and then walk over to her desk to instruct her in making the fixes.
Because we’re dealing with several pages, which takes a few minutes, I’ll often grab a chair from a neighboring desk so I have a place to sit as we go over them.
And I did so again this most recent Saturday, only to see this:
“Hmm, what do you think that is?” I said to Kate and Joy Pariante, the third member of our editing team.
“Blame it on Chester,” Kate said, referring to the pug owned by former cops reporter AnneMarie Knepper, who often brought the dog to the newsroom. “He peed under my desk.”
“You think he could hop up there and pee?” I asked as I used the back of my fingers to see if whatever it was still damp. It was dry.
“I’m going with coffee,” Joy said.
“But it’s right under where somebody’s butt would be,” I said, realizing I was getting sort of tired of analyzing the matter and wanted instead just to get on with the work. “Well, whatever it is, I’m just going to count on my sort-of-thick athletic shorts to protect me.”
Apparently they did, since my rear didn’t fall off, develop a rash, etc.
But nevertheless next time, I think I’ll grab a different chair.
