I finally met the current editor of my usually-beloved/occasionally-infuriating local newspaper, and it turns out he’s a decent guy. It’s hard to believe we’d never actually met.
He seemed to know who I was. He reminded me about that time last year I photoshopped his head onto the body of a young girl on this blog. Oh…yeah. To tell the truth, I’d forgotten all about that. I felt my face redden with embarrassment. It’s easy to sort-of disrespect a public figure online, but when you are face to face, it’s a different story. Plus, I sometimes just get carried away, heh. I apologized to Silas, but he said he had a good laugh over it. I hope he wasn’t just being polite.
He was speaking to the Shasta Association of Realtors about some new programs and stuff. More interesting to me was the glimpse into the things that keep a small town newspaper editor awake at night, while their business model is rapidly changing. Ironically, there was a new online classified ad website being promoted at that same meeting. The new site trumpeted their “localness” but seems to be more of a a statewide business. Another new competitor for the RS revenue stream. Silas and his crew face huge challenges. I want them to be successful. We need a strong newspaper.
Silas was kind enough to let me take a few photos if I promised not to photoshop him again. In return, I was reluctant to bring up my pet peeve about the RS continually running and re-running cartoons in the Sunday paper penned by the long-dead Charles Schulz. Okay, so my dismay about Peanuts is more of an obsession than a pet peeve, but I kept a lid on it. Like I said, Silas seemed like a real nice fellow. Anyway, after looking over the photos, I can see why he’s very comfortable with our newspaper running Charlie Brown cartoons over and over…
