Disclaimer: if you are currently employed by the Los Angeles Daily News, LANG  or any other MNG newspaper property, the following content is not meant for you. I recommend you go directly here.

Wednesday, 11 a.m.

Will Flash save my life?

I’m sitting in my home office, in green, striped boxers and a v-neck t-shirt. My v-neck t-shirt is tired and a bit gamey and has seen better days.

The invincible morning sun is throwing back the drapes, forcing it’s way into the room and splashing across floor. The temperature is already 87 and heading for 105.

Outside I can hear the sounds of SUV’s racing past my house carrying soccer moms to Yoga sessions.

As I sit here, this is what I’m looking at:

I have two hours before I have to get into the car, drive 32 miles through the Newhall Pass and then from north to south from one side of the San Fernando Valley to the other to get to my job at the Los Angeles Daily News.

Tonight I’m working a night shift repurposing copy, photos, video and graphics – all of which somebody else has created – to be posted on the Daily News’ website. I do this every Tuesday and Wednesday night now.

I’ll probably start tonight by locating the features cover story for Thursday’s paper and any associated sidebars, art, graphics and links and pummel it into submission by coding it up for the web.

Thursday’s feature section is always health-related, which means I’ll have a story about somebody who wrote a book about fitness or maybe some family dealing with the ‘disease of the week.’

This material will have been created by a freelancer who lives in Torrance or maybe a staff writer at the San Gabriel Valley Tribune.

Later, I’ll code up news stories written and photographed by staffers at the Daily News.

There will likely be something about LAUSD, some LA City Hall stuff, a couple of crime stories, a couple of stories about economic woes and I already know that tonight there will be a “comprehensive” piece about LAPD Chief Bill Bratton stepping down half-way through his second 5-year term.

I’ll open, crop, tone and otherwise enhance photographs of somebody holding up a widget while staring into the camera, kids running through sprinklers and generally, people dealing with hot weather, people eating corn dogs at opening day of the Ventura County Fair and likely, Bill Bratton and other politicians standing behind a podium.

These photographs will have been taken by staff photographers who have been employed by the Los Angeles Daily News for no less than 15 years.

At some point tonight, just as I did when I woke up this morning and as I do nearly every day I will ask myself, how did I get here? Continue reading →