And that's a wrap

For a whole bunch of things. My last column for The Post ran this week - sniff, sniff. I also had my last night of copy-editing, because there's no paper tomorrow, it being the day that the University observes Veteran's Day.

The Last Copy-Editing Night was actually Election Day. I was in the newsroom from 8 on Tuesday night until 6:30 on Wednesday morning because the Athens County Board of Elections had "technological difficulties." We were rushing around trying to think up headlines and edit the copy before the deadline, which was 6:00 (we were a bit late getting it to the press. And we still didn't have all the numbers yet!).

It was very unpleasant to have to read and re-read and think up headlines for all the stories about the Democrats winning this, that and the other. But what a copy-editor does is check copy. If I was just sitting at home I could just switch the TV off and do other things, but no, I had to stay in the newsroom for 10+ hours contemplating the disaster. And the complete sweep made headlines impossible to write - how many ways can you say, "Ohio Flips Blue"?

And most of the "issues" that I voted for - against the smoking ban (I don't smoke, but I have loved ones who do), against the minimum wage increase (my father owns a small business) - all went the wrong way. The only one I "won" on was the gambling issue, which thankfully failed.

I still mostly had a good time. Election Night is always a special night for newspapers, whether it takes place in Athens, Ohio or New York or Bangladesh. The editors all ordered pizza for us - yum, yum. And we had a couple of the famous One Minute Dance Parties in the newsroom, led by the Assistant Managing Editor, Burns, which helped out during periods of stress. Burns' mother actually works (I should say worked) for Republican Betty Montgomery, so I was extra special sad about that one.

And I have to say that there's nothing like walking home through empty city streets as the sun comes up :)