letter the eighth: not a prostitute

This one is not a leditor per se but a story from a contributor about an attempt to submit a letter to the editor that went horribly awry. I'm a little skeptical. At the same time, from working in a newsroom, I also see this happening. Either way, I found the mental image of this funny.

Since I find it funny and I need more content, here's a story. And I need more content. Yep, I'm going to beg for it like not a prostitute till the inbox is overflowing.



TO THE LEDITOR:

I used to work in a two-story newspaper building and, because of how customer needs were set up, some of them were sent upstairs into the newsroom.  As some of you know, you really don't want readers in the newsroom.  Ever. They tend to be crude, dirty and sometimes deviant. And I haven't even described the people yet.

As you also know, you also don't want the customers in the newsroom because some of them are a verb short of a nut graf.

One day, we get a woman upstairs who immediately demands submission of a letter to the editor or an article written about her. She had been in our police blotter a while before when she was charged with prostitution, solicitation and trespassing.  I found this to be a good time to start calling sources so I wouldn't have to deal with it.

I'm not saying she was a prostitute but, from how she was dressed that day, I could see how an officer could be confused. Her story was that she was behind a gas station trying to get $5 for gas or something and said the cop asked her what she would do for $5 and then she said ... and this is me tuning out the conversation in front of me.

Our managing editor was in the process of leaving the office early and ran into the scene. The person dealing with the woman and had no idea what to do immediately said, "Here is our managing editor," and quickly retreated.

The woman said she wanted to clear her name. He felt the situation was out of his control, tried to get her to understand there was really nothing we could do and then tried to dump her off on someone else since he was going home. It would have been me, because she was arrested in my beat but, luckily, I moved on to my next call: a state police officer who was about to retire.

As this was going on, I noticed that she had two very large sheets of paper. She unfurled them and showed them to the editor. She had very, very ornate handwriting so it looked like she was trying to hand him the Declaration of Independence.

I got the beep and started to leave a message and it got out of hand in the background quickly.  I paused.

"Run my letter! I am not a prostitute!"

I missed what boss man said but it finally pushed her over the edge.

“I'm gonna go postal; I'll make the massacre at Virginia Tech look like a kindergarten!”

She turned and started to run.  Someone was coming up the stairs and she nearly pushed that person down in the process.

While everyone was still frozen by the WTF-ness after she left the room, I didn't skip a beat.

“As I was saying, we have heard that you were retiring. ...”

Our editor called the polce, we conveniently got her address from the blotter and mailed her a letter from our lawyers saying not to come to the building again.

Although I'm certain he had to have heard it in the voicemail, the state trooper didn't mention the yelling at all when I talked to him.

I wish I could share the leditor but, sadly, she took ye olde leditore with her.