Target Practice

Musings, This Is My Job
Jan 132011

On Twitter today, I noted that Target is the Wal-mart for people who don’t want to be seen at Wal-mart. This isn’t a knock against Target, or the folks that shop there. I have nothing against Target; I usually visit whenever I’m in Americaland. In fact, the last time I was down south, I went to a Target and bought not one but two Snuggies. So clearly I’m in no position to cast any disparaging eyes. (Nor can I point fingers. My blanket has very long sleeves.) No, it’s more a comment on their branding. I wouldn’t even be surprised if there was some sentence like [...click for more...]

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Posted by Melissa at 11:33 pm 1 Response » Tagged with: ,

Stealing the Tools of the Writer's Trade

This Is My Job
Jan 122011

I’m wrestling with a few ethical quandaries about how best to blog on a few issues of note (and these are things that would fulfil the MOAR WINNIPEG! quotient of the poll). And yet, I’ve committed to blog at least once a day, which is more of a personal challenge to stop self-censoring and just get thoughts out, and besides this has so far been a remarkably energizing incarnation of this blog for me and I don’t want to lose that. So while I’m wrestling with said ethical quandaries, in the meantime, we move along the topic of writey-stuff: from favourite books, [...click for more...]

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Reasons To Love Your Photog No. 2

This Is My Job
Jan 092011

Because if you really, really love your photographer enough, he or she just might take some really awesome pictures of you while out on quirky assignments. N.B.: as excellent as your photographer (in this case) might be, they are not able to make your bleach-murdered hat-hair and terrible Tyra Banks-inspired “model with your pain” poses any more appealing.

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No Seriously, Smoking Really Is Bad

This Is My Job
Jan 052011

Nothing suits a broken heart (see below post) like some late-night work catching up on blogs. And in this case, it prompts a short post. Over at Anybody Want a Peanut, Cherenkov aptly boggles over the continued expansion of warning labels on cigarette packages.  (P.S. Oh hi! Hello! I have just found your blog. Remember how I told you, before, that I hadn’t seen it? Well now I have! Huzzah!) He’s right, of course, but an interesting note on this. Photographer Mike Deal and I were tasked with gathering up some local colour to add on to the wire story last [...click for more...]

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Posted by Melissa at 1:48 am 1 Response » Tagged with:

The Lifeline

This Is My Job
Jan 052011

A post, a post tonight for a broken heart, but I digress, all hearts are broken and mended in time, yes? So it was fitting today that Daniel called me. Daniel is in his late-60s. He is paraplegic. He was in the hospital, for a long time. Now he is in a care home, somewhere in Winnipeg. Daniel is lonely. He’s allowed an hour of phone time every day. And every time he can, he calls me. Students, take note: this is the part of journalism that nobody prepares you for, that nobody ever mentions. There are people in the world [...click for more...]

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Posted by Melissa at 12:10 am 2 Responses » Tagged with:

Retrospective: The WFP Yule Log

This Is My Job
Jan 012011

If you haven’t seen the highlight reel of the 2010 Winnipeg Free Press Yule Log, I insist you do so. (Goodness I wish that vid had an embed code.) For the record, I think this was one of the most brilliant WFP online initiatives of the year, right up there with the famous (infamous?) Traffic Circle Cam. Here’s the deal: we’re now in approximately year zillion of much international handwringing over the Future of the Newspaper. There are a couple of bright spots — for instance, there was recently an economic forecast that 2011 would be more profitable for newspapers, though [...click for more...]

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Posted by Melissa at 5:12 pm Comments Off Tagged with: ,

Reasons to Love Your Photog No. 1

This Is My Job
Dec 092010

Because if you love your photog enough, they’ll get a better parking spot for a murder than the cops do. There were five other police cruisers that did not get as good of a parking spot for this murder.  This means that you can simply holler at witnesses and take pictures of police pointing at things from the warmth and safety of your vehicle, instead of standing around in the Winnipeg freeze like those poor folks with the TV cameras who did not score this parking spot.

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Posted by Melissa at 6:43 pm Comments Off Tagged with: , ,