Shots Wednesday! meet Down and Out Revolution

The worst thing about meeting cute bartenders who are still in college is that they card you and know within seconds that you are indeed 30 and, in their adorable 22 year-old-eyes, probably qualify as a cougar. When did I get here?

Also, I do not know what the deal is with me and bartenders. They are attracted to me like gay men to plaid shorts.

I speculate it is because my pores actually ooze vodka and they can sense it. They figure if they pay attention to no one but me all night they’ll make enough money to buy Guitar Hero: Metallica and that sweet new amp (because, in my mind, all bartenders are flunky lead singers. Goes back to a failed romance I had in college.)

I’m too hungover to write much today (Wednesday Happy Hour somehow morphed into Shots Wednesday! thanks to the SG-Martini wonder duo), but I am going to get serious and leave you with these two news items that came across my desk:


Huffington Post
Executives at New York Times accept substantial bonuses, while staffers face five percent salary cuts
The New York Times has joined the club of organizations that give bonuses to their fat-cat executives, while the company slides and rank-and-file employees face pay cuts and unemployment. Here’s the scoop: top executives at the Times received substantial bonus and fringe benefit payments over and above their salaries, according to a proxy statement to the Securities and Exchange Commission released March 11. Meanwhile, employees at the paper are taking five percent salary cuts. Staff of the New York Times-owned Boston Globe face even steeper cuts if that paper even survives. Related New York Post New York Times Company has a mere $34 million in the bank—not good considering it has more than a billion dollars in debt.

Crain's Chicago Business
Chicago Tribune axes 50 newsroom jobs then asks for approval to give $13 million in bonuses to survivors
At the Chicago Tribune Wednesday, 50 newsroom employees lost their jobs as part of a restructuring that Tribune management claim will position the paper for its news-gathering future. Shortly after the layoffs, the paper’s parent, the Tribune Company, asked a bankruptcy court for approval to give 703 employees bonuses worth a total of $13 million. The company’s top ten executives are ineligible for the bonuses. Tribune Company said the bonuses are “vitally necessary” to reward employees for a difficult year and motivate them. To the victors—in this case survivors—go the spoils. Related Chicago Reader See the memo that announced the layoffs, and a list of the journalists let go. Related Riverfront Times In other dismal news about the newspaper industry, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reporter shot while covering a city council meeting in 2008 was laid off from the paper.


This is infuriating. Seriously, how many people (I resisted the urge to use the phrase “Regular Joes” – thanks for ruining my thought process, Sarah Palin) are going to end up unemployed before we, the majority who don’t make millions, do something?

We’re a pretty apathetic group of people in the U.S., I think. I know I can be. I mean, Ashton Kutcher is the first person to reach 1 million Twitter followers. Why didn’t someone stop this? This says something about our priorities.

But when people aren’t able to afford their DVRs and iPhones I think we’re going to have a serious problem. Viva La Revolucion!

Hmmm … maybe I can find a way to bring together both of the brilliant ideas presented in this blog: Shots Wednesday! meet Down and Out Revolution. This is almost as good as my scheme to take the White House with my Liquid Lunch platform.

My 30s have made me quite the activist.