A troubled relationship with deadlines

Writing a weekly column for a newspaper comes with its share of trials and tribulations. Not many, of course: I’d much rather be sitting here trying to think of new ways to insult various people who probably deserve it than writing parking tickets or serving espresso. But, as I said, there are drawbacks. Sometimes, for instance, you insult people that *don’t* deserve it, which induces strong, queasy sensations of guilt. Other times you end up writing brilliantly about a subject that fascinates and enthralls you, only to realize that you’ve just banged out a solid 750 words on something so lethally boring, like the origins of papier-mache, for instance, that no sane human being will get through the opening paragraph. Who had the macchiato?

In all seriousness, the opinions deadline is one of the things that make a Wednesday column so frustrating.  Elections in this country happen on Tuesdays, so you’d think that it’d be great to be the Wednesday guy, right?  Wrong.  The entire opinions page is due at 6 p.m., so I don’t know how this monster of a primary day turned out.  Obviously, I couldn’t possibly write a column about it.

I’m sorry, partially for those of you who wanted morning-after insights into Super Tuesday, but mostly for myself, because I don’t get to write them. Dammit.