NY Times: Special rules for special talents.

Alma's right. Considering how vanilla of a "review" it was, there wouldn't have been much difference if she participated or just watched others having oil squeezed on their bodies from linen.

The story came across as incredibly excessive even with all of Dowd's puffery about how the economic miasma is affecting everyone and would this spa be the right thing to do?

 

There's a good reason why Marriott's is the most popular program . . . among the majors, Marriott delivers more for less than the rest. Loyalists receive tangible benefits, without roughing it. The chain delivers, without breaking the exchequer. Who can ask for
anything more?

 

Why? Because the fucking companies they work for are screwing them in every conceivable way. Shitty pay, shitty benefits, shitty vacation time, always a day away from being "furloughed".

It's the only perk you get as a sportswriter. Hotel and airline points are just about the only way you can afford to take the spouse or family on a decent vacation at the end of the year to make up for the fact you're never fucking home.

 

Doesn't matter how Marriott doles out its points. Newspapers are never going to let copy editors take free trips on them. So get over it. ;D And stop rooting for colleagues to take unofficial-compensation haircuts.

 

Agree 100%. Road trips are not vacations.

 

Stay home, then. Do something else.

But this is the typical attitude of way too many sportswriters. <i> What about my annual fucking vacay to satiate my family? I <b> need </b> that</i>. No, you don't need it. You know how many Americans don't get vacations anywhere for years and years?

Sportswriters and lenient editors need to take a hard look at themselves and their culpability in newspapers overspending on sports coverage for decades. No, it's not the driving force. But it takes a cumulative toll.

 

Bullshit.

 

Good answer.

Hey - buy it or don't buy it. I've had the same argument with union members in my family, who insist that their 401k grow by leaps and bounds year after year, and they piss and moan about losing half of it when all they needed to do was reallocate the funds so it strayed away from the market.

There comes a point when you've got to set aside everybody else's greed. A lot of people toiling under the "but I'm a <i>good</i> person" delusion struggle with that.

 

Probably not, but I just had a convo with an old colleague during bowl season who was miffed that media hotel - a perfectly functional establishment - didn't fit into his points plan.

I told him, flat out, "good to see your heart's in the right place after your shop just got done with a round of layoffs."