Part-timer horror stories

no, not John D. Villareal.

 

Maybe this belongs under a different horror stories thread, but...

My part-timer was fantastic. Probably too good to the paper. I was at a small daily in a BCS town. There was me and the SE, who had been at the paper 30 years, and a part-timer. SE took the BCS school's football and basketball beat, I took everything else, including the college's secondary sports if they conflicted with an away football/basketball games. There were some loooooong weekends. But despite having a full time job, the part-timer went out of his way to make sure everything was covered. He never said no to an assignment. Offered to make phone calls to the area schools when I had to travel on Friday nights. Stories weren't always award-winning, but usually pretty solid. Overall, it was probably too much work for two-man staff and a part-timer, but it was managable.

Until the weekend of state basketball. SE leaves for the conference tournament. Local college team gets bounced out in the first round (a Wednesday). We have four area schools in tournaments throughout the state, local town is hosting a state tournament, the college indoor track and field team is at nationals and the college baseball team has its first homestand. SE decides he's not coming back until Sunday. It's my job to cover and layout everything. Without the part-timer taking vacation from his real job to help out, I probably would have lost my mind.

The same scenerio repeated itself in the spring. State baseball/track/soccer/softball weekend also happens to be the conference baseball tournament. SE goes to the college tournament, local team is bounced in the first two days. Instead of coming back to help, SE takes the next week off for vacation. Part-timer takes two days of vacation from his real job to cover a state soccer tournament and when the soccer team finally loses, drive 150 miles to cover a state championship baseball game.

After I left the paper, part-timer worked 40 hours at his regular job and another 30 hours for the paper because, "the kids deserved coverage." The guy is a saint.

 

Bravo for this guy. Now where are the horror stories?

 

Wow, billikens. Your SE was quite the cocksucker. And I agree; it sounds like the part-timer was golden.