100 Confessions: Copy Editing

(73) I did a brief stint in copy editing at my first newspaper job. It didn't last because I would get crazy stories. Really crazy stories. One reporter would commonly turn in 6000-word stories. The news hole was 600 words. And my job was to make it fit.

I would basically end up rewriting the story. One time the reporter in question covered a local council meeting that was completely a transcription, no journalistic structure in the midst of it. In the middle of the story, I finally found a quotation. There was no attribution and to this day, I have no idea was it's about. But I ended up nearly on the floor.

"She likes to do it. She's so good. I really like the way she does it for me. Let's keep having her do it."

There may have been some reference to lawn-mowing about 1000 words higher. But I had to bring the quote to my editor and say "Look, I know you want a quote for this piece, but what the heck do I do with this?"