ONE QUESTION … FOR EX-REPORTER/FUNNYMAN THEO DOUGLAS
By Greater Long Beach
[Another in a trying-our-best-to-make-this-a-weekly series]
The back story: In the good, old days when he was a member of The District Weekly staff—actually, even in the not-quite-as-good but even-older days, when he was a member of the OC Weekly staff … or way the hell back in the bad, as in going-Medieval on your ass, days when he was a member of the Press-Telegram staff—Theo Douglas was always pretty dependable for a quirky observation, an oddly tethered insult or a hair-trigger fit of temper that gave everybody a good laugh. But lately, not so much. And moments ago, as we wound down a spirited text-messaging joust, Douglas went for the finishing thrust by calling me a “dum kauf.”
The question: Theo Douglas, why aren’t you as funny, anymore?
Theo Douglas’s answer: My humor doesn’t translate well in German. Like that time I occupied the Sudetenland?People just didn’t get it.
2 Comments
So speak in Czech while I down a Velkopopovicky Kozel
Citizen Journalist Quotes of the Day — So They Will Be Guided by Its Light
“Money is the great power today. Men sell their souls for it. Women sell their bodies for it. Others worship it. The money power has grown so great that the issue of all issues is whether the corporation shall rule this country or the country shall again rule the corporations.” — Joseph Pulitzer (December 1878, St. Louis Dispatch)
“I don’t so much mind that newspapers are dying – it’s watching them commit suicide that pisses me off.” — Molly Ivins
“Put it before them briefly so they will read it, clearly so they will appreciate it, picturesquely so they will remember it and, above all, accurately so they will be guided by its light.” — Joseph Pulitzer
“An editor without a magazine is like a jockey without a horse. When you see a jockey standing there without being up on a horse, they seem little and not very impressive. I was riding a lame horse, but I still enjoyed it.” — Frank Lalli
“A newspaper is not the place to go to see people actually earning a living, though journalists like to pretend they never stop sweating over a hot typewriter. It is much more like a brothel – short, rushed bouts of really enjoyable activity interspersed with long lazy stretches of gossip, boasting, flirtation, drinking, telephoning, strolling about the corridors, sitting on the corner of desks, planning to start everything tomorrow. Each of the inmates has a little specialty to please the customers. The highest paid ones perform only by appointment; the poorest take on anybody. The editors are like madams – soothing, flattering, disciplining their naughty, temperamental staff, but rarely obliged to satisfy the clients personally between the printed sheets.” — A UPI Washington Bureau Manager
“These days there’s all too much coverage of pseudo-events about extraordinarily inauthentic people doing inauthentic things.” — David Halberstam
“Anonymous sources are to journalism what silicon enhancements are to the feminine figure; they look impressive to the gullible, but something doesn’t feel right.” — Larry King
(Source: “Journalism Quotes” –- schindler.org)