The Glamorous World of Journalism

Forty-five minutes to get to a shitty part of an assfuck borough. Rows of Tudor houses next to gas stations and strip malls. A car driver who won’t stop blathering about directions and which way each street goes. I, it must be said, have a hangover. Everything sucks harder than it has to.

I reach my destination on time, thanks to Blathering Driver, who tells me repeatedly during our journey that he will do his best to get me there at 3 o’clock, in time for my scheduled interview. “I’m good at hustling,” he says.

He is. We arrive. I ungracefully push myself out the car door and clamber up some stairs to greet my photographer, who is already waiting for the interview. We are at the office of a famous fashion designer. He, it appears, is running late. So we sit. Me and the photog, who turns out to be one of those people who ask questions, questions like: “What’s the last book you read?” “Where do you live, where did you grow up?” “Where did you go to school?” “What job did you have before this?” I, it must be repeated, have a hangover. I answer curtly, hoping for the probing to end.

“Can I just take your picture?” he asks me as we wait in the reception area, which is violently colored in fluorescents.

“I’d rather you didn’t, no,” I tell him.

He focuses his camera on me anyway, so I sort of ignore him while he snaps a couple of shots. I look up, asking him to please stop, and he takes a few more while I am looking at him.

“I never do this,” he says, “take pictures of the reporter I’m with. I think it’s those glasses.”

“Um, ok. Just stop, though?” I tell him. “I’m feeling pretty unphotogenic today.” In truth, I am free of makeup, my hair is long and loose, and I feel sleepy. It’s a bare feeling, which is probably what he’s liking. Whatever it is he’s liking, however, is getting a little beyond creepy. Witness:

“Well, it’s the photographer who can make you look good, so don’t worry about that. And I can use Photoshop.”

Bite me.

(Forty-five minutes later, I head back to my office, cursing the designer who never showed. Asswipe.)

And just now a reporter wanders in. I heartily complain my cranky heart out to him.

“Don’t worry, McBickle,” he says. “You’ll be dead soon.”