MARK SMITH MORE COLUMNS Advertisement

I have sometimes, and not often enough, thought about the work done by those not in the newsroom here at the PVT.

The folks in production, who actually put these pages into shape before sending them on to the press, deserve a lot of credit, as well as those who don't directly take part in the paper's editions. (There are people here no one ever hears about who make a big difference to the company's worth.)

What impresses me the most about the production crew is its willingness to make last-minute changes as new news comes in or, more often, when I am told that this or that story's jump was never "dummied" onto another page, and what am I going to do about it?

The information is often presented to me with a snake-like hiss, which I deserve.

Also among the lesser known are the ad reps, the men and women who go out and sell the ads that pay for the whole shebang, whether they will end up in the phone book or the paper or the Nifty Nickel.

Except for the advertisers who see them frequently, many people have no idea who Wilma, Phyllis, Sheryl, Dave and Gail are, or the importance of their efforts in making this a going concern.

Think about it: What we do in the ad columns is the equivalent of low-tech still photos. No videos, no pleasant radio voices luring your dollars, no "Hi! Billy Mays here for Leeches-R-Us bloodletting kits!" and no guy selling chamois cloths that will soak up the entire Pacific Ocean if given half a chance.

But unlike their electronic counterparts, the ads on these pages allow for time to think and ponder and even go back for another look when that new external hard drive or new handbag has caught your eye. You're not likely to miss the entire production because you ran to the kitchen for a PB&J or were cursing traffic and ignoring the radio.

There are also those folks we don't often see right here at the PVT -- the drivers who get these papers out to the subscribers and the news racks. With the papers printed in Vegas, it doesn't matter what the weather is, someone has to get them up here. Seldom do they not make it on time.

Seldom, also, do you find a warehouse supervisor like Terry McCaslin, who like me served in the 1st Air Cavalry -- me as an infantryman, he flying on a "Guns a Go Go" Chinook gunship.

Finally, there is the front office crew, which operates as every front office does, as a benign listening post for those who otherwise might interrupt the rest of us who are working on this or that aspect of the paper, and who often can take care of a reader's concern while at the same time lessening his upset.

(Our publisher, Marie Wujek, is herself almost magical in being able to soothe those who are reaching the point of apoplexy.)

If you have ever been here when it is really busy -- two or three or four people at the desk and a couple of phone calls under way at the same time -- you know how burdensome the work of the front office is. Sainthood seems called for.

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Wednesday's headline was, as my sports guy mentioned, open to misunderstanding. Of course the county has not "taken over" JobConnect but, instead, plans to displace JobConnect. What it plans to "take over" is JobConnect's space. "Displace," were it to fit properly, would clearly have been the better word, or perhaps "dislodge."

That happens from time to time, when a word seems fine until you see it in print the next morning and think, "Oh, great, another case of heartburn. What was I thinking?"