And apparently, that was not necessarily a guarantee, for a lot of us.

It was the old joke about good news and bad news Wednesday.

The good news was that our papers and staff members won a mess of awards from the Washington Newspaper Publishers Association, as usual.

And as usual, I picked up a couple of news reporting awards for my own work.

The bad news was that our papers are merely the latest business to have been hit by hard times.

Meaning that the Arlington office is being closed at the end of the month.

Astute readers might recall that I work out of the Arlington office, or at least, I used to.

But I still have a job.

The Arlington and Marysville papers will continue to be two separate publications.

But since our sports reporter is already covering sports for both papers, and since our Marysville reporter recently transferred to another paper, under our same publisher, that's closer to where he lives, the editorial department has been able to perform a bloodless consolidation of staff.

Sarah, who used to do the arts and leisure section for both papers, is now the news reporter for Arlington, where she lives.

She'll have to commute down to the Marysville office to do her writing and such, but she's getting comped for her miles like the rest of us, and when she covers news on the scene in Arlington, she'll still be close to her home.

I live in Everett, which is closer to Marysville than to Arlington, and I have a year of experience in being the news reporter for Marysville, albeit from a few years ago.

So, I'm now back where I started, as the news reporter for Marysville.

What's weird is, even though it was brought about by unfortunate circumstances, this is actually great for me personally, because I'm now driving half the distance from my home to work, which were miles that I wasn't getting comped for.

When I first got hired by this paper, I felt like Griffin Dunne at the end of After Hours, spinning through a whirlwind, but winding up right back where I started.

In that case, it was the civilian world I was returning to.

In this case, it's the civilian paper I started out at.

It's weird, because even though I'm working for the same bosses and doing the same thing, in a familiar location, this first day back at Marysville feels like I'm starting a new job all over again, except not quite.

If that makes sense.

And life goes on.

.

That's over a million dollars in stocks. This is a depression and I challenge anyone who says otherwise. This is just getting worse and worse.

Hold on to that job, because we're entering something truly terrifying none of us (unless you were born in the 1920's) have ever lived through before.

I handed my notice in a week ago. The job wasn't working out. I had differences with the Chairman on the appropriate ways to treat staff and some development options and it became clear that things weren't getting better between us. The three hours a day commute wasn't helping things either. I'm too old for this crap.

I won't be posting a story this weekend because I'm caught up in some serious family problems that will require my full attention and haven't left me in the mood for creative writing anyhow. My apologies to the board.

I certainly can't blame you for that. The commute alone would be enough for me.



Certainly no need to apologize. You've helped many of us through hard times with advice or simple friendship, by all means let us know if there's anything we can do for you.

That really, seriously, sucks, man.