News-Record.com

Ann Morris, our managing editor, was called on to speak to some journalism classes at Elon University last week. Many of the students there are on the broadcast and PR track, rather than the ink-stained wretch track. Who knows, maybe they think newspapers are less glamorous? Go figure. Anyway, rather than give the stock, boring speech as I would have, she and a couple editors came up with a top 10 list of reasons to be a reporter.

10. You don't have to dress like a banker.
9. You get to watch TV people with nice hair read the words you wrote.
8. You're too smart to be a lawyer.
7. As long as they don't know your salary, everybody thinks you're cool for working at a newspaper.
6. There's a hot newsroom singles scene.
5. You get to make powerful people squirm.
4. The mayor knows your name, but so does the Mafia button man you wrote about.
3. Ernest Hemingway was once a reporter and went on to become famous, drunk, suicidal author.
2. You can pretend to work but actually surf the Internet, feed a blog, and answer lots of e-mail.
1. You can change the world.

All true. Hemingway is actually the reason I got into the game. Not so much the alcoholism, chauvinism and suicidal tendencies, but rather the adventurous lifestyle, hunting and fishing around the world. Purely vicarious, unfortunately.