DUDE NEWSPAPER SEASON BEST ON RECORD
M. Toole | Dec 17, 2019 | Comments 0
(Ouray) The San Juan Horseshoe is admitting to staggering profits after completion of its third Dude News Session, terminating in October. The 2-week seminars give newspaper buffs the opportunity to get a little figurative ink under their fingernails in the computer age.
Participants, who must apply for the minimal spots as early as April, undergo the pain as well as the joy of real journalists. Deadlines, logistical nightmares regarding circulation and subscription correspondence, and computer skills are highlighted. Perhaps the most useful experience occurs on the last day of the dude ranch venue where students actually herd wavering advertisers into a pen for branding (read fleecing).
“That was my favorite,” said Bennie Furnace Hemmingway of Clovis, New Mexico. “How they coerced those merchants in that small veal shoot is beyond me!”
The regular dude staff enjoy breaks from the tedious grind too. Many spend lazy afternoons sitting around the camp jug sneering at and then shouting encouragement to the tabloid rookies.
“We just chill and let these overachievers overachieve,” said darkroom analyst, Juan Cameroon Swayze. “Last week we ran a bad blood drive in Crested Butte where our guests dropped their chaps and mooned the new trail boss, Vail and Associates, while we took photographs.
After that we had an authentic western cookout where we charged our clients in a grand fashion and served them delicacies like Slate River humus, East River biscuits, cowboy beans and choice of Guinness Lite or warm, poorly distilled vodka drinks. Staying on top of food cost is everything these days. The brandings, or bovine tattoo handicraft as we like to call it, were an optional extra.”
The rickety management of The Horseshoe feels that corporate America needs to understand how jerkwater operations like this website are formulated. Survival techniques, social skills and alcohol control are a side effect as is proper spelling, grammar and extensive (often elitist) vocabulary use.
“And all of our delivery wagons run on methane gas made right down on the farm, taking advantage of the hayseed culture that’s all around us,” said Swayze, a heavy proponent of horses’ rights and advocate of horses’ asses.
-Estelle Marmotbreath
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“…that if the earth and moon were about to collide many persons would doubtless sit up upon the roofs to witness the collision.”
– from The Red Badge of Courage by Stephen Crane
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