Lent, Day 29

Long day at work today, 11 hours. It was a 14-page paper. I still have 6 pages left to proof & finish. We didn't even get the first page out until 1 p.m. Almost 2 hours behind schedule.

Just one little thing & then I'm headed to bed. I got a phone call from someone in Malad wanting to know if it was too late to get an obituary in. The obituary page was done. I said no, because the policy is that we try to get an obituary in. I gave the woman the options, she could do a death notice for free, or she could do a full obituary with picture & it is $4.50 a column inch. She said she would give the woman's daughter the information. A little while later, I got a call from the woman's daughter. She said that the Malad paper doesn't come out until Thursday & her mother's funeral was Wednesday. She decided to do a death notice. That was a relief to me, we were already waiting for Mondell Nash's obituary & picture from Webb Funeral Home. We weren't sure if we were going to have enough room for another obituary.

I finally went to lunch at the Subway. I had debated about going to Stokes grocery store & grabbing a small deli sandwich. But I decided Subway sounded better. I was hungry & thought a 6-inch sandwich with extra toppings sounded better than a 3-inch plain meat & cheese sandwich. But I had also decided I wouldn't do a full meal, cuz I just wanted a soda refill. You have to buy the full meal of 20-ounce drink & either cookies or chips to get cookies at a reduced price. I said I learned another new thing today. The lady that waited on me was new, at least someone I'd never seen before. She asked what the first new thing I learned was. I told her the Malad paper comes out on Thursday. She asked if I was from Malad. I said no, & asked if she was from Malad. She said yes. I said I work for the Preston paper & we had got a death notice from Malad. She wanted to know who died. I told her Rula Thomas. She said she knew her, she'd worked for her. She knew she'd been in the hospital. She wanted to go see her & she didn't want to. So she'd sent her a dozen pink roses for Valentine's Day. I was able to tell her the funeral & viewing information. She said she'd heard she had cancer. I said no, the daughter said they didn't know what it was. I'd asked what the cause of death was because sometimes they put what the person died from in the obituary.

I thought how interesting that was. I usually don't go nattering on about publication dates & spouting information about obituaries to total strangers. But this woman may have got the information too late to pay her respects because our paper doesn't come out until Wednesday. If she works at the Subway during the day, she would have missed the Tuesday evening viewing & Wednesday funeral.