PUZZLE #40 & newspapers

ACROSS LITE PUZZLE: [ END OF NEWSPAPERS] 
PROGRAM: [Across Lite]

PROGRAM: [Java]

PRINTOUT PUZZLE: [ END OF NEWSPAPERS]

PROGRAM: [Adobe Acrobat]

I grew up in a house that worshiped the newspaper. It seemed my father would buy enough of them each week to wallpaper the townhouse some eight times over. Christ, his Sunday afternoons were spent rifling through The Boston Globe, The Boston Herald, The New York Times, and then whatever other paper was the impulse purchase that morning. It was an amazing feat to behold. Thirty plus pounds of newsprint piled up on the ottoman, Dad engrossed in whatever broadsheet, some opera CD on in the background, and the TV set to some Patriots game with the volume muted. (Oddly enough, Dad never actually watched the games. More he had a sixth sense to know when to turn away from the newspaper to catch the most heartbreaking play, say some disparaging comment about Drew Bledsoe, and go back to whatever he was reading.) He’s been a newsjunkie his whole life, and maybe in some alternate universe Bill Quigley studied journalism instead of accounting.

I almost got a journalism degree. (Instead of saying why it’s not really a journalism degree — I did everything but the internship — it’s easier to say I have one.) When I stumbled forward through my college career, I probably went through like ten different majors. I had heard somebody say before that the most interesting people were the ones who didn’t know what they were doing with their lives. I guess I was intent on being the most interesting guy on the planet. I think the thought of having to cover alderman meetings and PTA rallies wasn’t that intriguing to me. Also, I had started selling crosswords to the Times before senior year was up. So I think the almost-but-not-quite journalism degree was the fastest way to get through UNH.

Nowadays, dad still devours newspapers, only now they’re the electronic kind. I think the Internet was the greatest thing for him, as he was now able to indulge in not only the local media, but also all the Midwest papers he grew up with. Just now he does it daily. I mean, now he can read the sports section of the South Bend Tribune just to keep with the tribulations of Notre Dame football. But my fondest memory of dad will always be him rifling through page after page of the Sunday newspapers. So, with the newspaper dying and being reborn on the web, this puzzle’s for you, Dad.