I was relieved to take a break from my many bad WB show reruns Thursday (a-hem, DICKie) to watch a movie that, as a journalist, always makes me intensely nervous: "Shattered Glass." For those of you who haven't seen it, it's the story of Stephen Glass, jerkass who made up tons of stories while at The New Republic and has made lots of money since then talking about it.

For you journalists - and let's face it, it's all of you reading - have you seen the movie or read his book? And doesn't the fact that he's got both really piss you off?? I think the movie does a great job of setting up the tension and suspense of editors finding out that one of their writers is a lying asshole. And as a writer, watching the jerk try to squirm out of each situation - man, it just makes me so nervous for the guy and hateful of him at the same time.

Growing up, the concept of "getting in trouble" was like, pretty much the worst thing that could happen to you. You might as well have committed murder, even if you'd only gotten detention. Making fun of other people or lying? Well, that would get you the "look" from Mom: that look of disappointment that says "Wow, who are you? Cuz MY daughter would never do such a thing."

Hence, it makes me shudder just at the idea of getting caught in lies like Glass's. shiver It's so tempting when you're in a rut to say Oh, I think that's what he said, I'll just finish his quote for him. But we don't do that because we respect our profession. And because we paid $60K to be reminded never to do that. And damnit, because we're better than Stephen Glass, the original Jayson Blair. What's Glass doing now? He's a lawyer making money off of stories about lies. Hm. Telling.

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Random thought of the day: there are few things more beautiful than the Chicago skyline at night. There are also few things more depressing than getting in your car at 11 p.m. to head back to Northwest Indiana because, oh yeah, you don't live in Chicago anymore.

Man down.