What a day, what a day!

As you've probably found out by now, we had a fire in the pressroom last night and we couldn't deliver our newspapers in time this morning.

So I got a call from my editor, telling me to report to our loading dock at 11 a.m. It wasn't the loading dock in our building, but at our distribution center, which I never ever knew existed.

Once I got there, I was given a route and 165 newspapers.

I then had to insert the To Do section and advertising sections into our newspapers. Then had to double bag them because it was going to rain.

After I did a bundle, I knew I would be in trouble later on. These tables were meant for much taller people than me.

I found a pallet, which made the task much easer.

John Kelly, our circulation director, did a double take when he could actually see me over the partition. Then he looked under the table and saw that I was standing on a pallet!

After I loaded my car, I took off down the road.

Piece of cake, I thought.

Oh, no.

I've lived in Columbus almost 40 years and I've never been in some of these neighborhoods.

They were very nice neighborhoods, but I really was lost.

I managed to deliver more than half of my papers, but it was getting close to 5:30 p.m. and I was going to meet my brother and his wife for dinner and then go see "Greater Tuna."

So I got back to the newspaper, soaked to the skin, hungry, thirsty and very, very tired. And pretty much Ms. Grumpypants. Tnat's the Features Department code word for someone who's not too nice to be around. Sometimes it's Mr. Grumpypants. Today, I was Ms. Grumpypants.

Oh, and I dumped the rest of the papers on some poor guy's desk down in circulation.

I thought the professionals could deliver the rest.

I now have a great respect for these men and women who deliver our newspapers. I mean some of these houses had no addresses on the house or the mail box. I don't know how they do it.

It was raining, I had to walk from door to door throwing papers on people's porches.

Some of the people stuck their heads out when I came near their doors. They were so nice.

All of them recognized me and asked why I was doing this. I told them it was important for all of us to get the newspapers into their hands. One of them said he appreciated the first-class service! He didn't expect me to show up at his door.

OK. I wrote this last night, but it didn't get posted for one reason or another. But as you can see, I was the cover girl for once in my life!