INTERN WANTED

The position of intern has opened up at The Coconut Chronicle following the sudden departure of my nephew Montague. I will not go into details other than to say that I believe you are making a very big mistake, Montague, and that a career as the assistant to a rude Slovak magician is simply not a viable long-term career move. I know you have grown up amidst the wiccan sortilege of your aunts Cordelia & Morticia but there is a big difference between burying hamsters for blessed weather and the dark brand of cabbage-based sorcery practiced by Dracula, Wizard-Chef of the Mystic Mountains. 

Job description: Applicants must be recent arrivals and unsponsored. You will enter the associate ranks of The Renegades with myself as your sponsor. You will work with me to publish The Coconut Chronicle, involving yourself in the generation of story and special report ideas and pitches, conducting interviews when required, as well as general muckraking. You may earn the right to have your own stories published and/or develop a personal column if desired, however that is not a necessity. I am mainly looking for people with fresh ideas and an ear to the ground, it doesn't matter if you want to write or not. 

Your compensation: You will ride shotgun to the glitz and glamour of life with Coconut Randy; the long afternoons of cornhole with my uncle Billiam (who you may not call Bill), the hours of crafting shell-based male jewelery, more tabouli than you can bathe in. I will pay you a salary of $1,000,000 per issue until you have graduated into the family as a Made Man, at which point you will be given the option to leave the position, whether that is to graduate to a permanent role with the paper (e.g. your own column, as mentioned previously) or to simply have outgrown it as someone who has made their bones and become a full member of the family I serve as the brains, brawn and beauty behind the operation. 

You may apply here publicly or privately via my inbox. If there are no applicants, I beg you, Montague, do not follow Dracula to Little Rock, Arkansas. They will not take kindly to your gentle disposition. 

Thank you.

Salvatore ‘VIPCreditsGrin’ Grinbini was walking down the street. He did that a lot, walking. This was just one of many such interesting anecdotes about Mr Grinbini that would likely come to light in the future, he was sure. Whilst participating in his walk, he heard about a job opportunity and was immediately starstruck by the potential employer. 

Oh my god, is this the CoconutRandy? Former Editor-in-Chief, former Junior Reporter and latterly restored Editor-in-Chief of The Coconut Chronicle pending takeover? It is? Wowzer, what an honour it is to meet a local celebrity such as yourself! I actually came here by chance whilst on one of my enjoyable walks to combat my increasingly sedentary lifestyle and was delighted to discover there was a chance to work with...no for...such a champion of journalism as yourself. Only, I already have a sponsor, mighty Viktor, and I note there is a condition that potential interns must be employed by yourself. If you could perhaps overlook this, I would be pleased to offer my services as general office skivvy, coffee maker and fact-creator.

Please do let me know if I am eligible to work for you.

Wistful. 

My, my, CoconutRandy. In the same street as little old me. The boys back home will never believe me. “You’re a liar” they’ll say. The egg and their faces will be meeting. Oh yes. 

Young Grinbini, the fact that you have pushed forward undeterred despite not meeting one of just two guidelines I have set for this position informs me that you are precisely the kind of applicant who will succeed in the cutthroat world of mass media. This is, in fact, my first lesson to you: trust no one, especially not me, Coconut Randy. 

When can you start?

I'm afraid my previous intern, nephew Montague, is stowed away on a wagon train of fur traders headed to the Ozarks. I fear that if he is not caught and eaten by inbred mountan-men who take shelter in the caves ('coal miners' if you want to be politically-correct), he will be served in a soup by his occult new employer. In both cases, we find ourselves short-handed at Coconut Chronicle HQ.

Not even a day into the job and already the nuggets of wisdom are being gleefully mined. I'll be sure to make a note of that one, boss.

Grinbini opens his diary and scribbles on the first line: 1. trust no-one, especially not CoconutRandy.

Fortunately, I think I am free to begin duties immediately as a result of a recent bereavement having killed everyone I know. I expect that my calendar will be rather free, I think, I'll just confirm. 

He checks his diary again before realising that he didn't actually have a diary at all and had drawn a smiley face on his hand.

Oh, quite. Confirmed - I don't have any appointments, boss. Intern Grinbini is ready to report for duty at Coconut Chronicle HQ immediately. I even heard a juicy rumour that 500 credits were out in the wild. Oh? They've been claimed. Never mind. False alarm, guys. Coffee, boss?

Consider yourself hired! Welcome to the Coconut Chronicle family, Grinbini. Or are you OK with VIPCreditsGrin for short? Whatever you're comfortable with. I may call you Montague at times but that is just force of habit. He was my favourite nephew and now he is a soup. I just need time. 

Yes, coffee, thank you. We have five days until the next edition, I need you to get out there and see what you can find. Conspiracies, shakedowns, hustles; just last week Vegas Crewleader Xanxus was 'disappeared' by The Man for being a short-circuiting robot, Monty, some kind of tommy-gun terminator months, weeks, maybe mere days away from flipping a switch and killing us all on the orders of whoever programmed him. 

In fact, I have it on good authority that the smoking gun on that investigation can be found here, I have documented the exchange. As you can see, it appears Xanxus' malfunctions were already beginning to appear in plain sight, as he is seen to have wired Detroit supervillain Destro $1,000,000 dollars for merely submitting a vote. What now appears obvious is that the Xanxus-bot was returning his callously-won tribute to his master, his wires already too frayed to do it via their normal private drop. Absolutely diabolical stuff. 

Bring me stories, VIPCreditsGrin. The truth is out there. 

Sitting in the back of his Lanchester, Neil typed out a quick letter on exquisite quality personalised 90 gsm paper. He'd given this some consideration for a while, and although CoconutRandy was likely to laugh in his face, Neil reckoned he should at least extend the olive branch of friendship, after all, he could always beat him half to death with the branch if things didn't work out.
 

Dear Coconut Randy,

 

It is with deep and sincerest condolences that I note the passing of your intern, VIPCreditsGrin. Having read the latest edition of your Rag Newspaper, I can only assume that you have not, as yet, replaced him. Therefore after a fair amount of mulling it over, and cogitation as well as a hint of consideration, I have decided to offer my services to you as a replacement. I am in no way experienced in the art of interning, and I probably won't work as hard of as effectively as Grin, and that is saying something, however, I am now a self made man, no longer having to pick up cigarette butts from the gutter to smoke, and with a successful legal practice behind me, I would not be in need of the pitiful stipend you paid your previous lackey. Added to this, the fact that I am a fully qualified Attorney at law, with at least 3 successful representations under my belt, and you could probably sack that shyster lawyer you have on retainer, CoconutRandy, LLB.

 

I look forward to your scornful response at your earliest opportunity.

 

Kind Regards

 

Neil Anblomi

Attorney at Law
 

Coconut Randy addresses a typed-letter to Mr. Neil_Anblomi:

Mr. Anblomi, let me tell you about the life of a newspaperman.

I wake up at 5.30 AM, invigorated by a night's rest and ready to seek out the stories of the day as they unfold. I spend 15 minutes enraptured by delirious open-eyed fever-dreaming, before resuming to sleep until 12.30 PM. 

At 1 PM, I am fully awake and ready to face the day. I masturbate until about 2 o'clock. At 3, after I have finished shaving and eaten breakfast, I dress myself. At this point, Coconut Corp is bustling. I shove my pillow and blanket under my desk and peak out of the door of my office, where my secretary believes I have been since the early hours of the morning. She is correct, of course, besides the fact that I have never left. 

I say, 'Ms Coconut Brandy, I seem to have worked through lunch. I'll be back in an hour', and I am gone by 3.30, headed to the bar to break some news. After I have been forcefully removed from news-breaking around 11.30, I return to my office, where I sleep until 5.30 AM. 

It is not a life for everybody. As you are aware, my two previous interns - Montague and VIPCreditsGrin - were both brutally murdered. In fact, VIPCreditsGrin continues to haunt our basement levels to this day, as his corpse is taped to a rolling desk chair and wheeled into meetings where the stinking carcass of a malnourished newsboy is deemed necessary, which is more than you think. 

Mr Anblomi, I must be honest with you, it would be easier were you similarly lifeless and rotting, as it would at the very least provide us with a way to distract the packs of wild dogs who have made Grinbini's corner area of the basement their own. The alpha, who is known as SeanCallan (after the former editor of the Coconut Chronicle), is very aggressive and has proven an extremely frustrating obstacle in our mission to retrieve Grinbini's lurid sketches of Ms Coconut Brandy for my daily 1 to 2 o'clock meetings. 

As you remain alive, it presents complications, such as a living wage, your opinions, your hopes and dreams, none of which we can accomodate presently, nor wish to...futurely. News is a hard business and it would be irresponsible of us to soften you up with those kinds of privileges. If you would like to take un unpaid position chucking knuckles at the staff of the Star-Examiner, we can offer you a share of the eggs being incubated in the birds nest occupying VIPCreditsGrin's ribcage. You will not be in any way affiliated with Coconut Corp, legally-speaking, but you will be able to fry a very questionable omelette. 

Though we understand you have come some way from your very gross origins, the fact is there is a wall that leaks an unidentified fluid directly behind the office space where our interns are situated and I simply do not trust that leaving you there alone would be in your best interests. Should a smoked Marlboro protrude from those murky depths, it may prove to be the last temptation of Neil_Anblomi. 

As former Las Vegas crewleader Xanxus proved, even the dumbest, most ridiculously stupid things are possible - such as a crewleader being outed as a robot - and I cannot risk any kind of swamp-thing scenario snowballing out of the puddle-diseases you will surely contract. There is plenty of nutrition for a growing horror down there, given the dogs, and God knows what kind of repulsive, bloody-thirsty mutant you will turn into, hell-bent on revenge against the seedy corporate powers who spared nothing to eliminate any trace of your existence (in other words, me). 

Regardless, we have yet to open our latest round of above-the-table recruiting and do not plan to do so for some time; not at least until we are freed of the moral and financial responsibility for the deaths of our two previous interns, of which litigation remains fierce and fairly depressing. That is why I must reject your application. If you would like to re-apply when recruitment has officially begun, you are welcome to submit your resume then. 

Thank you,
Coconut Randy, Editor-In-Chief, The Coconut Chronicle