The Sun-Times regrets the error.

   Grr. Urg. Other expressions of visceral, teeth-grinding frustration.
     Monday morning. All is right with the world. Or right enough, if you squint. The vanhoutte spirea are in their puffy white glory. There are fresh blueberries to put atop my Shredded Wheat. The big challenge of the day is to get downtown and go to Gene & Georgetti for lunch. Maybe get something going for Wednesday, columnwise, so I don't have to reinvent the wheel Tuesday morning.
     Rinse the blueberries. Pour the cereal and the milk. Flip open the Sun-Times to page two — "Every day I'm on page two is a good day," I often tell the wife. There is my lighthearted riff on yo-yos. The story begins:

     “No," I said, puzzled, slow on the uptake, figuring she was coming out of a dream. "Why do you ask?"

     Well, that's how the story begins in the physical newspaper. The actual column, as written, has three paragraphs before that. Bowl of cereal in my hands, I rush upstairs to the computer, to see whether the opening was also sliced off online, or whether it was a print issue. I'm worried that, in copying the opening to post on my blog, I somehow cut it instead, and the mistake was carried unnoticed into the paper. An actual impossibility with the system, but still...
     The story was fine online. Whew, so not my fault. But somebody's. I instantly see what had happened. They put in a big "OPINION" bug as a subtle hint that what you are reading is not the just-the-facts-ma'am impartial news the paper prides itself with, but slant, bias, perspective. Whoever went to grab the copy to put into the paper took the part below opinion and didn't notice the part above, and no sentient eyes gazed up the result.
     Forty years writing for the paper, I can't recall that ever happening to one of my stories. A first for everything.
    I fire off a note to my editor saying as much. Then wait, checking my email for befuddled "Huh?" notes from readers. Instead, I get people enthusiastically upping their subscriptions and donating to the newspaper, which seems an odd reply to a blunder. Then it hits me. Ohhh. The marketing department had asked me to write a letter, rattling the cup. The same morning that my decapitated column hit the street, the letter asking for donations also went out, the type of ironic coincidence which makes life the rich pageant it is. The species of minor indignity that follows me, quacking, like a pull-toy duck. Some journalists won the Pulitzer Prize on Monday, others have their mangled work tossed out into the world with a shrug.
     I knew immediately that I would not be inundated with puzzlement. Readers tend to plow on. And as my wife points out, even the few who notice something amiss, well, most people do not write to newspapers. The physical paper itself goes to, what?, 50,000 readers. Maybe. Not 2 percent of the population. Online is where it's at. Online we draw a full ... well, several multiples of 50,000. I think. Or hope.

     I call my editor, not seeking explanation, more just to have some someone to talk to about this. "The trick to journalism is to both think what you're doing is the most important thing in the world and know that it actually doesn't matter much," I say.  You thunder in a column against Donald Trump, liar, bully, fraud and traitor, as if doing so is the difference between America continuing on in freedom or sliding into a slough of fascism and oppression. And know that you could have written every single article highlighting the Oort Cloud of crimes and errors surrounding him and he would still be right where he is now, poised to retake the presidency. Raising your voice is the most important thing you can do, and nothing.

     The paper is actually doing something surprising. It's reprinting the column today, with the top three graphs in place (I'm told. I haven't seen it yet. It would be funny if the three paragraphs got lopped off again). I didn't ask for that — in fact, almost pointed out that it really isn't necessary. But they feel it was, and I decided not to question their judgment. Besides, I can't ever think of that ever happening in a Chicago paper — a column running Monday, then its corrected version Wednesday. Kinda cool, really. A distinction, almost. I'll take it.
    Onward, as Rick Kogan says.  Apologies for the inside baseball, but that's what I got today. Honestly, when they said they were reprinting the column, my first thought was I'd have a day off, which I can use. No biggie. Mistakes happen. To write is to err or, as I sometimes spell it, "Too right is two air." Even noble Homer dozed. Sometimes you get the bear, sometimes... Okay, you understand. We'll try again tomorrow, and hopefully get it right this time.