IT STILL MAKES MORE SENSE THAN J-SCHOOL

As if Jayson Blair, massive media consolidation and this wacky unrecession haven't been ill enough portents for those of us in the journalism biz, now there's this fun new option for the upwardly mobile reporter. Instead of putting in your time in the trenches, building a decent clip file, and uncovering that one big scandal that can define a career, you can simply bid for a major-network writing gig on eBay.

Okay, okay, so maybe it's on Fox. But at the moment, the bidding for this Nascar column-writing gig is well north of $200, which vastly exceeds your typical rookie reporter's annual budget for Ramen noodles. A pity, too -- I've always wanted to build on my well-documented ability to cover sophisticated, upscale sporting events.