I didn't want to misremember anything, so I asked my good friend who also started at the Herald with me (same month as Felger, same day at MAzz). We worked from 8:00pm until 1am three days a week and usually Saturday. it wasn't a full-time job, but 20 hours or so. The Herald under Bob Sales was a toxic place. This was the Lisa Olsen era. Sales and his #2 guy were just bad people and cultivated a terrible environment. I got the job because one of the BU professors worked there and got us in (same with my friend and Felger, all had the same class at COM). I spent first two years primarily doing non-writing agate type stuff, collecting and inputting scores and boxes and the like, with maybe some occasional editing/writing based solely on the data we got from the coaches who would call in. I didn't start "reporting" until my third year, doing high school sports and some BU stuff. And yes, Simmons had it right in terms of Felger being a kiss ass. Mazz was worse because MAzz knew he was an idiot and basically just tagged along to the bar every night at 100am. Felger knew what he was doing, Mazz just wanted to fit in. felger lived next door to me on Beacon during this time. he was always ambitious and wanted desperately to be the hockey guy at the Herald.
Simmons came in my last year there. was not a bro with the rest of the group. he hated it there, maybe because they viewed him as too white collar. Or he looked down on them as sucking at life (which, honestly, most did. unless you think bitching about your existence, drinking and smoking constantly is considered awesome). I never fetched coffee per se, but basically had to do whatever. I remember I came in one night in a suit. My internship at Worth Magazine required me to dress up that particular day and I went straight from. Sales flipped out, saying I must be interviewing. One of the editors was like "he's a college kid, he had to for an internship he has during the day" but Sales never talked to me after that. When I took a full time job at Worth in NYC, he said something like "I knew you didn't fit in here." LOL
end of the day, Simmons wasn't making more than $25k at the Herald. the full time job they offered me upon graduation would have paid me ~$20k per year roughly based on hours offered. Him blogging and working nights as a bartender was likely the same math just different jobs/hours. and yes, he lived in Charlestown, not Brighton. I paid like $700/mos for my apartment on bay state road with two other guys. I did it, but there wasn't a lot of cushion. and I made $100+ week at the Country club as a waiter/bartender as well
you want to say he had a cushion and made it easier...that's fine. I was in same boat with no cushion and was able to do it. but the guy worked his ass off and is talented and bet on himself when many wouldn't. He wanted to be a columnist and being at the Herald was not necessarily a great way to do that. he identified that and moved on. lot's of folks start where he started and never advance. there are several still at the Herald now. guy started two successful media enterprises, one that today is likely worth nine figures