Lileks Keeps His Job

There will be those whose schadenfreude will have been thwarted by the announcement that, although he's lost his daily column, James Lileks won't be taking a buyout from the Minneapolis Star Tribune and will instead receive a plum new assignment. But I'm not one of them.

I've been reading The Bleat for almost a decade, and it has brought me a lot of enjoyment. As a political commentator, Lileks went a little off the rails after 9/11 ("The terrorists are coming to Minnesota to kill MY CHILD!!!"), but he's always been a reliable source of fun and insightful writing about pop culture. His Gallery of Regrettable Food is still gut-bustingly hilarious.

I'm not so keen on his fiction, though. I couldn't even finish his mystery novel, "Mr. Obvious." The snappy patter that works in a blog post begins to sound... desperate when stretched across a 200-page narrative.

Some will complain that Lileks is overpaid or lazy or just plain insufferable. But I'm glad he achieved the resolution that he wanted. I know what it's like to work at a place where the Specter of Unemployment stalks the halls and can only wish him well.