We have a new staffer among us. Her name is Elizabeth Johnstone — or, as I call her, “Liz.” She’ll be writing the daily FrontBurner feature “What To Do In Dallas Tonight.” And, of course, her tireless efforts to uncover fun stuff will inform part of our iPhone app and they will bear the tasty fruit that we call our comprehensive online Events database. By way of introducing her to you, dear FrontBurnervians, I thought we’d break off a little Q&A.
1:32 PM me: You ready to do this?
1:33 PM elizabeth.t.johnstone: Yep!
me: So, first, welcome to D Magazine. Your first day was yesterday, yes?
elizabeth.t.johnstone: Yes it was. Very exciting
1:34 PM And I was an intern here over the summer, so it was nice to be back.
1:35 PM me: What one experience stood out for you on your first day, the one thing that made you say, “Huh, didn’t expect that”?
1:37 PM elizabeth.t.johnstone: Well, I didn’t get any horrible comments of my first FrontBurner post! So that was a very kind surprise.
1:38 PM On my post, rather. But in all seriousness, the thing that stood out was how quickly I was sort of thrown into the fold, and how welcoming everyone was. I was pretty nervous coming in.
1:39 PM me: Liz, I hate to break this to you. But several people actually came up to me yesterday and mentioned that they really, really didn’t like you.
I’m kidding! Of course!
1:40 PM elizabeth.t.johnstone: And now I’ve been disillusioned. Thanks, Tim!
1:41 PM me: Now then. About those exclamation points. You might not be aware of this, seeing as how you’re still fairly new to the whole Journalism thing. But there is a limited supply of exclamation points. You’re too young to remember when Jimmy Carter asked us all to conserve energy, but I want you to think of me as Jimmy Carter and the exclamation point as energy. I’m asking you to conserve them.
Next question: where do you come from? To what tribe(s) do you owe an allegiance?
1:42 PM elizabeth.t.johnstone: I can do that. Only for very, very excited and/or important things.
1:44 PM Well, I hail from Irving, originally. And if we’re taking this tribes thing literally, my last name is Johnstone, so I’m a little bit Scottish. And we have our own plaid and coat of arms, which I might possibly wear around the office.
1:46 PM I’ve also got to give kudos to New York City, where I went to college. I earned serious street cred (I didn’t, actually, but I tried).
1:48 PM And finally, if I were actually join a tribe of some sort on my own volition, it would probably be one dedicated to seriously nerdy TV shows. Like the X-Files or something. Stop me if I’m going off in the wrong direction here.
1:49 PM me: No, no. Precisely what I was after.
1:50 PM elizabeth.t.johnstone: Yeah, nerdy television. The serious fans who attend Buffy the Vampire Slayer singalongs? Those are my people.
1:51 PM me: I understand on your first swim through the D Magazine offices, as an intern, you had a problem sitting up properly in your chair. This true?
1:52 PM elizabeth.t.johnstone: This is sadly true. Wick, the publisher, gave me the shock of my life the first time he shouted, “ELIZABETH! SIT UP STRAIGHT!” from the across the room.
1:53 PM I’m pretty paranoid now.
1:54 PM And my former ballet teacher is going to be really ashamed to hear about this. I’ve been outed as a sloucher.
1:55 PM In my defense, the spreadsheet I was working on at the first time I was so unceremoniously called out had really, really tiny type. I had to get really close to my computer to see it.
1:57 PM But now I realize that’s a terrible defense, because I could have just zoomed in on Excel. So let’s just forget I even tried to excuse my bad posture and just say that I’m working on it.
1:58 PM me: Fair enough. Final question: what do you have to say to the callous flamers who lurk on FrontBurner and who will, no doubt, find some reason in this Q&A to attack you?
2:02 PM elizabeth.t.johnstone: Oh wow. Depends on what they want to attack me for. If they want to have a Buffy quoteathon to prove that I am not, in fact, a diehard fan, than I say, bring it. Otherwise…you know, I think I can take it. And if Tim hears mysterious sobbing noises from over here, he’ll maybe be kind enough to not mention it.
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