Having fun

It's been three weeks since I'm here. After a slow first week, just getting acquainted with the computer systems and people at the Inquirer, I started to find stories to write about. Now I have 3 stories published, here, here and here.
People in the newsroom is very busy these days, because of the shortage of work force caused by the layoffs. They can't afford to waste too much time coaching me. In spite of all this, everybody is very helpful - but I quickly found out that I need to bring them practical and objective questions. There's no time to waste over there. My mentor, Bob, looks more busy than most of them, because he's got the night shift. But we went out for dinner and lunch some times, and we discussed a lot about my fellowship. Since he's the one with the big picture (he knows my objectives as well as the newsroom availability to help me to achieve it), he is being very important.
I'm trying to get out of the newsroom as much as I can. We are allowed to get company cars, and I did it some times. But, when it's possible, I prefer to walk or take the public transportation system. This way, I can get to see more people, get a better sense of directions in the city, listen to them talking. This always helps to come up with story ideas, specially here in a new and totally unknown city.
I'm also trying to read all newspaper everyday, which is not very easy because the edition is very big. I read more slowly because I try to understand the context behind most stories, sometimes using the Inky's Doc Center or questioning reporters around me. I'm gonna work harder on that: studying the print edition I can have a better awareness of how do they write, what's newsworthy and all.
The third story was a collaboration with a free-lancer, St. John, who also became a good friend. He's now working at the Daily News, the other newspaper published by Inquirer's company. Their newsroom is downstairs. That story, although wasn't very big, was really good to report because the dragon boat race I reported ended up at 5:30 p.m., and our final deadline was 7 p.m. When I got back to the newsroom I had to rewrite the lead (we got the background story already written) and add other information I got that afternoon, and very quicly. I could see the editor, Julie, working, and I learned a great deal about what they consider important in a story and what they don't.
To understand how do they choose the information, how do they structure the stories and what's important: this is my first goal. In all the three stories, I made a giant leap in that sense. The soccer story also got me a good feedback from readers - another main objective here is to learn about American reader's profile.
To cut a long story short, I'm having a great time over here. Inquirer's editor, Bill Marimow, told me: "Please make sure to enjoy every day here." That's an order that I'm more than willing to follow.