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Honolulu Lite
Charles Memminger
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Department heads going for glamour
State deputy sheriffs finally caught one of those idiot copper thieves in the act of pulling hundreds of feet of highway lighting wire out of the ground.
Former TV reporter-turned-Department of Public Transportation spokeswoman Tammy Mori -- looking quite stylish in her yellow hard hat giving interviews to her former TV reporter buddies -- said the 43-year-old thief was caught "red-handed." I attribute that to her being fairly new in her DOT job. She clearly panicked and went for the easy cliche, probably thinking she was back on deadline for KHON news.
Knowing copper is sort of pinkish-gold colored, she could have said the thief was caught "pinkish-gold-handed." But I'm sure she'll soon learn to use transportation-related metaphors such as, "the highway heist crashed to a dead end for the 15-time loser" or "sheriffs put the lights out of a copper thief who almost left Makakilo drivers in the dark."
Louise Kim McCoy, spokeswoman for the Department of Public Safety, said sheriffs were asked to stake out the area after a DOT crew noticed someone had broken into the light-pole wiring boxes. The sheriffs were the ones who actually caught the idiot thief pinkish-gold-handed.
Had I been a spokesman for one of these agencies, I would have said something like, "State coppers caught a copycat copper klepto cold in a copper-copping caper." Or at least tried to.
But that's just jealousy talking. Because one thing Louise Kim McCoy and Tammy Mori have in common, aside from having been local TV news reporters, is that they are both -- and I mean this in the most sensitive, nonsexist, respectful way -- lookers. Call me a chauvinist, but they are young, smart and very attractive women.
My point is that if these state agencies can keep raiding TV stations for young, smart, very attractive women as department spokeswomen, what chance are aging, not-so-smart endomorphic male newspaper columnists going to have when they are ready to seek work outside of journalism? Not that I'm looking for a new job. But you like to think there are certain opportunities out there.
Nevertheless, if I were the head of the DOT, Department of Public Safety or even the Dead Animal Removal Branch, and I had a chance to hire Tammy, Louise or Charley as my spokesperson, well, a cliche comes to mind: "Sorry, Charley." And I don't blame them. I look goofy in a yellow hard hat.
(For the record, my wife and I are godparents to Louise and Jim McCoy's son, so I doubt there's much I could write in this space that would surprise her.)
I just happened to be talking recently to Mayor Mufi Hannemann's spokesman, former KHON-TV reporter Bill Brennan. And while Bill's a smart, good-looking guy, all I can say is, Bill, you'd better hope Tanya Joaquin, Kathy Muneno, Marisa Yamane and Trini Kaopuiki are happy in their TV jobs. And that's just the Channel 2 bench.
Buy Charles Memminger's hilarious new book, "Hey, Waiter, There's An Umbrella In My Drink!" at island book stores or
online at any book retailer. E-mail him at
cmemminger@starbulletin.com