Topsy Turvy edition: ANR invites readers to change perspective, smile

Welcome to ANR’s first-ever Topsy Turvy edition.
Just as the name implies, our staff has turned some things upside down and sideways in this week’s edition, on purpose, hoping to shake up your perspective just a tad and have a little fun.
Everything is not as black and white as usual this week, pun intended, though there is a method to our madness. Before you start turning the pages and wondering what in the name of Woodward and Bernstein (famous Watergate reporters) is going on at the ANR, let me explain.
Readership studies at the Poynter Institute, a global think tank in the journalism world, confirm that newspaper readers are in fact creatures of habit. Many long-time print media fans, perhaps including some of you, often follow a very specific routine while reading news in their hometown weekly. 
Some sit in the same chair, according to one well-documented study, reading their paper on the same day at approximately the same time, looking for their favorite elements in much the same order.
Some may start logically with the front page, while others jump to the sports page, or perhaps look at Page A5 to see if they recognize any names on the obituary page. I know for a fact that the court report and police blotter on Page A2 gets a lot of attention, just out of curiosity of course. We published my name in that space when I got a speeding ticket a few years ago, and boy did I hear about it:-)
Your reading routine is all about personal preference, though that approach may over time lead to missing out on stories, advertisements or information simply because you didn’t look closely enough. That’s why we’re changing things up this week, hoping to alter that routine in a variety of ways.
Bekah Mead, our energetic young advertising/marketing representative, came up with the idea in hopes of putting more emphasis on ANR advertisers. “Local businesses are a fundamental part of the community,” Mead writes in a must-read Topsy Turvy personal column on Page C2. 
We decided to help you out in that regard this week, flipping the age-old newspaper script to put the ads at the top of the page and the news at the bottom. But why stop there? Some of our local businesses are very creative and resourceful in the products and services they offer, so we helped them take a little creative license this week in designing their ads. Look for the goofy looking emoji included with this column in ads that took our Topsy Turvy challenge.
So what’s the point you might ask. Have we lost our credibility, and our marbles? 
No and no, thank you, but there is in fact a point.
Today’s news comes at us 24/7 these days, chock full of grief, conflict and political unrest, even here in good ol’ Nebraska. This week we hope to inform you as always with news and information about people you know and care about, but also to change your perspective a bit, maybe even help you turn that frown upside down.

KURT JOHNSON can be reached at kjohnson@ hamilton.net