Wonkette, vice Ann Marie Cox, is going to be a regular contributor to Time magazine.

Does this mean that Time will feature more anal sex jokes?

HT: Fishbowl DC

Jim: My head is intact, mostly. Time decided to host Andrew Sullivan’s blog, so I guess it’s not all that surprising that they would sign on Wonkette.

What I don’t quite understand is how some folks in the media world continue to fall upward. Wonkette was never my cup of tea, but I understand it had a following. Whether that following warranted a $275,000 advance for her novel (as was reported by the New York Post), I’m not quite sure. Drudge reported a week or so ago that after being out for about two months, “Dog Days” had sold 5,383 copies, according to BookScan. (The consensus is that BookScan underestimates sales of a particular book, but the percentage is debated. So let’s be really generous and say Cox’s book has sold 8,000 copies.)

This means sales of the book have brought in $191,600; at least half of that goes to the booksellers. In other words, by my back of the envelope calculations, her publisher, Riverhead, must be taking a bath on that book. And yet, Riverhead reportedly gave her an advance in the “mid six-figures” for her second book, a nonfiction work, according to the Washington Post.

I know envy is not a good trait, but sometimes I look at stuff like this and just can’t understand how all this works.