We knew it was too good to last. FBLA hero and LAT-smut-beat reporter Claire Hoffman is leaving the paper to join Conde Nast Portfolio.

Here's a release the mag giant sent out. Print it out on soft paper, and you can use it to sop up your tears:

Claire Hoffman has been named a contributing editor at Conde Nast Portfolio, it was announced today by Joanne Lipman, Editor-in-Chief of the magazine. Her appointment is effective immediately. Ms. Hoffman joins Conde Nast Portfolio from The Los Angeles Times where she was a staff writer covering Hollywood and the adult entertainment industry. While at the Times, she wrote "Baby Give Me a Kiss," a profile of Girls Gone Wild mogul Joe Francis. That story, which began with Francis' assault on Claire and ended with his alleged rape of an 18-year old girl on the back of a roving party bus in Chicago, broke records on the LA Times website for the most page views. Prior to the Times, Ms. Hoffman worked as an intern and a freelance reporter for The New York Times, where she contributed reporting to a Pulitzer-prize winning series that investigated fraud and death by the American freight railroads. Ms. Hoffman is currently working on a book about her childhood growing up in the Transcendental Meditation movement in rural Iowa, where her meditations were graded and enlightenment expected.

Ms. Hoffman holds an MA in religious studies from the University of Chicago Divinity School and another MA from the Columbia School of Journalism. She lives in Hollywood.