And I call myself a Bears fan?

I was looking at an old email from around Easter 2003. I'd been to visit my friend Marriott in Miami and was flying home. The email made me smile, even after all these years. With football season about to get underway, I thought I'd post it here:

Bear with me, this gets a little long.

So I'm flying home from Miami via Atlanta. For various reasons, on the segment from Atlanta to Chicago I'm in first class (yeah, I know, tragic...)

As passengers are boarding, I notice that a few young men say hello to another passenger in my row. I can't see this passenger, because the rows don't line up and he's in the far window seat. I don't think much of it.

As we're taking off, the woman next to him (whom I can see clearly), starts rambling about premiere golf courses in Chicago, and then babbles on about the layout of the Chicago expressway system. It sounds kind of giddy and odd to me. Something's up here. Is this passenger somehow famous? Maybe an athlete based on the golf conversation.

All I can see of him is the top of his head. He's African-American and doesn't look familiar. All flight I wait for clues. As we're about to land, the woman asks for his autograph. Bingo. She asks his number. I don't hear the reply. But I now know he's an athlete on a team sport.

He deplanes in front of me, and I get a clear view. Not overly tall or bulky. Nothing to firmly place him or his sport. He catches me looking at him. I smile. I don't recognze him! I'm feeling stupid. This story is no good until I know who I flew with!

We're walking through the terminal now, and he's to my left, even with me. He has his phone on and his earpiece in his ear. I hear him talking and keep walking.

"Are you from Chicago?" he asks. I look at him. He's talking to me.

"Yes," I reply.

"Where do you live?" he asks.

"The western suburbs."

Now I'm really feeling stupid because I'm in a conversation with this man and I don't recognize him!

"How about you?" I ask.

"I'm in transition," he replies. "I just signed with the Bears about a month ago." I remember it was a big story when the Bears signed someone recently. I wish I'd paid more attention.

"What's you're name?" he asks.

"Haley." OK, I bite the bullet and confess that I don't know him. "And what's you're name?"

"Kordell," he replies.

Kordell. Kordell. I know that name. He's big. But I don't remember any more.

He holds out his hand to shake hands. I look down at my hands stupidly. I'm pulling my suitcase with my right hand. Should I switch? Oh, wait a minute, he's pulling his suitcase with his right hand also. We do a left-handed shake and keep walking.

Someone calls out to him, "Hey Kordell, good to have you here."

He responds politely, then turns to me, "Did you catch that?"

"Yes," I reply. We talk about my weekend in Miami and what he was doing in Atlanta. Someone stops him.

"Kordell, I just wanted to shake your hand, man."

He responds politely, then smiles to me, "Did you catch that?"

"Oh, yeah," I reply. I ask him if he's doing any training now. He says he's doing a lot, staying in shape and resting his neck.

Someone calls to him again. "Hey Kordell." Kordell turns to me again. "How about that? Did you catch that one?"

"Yes," I laugh. "You're really enjoying this aren't you?"

"Oh, yeah." He laughs back. As we're nearing the escalator down to baggage claim, he asks, "So are you a Bears fan?"

"Yeah," I say sheepishly. "But obviously not a big enough fan."

He laughs again. "You did fine."

He asks if I heard which baggage claim to go to. No, I didn't check any bags. We find the correct claim area. I leave him.

"Well, it was good talking to you. Good luck this season."

I rush out to the arrivals area and find Dave. Get in the car. After a minute I ask Dave. "So, who's the Kordell who signed on with the Bears about a month ago?"

"Kordell Stewart. He's the new quarterback. He used to be with Pittsburgh, remember?" Oh. The quarterback.

"Huh," I say. "Well, I just had a five minute conversation with him as we walked through the terminal. Nice guy."

Needless to say, Dave was impressed. :o)

Although, looking back, Dave wasn't impressed for long. Kordell's stint with the Bears ended up not working out the greatest for either him or the team. I think he's retired now.

Sunset during a break in the storms

Some wild weather we've been having. I can't count the number of days this month that we've had thunderstorms during the night. But yesterday, so far, takes the cake. Chains of thunderstorms coming through -- even a tornado warning mid day -- making the daytime feel like night.

As I was driving home yesterday in the dark, the sun started to peak through the clouds like a bright orange eyeball. I had my camera with me, but by the time I was off the expressway and into a parking lot in a local forest preserve, the eyeball was gone and a huge portion of the horizon was bright orange.

I stopped a few more places on the way home to snap photos, and I'm really happy with a few of them. I even played with stitching a few together to get a panorama (top photo).

'It's not a normal occupation'

"I don't know if it's possible to be a writer and be normal. It's not a normal occupation. I know I'm deeply neurotic, and I'm comfortable with that."

-- Jeff Lindsay
author of Darkly Dreaming Dexter
as quoted in the article Dexter creator grasps life's charades

Saw this in an Associated Press article and I had to laugh.

I've never read Lindsay's books or seen the Showtime series Dexter based on the books, but I'm intrigued now. A sympathetic serial killer on the side of justice?

A new photo rises to the top

I have a new "most-viewed" photo on Flickr.

This is the photo that my husband often refers to as "The Photo". I might be biased, but isn't it obvious why it's so popular? If I'd posted it at the same time as the one of Thor pawing at the door (see previous Flickr entry), it would have been the most viewed all along.

We took this photo five years ago when Loki (the center puppy) was six weeks old. This was two weeks before we took Loki home. In case you're wondering -- Yes, this was a blink-and-you'll-miss-it photo. It was difficult getting all three puppies to cooperate. They had to be repositioned many times, as they became easily distracted and wandered off.

How long have I been at this book-writing thing?

Had a really good Windy City RWA meeting a few weeks ago. The kind of meeting that left me both inspired and sad. Inspired, because there was so much good information and positive energy. Sad, because it was yet another reminder of *how long* I've been at this book-writing thing.

One of the multi-multi-published writers was talking about her first conference 10 years ago when she was still unpublished and how cool it is now to be involved in the Avon booksignings and to actually have people line up for her books at the conference. And I agree -- it's got to be very cool. That's what we unpublished writers fantasize about.

But then I think about that same conference 10 years ago. It was my *fifth* national RWA conference (the first few I attended as a reporter and not as a romance writer, but it was still my fifth national conference). Susan Elizabeth Phillips said nice things about my opening chapter. I pitched to an Avon editor and got a fantastic response. I was on a high -- but yet I never converted that opportunity into a sale.

Ahhh... I've been at this a long time. It's easy to get frustrated with myself.

But, I also said I was inspired, didn't I? And I was.

Mostly, I think, it's because of the positive support at the meetings, the serious ambition of the writers, and the recognition by everyone that this isn't easy no matter what level of your career you're at.

Right before I left on vacation, I was looking at my writing binder. I have so much there. So many ideas. So, it's time to dust off the binder and get back to work.

Note to self...

I have this postcard on my bulletin board in my office. I bought it back in high school -- more than 20 years ago -- when I worked in a Hallmark shop. Little did I realize then that I'd be using it to threaten myself today.

:-)

Signing books -- or vandalizing them?

An author makes arrangements with a bookstore manager for her to come in and sign several copies of her books. It's not a formal book-signing event. She'll just sign the stock and they'll put it back on the shelves with a note that the books have been signed by the author. It happens all the time.

Here's where it the story takes a turn from the usual.

Apparently, the manager didn't tell the store clerk. The clerk thought the author was vandalizing the books and wouldn't let her sign them without buying them first -- which defeats the whole purpose of signing them. In this case, the author left without signing her books, and the bookstore was stuck with extra unsigned stock that they'd ordered in especially for this signing.

A local Chicago-area author (I can't remember who -- sorry) told this story last week during a discussion on publicity and book signings at my writers group meeting.

With this story fresh in my mind, I laughed today when I saw this headline about Stephen King in a similar situation (only he apparently didn't arrange the signing with the store manager):
Horror author Stephen King mistaken for vandal in Aussie outback.

Flickr fixation

I discovered a new toy over the weekend: Flickr.

OK, so I didn't *just* discover it, but I did start to use the site for the first time -- and got hooked on monitoring my "views" and how Flickr rates "interestingness". (But, then again, I thrive on positive feedback.)

Most Interesting

What determines a photo's "interestingness" seems to be based on some complicated algorithm. For me, it seems that the algorithm likes photos that have more complex textures and a lot of tags describing their content.

Currently, Flickr ranks this photo as being the most interesting of all the photos I've posted. It was taken shortly after sunrise on Trinity Beach in Queensland, Australia.

What I like about the photo is the layering of the clouds over the sun, over the water, over the beach. Each layer has a different texture and slightly different colors, especially the layer with blue sky poking through the clouds.

Most Viewed

I've only posted photos from my Australia trip and of my dogs so far, and the dogs seem to be winning the race for most views.
Coming in right behind, though, is the sunrise photo above and several of my photos from the Pixar exhibit we went to in Melbourne. Cute seems to go over really well.

What's interesting to me is that these views are from random strangers based on their own searches -- I haven't until now shared my Flickr link with friends or family.

Photo Sharing Sites

Of course, now that I've started using Flickr, that makes three different photo sites I've been using regularly. All three are free to use, although Flickr does have a "Pro" option.

I like Kodakgallery (formerly Ofoto) for sharing with my sister and some other friends and family. This site is mostly geared toward photo printing. I've been using the site for years and have albums dating back to 2000, and I love the fact that I have that archive available (password protected) through the Internet.

I've been using Photobucket for basic photos that I want to share through this blog. What I like about Photobucket is the ease of sharing, but I wasn't so sure it was the best forum for me when it came to making my photos public.

Flickr seems to be a good compromise of a free site with a lot of quality photos. My philosophy for posting to Flickr has been to choose photos that I think would be interesting to people who don't know me -- photos that perhaps are not so personal and have a more artistic bent.

Please, go ahead and check out my photos on Flickr. I'm curious to see what photos move up in popularity now that friends and family know about them. I have three different sets you can browse through: my Australia trip, my dogs (Loki and Thor), and a collection of some favorites that I've taken.

Speak to me...

The storytelling and the emotional content is what gets into my heart and soul and brain, and then eventually down my arm and out of my hand onto paper.

-- Ralph Eggleston

This quote was posted at the Pixar: 20 Years of Animation exhibit at the acmi in Melbourne, Australia. I just found it while looking through my photos from my trip to Australia. (The photo itself is not worth posting - trust me.)

Turtle, turtle, turtle

Cloud creatures don't usually speak to me, but this one was screaming for attention yesterday as I was leaving the office. Do you see it?

In praise of my little yellow truck

My little yellow truck just hit 100,000 miles yesterday.

Of course, I managed to miss the grand moment. Saw it 20 miles pre and 30 miles post. It's probably for the best that I missed it, because I might have been tempted to pull out my camera and document the event. Using a cell phone while driving is bad enough, but using a cell phone to take a picture while driving has to be much worse -- and who would want to see that photo anyway?

I'm probably jinxing myself here, but my 2001 Nissan Xterra has spent her working years doing the daily commute in the Chicago area, and shows no signs of even contemplating retirement yet.



Oh, I remember when the little yellow truck was young. She cut her milk teeth on the steep grades of California Street in San Francisco, showing off for all those ancient cable cars chugging alongside her. She wasn't even a teenager yet when she carried Marriott and me cross-country to Chicago. (Am I carrying the metaphor too far? By "wasn't even a teenager yet" I mean she hadn't hit 10,000 miles. Oh, and did you catch the cross-country reference? Xterra. Cross-country. Get it? Talk to me privately if you didn't.)

The little yellow truck is the third vehicle I've gotten to drive past the centenarian mark.

First there was the blue muscle car - a 1972 Pontiac LeMans (350 V-8) that my grandfather used to own. The only thing that would have made her cooler (all the guys told me) was if she had two doors instead of four. But, hey, we all have our faults.

Then there was my little red car - a 1991 Pontiac Sunbird. She had front-wheel drive, a sun roof and a really nice ability to never show her dirt (one of the guys at work was constantly asking if I'd just gotten her washed -- like I could afford to pay for regular car washes while working at a weekly newspaper). In her later years, the little red car developed a few quirks, but she served me well.

I guess I have a thing for thinking about my cars in terms of color, but at least they have color. All my husband's cars over the years have been the "little black car" - how boring. ;-) But, then again, my husband and I don't always agree on nick-names, as he likes to call my Xterra the "big yellow bus", which actually brings to my mind images of those short buses the school district used to drive students with special needs. I digress.



Since this is a post in praise of my little yellow truck, I won't complain about her gas mileage. It's a fault that's not unique to her. Most of her friends on the road are guilty of the same.

Instead, I'll praise her for her virtues. Her faithful service. Her ample passenger and cargo space (Loki and Thor positively adore her). Her stadium seating and rooftop basket that give her a distinctive profile. And her quirky little first-aid kit that gives her such a cute bump on her rear, even if the kit contents are probably out of date now.

I'll stop blathering on now. I know she's just a car. But yet...

British vs. American journalism

Stumbled on an interesting article in the Columbia Journalism Review about American vs. British journalism titled Superiority Complex: Why the Brits think they’re better.

Here's an excerpt:

Having recently surveyed the American landscape, the bbc’s Sambrook is confident that his network’s breadth and depth in international coverage gives it a real competitive edge. He’s hardly the first to point out what’s happened to global news here–namely that the top three broadcast networks (and for that matter many big newspapers and newsweeklies) have shuttered many overseas bureaus and shrunk the hole for international stories. In contrast, the bbc ”decided to go in the other direction,” says Sambrook, and has been bolstering its foreign coverage, with nearly five dozen bureaus around the world.

...

Porter argues that one big reason U.S. readers have flocked to the bbc’s Web sites is that they’re seeking a fresh, non-U.S.-centric take on world events.

The article nailed the reasons why I personally like to read the BBC website, and have been reading the site since the fiasco of a 2000 presidential election and then September 11th. I remember reading all their stories skeptical of the reasons for going to war in Iraq, and at the time finding that skepticism refreshing.

Heaven for history geeks like me

"Films and television may come and go, but there will always be some geezers in armour running around a wet field in England."

--Alan Larsen, a historical event expert
who organizes military and equestrian reconstructions
for film and television

That quote made me smile. It's from a BBC article, Knights of old and new, about the annual Festival of History, run by English Heritage in Northamptonshire later in August.

Think about it. Knights. History. English countryside. Elizabethan mansion. Sounds like heaven for a history geek like me.

There's supposed to be Roman re-enactments, Norman re-enactments, a knights tournament, an English Civil War battle, World War I re-enactments. The list is huge.

The article makes it seem as though the festival is supposed to be for school kids, but looking at the event website, it seems like the festival is geared toward everyone. Can I go? Can I go? I know, not this year... Maybe someday.