A mini journalism scandal erupted not long ago when a sports reporter wrote a story about a game he didn’t attend – I don’t remember the details because frankly I thought two things: 1) it was a minor infraction from a well-respected writer and it did not involve any intended deception or fabrication. I think it was more a matter of going with the advance lineup and not hearing about a substitution, or something like that. And 2) I would never do anything like that, even in a pinch. Weeeelll, maybe not, but I came close enough to see how it could happen. <\/p>\n
Last night, sitting at home on the left coast, I thought I’d get a head start on today’s blog entry. I figured I knew pretty much how my trip would be, what kind of reception I’d get at this end, so why not write the draft and then edit in a few details if need be and post? It would just take a few minutes that way, and I was bound to be tired. <\/p>\n
This is what I wrote last night:<\/p>\n
\nThanks to JetBlue’s new nonstop service from Burbank to New York, I was spared the hassle of getting to, and through, Los Angeles’ main airport (LAX for short). My flight left at 7 AM, a tad early, even for me who usually arises around 6. My husband was kind enough to drive me to Burbank and we left the house at 5:30 — those of you who know him well know that we arrived in no-time flat. Security was thorough, but less uptight than at LAX, and I had plenty of time for a cup of Starbucks to rev my own engines.<\/p>\n
The flight was smooth and I spent the time thumbing through a 400+ page catalogue of the Luther Henderson archives that I will be visiting tomorrow, and at the recommendation of Rifftides<\/a>, reading The Shadow of the Wind<\/em>, which I had ordered a few weeks ago and had been saving for this trip.<\/p>\n
New Yorkers typically escape the city on summer weekends, and I knew that arriving at JFK on a Sunday afternoon would mean a lot of traffic heading back into the city. Luckily, the taxi fares from JFK into the city are flat rate, and the cab was air conditioned.<\/p>\n
I’m not sure who was happier to see me, my mom or Django, who, though four-footed and only 25 pounds, is perfectly capable of knocking me over. (Dad’s still on tour in Europe.) I am posting this from my parent’s living room, using my mom’s computer and cable modem as the library with free wifi is closed on Sundays. <\/p>\n
So there you have it. I have arrived and will be blogging from New York for the next two weeks.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
And this is what really happened on the way to the airport:
\nMy husband wanted to leave at 5:30 and I was running a few minutes late, no big deal. We got about 3 blocks from home and I realized I forgot my glasses, so back we went. Still nothing to really worry about, with my husband behind the wheel, we only live about 15 minutes from the airport (20 when I drive). We’re cruising along, traffic light and moving swiftly….until we rounded the bend onto the Golden State Freeway and everything came to a complete stop. Nothing was moving at all, and we couldn’t see what was causing the problem. It was five minutes before six, my flight was at seven, and I had luggage to check. I turned on the radio, couldn’t find the traffic report, and realized that it didn’t matter what the cause was — nothing was moving. I got on my cell phone and calmly called the airline to see if there is a later flight, which there was, but showing only one seat open. Should I grab it? I asked about LAX, still not awake enough to remember that Jet Blue does not fly out of LAX. “Four seats on the 10:30 out of Long Beach” the lady was saying just as a few cars began to inch forward. I said “thank you” and hung up. Just a minute longer and the traffic was moving as if nothing had happened. I don’t know whether that got my adrenaline going or stopped my heart. We pulled up to the terminal at ten minutes past the hour, I checked my bag, got through security, and as I apporached the gate, they announced boarding. No Starbucks. Thankfully, the flight was smooth and uneventful. I got throughthe first 300 pages of the archives catalogue, but I haven’t started reading The Shadow of the Wind<\/em> yet.<\/p>\nMy husband always teases me about being outgoing; he says I can get on a elevator and know everybody’s life story before we get to the lobby. He’s right,and I say that you never know who you’ll meet. Just yesterday we hired a building contractor to repair our roof – I met the contractor while on jury duty last year; he had been talking about his company and I liked what I heard and took down his number. I didn’t have any jobs in mind, but you just never know. Anyway, waiting on a long line to get a cab from JFK Airport, I got into a conversation with a fellow ex-New Yorker\/California transplant. In a sleeveless tee-shirt and blue shoes, he didn’t look like a litigation attorney, and he had sense of humor, too. Turned out his destination was within about four blocks of where I was headed so we shared a taxi and exchanged email addresses — you never know when you’ll need a good lawyer. The taxi was air-conditioned, but the traffic wasn’t bad at all.<\/p>\n
My reception was as anticipated, but now it’s after midnight and I am using my own laptop connecting to the Internet via telephone modem. I never could have imagined today’s events, so it’s a good thing I didn’t post last night’s pre-written account. “One never knows, do one?”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A mini journalism scandal erupted not long ago when a sports reporter wrote a story about a game he didn’t attend – I don’t remember the details because frankly I thought two things: 1) it was a minor infraction from a well-respected writer and it did not involve any intended deception or fabrication. I think … Continue reading “Summer in the City”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-75","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-writing-life"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=75"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=75"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=75"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.devradowrite.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=75"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}