Glutens for Punishment

toasterWhat do men find so fascinating about toast being made? I admit it. I’m a man and I, like others of my gender, am spellbound by the utter stationary madness of a member of the bread family being heated until brown by red-hot metal strings. The toasting process involves just two dynamic acts: pushing the toast down, and the toast popping up when the toaster is good and ready to do so.

It is the period between pushing down and popping up that appear to capture the total attention of Y-chromosomal beings. Nowhere is this more apparent than at a hotel breakfast buffet or company cafeteria. Today, for example, a gentleman roughly the size of Nantucket Island quietly lowered two slices of whole wheat into the toaster, then planted himself in front of it with his Neptune-sized noggin’ and its nose and eyes bowed over the appliance close enough to also toast his flesh and liquify his retinas. Unfortunately, the display of not yet toasted breads was positioned above the toaster, meaning this oversized parcel of protoplasm posed an insurmountable obstacle for those hoping to grab a couple of slices to toast.

I attempted to lunge through the small space to his left that afforded me a slim shot at a bran muffin. I even tried a half-hearted, “excuse me” in hopes he’d break his deathstare into the bread-burning abyss to take a half a step to his right, but the spell was just too great.

By now the line behind him was growing with three more men desiring hot, browned bread waiting impatiently for their opportunity to remove themselves from the immediate world for four minutes as they slip into the trance provided by heat rising from their scorched rye.

Undaunted, I muttered in a stage whisper, “asshole!” which seemed to strike a chord, or at least a moment of self-awareness, causing the Human Haystack to break concentration just long enough for me to make my move and capture the muffin of my desire and quickly head for the cashier to make my escape.

But before I could get through the door, I heard the telltale “pop” of the beast’s bread emerging from the toaster. Unable to turn away I witnessed a grown man gently grab the wooden tongs, use them to extract his slices and place them on a styrofoam plate and put on a smile generally generated by an especially effective honeymoon or well-made muscatel. The other men waiting their turns eyed him with a combination of jealousy and respect, but knowing they were only a few four-minute cycles from their own crisp crust climax.

Almost Super

superbowl

There’s no place I’d rather not be than in attendance at a Super Bowl. However, I have no qualms at all about being close enough to the big game to create and embellish any number of anecdotes to unsuspecting victims. This is one of them.

The 2002 National Automobile Dealers Association’s annual convention was held in New Orleans at the precise moment when the highest number of drunks would be in the Crescent City–the confluence of Mardis Gras and Super Bowl week. Being the national auto writer for the Associated Press at the time, I was assigned to cover the NADA for the next four days.

I love New Orleans, but one must admit, it operates in its own universe. For instance, after my cab navigated through the French Quarter and was almost upended by revelers, I was deposited at my hotel on Royal Street. I still had an unrelated story to finish to make the morning deadline and thought it would be good to call room service for a burger and beer. I wasn’t particular about the beer and just asked for a “Bud.” The young lady taking my order paused, and in an embarrassed voice, apologized they didn’t have “Bud” but did have something called “Bud-weiser.” She was sweet so I agreed to try that. Tasted quite similar to “Bud.”

After a couple of days my editors tired of stories about car dealers and told me to cut my trip short. With 5 hours to kill before leaving for my flight I decided to walk the mile or so up Poydras Street to the Super Dome where the Super Bowl would be played the following Sunday. I figured there would be some sort of souvenir shop where I could buy some overpriced tchockes with “Super Bowl” printed on it, allowing me to boast I had “been” there.

I did find a store in an office building that was attached to the stadium by a footbridge. I purchased a couple of the t-shirts, one of which is pictured here. The other stuff was either ridiculously expensive or just stupid. I could see no need to spend over 100 bucks on a leather cowboy hat with the Super Bowl and NFL logos on it, or night light, match book or any number of glass and plastic containers with the sole purpose of conveying beer into one’s gullet. A t-shirt always works and at 20 bucks each I was fine with it.

From there I attempted to get closer to the dome and perhaps be lucky enough to get inside to sneak a peek at the field. However, despite being 6 days before the actual game, the super silver spaceship of a stadium had more security than Vladimir Putin’s bare chest. Concrete barriers, armed police, fences, cameras, signs warning you to not even entertain thoughts of breaching the imaginary line between “Super” and a life sentence in Super Max.

I quickly surmised instead of being appalled at the pop-up warzone created to protect a football game from being invaded by an enemy force of ball deflaters, I would embrace the experience, take it all in and delude myself into believing I had, in some way, wormed my way into close proximity to the big game for the mere price of two t-shirts.
And so, each Super Sunday I wear my now threadbare souvenir of Super Bowl XXXVI and each Super Sunday, just as members of my Tribe are encouraged when reading the story of Passover each year, I tell this tale, embellish it, enlarge it, make up a few details and embrace it, and toast my brush with Super-ness…with a Bud, or Budweiser, whichever is available.

A River Runs…down my arm

lettucewrapsAlmost every Friday our team goes out to lunch and we eat mostly things that will reduce the amount of time we spend on Earth. Big, fat, burgers with bacon and cheese on them, Philly cheesesteaks, gooey pizza with every meat that can find a seat on the greasy circle of mozzarella and marinara, all accompanied by the dynamic duo of duodenal distress: onion rings and fries.

The result is packing on the pounds until one’s pants pop in a desperate act of surrender, and the blood pressure cuff doesn’t bother to inflate as a show of contempt for our disgusting dietary habits.

But this week I began an earnest attempt to reverse the growth of my gross gut and strain on my bathroom scale by bringing a healthy lunch to work each day and avoiding the vending machine and any contents within called Kit Kat, Snickers or Twix. The real test would be this Friday’s lunch out with the gang, and I passed…but I’m here to tell you it came at a price.

I chose “Sesame Ginger Chicken Lettuce Wraps” from the restaurant’s “healthy choices” menu. I now realize that’s a euphemism for “disgusting and sloppy foods less desperate people avoid.”

My meal came with a little crock of something resembling, uh, nothing I’ve ever seen before. There were little stringy things, tiny chunks of chicken, shredded carrots, some tiny red squares that may either be red peppers, tomatoes or the scab from the server’s pimples, all swimming in what I’m guessing is a soy sauce the color of a palomino’s pubis. I only know that color because I grew up near Belmont Racetrack and rode my bike around the paddocks.

Accompanying this mess was another little crock with six tiny lettuce leaves. Ostensibly the idea was to spoon the gook in the first crock into a lettuce leaf, fold it up and eat it. Nice idea. Poor execution. The lettuce leaves were about the size of a Spanish doubloon and could not possibly be folded once they were stuffed with a spoonful of chickenstringystuffcarrotredsquaressoysaucemush. I folded it as much as I could and attempted to quickly push the thing into my mouth only to have half the stuffing leak out the other side causing a tributary of the River of Soy to run down my arm.

Annoyed, but hungry as hell, I shoved the leaf and whatever contents were left within, into my pie hole. I tried this again with the next lettuce leaf and again, the stuff squirted out the other end, threatening to emblazon my lunch partner to my right with the Brown Badge of Bad Luck. He was not amused and threatened to shove the remains of his absolutely delicious looking burger up my personal lettuce wrap.

When I had exhausted all six lettuce leaves, I still had half a crock of crap left and nothing to stuff it in. You can imagine my relief when my only alternative was to finish it with an actual fork, but by then the idea of eating healthy had completely lost its charm.

I was tempted to order a nice, big plate of tater tots and wash it down with a pint of Guinness. But I resisted. I’d come this far in a week, there was no way I was gonna blow it. Afterall, there’s always next Friday. .at Steak n’ Shake…they have a very nice salad menu. I think I just made myself laugh.

The Inside Story About Predicting the Outside Weather

Weathercasters take a beating all the time for screwing it up. They said it wouldn’t rain on the weekend, and there was a hurricane. They said the East Coast would be buried deeper than Jimmy Hoffa in an historic snowfall.  OK, some got buried, New York City didn’t, but they bitched about it anyway. “Hey! You said we were screwed and we didn’t get screwed! You screwed up!”

Many years ago I was, in fact, a TV weather guy and I’m here now to reveal some secrets of how this whole thing really works.

The first thing you have to know is that I knew nothing about the weather. To get the job as the weekend weather guy at KGUN in Tucson, Arizona, I took out at weather book from the library and memorized a few facts such as what those lines on a weather map that have either bumps or triangles on them mean. Hint. It doesn’t matter to the viewer.

For my audition, the news director told me to use the same map as the real weather guy. The problem was, the real weather guy was 6’2” and I was roughly two-thirds his size. That’s an issue when you’re using a 7-foot tall physical weather map made of aluminum. After acing the audition, I got the job, but I was so short, the station built me a platform so I could reach Montana at the top of the map.

My background was spinning records as a morning drivetime radio announcer, but I was told I landed the job because news directors thought radio guys were “good bullshitters who could ad lib, working without scripts.”

So how did I come up with my profound prognostications? Simple. We had a weather wire that spat out the weather map features and forecasts. All I had to do was get that all in my head and act like I made it all up once I got on the air.

Oh, I had no fancy graphics or satellite map or Doppler Radar, or even a weather vane. Just little magnetic raindrops and sunshines and L’s for low pressure systems and H’s for high pressure systems. The weather wire told me where to toss them on the metal map. I also had magnetic numbers for the various temperatures. One night, between the early and late shows, the studio crew got stoned and when I returned, I found all the temps changed. For example, the map now showed the temperature in Chicago at 32,271 degrees. Wow! Windy AND warm!

We had a Native American cameraman who carried a hunting knife. When I predicted rain for the weekend he flashed the blade at me with threatening eyes while I was on the air. OK, well, maybe it’s only a 10 percent chance of rain. Put the damn knife away!

My big and tall predecessor who had been a TV weather guy for 25 years and was about to retire, gave me some important advice. “Make the shit look convincing and toss in a technical term every once in awhile to make them think you know what you’re talkin’ about.” His favorite was the acronym, CAVU, which stood for “ceiling and visibility unlimited.” Fancy pants for clear skies. I did toss it in a few times but after that I was outta bullets.

If you look at this video of one of my weathercasts, at the very top you’ll see “Associate Member of the American Meteorological Society” on the screen below my name. How did I earn that lofty title? I tossed a check for 25 bucks in the mail and sent it to the AMS and that bought me the right to stick that instant credibility on the screen.

Sometimes I got it wrong. Very wrong. Maybe I read the weather wire wrong. One day a guy from a local sub shop called and said my 6-foot sub was ready. I told him I didn’t order one. He insisted the giant sandwich was ordered in my name. Turns out it was a pissed off viewer who didn’t like the fact that I said it would be nice on Sunday and it rained on his family picnic.  Nice prank. I lost two viewers. The wet picnicker and the PO’d sub guy.

So you see, weather’s a tough game. Not everyone is up to the task. Indeed, we decided to audition some lovely aspiring actresses to do the weather on the weekends. One flustered babe looked at the map during her auditioned and proclaimed, “Well..Looks like there are L’s! Those indicate the Left side of the map!” When the director asked what the H’s stood for, she proudly announced, “Hot, silly!”  Maybe she’s the one who predicted NYC would be buried.

A Flyover on the Wall

flyoverIt was somewhere over Iowa that I started paying attention to the screen in front of me showing my flight’s location. At what point, I wondered, did we enter “flyover” territory–the fairly arrogant term East/West coasters use for the area of the country between the coasts you wouldn’t think of actually landing, and, golly, find something worthy of their sophistication to do.

So having several hours to kill before landing in San Francisco I started thinking about the nation’s midsection and what I might have missed had I always flown over, and never landed in it.

Permit me a fond recollection that dates back to 1974. I had never seen the Mississippi River, or any place actually, west of Buffalo. My wife had seen it all. I had a week off from my $1.85/hour radio DJ job in Fulton, NY. This would be our first vacation since our wedding in September, 1973 and I asked my wife if we could drive to the Mighty Mississippi and back in a week. She assured me we could.

We hit the road and in short order I got my first glimpse of Ohio and the great city of Cleveland. I had hair that reflected the times and my age and the clerk at the first motel we attempted to stay in promptly refused me on the grounds that I looked like a creep.

After finding a more open-minded hotelier we hit Columbus, Cincinnati, and Louisville in short order. No money or time to do much so we quickly drove around Churchill Downs wondering what it would be like to attend the Kentucky Derby. From there we crossed into Indiana and became hopelessly lost. Somehow we ended up in Tell City, IN, then Hawesville, KY. A strong wind across the flat farmlands promptly blew my side view mirror off our awesome white Rambler. Eventually we found our way and the great Gateway Arch poked its apex over the horizon, providing a prominent trailmarker to our destination, and feeling almost weepy at seeing the Mississippi at last as we crossed into St. Louis.

We again faced the challenge of finding lodging, only this time it was due to a long parade of “no vacancy” signs. A room was finally secured at a high rise in suburban Clayton where we dumped our things and headed back to town to catch a Cardinals game in what was then, the modern, total ’70’s circle, Busch Stadium. They were playing the hated Reds and we saw Pete Rose, whom 16 years later, would slam me into a wall when I asked him a tough question just before he was bounced from baseball.

As I mentioned, we had little money, so we took the first tour of the Budweiser brewery the next morning and slurped as much free swill as we could before moving on to Illinois where we made surgical strikes in Springfield to see Abe Lincoln’s grave and Chicago where we drove around the Loop and headed back east.

We noticed the Kelloggs factory in Battle Creek, MI was an easy detour off the Indiana Toll road and guessed, correctly, they’d give us free cereal. Sure enough, “Request Packs” was given to us after a fascinating tour watching Corn Flakes made by mashing corn grits to smithereens between two gigantic rollers.
Then it was the home stretch back to Oswego, NY where we lived, via Detroit, Canada and Niagara Falls, where we pulled up to parking space, looked over at the falling water and got back in the car because we had no coins for the parking meters.

After a lifetime, to that point, of being a fairly sheltered New Yorker who thought the western border of the U.S. was the Hudson River and nothing north of the Catskill Mountains matter, it was a geographic and cultural coming of age for me. From that day on, I appreciated what lay between the coasts, the marvel of the Rocky’s, the kindness of the people, the variety of the vittles, and the cornucopia of customs and routines.  As a reporter I covered everything from natural disasters, plane crashes, trials, politics, crimes, sports, most times meeting people who opened my eyes to points of view, to courage, to mystery, to incredible sadness and misery, music, humor, triumph and joy.

Flyover country? Not at all. That IS the country.

MLK Day-The Reluctant Holiday

One Monday in January, 2002 I showed up for work at the Associated Press at my regular time, not completely sure why I was able to find a better parking space than usual but grateful. Before I could reach my desk the shift supervisor intercepted me and with amusement in her eyes asked what I was doing in the office.

“Uh…Monday,” was all I could muster.

“Uh, MLK Day,” she replied. “You get a choice of off days. MLK Day or your birthday. So who’s birthday you going to celebrate?”

“Mine, I guess,” and I hightailed back to my car, giving up my awesome parking space.

During the 30 minute drive home, I was a bit ashamed that MLK Day just wasn’t on my radar…that it was an optional holiday per the union agreement. His birthday or yours. Didn’t matter. You get a day off.  Never crossed my mind. It should have. Not only because I grew up in the 60’s, was 100 percent aware of, and in awe of, his courage and accomplishments, recall with great clarity hearing the bulletin announcing his assassination, but because 15 years earlier, I was assigned to cover the very first MLK Day in his hometown of Atlanta for CNN.

But as I reported in the story attached here, MLK Day faced a volume of struggles in direct proportion to the challenges Dr. King faced in life. Bigotry, small-mindedness, ignorance. Indeed, there seems to be a take it or leave it attitude. Your birthday or his…which day do you want off? Doesn’t matter. Pick one.

Don’t get me wrong. There are many wonderful events commemorating Dr. King’s birthday including the annual “United We Walk” march in my community in suburban Detroit, and many, many others across the country.

I remember covering those first MLK Day activities from Dr. King’s church, on the street where the Martin Luther King Jr. Center for Non-Violent Social Change sits, where Dr. King is buried. On a map it’s called Auburn Avenue. In the hearts of those who respect Dr. King’s work, it’s called Sweet Auburn.

I interviewed all sorts of people including Rev. Joseph Lowery, head of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, and Dr. King’s widow, Coretta. She exuded peacefulness, forgiveness and strength.

Jesse Jackson and Rev. Robert Schuller were there. Perhaps caught up in the moment I breathlessly reported to the CNN assignment desk “the civil rights movement has been revived! I can’t wait to turn this package!”

All the air out of my balloon was expelled when the editor told me to just do a VO/SOT. That’s TV language for some video for the anchor to voice over and a soundbite. Don’t even write a full-length piece.  Being in the Deep South, I took what’s known down there as a hissy fit. The editor thought I was just a reporter having a tantrum. I was beyond frustrated, but had no recourse but to carry out my assignment.

So there it was. From the first MLK Day to today, 28 years later, the annual remembrance of the birth of this giant of the civil rights movement, who risked his life, and lost it, fighting for common human decency and fairness, still seems to be an afterthought. A welcome three-day weekend. Three at last.

Your birthday or his. Pick one. Do yourself a favor. Choose both. Your life is better because he was born.

Motor City Gladness

route95Some auto thoughts and recollections coming off another smashing media preview week at the North American International Auto show.

I had a friend in high school named Neil. He owned a brand new light green Pontiac TransAm, while I drove a ’62 Pontiac Tempest my dad bought for $25. No one loved my Tempest. Everyone loved Neil’s TransAm. One night, a bunch of us who were admitted “Neil’s TransAm Disciples,” gathered in his driveway and watched him install a set of Thrush mufflers that gave the car at least 5 extra sets of balls when Neil nailed the accelerator. Only Neil was allowed to nail the accelerator, or touch the steering wheel or deem to sit within the holy walls of of Neil’s TransAm…without Neil’s permission, of course. Besides, it had a white almost-leather interior and who needed the mortification of marring the chemically-produced cloud?

Honestly, I never gave much thought about cars after the gang scattered to universities across the country.
My first new car was a groovy red, 1974 Chevy Vega, which went through three transmissions in the three miserable years I owned it. Many years later, as the GM beat reporter for The Detroit News, I interviewed a union officer at the Lordstown, Ohio plant that produced my red lemon. He said to me “You owned a Vega? Well on behalf of all the men and women here at Lordstown, we sincerely apologize!”

As you can plainly see, I was less than an automotive aficionado…otherwise I might have settled on a Gremlin or Pacer, the Vega’s partners in the 1970’s Triad of Dreck.
My automotive ambivalence changed drastically when CNN transferred me from Atlanta to Detroit to be the bureau chief and correspondent there. Back then the bureau was in the basement of the PBS station, WTVS, two blocks from the former General Motors headquarters. I was told Ted Turner directed the bureau be located there because he wanted to be close to the biggest company in the biggest, most important industry in the country.

My education into the auto industry was swift and brutal. I was sent to interview Ford’s chief numbers cruncher for a sales story. He was three months from retirement and didn’t suffer newbies lightly.
“Sit your ass down, listen to what I say, learn from it and don’t ask any stupid questions. Got that?” How could I not?

I actually found the men and women of this great industry to be very understanding about my learning curve and as long as I didn’t act like a cocky dipshit, they were happy to help my learn the ropes.

Indeed, there I was, in a conference room with the great Lee Iacocca at Chrysler’s old Highland Park, MI headquarters. He strided into the room with a big cigar, handed the big, wet thing to his PR guy, shook my hand, smiled and asked “what’s on your mind?”
Yeah, I was starstruck because I had just read his memoirs before moving up north.
I told him I was new, and apologized if my questions seemed simple or naiive.
He gave me another big smile and said, “don’t shit your pants, ask me anything you like and I’ll make it easy for you…and welcome to Detroit.”

That was 1989. This is now. Detroit’s always been welcome to me and my family and I can’t think of a reason to hop in my jet black Jeep Wrangler Moab Edition and leave.

2015 North American International Auto Show Days 1 and 1.5-Tiny Tomatoes to Topless Spiders

This year’s auto show was a blend of little tomatoes presented on pedestals, big vehicle introductions and dawn patrol scrums.

 

IMG_1972Being a major auto show, let’s tackle the tomatoes first. Here you see teeny tiny tomatoes perched on diminutive pedestals begging always grazing reporters to pluck them…and eat them. In what appeared to be the comestible version of Lilliput, the tomato-tots were joined by sandwiches small enough to be plucked, shucked and swallowed in one motion.

What miniature meal would be complete without a first course. Voila, spoon-sized salads so small one could only top it with Two-And-A-Half Island dressing.IMG_1969

 

 

 

 

 

 

As I moved on I found some journalists thoroughly involved…in themselves…socializing by being anti-social, but not alone.

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One poor guy just gave up altogether, surrendering to the rigors of covering an expansive motor show by collapsing in one of the manufacturer’s stands—an import, of course.

IMG_1975

 

 

 

 

 

 

Indeed, our company energized the crowd buzzed on free espresso and granola bars with the Alfa Romeo 4C Spider. I mean, you can’t beat curvy..and topless.

spider

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Ram Rebel didn’t cause any of the journos to yell, except those who might have missed their chance to snag more than one press kit. I can’t wait to blast Billy Idol and annoy those next to me at stop lights.rebel

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

IMG_1982When the big boss takes a walk on the floor a scrum immediately materializes even if it’s 7:15 in the morning. A reporter clutched his coffee while in the clutches of the group hug aimed at getting him to say what he said yesterday, only this time, to them.

 

We’ll do this all again in a few weeks in Chicago, the next stop on the domestic auto show circuit. New badges, new wristbands, new vehicles, new shrimp, new blisters. Can’t wait.

2015 North American International Auto Show Day 1/2

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There it is. My one-hand, handcuff for the next two days. Together with my surfboard sized credential a security guard will permit me passage onto the show floor of the 2015 North American International Auto Show.

Permit me a tangent. I pray endlessly for a slave to type “North American International Auto Show” for me. Thank you.

Anyway, having passed this two-pronged security protocol I was allowed to make my way toward my company’s area by hopping over dozens of planks of plywood, darting around forklifts that appeared to be driven by former polo players, tripping over half-laid carpeting, breathing in three or four hundred cubic feet of propane exhaust giving me awesome powers of circumventing the annoyance of longevity, and
avoiding a head-on collision with a journalist attempting to walk, take a selfie and shake a guy’s hand simultaneously, while accepting a breath mint.

Thought it would be fun to take a few photos of our stand being set up and post them on the company Facebook page. After taking 8 shots I heard a sound getting closer that was either a mule-deer pursuing the love of his life…or a Cobo Hall security guard. Yes, they sound that much alike. Alas, it was a gentleman in blue waving his hands hollering, “no photos!” I smiled and explained I’m a PR guy from the company. “Well, no problem, then,” he said as he smiled and walked away. Then it dawned on me he never asked for ID or proof of my employment. I might have tried that at the Chevy stand but I try to be a wiseass maybe only two times a day.

Since it was setup day there’s no free food around the floor, preventing me from grazing like a Costco shopper lunching off free samples. I decided to try the new food court. It looks a bit like smaller version of a food court in a mall, without the screaming kids or a Manchu Wok. The pizza looked good..deep dish..so I stepped up to the counter. “What?” asked the clerk. “Pepperoni,” I grunted back. The young lady gives me a look that says “no crap, that’s the only kind we have,” and just wiggles her index finger over the squares of grease apparently begging me to choose one. So I wiggled my finger back and she seemed to get the message. $9.32 later for one slice of index finger wiggle pizza and a bottle of Vernors, I sat down at one of the stylish Formica tables. First bite? The pizza was colder than Putin’s heart. Oh! Silly me! I didn’t realize they were selling FROZEN pizza! Ah!

Well Monday and Tuesday the free food will be flowing, rendering the Food Court adjourned. More tomorrow.

In fact, you DO need those stinkin’ badges…and a wristband too!

My first credential to the North American International Auto show was just a thin piece of paper with my name and “CNN” clearly typed on it. You shoved the thing in a plastic holder and wore it around your neck for three days. It was fine. More than sufficient. A security guard or someone who thought they knew you but forgot they didn’t who needed to see your name and affiliation, could.  The paper badge swingin’ from the top of your spine did the trick to get you in the door and that was that.

That was 1990.

IMG_1945It didn’t take long before something that was simple and functional was replaced by something else that was small and hard to read. It was a little plastic badge like the server at a Big Boy might wear, or a sales clerk at the feed store. The pitiful plastic thing hung on a flimsy chain that froze your neck every time the forklift drivers left open the giant doors to the loading docks, allowing polar blasts to permeate the show floor. Nevertheless, you wore the badge, you got past the security guards so you could do your job.

Well..not quite that simple. One year they stuck a “VIP” ribbon onto my badge. Well..I was a network guy so why the hell not? But then a blowhard from a local affiliate whose ego needed a building permit noticed his badge didn’t have the ribbon. “Why do you have a ribbon?” he bellowed at me. “Because I don’t suck,” was my only reasonable response. “Harrumph!” was his best reply. “I’m going to force them to give me a ribbon!”  Tough. Local boy didn’t get the ribbon. Just wasn’t a VIP, I guess. My best guess is the person at the credentials desk just pegged him as boastful moron.

IMG_1944The ribbon disappeared after that year and local boy shared the same media credential as every other reporter and there was peace in the land.  As a sign of progress, large credentials, the size of standup paddle boards were created. One could read a person’s name and affiliation from Philly. But for some reason, that wasn’t quite enough to proved to the dour security guards you were cool, so a second level of validation was created…a plastic wristband!  Now one needed to present the proper credential, and a wristband, all of the proper color, to be allowed entrance onto the auto show floor. If you cut off the wristband at the end of the day, you had to wait again at a special desk to get a new one.

Now some reporters and industry people would receive the ultimate symbol they were important by finding a lovely lapel pin with the auto show logo and their name etched in it. I don’t know what the criteria for getting the pin is, but when I worked for CNN I got one. When I didn’t…I didn’t. All I do know is when a pin-able person sports the thing the pin refusniks are very jealous and say things like, “Oh, nice pin. You must be special. I must be trash even though I’ve been covering this show for 25 years.”

Some auto shows don’t put any effort at all into their credentials. One major show gives you the paper badge and a holder, but, psych, no lanyard from which to attach the thing to your body. You can clip the thing to your pocket but you find yourself bending over all day picking it up off the floor and a reporter with a plate of handout shrimp trips over your ass, losing most of his seafood swag.

Should be a fun show this year. I have my giant badge, holder and a lanyard. But boy, I wish I had that VIP ribbon.