Looking from the kitchen into the living room, through the massive limestone arches supporting www.ourhouseinfrance.com: my writing desk is against the back wall, which is part of the old ramparts. Today's work: a communications audit for a U.S. community foundation. Tomorrow's work: preparing to train a large state university system how to write the cases for a $1 billion campaign. It's so much nicer to work within a block of the vineyards.
And that's sometimes my inspiration.
For note pads I use Levenger pads, what the company calls Notationery. It has faintly printed boxes at the top of each perforated sheet: for topic, date, file under, and page. It has a narrow left-hand vertical column for making annotations. And it comes in a variety of colors. I started with legal yellow. That's still my default. But I also have a deep tint of robin's-egg blue and a pale flour cream that reminds me of something personal and secret. I write better on these note pads. I do all my outlines on note pads, where I can brainstorm freely with a pen.
The other place I get note pads is a southern French city called Montpellier. We have a house 45 minutes from there. Montpellier has a distinguished botanical garden, just reopened; its gate to the old city center is a miniature Arc de Triomphe; the first medical school in medieval Europe started here, in part because it was a Mediterranean port and close to the Arab world, where medicine was far advanced in the Middle Ages; it is the European headquarters of IBM; it is a conspicuously young city -- if you are a 20-something or 30-something and want to feel in the majority, like this world is your world, go to Montpellier. The clothes shopping there for women is superlative. And it's better than average for men; but you have to hunt. I bought a pair of dress boots there never seen outside France; they're made by an old (and small) French ski boot company.
But I digress. In the middle of 'ancien" Montpellier is Trait (see www.ourhouseinfrance.com for this and other shopping opportunities; under "day trips"). Trait is an branch of a Parisian company that makes custom note pads, and other paper and stationery related supplies. Trait (24, rue de l' Aiguillerie, 04 67 02 79 54) is down a narrow alley with a lot of other intriguing shops. We always drop a hundred euros there, buying beautiful notebooks, pens, handmade paper, gifts, weird greeting cards. Oh: go. Just a block away is the world's most delightful and curious toy store; absolutely one of a kind.
Calgary, May 7, Simone and I present to the AFP chapter.
Night before, Tony and Erna Myers host a home-cooked cedar-planked salmon feast and St. Mary's University MA in Philanthropy and Development reunion.
Is demon prankster Guy Mallabone North America's best college fundraiser? He's doing amazing things at SAIT. Inquiring minds want to know: What is Lorie showing Candace?
Holding on. I now have 13 versions of All Along the Watchtower on my iPod. For every occasion.
This was my worst air trip yet. And that includes the puke-inducing migraines and the drunk Brit episode.
On the second leg of our journey to Winnipeg for a speaking engagement, Simone, my co-presenter, realized she'd left her U.S. passport behind. The airline would not board her for Canada, citing potential $50,000 fines. The U.S. consul in Winnipeg tried to intervene. The airline refused. Simone headed in tears for the O'Hare Hilton. I boarded for Winnipeg.
My true destination? Panic. I had three hours of material for a six-hour gig.
Happy ending though. YAY! United pulled through. Simone's passport arrived via cockpit express at O'Hare early next morning. She landed in Winnipeg a little after noon. The Winnipeggers (yay, Leslie!) performed like a precision drill team: urgent cell phones, racing car rides, the lot. Simone strode in to applause and took up her duties. Brilliant, too. Top of her game.
Okay.
Yet somehow .... leaving Canada, dragging my luggage around downtown Winnipeg, merrily photographing Nutty Club signs (from a certain view, the mascot did look deranged), already late for the plane, I picked up traces of explosive materials.
Security detained me. A deliberate, skeptical bunch they were. The pat-down was so intimate and frank that he and I really should have married (sigh). Simone was dancing from one foot to the other. Volcanologists know the signs. She kept trying out her objections on me. She's a hater: of bureaucracy, of poor management.
"Oh, please, my honey," I'd whisper, "please don't say that." We boarded frantically at the very last moment. I'd departed her in Chicago. She was fully prepared to depart me in Winnipeg. "Let's go home." We both said it.
Home in Rhode Island, where at this time of year the mating frogs sound like the bed springs of the metal gods, is where I discovered that the U.S. Transportation Security Adminstration (TSA), an arm of Homeland Security, for whom's mission I should be grateful, had slipped a note into my luggage, letting me know that, despite the Winnipeg rush, they'd been vigilant and rifled my unclean underwear. "To protect you and your fellow passengers, the TSA is required by law to inspect all checked luggage." The card said.
They'd yanked out my gloves. Packed on the chance that ambient Winnipeg's temperature fell below sufferable (it did not). TSA returned just one, you classic dipsh*ts. It was the left glove, my right-brained hand. Maybe it was a statement, from the sinistral side.
Do gloves exist to get lost? This particular pair was an indulgence, hand-stitched by a second-generation glovemaker in Millau, France; cost me around 90 euros; $135. What's the sound of one expensive glove clapping?
But then. Today, one of America's foremost charities phoned BEGGING for my help with a $500 million case. Which group has vowed to reverse global warming? I now know. Balance achieved. Lost gloves. Found cause.
Back in December, Marj McKinty emailed me, inviting me to speak at Lincoln, NE's 2008 "brand camp" for nonprofits. Her opening comment: "We're seeking Scheherazade." Who could resist? On my journey, I watched Ted Danson drink coffee in the Detroit airport. Marj met me at the Lincoln airport with fresh miniature daffodils. I speak today at noon, using Scheherazade as the frame tale for my stink bomb about donor communications ("Mostly bad. Mostly very bad."). Lincoln is a college town with a buzzing arts and dining district around the old train station. One landmark, shown in this photo: a remarkably-crafted bas relief mural, of just brick. Dinner recommendation: Lazlo's extra-friendly brewery (delicious oatmeal stout) and restaurant. UPDATE: Heading out, Marj took me by the state house, where her friend Ron gave us an insider's tour of the murals, the carvings, the last moments of Art Deco. The state house was finished debt-free during the Great Depression. Nebraska's constitution still requires a balanced budget; and this year's session obliged. Back in RI, my state of residence, different story: government fiddles while a $380 million deficit burns.
One advantage: writing a magazine food column for years: people jump in with both alligators when you say you enjoy delightful regional eats and drinks. Dragged me (smiling) thru four Memphis BBQ joints in 24 hours two years ago. Case at this point: Chatham Brewing, Chatham, NY. I showed interest. Hilary Dunne Ferrone, the wife of co-founder Mister Hilary Dunne Ferrone, brought me a "growler" of their prize-winning porter. A growler is a large bottle filled from the tap. I had an iced-down cooler in my car's trunk ("boot," English folk). For two days I rambled the buttocks of western New England, presenting workshops, while that growler floated in a melting ice storm. Today, Saturday, I drank, doing yard work in humid, unseasonal heat. GORGEOUS! A chocolate bar in every sip. And easy on the productivity. You could drink this all afternoon and still make progress.
My desk. I have two alarm signs. They originally dangled from chains in a factory or fire house; picked up at Ipso Facto, an antiques store in she-she farm town, Three Oaks, MI. An alarm sign dropped on a pile of reference matter means the project MUST BE WRITTEN TODAY!
