Setting the record straight: Lies I told The PG

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My friends at the bar had sporting fun over this excellent article all about me and my book that appeared in yesterday’s Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.

“I must congratulate you,” one said, “on nurturing this conceit that you’re some tremendous humanitarian for the purposes of hocking your book.”

I thanked him for the spice his sarcasm adds to my day.

But he’s correct. The flattering article makes me seem like one of the world’s greatest guys, a generous and caring man whose every motivation is the well being of his fellow man.

How’d this happen?

Well, I’m the story’s only source and budgetary necessities have laid waste to newspaper fact-checking departments.

So if a reporter asks me what kind of guy I am, sure, I’m going to say I’m a real sweetheart. Happily, I have a cheerful book out there that supports the contention.

It would be fun to see what a real warts ‘n’ all portrait of me would say. But no reputable news organization would bother to undertake the task and my wife’s too busy to do it herself, thank God.

And, geez, would that be a best-seller with the boys at the bar.

But I thought I would try and balance the perception by giving the honest version of the 19-question “Snapshot” that accompanied the print version of the story.

I’ve never been asked these questions with the understanding they’d receive a wide readership. But I think anyone who’s ever seen the profile of a Playboy Playmate of the Month has put themselves in their shoes -- if they’re even wearing shoes -- and asked themselves how they’d answer.

Like, “That’s odd, my turn offs are traffic, bad breath and rude people, too. I think me and Miss March might really it it off!”

These questions aren’t as easy as they look because they all tempt you to lie a little.  You want people to think you’re cool and fun so they’ll buy your book or maybe invite you to a party full of interesting folks.

So I’ll set the record straight here with my actual answer and the true answer, where it applies.

• Age: 50

True. I flinched just a bit when I wrote it. Would people be more impressed if I’d answered 29? Strangers would, but you can’t lie on the age question.

• Hometown: Raised in Mt. Lebanon; now lives in Latrobe.

True. In Pittsburgh, Mt. Lebanon connotes privilege and as I’ve mentioned before, it’s a fact I used to dodge. No more. I’m proud of where I’ve been and where I’m at. I love it here in Latrobe and we’re not going anywhere.

• Education: Bachelor’s Degree, Ohio University.

True. Lots of people like to pad their resumes in this regard. Not me. Being a Bobcat is one of my most proud attributes. It’s where I learned to drink responsibly whenever I should and irresponsibly whenever I can. It’s where I became who I am. Go Bobcats!

• Family: Wife, Valerie; daughters Josie, 12 and Lucy, 6.

True.

• What’s important: Family and fun.

True, in the broadest sense. It’s a tricky question. Because I’ll catch hell from all quarters if I put “Staying on my bartender’s good side.” So I gave the safe answer. You see a lot of people who put “God” in there, first even. Sorry, God, but I wasn’t going to do that. Hope you understand.

• First job: Newspaper carrier for the Pittsburgh Press.

True. Not a traditional job. Should I have put pizza maker? No. Delivering newspapers was such a great job for a kid. Sorry it’s not around anymore.

• When you were a kid, you wanted to: Skip School

True and a genius answer. I thought about putting astronaut or ball player, but I remember some of my happiest childhood memories occurred when I was skipping school. But I became so enamored with this answer it became a detrimental influence to several of the following questions.

• Hobbies: Reading, golf, recreational tavern time at The Pond in Latrobe.

Mostly true. I love to read and golf, but crafting a way to include my bar hobby, which I had to do, is a lie. Recreational tavern time? What the hell does that mean? Putting “drinking beer for a couple hours every other day or so,” makes me sound like a drunk. The honest answer would be “drinking,” but there’s so much more to it -- laughing, watching sports -- that I felt the dodgy “recreational tavern time” would work. Plus, that gave me a chance to mention Dave’s bar and that pleased him, which I’m always happy to do. The world will be a better place when convivial men and women like me can say, “I like to drink!” without crabby folks getting all judgmental. 

• What’s playing on your TV: “Breaking Bad” re-runs.

Partially true. It’s our favorite and the one we’ll watch over and over. But we also love “Justified,” and “Homeland.” Our lunch routine includes “The Price Is Right!” Showcase Showdown followed by classic “Hawaii Five-0” reruns. I picked “Breaking Bad” because I thought it was the one that would make me appear most cool and, remember, that’s the motivation behind each and every answer, true or false.

• What’s playing on your iPod: Mark Knopfler, Van Morrison, Todd Snider, Joe Ely.

One-quarter true. According to my iTunes play count, my top five most played songs are Mark Knopfler, Mark Knopfler, Mark Knopfler, Ray Davies and Bob Dylan. The first Van Morrison song doesn’t come until 15 and is preceded by more songs from Knopfler and ones by Stephen Bruton, Alan Jackson and the Rolling Stones. Snider and Ely don’t appear until well into the hundreds, so clearly I was calculating including them would appear cool. And I do love them. Josie asked me the other day who my favorite band was. I told her it depends on my mood. Then I went on to bore her with a 20-minute discourse on how much music means to me (she stopped even pretending to listen after two minutes). It’s an issue I plan to blog about soon, but the essence was I’m glad I’m not one of those people who can blurt out one name and be done with it. Music matters so much more than that. Honestly, I’ll take anyone of the four I mentioned with me on the deserted island.

• Fantasy dinner date: Bill Clinton

False. I love Clinton, but the word “fantasy” makes this a difficult answer. For me fantasy includes nudity and I don’t want to see Bubba in the buff. I suppose my fantasy dinner date would be Rachel McAdams. She’s the perfect combo of sweet and sexy. Many guys try and score points by answering, “My darling wife.” I wasn’t going to do that because Val would know I was bullshitting, just as she would if she put, “My aristocratic and refined husband.” Her fantasy dinner date? The girl who plays Michonne on “Walking Dead,” a woman she once described on Facebook as “dreamy,” which still freaks the hell out of me.

• Who would play you in a movie about your life: Matthew Broderick.

False. This is where the “skip school” answer again rears its head. Someone about 30 years ago said I looked like Broderick, so there is some ancient validity to the answer. But again with “cool” as my lighthouse, I answered him because I thought people would think of “Ferris Bueller” and perpetuate the conceit about me being this carefree hipster who writes self-help books about happiness. It’s a tough question. A great answer would have been Fred Flintstone.

• Guilty pleasure: Playing hookie to watch Pirate baseball.

False. I love doing this, but I feel no guilt about it whatsoever. I suppose I should have answered splurging on sushi without my wife knowing about it, but then she’d read about it and I’d feel truly guilty. She reads about one out of four of my blogs and I’m hoping she’s skipping this one.

• Favorite spot in the whole world: Bitter End Yacht Club, Virgin Gorda, British Virgin Islands.

False, but only because I’ve been fortunate enough to visit some great places. The butt-kissy answer is “At home in front of the fire with my darling family and our stupid dog!” I almost put Lake Louise in the Canadian Rockies, or New Orleans. But Val and I did have a great vacation at B.E.Y.C. and it’s obscure enough to boost my cool factor, I think.

• If you had to do it all over again, you would: “Be more contemptuous of all authority.”

False. I took a lot of advice from more elderly idiots throughout my life, but that’s all part of growing up. No, if I was honest I’d have said something about screwing more babes before I got married. I had an old-fashioned view of integrity that kept me from cheating on girls who probably wouldn’t have really cared. But how would it have looked if I’d have answered: “More sex with bimbos!” Honest, but not cool.

• Proudest moment so far: “Authoring a widely rejected self-published book that is showing signs it has a chance of being a sensation.”

False. I’m hopeful about the book, but it’s too early to say I’m proud. I’m proud of our daughters and my marriage, but nobody wants to read about that. Plus, I was running out of questions and wanted to hype the book some more.

• What’s on your bucket list: “Go another 20 years without having a job and somehow parlaying that into an actual job.”

False. A real whopper. Please! Please! Please, someone give me a job! Any job! I’d love to have a job that paid well, offered benefits, and had boss who was appreciative of my skills, one that rewarded me with influence and prestige.

I guess that’s on your bucket list, too.

Related . . .

• Chris is an honest guy: agree, disagree

Don't ever say don't ever change

I sent in my $60 high school reunion registration fee and in 23 days will show up with multiple scores to settle.

I’ve for 30 years bore a grudge against the people who were once my very best friends, the ones who taught me all I know about laughter and friendship.

Today I resent them.

Why?

I’m the guy who never changed.

It’s scribbled in there all over my 1981 Mt. Lebanon (Pa.) High School yearbook: “Don’t ever change!”

Well, by God, I didn’t. And it’s been my ruin.

The high school reunion is a pivotal take-stock milestone. We look at our hairlines, our wrinkles, our midriffs and we time travel back to when we were all trim, beautiful and bubbling with enthusiasm about our rosy futures.

And, inevitably, we look at who we were and what we’ve become.

Today some of us are respected bankers, prestigious attorneys and celebrated educators.

People will embarrass these accomplished classmates by saying, “Tom! I remember you with that bowl haircut and those dorky glasses. And now look at you! Handsome in a tailored suit. I can hardly believe you’re the same guy who spent his whole junior year with his finger jammed up his nose!”

Tom will show he’s matured in other ways too by refraining from punching the uncouth lout in the kisser like he’ll surely deserve.

I confess I’m feeling a little anxious about attending. Not because I’ve become some sort of disgrace or have let myself really go to hell. No, my anxieties are symptomatic of my whole affliction.

I still get nervous around grown-ups.

I’ll hear some of them expertly conversing about the global economic upheavals, about college endowments and ground-breaking pharmaceuticals they’re helping to market.

Overhearing any of these cerebral discussions will be to drive me to the distant wall (the one nearest the bar).

Just like high school, I’ll be the guy in the back of the class giggling at all the fart jokes.

Is that anyway to go through life?

It began to dawn on me that I’ve never changed when a good friend’s mother told me her son had told her I’d never changed.

And I haven’t.

In many ways, my job description is exactly the same as it was when I was a paperboy and was paid to deliver stories.

The real shame is my income is roughly equivalent to what it was when I was a paperboy, too.

Informing people what I do for a living is always tricky for me. It often changes from week to week.

Some weeks I’m a bona fide author. That’s when I’m pitching book proposals and having discussions with editors and agents about the viability of my latest pipe dream.

Next week I’ll be a magazine writer again. I’ll be interviewing Arnold Palmer for about the 50th time. That tends to impress so I may go with that. Being quasi buddy-buddy with AP is one of the coolest things that’s happened to me since graduation.

Travel writer works, too. I’m doing two or three travel stories a week for msnbc.com and that sounds like a real job, even when most of the stories can be done by phone.

I hope to God I don’t blurt out “Blog!” when someone asks me what I do. I probably feel more like a professional blogger than anything else these days but everyone knows blogging doesn’t pay squat so they’ll burst out laughing and continue to laugh until they decide it’s time to give me a wedgie.

And, boy, will that take me back.

So how’ve I changed since high school? I weigh about 30 pounds more than I used to, am more hairy in some places and less hairy in others, and I don’t need to ask anyone if I can have the car on Friday night.

And I drink on school nights without having to produce a fake ID.

What happened?

I never changed. I remember being very happy in high school so it seemed like good advice.

In so many ways I guess I’m still a pretty happy little kid. And there’s a lot to be said for going through life happy as a high schooler.

If your old classmates were signing your year book today, would they urge you to remain the same or would they write, “Change! Now! Please!”

If it's the latter, come see me.

We should talk.

Move nation's capital to central Kansas

In 2005, I launched a movement to, for reasons social and financial, relocate our nation’s capital from Washington, D.C., to Lebanon, Kansas, the exact geographic center of our polarized nation.

Five years later as the 112th Congress convenes, not much has changed. We are still mired in gridlock and my many grand movements are still met with reactions ranging from indifference to ridicule.

But one thing has changed.

Today I can blog about it!

So here’s the story I submitted to various prestigious publications in 2005. No one saw the merits of my genius. In fact, I don’t remember anyone even responding.

Perhaps you’ll appreciate the merits of the suggestion. If so, please feel free to share the story with friends and any influential legislators.

And here’s a tip: you might be wise to start buying real estate in Lebanon while it’s still cheap.

Here’s the story, dated and typically error-ridden as it may be . . .

The Beltway gridlock has the nation mired in another series of seemingly insoluble problems. From saving social security to excessive fuel costs, the politicians we look to for creative leadership appear incapable of divining the answers that will move America forward.

That’s why it’s time to think outside the box or, more precisely, outside the Beltway.

It’s time to relocate the nation’s capital to Lebanon, Kansas, the geographic center of the contiguous United States.

Sound preposterous? The Founding Fathers didn’t think so.

Washington, D.C., became the nation’s capital because its location was a logical compromise for legislators who’d have to ride horses and bone-rattling buggies over terrible roads for long distances. The shores of the Potomac made perfect sense 214 years ago when our infant nation of just 13 states clung to the east coast. But even as manifest destiny pushed our population ever westward, our capital’s location has remained stump stubborn while the country moved farther and farther away from it.

Consider the majority of our illustrious state houses. When given opportunities to settle in more renown marquee cities like St. Louis or Chicago, Missouri and Illinois bestowed capital status on the centralized, if unremarkable burgs of Jefferson City and Springfield. Same goes for capitals in lunch bucket towns like Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, Columbus, Ohio, and Lansing, Michigan.

The move would spark an immediate and enormous savings in congressional travel expenses. Gas prices would plummet. Taxes could be slashed.

Better still, the move would instigate the purification of a political process that seems irrevocably poisoned in swampy old Washington.

When the conservative stalwart Wall Street Journal savaged Republican Majority leader Tom DeLay for a series of alleged ethical lapses, it seemed to imply the fault wasn’t DeLay’s inability to tell right from wrong, but instead stemmed from a foul-smelling infection thriving inside the Beltway incubator.

“In Beltway-speak, what this means is that Mr. DeLay has an ‘odor;’ nothing too incriminating, nothing actually criminal, just an unsavory whiff that could have GOP loyalists reaching for the political Glade if it gets any worse. The Beltway wisdom is right. Mr. DeLay does have odor issues. Increasingly, he smells just like the Beltway itself.”

The Journal makes Washington sound like a fraternity house where prudent guests wipe their feet on the way out.

All of which brings us to bucolic Lebanon, Kansas. For those who think there is no center in our polarized political world, it’s time to consult a map. You’ll find Lebanon, pop. 273, at the exact center. That only 273 out of 308 million Americans can lay claim to true centrality points out the scope of the problem.

No politician in the past 30 years has won high office by boasting of being a Washington-insider. That little conceit will end when we move the capital to Lebanon.

“You can’t get much more outside than Lebanon,” says city clerk Connie Herndon. “We’re 60 miles from the nearest Wal-Mart.”

Yes, utter desolation. Congress will be free from the pesky distractions of Gucci-hooved lobbyists, $700 wine-drenched dinners at The Palms, and the comely hookers, mistresses and interns who’ve reduced so many would-be statesmen into fondling fathers. What does Lebanon offer?

“Nothing. Absolutely nothing,” Herndon says. “It’s a farm community of old farmers who work during the day and stay in at night. The only thing that qualifies as entertainment is a local choral group who gets together and sings patriotic songs.”

Hmmm. Sounds like red meat for a Red State.

“Well, the year before they sang popular songs from the ‘60s.”

Perfect. A bipartisan glee club capable of swinging from The Stones straight to Sousa.

Of course, some things won’t change. Lebanon is the very heart of the heartland. It is farm country and that means manure. Sorry Wall Street Journal. It’ll sometimes stink in Lebanon, too. But at least the fertilizer in Lebanon is used to nurture farm produce and won’t wind up being broadcast on C-Span.

Moving the nation’s capital out of Washington and to farm country will no doubt be dismissed by some as, well, a corny idea. But it’s worth a try. Clearly, the Beltway is broken. It’s time America made a statement that would show we’re going back to the grassroots of our democracy. Goodbye Beltway.

Hello Bib Overallway!

The new capital will start off with one impressive surplus. The farm town will be so awash in fertilizer the local glee club will be performing patriotic ditties above the fruited plain in hip waders.

Hello Denmark!

I knew Google blogger’s introduction of a “Stats” feature would be a colossal waste of time destined to compound another colossal waste of time.

That would be this blog.

Don’t get me wrong. I enjoy blogging and the great feedback I hear from so many friendly readers here and at www.redroom.com.  It keeps me going when all the people with real jobs coldly ignore my heartfelt petitions for real work.

I used to say blogging was the journalistic equivalent of running a lemonade stand. Then it dawned on me even 8 year olds know enough to charge a quarter for a glass of lemonade.

So why blog?

Well, ideally to build an audience so vast and enthusiastic that prestigious editors will pay to cannibalize our blogs for their readers and that publishers will be forced to recognize our work because of the sheer power of the readership we bring to bear.

We seek validation.

After two years, I have found it. And it was in the last place I would have thought to look.

Hello Denmark!

Thanks to the new weeks-old stats feature I can track how many people are reading my home blog, where they live and when the last time any of them engaged in anything the right wingers on the U.S. Supreme Court consider deviant (your secrets are all safe with me, my friends).

So now I spend about an hour or two every other day or so writing a post and the remainder of my waking hours checking to see who’s reading what and if any of the real deviates live near to invite over for high tea.

And the most astounding thing I’m learning is I’m a global phenomenon. I have readers from all over the world. I have scores of them in South Korea, Australia, Brazil, the U.K., China, Thailand, South Africa and Lebanon -- and I mean the Lebanon with Beirut, not the Pittsburgh suburb of Mt. Lebanon where I grew up, the one with Carbonara’s Restaurant on Mt. Lebanon Blvd.

And I have at least one reader in Luxembourg.

I’m ashamed of my ignorance of these distant lands. For instance, all I know about Luxembourg is that is one of the smallest independent nations in the world. How small I have no idea.

For all I know, maybe there are just five people there which would mean that 20 percent of the population reads “Eight Days To Amish.” Who knows? My one reader might be Grand Duke Henri, the nation’s beloved monarch.

And wouldn’t that be cool!

Let’s assume it is and here’s what’s odd: I know that at 6:45 a.m. Henri (he’s so omnipotent he has just one name) was reading my blog, but he wasn’t reading a current post. No, he was reading “WeatherMan is my Superhero,” a post dashed off on June 22, 2009. 

Why anyone in Luxembourg would be reading a 13-month-old post from an enigmatic blog purporting to be approaching Amishness is baffling.

I for the life of me have no idea how on earth anyone stumbles onto a blog called “Eight Days To Amish.” Really, calling it that was a very bad idea.

I thought it reflected just how desperate my financial situation had become (and still is). Heck, some days I’m about four days from having the electricity shut off and doing this like churning butter and trading kids for cattle.

And that brings me to Denmark, pop. 5,540,241.

For reasons I cannot fathom, I have 68 readers in Denmark, second only to the 1,718 of them stats says I have this month in the USA (I invite you all to “follow” the blog by posting your picture to the right. I futterwacken anytime someone does -- and that’s the dance Johnny Depp does in “Alice in Wonderland,” not something deviant).

So, finally, after two years I know my target audience. I know the people who “get” my stuff. 

Here they are straight from Wikipedia: “Denmark, with a mixed market capitalist economy and a large welfare state, ranks as having the world's highest level of income equality. Denmark has the best business climate in the world, according to the U.S. business magazine Forbes. From 2006 to 2008, surveys ranked Denmark as ‘the happiest place in the world,’ based on standards of health, welfare, and education. The 2009 Global Peace Index survey ranks Denmark as the second most peaceful country in the world, after New Zealand. In 2009, Denmark was ranked as one of the least corrupt countries in the world according to the Corruption Perceptions Index ranking second only to New Zealand.”

I have found a home. So I’m going to do everything I can to court these happy, virtuous liberals in the hopes they’ll welcome my humble little blog into their mixed market capitalist arms.

That means you’re about to be deluged with musings on Tivoli Gardens, 12-time world champion windsurfer Bjorn Dunkerbeck, and how I pine to have a Carlsberg beer to wash down my hearty frokost of frikadeller with a side of Sol over Gudhjem.

I’m going to focus on cultivating every last Danish reader from Abenra to Lolland, from Copenhagen to Esbjerg and clear north to Skagen.

But it won’t happen overnight. It’ll take time.

Until then, I’m eight days to Danish.