News on my Blue Riband Chicago Show Exhibit and Update on Book Availability

Neill Archer Roan and Jon Guss in front of Blue Riband Exhibit, photo: Mark IrwinA week ago this morning Gary Schrier (my book’s publisher) and I spent the day at our table at the Chicago show with four big cases of books next to my Comoy Blue Riband display. I inscribed the books while Gary sold them. It was really a great experience–one of those very memorable stitches of time that I expect will stick with me forever.

Comoy Blue Riband Exhibit, photo: Mark IrwinThe preceding afternoon, Jon Guss and I presented a session on Comoy, addressing some surprising (and intriguing) results of our research for the book. We had a wonderful audience and a good time. There was food and drink and some great conversation. I felt great about the amount of interest that was shown to my collection exhibit which (immodest as it sounds) turned out to be both lovely and impressive. It is one thing to see three or four Blue Ribands; it is quite different to see 54 of them arrayed in a wide variety of shapes. To really grasp the character of a brand, there is nothing like experiencing critical mass.

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Put this in your pipe and smoke it.

Thank God tobacco is a plant. Otherwise I’d have had to give it up early last month.

After nearly 60 years of omnivorousness, I am a vegan. Actually I am stricter than a vegan. I make a vegan look a dumpster diver.

Vegans eat wheat. I don’t. Vegans eat sugar. Not me. Vegans drink wine, eat white rice, and drink the occasional brewski. I neither eat nor imbibe these things. Do you sense a certain holier-than-thou-ness?

If so, good. I need the zeal normally found in the reformed drunk to keep me going. This ain’t easy. I still have to drive by rib joints, steakhouses, and oyster bars. It’s ridiculous. In my new life, I can’t even drink to forget what a grilled t-bone tastes like after a martini and oysters on the half shell. But, all good things come to an end. In my case, all good things went to my end. It’s time to focus on beginnings.

My friend, Neil Flancbaum, insists that I’m not a vegan. I can hear him dialing me now to harangue me about my word choice.

“Vegans use no animal products. They won’t use leather. I know you. You love leather and are not about to give it up. You are NOT a vegan,” he mutters. “You eat a plant-based diet. Get over it.”

“I’m a dietary vegan,” I persist, unwilling to be deprived of my new label. I like the easy comfort a stereotype affords. Birkenstocks here I come. Hemp tunics get ready. I still have some patchouli from my Oregon days.

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