So Long For A Couple Of Days

There is one thing I’ve learned during my tenure here as editor of Martinez Patch: vacation is a four-letter word. My staff here at Patch headquarters (me) has decided that it’s time to get away for a couple of days, though, so out I go onto the wild open road to taste the winds of high adventure. Actually, I’m not going that far, but since I spend virtually all of my time in this town, even going to Berkeley can feel like a major getaway (I'm not going to Berkeley, by the way, I'm just saying ...).

I’ll be back sometime Thursday, and the only reason I share this information with you is to provide you with an explanation as to why the stories may not change quite as frequently as they otherwise would. I don’t have a lot of folks out there with cameras and notebooks writing stories for me, so when I leave town, things tend to, um, slow down, story-turnover-wise.

Of course, it was my dutiful intention to put nose to grindstone and crank out a stunning array of insightful, riveting journalistic nuggets in those precious hours leading up to my departure, but alas, I don’t do that on days when I’m not going anywhere. And also, like any good journalist, I tend to wait until the very last minute before I sit down to write anything. Preparation is not a skill set of the typical reporter, much as we like to think it is.

So I leave for fair, hardly-distant shores without much of a story bank to leave behind. I will be taking my computer with me, to make sure that things are as stable as they can be in my absence, but this will be a quiet week on Martinez Patch. When we return, all refreshed and ready to tackle the endless news horizons that stretch out before us, we will endeavor to make up for it.

Meanwhile, behave yourselves while I'm gone. Or, if you don’t, at least take notes so I can write a story about it when I return.

EVENTS:

TODAY IN HISTORY (from Wikipedia):

1483 - Opening of the Sistine Chapel in Rome with the celebration of a Mass.

1854 - Henry David Thoreau published Walden.

1892 - Thomas Edison receives a patent for a two-way telegraph.

1936 - Summer Olympic Games: Games of the XI Olympiad – Jesse Owens wins his fourth gold medal at the games, becoming the first American to win four medals in one Olympiad.

1969 - Members of a cult led by Charles Manson murder pregnant actress Sharon Tate (wife of Roman Polanski), coffee heiress Abigail Folger, Polish actor Wojciech Frykowski, men's hairstylist Jay Sebring and recent high-school graduate Steven Parent.

1974 - As a result of the Watergate scandal, Richard Nixon becomes the first president of the United States to resign. His vice president, Gerald Ford, becomes president.