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In addition, I will be speaking “live” on Monday, February 22nd at the Root Room in Chicago from 6 to 8 p.m. about the 2 volume “Obama’s Odyssey” book, chronicling my coverage of the 2008 presidential election. I’m flying in from Texas to do so.
The entire odyssey began, for me, with articles on my own blog and on Associated Content, which became Yahoo. I posted over 1,000 articles, focusing on entertainment and politics. I began covering the caucuses because I had recently retired and it was boring. So, a sixty-something Iowan went off on an adventure, hiking at least 15 miles a day, it seemed, and having a variety of once-in-a-lifetime experiences, which I didn’t write in book form until Yahoo kicked back the articles to the members of the Content Contributors Network in order to hire Katie Couric for $10 million. (Yahoo recently announced another big lay-off of its employees—something like 170,000—, as the Katie Couric thing isn’t working out too well, apparently.)
My coverage of the Iowa caucuses began to pick up interest as the caucus season heated up. My posts on Yahoo were “hit” roughly 3 million times. Some of my predictions (like the one, in advance, that Obama would carry Iowa) were quite controversial and generated a lot of debate.
After the Iowa caucus articles appeared, I was contacted by my editor at Yahoo, Tim Skillern, and asked if I would consider going to Denver to cover the Democratic National Convention and to St. Paul to cover the Republican National Convention.
“We’ll get you inside,” Tim promised.
I think my response was, “Heck! I’d pay YOU for that, but you’ll have to find me some place to stay that is less than $500 a night.”
Hence, I ended up in a room within a house of Yahoo bloggers, all in their twenties, sleeping on an air mattress. There was no closet in the room, which did not bother me, but the lack of a chair eventually caused me to take one of the dining room chairs and struggle upstairs with it, so I could crawl over to the chair and use it to help myself up from the on-the-floor air mattress. (The door knob was taking a beating!)
And all of it ended with me being named Yahoo’s Content Contributor of the Year.
I will be talking about my adventures in Denver (inside) and St. Paul (inside) and at the Belmont Town Hall meeting in Nashville (inside) and following Rudy Giuiliani around in Florida and talking a good friend into covering the Nevada caucuses, plus the unforgettable experience of attending the Ron Paul Rally for the Republic in Minneapolis at the Target Center as a member of the press.
My anecdotes about my personal experiences [falling down the hill outside Invesco Field while following the Fox News Team (“One More Reason to Hate the Fox News Team”)] or being detained by the police outside the “Rage Against the Machine” concert in downtown Denver, or attending various state parties after the day’s work was done are highpoints of my life. There are many funny stories among them.
I will be talking about Volumes I and II from 6 to 8 p.m. at the Root Room in Chicago (5203 N. Kimball Ave.). This presentation will be filmed and streamed “live.” The live streaming will be able to be viewed on Amazon’s Kindle Fire channel and here is the link to learn more about how that works: http://www.meetup.com/authors-showcase/about/