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12/02/2006: "A Voice From Not-So-Distant Recentness"

Yesterday, while conducting a conference call between the publisher and a hideously lost Grogan Tumble (who had volunteered his courier services the microsecond I'd finished uttering the words "advance check"), I was interrupted by an incoming-call beep. I looked at my phone which displayed two words I thought I'd never see again:

Carly Calling.

I let Prentice/McTiernan Publishing help Tumble figure out how to get back from Wheeling, West Virginia and took the call. Frankly, she could have dialed my number by accident and I would have been happy just to hear her hang up. Carly meant to call, it turns out, and needed someone to talk to. Her ex-boyfriend was back in town, a poker-circuit crony who'd come out with his own line of instructional DVDs a couple years back:


It was a nasty relationship that he was all-too-ready to rekindle, and Carly didn't know what to do. I talked with her for hours, offering advice and comfort, and receiving in return a glimpse of the magic that was our whirlwind romance-in-disguise. We promised to get a cup of coffee in the near future and ended the call just as Tumble made it through the front door, check in hand.

After a brief household conference, Chestnut and Tumble and I decided to spend the advance check on some top-shelf barley wine, reupholstering the sofa, and seasons 1-3 of The Wire.