Breathtaking cuts at Gannett newspapers, breathtaking

ELMIRA, New York, USA - The people in charge of the business side of newspapers rode high in 60s and 70s and even the 80s. Profits were huge. Newspapers were a way print money.

Family owned newspapers were swallowed up by well-funded print-predator corporations interested almost exclusively in the money-making aspects of the publications, not their communities or how vital the newspapers were to keeping the people informed.

And then all hell broke loose, profits started to slide, all resulting in an industry headed in a downward death spiral for decades. The Gannett Corporation, once one of the biggest players in the newspaper industry, in recent weeks dumped another 400-500 employees from its newspapers already working with skeleton staffs.

Here's a link to a blog by Gannett staff (and former staff) with details: Gannett Blog

At the same time, the corporation is going to pay $2.2 billion to purchase the television stations owned by the Belo Corporation. It will take Gannett's total TV station holdings to 43.

Television, you see, is the new way to print money.

But the purchase of the television station and the layoffs have no connection say Gannett executives. None. It's doubtful any newspaper reporter or editor still working for the tattered remains of Gannett believe that for a nanosecond.

If they do, they should quit and go to work for Fox News.

Perhaps what has me the most torqued is the ruthless way the corporation is going about the layoffs - in some cases waiting for people to go on vacation, then presenting them with a pink slip when they return. Or maybe it's the corporate doublespeak about how the layoffs will actually result in better newspapers. Frankly, If I read a statement from another newspaper publisher about how he or she is right-sizing their publication, I will barf.

Many people say the newspaper industry's financial woes - decades of declines in paid advertising - started with  the Internet and all that free content. If so, the management did that to themselves. They didn't have to give it away for free.

But a better analysis is that the corporate raiders who bought the newspapers didn't give a crap about the quality of them. And so as the quality declined, readers stop subscribing. Fewer readers meant fewer advertisers wanted to buy ads. That meant less revenue. Less revenue meant more layoffs. More layoffs meant a decline in quality.

And on and on we go.

Don't count newspapers out completely. There are pockets of excellence still. And some weekly newspapers - those not owned by vampire corporations - are doing just fine, maybe better than fine.

But right now many career Gannett journalists are out of work, with even more layoffs likely.

After all, $2.2 billion is hardly small change, even for a media company like Gannett.

The Captain and the Admiral finally getting back on the water

VALOIS POINT, New York - The summer has flown by. It started slow after I had to have a hernia repair (ouch), which meant about a month of relatively limited activity. There went June.

Then the Star-Gazette newspaper and a regional magazine called Mountain Home called me for duty a lot. The assignments were all fun, but all seemed to coincide with the best boating weather.

A great day to head down the lake

We also had a hot spell - a really hot spell - that sent Admiral Fox and I diving not only into Seneca Lake, but into air conditioning. It was actually hard to breath at times. High 90-degree temperatures and 90-percent-plus humidity does not make for comfortable living. Ask anyone who lives in Florida in the summer.

And then, there's the book.

The draft of The Fracking War is now safely in the hands of three expert editors to read, critique and eventually return to me for rewriting, editing or a trip to the landfill. What a relief! (Though this morning I woke up rewriting a chapter in my head...)

Spirit of Louise at Village Marina

Today the Spirit of Louise pontoon boat will head out for a down-lake adventure to Watkins Glen. I just arranged for a berth at Village Marina for a few days - right next to the Sheriff's Boat. We hope to explore the south end lake, perhaps even the wilds of Montour a few miles down the channel.

Then on Saturday, the Spirit of Louise will become a press boat for the day. I will be covering a floating protest against a proposed propane storage project that has the community united - united against it.

About 100 kayaks and other boats will join the floating entourage. I'll be shooting still photos and taking video for the newspaper. I'm really hoping for calm water. Really hoping.

The summer also ended up with virtually no blogging for me - the book and commercial writing assignments took up all the writing energy I had.

But at least until the beta readers return The Fracking War, I'll hit the keyboard more often. In fact, I just finished the latest novel by James Lee Burke - Light of the World. A review of it is definitely in order. A great book. But then, his books are all great.

Josh Fox's 'Gasland II' - another game-changer movie

ITHACA, New York, USA - Admiral Fox and I journeyed to the Cornell campus Friday night for a showing of Gasland II, Josh Fox's followup film to his amazing first film Gasland. That movie was so powerful that it gave the natural gas industry such gas, it is still sputtering.

Gasland II's Josh Fox

In fact, while Gasland II was being shown in Ithaca, the natural gas industry was showing its own pr-firm pro-hydrofracking film at another New York location.

It's doubtful that the audience there was as enthusiastic as the 300 or so people who packed Statler Auditorium at Cornell. The film was interrupted frequently by applause - and more than a few gasps.

The film will premiere on HBO July 8. And it's a must-see movie for people already opposed to hydrofracking for natural gas as well as anyone still sitting on the fence. Josh suggested that perhaps some Gasland II parties might be in order when HBO releases the film - parties that would include doubters as well as the faithful.

It would be hard to watch this film - a compendium of images of science, pathos, humanity and corporate greed - and not come away feeling, well, I am still sorting all that out the morning after.

We had hoped to actually meet Josh - and we did, sort of.

Sylvia, Josh Fox and me

At one point he jumped down off the stage and stood for a photo - a photo he was sending to President Barack Obama via Twitter. He is flanked by Admiral Fox and I in the photo.

It's a little grainy, but lately I've noticed I look a lot better in soft focus anyway.

The evening gave me even more encouragement to finish editing The Fracking War. It also gave me several ideas for additions to the book and even some new chapters.

The climate change we are already witnessing is being exacerbated by all the methane gas escaping from  all the gas wells being drilled. It has taken an already nearly out-of-control freight train and added ice to slippery tracks.

If the methane emissions aren't controlled, well-known Cornell Professor Robert Howarth said, it's game over for the planet.

The event was partly to help promote the film and also as a fundraiser for Gas Free Seneca (link to GAS FREE SENECA website), the group fighting to stop the Inergy Corporation from storing propane and natural gas in salt caverns adjacent to - and under - Seneca Lake.

Here's a photo of the crowd last night, sending a message to the president and to NY Gov. Andrew Cuomo.

Josh Fox with the banjo, Adm. Fox to the left, me on the right

Productivity - exactly what the (%*&#&%^)%^ does it mean?

WATKINS GLEN, New York, USA - The past three days I have been mostly housebound after some minor surgery (minor, the doctor said, referring to the surgery, not the pain factor).

And in that time, I have cleaned up a bunch of things on my desk - including my desk - and made valiant attempts at getting organized. But I get distracted. Often. And often it's by this machine.

That said, I wanted to reprint (below) a piece that I have had sitting on my desktop for weeks, which when I read it, made a great deal of sense. I should have internalized some of the things right away. But, of course in the hurly-burly, mad rush of life I didn't.

The one that sticks out is No. 4 - about focusing on yourself. You can read the full account down below, but the main point is if the first thing you do is check your email in the morning, you let those email messages set the tone and agenda for your day.

A happy note is one thing, a complaint from a reader something else.

Can I check my email, now, please?

---------------------------------------------------

8 Things Productive People Do During the Workday

By Ilya Pozin 

1. Create a smaller to-do list. Getting things accomplished during your workday shouldn’t be about doing as much as possible in the sanctioned eight hours. It may be hard to swallow, but there’s nothing productive about piling together a slew of tasks in the form of a checklist. Take a less-is-more approach to your to-do list by only focusing on accomplishing things that matter.
2. Take breaks. You know that ache that fills your brain when you’ve been powering through tasks for several hours? This is due to your brain using up glucose. Too many people mistake this for a good feeling, rather than a signal to take a break. Go take a walk, grab something to eat, workout, or meditate – give your brain some resting time. Achieve more productivity during your workday by making a point to regularly clear your head. You’ll come back recharged and ready to achieve greater efficiency.
3. Follow the 80/20 rule. Did you know that only 20 percent of what you do each day produces 80 percent of your results? Eliminate the things that don’t matter during your workday: they have a minimal effect on your overall productivity. For example, on a project, systematically remove tasks until you end up with the 20 percent that gets the 80 percent of results.
4. Start your day by focusing on yourself. If you begin your morning by checking your email, it allows others to dictate what you accomplish. Set yourself in the right direction by ignoring your emails and taking the morning to focus on yourself, eat a good breakfast, meditate, or read the news.
5. Take on harder tasks earlier in the day. Knock out your most challenging work when your brain is most fresh. Save your busy work – if you have any – for when your afternoon slump rolls in.
6. Pick up the phone. The digital world has created poor communication habits. Email is a productivity killer and usually a distraction from tasks that actually matter. For example, people often copy multiple people on emails to get it off their plate – don't be a victim of this action. This distracts everyone else by creating noise against the tasks they’re trying to accomplish and is a sign of laziness. If you receive an email where many people are CC'd, do everyone a favor by BCCing them on your reply. If your email chain goes beyond two replies, it’s time to pick up the phone. Increase your productivity by scheduling a call.
7. Create a system. If you know certain things are ruining your daily productivity, create a system for managing them. Do you check your emails throughout the day? Plan a morning, afternoon, and evening time slot for managing your email. Otherwise, you’ll get distracted from accomplishing more important goals throughout the day.
8. Don’t confuse productivity with laziness. While no one likes admitting it, sheer laziness is the No. 1 contributor to lost productivity. In fact, a number of time-saving methods – take meetings and emails for example – are actually just ways to get out of doing real work. Place your focus on doing the things that matter most as efficiently and effectively as possible.
Remember, less is more when it comes to being productive during the workday.
What’s your secret to productive workdays?

About Ilya Pozin:
Founder of Ciplex. Columnist for Inc, Forbes & LinkedIn. Gadget lover, investor, mentor, husband, father, and '30 Under 30' entrepreneur. Follow Ilya to stay up-to-date with his articles and updates!

Fear of heights? Star Trek Into Darkness might not be your movie

CRONOS, The Klingon Empire - Some movie critics have been generally unimpressed with the latest installment of the long-running, likely never-ending, Star Trek franchise, titled Star Trek Into Darkness.

After sitting riveted to my seat for the 132-minute movie, I think those critics need to pull their collective heads out of their warp cores.

Peter Weller - a Star Fleet Admiral

The movie blends action, humor, pathos and drama in a neat package that revives all the traditions of earlier Star Trek films and creates more. The opening scene - with Captain James Kirk and Dr. Leonard 'Bones' McCoy - will be familiar to anyone who ever watched the original television series or viewed the films made since.

There are actually several villains in the film. But unlike many of the one-dimensional characters in science fiction dramas like these, these bad guys are complicated.

Peter Weller - perhaps best known for his roles in the RoboCop movies - plays a Star Fleet Admiral whose political philosophy seems to have been torn right out of the history books from chapters about the Cold War. Benedict Cumberbatch, best known to most U.S. audiences as Sherlock Holmes, is villainously evil, but is fighting to save his own people from extinction.

See? Complicated?

And then there is the introduction of Alice Eve, who plays the role of the Admiral's daughter.

You are out of uniform, commander (Alice Eve)

In one scene with Chris Pine (who plays Captain James T. Kirk) she asks Pine to turn around so she can change her clothes. The look on Pine's face when he peeks (and of course he peeks, he's Jim Kirk) is wonderfully understated.

Some scenes in the movie almost triggered some vertigo. In the future envisioned by director J.J. Abrams, we live and travel pretty high off the ground. Risky.

Star Trek Into Darkness isn't a film I would rush out to watch again today. Maybe in a few weeks when I get over my fear of heights.

But don't wait for the DVD or streaming version. This is a big-screen experience. And be sure to stay in your seat for the whole movie. This isn't a film where you can't go grab some popcorn mid-chase and ask 'Hey? What did I miss?'

Bones draws a blood sample - very carefully

Time to say adios to 'Troupey' our faithful Isuzu Trooper SUV

WATKINS GLEN, New York, USA - When our Toyota Tundra pickup arrived in the driveway two weeks ago (with us inside), our 1997 Isuzu Trooper probably knew its days were numbered.

With the Tundra home from Mexico, the Trooper will now be sold to someone else out looking for  adventure, we hope.

It certainly provided us with plenty.

We bought the Trooper - nicknamed Troupey - the same fall that we dragged the original Gray Goose Express traveler trailer from Pat and Sanders Lamont's house in Sacramento, through California and Arizona and down all the way to Tenacatita Bay.

Eventually, the Gray Goose Express was parked in Arroyo Seco, where it was temporary housing for Laura McCartney while she was teaching English to the village children.

Troupey served as a great go-to-the-beach vehicle as well as a family loaner. A lot of people borrowed the SUV, frequently using its 4-wheel drive function in the soft sands of Arroyo Seco.

Last summer we used Troupey a lot here at Seneca Lake, managing in the fall to get it stuck up to its axles trying to retrieve the sailing vessel Crimson Tide. Eric Hazlitt came by and pulled the entire rig from the soft sand and gravel at Fitch Beach in Valois in that episode.

Troupey will be missed, but the Tundra will take its place quite handily as the primary tow vehicle here in New York, for the various watercraft already in our fleet, and perhaps for one new one - a Windrider 17 sailboat if I can find a good deal.

Trooper and Grey Goose at Jim Carr's house in Arizona where we had to dump nearly 1,000 pounds

A trip to a wine bar where the belly dancers rule

PORT ANGELES, Washington, USA - Adm. Fox, Dustin and I headed downtown to Port Angeles tonight to a place called Wine on the Water (LINK: Wine bar) where we tried a few wines and listened to music.

Note the ladder to the left

Quite a cool evening

It wasn't the usual wine bar fare when it came to tunes - though at first there was some pop-fusion something that was giving me more of a headache than the sulfites in the vino.

The music that eventually dominated came from the adjacent room where a group of four belly dancers were putting on a show.

And the room was packed with their fans while they went through a series of quite provocative moves. (A brief video is below.)

Tomorrow our travels will take us to Canada... Still looking for my passport, though.

A town called Squim... even though it's spelled Sequim

SEQUIM, Washington, USA - Adm. Fox and I have been making far too many jokes about some of the local names around here - this town's handle for example: Sequim.

Not much rain, but the river runs fast

Even though it would seem that it would be pronounced See-Quim, it is pronounced simply Squim, like Squish but with an M at the end instead of ish.

So when you leave from here to go to the downtown you go.... Squimming, of course.

Name aside, this is a fabulous place and has only about 17 inches of precipitation per year. That's practically desert, especially for the northwest.

A half-hour's drive way, on the other side of the mountains an average 170 inches of wet stuff is the norm.

I'll stick to squimming in Sequim.

We've been taking great walks here on a trail, seeing lots of wildlife. You don't have to go far however as the deer come into the yard every night, snacking on both the bushes and any birdseed I have been foolish enough to leave out.

The nursery said the deer don't eat this bushes

Adm. Fox also made a new friend today who really wanted to get out of her enclosure and continue the walk with us.

I have a bag of lettuce to give her on our next pass by.

Another recruit for Zumba?

Our time here visiting son Dustin is almost over and we are charting a course home to New York.

We have a few more adventures planned before that, including a sojourn to Canada Saturday - Victoria, Canada to be exact, an hour-and-a-half ferry ride across the straight.

We will join up with Bahia del Sol amiga Shania who has graciously agreed to squire us around the city.

Now if I can just find my passport...

Starting to like the gray skies and light rain... Uh-oh!

PORT TOWNSEND, Washington - The gray overcast here has starting growing on me a little, kind of like the green moss I see on almost every rock and on one side of the trees.

Kee-rist, I see it's growing on the back of me, too!

Today Adm. Fox and I took a sojourn to the east to visit former CSUS colleague Paul Cahill and his wife Tamar at their five-acre estate a mile or so from downtown Port Townsend. Paul says it's a work in progress. I don't know. It looked like a fabulous place to me.

Port Townsend waterfront

And I don't know anyone else who keeps llamas in their front yard.

Port Townsend in a relatively short drive from where Dustin lives and another waterfront town. It seems to have resisted all of the big-box stores and retained a lot of charm. We bought food at a Thai restaurant, then retired to bar called the Pourhouse on the waterfront to eat it along with some excellent pale ale and cider.

Excellent!

Tomorrow we will explore Port Angeles itself and pay a courtesy call on the Peninsula Daily News newspaper (LINK: Daily News website), an 18,000 circulation publication that seems to have a good reputation with the locals here.

Port Angeles downtown

What's up with that?

No plans yet for our sojourn back to Watkins Glen and Seneca Lake... Still waiting for the all clear from the weather folks. And I just read that it snowed in Central NY. today.

What's up with that, too? 

New blogging software for iPad... let's see

SEQUIM, Washington, USA - Just a little too lazy to pull out one of the two laptops I have along, so I decided to install some new iPad software for blogging with blogspot.com.

This, as you can see, is a test to see how well it works.

If it does, well, fabulous. If it doesn't, well, just another bit of evidence in support of my recent purchase of a MacBook Air.

Now, let's see if a photo can be added.

On to The Honest Travelers

SEQUIM, WA. - Adm. fox and I launched a new website several weeks ago, calle The Honest Travelers and are using it as a test site during our cross country sojourn...

We will do some cross posting, for sure, but look for our travels at this website: http://thehonesttravelers.blogspot.com/




Gas stop on the way to Port Angeles

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Back in the good old USSA with more sojourns planned

SACRAMENTO, Calif., USA - Two days back in the USSA and I think I am finally rested enough to write something coherent.

You get to be the judge.

Pool and view from our condo

After Adm. Fox left Mexico in a cloud of dust (quite literally) driving from Puerto Vallarta to Sacramento, I stayed behind, wrote a little but mostly closed up the condo at Bahia del Sol, said goodbye to, well, so many Canadians that I wonder if anyone stays there in the winter.

Adm. Fox's trip went smoothly, with a stop in San Diego before landing here at Dr. Pam and Steve's house where I joined her two days ago. My flights were good, all luggage is accounted for and now civilization is being enjoyed.

You can drink water from the tap! Eat lettuce without soaking it in a disinfecting solution! And the wine not only is drinkable, it's inexpensive. At least the wine I buy and drink.

Rinse before eating, but nothing else

I do miss the sound of the ocean, replaced here by the distant thrum of the freeway. And I miss our Spanish lessons with arguably the best Spanish teacher from whom I have ever taken a class. But it's on to new adventures, including a trip to the Northwest then across the Rockies and back to New York sometime in mid-April.

Before that, I have to finish up the writing on my book The Fracking War and - perhaps equally important - find a camper or camper shell for our newly painted Toyota Tundra to make our expedition more fun.

We had the Tundra painted before Adm. Fox headed north. There were more than a few dings and scrapes from living in the village and some small truck vs. car mishaps. I will miss the cost of Mexican repairs. The body work, repainting and bumper straightening cost $546 U.S.

Time to start checking Craigslist for that camper... like the one shown below...

Looking for this kind of camper...

Tonga talk and parachute jumping all in one afternoon

NUEVO VALLARTA, Nayarit, Mexico - Adm. Fox and I gave a talk/slide/video presentation Friday at the Vallarta Yacht Club to a group of folks about to sail across the Pacific Ocean to the South Seas.

They are self-named "Puddle Jumpers" a pretty understated sobriquet, considering they might be at sea for 30 days jumping the Pacific puddle.

Video of the pie eating (throwing!) contest

Still, there was lot of excitement in the group, as they watched our show about our visit to Tonga last September.

We went to Tonga - Vava'u specifically - to watch, photograph, video and participate in the 4th Regatta Vava'u, a week-long celebration of sailing, culture and Tonga itself. We had a great time - much of it already described in earlier blogs. But reliving it Friday has us already scheming how to get back for Regatta Vava'u V this fall.

A Regatta Vava'u shirt from Tropical Tease

The islands sold themselves easily to this group of cruisers, many of whom only know for sure they are leaving in a week or two. When they get to the South Pacific, they have a vast number of places - and a vast ocean to explore. But it sounded like at least a half-dozen boat captains are leaning towards a Tonga stopover. And one young woman - a registered nurse - said she was interested in maybe spending six months there.

At the end of our hour-long talk, we gave away a number of items from Tropical Tease, a clothing shop on the main drag in Neiafu. Owner Cindy Russell makes arguably the finest T-shirts and other clothing I have ever bought and worn. Her Tonga Dirt Shirts are famous here in Vallarta among the cruisers.

At the end of this blog is a video we produced this fall, parts of which are in the videos we showed the cruisers.

There's Daddy!!!!!

Photography can be dangerous

After the presentation, we scurried over to the beach at Nuevo Vallarta in front of the Hard Rock Cafe where a group called SkyDiveMex has been doing parachuting jumping all week, often taking tandem rides with some of my amigos here at Bahia del Sol.

We watched some of the folks jump a little before sunset. A second group never got jump - it just got too dark.

But just as the last few jumpers were coming down, one of them collided with a photographer on staff with the group. He took his bloodied head in stride, even grinning for Adm. Fox's camera as he left the landing site.

 Below is a video of that crash.

Here's a trailer for Regatta Vava'u IV - the movie...

Hitching a ride on Richard Branson's SpaceShipOne

NUEVO VALLARTA, Nayarit, Mexico - I have had a great run in the news-journalism-writing business, starting at the Napa Register newspaper in Napa, Calif. and now with the Finger Lakes Times in Geneva, New York.

In Napa, I was hired just as I graduated from college and spent a summer writing obituaries, chasing firetrucks and generally dealing with all the stories that the veteran reporters didn't want to touch. With the daily Finger Lakes Times, I write a once-a-week column on the topic of my choice. The freedom to do that is awesome.

In between these two bracketing media experiences, I worked at six newspapers in a variety of editing/writing capacities, almost always with fun people. Fun or not, they were always interesting. Thanks to Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter and few other social media outfits, I have reconnected with many of those fun/interesting people.

Just yesterday, after I posted a story about entrepreneur Richard Branson, a former colleague told me about the time her husband - also a journalist -  had interviewed Branson. She was kind enough to send along this photo.

The fellow interviewing Branson is Dave Koenig, who, along with his wife Darlene Bryant, worked with me at the Chico Enterprise-Record back in 1981. Gawd that was a long time ago. I came in as news editor, Dave was a reporter and I was lucky enough to get Darlene to move from reporting to copy editing. She was an excellent copy editor.

My experience at that newspaper - because the publisher was, to put it kindly, a difficult man - wasn't all that good, except for interacting with people like Dave and Darlene.

How difficult was that publisher? Well, my first day on the job, before I had even met the staff of about 25 people, he gave me the names of five people he wanted me to fire - that day. I declined, saying I needed time to evaluate everybody before any action was taken. I am still surprised to this day I kept my job for the five months that I did before I joined the faculty at Chico State University.

But, all that nostalgia aside, my big question for Dave Koenig is this:

Can he get me a complimentary ride on Branson's Virgin Galactic SpaceShipOne? I don't get seasick anymore. Promise!

A concert on the Nuevo Vallarta beach - with Latin rock star Juanes

NUEVO VALLARTA, Nayarit, Mexico - Practically every flat surface around Nuevo Vallarta and Puerto Vallarta was plastered with a poster contained the mug of Juanes, a Latin rock star who brings in fans from all over wherever he plays. This is a holiday weekend in Mexico and his concert was part of the celebrations.

Juanes - related to Antonio Banderas?

Juanes a huge star around the world, with his Unplugged tour getting five Grammy nominations. Our amiga Laura McCartney caught his act in Madrid. Yes, the Madrid, as in Madrid, Spain.

But back to the beach here.

The concert was held in an open area next to the Hardrock Hotel (yes, it's a hotel). It was supposed to start at 8 p.m. But, being Mexico, the crowd didn't even get very restive until about 9:30 p.m. when Juanes jumped up on stage and started a rockin' show.

The security guards said they expected a paid attendance of about 5,000. It was hard for Adm. Sylvia Fox and I to get a good look at the crowd. We attended the concert sitting on the beach side (read: Free) where we were joined by about a hundred gringos and vacationing Mexicanos.

And we had our own huge Jumbotron right in front of us. (Huge Jumbotron? Is that an oxymoron?)

Here's a link to Road Trip Zumba in which Sylvia talks about Juanes and the concert. She had a great time at the concert, even doing a few Zumba steps as she listened.

LINK: ROAD TRIP ZUMBA

At one point the staff who run the beach area where we were squatting came by and starting asking people if we were staying with them - generally being kind of obnoxious. After he hassled a couple of people (me included), a hired security guard (with a .45 caliber automatic on his hip) chatted with the staff fellow and he disappeared back into the building.

It was reminiscent of our days in San Diego when we would go by dinghy to Humphrey's By the Bay and listen to the concerts there. We heard the Righteous Brothers, Arlo Guthrie, Judy Collins - even Joan Baez, among others.

Here's a short video of some of the concert - from the beach perspective:

'The Lotus Eaters' helps relive- not relieve - the Vietnam War

SAIGON, Vietnam - The Vietnam War has been the subject of many books - fiction and non-fiction - and remains an often-sensitive a political topic in America. I know because I have read about a dozen Vietnam books, including Frances FitzGerald's excellent Fire in the Lake. And I get into Vietnam debates, still.

In my generation - those of us who hit draft age right at the height of the war in the mid 1960s - we are divided between those who served in the military and those who did not. For the record, I had a draft deferment while in college, then in 1968, I dropped out and for about a year was prime-grade draft material with a 1A classification.

I was never called, though I have many amigos who were.

Tatjana Soli's The Lotus Eaters floods back memories from that time. The book is a combination documentary-drama-romance-potboiler that follows a woman photographer's personal and geographic journeys across Vietnam. The main character works as a journalist, so naturally my interest was piqued from the opening paragraphs. I stayed glued to it.

The book took Soli 10 years to write. Ten years! It makes my self-imposed book-writing deadline of April 1 seem pathetic. But the book's smacks of authenticity and research.

Tatjana Soli

I haven't had the heart to start her second book yet - The Forgetting Tree. The person who recommended The Lotus Eaters to me said The Forgetting Tree doesn't show the same genius.

Then there is also the issue of whenever I read a book as powerful as The Lotus Eaters, I have to ponder what it means for some time before I can pick up another tome.

This is not a light book for the beach. But I suspect most people who read it will come away changed, whether they served in Vietnam or not, whether they were a journalist or not, or whether they have been in love.

Or not.

Banderas Bay whale-watching tops 11 on a 10-point scale

PUNTA DE MITA, Nayarit, Mexico - A quick Sunday whale watching expedition out of this village on the northwest tip of Banderas Bay brought out the inner child in four of us Sunday.

Adm. Sylvia Fox, amigos Marc and Marci and I hired a panga (an open boat) to take us out to check on the whale action just offshore from a restaurant called El Dorado.

The whales put on a show for two hours, so much of a show that I filled my Flip video to capacity. Sylvia probably shot 800 still photos - some of them National Geographic worthy, I am sure.

As many times as we go out and do this, we never seem to get tired of it.

We capped the morning's boat ride with a lunch (and snooze) at a restaurant called the El Dorado where the fish and shrimp were great.

And the Pacifico cerveza wasn't too bad either.

One of Adm. Fox's 800-plus photos

Below is a short video of the whale jumping, whale-tail thumping, gringos screaming action out on the panga.

On the trail of whales and dolphins in Banderas Bay, Mexico

BAHIA DE BANDERAS, Nayarit, Mexico - Admiral Sylvia Fox, Pam DiTomasso and I boarded an outboard-motor-equipped panga this morning at 8 a.m. (Yes, I got up early enough for an 8 a.m. boat trip - hold the comments, please.)

We've done many whale-watching voyages in Banderas Bay, usually aboard a sailboat. We have never been disappointed.

But I was a little skeptical of how much fun it would be, given that in September we were actually swimming in the water with leviathans like these in the Kingdom of Tonga, in the Vava'u Island group.

But a boat ride is never to be turned down. So we went. And, yes, except for my getting a sunburned nose, it was great... Really great.

Think we got close enough?

The captain of our panga, a 28-year-old Mexican fellow named Mario, was fabulous at finding the whales and keeping us close enough for photos but not so close we violated any Mexican rules.

Yes, there are rules about this stuff in Mexico.

Sylvia shot nearly 500 photos

Capt. Mario was a fount of good information. When we spotted the normally placid whales swimming and diving like college students on spring break, he explained that there were as many 10 male whales trying to, um shall-we-say date(?) a female humpback.

On the water, above the water, under the water, love makes the world go around. Si?

He also found us a large pod of dolphins which we stayed with for nearly an hour.

Sylvia used her new (well, it was new when we went to Tonga) Canon camera today, shooting nearly 500 shots in a rapid fire setting. I shot a measly 300 photos with my trusty Canon Powershot 560.

Between us though, we got some great stuff.

Posted below are some of the other photos I pulled from my 300. She will no doubt post some of hers later.

Hmm. 300. What a great name for a movie!

Which way did she go?

Bottoms up!

On the move

Pam and Sylvia

Time away from the beach to view the film 'Lincoln'

BAHIA del Sol, Nayarit, Mexico - Adm. Fox and I checked out the sunset last night and then watched the Spielberg film Lincoln that has been nominated for so many awards you might expect it to show up on a Catholic list of those under consideration for canonization.

Lincoln surveys a battlefield

Most of the feedback we received from people who had seen it was that it was pretty slow, ponderous in fact, and in a couple of cases, people didn't finish it.

It is not exactly a James Lee Burke potboiler.

Still, the movie has good points and focuses as much as passage of the 13th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution as Abraham Lincoln himself. It's quite a story.

The politics of getting the amendment passed swirl through the movie. And as a long-time observer of American politics, it was fascinating for me to see the politics at work in the 1860s. They were almost as ugly as today. And the politicians were not a great deal smarter.

Lincoln, was clever, of course. And Lincoln had ethics. Ok, there is a stark difference between then and now.

Tommy Lee Jones

Brooding on the movie later, I realized one reason I couldn't take my eyes of it was because the politics in it reminded me of the byzantine inner workings of the university where I taught for 25 years. We nearly had our own civil war there when the university president shifted funds from academics to public relations - then said he had done no such thing.

What I would have done for a General Ulysses S. Grant!

The performance by Daniel Day-Lewis was Oscar worthy. So was a lesser role by Tommy Lee Jones.

In fact Tommy Lee Jones' character really gets the last word(s) in the movie. It's worth watching until the last minute to see him sans his dark wig and you quickly understand why he felt so strongly about abolishing slavery.

Lincoln is worth struggling through.

Daniel Day-Lewis (center) as Lincoln