Good morning!
I'm sitting in the bedroom here on the 2nd hole of the Dunes Golf and Tennis Club on Sanibel Island, typing on my Traveler keyboard, the better to go with the flow of my thoughts in this new platform, created courtesy of the good folks at Substack.
And hello to the first 8 subscribers to Len's Newsletter! I smile when I think of Kes, Steph, Deb in Holland (Mass.), the Meeses just down the coast in Naples if I remember correctly, Mark in Oakland, Gary in Nashua, Scott in California--what an intriguing mix of family, friends, and Internet companions. I just counted and realized I'd left out John Aga, a longtime Kindle Chronicles listener and steady source of tips that find their way into the show. He won a drawing for a Fire tablet, I recall, when our late beloved Yorkie Claire pulled his name out of a hat in the sunny living room in Denver. So many memories.
On the Morning Journal that I just posted, I recalled a conversation with Mayor Pete a year ago in Las Vegas, when I pitched him the idea of creating his own Alexa flash briefing for the campaign. "That's something to think about," he said as we stood looking out at a nature preserve in a quiet moment on the day I was the volunteer driver of a big, black Suburban carrying his staffers, trying to keep up with the professional Ukrainian driver of the Suburban carrying Pete, just ahead. "There are so many new platforms to consider," Pete said. If you see Secretary Pete launch an Alexa flash briefing, you'll know maybe he remembered that brief conversation as much as I do.
Yes, there are so many platforms.
I'm having a ball hanging out at Clubhouse. Scott Monty, whose excellent "Timeless and Timely" newsletter on Substack has a great riff on clubs and exclusivity, was my co-moderator yesterday in a room I created on the topic of "What's YOUR favorite newsletter?" Our informal conversation included a couple of people who found it because they follow Scott.
I opened a post-TKC room on Saturday afternoon, talking about my interview with Noah Smith--whose highly recommended newsletter is "Noahpinion. I'm not sure I will do a Clubhouse room every Saturday forever, but I'll certainly try it again this week after my conversation with Dean Koontz. If his fans get ahold of it, there could be enough people to make a real audience. Dean's new book, The Other Emily, will be released by Thomas & Mercer on March 23rd. I'm reading an Advanced Reader Copy. The novel is an amazing tale based on science, romance, and the odd life of a bestselling author. I have no idea how it ends yet, but I will make sure finish the book by tomorrow at 1 pm when I will Skype to Dean's home phone for my third conversation with him on the podcast. He's an engaging, wry fellow, about my age. I've enjoyed learning about his writing process, where he gets his ideas, and how he leads his life in the odd bubble of an author whose books have sold more than 500 million copies worldwide.
Out my tall window, I see the swimming pool in the backyard is shimmering with shadows from the palm trees. Beyond the hedge separating our rental house from the golf course, I don't see Captain Hook, my name for the alligator we spotted in the pond, swimming about.
It's going to be a mainly sunny day here, in the 70s. I will spend most of it reading a book on Kindle and hanging out with Darlene, probably on a long bike ride to Captiva and back. Reality is still the best platform—but I love all these others, too.
Len, thanks for authentically sharing your full and interesting life through these various channels.
Responding to the question in your first post about favorite newsletters, what brought me to Substack was Heather Cox Richardson's "Letters from an American." She's a professor of history at Boston College. I'm also enjoying Dan Rather's "Steady" and Joshua Gans' newsletter observing our response to the COVID-19 pandemic, titled "Plugging the Gap." He's an economist and professor at the University of Toronto.