A Long Week 

As most of you know who often read my column, I’ve shared some of the challenges I’ve encountered in my role as publisher of the paper. I’ve also shared the triumphs. Last week was a bit trying.

Thankfully, we had no printer issues; the March 17 issue got off the floor right on time resulting in the newspapers arriving here at our office around 12:30 a.m. Thursday, ready for distribution. Unfortunately, one of our drivers was unavailable to do his routes (he has two) and no other driver could take on his work. Thanks to a Herculean effort by our office manager Rachelle Miller, writer Mary O’Keefe and me (and my son Danny, thank you very much), the papers were delivered with few problems.

The challenge was on Thursday I was due to head north to Cambria and, unfortunately, I didn’t get a lot of sleep the night before. But, with wine country waiting, I gathered my wits about me and, with Amy in tow, we made our way north.

The next three days were spent picking up wine shipments, enjoying pours at new locations and just resting. Oh, can’t forget that early on we stopped at See’s Candies (after all, what goes better with red wine than dark chocolate?).

What a glorious reprieve from work – though the news I received on Saturday was scary that our local rescue helicopter, Air 5, went down with crew aboard. Steve quickly contacted me to let me know that he was not on board.

Air 5 is the LASD helicopter commonly used for rescues here in the local mountains and it is not uncommon to find Steve on board when he is working with the Montrose Search and Rescue team. I was grateful to learn that he wasn’t involved. He did share video he had taken just two hours earlier of the helicopter landing at a rescue. (You can read more about the accident in Mary O’Keefe’s story on the bottom of the cover page of this week’s issue.)

Considering what is happening in the world today, having a couple of days to unwind was truly a blessing.

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“So a pigeon walks into my office…” Sounds like the beginning of a joke, doesn’t it? But it’s exactly what happened on Friday to our office manager Rachelle. While the front door to our office was opened, in strolled a pigeon. It was injured and Rachelle moved heaven and earth to find someone to take the injured bird and nurse it back to health. Thankfully, a kind heart named Sondra took “Short Round” (the moniker given to the pigeon by Rachelle) and was able to heal it.

It took off for the wild blue yonder earlier this week. We’re hoping it’s a homing pigeon and made its way home.