Back from St. Louis. What an amazing event.
TSS Executive Producer, Paul Block, and I flew in on American Airlines on Friday. (Patrick took a red-eye and met us on Saturday morning.) A very smooth flight, and I have to say I really appreciate the extra leg room in coach on AA - it's much more comfortable, and the iBook doesn't get squeezed when the guy in front puts his seat back. I have a ton of frequent flier miles on United, but I'm sticking with American from now on. (And I even said this before the events of our return flight. I'll tell you about that in a minute.)
On the way Paul and I wrote a treatment for a new weekly show we'd like to do. It came out very well. Can't tell you the details yet, but there's some interest from on high.
Friday night we joined a dozen or so folks from the local cable company (Charter Communications) at Busch Stadium for a Cardinals-Reds game. It was delayed by rain, but the sky cleared and the game started at 8:10p. Unfortunately it was the coldest May 17th in St. Louis history ' it got down to 42 degrees. The ice cream and beer vendors were somewhat unpopular, but the hot chocolate guy was doing great business. I had packed for warmer weather, so I had to throw in the towel after just a couple of innings. Fortunately the hotel was right across the street so it was easy to go home and get to bed early.
I'm glad I did, because we had a record turnout on Saturday. We were scheduled to stay two hours, from 11a-1p, but so many people showed up that we stayed until 3:10p. We stayed so long that the tent rental people came and claimed the tent and ropes around us. We just moved the table into the parking lot and kept on signing. Fortunately the rain had stopped and it was a beautiful sunny day.
At most events we have to leave before we meet everyone, but this time Patrick and I met everyone who came. We went through over 750 pictures and I estimate that we signed around twice that number of autographs ' certainly the most ever. My hand is still aching.
I was very pleased to see that a lot of people had my book. We signed lots of computer hardware, too. But the weirdest thing we signed was a pair of breast implants brought by a plastic surgeon. I kid you not!
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We stayed until we had to leave for the airport ' no time for Steak 'n' Shake, but a fan had brought us sliders from White Castle and we had a bag of SnS burgers in the car, so I didn't go hungry.
At the airport an American Airlines customer service agent recognized us and bumped Patrick and me up to first class. First time that's ever happened. I asked her to do the same for Paul, and she did. Woo hoo! What a great way to end an excellent event. Thank you, American!
I must say I relaxed and took full advantage of the first class amenities. It was too short a flight for a movie, but I watched 'Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels' on my iBook. Dynamite movie. Just as good as Guy Ritchie's second film, 'Snatch.' Both are favorites among The Screen Savers, and now I know why.
Maybe I should have paid less attention to the movie and more to my seatmate, however. As we were getting off the plane he noticed my TechTV shirt. 'You work at TechTV?' he asked. 'My brother is Greg Drebin.' Doh! Just think of the inside stuff I could have learned.
Thanks to everyone who came out and said hi in St. Louis. We all had a great time, and Paul got much useful feedback. You'll find some pictures on the
message boards thanks to rtownsen and peterstork. I can't wait to go back.
Friday, December 31, 1999 at 5:01PM