There is a lot going on here, and DeMille said to draft something with apologies with a flashy graphic at the top and figure out how to track what appears to be noise about general war in Europe- the one with rockets and NATO or EU forces somehow entering the conflict in Ukraine with troops now opposing Russian young people with North Koreans and Yemenis at their shoulders.

Splash and Rocket are doing that while young Melissa is working out some of the confusion about the Cabinet nominees and the prospect of a looming conflict over the size and role of the Federal Government run by our neighbors and if it will have a negative impact on real estate with talk about higher density that makes the HQ complex a target for development.

So there was that stuff going on, sort of in the middle distance in message immediacy and then news about the new book thing. Meat is the guy from production and shows up at the Creative Section meetings when there are some marketing things he needs words or images to promote. He has a presence when he is here. Needs a haircut but fairly well groomed with a posture that says he might have once been an athlete. Melissa appreciates his energy since it s ebbing in the people she has to deal with in the Conference room.

Meat was there because there is milestone in the Dick Ranger deal. His team has done three previous covers with a bright and assertive creative lead there who also handles the editing work on the “ American Century project DeMille would like to get behind him. There is a new Century underway and it seems interesting while he can still see it.

We like the fact that this past piece is funally coming together, since it provides the link between the stories our 93-year old drinking buddy told us about the codebreakers in World War Two, the establishment of CIA and NSA, and Vietnam. Our set of Salts covered that last part in our youth, and the first of the books was done as a project back in the day.

The reason it was written was to do a morale thing in the ship’s newspaper onboard USS Midway in two deployments during the Hostage Crisis in 1979-80. The publication had been a somewhat rustic large format black and white paperback, no illustrations. When a book of cartoons produced in the same publications shop, the Chairman told DeMille to get it incorporated into a new edition that covers some of the emotion of the Global War on Terror when our part in it started a half century ago.

So, we will be fooling around with that as Yeminis show up in Ukraine. Kristina is off with her cooter to see what the excitement is in Lubber Run, and Ruth the Desk Lady says there is some agitation from the new folks on the 5th floor about converting the formal modern look of the lobby. The couches with chrome touch and the stately desk across from the brass mail box rows could be replaced by a package area with easy access to the delivery space next to the canopy entrance on the parking lot . It is a good smoking spot, wind protected and a place to grab a smoke if it is too wet on the Patio.

So, the new name for the cover is why Meat was at the table. The new name incorporates direction from Legal to change the first letters of the original title to something else. That was about as detailed as they felt like contributing, and figuring it would avoid showing up as something AI could identify for copyright violtions get involved in paid correspodence. Changing the ‘N’ and ‘D’ to anotker couple letters is just coincidence, right?

So, the new edition may feature a guy named Dick Ranger, he is still parking the Packard nesr that security light down at the end of the pier. And the Ayatollah was out in the darkness and the laughter of the lithe beauty he had met in Perth still echoed.

It is interesting to wander through the change in deployments has been in the transition from the old Cold War force structures through the years and we tried to capture it that way, with the generations who lived it in the way they spoke and remembered. And shared. This book shows a flash of where a major theme emerged in global relationships, the next one was about accidental participation in the peaceful Russian surrender that ended the Cold War and official travel in the decade after that sorting out the change in us as well.

Fun stuff, you know? It is busy enough that there is talk about maybe going over to the Havana Club 151 on the second deck above Lena’s down in Alexandria. We liked the old neighborhood places over in Ballston but they are gone, like the proper stone Lutheran Church just up the boulevard that has a new name.

We haven’t figured that out and it is like a hundred yards away, so we will investigate on the way to Happy Hour. Businesslike, you know? A way to channel some of the energy into something constructive or at least entertaining. And there is plenty of that, plus the search for low-cost access to the truth. Or at least fun.

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