He's dead to me

I was given the assignment of covering a Berry Blast-off recipe contest for the Star. I've covered a million little community things over the years, so I know the drill. This was going to be an Iron Chef-style competition for the best strawberry recipe that didn't need to be baked.

I was sitting there when Tracy Lehr from KEYT News stopped by and said her camera guy was on his way. The KEYT camera guy is Sean -- my nephew. So I'm sitting at the judges table when I hear my name and turn around to face a camera lens about 10 inches from my nose.

After establishing that we were both there to cover the same thing, I told Sean "Make sure I'm not in any shots." When I have full use of my legs, I tend to follow the cameraman around -- then I'm never in any pictures. But since I'm hobbled, I issued the directive.

It was actually a good thing Sean was there because even though I'd called ahead to inform them I was on crutches -- I NEVER EVER want to go through what happened to me in Vegas -- no one informed me that the entrance to the cook-off area was behind the Courtyard Marriott. So I went in the main entrance and had to walk down a really long hall, take a left, walk completely down another hall to reach the area. I was bitching about this to Sean, who then offered to move my car, which was really nice and useful.

But after, when I was working on my story at home, I got a phone call from Sean -- we have individual rings for family members and Sean and Gen's is the Star Spangled Banner. He said, "You might be on TV. You might be eating something. And it MIGHT be coming on in a couple of minutes." I responded with death threats and he just laughed.

No one was home and no one answered when I called their cells, but I finally got in touch with Kim -- my friend. I needed to commiserate. The piece aired and there I was, crutches and all, eating something, as promised.

One of the ways Rob and I will never be native Southern Californians is that we HATE having our pictures taken. For me, it's because I can maintain some self-delusion about how well I'm aging. Photographs burst my little bubble. I like the fantasy. Or as Judd Hersh put it on Numb3rs, "as long as I stay away from all reflective surfaces, I can pretend I'm 18 again."