Barry's Life in Napa Blog

AVOID SWINE FLU! DO NOT LICK PIGS!! Being the kind of guy who needs to feel plugged in all the time, I use Google Alerts to send me news stories about Napa. Back when I was on the radio every day, it seemed essential to have a fairly good idea of what the heck was going on around town, and ever since I started trying to know what's going on, people started expecting me to know what's going on, so now I actually need to know what's going on, or else I will let everyone down and I can't have that on my conscience. Expectation created, expectation pending, expectation must be fulfilled, or else I lose face. Tools like Google Alerts make it a lot easier to stay informed than it used to be (and a lot cheaper than using a clip service.) In my job with the City of Napa, then, I continue to try and have a clue most days. So my Google Alerts generate these emails that have headlines and a few sentences from online news stories. All of these stories have the word "Napa"...

Throughout the annals of history (and it is in the annals where all the best history happens) there have been many well-known stories of survival against the odds. The Israelites and their forty days in the wilderness - that soccer team whose plane crashed in the Andes and went cannibal - Dick Cheney toughing it out in his undisclosed-location bunker - all inspiring in their courage, fortitude and sheer will to live on! Nothing, however, can compare with the horrendous crisis from which I have just escaped... THREE DAYS WITHOUT FACEBOOK!!! That's right, my friends - three long, anxiety-wracked days and sleepless nights deprived of my social media of choice. A 72-hour soul-searching test of resolve. A gut-wrenching off-line stress-a-lapooza! How did I do it, you ask? Draw nigh and hear my tale of woe. It all started with an email. An email that looked fully bogus, in fact, telling me my account was disabled due to my violation of the FB terms of service. I'm sure you, like me, ...