Wanted: Stenographers

Much time has passed, B/S, since last we spoke. And with every second that lapsed incommunicado, I felt a distinct pang of remorse for the lost opportunity. On so many occasions in these last twelve days, I experienced some small but enriching life detail, or some fleeting but (at the time) momentous single-frame thought flashed across the silver screen of my consciousness.

But these earthshattering ephemera always occurred to me when I was away from a computer — and they naturally would flit away into oblivion (as ephemera tend to do) before I could take a seat in front of my terminal, pour myself a Diet Coke, and get to typing. My PowerBook is handy, I grant you, but it only helps so much. What about when I'm driving? Or scooting? Or negotiating an arms sale in an abandoned warehouse in Southie?

I've decided I need to keep Archives. I need to maintain a more complete record of my utterances during this rise to power than I am making available to you folks now, in this weblog. Don't get me wrong, B/S — the weblog is not going anywhere. You'll still get the highlights here. But the Archives will have it all — every word I utter, at breakfast, lunch, dinner, in the bath, in my sleep. Everything I say between next Monday and the end of my life will be recorded for posterity's historians and journalists to consult and review.

So right now I'm interviewing stenographers — court reporter-types who can take down on their little machine thingies everything I say during an eight-hour period, then go back and massage their shorthand type into a definitive transcript for my signature later in the week. I'm looking to hire three people, each of whom will work one shift a day.

Qualifications? No formal requirements: I'm basically just looking for skills here. Notary certification would be a plus. And obviously an ability to handle changing work conditions. Most of these people set their apparatus up on a tripod and sit down. I'm going to need people who can follow me everywhere I go. They'll have to be able to rig up their machine so they can type while they walk, or while they're in a car or a helicopter — or crouched in hiding nearby while I'm fighting off some of Ortega's Incan Dance-Fighters.

So that's the plan. I'll be interviewing four candidates this afternoon, and six tomorrow. First an informal conversation, then the skills test. PePe and the intern are setting up an obstacle course/steeplechase for me to run with the stenographer beside me. I'll be reciting Latin poetry as I step through the tires, legal disclaimers while I climb the rope to the diving platform, and baseball statistics during the 100-meter swim sprint.

Entourage status will be awarded to the three stenos who can keep up!