I met up with Andy at a beach bar for beers. We hadn’t seen one another since covering the Crist gubernatorial campaign together back in 2006, just before I left the newspaper, and he moved back to New Jersey. He was in town to close on a house at the beach. Seems his stint in the Garden State had cured him of his fear of hurricanes. And left him with enough east-coast cash to cash in on the slump in Florida real estate prices. They’re planning, Andy and Elle, to take occupancy before year’s end. Andy will teach. Andy has a questing mind. We would sometimes stop for an illicit drink after an assignment, toss a few impressions around, before returning to the newsroom. The managing editor found out about it once and punished us both - humiliating me, and infuriating Andy - by giving us a joint byline for Andy's story. Crafty wench. Not that it stopped us, or was even meant to. It was more in the vein of Paul's "meat sacrificed to idols" principle. Once something is on t...
