Happy Holidays!

Time spent with my three youngest kids On Christmas. That was great. Have spent the rest of the week ill, unfortunately, but that was the highlight of this holiday week for me.

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Holiday Parties

Last Friday night I went out with colleagues for an after-work party. Yesterday I went out to lunch on the the waterfront in SF at a great Chinese restaurant. Great times!

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Pre-holiday Cheer

Peter and Claire came by last night to exchange presents. They are headed to Seattle for Christmas this year.

Aidan and Julia came by KQED today and we had lunch in a nearby cafe. Wonderful to see my youngest after four months -- our longest time apart ever.

Meanwhile, last Friday on Newsroom we aired an interview with Rep. Jackie Speier, in which she said there was a "rumor on the Hill" that Trump intends to fire Special Counsel Mueller. That story has since gone viral, most recently airing two nights in a row on CNN.

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Sunday Fun

Wonderful family get together yesterday. Laila, Loic and kids came over as did Peter and Claire. In the middle of it all, my car wuldn't start. Laila and Peter helped me jump start it and I got it reparked on the other side of the street.

Thanks, guys!

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This Week's Guest

                                                                                 (Photo by Roger Chiang.)

The long-time CBS journalist Dan Rather came by KQED this week and appeared on our various shows and platforms. He was articulate, gracious and accommodating.

This is a photo of him, our Raul Ramirez Diversity intern, Audrey Garces, and yours truly, taken in Studio A.

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Happy Thanksgiving Weekend!

Aidan and I started out the day with a frustrating task -- updating is FAFSA profile now he is headed back to school in January (probably at San Francisco State). But he did the work, with my assistance. That is my rule these days -- to have the kids handle their own financial aid applications, with me by their side. As opposed to the old way, when I did it all for them.

Then he drove Dylan and me over to Peter and Claire's house, where we spent a lovely afternoon and evening with the extended family. Claire prepared two turkeys, flattened and with their spines removed, in a manner I was not previously familiar with. The entire meal was delicious -- Dylan was especially expressive about how much he liked it.

It looks like he will get into U-C, Santa Cruz, in January!

We spoke to Julia by phone. She is in Connecticut with her grandmother for the weekend, having taken the train up there from Baltimore.

The grandchildren were charming as ever, shyly hugging me one by one. I must be an odd, intimidating figure to them -- sold old, with long white hair and a strange history they can be only vaguely aware of.

Must of the past week was devoted to talking to people about the HBO documentary about Rolling Stone. I am one of the featured characters in the doc. That was a long, long time ago, but I am still proud of the work we did there -- Howard, Lowell and me.

Happy Thanksgiving weekend. I hope yours is healthy and relaxing.

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The First Amendment

Yesterday Tom Burke came to KQED to speak to our news staff about libel, privacy, surveillance and the many other legal issues we face as journalists. It was the first time I'd met him in person and we got to spend some time together chatting before and after his presentation.

He is our outside counsel on the many public records act requests we make, he teaches at the J-School at Berkeley, and is a partner at one of the leading firms in SF. It turns out he started his career as an intern at the law firm that represented both Rolling Stone and CIR in the years I worked at those places, and hsi first project was to work on the Bergman-Ramirez defense team.

The legal aspects of investigative reporting have long been a passion of mine, so this was an opportunity to get to know a leading expert.

When I introduced myself, he said, "You are a legend."

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