Story ideas with a scone and coffee

In early August, I wrote about California Watch’s Open Newsroom project, in which its reporters spread out around the state and set up shop in wifi-enabled coffeehouses.

The purpose was to mingle with readers, gathering story ideas while promoting California Watch at the same time.

I wanted to do something similar on my new beat covering Oldham County at the Louisville Courier-Journal and am happy to report that earlier this month I did.

The Courier-Journal dubbed the event “C-J on the Go,” and along with promoting the fact that I would be sitting around a coffeehouse for five hours in the newspaper and on my blog, we shot a promotional video, the link to which is happily no longer available online — being on video is not my favorite thing to do — and set up a live blog for me to update throughout the event.

Sweetbread isn’t a dessert, and Satan’s Whiskers go with Brussels sprouts

One evening earlier this year, I ate the thymus gland of a cow.

The culinary name for the organ is sweetbread, and I didn’t know what it was before I bit into it.

But that was kind of the point. And, though I’m surprised to say it, it wasn’t terrible — actually kind of good in a purely carnivorous sort of way.

Several months ago, I, my boyfriend, Niel; and friend, Corey, went to 732 Social, a restaurant in Louisville’s NuLu neighborhood. Not sure what to order, the waiter pointed us to a little visited part of the menu that offers tastings of food and drinks at $5 a piece.

So it was essentially $10 a course for a small dish and cocktail.

A colorful sky over an evening drive

I may or may not have taken a photo while driving 75 mph down Interstate 64 tonight.

But the sky was too beautiful not to document it in some way.

The storms had recently subsided to reveal one of the more colorful skies I’ve seen in a while.

It made the hour-long drive between Lexington and Louisville one to behold.

My brother, the Marine, pulls off surprise our family will never forget

My brother, Dustin, was 12 years old on Sept. 11, 2001.

He was in seventh grade, with shelves of Hot Wheels cars, an amateur drum set and University of Kentucky curtains in his room.

Now he’s a corporal in the Marine Corps, just home from fighting in a war that started before he could get into PG-13 movies.

While I have mixed feelings about the war, they do not waver when it comes to my brother.

On Thursday, Dustin came home a day early after spending eight months in Afghanistan — his second tour — to surprise my parents.

They were expecting to pick him up at the airport Friday and had come to a local bar to sign a Welcome Home banner and to plan a surprise party for him on Saturday.

Or so they thought.

I learned Mommy is a zombie, among other things

Like some of the other notable traditions that have taken root in Louisville, the annual Zombie Attack Walk started when a small group of people decided to be kooky and others wanted to join in.

In this case, some individuals thought it would be a hoot if they and their friends dressed up as zombies for their shared birthday.

Six years later, the event has grown to include hundreds of undead in a parade of the damned down Bardstown Road.

Elbow to elbow with the mortals on Monday, I watched the stooping and limping masses moan and groan as they made their way to Bearno’s Pizza for the zombie bash.

A nimbler member of the walking dead randomly ran up and shouted at members of the living, trying to raise a scream.