A woman called the office and requested to speak with my boss, the man in charge, the big guy. I took a message because I generally don't forward calls to him unless I know who it is and how long the call will take. He's a busy man, my boss.

The woman said she was calling from a Congressman's office, inviting my boss to an annual dinner with the President.

I wrote down her name and number and took the memo to my boss, who looked at it and giggled at me like he does. And then he blamed me for trying to pull an April Fool's trick on him. I assured him I was in earnest, and would do no such thing. He said he would call the woman back, certain it's a joke, because who, he said, would invite him to dinner with the double-u? He waggled his eyebrows high at me. He has a poster of a southwest canyon with an Edward Abbey quote on one wall. "The idea of wilderness needs no defense, only more defenders."

I smiled and shrugged. He said he wouldn't cross a street let alone pay for a dinner like that and giggled again and threw the memo on his pile of phone memos. I love working for my boss.