you know, if i want to write about the homeless or child welfare policy in new york city, i call celia dugger who covers that for us and she has a million different contacts right on the tips of her fingers. so, i mean, given how good our staff is, there's 100 terrific brains to pick. c-span: is there somebody, either a friend or somebody you work with, that always calls you the day that a column hits the street and reacts to what you've written? >> guest: yeah. my best friend will do that, and my husband does that most of the time. maybe not first thing in the morning, because he knows i'm a little fragile sometimes first thing in the morning. c-span: now what does that word mean? >> guest: well, after having written all day tuesday and gotten into a lather about something, i'm usually a little still head-up about the subject. and i don't want to hear about what i did wrong with it, if i did, so that it's usually over dinner on wednesday night that jerry will say, "you know, you made a good point in that column about clinton, but i don't think you took into account x, y or z." i may still ge