First, I’d like to thank all of you for your patience. I gave birth to a boy on September 25th — he was a bit late (like his mother), but he’s wondrous. Accordingly, my work, and especially my volunteer work, has suffered. I offered to resign Vidya, but was talked out of it (thanks, you three!). Grandparents from both sides of the family congregated at our place, first my father, then my husband’s parents. Only two of my three local cousins have met the baby as yet. Baby announcements are still going out. Many appointments with various doctors have taken place. And my students missed me for two weeks, then we had to catch up with the other sections of the course I’m teaching. During all of this brouhaha, Stevie Stahl came through (twice!) with the Membership Roster, so you should be receiving it with this issue of Vidya. We were emailing back and forth about it while I was in labor. A BIG thanks for a job well done to Stevie!

Of course, as two months have passed since the last issue, there are two months’ worth of submissions in the "September" folder — this is how it will be: the September issue will be heavy on Constitutional Reform matters, since everyone who’s been discussing it on the email list agrees that this is the most pressing business. The email lists are also pressing business — see the Notices section on the back cover for information about how to join those if you are online, or how to access them (and, separately, the Constitutional Reform website) from your public library if you are not. The October issue, which follows swiftly (no kidding) will be more generally entertaining. In the editor’s opinion, anyway.

Our Regent is about to be online, and for the last month she has had a working email address accessed from her public library: [email address omitted online to avoid spam]

In this issue, Cyd Bergdorf gets creative, and Clint Williams gets weird — more, more! Walt Kopp’s article is an excellent illustration of a triple-niner interfacing with a hierarchy in which his superior "just doesn’t get it." He says he has more such — I’m eagerly awaiting the next. Cal Woodruff has provided a response to Dave Slater’s article on "Wisdom..." which explains his (Buddhist) view of it, and, separately, a discussion of the steps he thinks are most important for reform of the TNS constitution. Rebecca Zoole makes an excellent suggestion about regional contacts in her letter. She and Eve Gregory like the "polite & brief" policy.

Wayne McConnell introduces his "Redneck" writings. R. O. Whitaker very concisely critiques Vidya 177 (sentiments aside, that is the specificity I would like to see in people’s comments) and then provides an essay with a response to the McNair poem as a springboard. I anticipate several responses. Kevin Langdon responds to the McNair poem also, and Scott Jackson and Celia Joslyn provide reader feedback in the "no letters policy" direction. There are long letters or new articles from Paul Maxim, John Kormes, Kent Shultz and Robert Hannon, but there was not room in this issue, which is already overweight.