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A 'lil HooHaa

Messing with the blogging world since 2005

zander hollander

Notes from my noodle: May 20

May 20, 2013

A couple of years ago, I did a blog post about Zander Hollander.

Earlier this year, I got a comment on the post from his nephew, who also gave me the e-mail address of his wife Phyllis. I had planned to e-mail, but didn’t really know how to approach it as Zander’s nephew had noted his uncles wasn’t in great health.

Autographed book.

Recently, a freelance writer happened upon my blog, hoping to find some info about Zander. He is working on a piece about Zander, so he’s looking for all he can get.

That made me remember the e-mail to Phyllis.

I wrote to Phyllis to see if I should forward her e-mail address and such to the writer. I also mentioned meeting them when they came to my town as part of the local book fair. She remembered, which was quite cool.

I’m going to be, in the next week or so, calling Phyllis. I’ll write a little more on the blog after that, to update my post from 2011.

With all of this, however, I went digging for some books by Zander in hopes of finding a signed one. Turns out, I have two signed books. These are very cool to have.

I love signed books and they are ones I really like to keep. So having these two is a bit of a thrill.

Check out the post linked above for the full story.

****

As much as I hate to say it, I guess I have to start working.

I’ve pointed this out on the blog before, but I’m a dreamer. So I’d be lying if I said I didn’t dream big when I purchased my Powerball ticket for the $600 million jackpot.

No winner for me.

Though there was a slight disappointment when I heard the ticket was sold in Florida, it’s also reality. Think about how many tickets were sold for that lotto. Imagine the odds of winning. I only buy one ticket, so my odds are even greater.

It still would have been cool though.

Have you ever read the stories about people who win a massive lotto and are broke in a couple of years? I can assure you that wouldn’t have been me. Many of those stories repeat themselves — the person gives away money, is silly with his spending etc.

No chance for me.

I’m not going to lie — if I won $600 million, I would have tried to spend a million in a week or so. House/land, cars, some other things. All frivolous  Why? Because I could.

After that? Back to being smart with it. Invest it. Pay off bills for myself, family and close friends. Set up some college funds for certain youngsters. Set up a charitable foundation.

Then, have it set up so I get paid weekly. A certain amount. That way, I don’t just go spending money for the sake of spending it.

Alas, that won’t happen.

So when this new summer job of mine starts in a few weeks, I’ll be heading there. And I’m OK with that.

Though $600 million would have been sweet.

****

For the past week or so, I’ve been out finding spots to place geocaches in my area. I am hosting an event this upcoming Sunday and I wanted to have some new caches available.

You can find some interesting things while doing this.

Old ball caught in a bush.

Whether it’s piles of trash, makeshift memorials, the beauty of nature, or whatever else, you never know what you’ll find.

When inspecting at a local field, an old baseball was found.

This isn’t rare. I’ve come across old baseballs many times. And they often make for good photos.

But this one was different. It wasn’t just a ball in the middle of an old field or something. It was stuck. In a bush. We didn’t remove it as we thought it seemed cool an had its place.

It also looked like it had been there for a while.

Just another interesting find while out and about with geocaching.

****

That will do it for this edition of Notes from my noodle. I’ll be back with another edition of this shortly has I have a few more things to randomly share!

Feel free to leave a comment, or e-mail P.J. at hoohaablog [at] gmail.com. Also, please “Like” HooHaa Blog on Facebook!

Filed Under: Books, Geocaching, My world, Notes from my noodle, Writing Tagged With: baseball, geocache, geocaches, geocaching, hiding geocaches, hollander, lottery, lotto, notes from my noodle, powerball, zander, zander hollander, zander hollander books, zander hollander signature

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Thank you, Zander Hollander

July 28, 2011

In recent months, I’ve wondered where I ever got my love of writing.

It’s not a money-making career choice, that’s for sure.

I could have been anything. Like most kids, I had the normal dreams. A professional baseball player. A firefighter. An astronaut. Who knows what else. That was a while ago, after all.

But somewhere, I started to love writing. And someone probably forgot to mention how unless one is a prize commodity, he or she likely isn’t cashing in the bank on this career.

Still, somewhere I started to love writing. And reporting. And news. Somewhere.

I know I used to write things as a wee youngster and got, of course, encouragement from family members. There were a few people at the local weekly, too, who encouraged it because I wrote my first published article when I was in seventh or eighth grade. Some of my teachers in high school also pushed me and one even gave me a portfolio to use when I graduated. He had been pushing me toward writing for several years.

Heck, I was even given the award for Best Sports Editor in my seventh-grade reading class. (Truth be told, it was an in-class newspaper we did as a project and I’m not sure I was actually an “editor” or how many “sports people” were even on the “paper.” Still I got a cool plaque out of it and as a seventh-grade kid, that was sweet).

Still, even with people pushing and encouraging, something had to really make me love writing.

I’ve finally figured it out.

Zander Hollander.

If you don’t know who Zander Hollander is, he’s an author who wrote sports books with his wife Phyllis. The first one I truly remember reading was “Amazing But True Sports Stories.”

The book really amazed me. I was intrigued. The way he wrote and the way he told a story was awesome. I was hooked.

Every year our school had a book fair that ran a week. During the week, students invited authors to the school to speak and visit the book fair. If your author came, you got out of many classes to escort the author around, introduce them etc.

So, I wrote Zander Hollander and got a letter back saying that he would love to come (he was downstate, so not too bad of a trip), but he was unavailable that week.

Every year, I kept trying.

At some point, the trying stopped. I can’t remember if I was in ninth or 10th grade, but I got a letter back saying that Zander Hollander would be happy to attend that year.

Sweet!

He and his wife came to the school for an afternoon. They spoke to classes. They hung out at the book fair. They talked to me. And Zander Hollander talked to me about writing. What he did, how it works and everything else.

He encouraged me.

Can you imagine, being a young teenager and being encouraged by someone you looked up to — but someone beyond teachers, parents etc.? It was amazing.

In my eyes, Zander Hollander made writing cool. He wrote about sports and made it interesting. He had a great style. He was one of the most influential writers in my early life. Though I can’t remember everything he told me, I have the idea of what items he told me. I know he told me some basics — rules which every writer should know sort of thing. After all, I was still young, so telling me basics was a good thing.

I got thinking about this not too long ago as I uncovered a copy of one of his books. I did a quick Google search and I couldn’t find a lot about him. No website. Nothing. That’s not too surprising as I would imagine he would have to be in his 80s by now. I found the company that he and his wife run/own and the directory seemed to have been updated in March, so I’m wondering if I should blind call there one day. It’s actually a little nerve-racking, but I almost want to thank him for being such an influential person in my writing life.

It’s really something else, in this day and age, that you can’t find information on somebody with a Google search. But there’s not much on Zander. I have to figure out if I should try and call the number listed on their company site or if I should just do a tip of my cap from afar. What do you people think?

Either way, Zander not only helped my love of writing, but my love of sports as well. I read many of his books at a young age and it really gave me a different view and perspective on sports.

For all of that, I thank Zander Hollander. Maybe one day, should I write a book or two, I’ll be able to be that person who helps another youngster along the path of writing. It’s becoming a creative path that many people won’t take anymore. Especially with the Internet growing, the small amount of pay you can make and the amount of work it takes.

I still love to write, however. Zander Hollander is a big part of that. And he always will be.

Feel free to leave a comment, or e-mail P.J. at hoohaablog [at] gmail.com.

Filed Under: Books, My world, Writing Tagged With: amazing but true sports stories, author, book fair, hollander, writing, zander, zander hollander

5 Comments

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