Seniority is very important in my my workplace. So scalia, although he was three years younger, he was appointed to the court many years before i was. Thats why it is skill he ginsberg. You can watch this and other programs online booktv. Org. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome dave and carl. Was your name again . Carly harrison couldnt be here but im in his place. He probably be famous if youre an enormous spelling. Thanks for jamie for putting on this incredible writers always thought we would do in the few minutes we have left is where both to briefly talk about our newspaper careers, first we need to thank the festival for fitting a million and a half people in this room. Thats a National Park service estimate. Ive never seen a crowd this big its an amazing credible crowd. So for those of us i dont know were going to tell you about our careers. And then well talk about little bit while well talk about florida. I started the newspaper business in 1971 and work for newspaper the pennsylvania called the daily local news in west chester pennsylvania a small local paper that we once ran a headliner that said woman beats off would be rapist. Thats kind of our we were and i was the general reporter and i wrote obituaries and covered fires and police and covered municipal meetings that are probably still going on. However from there to the Associated Press in philadelphia and west journalism for a while to teach effective writing seminars and tried to get people to find the enclosure and then i started writing a humor column. I kept writing it and got in a few papers in the early 80s i started to get into more papers and a 1983 the three the miami herald hired me although i did not want to move there so i stayed i was i started visiting miami regularly to do stories and came to like it. In 1986 i moved to miami and have been there ever sense. Carl carl and i have to talk about it but really if you want to be a humor writer next line place to go. I was born in Fort Lauderdale and i started a newspapers in 1974 in a small paper and i came to miami herald and 76 on the city desk and worked on the sunday magazine where dave and i cross paths. I worked on the Investigations Team for a few years and then a 1985 started writing a column which i still write for them and having outlived all the editors and publishers who i have aggravated over the years, my career got started with this tiny paper in florida was called cocoa today. It later was the prototype for something called usa today which is still around and you can read it. But i know ive one of my first assignments was a tv show called batman. There is a guy named adam west who played batman. Adam west was now doing tours. He would to shopping malls and entertain kids. I got to go and had an interview and were in a tiny little dressing room watching him try to fit into leotards and i just thought this was right as woodward and bernstein were say the whole watergate thing is happening and im sitting in this closet with adam west twos swearing like a sailor because he cannot fit into this batman outfit. That showed me the right business. Im an eye when it 76 and and been there ever sense and as a hometown south florida person that seemed like the logical place stand up and there wasnt a better news towner place in the country. So the material is boundless. The thing is in carl has written an amazing book about florida and is something he has remarked on many times. Its so true, you cannot make things up that are weirder than the things that it or would this involved a citizens crime watch meeting in homestead for the nickname was kurt iv addressing the group and they were meeting outdoors. Theyre explaining how it worked with a crime watch. Its going well up until kurt was hit on ahead by 75 bail five bel of cocaine falling from the sky. There are coming over at the bahamas one of them had a church. And they finally force him down in naples they set off a Treasure Hunt in the everglades the next day. If you wrote a novel and had a scene its a citizens crime watch meeting. The critics would roast you. If you put it in a nobody would believe it. There are times when i had stories out of the herald and send them to my editors in new york to convince them the fiction i am writing is not so farfetched. Remember this is years ago right after the drug wars got started is basically a courthouse hires a voodoo staff. Voodoo was in the headlines. Because there is a semi religion that involves animal sacrifice every morning they waited find it dead chickens and beheaded goats and things because somebodys trial was coming up and they would put a curse on the prosecutor. They had to hire we didnt call them hazmat back then, janitors willing to clean up dismembered animals. They had to have the staff so that when all of this arrived at the day county courthouse every morning, they wouldnt be slick with blood. So the herald actually ran it. We tried to write it like this happened everywhere. We dont want to offend to remember the story when the santeria guys got their own pr people and theyre going to try to make everybody think this was okay . And they still do. They had a tv crew and they were going to show them the efficacy of the humaneness by which they did animal sacrifice. The goat got loose in the middle of it. It backfire. It was terrible. It still is a strong market for goats in miami. Its not because we eat them. Every now and again therell be a car like a camry on the expressway with a bunch of goats in it. Im not kidding. It does still happen. The wildlife we have a lot of wildlife and again they interact more with the citizens that he would like in miami. My favorite wildlife story involves these two homeless guys who were fishing and they caught a nerf shark. And they decided they would sell its, theres a bunch of restaurants along the miami river. Why they thought they could sell the shark at a no but they did. They needed to get it over there and they didnt have transportation. So they took the people mover which is a hightech thing we have in miami that goes around. Its not really designed for marine life. Why would call the people mover, but they got on and it was rush hour. I know this because the person who is on the train was a friend of mine and he started sending me pictures. She said theres a shark on the people mover and it is not dead. The shark was not in good shape but it was doing poorly. It did not attack anybody which is a shame really because that wouldve been the best miami story of all. They finally got it and nobody would buy the shark, the herald did a big story of this because they are not leaving it on the streets of downtown miami. And we had the story where they talked about the merchants who shut up the next day and they say the shark on the sidewalk. I really need the water at all. My favorite was when i first thought i thought it was a body so when i was so relieved and i thought was just as shark. It was a feelgood story. I think my favorite animal story was the guy who lived in a trailer park in west stayed in his neighbors kept calling the police except they were calling the police they were calling the game wardens. They were calling they knew something wasnt right and when they get there he says he comes to the door and he is puncture wounds all over his torso and they said whats going on we command and they said everythings fine. They said everything is not fine medicine. So they have to do a search and its a double wide so take some time. They finally get to the master bedroom and hes clearly nervous let me just said theres only one bed in the house. They walk up to the bed and they pulled the covers off the bed and their two adult alligators in the bed. The only bed in house. His room. So the affidavit the alligators were removed from the premises quote for their own protection. [laughter] now, dave knows this story. And then the other stadium in california if that happens in your neighborhood, whoevers caught with two alligators in their bed, they just cleaned out and leave the neighborhood and hope they Start Talking about him tender 15 years later. This guy hires a lawyer in florida. In florida. He sues to get his friends back and he takes two and half years in the dade county, almost two years in the Florida State court system before some appellate judge finally says okay this is going to end. Theres no constitutional right to sleep with the reptile. A wild reptile. It was under federal protection. A man had to keep these poor gators in custody all of these years in case the guy lost. So the day the verdict comes down the game warden storm in the back of his truck and driveway into the at at everglades because they didnt want this lovestruck i do find it. They were consenting adult alligators. The current wildlife issue that we have in miami and dave countys burmese pythons. There is the expert on snakes. Their large. They should not be here, they should be in burma. And what happens is people in south florida love reptiles. Charles is one of them. Use like starbucks if you need us naked three clock in the morning juergen find it. So people get these things in the have them in their condominiums, then at some point they run out of crack and they go they let them go and they reproduce like crazy and they have no natural enemies. Theres thousands of them out there. So the state of florida decides to get rid of them and comes up with this thing called the python challenge. The statement wildlife god to them by people all over the world to come and kill our pythons. But, there could be a problem because you had to pay a fee of 25. That we did have a lot of really bad people. [laughter] and you had to take a short on my course. So anybody who has ever dealt with dangerous animals the short on my course is the way to go. So i did come i went on and the big thing with how you kill the python and if you think, i would that the way to do it is a hack hack the pythons had off but thats not how youre allowed to kill them because according to them if you cut that snakes head off the brain keeps working. They dont say what its thinking. So you have to destroy the brain. So the first year now keep the numbers in my. The estimates range in the tens of thousands. Some people say hundreds of thousands. We have we have people from all over the country come down for a month. At the end we told the was 68 dead pythons. So im not a biologist but im assuming that at sometime during that month a mother python late semantics and produce not more than that. The point is we lost the python challenge. We lose it every year. And so the demographics i just want you to picture lots of people arriving with snakes and machetes and just the demographic that if you held a duck dynasty lookalike contest for example. And what you gave out was crystal meth in the beginning, then you you got yourself a python rodeo going on. Every year they try something new. They alter ten lengthen the time and every year theres a few pythons but every female python layup to 90 eggs. They have no natural enemies. So this is a losing cause. I told dave that one of the great, every president ial year, did happen happen lester the usually president ial candidates come to florida into a photo op in the everglades. You have to go down there theres a thing on the trail and you pose on the boardwalk and its like a chamber of commerce alligator flow behind you. To to show how much you love the everglades. So if youre running for president you have come down there. Even jeb bush did this. When he said love the everglades, but its in the everglades. So you have these fantasies if you live in florida that during one of these photo ops theres this huge giant creature snatches right off the boardwalk. And whos smaller, michele bachmann,. I think thats my fantasy mightve been her. But anyway and then theyre gone. And you think thats the next step in the python invasion. It is an invasion. I propose that a forget to challenge a species should challenge when we should win against. I picked manatees. We all love manatees, but they dont do well in florida because first rather not that bright. With all due respect. They are brighter than the boaters of florida. [laughter] who are really not bright at all. They keep running into manatees may have all these manatees owns and it never works. The idea came up with his we cancel cancel the boaters down lets speed the man it is at. My idea was to put motors on the manatees to get them up to 70 miles an hour. After couple boaters are killed by highspeed manatees they will start slowdown. But we really should talk a little bit about one of the richest sources of humor in florida and especially dade county is the political system that we have down there. I proposed years ago that after the election we should indict them in one ceremony. Because we have the most amazing record. Once there was a glorious time of about six years when the two main political candidates, the two most powerful men in date county were known as crazy joe and mayor local. And we had where three mayors were indicted in the space of two weeks. Thats a trifecta that even in my lifetime. In they get indicted and convicted and go to jail. Then they get reelected. Im not kidding. Its like this guy doesnt need any training. [laughter] mayor he was while he was the mayor theres just one thing he did. The herald described him as eccentric or Something Like that. Insane. A lady wrote a letter retired City Employee wrote a letter to the mayor criticizing something he had done. His response was was to go to her house at 1030 at night and pound on her door. Because it was miami she went in and got her gone. Which it and if you saw the herald that has those bullets that you will damage. [laughter] so thank god she did not open the door to the mayor as i recall. Is sitting on the doorstep pounding in their same this is really not a good idea. Shes in in there like just put them in the chamber and the other crazy thing that he did was he was pissed off at the herald for something maybe something i wrote or someone wrote in hughes so upset that he showed up in his bathrobe. In the lobby at about four the morning because thats the first place newspapers were delivered. And these are the things that are made of paper and you dont see a much anymore. But he was there waiting for the truck to drop in his bathrobe. And theyre security people saying theres a guy and its mayor local. I have to say for the roy black in south florida and his partner a few years ago. This is great because i kind of stole this from one of the models. His partner gets home from work and hes walking his dog in the neighborhood. Another dog comes over. The neighbor dogs breaks off the lesion comes over theres a confrontation. Being a lawyer in miami and of course you carry a gun. So frank the two dogs are having a confrontation and frank just takes out his gun and blows away the neighbors dog. It happens likely to have his law partner one of the most famous defense lawyers in the country. They tried to take away didnt want to put them in jail they were just going to take his license away for shooting the dr. Was the trial of the century. He sent helicopters up to do crime scene folders. They had reenactments and place where the four dog fell. It was unbelievable. And then this guy that is not the only lawyer shooting dog story i have. Another when i have is a guy walking a dog and up the ball got away. When a neighbor and he lashed onto the golden retriever and he pulled out his weapon. This is where the people and its dead but it doesnt let go of his dog. The golden retriever runs off down the street with the dead fishbowl flopping on his back. They had to shoot the dog off the golden retriever. Had a lawyer tell me about and the best part is the pitbull story and said you just put out your gone he had a briefcase in his gun was most normal conversation in the world to him that of course i carry a gun at all times why wouldnt i shoot the dog. So there is gone and over. A lot of people in miami is a literary escort so when authors came to pick him up at the airport and she the publisher requested they get a large vehicle so she came up and took him to the rental car place and theyre gonna get a rental car. As shes getting ready to leave a man comes run running up and grabs her purse and jumps out and runs over and gets in another car and starts driving. So they come over and starts screaming and yelling. A man pulsed to stop and pulls out a gun and fires several shots at the fleeing person in his car doesnt hit them, jumps back in his current caps off leaving penny with no purse on their towering, welcome to miami. We dont always present the best case, although i had a bumper stickers made up as i come back to miami, we were shooting at you. [laughter] but this story created quite a stir abroad, we had a german tourist set of hotel when he checked in and spent the night, he comes from the next morning and is complaining is a terrible odor in his room he goes back to his room and they look under the bed and theres a body under the bed. They made a big deal about that in germany they did not point out he was not charged for the extra occupant. The norwegian tourist. There always getting in trouble. They mean well, they got there sandals and they just dont realize theyre in a war zone. They dont know what a war zone is into they get to it. The interesting thing about it is when the miami Vice Television show started they were whining and complaining theres 12 homicides per episode and thats not fair and its not that bad. They were complaining about the history of the wild west. It was incredible. A lot of them were foreign tourists. Were getting the shows that in syndication were fascinated. We had sorta been competing and we were orlando and were feeling badly. So when miami vice came the city fathers were really angry. They made it look like every person in miami was a drug dealer when in fact its like one in three. Maybe. I wanted were talking about the political system and we did a story once were its kind of an issue that had been raised by President Trump who feels his election was ranked even though as i recall he wanted. We need an investigation by the way. So in miami the herald decided to do a story on absentee voters misses people who voted in the city of miami but dont live there. And it turned out to be very easy to locate people who lived there so they call them up and i wanted to redo some explanations so in a city where they dont live in they said stuff like this woman who i know i shouldnt be doing it but i dont want to makers another month its a tradition, the important important things we do as a family together. When we moved i cannot vote for the people i liked here. And my favorite, i voice felt more in tune to with things in miami than anywhere else. Im. Im an american citizen. If you dont violate the law when you vote its my right as an american citizen. Most of the corruption we had down there has been in municipal and county races. Often its candidates themselves who dont live where they say, they live miles away and representing the district, and the herald one of the things he said was a gentleman named manwell voted three times and they made it clear that he wasnt even alive, he was dead. Three times. Thats a citizen there. There is big controversy in florida and around the country about felons restoring the Voting Rights and we have always argued that who is Better Qualified to judge miami politicians than a felon. They are the most knowledgeable, informed voters in south florida, they know. But well, the selection. Were debating whether were going to talk politics are not know should do the time that we have, lets take some questions to make it. Sure related to questions will break the rule. Shout them them out of you have a question for you. Theres a signal from the booth back there. Theres some ninja guy given us a signal. Is that a bad thing were doing with cspan question. Cspan is on, thats right. Hello. Did he say, i think he said at one point. You said it. A decade ago work i was fending off the bad guys. Thats a true story. There is a friend of mine in the keys when i lived in the key felt on the fifth. Given broken into several times and for the rest of for reasons i cant go into he was not allowed to possess a firearm at that time in his life. He had a big giant carnivorous lizards that have passed away. Anyway he didnt want to get rid of it so they put it in the freezer. And i said said why are you keeping that, his name is klaus or something why you keeping that awful thing. And he said said because, if they break in again thats what im going to go after him. He would turn off all of the house lights at night and sit there with a frozen lizard because his theory is he has some interaction with lawenforcement in the past so he thought if he used the lizard on the burglar and then nobody would believe you a kill someone with the lizard. Thats true. It was horrifying. Horrifying. Heres what happened. There is a hurricane come through the keys and knocked on the pope or off. So the last we saw the lizard he was tied to the back of his boat and taken out to set it loose. So anyway anyway that was a true story. It happened. I can begin to tell you how twisted and sick and perverted carless when it comes to lizards and snakes. But all give you one little example. When i got married carl gave me, as a wedding gift and egg. It wasnt a chicken egg, and all he would say is, you better get a cage. I meant on what happen. First vault wasnt easy to get the damn thing. And i michelle, she killed the egg. She put it in the freezer just because i want to what it was. Quite good is this. There are some laws, but if you had a cage it wouldve been fine. It wouldve been fine. What we use most often for inspiration . For me is the realization that if i dont come up with Something Else right then i might have to get a real job and thats been a lifelong motivator for me. Jimmy is great hes a friend of mine in here dissect when people asked its a perfectly good question. He would often say my mortgage. It is a job but what youre talking about is created. All you have to do is read the front page the whole state of floridas completely insane at this point. Dave gets the greatest clippings sent to him an email to him. I get a fair number. Theyre disturbing. They make you. They make you want to sleep with the lights on at night. It is good material for your next book. The real life is the best. Were in a situation now politically with one of our most famous residents in palm beach florida. This is a situation no novelist can of comments like tom wolfe and Hunter Thompson got together. And they created what we have now. Or or somebody. So i think by a large writing is a job. Its a peculiar job when he think about about it. Most of the people who write the image you have is like something comes to you and is so rare. Its really more like it doesnt seem that good and then the next day seems a little bit better. But its like that. Slowly adding words. Not just the slashes. Except for stephen king. But then some people can write at incredibly high i dont know how he does it. It is pretty much torture for a lot of us. Its like coal mining that much harder. People should feel sorry for us. It is a weird job when you think about it. Going to. Oh two a room. And you go and theoretically if you can a book 500 blank pages if you have the audacity to think youll put words on it somebody will read it and enjoy. Think about the nerve it takes to do by nerve you think im in a right something good enough that something is going to want to read. And then the insecurity plaza with every page. And then the worst thing can happen. And we talked and we talked about this in the middle of a novel or book and you read a really good book and he feel like a total imposter. You literally feel like putting the torch to the operation. So thats why i dont read a lot of fiction when im writing fiction because it will send me over the edge. The other side of that coin is that you write something and you think its okay. And then 50 shades of gray comes out. And you like 90,000,000,000,000 people people buy it and youre like well i couldve done that. Exactly. Anyway. [inaudible] [inaudible] thank you. [applause] ive said this many times. Its a sweet of you to say that and i appreciate it. People will tell me when i was depressed or wasnt getting along with my kid and we bridge a book together and made us feel so much better humor so wonderful. And im always grateful but even in my heart i said it was still i would still do it if it hurt you. [laughter] because i dont really have any other useful skill. No other skills. But the cool things about this is that dave and i talked about this when you have a book come out onto her we always complain about being on the road away from your families which is hard. But this is the only chance we get really to meet the people who read the books. Its a very, very isolating, lonely grind writing it. You never know how good or how bad it is when youre done. And then you take a deep breath and get on the plane and start going to different cities and meeting people and getting feedback and this is true with kids books i do. Thats what keeps you going. It is a job and sometimes not a happy job to be doing, but the rewarding thing is when you get the feedback. This is only connection we really get. Even working for the newspaper now unless your masochist and want to read your emails or going twitter and read what people are saying about you, thats not really human contact. This is very it is a privilege for us. We both written books for kids and i love the kid readers different from adult readers. Theyre very direct. Like have you ever done the school group. And like 306 graders its great. Talking about my book and very exciting. Does anybody have any questions when they go yes and the like to know you have a big wet stain under both the arms. [laughter] i was true. I did. Kids are so honest that way. It is true but it is fun to talk to them. Theyre so slick and smart. It is a good, inspiring thing to be able to do that we need readers of this country desperately now. Readers ought to be reading anything they have to read. We need at least a million and a half maybe. Thank you. The question was its a very nice book that i wrote that became a movie called big trouble and we have any plans to make more movies out of our books . Well, thats completely out of our hands. The way it works as they give you money and you give them their book. And thats. And thats the end of your creative input. [inaudible] i did have one interesting experience. I went to rush a couple of years ago as part of an exchange program. Were they sent authors over to improve relations between any see how well that worked out. And they asked me in st. Petersburg the consulate they have a program where they show american movies to russia. They asked me if i would bring big trouble over. Usually its like White Christmas with bing crosby. Very american. But they want to make because i had the book in the movie. So i go around around and do it to any stocks in one of the questions id asked them is what you think we think of you that bothers you . And they all said we think youre all drunk on vodka all the time and gangsters. They did not like the gangster thing. And so than in st. Petersburg i went and i had my movie and i am remembering the plot of the movie and i thought all theres actually two russians in the plot of this movie. And there gangsters. So i had to get up in front of a bunch of russians and theres russians in my movies and their smart gangsters were all the americans in the movie are stupid. If you ever go to russia one thing i learned if you go to russia, do not eat mexican food. Because we were in moscow one night and all the restaurants open around the hotel was a Mexican Restaurant run by russians. And i ate what i realized what a nice chimichanga. I wont go into it but if they were listening in on my room, which i think they were, it was a long night for them. [laughter] at the ritzcarlton. The same president ial suite. Yes. And it was urine for you i will say. I do not have anything to do, besides cashing the check i have little to do with striptease the movie. I went on set, everyone was as nice as could be. You realize and i said this before. All writers know that when you turn in your books over to hollywood is like turning your kids over to Charles Manson daycare center. Thats pretty much what it is. You go in with low expectations anyway. You wish them the best. But theres a couple of projects always kicking around in your nice to them on the phone. Sometimes the writers want to come talk and you said yes come talk and all you can do is be nice and hope they get it, they sorta sorta get it in the script turns out okay and in many cases the scripts do not turn out okay in the stuff doesnt get made. Were actually better off with a bad script not getting made of your boat then you are with one getting made in getting the money you still have to spend the rest your life answering things like what did they do to your book. I was in the book is right here the book is good. He went to see Something Different entirely. Most are nice and meanwhile. What writing good screenplays hard work. It has have structure there has to be continuity in all the things i throw away when i sit down to write a novel. They have to be in a screenplay. We are out of time. Thank you for coming. [applause] [inaudible] [inaudible] you are watching book tv on cspan2. The top nonfiction books and authors every weekend. Book tv, television for serious readers. This week in a book tv the high commissioner from refugees, recounts the perilous journey of Syrian Refugees to europe. The misconceptions government officials have about the