Book bribe

Every year I do two fundraiser walkathons in May -- Grand Rapids' Hunger Walk and the national Great Strides campaign for Cystic Fibrosis. It's hard to ask people to support both so I keep coming up with tricks. I used to bring in cookies to work and offer them for a donation to the hunger walk. Now that I'm retired, I no longer go to the office so this year I've been offering my book as a bribe. A free autographed copy of Laughing for a Living to anyone who'll contribute $25 or more for the Hunger Walk. I've brought in seven contributions that way, edging up people who would have contributed much less. Laughing for a giving!

O'Hurley HaHa

Just finished talking with John O'Hurley in advance of his appearance with the tour of "Chicago" coming to Grand Rapids in May. Most folks think of O'Hurley on Seinfeld or Family Feud and don't realize he started out singing opera. He's also written some best selling books and founded a company to make energy out of waste materials. He's been taking his family -- wife and son -- on tour with him but now that the son is school age, he plans to move more into business so he won't have to travel as much. "You can do business meetings by Skype or conference call," he told me, "but you can't Skype a performance. Although I've known a few actors who should have."