Today I left work for a bit to get some lunch down at McDonald’s (doing my part for the nation’s “health care crisis) and while standing in line a nice man named Steve came up to me and asked if my name was Rob Port.  A bit confused, I answered in the affirmative at which point he turned and walked back to his table to retrieve the latest issue of the Dakota Beacon (a North Dakota-centric political magazine I write for).

Steve promptly flipped the magazine open to my column and asked me if I signed it.  I was...taken back.  And slightly embarrassed.  I don’t think I’ve accomplished anything making me worthy of this kind of treatment, but I obliged with my autograph regardless.

What really interested me, however, was that Steve isn’t actually a North Dakotan.  He actually lives in Duluth Minnesota, and said that he was put onto this blog via a friend in South Dakota.  He learned of the Beacon through my references to it in posts and makes a point of picking it up whenever he comes through the state.

My point in posting on this exchange is two-fold:

First, I wanted to invoke the humorous and rather absurd image of yours truly standing in line at McDonald’s and signing an autograph so that you could all laugh at me.  I can only imagine what the other people in the restaurant where thinking.  “Who the heck is this guy?”

Second, and a bit more seriously, it’s rather gratifying to know that things like blogs and the Dakota Beacon are breaking through and actually reaching people.  Though I must say that I never planned on becoming any sort of a public figure.