Are you going to chase 1A color or just key?

Just key.

Ah. What was that?

That's about the only kind of question I'm asked with any frequency. "FAQ" will be defined loosely from here on out.

Fine with me. What is it you do?

I'm an editor for the Mercury News, in San Jose, Calif. I've been there since 1983 and have worked a variety of jobs in the news and sports departments, including three years as the sole staff member of the now-defunct outdoors section. These days I mostly do page design. Once we figure out what stories we want in the paper, I decide where to put them, what photos to use, stuff like that.

So you studied journalism?

I went to UCLA, which doesn't have a journalism program. It has a pretty good paper, though, and I worked on that. My degree is in film.

Are you from California?

Historically, yes; personally, no. My family had been in Southern California since before the turn of the century, but my parents moved to Seattle a year before I would've claimed native status. I spent 10 of my growing-up years in Fort Collins, Colo., and I consider that my hometown.

Oh, I was in Fort Collins once.

Oddly, many people have been. (Odd because it's not really on the way to anywhere.) Some people I know have found it uncomfortably small-townish, but David -- who is one tough critic -- is quite fond of Fort C.

Is David your husband?

No, but we've been together since 1989 and we have the lodge and the baby and all.

Steade -- rhymes with "dead"?

Rhymes with "speed."

Thank you.

Thank you.