March 23: Mt. Pleasant, Mich.

Today, I flew from Milwaukee to Cincinnati to Detroit (who knows what makes the airlines tick) and then drove two hours northwest to Central Michigan University at Mt. Pleasant. Google map.

It was a prodigious amount of travel to visit a chapter, but its president, a CMU senior named Khristopher Brooks, had shown all the qualities of a great young reporter in convincing me to come. He kept asking until I finally said yes just to get him to leave me alone. (Note to students: The same strategy can work when trying to get a journalism job.)

The CMU student chapter and the Central Michigan Pro chapters of SPJ turned out a great crowd for me. I spoke about the breadth of activities of SPJ and our central missions -- the ethical practice of journalism, freedom of information, diversity and professional development. I tried to illustrate those missions by talking about the things SPJ leaders deal with, often in just a few days' time. We also talked about some of the challenges confronting our industry and the promise that technology holds for the journalists of the future. The photo was shot by student Russel B. Smith for the student newspaper, CMU Life.

After the meeting, we visited a venerable old CMU watering hole, The Bird, in downtown Mt. Pleasant, for local microbrew and pizza -- a thin crust with alfredo sauce, spinach, scallions and four cheeses, feta, blue, mozzarella and Parmesan. I bought a t-shirt as a souvenier.

Tomorrow, it's homeward bound, but I'll be traveling for about 10 hours to get there.