On Not Finding Out About Not Winning An Award

On Wednesday 13 September 2006, I might have been sitting at a white-tableclothed table in the ballroom of the Meridien Hotel in downtown San Francisco wearing a little, black cocktail dress and high-heels. I might have sipped champagne and worried about bits of salad getting stuck between my teeth. I might have been excited at the prospect of winning the "Best Columnist" Prize at the 2006 San Francisco Media Excellence Awards and felt slightly disappointed when Chronicle big-shot Ken Garcia got to walk up the aisle instead of me, yet happy at the same time, to have been proposed as one of five columnists from around the Bay Area for the accolade.

But because I was never informed about being nominated for the award, the above (besides Garcia's victory, of course) remains purely conjectural.

I was on Google last night, running a couple of test searches on my new website to see if chloeveltman.com/blog showed up anywhere, when I chanced upon another blogger's reference to the 2006 "Pubbie" Awards, as they're known. I did a search for the Pubbies and was surprised to see my name on a press release for the event along with Garcia's, Bruce Bellingham's, Mark Morford's, and Brenda Payton's.

Thinking that it might be a joke, I sent an email to one of the board members at the San Francisco Bay Area Publicity Club, the organization that runs the event: "Yes, you were nominated for an award," wrote board member Gary Carr. "Someone was supposed to contact you and invite you to the awards ceremony...and I am chagrined that the person who was supposed to invite you either had a brain cramp, or somehow the whole thing fell through the proverbial crack."

There's nothing like not finding out about not winning an award. It's a bit like not going to a party to which you weren't invited in the first place. At least, in the case of the party, you get to sit at home and drink wine on your own, safe in the knowledge that you won't have to share your bottle with anyone else. Still, I'm very chuffed to have been considered.

I wonder how many other awards I haven't found out about not winning?