Reflection on buying a newspaper

My daughter called 20 years ago to chat. “What did you do today?” she asked.

“Bought a newspaper,” I answered.

“Um, yeah, OK?” she said.

“No,” I said. “I mean we bought the newspaper, The Star.”

When that revelation sunk in, it elicited considerably more excitement than when she’d thought I’d spent some change at a store for the day’s newspaper.

Those two reactions pretty well sum up the nature of...