The gremlins did it.
Gremlins. Little invisible creatures that haunt things like appliances, printing presses, computers. They creep in on little invisible feet, when you least expect them, and do nasty things to electronic equipment when the mechanically impaired aren't ready.
Back in my newspaper days, we blamed gremlins for everything--misplaced cutlines, errors in spelling or grammar, disappearing lines of type. Of course we blamed the gremlins for things that we knew we actually did ourselves. Like wrong names, mixed up facts.
Gremlins, evidently, like to bother non-newspaper people, too. Including state legislators.
So, if you haven't received a phone call back from my office....if you haven't gotten the letter from me that you're waiting for...if you haven't gotten the e-mail you were expecting...blame the gremlins.
In fact, if you've contacted me by e-mail anytime in the past three weeks, would you try again? Or, just call me.
And if you can't find my phone number in the new Westfield phone book, you can also blame the gremlins.
When I get e-mail at celehahn.org, via my home page on the world wide web, I often forward your requests for information, citations, bills, my opinions on legislation, and many, many other pieces of mail, from Westfield to my State House office, where information is readily available.
Of course, I keep your e-mail at the internet site, in my Westfield office. The e-mail stays here safely, wherever it is that e-mails that come in over the internet stay, until I'm sure I receive it and handle it in Boston.
Over the past few weeks I forwarded more than several pieces of correspondence. Then, I realized, I didn't get them! And, they didn't bounce back, either. It seems that a computer update in the State House, done to be sure that our e-mail system was Y2K compliant (meaning it won't crash next new year's eve), made the system crash.
And all my incoming e-mail was lost. And, all of my outgoing e-mail was lost. Forever. Because, the safety plan failed.
The copies I safely left at celehahn.org, disappeared when gremlins in the west changed my computer mail system, erasing all traces of anything I had ever saved. And, because it all disappeared upon arrival in Boston....well. Gone, gone, gone.
Any e-mail that I thought I had answered (that's the reply you didn't get) also disappeared when the system crashed. It wasn't delivered; it didn't bounce back. Because when the House of Representatives system was cleaned out, all traces of whatever I had sent out from the State House office was gone, as well. And, couldn't be retrieved. Gremlins.
No garbage in, garbage out. Just nothing in, nothing out.
So, if you wrote, or called, or asked for information and you're still waiting, call me.
Of course, if you're looking for my phone number you won't find it in the new Westfield phone directory under Hahn, Cele. It was there last year. Right between Hague, Richard and Hahn, Frank (no relation, by the way).
For 1999-2000, it seems Bell Atlantic decided that I was a business, not a person, and put me in the business section. Between Haley Funeral Home and Haines & Belcastro. (They're physicians, it says.)
Of course, I'm not in the yellow pages, even though they think I'm a business. Because they didn't have a section for House of Representatives, or Legislators, or Politicians.
I pride myself on constituent service. So please forgive the gremlins. And, try again.
On a more serious note, goodbye Asher. You are indeed teaching the baby eagles to fly. And, goodbye Lenny. You're probably getting Heaven ready for the Fourth of July.