Just like a moth is attracted to a light and a college kid to a kegger, it seems I can’t stay away from Brandon for too long. And heck, who wouldn’t jump and drive all the way across Saskatchewan for a three-year, $54 million contract offer? I was trying to hold out for A-Rod money (10 years, $252 million, but they wouldn’t go for it.)

And despite a two-year absence while trying out my newspaper skills and learning new things while working with a great group at the Medicine Hat News, things around the ol’ Wheat City haven’t changed that much since the summer of ‘07, when Barb and I ventured west on our latest adventure.

Dave Burgess is still the mayor. We still don’t have a casino. The NDP still reigns in Manitoba. And, I found out on Day 1, Dean Esler still tries to beat the speed limit in his truck while avoiding the long arm of the law.

Walking out of the Journal’s new College Avenue office around noon on my first day of work at my latest stint at the Journal, a black truck whizzed by me apparently en route to a fire, or with the driver having his foot Crazy-Glued to the gas pedal and unable to pull back.

Suddenly, the truck’s brakes were employed and after it screeched to a halt, the driver slammed it into reverse and it came zooming back toward me at a speed similar to the one I had earlier observed going forward.

“What the heck are you doing back here!” exclaimed Esler, who was driving at an urgent speed, it turns out, because he was one of the organizers of the massive X-Fest concert at Turtle Crossing, held last weekend, and it was a mere three days before the scheduled start. An ambulance driver wouldn’t have had as valid an excuse.

Esler served on the Careers Connections board with me during my 2002-07 term in Brandon and I’ll say it loudly and clearly: Anybody who owns a Boston Pizza and has an ownership piece of a Quizno’s Restaurant will always be a friend of mine.

While proclaiming he was happy to see me back in Brandon, Esler primarily wanted me to spread the word that a member of the rock group Sloan had been the victim of a hit-and-run driver and was lying injured in a hospital, therefore forcing one of X-Fest’s headliners to cancel their appearance. All it took was a quick update of a Jerri James column and Esler’s wish was my command.

So now, after only a couple of days on the job, a number of people whom I wanted to see have been crossed off my list. That list so far includes Esler, Police Chief Keith Atkinson, my mother, Irene, who lives in the luxurious surroundings of Victoria Landing, and Brandon West MLA Rick Borotsik who, it seems, I couldn’t get away from even if I tried. I think he wants golf lessons.

That leaves only 24,000 or so people I have to call, or personally visit. So many friends, so little — no, lots of it — time.