For the Sherlockian who has been there and done that, and yet,  for whatever reason, doesn’t make it to New York City in January for the Baker Street Irregulars weekend,  there is  a void that comes with this most Sherlockian time of year. Big things, to our minds, are happening in that far off city, and we can only wonder just what they might be. The biggest thing that actually happens there is the enormous opportunity for Sherlockian socializing,  and missing the biggest  Holmes party of the year is not something one endures without some small whining.  So here comes my own bit of violin playing, along with the best tonic yet for curing that malaise.

There are those, of course, who simply say, “You should just come to The Weekend!”

Yes, I should. All of us should. We should fill the hotels of Manhattan to brimming, we should force the establishment of a third, and even a fourth, Friday night banquet just to hold our swelling ranks. But life hands us plenty of valid reasons not to all show up in New York on that one weekend  a year, as well as some really good invalid ones. (What if you show up and nobody talks to you? What if a cab driver decides to deposit you in New Jersey on a whim? What if the Cloverfield monster decides to come to town before his movie premieres?)

Finding one’s self sitting at home again,  for whatever crazy reason, a Sherlockian is naturally curious about what he or she is missing out on. CNN and Fox News obviously aren’t going to cover the BSI weekend, when they can repeat  the latest celebrity crime scandal every fifteen minutes. We wouldn’t want anyone in the country not to know that Britanny Spears scratched someone’s fender. Such media outlets have to have priorities, and we Sherlockians just don’t rate with them above  the level of Spears-scratched bumpers.

Luckily for us, we have the R&D department of the BSI, the first adopter of Internet Sherlockians,  the Johnny Carson of Holmes, yes . . . heeeeeeere’s Scott Monty!

If you’re have noticed Scott on the Sherlockian internet, you really aren’t on the Sherlockian internet.  His Baker Street Blog page has so many bells and whistles that an old internet browser  may occasionally need a Heimlich maneuver just to pull it up. Scott is very dedicated to keeping his readers abreast of the latest Sherlockian developments, and when the BSI weekend rolls around, he goes further than anyone else to keep us up-to-the-minute byposting real-time updates on Twitter from whatever handheld device he has smuggled into the BSI dinner.

Scott’s updates are like little telegrams shooting in with play-by-play, and , while not the same as being there,  let one feel at least tuned in. Of course,  those telegrams aren’t the same as actually hearing the voices of Sherlockians telling their tales, talking about their friends, waxing on about their passions . . . the sort of things you’d hear if you were actually there.

No, for that you have to turn to Scott’s “I Hear of Sherlock Everywhere” podcast, that he cohosts with Burt Wolder.  As fate, and the Christmas holidays, would have it, I was quite a few episodes behind in my podcast listening, and so I got to spend this weekend catching up. And that was some perfect timing, I have to tell you.

As I’m reading Scott’s Twitter updates on the BSI dinner, I’m actually hearing Mike Whelan tell Scott that he’d better not disrupt the BSI dinner when he’s texting the internet about what’s going on.  The interview was weeks ago, but the timeliness  is spot on. Mike also was quick to talk about  Sherry Rose-Bond’s behind-the-scenes work at the BSI dinner, so when Scott texts that Sherry got a Two-Shilling Award,  it makes all the sense in the world. Sure, it’s not the same as being there, but could you get any closer while sitting in your study in Peoria? I don’t think so.

And if I missed shopping at the Mysterious Bookshop, Scott had an interview with Otto Penzler that I hadn’t got to yet.  Interview s of Jerry Margolin and Bob Thomalen filled in for the random Sherlockian encounters of the weekend.  And then I listened to Randy Pausch’s “The Last Lecture,” which doesn’t have anything directly to do with Sherlock Holmes (yet all sorts of things to do with how I view being a Sherlockian), just to round out those non-Sherlockian cultural bits one gets from just being in New York City.

It was a pleasant enough weekend, and I have Scott Monty to thank for most of it. As a person who tries to be a listener more than a talker when I do get to Sherlockian gatherings, his “Sherlockian of the future” innovations lessened my whining a lot.

Postscript: On a personal note, which is odd to say when this is all a personal note, one of my biggest  gripes about the BSI since our fearless leaders quit also editing The Baker Street Journal  had long been this: Without that interface, a Sherlockian who doesn’t travel widely enough to meet the Wiggins really doesn’t have a clue as to the personality or methods of that fellow who decides whether or not to send them an invitation each year.  And if their turn on that invitation list takes a while in coming, it’s pretty easy to demonize the big guy. By getting an easily accessible interview with Mike Whelan on his podcast, Scott Monty has done the Baker Street Irregulars a big favor, and even though much of Scott's works are on an unofficial basis (and isn’t that the best and most Sherlockian way anyway?), I suspect they will have lasting benefits for the grand old organization.  Mike’s a good guy and it’s important  to show him off now and then. Like I said earlier, it’s not like CNN or Fox News is going to take the time, unless one of us volunteers to become a really colorful Sherlockian serial killer or something.  (You didn’t hear it here, future serial killing Sherlockians!)

Your humble correspondent,

Brad Keefauver