The Adventures Of Bette Porter And Sissee Gardner Schmidt After Howie (Part 3, Chapter 2)
PART THREE: SANTA BARBARA, CALIFORNIA

Chapter 2

We had a very busy week. Both Bette and I got up very early on Tuesday morning. While she got showered and dressed I woke up Angelica, and gave her breakfast. Mary had to get up early too to get off to school so everyone but me was in a hurry to leave.

I had a luncheon interview but did not have to leave the apartment until after ten, so I got the baby bathed, dressed and out the door with her mom. That gave me some down time. I decided to research skydiving but instead got a phone call from my editor welcoming me back and discussing interview possibilities. That followed by me making phone calls and getting call backs.

The interview I had today was with movie actress Ashley Judd who had just gotten her bachelor’s degree in French from the University of Kentucky. It seems she was one class shy of getting that degree after attending from 1986 to 1990 but she never went back for it until recently. My job was to ask why it took her so long to decide to finish, as well as give her ink to plug her new film, “Bug”. She also needed to push, “Come Early Morning”, which was not doing very well at the box office, having been released in January.

We were meeting for lunch at Spago Beverly Hills where Wolfgang Puck was going to serve us in a private room.

When the interview was over later that afternoon, I called Bette on my way home. I wanted to know how things were going with her since we were gone for four days and I know she hates getting behind. She said she was swamped but needed to take a breather so she asked James and a T.A. to leave her alone in her office for 10 minutes of quiet, after which she sat at her desk and proceeded to bring me up to date. It was business as usual with her until she asked me how my interview went. She personally thought Ashley Judd was adorable and was curious to hear about her.