Please Allow Me To Introduce Myself

When TigerBlog was little, he thought that the presets for stations on car radios were set by whoever built the car and couldn't be changed.

These days, TB has two settings for FM stations, with six stations on each, and one setting for AM radio, with six more stations. Some people, TB surmises, have their presets in numerical order from left to right, while TB prefers to have the stations he listens to the most on the far left.

For the record, other than a slight case of OCD, he has no idea why he does this.

Miss TigerBlog gets to have the six choices for the FM2 settings, while TB has the FM1 ones. There is no overlap, not by a mile.

TB has a deal with MTB, where he can listen to his stations if she is playing games on TB's phone, something he encourages to avoid listening to her music. Some of it is okay; most of it is unlistenable.

The song that tortures TB the most these days is "Call Me Maybe," which gets into his head, bounces around, stays there and makes him want to yell loudly "stoppppppppppppppppp."

TB's stations? You're more likely to hear something that is called "classic rock."

With that interest, TB was obviously intrigued by the stories last week that it was the 50th anniversary of the first time the Rolling Stones played together.

TB has always liked the Beatles more than the Stones, but that's like getting an A++ instead of an A+.

TB has never been in love with the song "Satisfaction." His favorite Stones songs?

"As Tears Go By." "You Can't Always Get What You Want." "Sympathy For The Devil." "Lets Spend The Night Together." "Waiting On A Friend." "Paint It Black." Pretty much anything off the "Hot Rocks" album.

Then there's the band itself.

Mick, Keith and the boys have certainly, uh, enjoyed themselves through the years, and yet they've endured, 40 years past when the Beatles broke up. They're still out there, putting on concerts and drawing the crowds and still, uh, having fun.

As an aside, the rather dry comedian Steven Wright used to have a line that went like this: "I love the Stones. I can't believe they're still doing it after all these years. I watch them every chance I get, Fred and Barney."

The group that gathered outside Dillon Gym early Sunday afternoon was decidedly "Call Me Maybe" and probably couldn't identify a single Rolling Stones song.

The occasion was the start of Princeton's field hockey camp, and several hundred girls from grades 7-12 (including MTB) were getting ready for another in the long line of sports camps on this campus. As the field hockey players were checking in, the volleyball girls were checking out. On it goes, for weeks, through June and July.

Kristen Holmes-Winn, Princeton's head field hockey coach, was giving her pre-camp address, which was a mix of motivational speaker and high school vice principal.

The authority part was going over the rules, which are pretty straightforward. Don't leave campus. Don't walk anywhere alone. Zero tolerance for breaking any rules. Eat right. Drink plenty of water.

The motivational speaker part was great.

Holmes-Winn talked about the sport and how the kids are here to learn it and to improve and have fun and how all of those things go together. She talked about how field hockey is a bit unique, which TB took to mean that, unlike soccer, little girls aren't force fed into the sport from the time they're four or five.

In fact, there are very few places for girls to get exposure to field hockey when they're young. For every girl who plays field hockey in high school, there are more than six who play soccer. For every girl

And so Holmes-Winn's message was to do their best during the camp to appreciate this sport, which some have played a lot and which others are pretty new to playing. Her passion for field hockey was very, very obvious.

And then she morphed into promoter, and in the process, she stumbled onto what real marketing is all about.

Here, with this captive audience, she spoke about her three Olympians - Katie Reinprecht, Julia Reinprecht and Michele Cesan - and how they'd be back at Princeton this year to compete and how her team figures to be one of the most exciting in the country.

With that, she had reached a wide audience, one with a demonstrated interest in the sport and in Princeton.

What else is there to marketing?