My first appearance in the media was my birth announcement, which appeared in (among others) the Sparta (Ga.) Ishmaelite. Could I make that up?

If a proper lady's name appears in a newspaper only three times, I am most improper. My scrapbook includes a photo of me, hair wildly uncombed, with the principal of my nursery school; me posing as Sleeping Beauty in the Columbia Mall, part of some odd Halloween or April Fool's edition of the Columbia Flyer; and, of course, the "It's Academic" photo, which was used in local print ads. As a writer, I maintain I've received a disproportionate amount of media attention because I'm a former journalist. (Squint closely at a photo of Jesse Jackson in a 1988 edition of the San Antonio Light and you'll see a very disgruntled young Lippman, out-of-focus in the background.)

But this, this -- http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/02/21/AR2006022101862.html -- this was new. I'm not mentioned by name, but a friend who knows that the writer is, in fact, my former colleague, e-mailed this to me.

Any media moments? Man (or woman) on the street, a chance photograph? Bylines don't count. If they did, my ladyhood would be even more compromised.