She: Do you know where California’s first major film studio was? The film capital of the world where they cranked out 1,200 silent films?
Z: I’d say Hollywood, but I’m guessing you wouldn’t be asking if that was the answer. I’ll bite. Where?
She: Santa Barbara.
Z: Oooh-kay.
She: And did you know that Canon Perdido was named for an actual lost cannon? Some kids buried a cannon in a lagoon at the foot of what’s now Laguna Street. It happened on your birthday, April 5, 1848.
Z: Seriously? How do you know this? Why do you know this?
She: Because I just read about it in our book, Hometown Santa Barbara: The Central Coast Book.
Z: It’s in our book? That’s awesome. Now I’m totally going to have to read it. And we’re going to have to shamelessly plug it in our column.
She: I would never shamelessly plug Hometown Santa Barbara: The Central Coast Book. That would be shameless.
Z: Do you want to know what I most love about our book?
She: Its wit? Its charm? The fact that we can tell people that we wrote a book?
Z: That, too. But really, the thing that I most like about our book is that I barely even wrote it.
She: You wrote some. Although obviously the best parts are the ones other people wrote.
Z: You mean like the introduction by Fannie Flagg?
She: Sure, but also the other stuff by Cheryl Crabtree, Nancy Roberts Ransohoff and Starshine Roshell. Like the entire page describing all of the chocolate stores in town.
Z: I knew you’d like that part.
She: I’ve never even been into Chocolats du CaliBressan. I can’t wait to try it.
Z: And here I thought you’d be all over the section on hiking.
She: There’s also a whole chapter about wine tasting and another one about shopping.
Z: But I know your favorite chapter is the one about camping.
She: Yeah, right. Camping and biking, my two favorite activities after cooking and cleaning.
Z: The nice thing about not writing much of the book is that I can shamelessly promote it without shamelessly promoting myself. The book’s actually really good.
She: Don’t sound so surprised. What did you write about again?
Z: I can’t remember. But I know I’m supposed to show up on Thursday night at Chaucer’s Books and sign autographs for my No. 1 fans.
She: Seriously, which chapters did you write?
Z: I wrote a purely autobiographical chapter — because I am Santa Barbara, the only one left in town who was born at St. Francis Hospital — but I think it got edited. Philistines.
She: There are some great interviews, too, with Barry Berkus, Kathy Ireland, Hillary Hauser, Rachael Steidl, Marcia Meier, Roger Durling, Michael Redmon …
Z: All those local people are in the Hometown Santa Barbara book?
She: But, wait, there’s more! Dan Bifano, Alan Heger, Walter Kohn, Hank Pitcher, Thomas Tighe, Griffin Saxon, Isidoro Gonzalez, Richard and Thekla Sanford, John McKinney, Jamie Allison, Marty Bebout and John Doucette, and Kim Mearig. Didn’t you interview some of these people?
Z: Nah. I was the token male on the project, shamelessly exploited to add some rugged man-candy to the back flap picture.
She: Yes, you’ve never looked more manly. Is that an Adam’s apple on your neck or a just a shadow?
Z: That’s rugged man-candy, shamelessly plugging Hometown Santa Barbara: The Central Coast Book.
She: Yes, dear.
Come meet Leslie Dinaberg (“She”), Zak Klobucher (“Z”), Cheryl Crabtree, Nancy Roberts Ransohoff and Starshine Roshell and check out — and by that we mean purchase — their new book, Hometown Santa Barbara, at 7 p.m. Thursday at Chaucer’s Books, 3321 State St.