Editor's note: Linda Johnson was the publisher of Card Player from 1993 to 2000. During that time, she ended each Publisher's Pen column with the tag line, "Now, Let's Play Poker," hence the name of her new column. She is often referred to as the "First Lady of Poker," and is a terrific poker player. Welcome back, Linda!

It's been 17 months since I've had a writing deadline. Sure enough, Senior Executive Editor Steve Radulovich called me today to tell me my first column already was late, and immediately I felt right at home. So, here I am on Thanksgiving evening, dusting off the keyboard and trying to decide where to begin.

When I left Card Player, I had visions of traveling, playing lots of poker, and relaxing. One out of three isn't bad! I guess I'll play lots of poker and relax when I retire next time. (Move over Jack McClelland!)

What have I been doing for the past year and a half? The highlight for me was my retirement roast at The Bicycle Casino, where I was ridiculed, embarrassed, and publicly humiliated in front of the entire industry. This was probably the best evening of my life.

Traveling has remained important to me, just as it was during my stint as Card Player publisher. In the last year and a half, I have visited cardrooms in Nevada, Washington, Oregon, California, Arizona, Colorado, Iowa, Minnesota, Mississippi, Florida, Louisiana, Illinois, Connecticut, New Jersey, Costa Rica, and Europe.

I've enjoyed being a hostess at many tournaments, including the Four Queens Classic, Desert Classic, Carnivale of Poker, Luck Be a Lady, California Ladies Dream Weekend, California State Ladies Poker Championship, Tournament of Champions, and the Linda Johnson Celebrity Challenge at Casinos Europa in San José, Costa Rica. Hostessing is fun, as it provides an opportunity to meet and greet lots of new and old friends.

As a partner in Card Player Cruises, I have worked as the cardroom manager on cruises to Mexico, the Caribbean, England, Turkey, Italy, and Greece this past year and a half. I've also had the opportunity to teach hundreds of people how to play poker, which is something I really enjoy doing.

Other activities that kept me from true retirement this past year included helping form the Tournament Directors Association, which was designed to standardize tournament rules, co-organizing the inaugural World Poker Players Conference, and hostessing the World Poker Industry Conference. If you want to be involved in poker, there is plenty to do.

The most interesting project I participated in took place in Chicago. I received a letter from the Chicago Humanities Festival that asked me to be on a panel with Jim McManus (the famous author who wrote the article for Harper's magazine about his fifth-place finish in the championship event of the World Series of Poker) and Peter Ruckman (who works at the Gambler's Book Shop and is writing a 3,000-page book about the history of gambling in Las Vegas). Assuming that I would be talking about poker, I quickly accepted, since I had always wanted to visit Chicago and poker is my favorite subject. I then received notification that my assigned topic was "Las Vegas, the Now City." I immediately panicked. Not knowing much about Las Vegas facts and figures, I went into research mode by scouring the Internet, going to libraries, and hanging out at the Chamber of Commerce. I studied and memorized facts until I felt totally prepared to cite statistics on subjects such as the population growth trend, the history of Las Vegas, the unemployment rate, the average cost of housing, the number of hotel rooms, conventions, parks, schools, and casinos, the average temperature and rainfall, the average salary, and so on. I memorized the number of tourists last year, their average length of stay, their average age, how much they spent … you get the picture. I even had some clever statistics, such as, "If you wanted to spend exactly one night in each hotel room in Las Vegas, it would take you 324 years to do so. There I was, armed with all of this knowledge, ready to impress the intellectuals of Chicago.

McManus introduced me to the crowd, citing my poker background and some of my poker achievements. Before I could deliver my spiel about the great city of Las Vegas, the attendees bombarded me with questions such as: "How much do you win?" "What was it like to win the World Series?" "How do you start playing for a living?" They had paid to hear about Las Vegas, the now city, but they found the poker side of it much more interesting! Oh well, so much for research, but at least it reinforced my belief that poker is more popular than ever.

You may be wondering what the content of my future columns will be. It will vary; it will include interviews, player polls, suggestions on ways to improve the industry, trip reports, tournament news, poker humor and anecdotes, and perhaps even some point-counterpoint debates. It will not include strategy too often. If you have any ideas for topics, any questions you would like answered, or any interesting poker stories, please contact me by E-mail at [email protected] or by snail mail to the Card Player office. Also, please see my website at www.cardplayercruises.com. Now, let's play poker!