Niranjana, Melissa and Andy Perdue

Growing up, Niranjana will have every opportunity to be a newspaper reader. Her Daddy is a third-generation newspaperman, and her Mommy was a reporter. Both of us are authors. The morning newspaper is a central part of our morning - as it is in homes that care about current events and higher vocabularies.

Still, I'm rather surprised that The New York Times - that bastion of great American journalism - is soliciting Niranjana for a subscription. The direct-mail piece showed up this week.

I've been racking my brain since the invitation arrived, trying to figure out how the folks at The Times might have come across Niranjana's name. I think this is her first piece of junk mail.

The best I can figure is that our subscription to National Geographic Kids is addresed to "Niranjana c/o Andy Perdue." The New York Times probably figured that anyone smart enough to subscribe to Nat Geo should want to receive The Times, too.

I'm rather tempted to order. It's $3.40 per week for The Sunday Times (which is more than the Tri-City Herald for seven-day delivery), and I think it's delivered by the Herald.