Hello, Goodbye, Hello again.

There's been quite a whirlwind of change around The Rapidian these days. 

This summer, intern Samantha Dine joined our team. And boy, has she ever been great to have around! She started the food beat, the first of many reporter groups that focuses on a specific topic. She survived the Hunger Week Challenge, chased down eight of the Top Ten for this year's ArtPrize and learned how to create audio interviews so she could share her conversations with our readers. She talked about how she has grown into Grand Rapids, and all the while she won us over with her quick wit and ability to rise to any challenge. Sadly for us, she is moving on to the next adventure in her life.

If you haven't yet, you should have an opportunity to meet Samantha.

This month, new intern (but long-time reporter and mentor) Nick Manes stepped aboard and is ready to take The Rapidian by storm. He's got big plans for creating a politics beat, and will lend his own expertise in labor issues to this arena. He needs your expertise to join him on the beat. He'll be writing articles on our pages as well: when they're not heady political topics, he'll have fun with a range of other community news, including a tour of local breweries (including a sneak peek into those about to join the scene). We are thrilled to have him join us.

If you haven't met Nick in his roles as reporter and mentor, you should get to know him now.

Just this week, we convinced Chelsea LaForge to take on an important task as our community engagement specialist. She's been a part of the community for a while, providing some important community news and stories for our readers and even attended events so she could help us out by talking to people about The Rapidian. We are pretty impressed with her and can't wait to see her forge ahead with her new position.

If you haven't met Chelsea yet, here's your chance to engage our community engagement specialist.

And saving the best for last: we've had many reporters and nonprofits join our ranks since we last had a social. We have new folks and old, reading our pages.

If we haven't met you yet, we sure would like to.

So here's what I think we should do: we should set a time when we can do all that, say, over a giant stuffed burger... or a retro beer or maybe a fancy whiskey. We can get to know each other, and maybe even challenge fellow Rapidians to a rousing round of arcades (hint: George may have some finesse up his sleeve; Holly is sure to "let" you win. Ahem.)

Why don't we drop by Stella's on Thursday, December 1, say sometime between 4 and 6?

See you at Stella's Lounge!