I am very much a media guy, though I try to forget this when I step into my other worlds of farm and camp. And so once in a while I indulge myself by doing what members of the media often do best, which is talk about themselves.

This last week, with its revelation of what certainly looked like a wild cougar in a photograph that seemed certain to have been taken in New Hampshire's southwest, has been a media roller coaster.

On Monday or Tuesday, I forget which, the photo appeared on the Internet and quickly in my e-mail, with information soon surfacing, from several sources, that it had been taken by a well-known and well-respected hunter in Alstead. I immediately called the man, who was one of the more direct and carefully spoken people I've interviewed over a long career, and then called two people who know him well. Both described him flatly as a straight shooter who would never be part of any hoax.

The story and photo hit the front page of that Wednesday's Union Leader, and right away my telephone and e-mail were jammed. Two of those calls were from radio stations, the first from Jack Heath at 107.7 WTPL-FM, a station widely listened to in the Greater Concord area and known for its straight-talking, good-natured, down-to-earth call-in shows. All radio is fun for me, if only because you have to be able to impart a story and scene using only your thoughts and your voice to reach the listener's mind, but in addition to that, WTPL is just a fun outfit.

I've done radio stuff with Jack and his partner in crime, Brian “Bulldog” Tilton, whenever a subject caught our mutual attention and seemed a fun and productive topic to kick around over the airwaves. Both guys have an across-the-kitchen-counter feel to their on-the-air behavior, the kind of tone that puts both guests and callers from listeners at ease.

So it was a kick talking with Jack and his listeners about feedback from the Union Leader story and photo, and about the history of cougars — catamounts, mountain lions, pumas, all those names fit — and their long history, from the time they roamed far and wide in northern New England when the first Europeans stepped ashore to today, when they are a shadowy and somehow mystical creature roaming there in the mists of the landscapes and people's minds, and are in fact here, which a growing number of diehard outdoor people believe.

And on Friday, just as this was being written, I got a call from Michelle Schaefer of Kiss Radio WLTN 102.3, based in Littleton, with its several other stations covering the surrounding region. We had a good time — though brief, but that's radio —talking about the mountain lion's history and the better and more recent sighting reports. These included one by former Littleton Police Chief Louis Babin and wife, Gail, and two friends a few years ago while driving on I-93 near Franconia, in which a big cougar — no doubt about it — bounded across the highway in front of their car.

All this brought me back to the wonderful days of radio I enjoyed when I owned and ran the Coös County Democrat in Lancaster and routinely did a Friday afternoon live, unscripted, off-the-cuff show with host Martin Murray at New Hampshire Public Radio in Concord.

Martin would call me in the morning and we'd come up with a short list of four or five topics, and he'd find me wherever I was during what the radio-speak wizards call late-afternoon drive-time, and we'd do six to 10 minutes — an eternity in radio — of more or less spontaneous stuff. It was a lot of fun, and this and a lot of subsequent radio gigs convinced me that if I didn't love the print medium so much, I'd go straight into radio. Television? Nope, done that too, fun while it lasted, but no thanks.

The odd thing is that Martin, whom I've ever after fondly referred to as my former Public Radio dance partner, wound up being a spokesman for Public Service in regard to its participation in the Northern Pass proposal, which I've fiercely opposed.

But even as bitter a fight as Northern Pass has become, I will always have a certain historical and current soft spot for Public Service, a company whose past builders and current good-neighbor policies, and particularly its line crews, I admire and respect. As for Martin, we've been friends through all this, and when the dust has settled, will remain so. That, to me, is the New Hampshire way.

John Harrigan's column appears weekly in the New Hampshire Sunday News. His address is Box 39, Colebrook 03576. Email him at hooligan@ncia.net.