When does the love of books/writing/reading get to be too much?
Recently, I had such a C-R-A-Z-Y week. One way or another, I was making out with the written word all day and all night, baby.
First off, I was participating in the A-Z blogfest. That's right, 26 posts during the month of April, on subjects from A-Z. Some writers freestyle it; others choose a theme. I chose a theme:
My 26 Favorite Ways to
This is a subject about which I am eminently qualified to write.
However, I probably should have passed. I had a hellish month at work, and a VERY full calendar on my nights "off," resulting in a feeling like this:
Tuesday night. Meetup with the Chick Lit Lovers reading group I joined, after work. We pretty much all disliked the last selection, but live in hopes the next one we picked will be better.
Wednesday night. Crit group, also after work, where I
But my crit group sisters, how come you always gotta bail on the nights it just so happens all I have to read is sex scenes?
Thursday night. Dinner with my SoCal Lady Bloggers, followed by reading and Q & A with Jenny Lawson, aka The Bloggess. Only my dinner did not happen, because the event was in Beverly Hills, I had 13 miles to travel, (yes, after work, even though I left early) and I stupidly allotted only an hour's travel time to get to the restaurant. FYI, an hour's worth of brake lights? Neither interesting nor tasty.
Soleil Moon Frye from Punky Brewster(Photo credit: Wikipedia)
I did get to the WritersBloc event, at the Writers Guild Theatre, on time to see The Bloggess and Soleil Moon Frye (the actress formerly known as Punky Brewster. She's all grown up, but she's still a little bitty thing). And to connect with my SoCal Lady Blogger sisters, and to see a couple of other peeps I'd "met" through blogging, like Annie Boreson, a fellow SheWriter who is also a very funny writer, like The Bloggess, only her work is fictional (so she claims).
Back to Jenny Lawson, The Bloggess. Hilarious. How can anyone top OD'ing on laxatives, while a potential rapist is passing you notes under the bathroom door? She read this selection from her "mostly true" memoir, Let's Pretend This Never Happened, answered questions from the audience, and then trooped out to sign books and pose for pictures.
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| Me squinting on the left; Jenny gorgeous on the right. In the foreground, Juanita Weasel is screaming, "Motherfucker, not only has my soufflé fallen, but I'm overexposed again!" |
*sighs* Yep, this is how pictures of me come out. Everybody else looks great, and I look drunk. This is why I mostly pose with sunglasses. Either the flash makes me close my eyes, or, because I am trying to fight Closed Eye Syndrome, I wear a stunned, wide-eyed expression like somebody just hit me in the back of my head with a two-by four. I can't even pick a cute photo mannerism, like Leila from Don't Speak Whinese, who always sticks her tongue out.
Still, I was delighted to meet Jenny, to get my book signed, to get a picture with her and Juanita Weasel, and to hang with my SoCal Blogger sisters like Leila and Carolyn West from This Talk Ain't Cheap, who totally rock, both in person, and in pictures. I think my own stupid question just might have inspired this purchase and post.
Friday night after work I stuck to blog writing and commenting. Plus just a smidge of reading.
Saturday I spent writing up book reviews on all the great books I'd been reading over the past month. And sleeping. And, of course, reading.
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| When you gaze upon a statue like this, it really makes sense where Trojan prophylactics got their inspiration. "Yeah, baby, I got a long, hard sword for you." |
Sunday LA Times Festival of Books at USC. Where I met a friend from another writing group, and we cruised the booths (saw Julie Andrews riding in a golf cart!), and sat in on the Love, Actually panel of romance writers moderated by my awesome LARA-RWA sister Dee J. Adams. (And bought books from all of them, because from Jill Sorenson to Tessa Dare to DeAnna Cameron, they all have such great stories to tell.)
And then Monday, World Book Night. Where I went down to the subway station and blithely accosted strangers, attempting to give away something very precious to me.... wait for it.... can you guess?
That's right, books! Gonna write a separate blog post about that experience soon. It was was quite interesting and I avoided getting arrested, always a good thing, though I was firmly escorted off the premises by two (very nice) security guards. I was allowed to remain on the fringes of the property, and from there I found takers for the remainder of the books.
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| And I made such cute signs, too. Which were allowed to stay up for almost three minutes. |
(I did sniff some of my new dead tree books though. Even though I love my Kindle, there's something intoxicating about that ink and paper smell...)
But speaking of wonderful books, coming on Monday, May 7 - interview with awesome erotic romance writer Rebekah Weatherspoon.Who wrote Better Off Red, which won me over despite my initial
Have you ever gone on a week-long book jag of some sort?
Did you attend the Festival of Books - or a Bloggess book signing?
Ever read a sex scene to a room full of guys?
