To compensate for their lack of instantaneous response, I told my friend Cynthia the entire plot yesterday. It is a tribute to her inherent goodness that she listened to the whole thing and remains my friend (at least I sure hope so).
Life As We Knew It was nominated for the Abraham Lincoln High School Book Award in Illinois.
Sally Young, a student at Goshen Central High School (NY) interviewed me for her school paper. Here's the link.
The Orange County Citizens Foundation (NY) has a traveling exhibit called Read All About It: The Lives And Works Of Orange County Authors. I went to the library today for the sole purpose of taking pictures of my very own display item, and one of the staff members was kind enough to take a picture of me standing by a picture of me.
Yes, I know my hair needs cutting (it's on my calendar for tomorrow).
Please note (as my hair stylist has) that the older I get, the blonder I get. We are both quite intrigued by this phenomenon.
I leave on Sunday for my vacation trip to Los Angeles to see the World Figure Skating Championships, with my friends (in alphabetical order) Christy, Janet and Renee. Since I couldn't bear the thought of being unable to retrieve emails and learn who got voted off American Idol, I bought a pink thing. I'm not quite sure what it is, besides 
pink.
I haven't figured out yet how to get on the internet with it, but I'm optimistic magic will happen when I get to my hotel room. I have found a handful of games on it, including Solitaire. Only I haven't figured out yet how to move the cards from the big pile downward. Please feel free to leave comments or email me to tell me how to do it (I wouldn't object to lessons on how to connect to the internet either).
If I can figure out how to get on the internet when I'm in my hotel room, and if Pink Thing allows, I'll probably blog from LA. Trips to the west coast are very tricky for me, because I'm a morning person (or at least I thought I was until I wrote B3, which I wrote in the afternoons and evenings, since I dawdled every single morning when I should have been working and it still remains astonishing to me the book is actually written), and I like to go to bed at relatively civilized times (like before midnight). Usually when I go to LA, I stay on east coast time, and wake up around 4:30 and go to sleep between Jeopardy and Wheel of Fortune.
But the schedule for Worlds is practically on Hawaiian time. Tuesday night, the Pairs Short Program will end at 11:40 PM, and that's assuming it doesn't run late. Nowadays, they save the better skaters for last, so if I want to see the good ones, I have to be able to stay up much later than my body ever wanted to.
I've been trying to train my body to be on west coast time, and the past few days I've stayed up until 1 AM (still two hours short of what I'll need on Tuesday). My body hates it and gets its revenge by waking up on east coast time. If my body persists in this while I'm in LA, I'll have plenty of pre-dawn time to blog, before going to skating practices which start on east coast time and end past everybody's bedtime.
To give me a fighting chance at staying awake for at least some of the pairs, which will start past my ordinary bedtime, I bought something called ZOOM. Take two ZOOM pills and within ten minutes, sleep will be an impossibility for four hours (or so the bottle assures me). I'm telling you this because I'm convinced ZOOM will kill me, and I want all of you to know, so when my estate's lawyer gets to work, you'll be able to tell him who to blame for my early, and startlingly blonde, demise.
If I survive ZOOM and 12-15 hours of watching skating and figuring out Pink Thing, you'll hear from me soon. No doubt at great length!
ETA (isn't it astonishing- all this verbiage, and I forgot to tell you something): I've been told that This World We Live In has an April 2010 publication date. I'd known Spring 2010, but not which month. I'm very pleased. The sooner the better, as far as I'm concerned.
15 comments:
I love pink -- wish my laptop came in that color.
And to keep in touch you could always try Twitter. I'm just getting used to it myself.
Congrats on finishing your book!! I can't wait to read it!
Hi Linda Joy Singleton-
No Twitter for this freelance children's book writer. I can just barely blog.
I learned long ago to respect my limitations. A good thing too, since I have so many limitations to respect!
Pink is my sisters favorite color!
for solitare, click & hold on the card & drag it to the card of your choice
Congats!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!-Jill
Well I can't tell much of the type of computer you've got from the picture, but if it's anything like mine, connecting to the internet from a hotel should be fairly simple. Most hotels have a wi-fi, so it won't be too hard. Okay, on the bottom of the screen, the little bar there that has the start button among other things and is ALWAYS visible, except maybe when you're watching a movie fullscreen(I'm not sure what it's called...) Anyway, if you can decipher my cryptic instructions, on the right hand corner of that bar, you'll see a bunch of icons; you should see one icon that looks like a computer with a giant red "X" on it's side, and another blue screen behind the computer. When you hover above it, it should say something about connecting to networks or being connected to network -- something like that. If you don't see it, click the arrow that expands the icon list. After that you click on that icon and click something that says something like "Connect to a network". From there it should give you a list of networks/internet connections you could use. Click the one that the hotel says is theirs (should be on a pamphlet somewhere) for safety reasons. Some hotels have passwords, some don't, but the hotel staff or hotel pamphlets should help you with password problems. From there, the instructions on the screen pretty much lead you through it.
I hope that was intelligible enough.
As for solitaire, it is like Anonymous said, but the objective of that particular solitaire game wants you to move it up (at some point) into those four slots at the top in correct order.
I'm glad the book's done. Can't wait to read it. :D
Have a wonderful time in LA! I have always wanted to go to a skating event, but have never been. I've only gotten to watch on TV.
I am waiting for my purple thing to arrive in the mail, but it is on backorder now. It was supposed to be here the 18th, then they pushed it back to the 26th, and then to April 1st. I am beginning to think it may never come.
Nora
Thank you Jill and Jenni-
I can now play solitaire on pink thing and go on the internet.
My plane ride will be considerably less tedious, and I'll be able to find out who got voted off American Idol.
Life is good!
Hi Nora-
You slipped in just as I was leaving a comment.
Sympathies on having to wait for purple thing. I hope when it arrives, it brings you as much joy and conveniece as I'm fantasizing about pink thing.
You know, when I went to the store, I saw pink thing in black and in white, and said I didn't care which color. The sales guy climbed up the ladder, and when he came down, he admitted what he'd pulled off the shelf was pink.
On the other hand, it cost $30 less than the black/white models, which I assume was because of its inherent pinkness.
Wishing you and Pink Thing a great West Coast trip! I'll be looking for you in the audience!
Hi Linda Jacobs and thank you.
My friend Hilarie taught me how to play Free Cell this afternoon, and between it, and solitaire, and pinball, I may just stay in my hotel room and skip the skating.
Just kidding!
Pinball is awsome!
do you have Minesweeper? or Spider solotair? or Inkball? or...........?
-Jill
I can't wait to read your new book! I absolutley loved Life As We Knew It! It is definitley on my list of top ten favorite books of all time!
(just a guess, but the pink thing might just be a laptop, but I'm pretty bad with technology myself, and I've only seen a few of these so called 'laptops')
April 2010 is so far away...! Ha. Enjoy LA. I just moved back east from there and I miss it terribly. I second the twitter comment :) Also, I just saw your contribution to Recycle this Book when it came into the bookstore I work at today. I loved it!
Hi Susan
I can't believe you went with Pink instead of Mac! I could have walked you through and you could have gotten the really lightweight iBook. Oh, well... don't whine to me when you get a virus or whatever. Just recommended you for an author visit to one of the high schools in our district. Hope they get you so I can see you again. You are doing great blogging and I think your hair is fine. I have quite of following now at my school that have read your book. We talk about it with each full moon! I don't know if you ever have time to read anyone else's books but if you can find the time pick up Shusterman's Unwind... it is another book that you keep going back to with the "could this really happen". Can't wait to see your next book. Your tourguide from FAME, Lynn Johnson!
i really like your books, espicially Life As We Knew It.
i also really like your pink thing.
Hi Anonyous-
I really like Pink Thing too. It let me keep up with my emails, and post a couple of blog entries, and follow what was happening on American Idol, all from my hotel room.
When I showed Pink Thing to other people, they loved it to. I bet if I'd put it on a leash and taken it out for a walk, people would have stopped to pet it!
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