Category: LHA

This is a very important day at our house!! Take a deep breath and shout out HAPPY BIRTHDAY to:

My daughter, Stephanie, who just finished her sophomore year at Moravian College

and

my Beloved Husband Scot, who is every bit as handsome today as he was when he was 16!!!!!

(They are both in other cities today, so we’re having a combo birthday and Mother’s Day blow-out on Sunday.)

And happy Cinco de Mayo to everyone in Mexico, and others who may be celebrating. Before you say something not-quite-historically-accurate, you should read up about the fact that today is not Independence Day in Mexico. That would be September 16th.

Today is also the first time I’m going to make it to my writer’s group in four months. I don’t think I know an author who doesn’t have a writer’s group. I’ve been attending mine for about a decade. We all write books for kids and/or teens. We are also friends – deep, true friends. Leaving them is going to be one of the harder things about moving away from Pennsylvania.

Is anyone out there interested in having me post how our writer’s group works? I’ll try to remember to bring a camera to our meeting so you can see our happy faces. We will be happy because we have some seriously good food planned for today.

It occurs to be that I am unreasonably perky for 6:30 in the morning. Just wait until I have some coffee!!

Wow. According to my completely unscientific poll, readers of this journal voted middle school way harder than high school. Top reasons were hormones raging out of control and social pressures.

I was in different schools for 6th, 7th, 8th, and 9th grades. Maybe I was caught up in the drama of being the new kid, but middle school didn’t bug me that much. I actually loved 8th grade. For me, high school was much harder. *shudders*

Yesterday marked my last middle school visit of the season. Thanks to Librarians Elaine and Angela for making it wonderful as usual (I visit their schools every year), the girls who joined me for lunch at Snyder, and Clay and JJ at Armstrong for their great questions. I think I have two more elementary school visits this month, make-up days for visits that were postponed because of snow in March.

My bronchitis flared back up, probably because I was on my feet and speaking all day yesterday. I promised my lungs I’d take it easy today. I have a date with the couch and a new library book. Life is good!

Speaking of books, I recently finished All The Pretty Horses by Cormac McCarthy. (Listened to it on audiobook.) Has anyone else read this? I enjoyed it except for one scene which bugged the heck out of me. I’d love to talk to someone about it to see if I missed something.

The Philadelphia 76ers (basketball) are out of the playoffs. I won’t even dignify this with a comment. How many days until football season starts?

I was at another middle school today (Thank you, Shafer MS in Bensalem). I was talking to 8th graders, who are just weeks away from being 9th graders. It made me wonder…

Which is harder: middle school or high school?

What do you think? Why?

I’ll give my opinion tomorrow.

48 hours of antibiotics, asthma meds, and sleep is a very good thing. I’m still coughing, but I’m starting to feel not quite as dead. And my voice no longer resembles that of a 90-year-old man who smoked three packs a day.

When I wasn’t sleeping the last two days, I’ve watched bad TV (which usually put me back to sleep) and have tried to read. I’m working on The Game by Laurie R. King, one of my favorite mystery writers. I’ve also followed the news. Boy, do we live in a strange world! Couldn’t she just have called a time-out?

Here are some recent questions:

Sheen writes: i thought that your book {Catalyst was pretty cool, like how it was in the first-person perspective of a teenage girl obsessed with MIT…..   well, i have a question…..  i was reading your acknowledgment part of the book and when u were thanking “the rest of the world”, u mentioned linkin park on there somewhere…..   i was just curious to know if u actually met them or if u just listen to their music and get inspired…….   btw, i listen to their musik and i am writing a story myself which i was inspired by two things:   the imaginary people in my head and linkin park musik (they rule!!!!)   so i hope u can answer my question… thanx….

My daughter Meredith turned me on to Linkin Park a couple years ago. She took me to a concert for my birthday and we had a blast. I wish I could meet them (I’m sure Mer does, too). But I’m just a fangirl, like bazillions of others. Glad you liked Catalyst.
 
An anonymous reader writes: First, I want to say that Fever 1793 was one of the best books I’ve ever read. Second, I was wondering if it will ever become a movie, (I have some friends that don’t enjoy reading, and they have to hear the story!).

FEVER 1793 would be a great movie, IMHO, but no movie people have shown any interest in it. Yet.

Morgan recently saw me at her school. She writes: You are killing me. I can’t wait for Fever 1803. When I read Fever 1793 i was addicted, I “caught reading Fever,” as you said. Fever 1793 is the best book I have ever read. It’s my favorite book. Saying that Mattie and Nathaniel are going to get married saved me for a few days. You have to write the book NOW. I’M GOING TO DIE.

Yep, I’ve been thinking about a sequel to Fever, set ten years later. But it’s going to be a loooong time before I get to it because of other writing commitments. Please don’t die, Morgan. Go to the library and ask for some more historical fiction.

I also wanted to say “Hi” to Jessica H. from Sheepshead Bay – I’m really sorry you couldn’t join us. Thanks for the sweet note!

I’ll get to some questions about Speak tomorrow. Right now I need another nap.

I gutted out today’s school visit (thank you, Lenape and sorry about the frog voice) but I felt like the walking dead when it was over. I knew I had more than just a cold. The beastly germs in my lungs were churning up a foul brew, the color of which you do not want me to describe. And it was getting hard to breathe.

Doctor’s diagnosis: nasty bronchitis, complicated by asthma.

Doctor’s advice: crank up the asthma meds, add a few others, lots of water, rest, and do not – under any circumstances – go to the conference in Maryland this weekend.

So both my body and my spirit feel really bad. I hate, hate, hate being sick, but it feels awful to have to back out of an engagement at the last minute. If I had any energy, I would rant and rage. But I don’t, so I won’t.

The last time I got sick like this, I ignored the doctor. That’s the time I wound up in the hospital, and it set off a chain reaction of illnesses that lasted more than two years.

So I am following the doctor’s advice.

*grumbles*

*coughs up lung*

*stops grumbling*