mimsy and outgrabe

I won't do this every time someone writes something nice and thoughtful (or not nice and thoughtful) about my book. But this is the first time anyone's written anything about it . . . so, you know. Thanks, Jake Hainey. Also, it's kinda nice to know that the Goodreads Giveaway wasn't too bad of an idea. I'm going to remember this when I'm struggling to get everything done and I wonder why o why did I spend time on that Goodreads thing when I could have been grading . . . Actually, I'll probably NEVER wonder why I spent time doing something other than grading. I hate grading. (I have to go back to grading. Blerg!)

I was talking with my friend L.E. today about the Best American Poetry Blog, which I do read occasionally but haven't read in a while, and when I returned home today and fed the baby, I looked up the blog and found this . Guest blogger Amanda Smeltz's post makes me laugh because of its tone, and I admire that she's honest about what she likes and particularly about what she doesn't like. And while I'm not really crazy about the sample epistolary poem she gives us, Matt Hart's, I sure as hell like Richard Hugo's. That's about all for now. It's that point in the semester where I'm amazed every time I get to the end of a week -- amazed that I've survived, that I haven't been fired for incompetence, or that my children are actually well-fed, relatively clean, cared for.

So this was fun. And weird. People sure like free stuff -- 1349 people (you read that right) signed up over Goodreads to win a free copy of my chapbook. I am not a well-known writer, nor am I under any delusion that there are 1349 feminist scholars out there, or even 1349 ordinary everyday readers, who think the idea of a sequence of poems about a pig who shifts shape is a really GOOD idea and wow, wouldn't I like to own a book like that?  No, people just like winning free stuff. And I am O-K with that. At the very least, I'm hoping that the 10 people who DID win DO actually wish to read the poems inside the free book they're about to receive in the mail. And by the way, Goodreads uses some kind of complex algorithm to figure out which lucky 10 readers are allowed to win books in the giveaway, so please don't blame ME if you didn't win a copy. You can, however, email me if you'd like one. Here are the lucky 10:  (I think it's so cool to ima...

Well, somehow I made it to the end of the week without completely losing my mind or my dignity. I say completely, because I'm fairly sure I lost a little of both. And that's pretty standard. I'm losing brain cells and pride the way a beach loses sand . . . a little bit at a time, imperceptibly, until one day, people'll be like, "Wow, she's nuts!" the way we go to the beach and say, "Wow, the water's right up to the dunes now." Or something like that. The beach losing sand is more impressive, really. I have a gajillion papers to finish grading this weekend. And myriad errands to run with the kiddos, who need clothes, diapers, birthday presents for friends . . . so I don't have high hopes for the grading. I do have good news to share, though. Verse Wisconsin Online published two of my poems (with audio -- a first for me!) and the issue was just released today. So that's happy-making. Even if I look like a sleep-deprived h...

At the moment I'm forgoing vacuuming; the washing, drying, and folding of laundry; decluttering; dishes; grading; typing up committee meeting notes; working on the creative writing festival; and probably an additional five items I can't remember at the moment because my brain is fried . . . in order to write a blog post.  But it needed to happen, I suspect. Lest you all think I'd died. Also, I'm PROBABLY a lot healthier when I write regularly, even if the writing is not exactly diary-like and consists of simply sharing poems and articles I find on the internet. I looked here the other day and realized I hadn't written since the first day of school. And that, my friends, seems like a lifetime ago. (And yet strangely, I can't believe that September has passed and that we're almost halfway through the fall semester.) Despite A.P.'s assertions that I look like a deer in headlights most Mondays, I think I'm doing all right with the three-kid sys...