Reading Under the Covers

Signs of the Times

2009-07-21T00:12:00.017-06:00

Jenny, The Best Dog

2009-07-06T11:10:00.003-06:00

Six months ago, Jenny was going on long mountain walks, splashing around in Cherry Creek and running away after deer. She'd slowed down considerably since the days she'd raced against motorcycles, but she was still way ahead of us on the trail. Then she slowed down even more. By March we had to wait for her to catch up when we went for long walks. By April she refused to go on long walks at all. Arthritis in her hips, the vet said.

We tried various medicines, in various dosages, but Jenny got increasingly feeble. By her 13th birthday in mid-June she couldn't even walk around the block. Nor could she get upstairs to sleep on the floor at the foot of our bed, which she'd done since she was a puppy. After the last vet visit 2 weeks ago, I took Jenny to her favorite park. We'd only walked 5 minutes when she turned around and headed back to the car.

After that she wouldn't walk more than 50 yards from the house, and spent most of her time stretched out on her side on the bare living room floor, panting. Whenever I petted her she emitted the faintest high-pitched whine.

Friday morning I called the vet to ask for an end to Jenny's suffering--and our anguish over her. He said he'd be here at 8:00 a.m. today.

At 7:00 this morning I sat on the front steps, with Jenny stretched out at the bottom because she couldn't make it back into the house. At 7:30 I brought out a cup of tea and yesterday's NY Times Magazine. At 7:45 Darling Husband came out to sit with us. Jenny moved into the shade along the north side of the house and barked for the last time at Snowy, the cat next door, who was walking along the fence. At 8:00 we were more than ready for the vet, but no one showed up.

At 8:15 I called the vet's office. The receptionist said they had us down for an appointment there. She was unswayed by my tears of grief and rage; no way was anyone coming to our house today.

Jenny was always terrified at the vet's; she'd start panting and trembling as soon as we pulled into the parking lot. Which was only as far as she was going to go today, we decided. If the vet wouldn't come to our house, he could at least attend to Jenny in our car. So she'd be calmer for her final trip, I shoved 10mg of Valium down her throat (like a cat, she always spat out pills). When I pulled my hand out, a big chunk of one of her molars came with it.

DH pulled the car around in front, close to the curb. I had to lift Jenny's hind end so she could get onto the floor, and then again so she could get up onto the back seat.

There was quite a crowd at the vets'. My eyes were so blurred with tears that at first I couldn't read the euthanasia form I was given to sign. For a half-hour, DH and I sat with Jenny in the car, petting her and telling her what a good girl she is.

Finally the vet came out. He had the good grace to apologize profusely for the screw-up. Then he and the tech injected Jenny with a sedative, and then something lethal.

I kept my left hand under Jenny's neck, my fingertips buried in the fur at her throat, where I could feel the vibration of her breathing. I stroked her head with my right hand and kept telling her it was okay to let go, that she'd always be my baby.

"This'll only take 4 or 5 minutes," the vet said. But it didn't. It took a good 10 minutes, plus 2 more injections. The reason was most likely circulatory problems--"probably her lungs," which fit in with Jenny's rapid decline and harsh, labored breathing.

The vibrations in her throat grew fainter and fainter, then stopped. In another minute I could feel Jenny was gone. Now my baby can rest without pain.

Spit Take/Quote of the Day

2009-06-22T07:38:00.002-06:00

An AP story on developments in Iran had me guffawing. Good thing I read it before I had my morning beverage, else I would have sprayed tea all over my computer.

[The Guardian Council] said Monday it found irregularities in 50 voting districts, but that this has no effect on election outcome. Council spokesman Abbas Ali Kadkhodaei was quoted on the state TV Web site as saying that its probe showed more votes were cast in these constituencies than there were registered voters.
But this "has no effect on the result of the elections," he said.

As the Brits say: Pull the other leg--it's got bells on it.

Weekend Lit Crit

2009-06-20T08:49:00.006-06:00

Better than a thousand words--and ditto for zombies, werewolves & other undead:

see more Funny Graphs

Tears of Laughter (and suppressed rage)

2009-06-19T10:56:00.004-06:00

Photographer Miriam Berkley sent me a link to the ultimate freelancer's video, which had me howling:

The Vendor Client relationship - in real world situations

Same Old, Same Old

2009-06-15T21:13:00.005-06:00

I haven't been posting lately because not much has been going on in my life, except:

I went to NYC for 4 nights for BookExpo, and also gave a "Polish Your Pitch" workshop with Ron Hogan at Backspace Writers Agent-Author Day.
Then I spent 3 nights in the Kingston, NY, area, where I hope to live in the not-too-distant future.
Just as I was returning the rental car in Poughkeepsie, Darling Husband called to say that he'd been laid off his job of 8 years--the one we'd moved to Denver for 3-1/2 years ago.
I have to crank out the text (some 17 K words) for the Bella Terra Massachusetts Lighthouses map so it can go to press in 10 days.
I'm giving another phone seminar on June 28. (Details in sidebar.)
Last Thursday, I had 3+ hours of excruciating nerve tests on my dysfunctional right arm, which has had 3 surgeries since I broke it 3 years ago. Preliminary results: Further neurosurgery would probably do more harm than good; my 3 middle fingers will remain numb forever.
I had 8 days of debilitating headache (technically neuralgia), caused by Denver's unusually damp & stormy weather. On the plus side, my garden has never looked more lush.
Tomorrow I go back to Dr #13, a hand/arm specialist at Denver Health's Center for Complex Fractures (which I wish I'd known about 3 years ago, GRRRR...), who will tell me whether further orthopedic surgery will help. If he says not, I'm giving up.
My wonderful dog Jenny, who turned 13 yesterday, is rapidly succumbing to arthritis. Once upon a time she'd run for hours without stopping. Now she can walk--slowly--for 10 minutes at most, and can barely make it up the 3 steps into the house. We've tried all sorts of meds, to no avail. Today I started her on Dog Gone Pain as a last-ditch effort, and tomorrow she'll get codeine too. There's a wonderful new book, HOW SHALL I TELL THE DOG? I keep asking myself (and the vet): How shall I kill the dog? And when?

As a palliative, I've been gardening and immersing myself in novels written or set in the 19th century:

PRIDE & PREJUDICE
RUDE AWAKENINGS OF A JANE AUSTEN ADDICT by Laurie Viera Rigler
CONFESSIONS OF A JANE AUSTEN ADDICT by Rigler (again; even better after RUDE AWAKENINGS)
LITTLE DORRIT, though Dickens's sentimentality & weakling heroines may have me reaching for Trollope's Palliser novels before too long

The Best Wedding Vow of All

2009-06-14T10:54:00.002-06:00

I got all choked up reading this piece in today's LA Times by YA author Kerry Madden, who's spoken at my workshops:

Our wedding vow -- to my mother--in law
Our elopement included a promise we would never lose our ambition. We kept it.

Off to BookExpo...and beyond

2009-05-26T23:40:00.002-06:00

BEA checklist:
1) Get teeth cleaned at dentist.
2) Do laundry.
3) Get online boarding pass.
4) Dither over what outfits to pack.
5) Print out "Polish Your Pitch" workshop program.
6) Confirm party & dinner dates.
7) 9:15 pm - Plant sunflower & morning glory seeds outside in the dark.

Maybe, just maybe, I'll find time to do some blog posts from BEA. Then again, maybe not...

Showdown at the Kitty Corral

2009-05-26T23:21:00.010-06:00

Snowball the trespasser beats a slow-motion retreat from Max the Mauler.

While I was making sales calls for Bella Terra Maps this afternoon, some high drama was playing out next to the house. Next-door neighbor Snowball came over, and as usual, had a faceoff with Max.

We can't figure out whether Snowy is really stupid or just stubborn. Max almost always beats up on him when he comes over, and Jenny almost always barks at him and chases him away. (She didn't today only because she was napping.) Still, he's constantly in our yard, and sometimes even sits on a kitchen windowsill and peers inside.

We have feline rock-paper-scissors going in the neighborhood: Max clobbers Snowy, Snowy clobbers the black cat across the alley, and that cat clobbers Max.

Update: Next day, the Boy Wonder found Snowy in our basement. He beat a hasty retreat out the window we'd left open for Max, who apparently needs to get a lot tougher.

It Was 20 Years Ago Today

2009-05-23T22:10:00.009-06:00

My one and only child was born at 12:26pm on May 23, 1989. He was due on May 13, but--setting a pattern for later life--arrived in his own time, well after I was completely exasperated. (That's him at left, age 5, styled by himself, down to the sticker on his right shin.)

Those last 10 days were the longest in my life. I lay like a beached whale, reading a one-volume collection of Jane Austen, interrupted by phone calls from family and friends to see whether I'd given birth yet. I got so fed up that I started responding, "Yeah, I had the baby and didn't tell you," or "I decided not to have the baby, and just stay pregnant forever."

I went into labor around 6:00am on May 22. It felt like mild menstrual cramps. Wow, I thought, this is going to be easy! How wrong I was. After 30 hours of fruitless and often agonizing labor, I had a caesarean section, and the Boy Wonder was pulled squalling into the world. At 9 lbs, 12 oz, he was 50% bigger than the next-largest baby of the 6 in the nursery at Wayne County General Hospital, in Honesdale, PA (best known as the home of Highlights for Children). Those 10 extra days in utero gave him a roll of fat at the back of his neck as thick as my pinky, huge round cheeks and a crease in his chubby chin. The discharging doctor called him "Moose."

That was the last time the Boy Wonder was fat. As I've often joked over the years, my plump little dumpling stretched out to be a long piece of spaghetti. More like capellini, as he's now 6'4" and 132 lbs. I call him "the human hummingbird," because he has to eat his weight daily to stay alive. Well, almost: 4 meals, plus big snacks. When he was with the Obama campaign, he managed to lose weight while having 2 super-sized Big Macs and a milkshake for lunch, plus an equally big breakfast and dinner.

Now my little baby is an Economics major. Today I was working in the garden, dressed in the Carhartt men's overalls (women's pants are never long enough) I bought as my first maternity outfit. And tonight I'll continue rereading Pride and Prejudice, from the same volume I read in what was truly a lifetime ago.

The Boy Wonder at Obama's acceptance speech in Denver (detail of photo that ran in NYT 8/30/08).

Follow the Apple

2009-05-17T07:51:00.009-06:00

A couple of years ago I planted a Stayman Winesap apple tree in my backyard. I since found out that it's self-unfruitful, meaning it needs another variety to pollinate it. Yesterday I bought two Cortland apple trees at Home Depot, instead of a Cortland and a Jonagold, (mis)remembering that they were good pollinators for Stayman. I just did some online research and found out that Cortland and Jonagold are the absolute wrong trees to plant with Stayman, as they won't cross-pollinate. Not that the Stayman has produced any flowers to date. But, ever the eternal optimistic (or deluded) gardener, I want to be ready for next year.

Deep into my Google search, I found this tidbit on a website about old apple varieties:
During the American Revolution, captured Hessian soldiers held near Winchester VA planted an orchard with Fameuse (aka Snow) apples.

My curiosity piqued, I did a search for Hessian soldiers Virginia, and found some fascinating--and appalling--stuff.

In a Wikipedia article on Winchester:

Hessian soldiers were known for walking to the high ridge north and west of town and purchasing and eating apple pies from the Quakers. Thus, this ridge west of town became affectionately known as Apple Pie Ridge and the Ridge Road built before 1709 leading north from town was renamed Apple Pie Ridge Road.

In the New York Times there is a March 31, 1912, article with the innocuous headline Virginia Mountains Shelter Colony of Lost Hessians.

And then there's the subhead:

Descendants of Hirelings in Revolutionary War Who After Their Release Took Refuge in Gloomy Hills Near Charlottesville, Live There in Rude Huts, A Law to Themselves and a Forgotten Band.

Those would be the same hills that visitors ooh and aah over when I take them for drives around C'ville.

The article tells how, after the Revolution, Hessian soldiers who had been imprisoned in Charlottesville (which named Barracks Road and Hessian Hills after them) took off and settled in the nearby Ragged Mountains, "a small range of black, gloomy hills." The Times's anonymous reporter then wrote, apparently forgetting that Hessians were, um, Saxons:

As we have recently learned, the Blue Ridge mountaineers are a fearless, lawless folk of the purest Anglo-Saxon blood. They have a native intelligence and furnish the best kind of material for a civilization to be built upon. A good citizen can be made out of a Blue Ridge dweller when put in the right environment....

The Hessians are quite different. They have little if any understanding of modern morality. Marriage is a luxury, which has seldom lingered at their doors.

There is hardly a cabin in these mountains which does not harbor an idiot, the result of atrocious family relations.

Wow! It gets even better:

When neighbourly quarrels arise they usually fight it out with sticks and stones and their big bony fists. Firearms are reserved for the wild turkeys and quail.

The Hessian women do most of the heavy work. The men cut a little wood and train the coon dogs. If the women become unruly they are whipped by their husbands.

The reporter supposedly heard a woman being beaten by her husband. Next day the reporter asked her brother what he was going to do about it. The supposed reply?

"Well, I reckon I can't do much. Fact is, I was a beatin' my own wife last night."

In the Good Old Days at the Newspaper of Record, I guess reporters weren't required to actually report and cite sources if unsubstantiated opinions and vaudeville jokes would do just as well.

P.S. Now I'm on the lookout for Delicious, Lodi, Honeycrisp, Golden Delicious or Fuji apple trees.

I'm Psychologically Distoibed!

2009-05-05T21:06:00.009-06:00

Glenda Jackson in Marat/Sade.

Today I went for a 10th(!) opinion on my right arm, to Dr M. As a welcome change, she was polite, kind & respectful. Unfortunately, she didn't tell me anything I didn't already know, nor give me any great hope for the future. She wanted me to see the partner of Dr Schmuck, who's in the same building, for "pain treatment" (e.g., physical therapy and drugs, which haven't been effective this go-round). I told her I wouldn't set foot in that office, nor have one dime of my money go into his pocket. So she referred me to someone else, whose name I've filed away.

Dr M looked at the results of Dr C's EMG nerve tests (i.e., "torture") and, just as he did, told me that the median nerve was doing better. I told her my response to him: "Sez you. If the nerve is 'better' why does my arm hurt more, and why are my fingers more numb?"

"These things take time," said Dr M, echoing Dr C & several others. She repeated that nerve tissue heals @ 1mm/day. My arm is a good 24" (610mm) from shoulder to middle fingertip. I finally did the math: I have to wait 610 days after last June's surgery, i.e., till February 1, 2010, to see whether the median nerve has regenerated. But if it hasn't healed by then, it'll be too dead to repair. So I'll be stuck with a sore arm and perpetually numb fingers.

My quandary: Should I have surgery that might fail & leave me worse off, or wait another painful year & maybe miss the chance to fix the nerve?

Last week I left a message for Dr C, asking for a referral to a neurosurgeon "who isn't arrogant & condescending" like Dr B. His office manager called back with contact info for Dr X. After I got home from seeing Dr M, I Googled Dr X. And--what's this?--he's not a neurosurgeon, he's a neurologist and...PSYCHIATRIST.

Official diagnosis: I'm psychologically distoibed!

Official reaction: Nothing makes me crazier than being told--always by a MALE doctor--that I should see a shrink.

Darling Husband agrees that if he were the one seeking help, he'd have been treated with a lot less condescension, and offered surgery rather than palliatives and psychotherapy. I feel a Third Wave of feminism raging within me.

The Never-Ending Story 2: Arm-ageddon

2009-05-01T02:00:00.008-06:00

So yesterday I went to see neurosurgeon "Dr B" (actually Dr L, but he was B in The Circle Game and so he shall remain), for the first time since November.

Within 30 seconds, the truth was revealed to me in a blinding flash: Most surgeons are arrogant boors.

I told Dr B that I'd been passed along from one crony to another in his medical center, with no resolution.

"Why do you think that is?" he shot back.

"Because they don't have any answers, so they send me along to the next guy?"

"Why do you think that is?" he said again.

"Um...because they can't figure it out?"

"Did you ever think that maybe it's because your case is very complicated, and there are no easy answers?"

He had the same patronizing tone as Dr Schmuck. What the hell is it with these guys?

"So you're saying that nothing can be done?"

"No, I'm not saying that. Surgery can be done, but I'm not waving any magic lollipops. So if you're in horrible pain afterwards, don't say I made you any promises. And don't call me begging for more pain medicine, because I won't prescribe any."

(Note: Back in November, Dr B insisted that I take Elavil, "whether you want to or not!" I lasted all of a day on it.)

Let us draw a discreet veil over the rest of Dr B's speechifying, which brought me to tears yet again.

In summary:

My fingers are unlikely to regain feeling without surgery.
The pain in my arm is unlikely to go away without surgery.
Odds are 50-50: surgery may make my arm feel a lot better, or a lot worse.
I don't want to give my money to doctors who are mean to me.
I don't want mean doctors poking around inside my body.
I shouldn't have to see my shrink after every doctor appointment.
I hope that Dr M (I see her next week) is nicer and has some bright ideas.

Meanwhile, Darling Husband and I are running away from home for the day. The aptly named Fairplay is on our itinerary.

Still Shattered, or The Never-Ending Story

2009-05-01T00:40:00.008-06:00

The glasses I was wearing on May 1, 2006.

Today marks the 3rd anniversary of the day Gomez the thoroughbred failed to kill me. We had only been in the ring for 10 minutes when I nudged him to go from a walk to a trot. Instead he went ballistic, and the next thing I knew I was in a helicopter in excruciating pain, with my eyes bloodied shut. Later I was told that he'd thrown me into the steel-pipe perimeter fence.

My injuries:

Broken right humerus and split humeral head
2 broken left floater ribs
Broken nose
Broken palate
Broken right palatinate bone
Broken right maxillary sinus
Broken right brow bone
Smashed-up front teeth, 3 top & 1 bottom
Nerve trauma to head
Severe concussion

In the ER at Swedish Hospital I got stitches in my forehead and upper lip (my teeth had gone through it), then spent a week in the multi-trauma unit. (Best memory: a card on my meal tray with "Happy Cinco de Mayo from your Swedish volunteers!") While there, I was given the choice of having a titanium plate put in my arm, or wearing a brace for 6-8 weeks. I chose the brace. Why have needless surgery?

The next month I had 3 root canals on my top front teeth, 2 of which died and turned a lovely shade of gray.

By August my arm hadn't healed, and my thumb and first two fingers were floppy. So I had a 6" steel plate installed, inspiring the late, lamented Miss Snark to run a Get Humerus Poetry Contest (see Well and Truly Screwed). My hand still didn't work after that, so in November my arm was sliced open again to release the median nerve.

When I went to see "Casino Royale" that Thanksgiving weekend, I discovered that violence made me nauseous and panicked. So did sirens, helicopters, ambulances, squealing tires, TV sports, news reports, combat photos...

I started getting therapy for post-traumatic stress disorder.

In August 2007 I had to have more surgery on one of the top teeth, plus root canal on the bottom front tooth, which also turned gray. In October I had surgery to fix the dent in the side of my nose and remove bone spurs from my sinus. (The dent caved back in.)

In January 2, 2008, I had a bonus lipoma (fatty tumor) the size of a half-baseball, which had been discovered in the ER, removed from deep under my right shoulder blade. My middle finger and inner sides of the index and ring fingers had gone numb and the base of my thumb had atrophied, then the steel plate in my arm started giving me trouble. So on Friday, June 13, my arm was sliced open yet again to remove the steel plate, plus carpal tunnel release was done in hopes of returning feeling to my digits.

My fingers stayed numb as ever, but my arm started feeling better immediately. Then in late September it suddenly got much worse. The doctor who did the 2nd & 3rd arm surgeries gave up on me. Thus began The Circle Game of trying to find someone who could actually fix the arm, instead of just giving me drugs to mask the pain.

In March, while in Charlottesville for the VaBook Festival, I went to see my former osteopath, the wonderful Mark Dean of Osteopathic Pain Management. He suggested that I might have a traumatic neuroma (why didn't the neurologist and neurosurgeon I'd been seeing in Denver think of that?). When I returned home, my D.O. here sent me to another D.O., "Dr Schmuck," for diagnostic ultrasound.

No neuroma, announced Dr Schmuck, but the lipoma is growing back in the same place, under the scapula by the infraspinatus muscle. No need to have it removed, though, nor for any surgery on the arm.

Oh joy! But...now what?

I soon found out. Last week my fingers abruptly got more numb after I'd been swimming for just 5 minutes. The area around the original break in my arm also turned dark, like a bruise--a symptom that no doctor had been able to figure out. I made an appointment to see Dr Schmuck the next day.

I felt like crap when I showed up: I hadn't slept well because of my hurting arm, my dog had awakened me twice in the night and I was spaced out from a new pain med I'd taken (never again!). Schmuck questioned the necessity of having the first lipoma out, even though my surgeon called it a "big-ass tumor" and you could see the lump through my shirt from across the street. Then without even touching my arm (an osteopath is supposed to do physical examination & manipulation), Schmuck crisply told me that my problem is "brachial plexopathy" and that the only solution is to see his buddy Dr T, 45 minutes from my home, for an injection of corticosteroid and anesthetic.

"What's that going to do to me?" I asked.

Whereupon Schmuck berated me for "choosing to see the glass half-empty instead of half-full," and for having a bad attitude, and for being a "cantankerous New Yorker."

"You fell off a horse," he scoffed. "I have patients with head injuries who can't add two and two, or who are missing limbs."

Which made me feel SO much better. Who am I to complain about pain and dysfunction after 3 years, 8 surgeries, PTSD and depression? I shouldn't have been wasting Schmuck's precious time with my little problems.

Just kidding! Actually, my tart reply was, "I didn't fall off a horse, I was thrown with great force. And I know what it's like to have a head injury."

Whereupon he berated me some more, and as he walked me out said that I had to have hope.

In tears, I snapped, "If I didn't have hope all this time I would've just taken a bottle of Percocet and killed myself!"

That elicited shocked expressions from some of the patients in the waiting room, but nothing from the charming and empathic Dr Schmuck. I vowed never to darken his door again.

But...now what?

Time to make another appointment with "Dr B" the neurosurgeon. And for backup, one with Dr M, arm specialist to Denver's sports stars.

Poetic License

2009-04-26T00:01:00.001-06:00

When I pick up a new poetry book
I always glance first at the biographical note
If the poet has children I don't read the book

--Bill Knott

Watch for These Books

2009-04-25T22:33:00.005-06:00

Look what some of my YA clients have been up to!

Katie Alender, BAD GIRLS DON'T DIE

Tanya Egan Gibson, HOW TO BUY A LOVE OF READING

Fran Cannon Slayton, WHEN THE WHISTLE BLOWS

Quote for the Day

2009-04-19T15:53:00.003-06:00

“People think it’s so hard to leave New York, but it’s easy. You just pack up all your stuff in boxes and call a truck.”

--Garth Stein (THE ART OF RACING IN THE RAIN), quoted in NYT State of the Unions

That's what The Ex and I did 20 years ago (to our friends' horror), only we had our own truck so didn't even have to make a call.

The hard part is moving back to the city. Which I'm not about to do, though living two hours up the Hudson would be fine by me.

Happy April 1

2009-04-01T00:01:00.001-06:00

Much-needed laughs for April Fool's Day:

Twitter switch for Guardian, after 188 years of ink
• Newspaper to be available only on messaging service
• Experts say any story can be told in 140 characters

If the Dogs Had Twitter (ROFBOL!)

Some jokes just write themselves:
Sebelius admits errors, pays $7,000 in back taxes

The Saddest Song

2009-03-25T14:06:00.007-06:00

When in New York two weeks ago, I went to the musical revue, "Brother Can You Spare a Dime?" at The Triad on W 72nd St. (More about that in another post.)

Afterwards when I congratulated the show's director (and tenor) Bill Daugherty, he gave me a CD of his previous production, "When the Lights Go On Again." It's a lovely compilation of WWII songs, some of them little-known, with fantastic harmonies.

I was listening to the CD in the car this morning and this song wrung my heart--so much that I listened to it twice. Change just a few details and it could apply to many refugees today.

My Sister and I
Lyrics by Joan Whitney Kramer & Hy Zaret
Music by Alex Kramer

My sister and I remember still
A tulip garden by an old Dutch mill,
And the home that was all our own until ...
But we don't talk about that.

My sister and I recall once more
The fishing schooners pulling into shore,
And the dog-cart we drove in days before ...
But we don't talk about that.

We're learning to forget the fear
That came from a troubled sky.
We're almost happy over here,
But sometimes we wake at night and cry.

My sister and I recall the day
We said goodbye, then we sailed away.
And we think of our friends that had to stay,
But we don't talk about that.

One Degree of Shock

2009-03-18T19:08:00.010-06:00

"It's been a long time. How are you doing?" my old (actually young) osteopath in Charlottesville asked me at his office this morning. He hadn't seen me in more than three years.

"I'm alive," I said.

He chuckled. A few minutes later, after he'd looked over the many pages of reports detailing the injuries I suffered in May 2006 and the many surgeries since, he said, "You're lucky to be alive."

"Yes," I answered. "It's been bad, but at least I'm here."

A few minutes ago, I read the news that 45-year-old actress Natasha Richardson died today from an unspecified head injury suffered when she fell during a ski lesson on Monday. According to the Quebec ski resort's spokeswoman, quoted in the NYT, “It was a normal fall; she didn’t hit anyone or anything. She didn’t show any signs of injury. She was talking and she seemed all right.”

In early August of 2005, I was in London and went to the theater with my long-lost cousin Larry. I'd gotten tickets to see "The Home Place" with Tom Courtenay, who'd acted with my father in the mid-1960s. I'd bought the cheapest tickets, but through some fluke was upgraded to mezzanine seats.

There were very few people in the mezzanine, so Larry and I moved up to the first row, by the railing. A couple of minutes later, he nudged me and gestured to the section to our right.

"Who are they?" he whispered.

I looked over to see a very glamorous couple getting seated. He was tall and craggy-handsome, with light-brown hair. She was gorgeous: blonde, tan, impossibly thin and dressed in impossibly spotless white from head to toe. Very L.A., I thought.

"You can tell they didn't take public transportation to get here," I muttered. (Larry and I had arrived via Tube.)

Then I looked a little harder.

"Oh, my God," I said. "That's Natasha Richardson and Liam Neeson. Her father Tony directed my dad in 'St. Joan of the Stockyards' in this theatre--or one just like it--in 1964, and in 'The Loved One' in 1965."

"Wow," breathed Larry.

After the play, we went backstage to see Courtenay, whom I'd been in touch with beforehand. Who else should be there but Richardson and Neeson, so I had a little chat with her. When I approached, she looked grim, probably thinking I was a fan, but warmed up when I told her of our connection. We exchanged names and everyone shook hands all around, greatly impressing Larry.

I then had a little chat with Courtenay, especially admiring the kiddie-print pirate sheets on the twin bed in his dressing room. Then the three famous people got into waiting limousines, and Larry and I walked to the Palms of Goa restaurant, where we ate cheap (for London), spicy food and marveled at our brush with the stars.

And now today Natasha Richardson is dead from a seemingly minor head injury, and I'm alive after a major one that left me with a concussion, PTSD, broken facial bones and nerve damage. The "family statement" to the news media from Liam Neeson came via Hollywood publicist Alan Nierob, who announced my father's death nearly 15 years ago.

It's all too close for comfort. But at least I'm here.

Quote of the Year...and It's Only March

2009-03-16T11:20:00.005-06:00

"The one regret I have is we ended up losing money."

--Ronald G. Insana, back at CNBC as an "analyst" after failing as a hedge fund manager. Quoted in the NYT: Back on TV, and Back in the Black.

Brava, Booksquare!

2009-03-16T10:01:00.003-06:00

Kassia Kroszer at Booksquare offers a devastating critique in New Think? Not So Much, beginning with:

Nutshell analysis of the “New Think for Old Publishers” panel at South by Southwest 2009: there was a not a single new think in the room.

She ends with advice for publishers that works just as well for authors seeking to promote their books:

Might as well address the blogger question. It’s quite simple. Find the bloggers big and small in your various genres, develop a relationship with them, understand their tastes, like, dislikes, deadlines, lead time, preferred method of communication, preferred formats for books.... Treat the bloggers with respect — you need them more than they need you. And note, the publishers [and authors!] who are already doing this well are leaps and bounds ahead of you.

Evolution

2009-03-08T23:45:00.006-06:00

Darling Husband got a Blackberry and yesterday sent his first message--to the Boy Wonder, in real English, with whole words & punctuation--saying that he was no longer a dinosaur.

BW's response, from his cell phone:
OMG lrn2txt :(

After DH & I nearly died laughing, he answered:
K

Odds & Sods

2009-03-05T22:10:00.005-07:00

Too occupied with consulting, editorial work (I'm done with Maine & on to editing the Mid-Atlantic Lighthouses Map now), sore arm (don't ask) & being knocked out at dentist today (ditto) to write any coherent blog posts.

So here are some tidbits I picked up during free moments at Twitter, plus a BONUS! photo.

Clichés cluttering your manuscript? Sweep them away with ClichéCleaner.
It's cyber Titania & Oberon: Robot Programmed to Love Goes Too Far.
Jason Pinter decodes Blago's book deal and Phoenix Books publisher Michael Viner's HuffPo column about reaction to said deal.
Headline of the day: Octopus gets inside lunchbox at Boston aquarium. Takeaway: A 7' long, 30-lb octopus can slither through a 2" hole.

Best of all, a photo taken in my backyard yesterday, where it was 70+F:

My little apricot tree started blooming today. But this being Denver, there's talk of snow in the foothills tonight, with a high of 40 on Saturday and a chance of rain. We sure could use it, the ground is dry as dust.

Out on the Town (up the block)

2009-02-26T12:53:00.020-07:00

Agent Kristin Nelson, author Jamie Ford & yours truly, channeling Jack Bruce, Eric Clapton & Ginger Baker (at bottom).

Jamie Ford, author of the new bestseller HOTEL ON THE CORNER OF BITTER AND SWEET, had a reading at Denver's Tattered Cover on Tuesday evening. His agent, Kristin Nelson, hosted a reception beforehand at Encore Restaurant next door.

Naturally I was at both events, because:

I consulted with Jamie last year.
I am the Party Girl.
I live 130 paces from the TC/Encore--didn't even have to cross the street.

More than 60 people came to the reception, then packed Jamie's reading and bought lotsa books.

Note to agents:
Host receptions for each of your authors when they do events in your hometown. It doesn't cost all that much, and is a swell way to bump up book sales (and maybe get your clients on a local bestseller list), plus have some fun. And it's all tax-deductible!

Note to authors:
You don't have to do much--if any--reading at your readings. The idea is to be entertaining. Jamie read for all of 5 minutes, spoke for 25, with the rest of the time for Q&A. And the audience ATE IT UP.

Last week I went to a "reading" by Jacqueline Winspear, out on tour for her new Maisie Dobbs mystery, AMONG THE MAD. Every seat was taken, the audience was rapt and Winspear didn't read a single word from the book. In fact, she said precious little about it, other than that there's an explosion and some of the action takes place in a madhouse. She mostly talked about World War I, its aftermath in the UK (the series begins in 1929; it's 1931 in the current book) and about her grandfather, a veteran of the Battle of the Somme who was picking shrapnel out of his legs into his seventies.