Waldorf to your Astoria

I received a nice e-mail from a young, gay athlete this morning. He was writing to tell me that Out of the Pocket had really meant something to him. Those notes are always extremely meaningful to me, because they remind me why I'm doing what I'm doing.

Chuck and I have been feeling a little joy deprived lately. Perhaps it's that we're both working so much. On top of his 9-5 job, he's been taking care of and decorating the house (with my input, of course).

What is the most important soundtrack in your life today?

As good as Saturday Night Fever is/was, as good as The Big Chill's songs were, I'm figuring that the most important soundtract in your life today is the narrative of thoughts that follows you around.

I've been struggling with hatred recently.

I feel extremely wronged by a person. The details are unimportant, but I think it's fair to say that whether they wronged me is not really in question here. We're talking truly poor behavior.

I've been angry. I mean, really angry.

A plea to Michigan attorney general Mike Cox, who steadfastly refuses to fire cyber-bully Andrew Shirvell, who has been publicly harassing the openly gay student body present at the University of Michigan: Please, don't fire Andrew Shirvell!

Don't fire Shirvell, because firing him would send the wr

I'll be presenting at the AETA conference on Friday (tomorrow) in Mesa! This year's Arizona English Teacher's Association conference will feature a program on Native American Literature and also one on YA authors.

At 3:40, I'll be presenting with Tom Leveen ("Party") on the subject of "Edgy YA Lit.

I cannot recall a time when I was LESS prepared for the start of an NFL season. Between teaching and writing and moving, I've been blindsided, insert obligatory reference to Kurt Warner getting sacked here.

Some off-the-cuff writing lessons I have taught my students in the last week*:

1) If you have two sentences in a row that sound like they could be in fortune cookies, you must change one of them.

2) Do not say music is as much a part of you as your pancreas, or any other internal organ.

Adam Lambert performed at the Hobby Center in Houston on Wednesday night. Not that you would know it from Brandon K. Hernsberger's insane review of the show in the Houston Press.

I rarely go to ESPN.com anymore. It's nothing personal, it's just that I tend to use MLB.com for my baseball coverage, and NFL.com for football. Those are my two sports. I still love ESPN, my former workplace, but I've been less of a user, especially since I stopped playing fantasy sports.

Here's a paragraph I really enjoyed writing from my work-in-progress novel "Scrambled". As some folks know, I have an egg phobia. This novel is about eggs, and intimacy, and some other things, too.

It's been a while since I've seen a review of Out of the Pocket, so I was pleased when one showed up on a review site called "Thrifty Reader." Great site. I perused and was impressed by the variety and quality of reviews. Of course, I am now a biased source.

I want a divorce.

From the Colorado Rockies, that is.

Listen. I've stood by this team for nearly two decades, the entire history of the franchise. I've been through bad seasons, I've been through bad seasons. Some good, too, I guess.

An interesting column from Maureen Dowd today about Obama and the left not being real happy with each other right now. I wasn't sure I agreed with everything she wrote, but this one paragraph seemed right on the mark:

"Obama got elected because of the clarity of his campaign and his speeches.

Last night, I happened by VH1. Who knew this channel still existed? I remember when they used to play music videos, then I remember Rosie O'Donnell hosting a show, and finally I recall some snarky shows they put out years ago about why people should love or hate the 70s and 80s.

Come take a class at The Piper Writers Studio!

There are some great sounding classes happening this fall, and some of them are online classes, so you don't even need to be in Tempe!

If you're in town and would like to take an eight-week fiction course, I highly reccommend Liz Weld's class, "What a

So there's this new group called GOProud. They are gay Republicans, I guess, or conservative gays, which is an interesting concept, in the same way that cutting and getting caned for the pleasure of it are interesting concepts.

I generally don't pay attention to these things.

So here's what you need to do: join ebates.com!

This site is awesome. It gives you cash back for shopping at sites, and I've already saved a bundle. I'm not a huge shopper, but I decided to join, and the first thing I did was go to restaurant.com.

I have just added these handy-dandy "Funny, Interesting, Cool" buttons at the bottom of each blog. I am not sure why I've added them.