- Tasty Bite microwave entrees -- Indian dinners that heat up in two minutes, are relatively nutritious (as two-minute dinners go), and are indeed tasty bites.
- Internet Scrabble games.
- James, le boyfriend, who just made a book trailer for HarperCollins that has almost a million hits among YouTube, MySpace, and various other websites. (I'm not linking to it here simply because it's very deliberately geared to the sensibilities of nineteen-year-old frat boys (as is the book), with all that that implies, and I would like my family to retain a good opinion of James, who does NOT have the sensibilities of a nineteen-year-old frat boy.) But you need a book trailer? He's your guy.
- Rachel Griffiths, who just got promoted to Editor and is moving to Scholastic Press in August. Yay Rachel!
- Emily Clement, our fabulous new AALB editorial assistant. If you're submitting to Arthur, be nice to her.
- My new part-time intern Shannon.
- Five Bucks to Friday and Go Fug Yourself, which make me laugh every single day.
- Dove ProAge Day Moisturizer, which actually does reduce the fine lines caused by laughing at GFY and FBtF.
- Nice taxi drivers.
- Church.
- The Bruce Springsteen song "Badlands" off his Greatest Hits album. I am terminally musically uncool, so I'm always discovering artists one, or three, or in this case twenty-eight years behind everyone else, and this leaves me unable to grab people by the shoulders and say "This song is fantastic! You must listen to it!" because everyone already knows the song and they smile politely. But what the heck: This song is fantastic! You must listen to it! Hard-driving, hard-working, hip-shaking, damn fine rock and roll.
Finally, if you're thinking of sending me a SQUID in the next month, I would suggest you wait. While I'm keeping up with my agented manuscripts, I have to say that between the Bologna Book Fair (which Arthur attends and I prep him for), the SCBWI talk I'm giving in April, a crazy work project, and several novels to edit, I'm probably not going to get to my unsoliciteds again until probably May. Holding off will save you the stress of waiting and me the stress of the pile. Thanks for understanding.