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'Sincerely, John Hughes' (a fitting tribute from former teenage fan and pen pal Alison Byrne Fields. Warning: you will get choked up reading this. Also MTV's Kurt Loder reflects on Hughes' legacy) (We'll Know When We Get There) (MTV News) - Pangea... Read the rest of this post

Thanks to 1)my setting an iCal reminder that tickets were going on sale at 10am today, which happened to go off when I was driving and couldn't do anything about it but then 2)thanks to the amazing and wonderful Webmeister, who, despite being really busy with other stuff, responded to my frenzied phone call by getting online and whipping out his credit card, Daughter and I are going to be going to see this! at Harbor Yard in Bridgeport, CT. Woo Hoo!

I just hope my man David Cook is going to be the one headlining as the 2008 American Idol. Otherwise, America will have got it totally wrong. He is by far and away the most talented one in the competition. Blows that little puppy dog Archuletta away. Watch this and dare to tell me I'm wrong.



So make sure to vote for him on Tuesday - early and often, as they say!

Oh, and the best part of all this? Remember a month or so ago I blogged about how my daughter's friend's mom surprised her with a trip to LA for her birthday and my daughter was feeling a little deprived and all she got was a note telling her I loved her in her lunch bag? Well, after I surprised her with the Idol tix, she said, "This makes up for going to California".

Gotta love that.

Chad Stephenson, San Francisco Friends School librarian, has been working on an extensive school project about Diwali, the Hindu winter Festival of Light, celebrated on November 9 this year. In a ‘personal views’ piece he’s contributed to the PaperTigers website, Chad gives us the scoop on the celebration of Rama’s victorious return from Lanka with his kidnapped wife, Sita. His article is chock full of great Diwali reading recommendations, including Uma Krishnaswami’s award-winning Monsoon, illustrated by Jamel Akib, and Hanuman, by Erik Jendresen and Joshua M. Greene, illustrated by Li Ming. Here’s a PaperTigers review of another book on Chad’s list.

Canadian Rachna Gilmore’s Lights for Gita isn’t on his list, but it will shed yet more light on the Diwali’s real meaning: Gita’s difficulties settling into her life in Canada are exemplified by not being able to celebrate the holiday the same way she would have back home.