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Monday begins my two week voyage through the Cypress Fairbanks Independent School District.

4 presentations/ 2 schools a day for 10 days! I am incredibly psyched and already fielding great emails from the kids I'm about to meet!

Tomorrow I get picked up at the Houston airport by the amazing Paula Morgan (from Sampson Elementary), who has informed me I'll be signing books late into the night in my hotel room to get ready for Day 1 of the "Pond Scum Texas Tour". (sadly it's an off-day for the Red Sox/Indians so I imagine I'll have to settle for the National League playoffs.)

A note on AUTHORS AND SELF-PROMOTION. The topic is always a hot button and the discussions go on and on. But I thought I'd share how this trip came about.

Last spring I discovered (in other words - Googled) that Pond Scum was one of 12 books to be selected for the Horned Toad Tales List. Google pointed me to the Cypress Fairbanks Independent School District outside of Houston and by digging around (ie. reading the press release) I found the name of one of the media specialists involved and called her to just say, "Thanks!"

In the course of the conversation that made both of our days - Paula asked if I do school visits. I said, yes. She asked if I thought I might do a "few" schools in her district. I said, yes. And the next day I was booked for my 20 school book tour.

All this is to say - I always thank the teachers, media specialists, librarians who suggest Pond Scum to students - and I have been booked numerous times simply for saying "thank you". It's not the reason I reach out - it's just a natural reaction.

So reach out and say "Thanks". It's a nice thing - and sometimes results in your eating real Texas Barbecue for lunch on Monday.

THANKS CyFair ISD!

I have a desk! Which I suppose means it's time to stop writing checks and start writing books and freelance articles again.

For your viewing pleasure, I thought I'd show you some before and after photos of my basement writing lair. Bear in mind I still don't have most of my office furniture (ie, the filing cabinets, the hutch and printer unit thingie) but at least...at least I have a desk :>)

1) So here's what the basement looked like when I did my building inspection back in March:



2) and here it is from a different angle:



3) and here's me wondering where the heck I'm going to put all my books:




Ok, so here's the not yet completed but we're getting there photos:

1) My desk (same wall as picture one above)



2) Bookshelves! not to mention Gorgeous Daughter!!! (same wall as picture 2 above)



3) MORE BOOKSHELVES!!! (same wall as picture with me wondering where I'm going to put my books)



I'm looking forward to getting the rest of the office furniture so I can finish unpacking boxes. But the desk is the critical thing.

It's been a busy, busy weekend chez saraclaradara My sister and brother in law were out with the kids, and it was my nephew Big D's 3rd birthday. We had a barbecue with the neighbors Saturday night and then went to the beach today with Grandma and Grandpa followed by a rather wonderful Cars cake. I'm just a bit exhausted because my 9 month old nephew slept in my bed with me (joined at 2am by his mother when he started crying) and then the birthday boy came in at 6am. As the mother of a previously early bird teenager who now has to be forcibly pried out of bed at 10:30, I'm not used to these hours anymore.

Plus I stayed up till 1:30 finishing "Suite Francaise" by Irene Nemirovsky, which I HIGHLY recommend. Irene Nemirovsky was an accomplished Jewish writer of Russian origin whose family emigrated to France during the Russian revolution. Suite Francaise was supposed to be comprised of five parts, but she'd only written the first two, "Storm in June" (about the fall of the Maginot line and the German defeat of the French in 1940) and "Dolce" about the early part of the Occupation in 1941 up until the Germans invaded Russia.

Although she'd made extensive notes about the other parts, in 1942 she was sent to Auschwitz where she perished.

When I finished this book early this morning I felt the same sense of loss and anger that I felt when I re-read The Diary of Anne Frank for the umpteenth time, but this time as an adult. The insight. The exquisite writing. The depth of this talent...lost. All lost. It makes me want to cry right now writing about it. I want to read the three additional parts of Suite Francaise Irene Nemirovsky had planned. I want to know how she would have ended it if the Nazis hadn't murdered her.

Knopf are publishing a newly discovered, unpublished novel of hers in Fall 2007 called "Fire in the Blood". I can't wait to read it. I'm sure I'll be filled with these feelings of loss and regret and anger all over again when I do.

On a happier reading note, I'm about 2/3 the way through the arc of "Zen and the Art of Faking It", Jordan Sonnenblick's new novel, which I'm enjoying tremendously. As always, Jordan's created a really likeable character with great voice.

After that I'm going to read Debby Garfinkle's Stuck in the 70's, which I've been dying to read and which has an awesome cover IMHO, and then Into the Wild by my TADN friend Sarah Beth Durst. So many books! So many boxes still to unpack! So little time!!