Back from the Cranky reading, which was surprisingly well-attended considering our competition (Ted Kooser was in town, along with another reading by the lovely and talented duo of Peter P. and Kathleen Flenniken.) I was actually pleasantly surprised by most of the readers (especially this guy Maged Zaher and Sierra Nelson, who reminded me a little of Kristy Bowen, who, coincidentally, appears in the same issue – 9 as the rest of us!) Valzhyna Mort opened with a poem in Belarussian. She’s like a tiny, 90-pound female Ilya Kaminsky but, um, lighter in tone and she actually infuses her work with Belarussian pop culture references. We’d probably get along. I had fun reading a couple of new poems, and thought they got a good reaction from the crowd, which is always a pleasant surprise. Then I skedaddled home to get back to cleaning and packing.
I also noticed that this particular issue was full of bloggers – Kristy, as mentioned above, Matthew Thorburn, Timothy Green. And me.

I may be out of commission blog-wise as I may not have internet in the transition between old rental and new rental. And the phone number is changing too, the new one won’t be up til Monday. So, if you want to get ahold of me over the holiday weekend, you’ll have to use skywriting. Or smoke signals. Have a good long weekend, eat some barbeque for me!

And I’m having my stress echocardiogram test on Tuesday. So think good thoughts…