Thanks for the birthday wishes, all!

Yeah, let me check what they want again...I've got till July but I tend to talk myself out of these things if I don't pretend to do them impulsively...I wonder what I did with the nice one I had.(I have a real problem with seeing my work as having a future, though...in fact I'm fighting the urge to type work like "work" right now, and it's NFG.) This one is nice because you don't have to pay...if I have an urge to throw away $10, there are plenty of other places to do it than fricking Glimmer Train. Thanks. Good luck with the editor, Deb.

Ed Gein: Everyone: What should I put in my cover letter? If they like it, it would be my first published fiction. My non-fiction is kind of relevant to this piece, though(It's the haircut one from the contest I lost.) Yeah, it's Short Story Bagged Salad.

Kewl! erika, send me the version of it you want to submit, and we'll get it formatted to their specifications.

I appreciate their not wanting to lose the stories, but they don't understand what it's like to write like Rain Man does math(I'm kidding, I studied too, but when it comes to presentation, stone tablets all the way.) And I won't even go into my bizarre rituals.

This is annoyingly interesting. I'm working the Library of Congress cataloging system, flipping through various headings. I'm in the Authorship section, and there's a subdivision for special topics. ONe of those topics is "Housewives as authors." I think I understand the phenomenon they're discussing, but I'm not sure. Are they thinking that a housewife trying to fit in writing in her life is different from, say, an accountant trying to fit in writing? Or are they thinking that housewives write a particular type of book?

There's a category for women writers. There are also categories for insane authors, laboring class authors, and prisoners as authors.

Ha.

One of those topics is "Housewives as authors."

Probably looking for a place to file Jean Kerr, Erma Bombeck, Peg Bracken, and the like. People whose writings focused on the domestic.

Big old tenterhooks. From my agent, in re the 4-6 proposal:

I think at this point it's just a matter of getting approval for whatever offer it is she wants to make. I'm nudging her for details. With any luck I can manage to turn your lunch into a celebratory one.

Nice if she's right.

Also, Fed Ex hasn't shown up with the manuscript of "Matty Groves" yet. I'm out of here at 9 tomorrow morning. Eep!

Damn, Deb! Sure hope it gets there.

Photo #8. (Nope, not tired of these things yet.)

That’s great-aunt Georgeane standing next to grandmother. They didn’t look much alike. Georgeane had a belly-busting laugh that filled the room; grandmother just smiled politely at a joke. Great-aunt’s appetite was legendary. Her son, Matthew, says he’d seen her clear off a platter of pancakes stacked 16 high! I’m surprised you see her in a dress in this picture. Usually, you’d find her in one of great-grandpa’s pairs of overalls, workboots and a kerchief on her head. She ran the farm for years, after great-grandpa died. She had to when Grandma ran away with the piano tuner to the city.