Thanks a LOT, Uncle Stevie

N and I had one of our 'date nights' last night, since Baroy had a rehearsal to go to for a couple of scenes of his a local theater is doing. I baked a lasagna for the event, since Baroy doesn't eat pasta (I know!) or cheese (I KNOW!) and I try to save such meals for evenings when he's not eating at home.

As we dug in into lasagna served on our good plates ("I'll set the table, Mommy," N said, "for a special occasion" SWOON), N swallowed wrong and began to cough. He then put his hands around his throat, and bugged out his eyes.

"N!" I barked. "Say something!"

He stared at me.

"NOW!" I said, starting to rise from chair and reach for him.

"What?" he asked, smiling, and dropping his hands. "I was just kidding around..."

Relieved, I dropped into my chair and explained to him that I'd wanted him to say something, because that would let me know that he was getting air into his lungs, and I didn't need to worry that he was really choking, like bad choking.

He considered this for a minute.

"You know Daddy and Uncle's president?" he said.

"Huh?"

"Daddy and Uncle's president. He got shot in the throat. And then his head blew up and he was dead."

Oh, for...Eight days with Uncle Stevie--Kennedy-obsessed Uncle Stevie--and this is what my son comes home with.

"Oh, you mean President Kennedy?"

"Yeah, him. And then this guy shot the guy who shot him. And he thought he was a hero, but he wasn't. He was a bad guy."

"You know, N, Uncle Stevie shouldn't have told you about that."

"He didn't tell me. He showed me about it on the computer."

Oh. MUCH better.

"Well, he shouldn't have shown it to you either."

"Well, he did," N replied, matter-of-factly. "And it's in my head now, and I'm not going to forget it."

I bet you won't, kiddo.

--------
Several of you asked for an update on Book Decision 2009. In short, my faith in how well out-of-sight-out-of-mind works with this kid was well justified.

In slightly longer, he got upset about the IDEA of a book purge when I mentioned it in the car, and seemed a little...bemused...by how empty his shelves were when we got home. BUT I presented it to him as a surprise (he kept his eyes shut, etc.) AND he had no time to be sad about it, because the box of books from my stepfather had just arrived when we got home. So after viewing what had been done to his room (I moved a little furniture as well, so it wasn't just the book shelves that looked different) he opened the box and was SO excited by what was in there (The Dangerous Book for Boys! Dinosaur's Fat Cat! a biography of Tiger Woods! a couple of the Stink Moody books! The Houdini Box!!!!) that all I had to say was, "See? Now you can go put them on your book shelves because you have room!" He said he wanted to go by himself to "organize" his new books...and that was it.

I did tell him in the car that we kept pretty much all his books (which is true in the sense that we kept any book he would have a CHANCE of remembering), and that I would be happy to go find any of the books he wanted...All he would have to do is tell me which book he was missing. So far, he hasn't mentioned a single one.

Apparently, not so much on the permanent damage. I should have saved that angst for something else, I guess.

So Long, Farewell

On Wednesday, my brother-in-law--Baroy's brother S--is moving to Boston. It is a huge loss for my children...and for Baroy and myself as well. This is the man to whom my kids are so close that they call him, simply, Uncle. (All the rest of their uncles require a name appended to the uncle, but not S. He is the Uncle above all uncles.) Through most of the kids' lives, he's seen them an average of two to three times a month, sometimes more. He's been here for pretty much every holiday, and certainly every birthday party. He was in the labor room when I was waiting to have Em; he stayed with Em when I was in the hospital having N. All of our friends know him; all of their kids do, too. And they all call him Uncle S, because he is pretty much everybody's uncle.

Add to that the fact that he's our only family within 3,000 miles...or, rather, he was our only family within 3,000 miles...and you've got an additional layer of sadness. Somehow, his leaving really brings home the reality that we are a continent apart from everyone to whom we are related by blood. (No, J, that doesn't mean we're moving back east...)

So, today, we went to Santa Monica, where Uncle has lived for 15 years, to have a last dinner with him. We walked the Promenade, we had dinner at Buca di Beppo, and we took a walk down to the beach.

As soon as Baroy snapped the photo to your left, we both knew it was going to be one of those shots. One of those shots that makes tears come to your eyes every time you look at it, that makes you think of sadness and endings. One of those shots that makes you hear the music from the end of Philadelphia, when they play that supposedly old video of the Tom Hanks character as a young child, and even though you know--damn it, you KNOW--that you are being manipulated, you still cry. Every single time. Or, at least, I do.

See you in June, Uncle. We'll miss you.

All's Well That Ends Well

Baroy's play went beautifully. I mean, BEAUTIFULLY. I'm so proud of him, and of M and G for the incredible production values they put into it (the set alone is totally worth the price of admission), and of the remarkable cast. I wish I could drag every single one of you to see it. It's that good.

I'm also really proud of Em, who not only sat through it totally rapt, and understood how important the night was to her father, but also chatted with the cast afterwards like an absolute adult, throwing in occasional references to how she'd sat through the "dry tech" and how nice it was to see it "all come together." I'm not as poised, at 44 years of age, as my 10-year-old is. (And then, this morning, she got up, gathered up her American Girl dolls, and went to have a doll party with her friend J. She's 35 by night, but 10 by day. Which is as it should be.)

I'm especially proud of N, who not only made it through the first act behaving almost perfectly, but slept on my shoulder through the second...including the curtain calls. There's nothing so well-behaved as a sleeping child. (He also stuck like glue to the side of his betrothed throughout the intermission and the champagne celebration later on; at one point, he told me--in all seriousness--that he had to go, because he had to bring some crackers to W, "the love of my life." How could anyone NOT eat him up???)

And the best part? My friend Deb is having both kids over for a sleepover tonight, now that I'm sure N's fever was just flukey thing, and I'm going back to see the play again tonight, just me. Anyone want to join me?

I feel badly about whining so much. The fates have been kinder to me than my behavior deserves.

-----
And, on a mostly unrelated note, so has my husband. To wit: Last night, as he was gathering up all the opening-night gifts he'd gotten for the cast and crew (framed original script pages for the various cast members, posters, stuff like that), he handed me a package with a note on it that read, in part, "...Know how proud I am of you for all you've accomplished lately."

This (except in black...and except he swears he didn't pay that much but instead got an awesome deal on it on Amazon) was inside.

Now, my camera has been on its last legs for about a year; it has never been the same after N dropped it on a concrete floor and we had to send it in to be repaired. These days, it seems to arbitrarily sprinkle white snowflakes across about half the photos I take in low light, and it only focuses when it really WANTS to. (It apparently wanted to for N, who took this self-portrait of himself two days ago; it had no intention of working for me, however, when I took a photo of Em and her beloved Mr. D on the last day of school.) So I'm thrilled. And so is Em, who now owns my old camera. And even moreso is N, who now owns Em's old digital camera, which used to be my old digital camera, which was originally Baroy's very first digital camera...a birthday gift from me to him four months before N was born.

We are about nothing if not the hand-me-downs in this family. But, hey. It totally works for us. For all of us.

I Love When My BIL Writes My Entries For Me

In my email box this morning, after BIL took N out for lunch with friends yesterday:

Yesterday in the car, N and I were playing an alphabet game: I started with "A" by coming up with a word that begins with that letter, so I said "apple." It was N's turn with "B," so he said "blue"--and we went through the entire alphabet that way. I had just finished "O" with "octopus" when I handed the reins back to N for "P." It occurred to me idly at that moment that I'd have been willing to bet every cent I owned on predicting the next word to come out of his mouth. He didn't disappoint me.

It's true. Males operate on one track only. Rest assured that if Em had been playing with us and had landed on "V," we'd have been discussing vacuums and voices and violets. Girls just don't go there. They actually have lives.

If I Tried To Tell You

If I tried to tell you about our weekend--really tell you about it--you might not understand. That's what's been keeping me quiet these past few days. Telling you about it and having you not understand would be worse than not telling you at all. Because it meant so much to me, that would hurt too much.

Plus, I'm not good with this kind of writing...the kind about emotions that you can't really label or explain in concrete terms. So, if I tried to tell you about our weekend in the earnest and "please understand me" way I'd like to, I would probably fail. And that, too, would hurt.

So, instead, I'm just going to give you the outline of our weekend, without the attempt at the emotional impact. Most of you, I'm betting, will be able to read between at least some of the lines and understand.

The background: Em, N, and I spent the weekend at a 'family camp' in the Malibu mountains, participating with about 60 of our temple friends in what is known as a Shabbaton. (The weekend was expensive enough to make it not worth dragging Baroy--who wasn't especially excited about the whole 'camp' thing in the first place--along and have to worry about boarding Snug and all that.) Although it was sponsored by the synagogue's religious school, of which I am the PTA president, the Shabbaton was planned by a group of women who allowed me to stay almost entirely on the periphery, and thus I was able to simply sit back and enjoy the weekend without feeling the need to 'work it' at all.

Because of the religious school link, the majority of the participants were parents with school-aged children, and the place we gathered treated our gathering somewhat like a traditional summer camp, with separate bunks for the children (who were divided by gender and had counselors who slept with them) and for adults (also divided by gender, but without the obvious need for counselors to keep us on the straight and narrow), as well as motel-style rooms for those adults who didn't want to sleep apart from their partners or en masse in a room full of bunk beds.

The outline:

1. I slept in a bunk with six other of my girlfriends. (Hint for reading between this line: Even though the bunk was cold and some of my roomies snored, there was a remarkable amount of giggling that went on among us all-over-40 ladies.)

2. Em slept in a bunk with her counselors and six of her girlfriends. (Hint for reading between this line: If Em could LIVE in a bunk with six of her girlfriends, she'd totally do it. She was BORN for this kind of weekend.)

3. After initially insisting that he was going to sleep with Mama and absolutely no way would he sleep in a bunk, and did he say no way? because really, no way...and after being told this was FINE, this was what I expected, it was entirely up to him...N slept in a bunk with his counselors and four of his friends. (Hint for reading between this line: Oh, please. If you don't get the ENORMOUS MONUMENTALNESS of that statement, you know nothing about my son. The fact that I just made up a word like monumentalness should give it away. If not, the fact that I told the two 18-year-old counselors who managed to change N's mind about his sleeping arrangements in under two hours that I was going to buy each of them a car might also give you an idea.)

4. During Friday night services, N found himself outside behind the full-wall plate-glass window that faced the congregation, and decided it was the perfect opportunity to do a little tap-dance while the rabbi was leading us in the Shema. (Hint for reading between this line: Although Em and I are still cringing in embarrassment, I'm pretty sure it was that moment that made N the complete and total darling of not only every member of our congregation, but every staff member at the camp. Man, did those college kids eat him up!)

5. During Saturday morning services, Em and her class got up in front of everyone and led several of the prayers, including the v'ahavta, which is the prayer that follows the shema. (Hint for reading between this line: It was Em's voice leading all her classmates'; she sang with power and understanding. She KNOWS this prayer. This is something that makes me melt with pride...and maybe a little jealousy, since I've been trying to learn it for ages, but can't read enough Hebrew yet to do it right.)

6. During the family activities Saturday morning, Em had a full-scale freak-out at the thought of trying the ropes course/zip line, and yet managed to go a little way up the rock wall, even if she was sobbing throughout and for as much as 10 minutes after. When she'd calmed a little, she went with N and I to tie-dye t-shirts and was so cheerful that people kept asking her if she had allergies, never suspecting that her eyes were swollen from crying. (Hint for reading between this line: Em's ability to bounce back in the face of even self-imposed adversity is awesome. She inspires me.)

7. During the adult activities Saturday afternoon, I went on a hike in the mountains, took a yoga class, was transported through an hour-long meditation that felt like maybe 15 minutes, and then sat at the top of a hill with a small group of my friends as the sun began to set, studying Torah with the rabbi. (Hint for reading between this line: Every single moment of those four-plus hours was sublimely spiritual in a way I don't think I've ever experienced before.)

8. Did I mention that N slept in a bunk? Away from me? With kids his own age? And that he went to every single activity they did, and even participated in some of them? And did I mention that this is absolutely unprecedented? (Once again, no between-the-lines reading needed.)

9. During the Saturday night campfire and sing-along, N--apparently exhausted by the unprecedented monumentalness of the weekend--fell asleep in my arms as I rocked him back and forth. Em, just a few bodies down from me, came over and smoothed the hair away from his forehead and kissed him gently, then kissed me and went back to swaying with her arms around her friends, singing at the top of her lungs. The girls' bunk later went on a late-night flashlight hike, and apparently laid on top of a big rock and studied the stars. (Hint for reading between this line: This is exactly the kind of childhood experience I want for my kids.)

10. Once the kids were settled in with their counselors each night, I realized I was totally and completely off the hook. We kidless grownups were feted with wine and cheese the first night, and martinis and kick-ass guacamole the second in the camp's 'conference center.' We schmoozed and laughed and bonded, and kept marveling over and over at how it was perhaps the first time that we all had been able to really talk without one or more children interrupting for food or water or to have us settle an argument. (Hint for reading between this line: This is exactly the kind of adult experience I want for me. Not every day, and not even every week. But sometimes, being really and truly not-the-mama even for just a few hours is incredibly refreshing.)

11. At the 'closing circle' organized by the camp director, kids and adults were encouraged to share their feelings about the weekend. More than a few voices--including a couple of adult male voices--broke while speaking. (Hint for reading between this line: It's one thing to find a particular experience remarkable. It's another to realize that you're not alone and that, in fact, there are many others who felt exactly as you did, even if you can't really express how you feel. That, I think, is the very definition of gratification.)

Don't get me wrong. I've had wonderful experiences before, and I hope to have many more in the future. This one was different simply in that it was so unexpected. When we do our annual trip to Big Bear, when we travel to visit family, when we went on our cruise a few years back...I have and do look forward to those sorts of events with delicious anticipation. In this case...well, frankly, I looked forward to it with wariness and more than a dose of dread about just how difficult it would be to handle the whole roughing it aspect with N hanging on to my arm for 48 hours and no Baroy around to help me out. So when what came to pass came to pass, when the reality so outstripped what I was anticipating, it almost felt like some kind of cosmic surprise party. ("Really? All for me? Oh, you shouldn't have.")

In other words, this was not the One True Transformative Experience of My Life or anything like that. But still. If I tried to tell you how much it meant to me, how much my mood has lifted and my soul calmed...I'm certain I'd come up short. In fact, I know I have.

Serendipity

I know that there are logical, scientific explanations for these 'weird coincidence' events that seem so significant when they happen but really have little significance. I know that, sure, I may be about to tell you about two events that have kind of freaked me out in that "ooooeeeeeooooo" way, but I don't often think about how many things happen to me on any given day that DON'T wind up in a strange coincidence, and I've probably been due for some kind of connection between events, because that's the way the world works.

I know all this, but I don't really want to think about it, because that would take all the fun out of weird random things happening. Not that either of these things is especially fun. They're just...random. [Hey, I'm trying here! Give me a break!]

The first one: About two weeks ago, my editor at Time emailed to ask me (and a bunch of other writers) for the names of important and influential scientists who might not be the obvious folks already on everyone's radar. Because I've been doing a lot of parenting stuff these days (have you seen the relaunched-but-still-being-redesigned ParentsConnect?) and very little science stuff, I ignored the email, figuring I didn't know of anyone that would fit the bill. But then, a couple of days later, when I couldn't sleep, I thought of a scientist I had written about a lot in my days in university PR. And so, for the first time in about two years, I googled his name, just to see where he was in his experiments on a pretty cool device that might one day make a big difference in a lot of peoples' lives. I didn't see much beyond what I'd written about two years ago, which was pretty preliminary, so I went back to bed.

The VERY NEXT DAY, I got a call from the PR office where I used to work--the first such call since I left there, mind you--asking me if I'd be interested in doing a piece for a new patient/alumni magazine they're launching on behalf of the medical school. A piece on the doctor whose name I'd been googling not twelve hours earlier. An update piece on the exciting work he's doing, because nobody has written about him since I left.

C'mon. That's a little spooky/weird/coincidental, right?

Then, yesterday, as a result of my continuing effort to habitually dispense medical advice without a license, I got an email from one of my colleagues at ParentsConnect, asking me my opinion on whether or not she should get tubes for her son, who has had recurrent ear infections. I sent her a long email, talking about how much the tubes had helped both my kids, and how it had virtually 'cured' them of getting ear infections, especially N, who had his put in at 18 months and hasn't had an infection in the five-and-a-half years since.

Which of course meant that, this morning, I woke up to hear N crying in his bed, and when I went to him to ask what was the matter--he's my relatively cheerful waker-uper, so crying in the morning is pretty unusual--he just pointed to his right ear. At which point, I immediately began wishing for a time machine, so I could go back one day and beat the crap out of myself before I could write those jinxing words about the five-and-a-half years.

Yeah, yeah, I know I didn't actually cause N to suddenly develop pus behind his tympanic membrane. Well, I mean, I know it, but I don't actually believe it. Science and logic be damned. I don't mind so much when something I google in the middle of the night earns me a nice chunk o' change in freelance fees, but when boasting about my kid's health makes them sick...then I get pissed.

[A funny little coda to all this: As I was proofreading the above, my sister called, and asked what I was up to. I told her that I had taken N to the doctor because I gave him an ear infection. "What?" she said. I explained the above, ending by saying, "I mean, I know I didn't give him an ear infection, but..." and she interrupted me. "No. You TOTALLY gave him an ear infection. Oh my god, I'm totally convinced that you did."

This, my friends, is why I love my sister so much. She understands.]

In Which My Brothers-in-Law Write My Blog Entry For Me

The only piece of info you need to have is that my brother-in-law J and I were good friends for a number of years before he introduced me to Baroy. (No, not that kind of friends. Really, no.)

This morning, J wrote the following email to his brothers (Baroy, B, and S):

In 1992 or thereabouts, I was watching a playoff game between the Oilers and Bills. The score was 35 to 3 at the half and TC convinced me to turn it off and meet her at a movie theater to see Eddie Murphy in "The Distinguished Gentleman." When we left the movie, I called Sports Phone and the first thing I heard was, "...and in the greatest comeback in the history of the NFL playoffs, Buffalo defeats Houston 38-35." This e-mail exchange followed this morning:

TC to ME: So you didn't happen to turn off the Superbowl, oh, about 45 seconds before it ended in order to watch The Distinguished Gentleman, did you?

ME to TC: No dear. That would have happened only if we'd been in the same city. (TC in 1937: "Let's go get some coffee. You've seen a blimp dock before." TC in 1951: "Aah, go get a hot dog. Bobby Thompson can't hit his way out of the infield." TC in 1863: "It's cold, it's rainy and Lincoln's a terrible speaker. Besides, who wants to go to a cemetery?")

Not to be outdone in smartassness, the rest of the boys (though not Baroy, He Who Knows What Is Good For Him) began to reply in rapid succession:

From B:

TC in February 1964: Who wants to wait in line to see the Ed Sullivan Show? That show's just for old fogey's anyway....

From S:

TC in 1948: "Oh, turn off the radio and meet me at the Persian Room. You can listen to President Dewey's speech tomorrow."

TC in 1956: "Nobody can make a musical out of 'Pygmalion.' It's a waste of an opening night. Give somebody else the tickets and let's go see 'The Green Blob.'"

TC in 1963: "Abe, enough already. There's nothing to film at the end of a motorcade."

From B again:

TC in July 1969: Oh, Neil, turn this thing around and let's go home. There's nothing down there but craters.

From S again:

TC in 1865: Absolutely not. First of all, Laura Keene isn't funny. Second of all, the seats are on the far right side of the Dress Circle. All you can see from there is half the stage and the door to the private boxes. Haven't they invented movies yet???

From J, not to be outdone at his own game:

TC in 25,000 BC: “Oh please, Gorb is always tinkering with something. I’m not investing any of MY shiny pebbles in some round thing for the drag-board.”

And finally, one more from B, who generally has the last word:

TC a ka-pillion years ago: "What?! 'Let there be light?' wasn't enough? 'Heaven and earth?' wasn't enough?! Now they want me to make PEOPLE, too?? No, absolutely not. This is where I draw the line!"

Yep, my brother-in-law just put me in the role of God. Nobody will ever accuse these boys of not taking a joke to its very limits.

I Must Be Doing Something Right

Today is my birthday, number 44. (Does it make me seem charmingly neurotic or just flat-out insane when I say that having a numerical palindrome for an age makes me very, very happy?) Since N's birth two days after my 37th birthday, these days have become quiet ones, as we gear up for celebrating a little boy who begins looking forward to his special day on January 27th each year. This is fine by me.

And so, today, I've cleared the decks of heavy-lifting work (lots of routine tasks to catch up with, but no research and no writing of complete sentences for a potentially critical audience), and we'll bring dinner in. That's all I need.

Well, that and some presents. Or, rather, the cards that came with the presents.

Baroy's card to me was too cute--a copy of the Time magazine cover (even *I* can't bear to link to it yet again; the tooting of my own horn these days is almost deafening) with "I know I would be sick without you!" on the inside. Hysterical, and very sweet.

But the kids outdid themselves. Em (who recently learned how to use Powerpoint at school), put together a Powerpoint presentation for me, and then printed it out. Here are some excerpts:

What her son thinks about her

• "She's perfect"
• "She's great at everything"
• "She's wonderful when she puts me to bed"
• "She's good at work"
• "She's sweet"
• "She's good at taking Snug for walks"

and

What her daughter thinks of her

• "She's a great friend"
• "She's great to talk to"
• "She is great to go to when I'm feeling blue"
• "She's great to go to for advice"
• "She knows me and all my problems"

OK, so that second one makes it seem like poor Em is constantly on the edge of a nervous breakdown, but still...If that isn't the official Cutest Thing Ever, I don't know what is.

Oh, and to top it all off, one of my nephews called me this afternoon to wish me a happy birthday...and we talked! For a long time! This is an 11-year-old boy for whom chatting on the phone has always seemed like some sort of evil torture...and yet, today, he used complete sentences! Sometimes two in a row! It was truly awesome. Seriously. I love that kid to death, and to get a chance to chat with him after not having seen him for a good six months is a huge gift.

So, yeah. 44. A palindrome year filled with notes and conversations and kids I adore. I could do much worse.

Naming

My Aunt Barbara has been staying with us for the last week-and-a-bit, on and off. She lives in Florida, and it's been a couple of years since my kids have seen her at all. They're like pigs in slop with all the attention they're getting--little consumer-driven, Aunt-Barbara-wants-to-spoil-us-rotten-and-we're-not-going-to-complain pigs.

N, especially, has been loving having Aunt Barbara here, because she's actually been playing with him--or, more specifically, watching his many activities and submitting to being bossed around by a not-yet-7-year-old who seems to have the bossing abilities of a man many years his senior.

[You're going to have to forgive me here, by the way. I've spent the last 20 minutes trying to figure out just how to make this into a cohesive story rather than a series of only loosely related sentences, and I just can't make it hang together. But I still want to say what I want to say. So please ignore the utter and complete lack of transitions. Or don't ignore them, but at least try to forgive them. Thank you for your cooperation. Sincerely, The Management]

One of N's 'quirks' is his extreme difficulty with names. There are people he's known for years whose names he still has trouble with...people he's known since he was BORN. Given time and hints, he'll get it...but it's a definite weakness he'll likely have to deal with all his life.

Thus it was not much of a surprise to me that he's been continually getting stalled this week when trying to get Aunt Barbara's attention. (Like most people, Aunt Barbara balks at responding to "Hey, you!") He's gotten better and better over time at covering for himself...my favorite this week was when he tried to ask me when Aunt Barbara was coming back from her friend's house where she stayed for a couple of nights, and wound up asking, "When will...um...uh...you know...our aunt be coming home?" Our aunt. Couldn't you just smush him up and eat him with brown sugar and butter melted on top?

Now, all of this is complicated by the fact that many, many years back--for reasons we have been debating on and off all week--I began calling my Aunt Barbara AB. (Short for, you know, Aunt Barbara. In case that was confusing anyone. Yes, feel free to despise me now for talking down to you.) Em has picked that up as well, but N had only ever referred to her as Aunt Barbara. Which only worsened the problem of his coming up with her name, since he wasn't hearing it from me or Em. Finally, however, after days and days of stumbling over her name and having to be reminded of what it was and of seeming to be visibly flustered by this problem--one of the first times I've seen him seem to feel badly about not knowing a name--he's finally given up, and has started calling her AB. Which, for some reason, seems unbearably cute and grown-up and yet almost inappropriate--almost disrespectful--coming from him. Still, the cute wins out. As AB said to me today, "I was going to tell him that you have to be a certain age to call me AB, but it's just so adorable coming from him, I can't bring myself to do it."

See? Not only rambling and badly constructed, but pointless as well! A trifecta of Bad Blogging!

This month simply can't end soon enough, can it?

Our Celebrity Judge Makes Good!

My brother-in-law--the one who judged the "give TC a new name" contest--has a book coming out soon, real soon, like in four days soon. It's a young adult book, which I read way back when it was a novel aimed at adults, and it was really good even then. Word has it it's only gotten better...and if Publisher's Weekly's starred review of it, which just came out, is any indication, word is right.

Check it out: His review is the twelfth one down, the only starred review of the bunch; the book is called Nacky Patcher and the Curse of the Dry-Land Boats, in case you didn't already click on the Amazon link above.

Yay, J! Now we just have to wait for the review copies of my OTHER brother-in-law's young-adult book, which is coming out next spring. And let's not even get into what all four of these boys have written and published in the past...Let's just say it's no wonder I feel just the teensiest bit underaccomplished in this family, what with just two measly not-selling-like-hotcakes nonfiction titles to my name.

(Phew. I thought for a second there I was going to write this whole post sounding all chipper and supportive and proud of J; thank goodness the real, bitter, self-centered me came through at the last minute, huh?)