Word picture from the Farmer's Market

Went to the farmer's market today, which was lovely and relaxed, with an old-time music festival in the adjoining park. People flowed back and forth between the two, eating plates of delicious smelling food, and biting into apples and peaches. Small dancing children, chatting adults, young ccouples on blankets.

If-I'd-Had-A-Camera Moment: A grey haired lady who had a small table covered with little cobalt blue bottles and a sign saying "homemade healing herbals." Standing in front of her table, a woman held opened her blouse while the grey haired lady earnestly rubbed an oil between her breasts. The woman getting the mini-healing-massage had her eyes closed, her face up to the sun and such a deep look of surrender, while we all walked around her, in the warmth and the music and the smells of cooking food. What was the story here, I wondered. Breast cancer? Heartache?

A few days ago I ran into a friend and asked about something he'd told me about a few weeks earlier. How can you remember I was doing that? he asked.

Easy. The stories are so endlessly interesting. I go around gleaning moments, as lives brush up against mine, and just for a few seconds, or a year, or a lifetime, our stories flow together.

Odd book titles, finishing touches on Big Cat Pepper

My blog today should be "read, write, laugh."

One of the things I don't do well is come up with titles. I admire people who do short snappy titles -- Laurie Halse Anderson is incredible at this with titles like Speak and Chains. I seem to prefer ten words or more....

So here's a contest for oddest book title of the year, started at the international Bologna Book Fair. Read to the end (it's a short article) for a good laugh.

We're getting down to the details on Big Cat Pepper. Melanie Cecka at Bloomsbury just sent me flap copy to check over, and asked for my dedication. Lauren Castillo's artwork is all done and is absolutely gorgeous.

Museum of Art and History in Santa Cruz

My dad and I had a great evening in Santa Cruz, due in part to a great write-up in Metro Santa Cruz beforehand, we had a lively audience and rocking party at the Museum of Art and History .
Gathering beforehand in the Sculpture Garden:

Wonderful audience:
My cousin Rym and his beautiful wife Winnie showed up: (Okay, he looks like a pirate in this shot, as in "arrrgh, Matey," but he's not. He does love the ocean -- he's a fantastic surfer who actually has a stretch of surf named after him in Santa Cruz called after him: Rym's Reef.)