Favors, & Anguish, & Blurbs, Oh My!
It is extremely hard for me to ask favors of people.  I’m not talking about the “Hey, Chris, can you please replace the toilet paper?” kind of favor.  I mean the kind where I ask someone to do something for me that requires a considerable investment in his or her time or energy (even when the person is my friend and probably wouldn’t say no).  Or, that has anything to do with reading my writing who isn’t the DYPS.  My hang-up is that I never want to inconvenience anyone.  It’s actually quite paralyzing sometimes. All of this is by way of saying, a few weeks ago, when I was lamenting to Karen that I don’t p

Still Pinioned Under the Boulder, Bob
We finally got Issue Four of Chickenpinata online.  We’re always a little more behind on things than we’d like, but this time (computer issues aside–don’t get me started on that) I had problems with several of the people that we sent acceptances to. There were three who did not respond when we sent the congratulations announcement–we always send an e-mail acceptance and ask for the poet to confirm that the poem was still available to be published.  This time three people did not respond.  And this was really irritating because I’d already created t

Under a Rock
In case you wonder where I’ve been, I’ve been under the oppressive boulder of registration, which has pretty much consumed my attention for the last two weeks.  You know how bad it’s been?  I completely forgot to go to my writing group this week.  I didn’t even think about it until yesterday.   Dreadful. Thursday night I was down in Columbus at the First Thursday Reading Series; I was the featured reader.  It was really pretty neat because there was an open-mic reading before me, and eight readers signed up, and each person read a couple of poems, so I got to hear poems by my Georgia Poetry Society friends

And Now a Word from She Who Is Soon-to-be Published
I’ve been thinking about cover art and blurbs and such, and I can’t tell you how stressful that is.  I’m beginning to think writing the book was waaaaay easier than all the stuff that comes after. Karen says I ought to hold a contest and have my students come up with possible cover art.  Which I could do, and maybe give like a giftcard or something to the winner.  However, there’s a little part of me (alright, a BIG part of me) that thinks that rates a 10 on the Gouda Scale.  But what are my options, otherwise?  I can’t take a photo to save my life, and let’s not go into my painting skills. And then there&

OMG!!! Finishing Line Is Taking La Petite Mort!
Alright, I’ve been hella down in the dumps lately, like, nauseatingly so. So, imagine how awesome it was to get an e-mail from Finishing Line Press today telling me that they’ll publish my chapbook La Petite Mort!!!! This is completely out-of-the blue too, because I had entered it in their New Women’s Voices contest, got the standard “Thanks, we’re going to publish this amazing writer, and you’re not her” note, and didn’t give it another thought.  I guess they also choose to publish a select number of non-winners.