Tagged: toad the wet sprocket
What Wisconsin looks like
Well, folks. Last week sure was ranked up there on the List of Interesting Weeks. I must say.
I don’t have too much time to write a long entry about it, because tomorrow we head up north to St. Paul to visit Common Good Books (which is rumored to be owned by Garrison Keillor, of Garrison Keillor fame). So, my suitcase, which is barely unpacked from last week, needs to be packed up again. But I do want to say hello. Hello! And here are some pictures….
Last week looked like this:
–Boswell Books in Milwaukee
front counter at Boswell Books
knight in armor in the green room
–WTMJ where I was a guest on “The Morning Blend,” which is a live tv morning show (and you have to know that people rarely use the words “live” and “morning” when they refer to me in any circumstance… )
One of the guests was Toad the Wet Sprocket. Another of the guests in the green room was a guy in a suit of armor. He is a jouster. It was a jolly time in the green room…
Morning Blend with Molly Fay and Tiffany Ogle (I’m on the left, gesturing about something, who knows what…)
Toad the Wet Sprocket!
All went well last week… in fact, the worst thing that happened was that we didn’t have time to skip and hop and play around the state of Wisconsin, which is too bad…. it’s all business when you’re in the book business…. (unless you are challenged to fierce game of mini golf, played between the bookshelves… which I was…!
… at Books & Co in Oconomowoc (where the Thiele family created a mini golf course inspired by Tom Thumb–I kid you not!
Lisa Baudoin and the Thiele family at Books & Co in Oconomowoc
Aidan, a fierce competitor
the hazards they made from foamcore
Also, if you have read My Family and Other Hazards already, you have heard of “Tom the cook.”
He was at the Oconomowoc event! Here is pic of us!
June and Tom Haebig
Hello, from Oconomowoc
Hello. I happen to be a long-time fan of the town Oconomowoc, even though this is kinda my first time here. Whatta name! I mean…! Years ago, when I lived in California, I considered placing a want-ad in a Wisconsin newspaper “seeking high school letter jacket — Oconomowoc…” Yes, I do love Wisconsin. Also, apparently, I love vowels. I thought it would be a fun and confounding garment to wear around Hollywood, with the name of this fine town spread across my shoulder blades…. thus weeding out the people who couldn’t pronounce it, but really wanted to say hello. (Oh, we midwesterners amused ourselves in strange and nefarious ways in Hollywood…)
I’m doing a reading tonight at Books & Company, owned by the uber-charming Lisa Baudoin. Last night I had an event at Boswell Books in Milwaukee, owned by the fast and furious Daniel Goldin. I am kind of in awe of him, I’ll be honest. And he has done some amazing things for spreading the word about my wee book, I’ll ya, and then I’ll tell ya again…
Milwaukee was strange, if you are measuring strangeness by the number of left-hand turns that the GPS would like you to take between Point A and Point B. Perhaps there is a special navigation option to request spinning counter-clockwise… or we have invented one…
This morning I was on television, but that’s not the important part. But…. Toad the Wet Freakin’ Sprocket! They were in studio! This morning! My jaw was literally dragging the floor, which was relatively well-kept for a production studio, but still…. Wow!!! Makes getting a book written so freakin’ worthwhile! I mean… ! After doing my segment with the perky hosts, I sat there on the couch and watched the band play, like, 30 feet away…. or was it only 20…?!
This morning I had an interview with Mitch Teich of “Lake Effect” which will air on Wisconsin Public Radio in a couple of weeks, and he was like the best friend I just met. Reminded me so much of the comics I hung out with in LA. So fun to talk to… New reviews this week from Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, the Spencer Daily Reporter, the St Paul Pioneer Press, and a Q&A with the Wisconsin State Journal.
I haven’t seen them, but, that’s kind of a cool list.
Also, because I do enjoy scaring myself to death on a regular basis, I joined Twitter. I have no idea what I’m doing. Honestly. I hit reply to respond to a bookstore that had my name spelled wrong, and apparently it isn’t a private reply, but public. So funny like that. It’s like thinking you’re whispering to your neighbor—“I think you have poison ivy on your front lawn”– only to see your words printed in the newspaper. Um… okay… ha.
junemelby 