Bloggy Game - Tag, You're It!

I've been tagged in my first blogging game. (Can you believe after 18 months of blogging that it's my first?) Blogger Demery Bader-Saye in Austin Texas has both challenged and enticed me to play, and to tag 8 other bloggers.

So . . . here I go - lightening fast answers on a Saturday night!

What do you think of when you the hear the word tag?

Um . . . social networking? Really. "Tag, you're it!" has become more of a community thing for me as an adult than when I was a kid. I was terrible at running and catching others as a wee one, and I always seemed to be "it" - which wasn't much fun. ( And TAG heuer - isn't that a watch?)

Do you think you're hot?

I don't just think it, I know it. We're in the middle of a heat wave in the Northeast and I am drenched.


Upload a picture or wallpaper that you're using at the moment.

See above.

When was the last time you ate chicken?

tonight at a stellar neighborhood barbecue, but of course I was shwetty.


The song(s) you listened to recently.

My son is playing Give it Away Now by the Red Hot Chili Peppers on his electric guitar RIGHT NOW. (I am in his room, listening to him practice and blogging. After I put my daughter to bed, he, his brother and I will continue our MONK marathon. Our love for Tony Shaloub carries on.) He also accompanied his sister singing The White Stripes We Are Gonna Be Friends on the guitar at the barbecue earlier.


What were you thinking as you were doing this?

How much I love prompts, and also how full my life is, and how lucky I am that there are so many things that I WANT to do, even if I get overwhelmed at times.


Do you have nicknames? What are they?

Léna is my nickname. My legal name is Madeleine


Tag 8 blogger friends... (okay, I have to tag 9, because I have a hard time with rules.)


1: Carrie Cox
2: Sarah Darer Littman
3: Arlaina Tibensky
4: Kristi Tuck Austin
5: Cherie
6: Anne Riley
7:Jen Violi
8: Gae Polisner
9: Amanda Cleary-Eastep


Who's listed as No. 1?
Carrie Cox was one of the first people to start commenting on my blog 18 months ago, and I am incredibly grateful for her friendship and support. She lives in Mobile, Alabama and is president of the Mobile Author's Guild. She has three children and LOVES to read and write YA. (She has also spearheaded the movement to get me out to Mobile next March. I can't wait to hug you in person Carrie!)

Say something about No. 5
I met Cherie on Twitter! We have been having a good time getting to know each other - twitterifically! She is also a writer and a mom. (Hmmm . . . I sense a theme here!)


How did you get to know No. 3?
I met Arlaina through a mutual friend - Arlaina is the creative director of Pen Parentis, a non-profit supporting parents-cum-authors, hosting monthly salons. Arlaina is a wicked cool and funny mamacita, whose first novel comes out THIS Tuesday 7/26, and is called And Then Things Fall Apart.


How about No. 4.

Kristi rocks. Like Carrie, I also met her through her comments on my blog, and started hopping over to hers which she shares with three other awesome writer/ artists. Then she asked me to come to Richmond, Virginia when Edges came out, and I said yes! I took the train and stayed with Kristi and her awesome hubby Adam - we drank loads of lattes, she held my hand at the ABC affiliate where I appeared on the morning show, we saw a silly movie before hitting Fountain Bookstore where I did a workshop, reading and signing. Kristi is now a life-long friend! (I miss you darling!)


Leave a message for No. 6.

Anne, I am so glad to have "met" you! Thank you so much for introducing yourself to me and getting this friendship ball rolling. I am so excited to sit down for a long talk when I come to Alabama next March!





Leave a lovey dovey message for No. 2.

Sarah, what can I say? You complete me . . . my go-go-girl. I can't wait to get my hands on Wanna Go Private, which comes out in two weeks on August 2nd!

Do No. 7 and No. 8 have any similarities?

Jen and Gae have both debuted on the YA scene in May, and they are funny, pithy generous souls and their waters run deep.  Please check out their fantastic fiction: Putting Make-Up on Dead People by Jen Violi (reviewed on this blog!) and The Pull of Gravity, by Gae Polisner. 


And I have to give honorable mention to Amanda, a wonderful writer in the Chicago area who has just started running writing workshops for teens!


Now my kids are giving me the stink eye, because MONK has just started and I need to pay attention!


Tag to you, bloggy friends!!

A Writerly-No-Writing-Adventure

It's been a full week since I have looked at my WIP - it's been a vacation, if you will, and an excuse to get together with my other writer friends (and make them play a little hooky too!)

So I went on a downtown writerly-no-writing adventure, a beautiful sunny day in NYC. I finally got to meet IN PERSON, writer, mom and arts activist extraordinaire Milda de Voe, who I had been "set up" with by our mutual friend, musician and composer Dorothy Papadakos via email a few months ago. (Milda has started a non-profit reading salon in the financial district for writers (who are also parents) called Pen Parentis.) Upon meeting me in cyber-space, Milda immediately got me in touch with her partner-in-crime, writer/mom Arlaina Tibensky, to set me up to do a reading in December when EDGES comes out! (Yay! My very first scheduled reading!)

Excited, I arrived early at Le Pain Quotidien on Warren Street and West Broadway. What was Milda like in person? I was writing in my journal when up walks a gorgeous, slim redhead wearing a black sweater with sparkling dark blue nail polish. (A big plus, in my book!) For the next two hours, we talked a mile a minute, finding more similarities than just a love for community building through the arts.

We hugged goodbye, already old friends and I walked by Ground Zero and Century 21 (I didn't go in, I swear!) past Trinity church and the financial district to 75 Broad Street where I was meeting my Girls Write Now mentee Meg in front of her school. We had a date to go have bubble tea. (One of Meg's favorite things in the whole world is to go with her friends to Chinatown to a bubble tea joint called Ten Ren. Going there is the highlight of her week, so I thought it would be fun to go together, see her where she is happiest.) We hopped on the J to Canal street, and wove ourselves through the streets to Mott. She ordered her usual strawberry with a big red straw, and I ordered green apple, (with a straw to match) watching as the server placed tapioca pearls in the bottom of the cup, and then poured a cold tea-like drink over them. Would I like it? I wanted to like it, just because of Meg. (The one time I had it before, it was more like a milkshake, and I didn't like the two textures together.) We sat in the back and pulled out our straws . . . OMG . . . it was delicious!

Meg breathed out a sigh of relief. Then we went strolling down Mott street, talking about her plans to go to the University of Rochester at the end of summer, the up coming AP tests, the prom. I bought presents for my daughter who is turning five next week, while Meg imagined decorating her dorm room with Chinese lanterns.

Thank you Milda and Meg, for a wonderful day!