All I can really think about today, or yesterday, and probably tomorrow, is this Miley Cyrus cover of Dolly Parton’s “Jolene” (most of you probably know who’s song “Jolene” is, but I found out yesterday that Dave had never knowingly heard a Dolly Parton song??? So I’m covering my bases). Listen to it.

I’ll wait.

Ok.

Now we can talk about other stuff, I guess. The Tucson Festival of Books is coming up, and I’ll be doing several panels, so it should be a lot of fun! Then it’s going to be time for AWP pretty much before you can sneeze your disbelief. (I’ll be doing a panel and an offsite reading there too!)  In the meantime, you can always buy one of my books to get ready.

It’s still pretty cold here, with freezing nights coming up, and I’ve been covering up my seedlings, which seems to be working ok so far. Evidently it’s snowing so hard in Seattle that one of the plum trees in my mom’s old front yard fell down, which feels like a bigger tragedy to me than it probably should. That said, someone on my block cut down a seemingly healthy tree this week, so I’m ready to be emotional about tree loss. My mother-in-law’s sweet dog passed away, and so I have been hugging Paul a lot, and watching the Westminster Dog Show. I was rooting for Baby Lars, but I guess congratulations to King, the actual winner. It was a welcome change last night to see a Breaking News alert on the New York Times website and have it be about a dog show.

Alright, here’s “Jolene” one more time, just in case you didn’t pay attention before. Good day, and good luck.