Strange Days with No Address Pages

The last two days have been strange and though-provoking. Yesterday I attended the funeral of the 95 year-old mother of my uncle (married to my mom's sister), Pearl. Pearl was a wonderfully smart and clever woman. She attended one of my readings for Get Well Soon in the fall, and was very open-minded. I never knew her that well, but I loved hearing the stories people told about her. After the funeral and the burial, we went back to her house for Shiva, where you visit with the mourners to keep them company, nosh, and reminisce about the deceased. There I got to hang with a bunch of cousins I haven't seen in ages. It was really wonderful. I do love being around family.

Today I drove an hour and a half to meet up with a person with whom I went to high school, Wendy. The interesting thing is that while Wendy and I were friendly in high school, I don't know if you'd consider us friends. We never hung out outside of school or anything. The crazy thing is that Wendy inspired one of the characters in my new novel, a sort of quirky, nerdy character named Dottie. The REALLY crazy thing is that the day I finished writing my novel, Wendy contacted me out of the blue to say hello. Again, we hadn't really been in touch since high school. We had a great time today, chatting and eating at Applebee's in Beloit, WI (although my meal was kind of gross. They didn't have a lot of options for my picky taste buds). One of our stops after lunch was Staples, where I tried to find a suitable replacement for my Chandler's. I looked through every assignment notebook they had, but none of them had a satisfactory address section. Am I the only idiot who likes to rewrite my address book at the end of each summer into a new Chandler's? Surely not!

Exciting news: I think my celebrity crush has moved on from Ron Weasley/Rupert Grint (although I still love the guy) to Daniel Desario (played by James Franco) on Freaks and Geeks. Not that I have any interest in finding out anything about the actor. The characters are always more interesting anyway. Real people always end up driving Hummers and dating super models. (Although I have heard that Rupert Grint owns an ice cream truck. Food for thought.)