Book Expo and Weekly Update

Last Wednesday afternoon I took the train up to Chicago. It was the first time I'd been to downtown Chicago (not the airport or McCormick's Place) in five years. Strangely enough, so much of it looked the same from when I used to come up all the time. The only real difference I noticed was that the Borders had been replaced by some big clothing store. 

I missed Bill and the boys, but it was quite fun to hit Trader Joe's (where I bought a disturbing amount of chocolate and chocolate covered almonds, oh, and a bag of coffee so I wouldn't look weird) and then eat dinner on my own while enjoying a book.  It was raining and late, so I abandoned the idea of finding a new and exciting vegetarian restaurant in the city and just ate at the Grand Lux Cafe near the hotel. It was great. I realized that some things are total tourist traps for a reason. They did not care that I was in my yoga pants, they gave me a great window table where I could peek out from my Kindle every few minutes and enjoy the busy street scene below, the service was great, and they did have a really good sesame tofu and vegetable stir fry.

I downloaded the Jolly Coroner from NetGalley, and it is okay so far. It is one of those books that is just not grabbing me--it is almost like there are too many adjectives around every single character. I keep waiting for the descriptions to end and for the story to begin. Hopefully it will pick up soon. Either way, I'll post a review here.

The next day was Book Expo. It is usually in New York, so it is quite a treat that it is here. I saw on the program that Mo Willems was doing a signing, so I got in early to make sure I'd make the cut in the line. He was very gracious. He high fived everyone who was waiting in line before the signing, and then he agreed to have his picture taken with everyone who came through to get a book signed. When it was my turn I wanted to bore him with how much Stephen loves him and how much we listen to his audio books, and how we read The Duckling Gets a Cookie every night at bedtime and how I've created a "Pigeon" icon on Stephen's speech device that he can select when he wants to have me read to him, but, I did not want to hold up the line, so I kept it short--my son and I love your stories, especially on Audible, with Edwina being a favorite. He agreed that the soundtrack for that one is especially cool. And the photo is below.  I can die happy now.

The rest of the day was great also. I went to a few of the conference sessions and got some good ideas for work (I won't bore you with that here) then did a tour through the rest of the exhibit hall. Picked up a free book about the Decker-Slaney/Budd mishap at the 1984 Olympics, and when the author found out that I jog, he gave me a coupon for 20 percent off running shoes from Zola Budd's sponsor. I normally get my jogging shoes from Target, so I'll likely send the coupon to Chris and Sarah, but still, not every day you go to a book show and get into a conversation about running. My other favorite booth was for a book called Someday a Bird Will Poop on You. They were not giving away free copies, but I am going to take a closer look at their website--Stephen and CK might like this one for Christmas.

Anyways, it has been a good week. More soon!