Writing: poems for the 30 Poems for 30 Days. Noodling a bit on a not-yet-sold picture book. Worked with Heidi on a speech for Saturday in Boston.

On Tuesday the 3rd, I flew home from Richmond, Va., then went to Bob Marstall’s studio to see how he’s coming along on his book. It’s going to be wonderful. We went out for dinner after and laughed our way through it.

Wednesday the 4th, worked all day on bills. Ugh. Signed 500 (count ‘em) bookplates for Chinaberry catalogue. After the summer’s push to sign 7500 bookplates for Scholastic, it seemed a stroll in the park. I managed doing them by watching 3 1/2 episodes of  “Top Chef.”

Thursday the 5th, more catching up on stuff. Wishing I could be writing. But with all the speaking stuff, I don’t dare settle into anything big and new. It’s a complicated part of being a writer. One needs to get out in the marketplace to support new books, but that takes time away from writing. When I first became a professional writer, my time writing was about 85% as opposed to 15% business. These days, those percentages are almost flipped.

Thursday,