BBAW 2009: Vote for me! Or just vote.

Let me make one thing perfectly clear: I am not boycotting the BBAW 2009 Awards. So you are welcome to use this BBAW link to vote for me:We blog about books because we enjoy reading, and enjoy talking about books, and most of all because we enjoy chatting with other people who enjoy books. Nobody is in this for fame and fortune, and none of us will get a Pulitzer for our blog (unless we convince the powers that be to add blogs... hmmm...).

Book bloggers depend on publishers to supply the books. Publishers encourage us to review their products by giving us free copies and advance reading copies, tchotchkes, and prizes to give away, etc. There will always be fine lines to cross, but in a Web 2.0 world, they're scratched in shifting sands. As long as we're all honest about our connections and intentions, let's just enjoy ourselves.

I discovered Book Blogger Appreciation Week for the first time this year. Through being nominated, and following the judging process on Twitter, I've found great new book blogs to read, and many new friends to chat with about books. What result could be more enjoyable than that?

Fallingwater

Spent last week in the mountains of Pennsylvania. Talk about a cellular dead zone! I couldn't post or Twitter for days. But it was a wonderful week despite (or perhaps because of) that. I had never seen Frank Lloyd Wright's Fallingwater before, so I finally took a side trip to tour it. A beautiful day to walk around in the Laurel Highlands, and to tour a home that makes the outdoor environment such a feature of the indoor environment.


Then my daughter made me an omelette with fresh eggs we bought from a neighbor that day, and the sorrel we weeded from my grandfather's overgrown garden. For dessert: she made a flaky, buttery pie crust with cherry-rhubarb filling, as fast as I could cut rhubarb from the garden. Food is never as good anywhere, as it is in the mountains!



I took Loving Frank, by Nancy Horan, along to read, but I confess I read a trashy romance novel instead. That's what summer away from school is for, isn't it? I promise to read Loving Frank next week.