so happy

Emerson could lay here for hours.

Emerson's bliss

too heavy for the kennel roof


16" before last night's storm






the trail from the patio to the backyard

our backyard deck

a writer's endorsement

Novelist Toni Morrison endorses Barack Obama. According to an AP article, "Writing with the touch of a poet in a letter to the Illinois senator, Morrison explained why she chose Obama over Hillary Rodham Clinton for her first public presidential endorsement."

Here's an excerpt of her letter to Obama, according to the AP:

"In addition to keen intelligence, integrity and a rare authenticity, you exhibit something that has nothing to do with age, experience, race or gender and something I don't see in other candidates. That something is a creative imagination which coupled with brilliance equals wisdom. It is too bad if we associate it only with gray hair and old age. Or if we call searing vision naivete. Or if we believe cunning is insight. Or if we settle for finessing cures tailored for each ravaged tree in the forest while ignoring the poisonous landscape that feeds and surrounds it. Wisdom is a gift; you can't train for it, inherit it, learn it in a class, or earn it in the workplace — that access can foster the acquisition of knowledge, but not wisdom."

surfing for ideas

Sometimes writing ideas come in unlikely places like this or this.

Or the smell of ribs slow cooking in barbecue sauce in the crock pot on my kitchen counter.

The "Disney green" walls of my home office. A soy candle (smells like hot apple cider) burning on top of the bookcase to my right. A stack of New Yorkers on the floor to my left. And on the floor to my right, my dog dreaming in his sleep -- small whimpers, twitching paws, sometimes a whispered bark. He must be chasing a squirrel, or worse -- a neighborhood cat.

Emerson's been following me around from room to room today -- except the bedroom (big no-no). But the "Green Room" is his new cave of comfort. When it's time to go outside at night to sleep in his kennel, he sometimes dashes away to the Green Room -- to sprawl on the carpet or lie down under the square table-desk -- as if to say, "Can't I stay here? Not in the living room, but here? Where all the books are? Where Amy will be eventually come back?"

favorite new website

According to its creator (another EWU MFA alumni), "LitList is a dynamic list of literary journals, independent book publishers, and e-magazines. It also gives small publishers new ways to interact with readers and writers. Built on the idea that updating information about small publishers online is often a tedious task, LitList gives publishers the power to update their own information, including contest deadlines and contact information.But that's not all. LitList is also a social center for news and articles surrounding the small publishing market and industry. Allowing users and publishers to comment on articles, blog posts, and publisher profiles, ideas about publishing are being expressed in real time."

is that a poem I see?

Idea Weather captures the spirit of Emerson, the real huskypoet,


before reading good poems
at Rockwood Bakery -- literally.