But still you should totally go read this article I was in for the local newspaper.

TUCSON WRITERS FALL IN LOVE WITH ROMANCE

I’ll post a blog about the exciting and absurd details of the interview tomorrow.

Just give us a minute here to wring ourselves dry . . . believe it or not, even though we live in the desert we experienced some pretty high humidity this past week. We don’t like humidity. We’re not used to it and we’re not having it. It makes us surly and unreasonable. What’s that you say? You thought we were always surly and unreasonable? Very funny. Here’s some more funny stuff . . .

1. More oddness with Vermont. Remember last week there was a giant pile of goat poo on fire in a

small town in Vermont. We thought that strange and worthy of investigation but now we’re not sure what the hell is going on over there. Apparently AZ is picking a fight with the state of Vermont. It seems our magazine Arizona Highways made some outrageous claim that our fall leaves are better than Vermont’s fall leaves. That’s patently ludicris. As an AZ native Amylynn must say that there are many, many places in AZ that are not desert – except that you don’t tune into this blog for vacation advice. You want snark. We have that in spades. Vermont countered that their Gorge is better than the Grand Canyon. OK. Everyone needs to just calm down now before someone gets hurt. Does Vermont realize that everyone in the state of AZ has a permit to carry?

2. Llama love. We have the wrong jobs. That became abundantly clear when we read this article. We’d be so happy to drive llamas around even if it was to talk to sick people. We make it a point not to be around sick people. They’re icky and there are fluids involved. But still, these llamas are very cute – especially the one with the hair cut. Where do we submit our resume?

3. Chaser the world’s smartest dog. We’d like a smart dog. None of the Quill Sister’s dogs are smart. They are high functioning morons in that they are smart enough to come out of the rain. Chaser is smart. Really smart. She knows like 1200 words including verb and noun combinations. That’s crazy. She can play hide and seek and hot and cold like a little kid. We don’t need our dogs to do that but it would be nice if they’d stop being so freakin dumb. What stupid dog needs to eat an entire pillow? Or a complete pack of raw spaghetti noodles? Dumb we tell you. Pretty but dumb.

4. Why doesn’t this happen to us? A guy in England rolled over to cuddle with his girl friend only to find that the person nuzzling his neck was in fact a wild fox. The guy freaked out and chased the fox back out the cat door. We think that was the wrong tack. If we woke up with a fuzzy little fox in our bed there would be a completely diffent outcome. For crying out loud, all the thing wanted to do was snuggle. What kind of selfish bastard won’t snuggle with an adorable fox? Cuddle up under the covers. Maybe turn on the tv. Perhaps call in the cat to join you. There are many acceptable responses that don’t involve screaming like an old woman and kicking it out. Wrong, wrong, wrong.

5. Google searches. Honestly we don’t know what Amylynn did before Google. Actually, we do know. She had the library in her Rolodex and she called them all the time. To the point where they knew her voice when she called in. That girl really needs to get on a game show. Anyway, today there was much silliness and in the course of our regular discourse, we looked up the following search “How to do a home vascectomy.” Alarmingly, this was already a known Google search and we didn’t even have to type the whole question into the search box. This is hysterical stuff. The first responder clearly doesn’t have a sense of humor – at all. However, the rest of the group are a laugh riot. Now we bet our husbands are very concerned.

We might have put this on the blog before, but everyone needs a little more Muppets doing Queen – It’s totally worth a four-minute investment.

I texted Ava today and asked her to come to my house and shoot me in the face.

Why? she asked.

Because we’re painting Sassy’s room and I want to die.

It actually wasn’t that bad. I do tend to exaggerate. A little. Sometimes.

Amylynn “Hyperbole” Bright.

So now Sassy’s room is lavender. The whole room except the ceiling which she opted to leave blue with clouds that her grandmother and I did when she was a baby. The Bandit wanted to help, which I suspected was a really bad idea, but what’s a parent to do? We gave him a roller and threatened him. Epic parenting, right?

Actually, the biggest trouble was the animals. Winnie the Wonder Mutt liked to lick the walls. Roscoe preferred to rub his head against the wet paint. The worst of it was getting paint off the cat’s tail.

Stupid cat.

Tra la la la la. It’s Friday. Thank all the old Gods and the new. There is much planned for this weekend. Much of which we can’t tell you now, but all will become known to you in good time. Isn’t that exciting? What do you suppose it will be? Will jail time be a consideration? A trip to PetSmart? We’re not telling you no matter how nicely you ask. Bribery is a consideration if you really can’t wait. We will promise that extensive blogs will be involved in the coming weeks. Here’s some funny stuff to tide you over.

1. Cancel Vermont. According to the newspaper, there is a goat-manure fire and it’s stinking up the town of Windsor, Vermont. Arson is not suspected. Apparently the pile of manure “spontaneously caught fire.” This is very alarming. Is goat manure the only kind that spontaneously combusts? We’ve been very interested in obtaining ourselves one of those adorable fainting goats, but perhaps we should re-evaluate this. We’re certain our husbands have several reasons why getting goats, fainting or otherwise, is a bad idea. The only one we’re interested in is this fire business. Although, we would like to remind you that Ava is from Jersey and those people are more than a little intrigued by fire. This latest news may not actually work in her husband’s favor.

2. Royal hedgehogs. Three wee albino hedgehogs were born in Russia the same day as Prince George so they aptly named the baby hedgehogs George, Alexander, and Louis. Thank goodness there were only three of them right? Otherwise what would they have named the fourth one? Moe? Hortense? Guadalupe? We don’t know, but we have opinions. It seems the entire world has hedgehogs except us. They gave these little fellows a castle to live in complete with carved windows, dark velvet curtains, and a plush bed. If we promise to give some hedgehogs cutsie

names and a castle to live in can we have one or five? Please?

3. More stuff we’re ABSOLUTELY not eating. The Vietnamese are all in a flurry, running all over Hanoi looking for bird’s nests to eat. We’ve heard of this before, but honesty we didn’t pay attention. We refused to believe it was true. Apparently these nests made from the “congealed saliva of Asian swiftlet” is a hot commodity, a delicacy known as the “cavier of the East.” By the way, cavier’s something else we’re not eating. We know that we’re often hypnotized by expensive stuff but to be fair, that’s usually jewelry. WE don’t care how much this

nest nonsense costs, we’re not going to be enticed to eat this. Ever. Ick.

4. We need boxes. We’re moving. It’s a done deal. We’re sending in the escrow check today. This humble castle has four towers. One for each kid. Excellent planning on our part, don’t you think? There are 16 bedrooms so you can come and visit if you bring a nice housewarming present. The 500 acres of land it’s on also has a tavern. That’s going to be the big selling point for our husbands. There’s also plenty of land far away from the house to keep our cute goats in case #1 happens. We feel that our ownership of this castle makes us eligible for #2. Also, it’s just down the road from Paris. They cook normal stuff there. Stuff with butter. There’s croissants. And chocolate. Even thought those French will try to sneak in the odd frog leg and a snail or two, they’d NEVER try duping you with a bird’s nest.

5. Amazon. Not the river, although we’re sure it’s just super. We’re talking about the worlds fastest bookstore. We do lament the loss of small bookstores, and we surely don’t want to see the brick and mortar stores go. We absolutely adore spending time in bookstores. Still, ordering a book and having it on your doorstep in two days is a beautiful thing. Be-u-t-ful! Besides, that’s where Amylynn’s books can all be bought.

I am such a fan of Elmore Leonard. I’ve been reading his books for…ages. His dialogue is genius. I got Ava interested in his work when I made her start watching Justified. He created the character and was a producer, although he didn’t write the show.

I have an autographed first edition copy of Elmore Leonard’s 10 Rules of Writing.

Even if you don’t think you know Elmore, you know his work. Get Shorty. 3:10 to Yuma. Out of Sight.

Several years ago I drove Mr. Leonard and his son around town for the Tucson Festival of Books. We wrote about it here. He was an absolute delight, even though he did critique my driving and Ava informed him he needed to stop smoking. He was 87 at the time, and an exceptionally intelligent man. I suspect he knew the risks of smoking, but still…

Raising boys is very exciting. All of a sudden the Bandit is on an injury kick. Just last week we were at the ER for stitches in his knee after a run in with our dog and a rock.

On Saturday the kids were in the back yard playing. Both of our dogs were asleep in the living room so I figured things would go alright. Then I heard the yelling and some crying, followed by screeching and the persistent wailing of, “I’m gonna die!”

A parent tries not to laugh at times like this. My children are very dramatic. I have no idea where they get it. As a consequence, I am exceedingly calm in an emergency.

I met The Bandit in the kitchen expecting very little in the way of an actual injury. I can’t tell you how many times I can’t find any physical evidence of a wound. Usually it’s a thinly disguised form of tattling. This time however, there was blood.

Copious blood. He had his hand over his eye and the red stuff was dripping from his chin and oozing out from between his fingers.

“Oh,” I said. I peeled his hand away from his face and determined that he had a cut above his eyebrow. It was nothing epic, but facial cuts always bleed like crazy making things much scarier than they need to be.

I got the bleeding to stop and put a butterfly bandage on it. A bandage that would be quite small on a grown man’s head was ENORMOUS on his little forehead. The trip to the ER was cancelled.

This time it was determined that the wound was received with the assistance of an older sister and a baseball. If you ask her, she will give you a complicated story that involves gravity and rivals middle East political negotiations. If you can pay attention long enough to follow the story you’re a better person than me.

I just love her. She’s sooo amazing. It’s long, but totally worth it.