The Heady Fragrance of Chanel No. DUDE! NO FREAKING BOOK-WITH-MY-NAME-ON-IT WAY!

By Cornelia

Part the First: O Joy! O Rapture! Could These Splendiferous Boxes Just Delivered by the Sainted UPS Hottie-Man Mean I Haven’t Actually Been Completely Hallucinating Whilst Flailing Around Like a Doof-o-Lusional Grinning Maniac for the Entirety of the Last Year-and-a-Half, After ALL (Knock Wood, Kinahora Poo-Poo-Poo, Hey Nonnie Nonnie)?

Two days later, and it still hasn’t sunken in. I think I must be in shock. It is a very NICE sort of shock—kind of simultaneously warm and fuzzy and even a little sparkly, around the edges—but it is shock all the same.

The impetus for my current mental state, the seed crystal precipitating the advent of its burgeoning fractally Fibonacci-ssimal hunka-hunka burnin’ serotonin-up-the-wazoo goodness, yea verily, are the three stalwart shipping cartons which arrived here at the Chateau Ultra-Trashy on Monday afternoon, each one filled to its dear little cardboard brim with copies of my first novel.

I wish I could report that I high-fived the UPS guy, but I would be lying my butt off, pretending to a cool dispassionate restraint not my own.

Here’s what actually happened: I hugged the poor man, little brown Bermuda shorts and all. Damn near knocked him over, too, what with all the leaping and frolicking to which he was subjected while in my vise-like grip.

In other news today, I got pulled over by a cop for taking a left turn at a light where you're not supposed to, between 4 and 6 p.m. (I'd jogged a block out of my usual route to mail some stuff, and didn't see the sign).

I of course had left my license in my top bureau drawer, BUT had a copy of the book on the passenger seat, so he believed it was me once I showed him my name on the front and my picture on the back, and agreed to radio in to have them look up my license number. Still gave me the damn ticket, but I told him it had been such a good day that I didn't mind so much. Total lie, but what the hell.

Maybe he'll buy a copy. Least he could do, considering.

TO BE CONTINUED once I drive the kids to school this morning, after MUCH coffee…

In the meantime, this is the funniest thing I've read in forever: "I am Michiko Kakutani"