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Sat down with Neil Heinen last time I passed through Madison, and now the interview is posted.  I haven’t actually been able to watch the whole thing (satellite internet: sounds zippy, isn’t) (yep, aware of other options, none of which are options at this latitude/longitude) (trust me and my blood pressure, we’ve checked), so I’m hoping I didn’t say anything horrifying.

Here is how the interview currently appears on my computer screen:

In addition to the recent Where the Wild Things Are renaissance, Daddy has particularly enjoyed Ken Stark’s Oh Brother! (the artwork so gorgeous and evocative of my own country childhood that it gives me happy heartache) the gorgeous, haunting, heartwarming blend of story and illustration that is Night Driving, and revisiting Katy McKy’s Pumpkin Town! (my older daughter ate up Katy’s new one, Wolf Camp).  I also note the Pout-Pout Fish circulates through the stack regularly.

As far as books without pictures, thank you to the jolly good gentleman who recently gifted me with The Uncommon Reader.  Most satisfying.  Last night I was working on The Heart is a Lonely Hunter (apologies, Oprah, it took me a while).  Finally getting to McCullers and also Flannery O’Connor.  Bought a copy of this in Seattle while I was on book tour, and also this.

Glad to know my mention of Eric Taylor led to someone else listening.  Neat clip, too, Eric joining his ex-wife Nanci Griffith in song.  I have an eight-inch-tall stack of Nanci Griffith CDs.  She was one of the first to introduce me to the singer/songwriter genre.

Whenever I wrap up a book tour or even one of my shorter road stretches, I find I’ve accumulated a collection of disparate gifts and mementos.  Books, notes, green-shelled eggs, tomato plants, snickerdoodles, funky magnets, a fine pair of slippers with cow appliques (those were actually mailed — thanks T!), t-shirts, rooster sweatshirts, inexplicable hoodies, fire department patches, truck mirrors (yep, you bet)…each thoughtfully presented by a reader somewhere out there.  During book tour – especially if I am flying and traveling light – I often have to box them up and mail them home, so they’re waiting for me here in my office upon my return.  When I’m driving myself, I keep a box or two in the back of the car and pile the goods in there.

After a couple of months of heavier touring I still have a few of those boxes to sort.  I thought it might be fun to show you a photo of an item I just dug out, and how it represents (in this case, literally) a story.

This was the gift (when someone hands me something that says “International,” it’s a pretty good bet they’ve read Truck):

And here was the note accompanying (click to expand).

The references to asphalt mileage and “never been shifted into third after 1943″ are terrific.

The thoughtfulness I encounter so regularly is the greatest gift of all.  Please consider this my thank-you in general.  I will say that gratitude notwithstanding, one has only so much shelf and floorspace (don’t get me started on the pole barn!), so at some point there may need to be a charity auction, but I’d never do that without announcing it first.  The snickerdoodles are long gone, by the way.

Early morning easy listening: Bloodletting, by Concrete Blonde.  I like the name songs: “Caroline” and “Joey“.

Later, for balance, some Dallas Wayne.

Which might make me dig out this guy (he once got me into big trouble while live on the air at a radio station, a story that requires some time lapse before the retelling) (he wasn’t actually there at the time).

Turned the pigs into some new territory late last night.  They wouldn’t cross the old electric fence line.  But this morning they had overcome their fear and the new patch looked like it had been attacked by organic bulldozers which in fact it had.  Back when I was off on book tour, the neighbor plowed us a patch and my wife scatter-sowed rape and rye.  The patch is thick green and luscious now and those pigs love that rape.  So do the ducks.  They hit it with their beaks all a-clatter.