A hazy Sunday morning out, but it is going to be a hot one again. Yesterday was intensely hot, but there was a stiff breeze that helped make it bearable. We had pastrami sandwiches at Coconuts for lunch yesterday - yummy! On the way back to the car we ran into Jeff and Nancy at the 19th Hole in Drake's Seat - a little bar in one of the many jewelry/sunglasses, etc. shops on Main Street. Gene and Harriett own the 19th Hole and are not only fun to talk to, they are a great source of information about the island. Jeff and Nancy were there celebrating their 6th month anniversary. They are so cute together. She is a hoot about dating in the islands. She was happy Jeff has all his teeth! Let's just say lots of the guys down here are less than GQ qaulity! :-) Especially when you get "a bit older" as we, and most of our friends, are!

In the evening we pigged out on favorite TV series DVDs since they came in from Blockbuster. It is like Christmas when we see that envelope in our mail box. Watched episodes of both Carnivale and The X Files. We watched the pilot and the first few episodes of season one of The X Files. Oh my were they both young in those episodes. Now Steve is watching episodes of Lost. I can watch this stuff once, maybe twice for some episodes, and then I need to move on, but Steve is watching earlier ones for clues to the recent episodes.

Although I haven't worked on the manuscript for weeks, I knew I want to include Black Mirror by Nancy Werlin in the second vol. of the booktalking book. But, I had to re-read as it had been 5 years since I initially read it. My students often do mystery themed booktalking sessions for their assignment and Black Mirror shows up on their lists quick frequently. I finished it this a.m. A smoothly written mystery for the older teen reader, which is what Nancy is incredibly good at writing. Food banks being run by prep schools and manned by scholarship students sounds wonderful, but what happens behind the scenes of the Unity Service food bank is less than charitable. Patrick Leyden started Unity Service when he was a Senior at Pentengill and moved on to open his own lucrative Internet company, funded by "angel" donors and young donors who were classmates of his. Daniel and Frances are now scholarship students at Pentegill. Daniel immediately became a central figure in the group of scholarship students volunteering for Unity Service, but didn't want Frances involved, not that she wanted to be anyway. She didn't like the slick Leyden and she really didn't like the way her brother idolized him and quotes from his books. Frances loves her brother, but not his snide comments and Buddhist quotes. When Daniel dies of a heroin overdoes Frances gets involved with Unity Service whether she likes it or not and discovers what Leyden really is up to. A thriller of a book that keeps you reading right up to the last page. Now to write the booktalk. :-)

We are out of Diet Coke so I need to make some strong ice tea to get rid of this headache! Then start working on the syllabi for Fall semester. Time goes by much too fast when your life revolves around semester due dates.