A dreary rainy day today. These are the days I want to stay in bed with the laptop and the heating pad, where I am right now! But, I have another meeting on campus this afternoon so I will need to get my act together before too long.

I did take time out early this a.m. for some fun reading. I spent quite a bit of time perusing and chuckling over G is for One Gzonk!: An Alpha-Number-Bet Book by Tiny DiTerlooney a.k.a. Tony DiTerlizza. Most people recognize DiTerlizza from The Spiderwick Chronicles, but my favorite of his books is The Spider and the Fly, due to the 1920s like illustrations that make this book one all ages can enjoy. I'd use it in a HS English class. Anyway, back to the book in hand - Tiny, who is on each page, with paint brush in hand, keeps reminding the reader that this is not meant to be an alphabet book. No boring bouncing balls here. DiTerlizza "honors" Seuss with his use of the recognizable bluish shades that frequent the creatures in Seuss classics. Only Tiny and the bodiless Woos (Onesie, Twosie, etc. ) -who frequent the pages andbring up numerical observations, much to Tiny's dismay - are in the full range of colors. A couple of the creachlings in this twenty-six letter menagerie are a bit scary, such as the Evil Eeog with his stinky breath and the Xirzle, with his anvil head and mean looking eyes. Not sure I would introduce all these critters to a toddler, but slightly older kids will delight in these weirdly familiar creachlings. I receive it from the publisher with a sticker that states, "Do not Open until..." Release date for this was September 12th. Since I received it yesterday I didn't have to wait and I am glad. What a fun book.

I also received a box of new titles from Scholastic and couldn't resist diving into the beautiful Tales of Deltora by Emily Rodda. It is the illustrations for each story by Marc McBride that got my attention. They are bold, detailed and down right scary! Absolutely perfect for that tween readership. :-) Even if they haven't read the other Rodda books about Deltora they will love these short stories. Display the Deltora books near the computers and bookmark the online site for the series, which has games based on the books, at www.scholastic.com/deltoraquest. That will get those reluctant readers involved. The site is fun to explore and kid friendly.

I didn' get this posted in the a.m. as the Internet connection bogged down so bad I gave up on it and figured I would do it when I got home. Had to browse through some new magazines and watch some TV after a day of meetings before coming back to the computer today. Why is sitting on your butt and trying to concentrate so much more tiring than physical work?