Okay. I feel like I owe you, the 7 readers of my weblog, an update. It is long overdue, really. A nice, solid, full update on my goings-on and my thoughts on other goings-on. So let's start in, I don't know, August. We'll go in a GOOD/BAD format, because that is the only real solid format to employ in a situation like this one. Okay:

1. The movie rights for Looking for Alaska were sold to Paramount with Josh Schwartz, the kid who created and directed The O.C., assigned to write and direct. This means, among other things, that I can not longer whine when Sarah wants to watch The O.C. The show has some of the best dialogue on TV, as it turns out. So hopefully they will make a movie someday. But maybe they won't. You can never tell with these things. Still: GOOD.

2. A lot of other GOOD things happened to Alaska, also. For instance, it is going to be translated into Japanese. This marks Alaska's first foray into a new alphabet.

3. Sarah (my fiancee--by the way, I'm engaged. GOOD.) and I moved to New York City, so that Sarah can go to graduate school. BAD. Now, the part where Sarah and I live together in a neat apartment and play house and buy bookshelves and hang out all the time--all those parts are great. The BAD part is that New York City is so expensive that I never leave the house for fear of accidentally spending 11 dollars on a can of Sprite. Also, Mayor Daley's administration is finally crumbling and I'm not in Chicago to gloat on WBEZ, which is a bummer. So yeah: BAD. But, then again, NOT NEARLY AS TERRIBLE as I thought it might be.

4. I finished a draft of An Abundance of Katherines, my second novel. I finished it while staying with my parents in North Carolina (incidentally, my parents moved to North Carolina. GOOD) in this beautiful little cabin with this ridiculous view of the mountains, and it was good and quiet and easy to write there. Or as easy as writing gets, anyway. GOOD, hopefully. Katherines should come out in September of 2006.

5. There's a mouse in our apartment. Really, really, really BAD. I keep dreaming about the mouse. (nb: I just typed mousse by accident. I can only wish I were dreaming about mousse. Mousse is fucking delicious.)

Oh yeah, and 6. I decided to start cursing in my blog again. For a while, I was thinking I shouldn't curse in my blog--not so much due to the sensitive ears of my readers but rather due to the sensitive ears of my grandparents. Sorry, Nanny--you raised me up good, but I just can't help but drop the f-bomb here and there. YA authors cursing in their blogs: KICK ASS.

7. Capote the movie: EXCELLENT.
Capote the writer: ALSO EXCELLENT.
Capote's friend Harper Lee: BEST ALABAMIAN EVER?
The sheer volume of human and dog pee on the sidewalks of my new hometown: BAD
Endings your years-long love affair with Nicorette: PRESUMABLY GOOD, although it feels for all the world AWFULLY BAD.
Cereal costing 8 dollars here (true story): BAD. And not even some fancy soy wheatmilk gluten-free fiber-rich cranberries-dried-in-the-vacuum-of-space type cereal, either, but--like--Lucky Charms. 8 dollars.
Veuve Cliquot Champagne from 1998: GOOD, if you're over 21. ILLEGAL AND TOO EXPENSIVE ANYWAY if you're not.
The Sun Also Rises: HATED IT in high school but turns out that it's really very GOOD.
Those aviator sunglasses: GOOD, but not on me.
Still having enough space for your books, which is all that really matters: GOOD.

(Oh. Incidentally, email from my contact page often goes to my bulk mail folder. I usually find it there, but occasionally don't. So don't take it personally if I didn't write you back. Try again. Or maybe I should just secretly give you the secret direct address. Frankly, I need some questions to answer in the blog, because I never know what to write about.)