I'm trying to keep myself in Back To School mode. I tidied up my office, filed my files, paid my bills, and now I'm diving into the last round of revisions on MY NAME IS WILL. This is the highly un-glamourous portion of the process. People are shocked when they hear my book won't be out for a year. Why does it take so long, they wonder. Getting an editor to acquire the book for a publishing house is just the first step. Said editor then has to convince publishing house it's worth promoting, excite the sales force, make it a priority. Copies of the book go out to opinion makers for jacket cover blurbs. (I've already got a great one from a somewhat surprising source, given our respective politics... Christopher Buckley, editor of Forbes, author of Thank You For Smoking and former George HW Bush speechwriter, has called WILL "witty, hilarious, and brilliant"). I have a passel of letters to write requesting permission for use of various song lyrics and the like that are used in the book. I've been updating websites, writing bios, etc. And then there are the revisions to the book itself. Suddenly, July 2008 is looking all too soon!

On another front... my friend Michelle sent me to a website this morning which left me a little shocked. Did you know that the No Child Left Behind Act has a provision that gives the military access to records of teen and pre-teen students, including mental health history and home telephone numbers, for recruitment purposes? Yeah, why "leave 'em behind" in our schools? Instead, we can draft 'em while they're down about breaking up with that last girlfriend, send 'em to Iraq and leave 'em there. Michelle supports an organization called "CAMS" -- Coalition Against Militarism in our Schools. This is the way to truly leave no child behind.