Spooky Little Girl

When Josh and I were dating for awhile, we started reading together. We have differing accounts about how this happened and which book was first, but we would read books by Laurie Notaro and laugh so hard we nearly peed. It is one of my many fun memories from before we were married. She is most well-known for her Idiot Girl's books, which are essays about her life.

Tonight we got to go to a book reading for Laurie Notaro's most recent book Spooky Little Girl, which I haven't read yet, but am looking forward to. I didn't get to see her on her last book tour, for there's a (slight) chance i might be going to hell, which was her first work of fiction and strongly influenced by her move to Eugene from Phoenix, because I was really sick, but Josh and I made sure to be at Powell's for this book tour (the last stop!)

Here I am waiting for the whole thing to start (we were apparently 30 minutes early):

Things filled up later. Josh remarked that it was a lot like the time when we went to a taping of "The Ellen Show"-- a lot of ladies out on the town. A lot of saving seats with purses, talking about how many seats needed to be saved, shouting across the room at each other, and cacklaughing. Also, a lot of back tattoos.

As predicted, Laurie Notaro was hilarious. She read a bit from Spooky Little Girl and something from her not-yet-published book about how she and a friend dressed up like characters from Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? for Halloween and she "saved" her friend from "choking." I can't recreate it, but it was funny stuff.

My only complaint is that, though we were in the second row, we somehow ended up toward the back of the book-signing line. There were a fair amount of people there, and Laurie Notaro talked to everyone, so it took awhile. Josh and I got a little nuts.

Here we are standing in line:

As time wore on, we started goofing around/reading books.

Our devil pictures:

There were some other pictures, which I've decided not to share. 

An interesting thing, and if you've been to readings at Powell's you may have already been aware of this, is that the lectern for readings looks like a stack of books. 

The books in the top part are actual books by writer Bret Harte. I found that interesting.

Finally we got to the front and got to talk with Laurie Notaro (Josh invited her to Hoodoo, and I just rolled my eyes), and we got to take a couple pictures.

The first one was the result of the woman taking the picture telling us to "say menopause!"

So we had to take another:

Totally worth it! If you're looking for a funny book to read, Laurie Notaro has now published 8 of them, so you have a lot to choose from.

Also, Josh bought this pin for me, which I'm going to wear to my next book club meeting: