Hrm

I discovered yesterday, courtesy of a link on a NYTimes webpage, that Pacific University now has a low-residency MFA program. This is the first of it's kind in the Northwest, and, as far as I know, only the second on the West coast (the other being at Antioch College in Los Angeles.)

Last year I was vigorously searching for a low-res MFA program to attend, and I seriously considered a couple, both on the East coast. But I knew that we were going to try to have a baby, and the thought of traveling to Maine or Vermont in January for residencies was seriously unappealing. I also was a bit daunted by the price tags -- which I now seem to reall as having been between $18,000 - $24,000 per year, but I'm just pulling that off the top of my head so I may be wrong.

I'm not really prepared to apply for this program in order to attend the June residency, but I'm going to be thinking about it for next January.

I'm hoping they get some kick-ass West coast authors (Dave Eggers, anyone?) for this program. There's a heck of a lot of talent here.

(no subject)

This has me very upset.

I returned a book to Central Library on Saturday. Actually, I returned two: "At the Bottom of the Garden," by Diane Purkiss, and "Kingdoms of Elfin," by Sylvia Townsend Warner. They're both books about fairies and fairy tales, books that I checked out many months ago and then didn't read much. I decided to return them with a bit of reluctance -- I thought (as I often do) "I'll probably have time to get to them soon." But they were collecting dust, and God knows I have enough dust collectors in this house, so I took them back. Unfortunately, only "At the Bottom of the Garden" was marked returned by the library. I called to let them know I had also returned "Kingdoms of Elfin," and now when you search for it it's listed as "Claimed Returned." How is it I can return two books at the same instant and in the same place, and one gets credited and one gets lost? If I had suspected it would get lost, I would have just kept it. Now I'm afraid to return any more books, unless I hand them to the librarian.

It's so wrong for books to get lost. I feel a bit sad about it.