I am currently watching a child in Park Slope cry over his Boggle board, while his mother stares into her laptop. Presumably, she’s searching for L. Ron Hubbard. The boy, as far as I can tell, is looking for someone to play Boggle and he’s surrounded by austere and humorless adults, all of them looking into laptops with similar degrees of intensity. (And just as I was preparing to engage the kid, he ran outside, presumably because he’ll have a better response from various automobiles crawling up and down 7th Avenue. Park Slope mothers. While not what a baser life form might call MILF material, you gotta love ’em.)

Don’t ask what I’m doing in Park Slope right now. I only hope the kid’s interest in words receives greater attention.

A roundup is forthcoming. But if you are a blogger at BEA, please email me your contact information. I’m assembling a master cell phone list. So let me know and I’ll get you on the list. (Incidentally, the email is ed AT edrants.com.)

More to come. Thanks to all who were able to attend last minute’s soiree.

My review of Richard Flanagan’s The Unknown Terrorist appears in today’s Philly Inquirer.

Ladies and gentlemen. I finally met Howard Junker. My last night in San Francisco. Two men. Pabst Blue Ribbon. It doesn’t get any sillier than that.

I am here to tell you that Mr. Junker imbibed Pabst Blue Ribbon with me. How many editors of literary journals would drink PBR? Would Wendy Lesser drink PBR? Or David Remnick? No! But Howard Junker did!

The only reason I was imbibing the stuff was because I am trying to acclimatize to Manhattan cocktail prices. Although it would appear that certain establishments in San Francisco are charging equally ridiculous prices. So perhaps I can return to better ales.

There will be more later. A lengthy post on leaving San Francisco. Another post, if I can find the time, on Richard Cheese and the remarkably dim audience at the Red Devil Lounge. But I suspect that BEA will trump all of this. Bear with me. I am now in transition!