STAB Antonio: Day 3

The Rickettes had their first and last full day in San Antonio. Today was the main event! The Teen Participation section of the Best Books for Young Adults committee took place in a room filled with about 200 people. Teens from all over the country were there, coming to grand total of 73. Only 10 of the 73 represented public libraries. I can safely say, without a trace of hyperbole, that the Rickettes were the best prepared, most eloquent, and snazziest dressed of all of the teens. A number of BBYA Committee members came up to me afterwards and commented on what a great job they did. I couldn't have been more proud of them! Take a look out the pictures from today's activites at:
http://homepage.mac.com/hrunting/PhotoAlbum13.html

Here is what our group had to say:

San Antonio Day #2

Hello again! You have no idea how long this blog took us to actually write, because every other sentence Rick starts talking and we’re like, “HELLOOO we need to finish our BLOG!!!!!” So Ricko has been regaling us with tales of his college days. He had research book piles as tall as HIM in his room. Talk about wild. He studied about death in the middle ages. Whoo-hoo.
Another FANTASTIC day in San Antonio. WE! GOT! SO! MUCH! SWAG! There were books, and pencils and books and candy and movie trailers and books and comics (excuse me graphic novels) and bags and books and books and books and books and books and books and books and some people were selling chairs. They weren’t free, so we didn’t get any… Molly really wanted one… it would have been so easy to carry them back on the plane!!
Let’s start from the beginning!!

1. Woke up!
2. Nina took a shower. The other three did not, which made Alene and Nina freak out about how they can function without showers in the morning. The two clean (OCD positive) and the three grimy (laid back) ones went off to the coffee shop next to our hotel.
3. The coffee shop. Supposedly, they served “Seattle’s Best Coffee.” However, everyone knows that Seattle’s Best Coffee is really Starbucks, which makes their title not only pretentious, but wrong. Anyway, it was a Seattle’s Best Coffee. We admit it: we are spoiled. We are Seattle girls all the way, and we have standards for our coffee. So first, we tried to order breakfast, and they were out of, like everything. Their cupcakes were “too hard” so they wouldn’t let Molly have one. They didn’t have yogurt. Then Nina tried to order a latte, and the woman was like, “No, we can’t do that.” Like hello can’t you just pour milk and coffee into a cup? And so Nina did. By herself. There are no standards for service here. And then Michelle ordered an iced latte. An “iced” latte. Brewed coffee with 3 pieces of ice in it. What in the….?! So that turned into lukewarm diluted coffee. NO. This is unacceptable. I just want some coffee, darnit. (quote Michelle).
4. Walked to the convention center. See the “WE-GOT-SO-MUCH-SWAG” part. Books, etc, and this FABULOUS lady who has tall and red hair and she’s fabulous. This woman’s name is ANGIE and Nina wants to be her, and she is absolutely the coolest woman IN THE WORLD. This is what she did. She took us around to all of the publishers, and said magic words, like, “these teens review books and tell the library which ones to buy.” People were THROWING books at us. THEY asked US what kind of books WE like to read. So Molly got all the sci-fi ones, and Nina got all the pink girly ones, and Angie was just like, on to the next publisher!!! We actually love her. ACTUALLY. THANK YOU ANGIE!!! We love you. Out bags were breaking with the weight, and it was like, Christmas on steroids. With free books. AHHHH! AMAZING!!
5. More books.
6. More SWAG.
7. More books.
8. More euphoria.
9. Some boring chairs.
10. Then we had a fantastic Italian lunch on the River Walk. Fabulous. We listened to an eclectic Mariachi band and started freaking out about the BBYA book talk.
11. We went back to the Convention Center for the Teen BBYA Participation Conference. Yay, exciting! No, really, it was. It was the whole point of our trip. Lots of publishers. Lots of local teens. Too many middle schoolers.
12. The room was “ginormous” according to our fearless Ricko Baggins. About the size of a short gym, it was filled with chairs (only about 5/6 full – guess we’re not the superstars we thought we were.) We were easily the oldest ones there – middle schoolers galore. This disturbed us. We sat down and made friends with people around us who had read only 3 books each. We almost died right there in our chairs. 3 books?!?! I guess they were just there for kicks or something. There were many different kinds of people there that irritated us. There were the young middle schoolers that were like, “This book was too old for me.” Yeah, no, really?? Then there were the kids who got up every single time, and said, “I didn’t like this book. It was awful. It was the worst book I ever read.” There was this kid who got up every single time and did that and Nina said, “If this guy likes the next book he talks about, I’m going to die from shock.” And then Nina did, because he actually did like one book. One.
Then there were the waste-of-time kids, who would get up and say something like this:
“I read ____. I kind of liked it. I mean, it was okay. Well, the part I liked was blah blah blah blah blah. And that was good. But then there were times when it was like blah blah blah blah blah. So I really don’t know how I feel about the book. I mean, it was okay. I don’t know if it should be nominated. Well, maybe it should. Well, I don’t know. I don’t know if I liked it or not.”

HELLO, WASTE ALL OUR TIME, WHY. DON’T. YOU.

Then there were kids who had note cards that quoted every single thing and dragged on FOREVER. There were also kids who were totally unprepared who said, “I liked this book. It was really good. Yeah.” And then they sat down.
THEN there were the alternate, I-am-so-above-the-masses kids who were like, “Harry Potter is so dull and boring. I don’t read them. There’s so lame. And the sixth one is the worst of all. I am too good for Harry Potter. I am so original. I read better books.” Like, why don’t you just go out, and walk around some, and GET A LIFE?! And while we’re at it, why don’t we add a big tall glass of YOU’RE NOT THAT COOL?!?!?
There was also one short kid who got up every single time Nina did, and got in front of her every single time, and talked to her. He was like, talking to her, like, “hey, how’s it going?” He asked her what time it was, and Rick wanted to go up and say, “What are your intentions towards my volunteer???” and “if you get any closer I will poke your eyes out.” Stuff only Rick can say.

Books We Talked About:
Nina: Looking for Alaska, (heart!) Orpheus Obsession, (love!) and Prep (reamed that into the ground. With a metaphor!)
Michelle: Peeps, Talk, Where I Want to Be, Kipling’s Choice, and Boy Proof – all positive.
Jackie: Cry of the Icemark, Gill’s All-Fright Diner, Poison, and Phoenix Dance – all positive
Molly: Superman, Flight, and King of the Pygmies –all positive

Also: the word of the day was poignant, which Nina used in her speech about Looking for Alaska. She also used the word “Touching” (ew – sorry!) but redeemed herself by using poignant.
Molly talked about two graphic novels which were amazing even though she is just starting to like them. Our favorite quote from her was “definitive and bold artistry.” We pet her a lot because she is so lovable.
Michelle wins the “Best Italian” award because of her use of hand gestures while talking about books. It was pretty sweet.
Jackie had a lot of passion while talking about her books and that’s the way it should be. (See annoying kid type number 3 for how not to be when talking about books.)

Our Rules for Talking About Books:
- Be passionate. Don’t talk about a book you don’t care about.
- If you don’t like a book, give reasons. Don’t be lame.
- Keep it short and sweet. If people in the audience look like they are done listening, you’re done talking.
- Don’t dis Harry Potter. We know you’re lying when you say you don’t like it.
- Don’t get up just because a girl you want to hit on is getting up too, or in the words of Rick, “Don’t use book discussions to mack on chicks.”
- Don’t rattle your bags when Michelle is talking. We can’t hear. When we can’t hear, we get angry and will shoot you the death glare. It kills. Whatever is in your bag that you desperately need, it’s not as important as what Michelle is saying, ever. Also, do you really want to die?
- Don’t go up to the microphone and say, “I read this book and this book and this book. I want to talk about every single book.”
-Be positive! J
And last but not least:
“Poignant.”


After we got out of the talk, we were all standing around the lobby when Nina gets a call on her cell from one of her friends telling her that he fell off his skis and knocked half his teeth out.

So anyway.

We went back to Angie’s hotel and got all our SWAG, and toted it back to our hotel, for about a half a mile. It was excruciating. We really wanted Thurston the Bell Captain to help us, but we couldn’t find him in the streets of San Antonio. Why wasn’t he there?? Since we didn’t have him, Michelle dropped all her SWAG and Alene had to save her from being squished for the sake of “Being Chloe.”

Ricko Baggins got us invited to this fancy shmancy reception thing (NOT for a wedding. Molly sorta thought that, but she was wrong.) “Harcourt Children’s Books: A Year in Art Show.” The pictures were really morbid actually (mice burning?? What type of kids like these???) and then there were some multi-cultural dinosaurs on a train that would’ve squished the cars. It prompted a very interesting debate about interspecies marriage between dinosaurs, and what the child of a T-rex and Triceratops would look like. Short stubby arms and horns. (sorta like rick!)

After WAY too many mini-chicken-quesadillas, and some spectacular Sprite, we headed back to the hotel, where we are now chilling, stuffing our faces with Pringles and chocolate mints, and listening to Rick pour out his heart about his life story and his job, and library school, and his first girlfriend. We listened like the good STABBBYA groupies we are. Now Rick wants to go swimming because we’re bugging him.

Quotes from the Day:

“And then, I was like, the Library Lad!” -Rick
“I know what Bundling Boards are! * weird look *” –Alene
“AHHHHHHH!!!” –Nina, after being given the advance copy of Sarah Dessen’s new book
and also, when she had a Marilyn Monroe moment walking over a grate on the street of San Antonio.
“Yo, fo schiz!” – Molly
“I would have asked for my money back, but I didn’t want to be that kind of person.” – Michelle, after being given her pathetic excuse for an iced coffee
“I didn’t just like it just because it wasn’t another coming of age story.” –Jackie

By the way, Rick found a rat in his room today. Way to go, Gunter.


I’M REALLY SHORT!1 I’M REALLY COOL!
I’M THE * doot doot * LIBRARY LAD!!!
I’VE GOT HUGE SHINS! SHIN SHIN SHINS!
HEY! TAKE YOUR HANDS OFF MY SHINS!
I’M THE * doot doot * LIBRARY LAD!
LIBRARY LAAAAAAAD!!! LIBRARY LAAADD……!!

We have to go now, because Alene says we have to go to bed, and Rick says “We’re killing him.” Good night!!! THANK YOU FRIENDS!!! We’re having the best time. We will continue to have a good time. And we won’t go back to that coffee shop.

BYE!!!!