Kjell Johansen
Post #3700 – 20140413
April 13, 2014
I'm listening to Radio Mozart while writing a report (my home email address is given above). Then you came on and mentioned your website. Your voice is so familiar because of all the times I have heard you on Bob Edward\'s talk show (XM Radio) but I never did make the connection to you on Radio Mozart until now. Your voice is the perfect accompaniment to the broadcast.
By the way, for the robot check, what if I were color blind, how would I be expected to know that red blue=purple? Now, about those darn commercials………………….
Daniel replies:
I am told commercials on Radio Mozart are only heard in USA, and (possibly less obnoxious commercials?) in France. If you listen in the rest of the world, it's all good. The day may come when the commercials disappear...it's something to do with the bandwidth supplier. There are a few other all-Mozart internet stations, I have listened to them, and they do not have the variety and superior performances selected by Nicolas Goyet on Radio Mozart. Thanks for being in touch.
Ada
Post #3675 – 20140410
April 10, 2014
Dear Daniel,
My son and I just listened to the podcast episode from last year where you made a few remarks about Internet radio. I suggest you also try out blip.fm, if you haven't yet. It is somewhat of a cross between Twitter and Internet radio. I just checked, and the only advertisements are visual ones, rather than audio that interrupts the music.
Daniel replies:
A cross between Twitter and internet radio. I am holding out for a cross between internet radio and a cheese danish.
Brad Smith
Post #3673 – 20140404
April 4, 2014
Many years ago, a friend of mine lent me 5 Novels when I was having a sad time in my life. I enjoyed the stories a lot, and they really helped as I was getting myself turned back around. They also turned me on to the art of chili making, which subsequently became a significant part of my life!
Recently I came across a copy of Lizard Music, and since I have had a lifelong obsession with lizards, I am very excited to read this book!
Thanks for your writings.
Daniel replies:
Writing a book, I have to say I'm not giving a thought to it being of any use to anyone, or helping anyone feel better. I'm actually having fun putting the thing together, much as someone would have fun cooking or building a birdhouse. Then, years later, someone tells me something I wrote gave them some relief when they were sad, and they learned about something important, like chili-making. Pretty nice.
Daniel
Post #3674 – 20140404
April 4, 2014
Dear Mr. Pinkwater,
I am currently faced with a choosing between three school for college next year. One is wonderful but very far away. One I am very happy to have been weird enough to get into. Also far away and wonderful. One is the local state university. Weird but a little too close. How did you decide which college to attend?
Young and rebelliously,
Daniel
Daniel replies:
Why am I all of a sudden a college counselor? OK, I will tell you--basically I had two choices, the local state university, and a college that specialized in creative and arty stuff, and was just coming to the end of a golden period. Naturally I went to that one. (Institutions can change, and while I had a great experience there, by the time I graduated it had become a different school, which might not have suited me as well.) Your concerns, expressed in your post appear to be weirdness, and geography, so you would probably not want to do what I would very likely do if I were applying to college today--spend 2 years at a local junior or community college, saving money, getting requirements out of the way, building a superior record, and then transfer to a university I might not have considered, possibly to study something I might not have known about or thought of when I started. I think higher education in this country needs reform--costs are ridiculous and often the student does not get anything like value for money. If by, ""very far away,"" you mean a college someplace like New Zealand, where you'd get a better educational deal, that might be a cool choice.
Robin
Post #3671 – 20140329
March 29, 2014
Hello Daniel!
I just discovered your prologue for your new book on Twitter (found out on your website so I looked). I haven't read "Lizard Magic" and "Bushman Lives!" yet and now would like to, inspired by your twitter tidbits. I'm going to contact my library here in Boca and see if they can order them from another library (they do that) and their only copy of "Lizard Magic" is damaged and being repaired.
I want to tell you how much I love your books, my favorite is Beautiful Yetta. I love all the Jewish references in general, all seem to pertain to food mainly, i.e. knishes and kugels. Love that!
My 9yo son loved reading the "Hoboken Chicken Emergency."
The next books my son and I will read of yours are "Guys from space" and "wempires."
If you do publish the "Skolnik Island Beach Club" please make an appearance here in Boca Raton, FL. My son and I would love to meet you.
Daniel replies:
Sometimes I envy readers discovering books of mine. (I'm my favorite writer, is that weird?) If you want to do it right, (and you don't have to), read The Neddiad first, then, The Yggyssey, then Adventures of a Cat Whiskered Girl, and then Bushman Lives! You can read Lizard Music any time. Thanks for the enthusiastic remarks.
Robin
Post #3661 – 20140323
March 23, 2014
My son is graduating from high school in a few months. He is in the throes of deciding which college to attend. We are curious how you decided on the college you attended.
Best wishes,
Robin
Daniel replies:
I was already sure what sort of person I hoped to be, and what style of living appealed to me. In my case that meant artistic, non-mainstream, beatnik-ish, bohemian. I didn't have a clear idea of what in particular I hoped to learn or do, so I could not choose a college that was strong in a particular department or area. All I knew was that I wanted to be a bearded weirdo, and pursue subjects like Zen Buddhism, clay modeling and obscure poets. I heard about a college where that would not describe the interests of a few people on the fringe, but the whole place. So I applied there. It turned out to be the right college for me. If I had gone to the state university, my only other choice, I would have wasted my time rebelling against the status quo--at the college I went to there was nothing to rebel against. I also applied to a big fancy famous eastern university--they were kind of intrigued, had me back for interviews three times, and finally told me, """"Sorry, you're just too weird a kid for us."""" If I were applying to college today, I am certain I would choose a local two-year junior or community college to save expense and get required courses out of the way, and transfer to a four-year college when I knew more about what I wanted to study.
Jo
Post #3662 – 20140323
March 23, 2014
Thanks for sharing the prologue to Skolnik Island Beach Club on Twitter! Do you have the whole book written, or just that bit?
Daniel replies:
What I posted on @danielpinkwater was written as I went along. I have some things in mind for the rest of the book. I'd prefer it to be published as a conventional book, and there is some chance that may happen--in that case I'd rewrite the prologue in a less twitteroid manner. If it is not to be published in book form I might twitter more of it, even further modified to work as tweets.
Brad Sondahl
Post #3652 – 20140315
March 15, 2014
Did you read comic books as a child, and if so, which are memorable? I'm a bit younger than you, but grew up reading Little Lulu and Tubby and Scrooge McDuck, which probably accounts for my not wanting a spandex costume. Lulu and Tubby had great comic plots set in the nameless city by the beach with summer camps, most of which were foreign to me living in South Dakota.
Daniel replies:
I remember Lulu and identified with Tubby. A favorite, which I only saw a few times was the Pie Face Prince of old Pretzelburg. You can find some reprints online.
Kevin Cheek
Post #3653 – 20140315
March 15, 2014
I cannot tell you how much I am enjoying reading your Twittercast (for lack of a better word) of The Skolnick Island Beach Club, but I will attempt to anyway: I am enjoying it very much! Thank you. You now have me completely hooked. Please continue.
Daniel replies:
I just read in the paper that a number of better known writers propose to post stories via twitter. I perceived that as usual, while actually the innovator, I would be regarded as a copier, so I halted my work of twitterature. @danielpinkwater has his pride.
Audrey Muzingo
Post #3655 – 20140315
March 15, 2014
My daughter Fauna and I have been alone since she was a baby, so we've entertained ourselves reading books aloud since she was 2. We've read some of yours but 'Adventures of a Cat-Whiskered Girl' was our first real novel, and the first she chose to take on again, without me, SNIFF! She turned 8 in January and has nearly finished her second reading of it. She also chose it as her Reading Fair submission for second grade. I wish I could upload a photo here. If you can get there, here's a link to a collage of it on my Facebook page:
www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10202767188254595&set=a.1045135102415.9401.1646767354&type=1&theater
Anyway, just wanted to thank you for such wonderful storytelling. I can't wait to read more of your books with her as she grows up.
Sincerely, Audrey Muzingo
Little Rock, AR
Daniel replies:
I am so happy to have Fauna as a reader!
Franz Helm
Post #3651 – 20140312
March 12, 2014
Lizard Music carries on in this taco bus as gecko. bit.ly/JYA6cj
Daniel replies:
I trust they do not offer gecko tacos.
Kayla
Post #3644 – 20140308
March 8, 2014
My most favorite childhood book was Irving and Muktuk – Two Bad Bears. Now, it's the inspiration for a school project. If it's not too much to ask, can you please tell me who/what inspired this book?
Thanks!
Daniel replies:
Two Bad Bears, the first of the Irving and Muktuk series was inspired by the Larry series, (Young Larry, At the Hotel Larry, Bongo Larry, etc.). Larry is such a good polar bear, and is always helpful, saves people from drowning, is polite, has never eaten a person. But, we thought, possibly not all bears are as good as Larry. So we came up with Irving and Muktuk, who are fairly bad. They lie, cheat and steal, (but also have never eaten a person...so they say).
Bucky
Post #3646 – 20140308
March 8, 2014
Dear Mr. Pinkwater;
I put keyboard to screen in search of an answer that has troubled my sleep for many years?
Have you ever owned a red pick, an old FORD I think. When I ask this I am not concerned with the entire sum of your days but rather in the last 10 years. I will explain
I have been an avid follower of your writings for many years, through my ex wife who was and is a children's librarian as well as a cadre of friends who introduced me to your prose in the science fiction community. All of your works I have loved a lot, but your works about the Hudson River Valley touched a part of me I didn't know existed until that moment. I am a native Californian and thus unacquainted with this thing called "seasons".
That is until I became involved with a woman long distance over the internet who lived in Kerhonksen and whom I was know to visit on occasion. On one such occasion I was making my way to her house from Stewart Newberg in a rental cal into whose radio I had plugged my iPhone and, which at the moment in question, I was listening to "Chicago Days, Hoboken Nights". I listen to your works a lot when I drive and actually time some trips and rest stops by the length of them. Also, being as I was where I was I figured it was what all the locals did.
I was pulled up to a stop light in New Paltz when it happens, a flash of oxidized red in the sunlight. It was a truck. Behind the wheel was a large man. His head was shaven. He had familiar round spectacles. The jacket he was wearing was similar to one I had seen on a dust jacket. He had a gentleman's figure. Was it he, er you? My neck snapped around with a speed that throated to dislocate my skull but the vision was gone from view behind a Stewarts.
Now I know that you live in the Hudson river Valley but I am ignorant of where. This could be like a message from a relative in another country who hears of an earthquake in Oklahoma and ask if you are OK in Los Angeles. Or maybe not. The chance of it being yo I expect are rather slim, but if it wasn't consider this a warning. There is someone in that area who either looks so much like you as top fool a rapid fan or there is someone manufacturing a clone army of Pinkwaters to undertake who know what nefarious deed.
Thank you for your time, your words, your humor and please keep writing
Your Pal
Bucky
Daniel replies:
There are a great many people in the vicinity of New Paltz, especially in the mountains nearby, who look exactly like me. I myself never go there. Draw your own conclusions. A pickup truck? What do you take me for?
J Mark Hamlow
Post #3645 – 20140308
March 8, 2014
Boing Boing says Daniel Pinkwater is tweeting a Bushman Lives! sequel because his publisher won't offer an advance contract on it. I think he should launch an all-out Kickstarter campaign to fund the writing of "I Snarked with a Zombie", "Escape to Zwerg Mountain" and the Bushman sequel. I mean seriously, I'm dyin' here!
Daniel replies:
Boing Boing says that. Not me, I do not say that. Maybe I am tweeting a novel @danielpinkwater . I have no comment. I don't think kickstarter is for me for various reasons.
