**Updates are in green.**
Did you know Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle is available as an audiobook? I had no clue. Of course, I’m all about reading actual print books and such. But audiobooks are pretty sweet when it comes to long drives and bedtime. (Hopefully, not at the same time, unless you’re a passenger. I imagine you wouldn’t fare well if you konked out during the Battle of Pelennor Fields and veered into the path of a giant rig carrying chocolate-covered marshmallow Peeps. Potentially delicious, but likely a complete disaster.) I have a bunch of audiobooks on my iPod, which I use during sleepy time. I plug a line-out cord into the booger and plug the other end into my record player. (Yes… one of those things people used “back in the day” for those funky, plastic, musical Frisbee things.) Then I drift away listening to Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince or Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency. (I happen to think Douglas Adams was a freakishly brilliant man and that Billy Boyd’s voice is rather soothing.)
I guess that’s really the end of my audiobook rant. Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle is one of the first books I can recall reading. It was published around four decades before I was born, but it made me laugh in all the right places and was a joy to read multiple times. (Oh geez… did I just use the phrase “a joy to read” in a serious sentence? I’ve become my 3rd grade librarian!!! ARRGGGGHHH!!!) Here are some cool books I remember reading as a kid. The first herd (yes, as in cows) of books I read have always stayed in my head. (Whoa! That rhymes! You know… sort of.) Go to your local library and check these books out, or click the links below to purchase them!
- Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle
- Seventh Grade Weirdo
- Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day
- Maus
- Matilda
- Freak the Mighty
- Where The Wild Things Are
- Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing
- Tuck Everlasting
- Sammy Carducci’s Guide to Women
I recommend starting with Sammy Carducci’s Guide to Women and Seventh Grade Weirdo, as they’re both very well-written and, rather surprisingly, didn’t register with a lot of my friends when I did my little “favorite kids books” survey. More people should read these books! They’re the kind of books that are fun and easy to read. They aren’t dumbed down, and they’re truly witty stories without being too brain-kabooming for the intended age range. (Nothing ruins a book quite like physics equations and that dreaded “train heading to San Antonio at 60 miles per hour” question.) I’m currently tracking down both books so I can re-read them and relive all the goofy goodness of my childhood. Slighty harder with Sammy Carducci, as the book seems to be out of print. I think Amazon has it, but only from the “Marketplace” which is always a bit dodgy. I’ll probably cave in and buy it eventually. I didn’t get to read it as many times as I would have liked because I never owned it. I was simply borrowing it from my Language Arts teacher, Mrs. Marcum, and I had to give it back. (Don’t steal, boys and girls! You’ll grow antlers, and not the cool kind that are all fuzzy and nubby and double as hat racks.)
Seventh Grade Weirdo is, thankfully, very much in print. Oh, and as I found while writing this entry, the author (Lee Wardlaw) is a super amazing person, which makes everything even more enjoyable. Lee talks and writes in a very strange, very funny way. It’s that kind of Gilmore Girls-y vibe. (Yes, there’s a connection, I swear.) It’s like things are making you laugh before you even get the full effect of all the funny goodness. And then you laugh again when you DO get the full effect. (That’s some powerful juju, eh?) So to recap: If you can track down Sammy Carducci, read it! And definitely read Seventh Grade Weirdo, especially if you’re a weirdo… um… and a seventh-grader.
Non sequitur of this entry: I don’t like when people apply a weird pronunciation to the word envelope.
![[The rats.]](https://wordy.justinthemighty.com/pix/jtmblog-remile.jpg "Remy + Emile")
I really love Remy and Emile. (They’re my rats.) They do all sorts of cute stuff. Well… you know… when they’re not too busy eating and pooping. I placed a wheel in their home, and while they don’t seem to understand that it can be ridden, they do seem to realize that it spins. Remy likes to hurl himself at it and watch the resulting rotation. Every few days, I’ll use an Expo marker to write on the outside of their bachelor pad. It’s fun to watch them react to someone writing random messages on their window to the outside world. When they squeak, I imagine they’re critiquing my work and creating a mental list of ingredients for rat-friendly Windex. They’ll escape, destroy my dry-erase masterpieces, and flee to Canada under the names Mr. Pibb and Mello Yello. (I know that sounds completely bonkers, but rats are rather crafty when it comes to falsifying government documents. They’re total Photoshop wizards.)
While typing this entry, I came to the realization that I have no idea how to end it. And so… The End.
I am honored to have my novel Seventh-Grade Weirdo cited on your Very First blog entry. Wow-worthy. Thanks!
FYI: I remember the Mrs. Piggle Wiggle books, too. They were published about 40 years before I was born, as well, so you know they’re really ancient. But they were the first books I read that made me laugh out loud.
Regards from my cats to Remy and Emile . . .
Lee Wardlaw
Just wanted you to know that Seventh-Grade Weirdo has been brought back into print by popular demand! It’s now available through the Author’s Guilde backinprint.com program. You can find it at amazon.com or at iUniverse.com with a brand new cover! -Lee Wardlaw