Why am I quoted on a Silicon Investor website? And more importantly, why am I always so damn sexy when it happens?

[edited to add: and why do they think I'm a guy?]

If loving the new Basement Jaxx CD is wrong, may I never be right.

[thanks, Laura, for the link.]

Happy Halloween, everybody.

I just found what's going to destroy Jessa at Bookslut: Christian Chick Lit. (Ah, I see she's already posted it.)

This letter just came in:

Pam, I completely forgot to tell you. My friend Liz bought and read your book, and loved it of course, and then memorized two different monologues to use for auditions for her college's theatre program. She did a selection from the Barbie diaries, and a selection from when [edited for spoiler]. Liz ended up getting cast as Bolette in Parade.

So there you go. Call Pam Crazy: The Pamela Ribon Monologues has begun.

Also it's been bugging me since I posted it and went on a meeting: I didn't mean that only rich people are losing their homes. I only meant to say that the fires weren't reaching us here in the city, with our concrete walls and streets. These wildfires are hitting communities set in the mountains and valleys, where there's acres and acres of trees, and small communites (yes, some quite wealthy, even gated, but some are little art towns with old theatres, etc.). I guess I should say, where there were acres and acres of trees.

For those who are local and want to help, the Red Cross is taking donations at the Rose Bowl until 6pm today.

Because I keep getting concerned letters, I want to tell you that we're fine here in Los Angeles. Check here for a map. These fires are in the mountains and forests, where there's dry brush and cabins and very expensive homes.

The most we're having to worry about here is very crappy air. And the good news is storm clouds have rolled in and temperatures have dropped. If you're a praying person, you might want to pray we get lots of rain.

A letter from Allison:

Pam, tell your readers I got on my knees in front of my computer and begged and prayed for them - the most generous people on the Internet - to please help the people of San Diego by giving to the American Red Cross. Looking at the pictures, even after everything that has happened to me and Chris, my heart breaks and my stomach turns. Seriously, in memory of Murphy, and because the loss of one's home and possessions is perhaps the most devastating tragedy an individual can face, we have to rally. I don't know what else to do.

For other donation information, go here.

The coverage on television is non-stop. You smell smoke everywhere. The destruction is beyond imaginable, and it's the most humbling feeling. Everything is on fire. It's truly hard to imagine. They've shut down part of I-5, which is our interstate highway, which means there's no leaving Southern California easily. Now you have to take the 101. What happens if they can't get those fires contained? How do we get out of here?

We've been keeping the windows closed because the air is so dangerous right now, and then I made the stupid decision to clean the bathroom with serious bleach. The fumes forced us to work down the street at a coffee shop, where I heard people cheering for a section of LA County that was burning. "Let those motherfuckers burn. Burn, motherfuckers, burn," I heard them sing. Yes, these times bring out the best in some people, but it also brings out the very worst.

I'm covered in work lately, so I rarely see live television. My latest Tarzan recap is up, which took many more hours than usual, as I watched fire footage between every other scene.

They're showing homes burning on television. The cameras just stay with these huge houses as they fill with flames. I couldn't watch. When Allison and Chris' apartment burned, I downloaded and watched the footage from their local newscasts because I couldn't believe it, I couldn't understand that a place I had gone to over and over again was gone.

These fires are enormous. On NPR they were reporting hundred-foot flames. These are the words we use in ghost stories, in horror movies, in tall tales and legends. This is how we describe mythological wars between mortals and immortals. This isn't what we're supposed to see in our backyards.

I read Pat because he reminds me of my freshman year in college, the good parts of my freshman year in college, and all that nervous, swirly energy that filled that year. Checking my mailbox for letters from a boy back home. Staying up way too late in the common room, gossiping about girls we barely knew. Talking on the cordless phone by the laundry machines because you couldn't keep your eyes off of your clothes. The sound of girls squealing from somewhere down the hall and knowing what they were squealing about. Like Allison, I was in charge of the bulletin board on my hallway freshman year. And like Couch Baron, I was very upset by the death of River Phoenix that year, so much so that stee has teased me about it in the past.

All of this is to say that I'm bummed Freshman Diaries is almost over. I'm surprised at how emotionally attached to the show I got, watching these kids wander through the West Mall, study at the UGL, or hang out on the steps outside 1.108 of the Winship Drama building, where I finished many a Daily Texan crossword puzzle in between rehearsals. And yesterday afternoon I spent some time catching up on the phone with a friend I hadn't seen since that time. She had read Why Girls Are Weird from a bookseller recommendation (Hey, West Palm Beach bookseller who pimped me -- thanks). When she bought the book she thought, "This girl has the same name as Pam!" It was only after she finished and saw the picture that she realized we were the same girl. (Take that, face-haters.)

We had lost touch after freshman year, once I was more involved in theatre and she moved into a sorority house, and I've often thought about her over the years. Turns out this woman has gone on to fascinating and fabulous things, and I was so proud of all she had accomplished.

But the best part was her voice. It sounded exactly the same. I felt like she could still come down the hall and bug me for hot chocolate and tease me for my Ministry poster and ask to borrow my roommate's Ella Fitzgerald CD.

It was all very comforting.

I keep forgetting to mention the nastiest thing that's just down the street from me, scaring me late at night.

At my corner 7-Eleven.

Sushi.

Is there nothing more disturbing than the thought of someone buying a lottery ticket, a container of sushi and a grape Gatorade Ice?

Bleagh.

I would love to launch Call Me Batshit Crazy: The Mariah Carey Monologues.

He gave me one of my first pep talks at the first JournalCon, gave me advice a few months ago, and he continually makes me feel better. Thanks, John.

The Concordian of Concorida College, Moorhead, Minnesota, reviews WGAW.

This entry in Oblivio will stay with me for a while. What the hell would I have done if I met that woman? I'm one of those people who tends not to state the obvious. It took Jeff and me three days to finally admit we were worried about the woman at the yoga clothes store -- she either had a chin implant that went horribly awry or a large growth on the underside of her face. If I was on a semi-blind date, and the person showed up wearing a literal wall, I would probably be too frightened to ask if I was on a hidden camera show. In fact, I'd probably assume that my date was making fun of me somehow.

Long-time reader Heith wrote to me bragging about his new gig at Citizen Robot, a pop culture review site.

Here and here.

My Gilmore Girls recap is up. Journal entry coming soon.