Author Event Summary - Myra McEntire; Also, the aPAULcalypse at ApPAULbee's

Saturday ushered forth another fantastic author event, this time Myra McEntire, solo.  Shalena from Writer Quirk and I headed to the Edmondson Pike Library in Nashville which, let me just say, has a really awesome librarian going to bat for YA literature.  We really need more like her around here.  Thanks, Angela, for coordinating such a fun event!  I would so attend another event at your library in a heartbeat.

Shalena and I were about 10 minutes late thanks to our silly bookstores who can't seem to stock books by local authors.  What's up with that!?  When we did finally arrive, it was to find everyone seated in a circle.

We were greeted (which was a relief since we WERE so very late).  What ensued was one of the most relaxed, FUN author events I've had the pleasure to attend.  We talked about everything: Myra's books (obviously); other books we read; TV; movies; our mounting frustration with the local bookstores and their overall ignorance of just how well YA is selling, which, in turn, leads to difficulty in getting more YA author events in place; and so much more.  It felt more like sitting around while chatting with friends, which was a blast!  I absolutely loved it.

After the talk portion of the event was finished, people broke up into smaller groups to chat, get their books signed, and get to know each other in general.  We bloggers generally mingled and traded books.  Fun was had by all.  Myra brought cupcakes with sea creature decorations, which prompted Lauren from The Housework Can Wait to decide that a rumor should be started stating that Myra's next book will be about mermaids.  Hee!  I got my book signed, chatted with Myra for a couple of minutes about a blog event, and lined up with some of the ladies for a group pic. 

Myra had her family with her, so she had to leave after 2 hours, but I can tell you that that 2 hours was such a great time.

From here on out we delve into what shall be known here as "The Epic of Paul."  Fair warning: this could get long.

After the meeting room cleared out, Shannon from Stalking the Bookshelves, Lauren, Shalena, and I decided to pile into my car and go out for an impromptu blogger lunch.  We found ourselves at an Applebee's in the neighborhood where, as it turns out, we were to be met with pure comedy gold.  His name was Paul.  What can I say about Paul?  Lauren says it best in her post (HERE), where she has even composed a sonnet about our perpetually absent waiter, but I will do my best to capture his essence.

First off, we were there anywhere from 20 to 30 minutes before we even met our waiter.  When the elusive Paul finally showed up at our table, he acted surprised to see us.  This could be the first clue that he might have been high as a kite.  It's all conjecture, but Paul was certainly giving us cause to wonder!  Luckily, by the time he came to ask us what we would like to drink, we had also figured out what we wanted to eat, so we placed that order, as well.  Otherwise, we might still be sitting in that Applebee's, waiting for him to bring us food.  As it was, another waiter brought us our food (complete with fun nicknames for our plates!  Why couldn't we have had that waiter?).  We tucked into our food with enough conversation to keep us distracted from the bad service.

What happened next was just... odd.  All of a sudden, a refill of my drink was placed before me.  It came out of nowhere.  Also unexpected: NO ONE ELSE WAS GIVEN A REFILL.  We waited.  And we waited.  And we waited some more.  It took probably another 30 minutes for Shalena, Shannon, and Lauren to receive refills.  In that time period, we watched as Paul delivered an appetizer platter to the table next to us.  It was, of course, the wrong table.  Of course!  Now we were really intrigued by our server's bizarre behavior.  We began to observe his actions.  We learned these four things:

  

1. He only had one facial expression.  It somewhat resembled this:

Unlike these villagers, Paul didn't get better. (pic found HERE)

2. He would disappear for 30 minutes at a time, which was really bad when refills were needed.

Forget Neptune.  I'm convinced Paul was on Pluto. (Pic found HERE)

3. He would start walking toward our end of the restaurant, only to do an abrupt about-face and walk in the opposite direction.  We never did figure out what he was doing.

A poorly-executed audition for the Ministry, perhaps? (pic found HERE)

4. He will keep your change.  All $0.08 of it, as Lauren found out.  Somehow, though, he missed the dime lying on the floor.  It was left on the table for him.

To say that the service was bad is an understatement.  A hilarious one, but an understatement, all the same.  I don't know how we began, but we started making some of the most awful puns in the history of pun-making.  They so suited the situation, though.  My take on it: we survived the aPAULcalypse at ApPAULbee's.  Shalena said we had apPAULing service.  Lauren says this is why he received such a PAULtry tip.  Shannon later wished us PAULitely goodnight after we rehashed the evening on Twitter.

Paul will forever live in infamy and is now Lauren's muse.  Her first poem, "Ode to Paul," was a thing of beauty and her second one, "Longing for Paul," was also a success.  We now have a poet in our midsts!  We owe Lauren's new-found calling in life to Myra, for she was the one to bring us all together for this momentous day!  Thanks to Myra, all the ladies that attended today's event, Shalena, Shannon, Lauren, and, of course, Paul, I laughed more that day that I had in weeks.  Thank you all so much for making my week after surgery such a bright spot.  I wouldn't have missed it for the world.