all things being equal, today is the first day of spring.

so like last august i sent off for these free prizes that were offered as part of a promotion for the book the magicians by lev grossman. i was all like wooowooo free prizes! and then they didn't show up.

so i emailed to check on it, and the pub coordinator was like, "oh yeah i'll get right on that sorry!" and so i waited again and then nothing and then emailed and got no reply and no prizes and kept emailing and then after a while i started emailing "hello? is anyone there?" type of emails and then suddenly a few days ago i received another "oh yeah i'll get right on that sorry!" and then yesterday i received a package containing the promotional item which is these buttons that i took a couple pics of for you - 1 above & 1 below. they are buttons like the kind that you pin on your jansport but they represent buttons like you secure your fly with. buttons apparently play a part in the book.

also in the package was... the actual book!

the. actual. hardback. book.

and it's got those rough-edged untrimmed pages that are the ultimate cool and so i am opening it up & looking and all, like totally smelling the paper which is probably TMI but too bad. and there on the title page - is mr grossman's signature! omg! a signed copy!

of course, his signature looks like that drawing in the little prince of that snake that ate the boy or the hat or whatever that drawing is, and i don't have a veri-sign subscription so i cannot know for sure, but i am just going to accept this on faith that it's mr grossman's siggy and say that the moral of this story is that if you pester a pub coordinator you will get something great.