Have you ever had a clash of taste or expectations when it came to discussing the books you love with the one you love? It seems that you are not alone. Here’s a link to a fabulous essay on the topic, written by Rachel Donadio and published in Sunday’s NY Times Book Review, whose wonderful title I borrowed for this post.

Last night I was absolutely exhausted, and by way of response to my near-stupor wolfed down enough dinner for two in front of the TV, where I promptly fell asleep soon afterwards, napkin sadly still in place on my lap. The reason for my tiredness – mental, sadly, rather than physical – was the first face-to-face interview for my book, The Young Widow’s Book of Home Improvement, which is in “good bookstores everywhere” on Monday 7 April.

The interview lasted for more than one hour, which is a long time to talk about yourself – even for someone who’s written a memoir. (And writes a blog, come to think of it.) It’s tough to have to reflect on questions such as:

What’s your life like now? Is it hard adjusting to “normal” life by comparison? How did you cope? How did you keep going? Is there anything you would have done differently, looking back? Was it hard writing about what happened? How did I decide what to include and what to leave out? Have you dated anyone since John died? What would John think of the book?

I rang my mum to tell her about the interview. “I can imagine it’s hard to rave on about yourself,” she sympathised. “I would have done a better job of that. You should have got them to talk to me instead.”

Regular readers will notice that I now have a spiffy new homepage with my picture on it, plus a few pages in addition to this blog. Concluding it was time to get a bit more professional in my virtual home, the website will function as a one-stop shop for anyone remotely interested in who I am and what I’m up to. (The stuff I’m willing to disclose publicly, anyway.) I even had some head shots taken while in New York a few weeks ago and to my surprise quite a few turned out OK, thanks to my photographer friend Peter McCarthy. So next week this page will feature a “skin” consistent with the rest of the site; my love affair with bridges will continue, as ever, but will no longer be reflected so literally here.

I was amazed to learn that there were more than 3,000 unique visitors to this site in February, which I’ve put down to advance publicity for the book (its own website will go live soon) … and possibly a surfeit of leisure time. According to Technorati, which monitors the blogosphere, this number (miniscule by blogosphere standards but very encouraging in the small world of the first-time author), launched my blog into the stratosphere of – wait for it – the world’s top 3 million blogs! I’ll try not to let it go to my head.

One of my favourite things about being in New York is the range of theatrical experiences at your fingertips. Whether it’s a man in gothic get-up, face painted white for no apparent reason, strolling purposefully down Lafayette as if he were heading to a business meeting, or a fully ticketed performance in a traditional theatre space, there’s a lot of drama available in this city.

Aside from the daily smorgasbord of self-dramatisations I can observe on the street for free, I have paid to see three excellent, if disturbing, shows. One was a production of Harold Pinter’s The Homecoming, a production marking the 40th anniversary of the play’s Broadway debut. A visceral and savage play, in which the excellent acting and masterful use of language ultimately cannot – for me, anyway - disguise the bitter taste of Pinter’s hatred of women. Another was Conversations in Tusculum, a new play by Richard Nelson set in a bourgois enclave outside Rome (that era’s Hamptons, if you will), which charts the sad decline of empire and the plot to kill Caesar, with parallels to present-day politics that are obvious without being cliche. (So exciting to see Aidan Quinn, David Straithairn and Brian Dennehy in full spittle from my front row seat.) The third, Betrayed, was based on a New Yorker article by George Packer about Iraqi translators working for the US inside the Green Zone, and about how they were, in various ways, hung out to dry by the administration they were risking their lives for, just by turning up to work each day. Read more about the origins for the article and its theatrical adaptation here.

The next day I balanced my dose of politically charged drama with a new pair of shoes, and, while grateful for the opportunity to see these important works, wondered if they can ever do more than preach to the converted.