The item on LoHud today about MLB’s initiative in fighting breast cancer (and CC’s participation in it) was excellent timing for a blog post of my own. Why? Because tonight I took part in an author panel to raise money for our local chapter of Planned Parenthood. The panel was called “Love, Laughs & Life As We See It,” and it was held at a gorgeous private house in the hills of Santa Barbara. Not a tough gig at all. Here I am with my fellow authors and our moderator sipping Cosmos. (Yeah, I’m the one who stupidly forgot to take off her shades.)

At the far left is Starshine Roshell. (That’s really her first name; her dad was an actor in the show “Hair” and named her after the song “Good Morning Starshine.”) She writes an extremely popular column for the Santa Barbara Independent and has collected the best of the columns in a new book. She’s also writing a TV pilot for CBS based on her life as a wife, mother and columnist.

Next to her in the pic is Jenna McCarthy. A former “shock jock” on the radio here in town, Jenna writes for tons of national magazines and is the author of hilarious books on marriage and parenting.

At the far right is Kate Schwab, who used to be head of marketing for Borders in SoCal but now has her own literary PR business. She was a terrific moderator, firing all sorts of interesting questions at us about the craft of writing. 

We also took questions from the guests, who had paid actual money to come and hear us speak. One of them approached me as the evening was winding down and said, “It’s such a pleasure to meet another female baseball fan.”

I smiled. “So you love baseball too?”

“Since I was a little girl,” she said. “My friends think I’m really strange to love baseball – it’s slow and boring to them – but I’d rather watch the Dodgers than do almost anything else.”

So…even at a fundraiser…on an off day for the Yankees…when I least expected to be talking about baseball…there was another she-fan. Perfect.

P.S. Here’s the nightly reminder about the Cooperstown Cookie Contest. Last chance to enter is April 11th at the stroke of midnight!