Sunday
11 A.M.–noon Home ESPN.com, NFL matchups
3–3:10 Booth Theater Playbill, The Pillowman, 12 pages
8–8:20 Friend’s apartment theredmist.blogspot.com, read friend’s daily blog entry
8:30-8:45 New York Daily News, Emmy nominations, 5 pages

(Photo: Donald Bowers)

The Globalist
Nicole Aragi, literary agent, 43

Monday
5:45–5:47 A.M. Desk at home Newyorktimes.com, “Too Soon to Tell” op-ed—“I don’t normally get up this early, but all the foreign publishers were in town that month.”
6–6:01 Timesonline.co.uk, “Emmy Hope for Briton Shot in Gaza”—“I’m half-English, half-Lebanese, so I always read the English papers.”
6:01–6:04 Dailystar.com.lb, “Lahoud Is Being Isolated by His Own Illusions of Grandeur,” “Sampling Lebanon’s Growing Wine Industry”
6:05–6:10 Guardian.co.uk, travel info on Shanghai, “Jubilant Palestinians Enter Gaza Settlements,” “Sorry Mr. President, Katrina Is Not 9/11,” “Tax Avoidance ‘Keeps Developing World Poor’ ”
6:10–6:13 Independent.co.uk, “UN Fears an Unhappy Birthday As Rows Threaten Summit,” “Extreme Organic,” “Belgian Priest Denies Inciting Rwanda Killings”
6:15–6:16 Sfgate.com, “Understanding Writers, Down to the Letter. How Do Authors Think?”
6:30–7:15 E-mail
7:15–8:15 Sofa eating breakfast Three chapters of manuscript by Nathan Englander—“I normally read 2-3 manuscripts a week.”
8:30–8:55 Kitchen table Revised draft of Farrar, Straus & Giroux book contract for Amin Maalouf, 10 pages
9:01–11 Desk E-mail
12:20–12:30 P.M. Le Zie Chapter of manuscript by Nathan Englander— “I arrived early for lunch.”
2:30–4:30 Desk E-mail
9–9:30 E-mail
10–10:15 In bed The New Yorker, “An Ex-Mas Feast,” by Uwen Akpan, 11 pages
10:20–10:50 The Brief and Frightening Reign of Phil, by George Saunders, 84 pages—“A tight, sad, hard little book. I loved it.”

Tuesday
6:15–6:20 A.M. Kitchen table The Stranger, random articles—“I had an impulse to subscribe. I’ve never lived in Seattle, but it’s nice to have a glimpse of another city.”
6:20–6:35 Desk Guardian.co.uk, “Bush Accepts ‘Full Responsibility’ for Katrina Failures,” “Race Not an Issue in Katrina Disaster, Says Bush,” “Death in Bobur Square”
7:30–9 E-mail—“E-mail takes up most of my day—editors, writers. I don’t e-mail anyone socially.”
12:45–3 P.M. E-mail
8–8:30 E-mail
9:45–10:10 E-mail
10:45–11:05 In bed The Brief and Frightening Reign of Phil, 45 pages

Wednesday
8–8:03 A.M. Desk Guardian.co.uk, “Scores Killed in Baghdad Blasts,” “Iraqi Farmer Describes Assault by Seven British Soldiers,” “Nairobi Dispatch—The Place Where Bad Things Happen”
8:05–8:06 New York Times, “A Fatal Incuriosity” op-ed, “Congress Finesses the Storm” op-ed
8:15–8:20 Independent.co.uk, “Brazilian’s Family Hears Defence of Shoot-to-Kill,” “Bush Makes the First Visit to Ravaged New Orleans Since Katrina,” “Man Kills Assistant at Beauty Counter Then Shoots Himself,” “Recycling Rates Soar in England, But Still Trail Europeans”
8:30–8:40 Atheists.org; infidels.org; exchristian.net, “What Is Atheism Really All About?” “Coming Out—Atheism: The Other Closet,” “Quotations Related to Atheism,” “Questions for the Christians— How Many Atheists in America?”— “I was arguing with a Christian.”
8–9 P.M. Desk E-mails
10:40–10:43 Guardian.co.uk, “Revealed: BAE’s Secret, £1m to Pinochet,” “Ignorance and Abdication That Amounts to Madness”
10:45–11:15 E-mail
11:30–11:50 In bed Bangkok Tattoo, by John Burdett, 30 pages

Thursday
5–5:10 A.M. Stack of cushions in the living room Chapter of manuscript by Julie Otsuka
6–6:20 Desk Independent.co.uk printout, articles by Robert Fisk, “Baghdad: The Bloodiest Day,” “Why Is It That We and America Wish Civil War on Iraq?” “People Torn to Pieces, Relatives Scream—Another Week in the Theme Park of Death,” “There Are Now Two Baghdads,” “What Does Democracy Really Mean in the Middle East? Whatever the West Decides,” “In Iraq, Man-Made Disaster”
12:20–12:22 P.M. Wordswithoutborders.org, “This Happy Few Actually Read Books” message board, “A Little Less Conversation,” by Tirdad Zolghadr—“I read this site casually. I was probably on the phone.”
6–7:45 E-mails
10:15–10:50 E-mails
11:15–11:30 In bed Bangkok Tattoo, 25 pages

Friday
5–5:02 A.M. Desk Guardian.co.uk, “Cruising for a Bruising,” “The Petulant President”
5:02–5:03 Independent.co.uk, “Global Warming Past the Point of No Return,” “US Poultry Giant Under Fire After Segregation Scandal Is Revealed”
5:03–5:04 New York Times, “Not the New Deal” op-ed
6:15–6:20 standing at the kitchen table Publishers Weekly, skimmed— “I read most of it on e-mail”
6:45–9:45 desk E-mail
10:30–11:25 E-mail
12:15–12:50 P.M. E-mail
3:30–4 E-mail
7–8:30 E-mail
10:15–11 in bed Bangkok Tattoo, 60 pages

Saturday
7:20–7:30 A.M. Desk Guardian.co.uk, “Radical Plan to Stop Muslim Extremism, “Terrorism Measures: Blows to Democracy,” “US Conservatives Round on Bush Over Katrina Aid Pledges”
7:30–7:35 Independent.co.uk, “Asylum Seeker Kills Himself So Child Can Stay in Britain,” “Schröder vs. Merkel: A Tale of Two Germanys”
7:35–7:37 Telegraph.co.uk, “Election on Knife Edge As Merkel’s Lead Goes Up in Smoke,” “Mugabe Spurned Loan in Fury Over Conditions”
7:45–7:47 Dailystar.co.lb, “Grants Alone Will Not Solve Lebanon’s Debt Crisis”
8:30–1 P.M. E-mail
3:15–4 E-mail
4–4:10 The New Yorker, “Storm Warnings,” “Briefly Noted,” “Wind on Capitol Hill,” “High Stakes”
4:15–4:20 Wordswithoutborders.org printout, “A Little Less Conversation,” by Tirdad Zolghadr, 6 pages
4:30–4:35 The New Yorker, Citysearch.com, Newyorktimes.com, reviews of movies Everything Is Illuminated, The Future of Food, One Bright Shining Moment
4:35–4:45 Topic, “Final Respects,” “Consumer Terrorism,” “How Hate Appears,” 10 pages
4:45–7 E-mail
11:30 P.M.–12:30 A.M. In bed Bangkok Tattoo, 70 pages