my good friend, juan delgado.ame to my college years and years ago when i was a student at stanford in a college and he read a poem where he described the freeway overpasses as looking like a snake eating itself and i still remember that image. so i'm very honored to be here with all of you. a tough act to follow. you guys are on making me teary-eyed city mayor. i first would like to thank the before columbus foundation, justin desmangles for awarding my second novel the five acts of an american book award. it is an honor to be recognized along such illustrious artists. the before columbus award foundation website states the american book awards are not bestowed by an industry organization but rather a writer's award given by other writers. for me, this scary special significance because we primarily do what we do in isolation, removed more or less from the literary world around us. this is ironic because what we are trying to do is enter into a conversation with other artists. sometimes they can feel like we are