Until a few months ago, I would’ve guessed that a “pingback” is a football position (like nickelback and dimeback.  Those ones are real).  Now I know better.  Whenever anyone links to this blog, I get a pingback – a request for notification.  I’ve been getting these a lot lately, and it occurs to me that the sites that link to mine might be interesting to my readers too.  So here are a few of the latest:

In “Must-Read Writing Articles,” Write It Sideways – a site offering some very good advice about writing – mentions two recent posts on this blog, Under the Influence and Laura Schenone’s Writing About the Past.

In a list of “Five New Literary Blogs to Follow,” First Person Plural – the official blog of The Writer’s Center, a DC-based “independent literary organization with a global reach” – includes A Writing Year, specifically citing Louise DeSalvo”s Why Having Kids is No Excuse, Chad Taylor’s Why Writers Should Care About Twitter, and my Q&A with Julie Metz on designing books, Judging a Book by its Cover.

In “Five Ways to Feel More Legitimate as a Writer,” Real Delia (dedicated to “Finding Yourself in Adulthood”) also mentions DeSalvo’s memorable post, quoting her lines:  “No one I knows cares if you’re writing.  That’s why you have to call it work.  Because that’s what it is.  Your work.  Your life’s work.” Real Delia adds:  Amen, sister.

And over at Art and Degrees of Freedom, “a mish-mash of musings and ideas on the interplay of art, gastronomy, and culture,” Lori Gordon discusses a recent quote on this blog from the French cubist painter Andre Lhote.  “Bridging art and writing,” Gordon muses.  “It just shows that concepts and the words to describe those concepts are timeless.”  That piece is here.

*For the young or pop-culture impaired: the headline is a reference to Sally Field’s cringe-inducing 1984 Oscar acceptance speech in which she gushed, “You like me, right now, you like me!” and which everyone misremembers as “You like me.  You really like me!”