And you thought YOU had a wait a long time for these pics?

Well, we had to wait even longer in line to get them!

Let's just say all of those pictured above weren't quite strong enough to stand for that long without food. Because Mr. Zusak was so nice and personable and took such a long time with each of his die-hard fans, we concluded that the library could have funded his visit by simply selling some refreshments.

He was offered a couple A& Ws, as you can see,

along with Brick Oven pizza (which smelled SO good) that he didn't even touch. Maybe he was too nice to eat in front of us. Or maybe in his time zone, it was the middle of the night, and he wasn't starving like us.

Dear Kara,

Here's to love,

colours

and

BOOKS. . .

Marcus Zusak

Dear Christie,

Thank you! (smiley face balloon)

Here's to accordions and books...

Markus Zusak

If I hadn't been so hungry and tired, I could've thought to have said something clever like, "If you were serious about moving here, I know of a cute, little place for sale with a nice view of the mountains." I could've also mentioned that I was moving to GERMANY! Oh, well.

We decided that Shauna got the best entry of all.

I think hers says:

Dear Shauna,

Thanks for leaving. The rest of us had pizza. No--seriously, thanks for coming.

Marcus Zusak